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So-called “patent trolls” — companies with the sole aim of suing over patents — have been a scourge to big companies for years. Now a new study reveals that patent trolls harm startups as well as venture capitalists shy away from investing billions of dollars.

As Americans Google ‘David Brat’ to find out how this unknown college professor came to unseat one of the most prominent (on the right) and loathed (on the left) members […]

Big Think is a knowledge forum that features insights from the world’s leading thinkers. Whether it’s Michio Kaku discussing energy sources of the future or Stephen Dubner, the co-author of […]

A radio dish that broadcasts galaxies? No, but they can detect them, according to NASA. In this image, taken two weeks ago, we can see the photogenic superposition of a night sky over New Zealand. NASA explains: As pictured above, the central part of our Milky Way Galaxy is seen rising to the east on the image left and arching high overhead. Beneath the Galactic arc and just above the horizon are the two brightest satellite galaxies of our Milky Way, with the Small Magellanic Cloud to the left and the Large Magellanic Cloud on the right. The radio dish is the Warkworth Satellite Station located just north of Auckland. Image credit: NASA

“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.” – Albert Camus

Far from questing after the fame and fortune that often accompanies state-sanctioned power, Mujica prefers to live quietly with his wife and their three-legged dog in a farm house.

Planners once thought that building more and wider roads was the solution, but a new study out of California finds that 90% of any new road capacity will be swallowed up by traffic within just five years.

With the World Cup in Brazil only a day away, the predictions are pouring in from gamblers, analysts, and even investment banks. All of them are trying to guess who […]

The World Cup begins tomorrow and the United States, simultaneously famous for its cultural diversity and its exclusive use of the word “soccer”, is having something of an identity crisis.

What we are more often presented with than not–from the realm of politics to the grocery store aisle–is a phony array of options that adversely affects our individual and collective psychology.

A clever device by the Turkish company Pugedon aims to increase recycling while providing food and water to stray dogs and waking up our kindness and humanity.

From College to Grad/Med/Law School to Scholarships and Jobs, these are the tips everyone should know “It’s a brilliant surface in that sunlight. The horizon seems quite close to you because […]

Oslo to Copenhagen, the world’s next megacity?

Are you a country that needs an economic boost? Just make sure that your national team wins the World Cup. Soccer fever is upon us, or football fever as the […]

A new international study that looks at how different species’ bodies evolve over time has found that as humans have acquired more brain power, they have lost power in the brawn department. 

What you know about the world and what you know about yourself practically determine your outlook on life, and the ability of social media to transmit digital information instantly has changed all that.

Becoming a fake corporate executive is an increasingly alluring option for caucasian expatriates living in China, writes freelancer Mitch Moxley, who knows from experience.

“All sins tend to be addictive, and the terminal point of addiction is damnation.” – W. H. Auden Auden, the great English poet who spent part of his twenties in the […]

New empirical approaches to psychology are better defining the introvert/extravert dichotomy. Behavior typically belonging to introverts better reflects a new identity category: Openness to Experience.

What does the x-ray of an entire spiral galaxy look like? NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory took an x-ray of interacting galaxies known as M51, or the Whirlpool.  NASA explains: The […]

“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.” – Rene Descartes

British computing luminary Alan Turing predicted that by the year 2000, computers would be able to engage humans in conversation while seeming more like fellow humans than computers. 

Tall buildings provide shade but that doesn’t mean they make the city any cooler. In fact, areas saturated by skyscrapers tend to trap heat.

Ed Mitchell is a renowned pitmaster in Raleigh, North Carolina. He owns a restaurant in Durham called Que. Mitchell can be considered not only a barbecue connoisseur but also a […]

It’s not “particularly” any one characteristic, and that makes it a rarity worth looking at. “Conceit spoils the finest genius. There is not much danger that real talent or goodness will […]

Attention stargazers, NASA released this helpful infographic today. From NASA: What is that light in the sky? Perhaps one of humanity’s more common questions, an answer may result from a […]

“Man is so made that whenever anything fires his soul, impossibilities vanish.” – Jean de la Fontaine

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wants to resume his nation’s commercial whaling ventures in the Antarctic seas despite the International Court of Justice’s ruling in March forbidding it.

Young artists are fleeing New York and searching for new, accessible locales to set up shop. Detroit’s budding arts scene has welcomed them with open arms.

British rock group Klaxons have announced that the world’s first 3D-printed tour will kick off in October. The band claims everything used on stage will have been created by way of 3D printing, though a quick viewing of their promo video reveals the announcement to be a joke.