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Physicians have long been counseled to have an emotionally sensitive bedside manner, but now scientists are discovering that a doctor’s words also affect our biology.

“An expert is a person who has found out by his own painful experience all the mistakes that one can make in a very narrow field.”

Winning a competition or completing a challenge causes your brain to release dopamine. Game makers can elicit more positive reactions from players by designing toward this end.

An Italian doctor is blazing a trail toward the first human head transplant, capitalizing on new medical techniques that can keep a patient alive during the operation.

Polish foreign minister, Grzegorz Schetyna, said this week that his country will pay $262,000 to two Guantanamo Bay inmates following a ruling by the court of European human rights.

Silicon Valley should be alarmed by a new report on the NSA’s international spying programs, says The Week’s Ryan Cooper. He calls the NSA “the kind of parasite that eventually kills its host.”

The consensus among most academics is that college students are cheating more today than ever before.

Competitive marketplaces are the key to lower healthcare costs in the United States, says Ezekiel J. Emanuel, the chair of the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania

Some anxieties are indicators of healthy curiosity and strong moral fiber, while others are a source of severe stress. 

How a funny idea to ship your enemies glitter turned into an empire. “There is a concept that is the corrupter and destroyer of all others. I speak not of […]

Stanley Milgram found in an experiment how easily one’s own ethics could become compromised in the face of authoritarianism. But Matthew Hollander argues that there’s far more nuance to the participants in his study.

Just as a Roman household needed slaves, so companies need staff. 

Vivek Wadhwa explains why he’s both optimistic and pessimistic about the inevitable change that will come about by way of technological advancement.

Nature’s games aren’t all “red in tooth and claw” competitions. Evolution also contains cooperation. And Game Theory provides the tools (“behavioral telescopes”) to show how cooperation can improve evolutionary fitness. 

Although government-run job training programs are intended to instill young workers with new skills, more and more pensioners are jumping at the opportunity to try something new.

Is innovation always a good thing? In the right hands, the myriad tech innovations on the immediate horizon could help solve humanity’s most pressing problems. In the wrong hands, change could lead to struggle.

If we ate fewer calories we would reduce harmful farming and industrial practices, and begin treating animals more ethically. 

Being a socially responsible company is a powerful way to change the world. It’s also a great way to advertise yourself to clients and create a loyal customer base.

An addictive product should at least provide value to the consumer and improve their lives. E-mail is a good example. Candy Crush — not so much.

The CEO of SAP discusses leadership ethics and why never missing a Little League game is good for business.

To be a more virtuous person, surround yourself with emblems of higher moral standards.

Robots armed with weapons and programmed to act autonomously are already in the hands of national militaries.

Journalist Eric Schlosser, an executive producer on the film Food Chains, discusses the exploitation of poor workers in the American food system.

New York neuroticism is the obverse of Kantian tranquility: harried, unsatisfied, anxious, perturbed. A life filled with worry and noise rather than one steeped in calm and virtue. But is this necessarily a bad thing? 

“Much of what we now call ‘religion’ was originally rooted in an acknowledgement of the tragic fact that life depended on the destruction of other creatures,” writes Karen Armstrong.

If you’ve got a friend or family member who practices medicine, asking them for advice can feel like an easy alternative to visiting a doctor. But sometimes those requests for help cross a line that doctors aren’t keen to approach. 

Big Think and the Kellogg School of Management have launched a new executive training program, Ethics in Action. This unique, expert-driven, program is designed to help corporations address the ethical […]

The real barrier to getting more women into leadership roles is the issue of time commitment. Companies that embrace values diversity and accommodate various time commitments will open doors to leadership for previously shut-out members of the available talent pool.

Every New Year, old yearnings to live better are reborn. And many who make New Year’s resolutions of the “less vice, more virtue” kind, need a higher-resolution picture of some relevant language and history. The “cardinal virtues” didn’t come from cardinals (and they’re not religious relics). Nor are the deadly vices just irrational restrictions. Ignoring this logic is expensive.

Who we are in our essence has a great deal to do with how people identify us in our everyday lives.