In addition to the eight planets in our solar system, there are also more than a million minor planets, including five so-called dwarf planets, plus hundreds of thousands of asteroids. When an astronomer or amateur stargazer discovers one, they get...
Grant reviews notable words and phrases from 2017. One is path of totality, meaning the part of the earth completely covered in shadow when the moon blocks the sun. Another is milkshake duck, which arose from a tweet by Australian cartoonist Ben...
Insensible losses, in the world of medicine, are things your body loses which you simply don’t sense. A prime example is the water vapor you see coming out of your body when you exhale in cold weather, but aren’t aware of when it’s warmer out. This...
What do darts, flubs, and maids have in common? Our Quiz Guy John Chaneski puts it to us in a game of rhymes. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Word Group Rhyme Quiz” You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and...
pluton n.— «If the ideas are approved at the general meeting of the IAU in Prague next week, schoolchildren will, in future, have to learn that the solar system has 12 planets: eight classical ones that dominate the system—Mercury, Venus, Earth...
