Search Results

Psychologist Madeline Levine offers savvy advice for courageous parenting at different stages of a child's education.  

Biology labs are now inexpensive and mobile enough to be set up in a garage. The kind of genetic tinkering occurring across the nation mirrors the experiments in computing a generation earlier. 

Did you know that time travel was possible? It really is. For example, you can visit remote parts of the Amazon River and meet people who are living just as […]

The BIG educational news today is that the mainstream expert journalist Thomas Friedman has certified that MOOCs are real.  And a quick bit of GOOGLING reveals that all the marketers of […]

It’s strange to think how young the Internet is, considering its enormity and complexity, and yet how powerful it has become as a means to connect people from around the […]

Over the past couple of years, my thinking has been greatly influenced by the “Prophets of Progress”—people like Stephen Pinker, Matt Ridley, Stephen Johnson, Hans Rosling, and Peter Diamandis to […]

The amygdala is a part of the brain that plays a key role in processing emotions. How does the amygdala function differently in a psychopath's brain from that of a normal person?

NASA's Mars Curiosity Rover. Big Data Predicts the Oscars. These are among the brainiest memes included in today's Mind Memes.   

We’re very fortunate at Big Think to have so many great thinkers and writers in our midst, and the woman of the moment right now is Maria Konnikova, author of […]

One of the biggest misconceptions about post-rational behavioral research is that its effects on society are small. From the news you get the impression “behavioral economics” is all about changing […]

Following on the heels of the Pussy Riot verdicts in Moscow, about a dozen women from the feminist group Code Pink dressed up in vagina costumes outside the Republican National […]

If we know that we are bad at predicting and can account for the underlying psychology then why do we continue to make bad predictions?

So I’ve gotten several emails asking what I think about the idea talked up by the devoted Democratic professor Jonathan Zimmerman in the semi-iconoclastic Christian Science Monitor: affirmative action for conservatives […]

As neuroscience, cognitive science, computer programming, and artificial intelligence progress, we’re understanding better and better how we learn. 

It’s that time of the year again when techno pundits are once again breathlessly telling us all about the technology and innovation trends that will be big in 2013. That’s […]

So the best reason to read a “great book” is that you might learn a lot from it about who you are and what you’re supposed to do.  In that […]

“Be yourself” can seem like risky advice in a competitive job market. But you know what’s riskier? Being nobody. Ken Segall explains how he became an ad man for Apple. 

In honor of Earth Day, I wanted to share an article written by my former colleague Ross Robertson for EnlightenNext magazine called “A Brighter Shade of Green: Rebooting Environmentalism for the 21stCentury.” […]

Being an outsider has its benefits, not the least of which is an ability to think outside the box, according to a joint Johns Hopkins-Cornell study.

BIG THINKER Daniel Honan reminds us that Mayor Bloomberg is not in any obvious sense an ideologue.  He’s just about using the power of government to curtail behavior that costs the […]

The most basic definition of collective intelligence is to get group of people to do something collectively that seems intelligent. A profound definition is the creation a global brain. 

One need not read all 145 pages of the SOPA and PIPA bills to understand the debate in Washington DC. Big Think has provided a brief guide to the issue for your convenience.   

This is a lengthy post but I want to do justice to Adam Lee, Big Think and the arguments. These are my initial thoughts. Fellow Big Think blogger and friend, […]

We pay special attention to the history of an object – where it has been, who created it, what touched it – because object’s history is what really matters when it comes to its value.

A new Pew poll, and the global perception captured in the chart below, leads Ali Wyne, a fellow Big Thinker, to inquire in an interesting post about the meaning of the idea, […]

“You don’t arrest Voltaire.” That was French President Charles de Gaulle’s explanation for his pardon of Jean Paul Sartre, who was arrested for civil disobedience during the events of May, 1968 […]

In his blog post yesterday, Big Think’s own Adam Lee called into question the editorial standard that would have us introduce evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa as our newest blogger. Kanazawa […]

So BIG THINK’S book of the month—Mortalilty by Christopher Hitchens—is a moving account of a singularly personal effort to die as a free man.  Hitchens wanted to see death as it […]

Big thinker Will Willkinson summarizes and analyzes a summary of a study by Scott Eidelman and others that’s hurt a lot of conservative feelings.  The big point seems to be that when […]

Critics of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan to ban the sale of soft drinks over 16 ounces in convenience stores, movie theaters and street carts are having a […]