Being smart is highly overrated, according to Kenneth Goldsmith, the Museum of Modern Art’s first poet laureate. Goldsmith, who considers himself a very dumb writer, likes to copy past artists.
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A month or two ago I wrote about the rampant proliferation of “hotness” ratings for women where they have no business or place. Even the most accomplished women, ranging from […]
It’s the most fantastic idea ever bandied about: that there are an infinite number of Universes identical to our own out there, and that everything that could have possibly happened […]
Bacteria stored in a fuel cell broke down chemicals in urine, generating enough electricity in the process to enable text messaging, Internet browsing, and “a brief phone call.”
Seventy-five years ago, The Museum of Modern Art staged their first exhibition devoted to the work of a single photographer—Walker Evans: American Photographer. That show brought together many of Walker […]
A victory for common sense, a setback for sex and drugs and rock ‘n roll
I recently teamed up with a Canadian filmmaker named Ian MacKenzie to create a new video explaining some of the key points of my work. Specifically, Ian’s piece beautifully expresses […]
We now have three domains that are quite distinct: the sexual, the romantic, and the marriage market.
One of the beautiful things about the Internet is that everybody has a voice. And one of the terrible things about the Internet is that everybody has a voice.
You often hear people say there’s going to be this massive maker economy in which everybody’s a designer. That’s actually not going to happen.
If you know only one work of modern art, it’s probably The Scream. More people know that “Mona Lisa” of modern angst than know the name of the artist that […]
Abnormality is simply a context game.
Earlier this month, Lu Ann Ballew, a judge in Tennessee, decided that seven-month-old Messiah Deshawn Martin must lose his first name. Her reasoning is inspiring condemnation from across the religious […]
Have you noticed how women in almost every professional field today are subjected to a hotness rating? Here’s a rating of the sexiness of women in academically elite colleges. Then […]
When you think of a prosthetic limb, the first thing that comes to mind is not beauty. After all, these are products that are made by engineers, not designers.
The afterlife, in the words of Tennyson [1], is “that untravell’d world whose margin fades / For ever and forever when I move”. Death is the ultimate one-way trip, its […]
How the perfect American Confucianism ought to be constructed BEIJING – There ruminates a discussion, from east to west, as to how the perfect American Confucianismought to be constructed. Should […]
The modern dictator needs only to become a client-state to Russia or China (or to be Russia or China), and there is nothing he can’t get away with. We members of open societies have the power to change that. All we need is the resolve.
With the cultural theories of the ’90s in decline, the humanities have begun picking up on neuroscience as the newest way of understanding how we relate to the world. But will it be good for art?
Bill Nye’s viral Big Think video continues to spread the thoughts of an inspirational man.
David Brooks endorsed the use of “nudges” (also known as libertarian paternalism) in his New York Times column yesterday, at least partially, giving a cautious thumbs up to the new […]
When Rodolphe Töpffer drew the first comics in 1837, he couldn’t possibly have imagined where the genre would go. It’s comparable to the Wright Brothers trying to picture stealth bombers […]
“I’ll never look like the women with beautiful bodies in the glossy magazines.” Right. You won’t. Because they don’t. This wonderful photo compilation by a model generously and compassionately reveals […]
Does great art last because it is great or is it great because it lasts? Do works find a place in the canon by familiarity, like a ubiquitous tune you […]
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal”—truer (and more gender, class, and race specific) words were never written by a group of rich, white, […]
Plastic? Where to start! It’s now the number one form of ocean debris, and muscled its way up the food chain, starting, of course, with hungry microbes. Recent research confirmed […]
During a crisis, the demonstration of wealth via the purchase of luxury items is more effective at exhibiting qualities favorable to survivability than such purchases in favorable economic times.
Who will win this death match?
As extreme weather events seem to be increasing around the world, changes consistent with the kinds of things climate change is predicted to cause, many people are realizing something […]
So if you want to read a really thoughtful and combative commencement speech, here’s Leon Wieseltier’s (the literary editor of the New Republic) deep and inspiring intellectual defense of the […]