We live in a time of information abundance, which far too many of us see as information overload. With the sum total of human knowledge, past and present, at our fingertips, we’re faced with a crisis of attention: which ideas should we engage with, and why? Big Think is an evolving roadmap to the best thinking on the planet — the ideas that can help you think flexibly and act decisively in a multivariate world.
A word about Big Ideas and Themes — The architecture of Big Think
Big ideas are lenses for envisioning the future. Every article and video on bigthink.com and on our learning platforms is based on an emerging “big idea” that is significant, widely relevant, and actionable. We’re sifting the noise for the questions and insights that have the power to change all of our lives, for decades to come. For example, reverse-engineering is a big idea in that the concept is increasingly useful across multiple disciplines, from education to nanotechnology.
Themes are the seven broad umbrellas under which we organize the hundreds of big ideas that populate Big Think. They include New World Order, Earth and Beyond, 21st Century Living, Going Mental, Extreme Biology, Power and Influence, and Inventing the Future.
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Big Think’s contributors offer expert analysis of the big ideas behind the news.
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Since the industrial revolution, humanity has flocked to the cities, where jobs are plentiful and centralized services make inhabitants' lives easier. However, technology is gradually beginning to reverse this trend. People who have always dreamed of escaping the city for the country life, but who ...
What's the Big Idea? Is the Internet making us stupid? Will our capacity for contemplation be fried by the minute-to-minute updates of Facebook, Twitter, and instant messaging? Actually, no, says James Gleick, author of The Information: A History, A Theory, A Flood. The Internet has ...
It blew my mind back in 2003 when I read that Dr. Miguel Nicolelis at the Duke Center for Neuroengineering had enabled monkeys to control a robot arm with their thoughts. Nicolelis published his report in the Public Library of Science Biology , which was a smart move. The media attention his ...
What's the Big Idea? Up up down down left right left right B A start. Press these buttons in succession while playing any one of the more than 60 video games which recognize it and heavenly rewards will rain down upon you, from extra lives to infinite ammo to full-on God mode. Originally ...
What’s the big idea? There is no shortage of online tools to help us research restaurants, track up-to-the-minute news and even plan out our zombie escape routes, yet there are very few tools that can help us research, track and plan our own happiness. One of the few that does exist is Happstr, an ...
Do you know what is in your digital dossier? Since you began to have a life on the Web, data has been accruing about the habits and interests of your online life. The generation of young people emerging in the digital age have the unique experience of having the entirety of their lives immersed in ...
Numerous studies have shown us how important sleep can be. Not only does it revitalize our bodies, it also gives the brain time to sort through all the information it has received throughout our hectic day. Sleep deprivation, and a lack of quality sleep, can lead to weight problems, high blood ...
There are approximately 105,000 people currently on the waiting list for solid organ transplant in the United States. 18 of those people die every day. These deaths are due entirely to the fact that there are far more people on the waiting list than there are available organs. Kidney transplant ...
Upon awakening this morning, and for no discernable reason, my first thought focused on religion, and why there is more disdain among the religious, of religions that are not their own, than there is of the devil in any religion. Such scorn seems an utter impossibility given that all religions ...
Jason Silva is an optimist. With a capital O. His optimism hits you full force the moment you meet him – the broad, beaming grin, the reassuring handshake . . . no, before that, in the form of multiple enthusiastic exclamation points in his every email. More specifically, he’s optimistic about the ...
I think the internet is a connection machine. It connects us with information and transactions and actions, but especially it connects us with each other... If you don’t start from an assumption of faith in your fellow man and woman, then I don’t think you believe in the value of ...
What’s the Big Idea? What do an art exhibit, live music, and a car manufacturer have in common? A lot more than you’d think. The Avant/Garde Diaries, a digital interview magazine sponsored by Mercedes Benz, just concluded their Transmission LA series at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los ...
What's the Big Idea? Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson believes in the power of science -- so much so that he gets hate mail for it. From children. As director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, Tyson made the controversial decision to remove references to ...
What’s the big idea? Anyone who doubts that the Internet has the potential to bring people together should take a closer look at Neighborgoods, a service that helps users share goods with people living nearby. At first blush, Neighborgoods sounds like it’s just a service for penny pinchers, but ...
It has been 130 years since the first practical light bulbs began to light up the world. In 1881, the Savoy Theatre in the City of Westminster, London was fitted with incandescent light bulbs, becoming the first public building in the world to be lit entirely by electricity. Since then, there ...