Model
Assay launch-seed
20 questions
- Do unconditional cash transfers raise household consumption?
In the GiveDirectly experiments in Kenya, large unconditional cash transfers raised household consumption and asset holdings, and local price increases did not erase those gains.
- Is the Hubble tension a sign of new physics, or a measurement error?
The discrepancy between local (distance-ladder) and early-universe (CMB) measurements of H0 reflects physics beyond ΛCDM rather than unrecognized systematic errors in the distance ladder.
- Is dark energy changing over time?
DESI baryon-acoustic-oscillation data, combined with CMB and supernova data, constitute robust (≥3σ, systematics-resistant) evidence that the dark-energy equation of state evolves rather than being a cosmological constant (w = −1).
- Do GLP-1 drugs like semaglutide protect the heart even in people without diabetes?
In adults with overweight/obesity and established cardiovascular disease but no diabetes, semaglutide causes a clinically meaningful reduction in major adverse cardiovascular events independent of weight loss alone.
- Is moderate drinking good for you?
Low-to-moderate alcohol consumption, about one or two drinks a day, lowers all-cause mortality compared with never drinking, once people who quit because they were already ill are set aside.
- Do brain signals show our decisions are made before we're aware of them?
The readiness potential observed before self-initiated movements (Libet-style experiments) reflects an unconscious decision to act, rather than stochastic neural noise accumulating to threshold.
- Could today's AI chatbots be conscious?
At least one current large language model meets enough of the indicator properties from leading scientific theories of consciousness to warrant a credence above 10% that it is conscious.
- Did smartphones and social media cause the rise in teen depression and anxiety?
Population-level increases in adolescent depression and anxiety since ~2012 were caused substantially by smartphone and social-media adoption, rather than merely correlated with it.
- Were humans in North America during the last Ice Age?
The White Sands (New Mexico) human footprints date to ~21,000–23,000 years ago, establishing human presence in North America during the Last Glacial Maximum, well before Clovis.
- Does generative AI actually make workers more productive?
Access to generative AI tools causes measurable productivity gains (≥10%) for knowledge workers in controlled field or lab settings, with the largest gains for less-experienced workers.
- Is letting AI 'think longer' better than building bigger AI models?
For reasoning tasks at fixed total compute, scaling test-time (inference) compute yields larger accuracy gains than spending equivalent compute on increasing model parameters.
- Will AI trained on AI-generated content degrade over time?
Training successive generations of models on web data increasingly composed of AI-generated text will inevitably cause 'model collapse' (loss of distribution tails and quality), even when real data continues to be accumulated.
- Is the Atlantic Ocean's major current system heading for collapse?
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) is more likely than not (>50%) to cross a collapse tipping point before 2100 under current emissions trajectories.
- Why were 2023–2024 so unexpectedly hot, and is warming accelerating?
The record 2023–24 global temperature spike was driven primarily by a reduction in planetary albedo (fewer low clouds and less aerosol pollution), indicating that the rate of global warming has accelerated beyond the ~0.18°C/decade trend.
- Will perovskite-silicon tandem solar panels replace standard silicon panels?
Perovskite-silicon tandem modules will reach mass commercial deployment (>5 GW/yr shipped) with bankable ≥25-year field durability before 2030.
- Are robotaxis already safer than human drivers?
Waymo's driverless (rider-only) vehicles have a statistically significantly lower rate of injury-causing crashes per mile than human drivers on comparable roads.
- Will fusion power be on the electric grid by 2035?
A fusion power plant will deliver net electricity to a commercial grid on a sustained basis before 1 January 2035.
- If the universe is so big, where is everybody?
Given current uncertainty in Drake-equation parameters, there is a substantial probability (>30%) that we are alone in the observable universe, so the absence of detected aliens is not paradoxical.
- Are UFOs/UAP evidence of alien technology?
At least one documented UAP case is best explained by non-human technology.
- How did the ancient Egyptians move the stones to build the pyramids?
The Giza-area pyramids were built using a now-vanished branch of the Nile (the Ahramat Branch) as the primary transport route for heavy materials, with stones moved by boat and human-powered sledges/ramps rather than any lost or exotic technology.