A tumultuous year seems to have reached a crescendo these last few weeks. The intensity of emotions generated by catastrophic violence, threat of war, acts of terrorism and racism, and nature at its finest as well as at its most destructive has a strangle hold on our senses.

PARIS (AP) — New results from looking at the split-second after the Big Bang indicate the universe is 80 million years older than previously thought, but core concepts in physics about the cosmos — how it began, what it’s made of and where it’s going — seem to be on the right track.