A round of applause, please: Scientists have finally figured out what’s behind the sound of clapping. The research pinpoints a mechanism called a Helmholtz resonator — the same acoustic concept that ...

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or ...

Listen to more stories on the Noa app. Want to stay current with Arthur’s writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. What is the sound of one hand clapping? You may have ...

In a pivotal scene from the 2006 film X-Men: The Last Stand, a mutant claps his hands and blasts a shockwave across a battlefield. In a theater somewhere, Sunny Jung watched—and wondered. “It made me ...

Social contagion If you wish to avoid the social faux pas of clapping at the wrong time, listen carefully to the volume of noise around you. That's the conclusion of a study about the social dynamics ...

Forget the Best Picture screw-up, the real mystery at the 89th Academy Awards was why in the hell Nicole Kidman was clapping her hands as though they were flippers. I foolishly just assumed this was ...