Everyone has once wondered how it is that we are alive and conscious, and how incredibly immense and beautiful the universe is. Religion and philosophy originated as attempts to make sense of such existential matters. Then, with the Enlightenment, the bases of the scientific method were laid, and in the past three centuries, technical civilizations emerged, and our species entered a new era. We discovered that the universe is still much bigger and more complex than we could have imagined just with the aid of religion and philosophy. Why is that? Why is science such a superior road to truth? The answer again has to do with the scientific method. Unlike religion or mythology, scientific explanations are easily discarded, if they don't agree with experience. Other systems of thinking, like religion, are hindered by dogma and revelations that are supposedly true and indisputable. Although philosophy is important in trying to establish, among other things, the very grounds on which the sciences rest, philosophers never actually bother whether experiments can be devised to test their assumptions or not. So the history of philosophy is of more concern to philosophers than the history of science is to scientists, because no philosophical idea has been proved or disproved, unlike scientific theories.

This site is about all the wonders we can learn about the universe due to science. There is no main concern here, because there is nothing uninteresting. You will be invited to read essays on astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, genetics, evolution, human origins, mind and brain, and so on. Everything in science will interest us.

And, last but not least, besides the feeling of becoming a better person that learning science brings, there is also the important need for science education nowadays. Human population is now so big and powerful that many of our actions will affect the whole planet. The way to make changes is, as it always was, via politics. A scientifically illiterate population is a dangerous possibility for the future. Although this site is not about combating mysticism, I believe it's part of the effort to make people wiser and to change this world into a better one.

Bruno Macaes

Notice of Copyright -Ó 2000 Bruno Macaes.According to U.S. Law (title17, U.S. Code) and International Copyright Agreements (Circular 38a U.S. Copyright Office), copyright protection is automatically secured to any original work published on this web site, even if registration has not yet been made.