June 22, 1675: The Royal Observatory Greenwich is founded

The Royal Observatory Greenwich celebrates its 350th anniversary today. Founded by King Charles II on June 22, 1675, the observatory was tasked with solving “the longitude problem,” the lack of accurate east-west positioning at sea because of the difficulty of precise timekeeping during long voyages. John Flamsteed, the first astronomer […]

A look at DARPA’s “Exponentiating Mathematics” program, which aims to speed up progress in pure mathematics by developing an AI “co-author” to conduct research (Alexander Nazaryan/New York Times)

Alexander Nazaryan / New York Times: A look at DARPA’s “Exponentiating Mathematics” program, which aims to speed up progress in pure mathematics by developing an AI “co-author” to conduct research  —  Breakthroughs in pure mathematics can take decades.  A new Defense Department initiative aims to speed things up using artificial […]