Bob Costas’ Sunday Night “perspective,” his celebrated half-time denouncement of American gun culture, wasn’t just dissonant hectoring. It wasn’t just a burlesque of Murrow or Cosell (USA Today‘s forced, but […]
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The New York Times reports that an MIT statistics professor has found that flying on a commercial jet has never been safer. Not that it was ever that much […]
It’s a slow news day. How about some internet drama to liven things up? As you all know, I’ve been writing a lot lately about sexism and misogyny in the […]
Diagnosed with brain cancer, an Italian engineer and artist put up a Web site displaying his medical records and asking for solutions. The response has been surprisingly fruitful.
Henry Molaison, known for most of his life as H.M., was a medical oddity. Surgery to cure severe epilepsy in the 1950s led to the removal of his hippocampus, which […]
Some research proposes that sorrow in fiction might be a form of psychological relief. A more fruitful explanation is that important virtues, values and morals that elicit uplifting emotions accompany sad moments in fiction.
The debate over the fiscal cliff has spawned a multitude of suggestions for reforming the tax system, including my own. One possible reason for the wide range of proposals, even from mainstream economists, is that the recommendations of standard economic theory may be very different from what the American economy actually needs today. Here are two views of taxation, from the theoretical and realistic standpoints – can you find a happy medium between them?
Last weekend I published a post titled, “The World is Getting Worse (And Other Lies)” in which I shared some inspiring data and anecdotes that have helped me to embrace […]
As some more traditionalist and religious conservatives have noted with disgust, that’s the advice of Ayn Rand: The best aspect of Christmas is the aspect usually decried by the mystics: […]
I’m happy to report that my post on the moral significance of sex workers and people with disabilities has made it into the nominees for the 3 Quarks Daily Philosophy […]
Some progressive Christian bloggers I respect have been writing enthusiastically about a new book, Rachel Held Evans’ A Year of Biblical Womanhood, which they say proves that the Bible has […]
This past July, I had the privilege of being one of the keynote speakers at the Secular Student Alliance’s annual convention in Columbus, Ohio. I’ve been promising video, but until […]
A new study from the Emory-Tibet Partnership showed that a form of compassion-based meditation helped increased test subjects’ ability to interpret others’ facial expressions.
Happiness is not an unalloyed good, Kant says. Without the correct character and orientation, without a sense of duty, happiness is just an animalistic state of mind.
What’s the Big Idea? The famous “trolley problem” was a psychological experiment developed by Philippa Foot that involved a railway trolley headed toward five people who can’t get out of […]
How long does it take to know that you’ve found The One—or someone who you might want to see for a second date? I found the answer to this and […]
Ever feel sorry for a sidewalk sparrow with a cigarette butt in its beak? Did you sigh in wistful sadness at seeing nature’s beauty polluted by human industry, which turns […]
In order to remake the economy to increase the well-being and happiness for all people, there are some new proposed tenets of economic freedom to address.
Currently being considered: A law that, if passed, would punish anyone who “insults” religious believers or holy sites. The Russian Orthodox Church and other religions are on board, but artists say it will only increase self-censorship.
So says an outstanding young conservative public intellectual—Helen Rittelmeyer. It’s true enough that conservatives still do accuse the Democrats—or, more precisely, the liberals—of being moral relativists. Rittelmeyer quotes Paul Ryan […]
I’ve received dozens of emails since my New York Times op-ed proposing a wealth tax came out on Monday. My goal with the piece was primarily to refocus the inequality […]
Decades of research suggest that we are not only initially attracted to likeminded people but that familiarity is essential for healthy marriage.
Part 1 of this essay appeared yesterday. Part 3 (of 3) will appear tomorrow. Where Thomas Hardy seems to me primarily a pessimist, W. B. Yeats is an ironist. A […]
French philosopher Alain Badiou has a new book called In Praise of Love (New Press). It’s a provocative and charming read. Badiou argues that love is no longer the “tenacious […]
In case you haven’t heard, the world may end soon. Very soon. On December 21st at midnight, in fact, the last date on the Mayan Long Count Calendar. Tosh, […]
With the help of NASA’s Kepler long-range scanning mission, scientists have located a solar system in which two planets are orbiting around two suns, confirming that multiple-planet “circumbinary systems” exist.
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 […]
Elizabeth Bernstein has a thoughtful and interesting piece in the Wall Street Journal about the troubling incivility, cruelty, and rudeness that many people unleash online, in Comments sections, on Twitter, […]
Here’s the abstract of a study that conservatives such as Charles Murray and magazines such as The Atlantic are having fun with: Previous research suggests that benevolent sexism is an ideology […]
Socialfish founder Maddie Grant argues that social media represents a paradigm shift not only in popular culture, but in the fundamental relationship between businesses and consumers, and, as a result, in organizational best practice.