Few scientific ideas have leapt from philosophy seminars to dinner-table debates as quickly as the claim that our universe might be an artificial construct. The simulation hypothesis promises a ...

Machine-learning tools have been used to assist the part of mathematical research that usually relies on human intuition and creativity — leading to two fundamental results in different areas of ...

A University of Portsmouth physicist has explored whether a new law of physics could support the much-debated theory that we are simply characters in an advanced virtual world. The simulated universe ...

On a crisp fall New England day during my junior year of college, I was walking past a subway entrance when a math problem caught my eye. A man was standing near a few brainteasers he had scribbled on ...

Sometimes your gut feelings lead you astray—particularly in mathematics, in which one constantly comes across results that seem impossible. For example, infinity does not always equal infinity, and ...