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So the respected New America foundation—taking its cue from former Princeton president William G. Bowen—is all about reconfiguring higher education along the lines of the 21st century high-tech, highly competitive global marketplace. What we […]

Having a strategic plan is a vital aspect of any successful organization. Unfortunately, most organizations have strategic plans that are really financial plans in disguise. And the larger the organization, […]

A little bit of philosophy can be a dangerous thing.

Humans have this almost paralyzing fear of death. One thing that keeps it from being paralyzing is this belief in what’s called symbolic immortality. It’s this sense that our symbolic […]

Spreading luck around isn’t as easy as it sounds.

My father worked God knows how many jobs so I could be an artist. 

Very often the first piece of information we have about a person is their name. It’s often the first thing you learn about someone and we form judgments about people very rapidly.

If you’re losing your sense of humor, if you’re not able to laugh at things, then what are you doing? It’s an indicator that maybe information that you’re consuming has […]

That would make it about ten times older than the oldest accepted examples of cartography

Obesity rates are rapidly rising in the United States, so that also means larger pant sizes, wider seats, and more and more overweight people having sex.

What’s the best way to hold people accountable for their actions on the job? Measure the results (though that might encourage them to break a few rules, or even a […]

A conversation with Matt Arnold, Managing Director and Head of the Office of Environmental Affairs, JPMorgan Chase.

It’s time to bring in an expert in conflict resolution to help President Obama and Republican leaders in Congress work together for the sake of all Americans. 

How, our grandchildren will ask, did we come to marriage equality in the United States? And we’ll answer, like Hemingway’s Mike Campbell: “Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly.” We can grasp […]

Last week was a big one for assumptions. There was Wolf Blitzer asking an Oklahoma tornado survivor if she was thankful that the Lord spared her life. Then that brief, […]

If you take the analytic approach to realistically look at your skills and your strengths and help develop a plan, a roadmap to get through a challenge and identify role models in your life you’ll be on the road to optimism.

So I’ve been criticized for saying that our country is, more than ever, a meritocracy based on productivity. One of the threaders, in fact, said we’re a plutocracy based in […]

Update: Following the publication of this post and all of your thoughtful responses, the Big Think editors have decided to discontinue the Big Think’s relationship with Kanazawa. This is a response […]

Last November, I published an article here on BigThink called, The Apocalypse May Already Be Here, or “Something is Rotten in the State of Denmark,” where I shared some of my […]

There’s a tendency, particularly when looking at brain function, to be over-awed by the brain and, this is understandable.

So we have no idea what happens after we die, and I’ve taken that lack of our knowledge as an opportunity to write fiction about it. I have a book […]

We do at this point in time need a new Einstein.  The one thing that Einstein did, which is so powerful and important in the history of physics is with […]

Far from the aloof practitioner of new-age feel-good solutions, viewing dilemmas as opportunities rather than life-crushing problems—in a word, being optimistic—has real benefits. 

A significant technology skills gap has occurred in America over the last decade or so, “causing people to not understand where the opportunities are within technology,” says Michael Kirven, who founded […]

The Communication Age is here, and it’s time we harness it. Why? Because informing is a one-way conversation between you and your employees, customers, or other stakeholders. And let’s face […]

Accelerating technological change will define how efficiently we use energy, not how much. The accelerating change of technology we use commercially and personally is dramatically increasing the global demand for […]

Nobody said putting a man or woman on the surface of Mars was going to be easy. As NASA astronaut Buzz Aldrin explains in his new book, Mission to Mars, it’s […]

Antiquated phrasings don’t make you any more profound than antiquated notions.

            When you think of social media, the first thing that comes to mind is probably Facebook. That’s no surprise considering that as of April […]

Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it This is the ponderous epigraph of many a high school history term paper. And it’s wrong. Like as not, we’re “doomed” […]