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.
Browse videos featuring experts across a wide range of disciplines, from personal health to business leadership to neuroscience.
Big Think’s contributors offer expert analysis of the big ideas behind the news.
Big Think’s Edge learning platform for career mentorship and professional development provides engaging and actionable courses delivered by the people who are shaping our future.
Big ideas in little doses
What's the Big Idea? "You're probably living in an upper middle class bubble if..." A variety of patterns of behavior can be inserted to complete this sentence, such as Downton Abbey watching or the consumption of boutique beer. And yet, even more telling behaviors are the types of activities ...
"We celebrities are desperate pigs" confesses Penn Jillette in his recent book Every Day is an Atheist Holiday . Jillette is referring specifically to his participation on The Celebrity Apprentice, a show that involves showbiz folks who are so desperate to stay famous that they agree to "suck up to ...
Marissa Mayer has ordered Yahoo's "stay@home" telecommuters back to the office, according to a leaked internal memo that has become a larger meme about the 21st century workplace. The reaction to the memo was swift, and much of it negative. Richard Branson, for instance, called the move "a ...
"Such a waste of talent!" sighs Kevin Spacey's character Francis Underwood during one of his signature direct-to-camera asides in the Netflix series House of Cards . Underwood is describing a lobbyist who "chose money over power," a mistake that "nearly everyone makes" in Washington. Underwood ...
What's the Big Idea? Second only in vulnerability to the newborn baby is the new parent. This pathetic creature, no matter how many higher degrees it may possess, is a target for every silver-tongued huckster with a more cuddly (or less cuddly, but suffocation-risk-free) crib mattress or ...
The fear of death. That's how a friend of mine who works in television described the essential ingredient of hit reality shows like Ice Road Truckers. That's why people watch. Viewers of NASA Television can get a similar thrill when they tune into a half-hour broadcast LIVE from NASA's Jet ...
How effective are fitness-tracking devices and apps? The first time I used one I felt transformed into a machine. Not only was I tracking my own bike ride but I had synced up the app to all the social media platforms I use. There would be absolutely no letting up. I pushed myself to not only ...
Snapshot: In the video below, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson argues that we need to break out of our "A-to-B thinking" in order to bring big, audacious ideas into existence. *** In an effort to foster transparency and participation, the White House launched its We the People petition ...
If you run into violinist Joshua Bell at a cocktail party, don’t tell him you find classical music ‘relaxing.’ “Beethoven’s symphonies are not relaxing,” says Bell, who at 45 is director, conductor, and lead violinist of Academy of St Martin in the Fields, where he first performed at the age of 18 ...
Some time in March a puff of white smoke will rise over St. Peter's Square. Will it signal a black Pope from Africa? After the surprising resignation of Pope Benedict XVI, there is speculation that Ghanaian Cardinal Peter Turkson is an early favorite. Nigerian Cardinal Francis Arinze is another ...
For over a year, The New York Times and several other media outlets honored a CIA news embargo on the existence of a secret U.S. drone base in Saudi Arabia. This base was revealed by the Times this week in advance of the Senate confirmation hearing for John O. Brennan, who has been nominated to be ...
How could the universe be created out of nothing? This question has so perplexed mankind that we have come up with a fantastic assortment of myths to explain the how and the why of existence. The stories that tend to resonate with us employ metaphors that are based on human scale, or the ...
"The nest of wickedness is ablaze," reads the caption in a newly released video from North Korea's official website, Uriminzokkiri. The video, which features a chilling misappropriation of "We Are the World," is a dream sequence in which a North Korean man is launched into orbit in a space shuttle ...
Do you want to learn to play the guitar? Speak Spanish? Lose weight? Then set aside $100 of your pretax income to donate to the Westboro Baptist Church. Come again? The Westboro Baptist Church, based in Kansas, does a better job than perhaps any other hate group in uniting Americans against it ...
Ed Koch, the quintessential New Yorker, was once asked to define the people of his city. "To be a New Yorker," the former three-term mayor replied, "you have to live here for six months, and if at the end of the six months you find you walk faster, talk faster, think faster, you're a New Yorker ...