In casual conversation, people often use the word theory to mean "hunch" or "guess": If you forget to put the bread in the breadbox and discover chunks have been taken out of it the next morning, you ...

The dappled starlight and swirling clouds of Vincent van Gogh’s “The Starry Night” are thought to reflect the artist’s tumultuous state of mind when he painted the work in 1889. Now, a new analysis by ...

The burnt toast theory is a metaphor for life that helps people interpret minor inconveniences as having positive ripple effects or a “silver lining.” It’s related to the butterfly effect. While not a ...

The oddities of social life—and our efforts to cooperate and coordinate—may turn on our assumptions about the knowledge we share.

Allegations that part of a key 2006 study of Alzheimer's disease may have been fabricated have rocked the research community, calling into question the validity of the study's influential results.