Things are getting hotter and hotter here on Earth, and global warming has everyone panicking. But let us try a wild idea: what if we took every drop of Earth’s water...
Wouldn’t it be cool to see things through any wall and any door? How about seeing through your own skin? Or your dog? No, no, no, and no. Of all superhero powers...
A tornado can turn an ordinary afternoon into a terrifying emergency within minutes. Powerful rotating winds can tear roofs apart, overturn vehicles, snap trees, and...
It’s not every day that a chunk of meat falls from the sky. Astronauts on the International Space Station have precautions in place to keep anything from dropping...
There have been 108 billion Homo sapiens born on Earth. But you are the very last one. With no other babies being born after you, you would be the end of the human race...
On your marks. Get set. Bear crawl. The movement of the future is here. And it looks a lot like the movement of the distant past. What benefits would you get from moving...
The delicate balance of the entire Solar System exists in a gravitational dance between planets. Swap the orbits of two of them and you could end up wreaking all kinds...
Welcome to social isolation, a new lifestyle where grabbing a drink with friends consists of getting drunk in front of your computer. Where hitting the club means...
Seawater is salty, undrinkable, and a potential source of planet-saving fuel. Hold up. Fuel? Yes, that’s right. We have the technology to convert seawater into liquid...
A former KGB agent, Vladimir Putin, likes to project what he considers to be a masculine image. Reports state his obsession with returning Russia to the former glory...
Today on What If, we’re going to build the highest bridge on planet Earth. Welcome to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, the “Roof of the World.”It’s home to the world’s...
Elon Musk says he wants to send one million people to Mars by the year 2050. The SpaceX CEO has become famous for making huge promises about colonizing the red planet...
Today, more people are alive on Earth than at any other point in human history. That sounds like an enormous number, but there is one figure that puts it into...
The idea of opening a portal to a parallel universe sounds like pure science fiction. It brings to mind stories filled with mysterious gateways, alternate realities, and...
Within the vastness of the Universe, humanity is not that big of a deal. We’re not here because we’re meant to be here, we’re just… here. If...
The Permian Period, which lasted from about 299 to 252 million years ago, was one of the most fascinating and dangerous times in Earth’s history. It ended with the...
Imagine spending years without seeing the sky or hearing another human voice. Your world is reduced to four concrete walls, a steel door, and silence so intense it...
For most of history, shadows have been seen as the absence of light. They cool us down on hot days, hide objects from view, and signal that the Sun has moved across the...
As Earth’s population multiplies each year, we’re quickly running out of resources to feed the planet. Before long, we’re going to need more space to...
Just four light-years from Earth lies the closest known exoplanet, Proxima Centauri b. It has captured imaginations because it could be one of the first exoplanets where...
