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Author Paul Theroux says that e-books seem "magical" to him, but that something is lost when we give up the "physicality" of a book.

Did we miss a utopia or avoid a disaster?

Faulkner would sacrifice his grandmother for his fiction—Anne Lamott, however, would not. For writers who, like most of us, have the goods on their family and friends, “honest can be […]

The relationship between literary talent and literary fame is not so interesting to discuss (being so much discussed, and yet being uniquely subjective). Why should we care if the writers […]

As a genre, science fiction could potentially wield more influence over its followers than any other cultural force. Through film, television, and comics, it has inspired countless socially-awkward young people […]

There’s hardly a feat of industrial design more emblematic of consumerism than the vending machine. But while vending machines may perpetuate a number of social ills – from conspiculous consumption […]

A conversation with the bioethicist and fiction writer.

Bestselling author Lionel Shriver isn’t embarrassed to admit that her impulse to write stems from her feelings of social incompetence: “You know that feeling of having had an encounter with […]

A top military adviser on the newly released war thriller “Green Zone” has written an editorial slamming the film’s assertion that a massive conspiracy led us into the Iraq war.

Personally, I remember back in the 1970s when string theory fell out of favor. At the time, it was very difficult to get a job and many people dismissed the […]

Will wonders never cease: professional self-promoter Emily Gould recently accused feminist blogs of stoking their readers’ outrage to “gin up page views.” Gould’s case in point is a reported piece […]

Don’t write stories about “ordinary people who think in ordinary ways,” and don’t spoon-feed your readers answers to moral dilemmas.

By mid-century there will likely be 9 billion people on the planet, consuming ever more resources and leading ever more technologically complex lives.

“If it’s any good, [literature] can make you feel less alone in the world...It gives you some late-night company with your memories and your sorrow.Literature does touch people; it’s not […]

 “Every generation is born to this same anatomical legacy; how they then fashion it with clothing is, in miniature, the story of culture,” argues Susan J. Vincent in her sweeping […]

Somewhat predictably, several pundits and commentators have framed Thursday’s Pew survey as supporting an all too common yet misleading “fall from grace” narrative about the place of science in society. […]

The Impressionists now stand as the ultimate in artistic comfort food for the mainstream public. The billowy softness of their images graces office walls in framed reproductions and countless calendars. […]

Will humans ever figure out how to time travel? Or discover an equation that explains the universe? The theoretical physicist describes a reality that’s stranger than the science fiction he […]

Cities won’t look like “some sort of science-fiction fantasy,” but it’s likely that technological advances and information overlays will change the way we live in significant ways.

We tend to think of work done on assignment as being somehow cheaper than work springing entirely from the mind of the artist. Art on demand never strikes us as […]

Carl Varjabedian, a photographic maverick, captures the surreal beauty of the American West in a manner worthy of tall tales and American dreams, writes NPR.

The Salon’s Laura Miller gives a word to the to wannabe writers - summarising the rules for writing fiction and advice from the point of view of a consumer rather than a fellow scribe.

Flash question: does the Internet help dictators or undermine them? Now how about a slightly different question: does technology empower Big Brother or destroy it? Ad finally, what’s the difference between a dictator and Big Brother?

The new information age certainly isn’t without its fair share of clutter. The United Nations has even spotlighted the growing need to combat e-waste building up in a number of […]

This week’s New Yorker contains extraordinary, and extremely moving, letters written by Saul Bellow to other novelists. Bellow was, for many critics and readers, primus inter pares in American twentieth […]

Why the author of “36 Arguments for the Existence of God” chose fiction as a path into the debate raging between atheists and believers.

I am back from an excellent science journalism conference in Denmark and will have more to say on the meeting which highlighted several issues that speak directly to challenges faced […]

Should abortion be permitted until the fetus’s birth? Bioethicist Jacob Appel believes so, arguing that any other guideline is too arbitrary to be legally justifiable, or enforceable. Indeed, his actual “philosophical […]

Facebook sends more users to broadcast news sites, while Google News sends more to newspaper sites. 10,000 Words argues that news media shouldn’t wait to develop iPad apps, because the […]

I don’t know whether it was the impeachment effort against Georgia’s attorney general, or the arrest of the Hutaree militia terrorists, or the Army doctor who refuses to obey military […]