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By consciously practicing optimism, Jason Silva believes, we create circumstances that make external challenges weaker and easier to overcome. It’s mind over matter – thinking your ideal world into being by choosing to believe it already exists. 

Judging by the abundance of “guilty pleasure” TV shows, many people in America seem to feel overly constrained by the norms of public civility. The expectations of reasonableness and respect […]

So I’m glad Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin gets to keep his job. The RECALL, for one thing, is a very ill-considered progressive reform (originating, of course, in La Follette’s […]

The right brain training regimen that harnessed the brain’s natural plasticity and helped to strengthen these specific cognitive systems might help.

Obviously, people’s priorities differ. But it’s fair to say that culturally speaking, the United States leans in the direction of intense productivity at the expense of time spent reading a good book, or in the company of friends and family. 

Will the natural gas boom revitalize the U.S. economy and provide us energy for 100 years? 

While it’s tempting to mock the hollow chants of health care law critics as Jon Stewart did last Thursday — “what do we want? freedom! when do we want it? now!” — […]

Singapore is the smartphone king of the world. With a staggering 62 per cent penetration rate for smartphones of all kinds (well in reality mostly Apple ones), it stands to […]

In a previous thread, again buried in a huge pile of comments, there was one I wanted to highlight: Now you talk of pregnancy as a real life threatening thing […]

So Cato Institute president Ed Crane is taking an “early retirement” and megabucks former BB&T CEO John Allison is set to take his place. It’s easy to see why Allison […]

The Boston Review is hosting a forum centered the claim of Michael Sandel,  a Harvard political theorist, that “markets crowd out morals.” Sandel’s essay is well worth reading. He clearly gives voice to […]

Most of us, especially if we follow the principles of critical thinking, go through life slowly building up a patina of evidence supporting the beliefs that matter to us. Under […]

Right after my recent post on “psychopunditry,” I came across signs of this kerfuffle between the writer Jonah Lehrer and the psychologist Christopher Chabris (not to be confused with this […]

I’ve spent the last two weeks getting licensed to work in a new field. Mitt Romney has spent the last two weeks since Rick Santorum dropped out of the race […]

We are the most complex thing known to exist. We are sensitive to an incredibly rich sensory environment. And we tend to give ourselves over to experience that distracts us […]

Scientists have made the most accurate measurements yet of how quickly our Universe is expanding. Since gravitational pull gave way to dark energy, the rate is increasing.

I don’t write fiction, at all. I can’t make stuff up. But I used to read more fiction than I do now. And occasionally I wonder why I’ve struggled to […]

Albert W. Florence was riding in the passenger seat of his car when his wife was pulled over for speeding. When the investigating officer searched his records he found Mr. […]

What’s the Big Idea?  Long-time political activist and self-proclaimed “party crasher”Richard Tafel believes that American democracy is under threat. The environmental, economic, healthcare, and political systems we’ve relied on for decades are […]

California-based TED is perhaps the most visible of the groups that are leading the crossover of serious intellectual thought into the pop mainstream. TED’s approach – the 18 minute inspirational […]

The reassuring point of Jonah Lehrer’s new book is that neuroscientific research into the human imagination will enable us to engineer environments that foster the creativity that is every human’s birthright, rather than extinguishing it.

Dr, Michio Kaku: Sadly, the US government will no longer boldly go into space. Its up to private enterprise to now pick up the slack and it appears that is exactly what its doing.

I was getting ready to tape a show yesterday with Sean Yoes, host of WEAA’s Afro First Edition political show, when I first heard about the “Life of Julia” ad […]

When people think about the future, at least in many of the progressive circles that I move in, do you know what they think about? Gloom and doom. Generally, our […]

The brain is a complex and demanding machine.  Given the amount of resources required to run the average brain, it’s no surprise that it takes a few shortcuts when it […]

A friend recently asked me: why has public opinion on same-sex marriage “evolved,” in Obama’s coinage, while public opinion on abortion grinds itself deeper into a rut? It’s an interesting […]

A couple weeks back, I wrote a post for the Economisttrying to get my head around the circumstances in which tax deductions and credits, and tax cuts generally, do and […]

One of the great mysteries of art is why it exists. Although our desire to create and enjoy art is so widespread that it appears as natural as eating or […]

Here’s an article by Thomas C. Terry  getting a lot of attention on how openly our professors disparage Mormons in  ways they would be ashamed to talk about  members of […]

Sometimes there can be a gap between identifying what you naturally gravitate toward and how that translates into your full-time work. Here are three steps to help you bridge that gap.