What makes a great software developer? Legendary programmer and designer Justin Frankel says the most productive programmers have an ability to cut through to what’s really important, focus on that, […]
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Today marks the second installment of Big Think’s newest series, “Moments of Genius,” which is sponsored by Intel and focuses on key discoveries by math and science leaders. In our […]
Today marks the first installment of Big Think’s newest series, “Moments of Genius,” sponsored by Intel. We sat down with math and science thought leaders—from the inventor of the very […]
Leonardo da Vinci didn’t invent the sfumato technique, which produced the “smoky” effects of masterpieces such as the Mona Lisa, but he may have perfected it. For centuries, art experts […]
Nobel-Prize winning physicist William Phillips admits that “laser cooling” is a somewhat confusing concept. How can light energy, generally thought of as a source of heat, be used to cool […]
The motto of the United States is E Pluribus Unum, Latin for ‘Out of Many, One’. Matt Kirkland, who provided me this map, thinks the US has become too unwieldy, […]
If humans contacted aliens, the astrobiologist would be the man in charge of sending the first message. So what would he say?
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The pioneering HIV/AIDS researcher used high school math in creating a drug “cocktail” to combat the worldwide epidemic.
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The mathematical physicist reflects upon his untraditional math and science education in Belize, and talks about how Einstein’s theory of relativity is a “profound connection” that can inspire young people.
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I rarely watch Meet The Press since Tim Russert died, and even then, I wasn’t all that regular a viewer. David Gregory, Russert’s replacement, may be a smart guy, but […]
Because of eurocentrism. But probably not for much longer.
When Jill Tarter was growing up, she remembers walking along the beach with her father, gazing up at the night sky. Well before she would become a leader in the […]
The words “packet switching” don’t mean much to many people. But for Leonard Kleinrock, UCLA Distinguished Professor of Computer Science, packet switching is what ultimately gave him the title, “Father […]
How a quest to combine aesthetics with mathematics produced one of math’s most famous, and gorgeous, images: the Mandelbrot set.
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Today we take a computer’s speed for granted, but it wasn’t so long ago when it was normal to sit and wait for several minutes every time we booted up […]
It’s around high school that girls start to fall behind in math. Up to that point, they do just as well and are just as interested, generally, but at about […]
The cover of this month’s issue of Fast Company has an excellent article by Anya Kamenetz on how smart phones are leading the charge in revolutionizing traditional methods of teaching and learning. […]
Called “the hardest exam in the world” by the Telegragh, the entrance test necessary for those keen to spend graduate careers at All Souls, Oxford, included a celebrated element, the […]
“Where is everybody?” the physicist Enrico Fermi once famously asked, disappointed that aliens hadn’t contacted us yet. Over 50 years later, Fermi would feel even more snubbed. As Paul Davies […]
The world of comedy hasn’t exactly been kind to scientists, but here are a couple of jokes in which math nerds get the last laugh.
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Schools across America are switching to a four-day week, hoping to stave off the effects of budget cuts – but fuelling fears of hurting kids’ education.
It looks like the internet forecasters were optimistic when they designed the current IP address architecture known as IPv4. They figured 4 billion addresses would be enough. But this was […]
In his latest op/ed Nick Kristof is lamenting the fact that girls are outperforming boys at school. Kristof is as ardent a defender of women’s rights as anyone in the […]
Freeman Dyson fell in love with math, science, and nature as a child. Later, as a statistician in World War II, he had a “front-row seat view” of mass tragedy.
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This remarkable video was made by the new Dean of the Harvard Business School, Nitin Nohria. It is Professor Nohria’s equivalent, in a way, of will.i.am’s Yes, We Can, the […]
When Benoit Mandelbrot first began the work that led to the birth of fractal geometry, there was “an explosion of interest” from his colleagues. “Everybody in mathematics had given up […]
The word “fractals,” which Benoit Mandelbrot invented, has caught on with everyone from kids to club owners.
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Scientific estimates of Earth’s maximum capacity range in the thousands of billions, but here’s some troubling numbers we have confirmed: Earth’s 6.8 billion residents produce enough food to feed between […]
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Smart people have long had a history of quirky and inexplicable habits: Nietzsche wound up hugging horses, Freud couldn’t kick a drug addiction, Nikola Tesla adored white pigeons and loathed […]