Earlier this week I wrote a series of pieces (below, at Scientific American,Los Angeles Times) suggesting that society regulate (with lots of open and democratic discussion) the behavior of those […]
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In a recently published book chapter, my colleague Lauren Feldman and I review the major areas of research on how media and campaigns influence public judgments and knowledge. We also […]
By 2012, world markets will be demanding 90 million barrels of oil a day. The world currently produces 88 million. Our dependence on OPEC oil and non-renewable energy sources is an increasingly bad idea.
A new study in the journal Carbon Management says architects should consider more wooden structures to reduce carbon emissions and create valuable carbon storehouses.
A special meeting of the United Nations security council is due to consider whether to expand its mission to keep the peace in an era of climate change with a new force of ‘green helmets’.
The theory of the multiverse may seem crazy, but cosmologits Alexander Vilenkin and Max Tegmark explain why they think the theory is good science and how it can be tested.
The vast majority of Earth’s water is too salty for humans to drink and desalination has, until now, proven too inefficient to be practical. A German engineering company has a new solution.
His name was Dandon and he was a strange man even for 1812 Berlin. By day, he was a Professor of Languages at the University. He was competent and respected […]
The future of global innovation is the Brazilian favela, the Mumbai slum and the Nairobi shanty-town. At a time when countries across the world, from Latin America to Africa to […]
The vandalizing of Nicolas Poussin’s paintings The Adoration of the Golden Calf and Adoration of the Shepherds at the National Gallery of Art in London just this past weekend sent […]
Nanotechnology isn’t going away. In fact, it promises to impact so many industries that the word will become ubiquitous in our daily lives.
Who’s living the American Dream? A recent survey offers some interesting clues.
So Borders is gone for good, its last four hundred stores scheduled to vanish within weeks. As mourners rush to the liquidation sales, it’s worth pausing to ask: what the […]
At PRI’s Marketplace yesterday, Mitchell Hartman took a look at Facebook’s opening of a new server center in rural Oregon. The story raised the question: How many jobs do social […]
Step One: Buy a truckload of 55 gallon drums of red, white and blue paint from a “job creator/big-time political donor” who has several manufacturing plants located in China. Step […]
With a well-established customer base, plus up and coming innovations in education and video, Amazon’s new tablet may be best poised the challenge the dominant iPad.
Responding to both its Buzz disaster and Facebook’s ongoing privacy concerns, Google+ decided to make privacy its top priority: Google has chosen to opt users out of being public.
Supporters of the hacker-activist group Anonymous have announced plans to create their own social network, to be called AnonPlus, after their Google+ accounts were shut down.
After Egypt’s military appointed a new executive cabinet, protesters once again took to Tahrir Square, so what role is social media playing in these renewed attempts at social change?
Anywhere from 1.8 to 3 million Facebook users will die in 2011, likely transforming those posthumous profiles into digital epitaphs. Dealing with death online is now standard.
When I lived in Portland, Oregon, I spent many pleasant years renovating old houses. It’s a fine way for a semi-employed writer to remain semi-employed. One of the simple joys […]
This rudimentary map, showing an Iran crudely cut in two, is currently making the rounds of social media in that country. Its message, as clear as it is simple, is […]
1. So my post on Brooks and death got (for me) big ratings and a lot of fine criticisms–both here on BIG THINK and elsewhere. 2. I pretty much agree […]
One of the best parts of my job at the Sidney Hillman Foundation is working on the monthly Sidney Awards for excellence in journalism. I was very excited to learn […]
Egypt’s new cabinet is set to be sworn in after a reshuffle that protesters say has only partially satisfied their demands for deeper political and economic reforms.
The desire to create competitive industry better explains Chinese behavior than the conventional wisdom of an unapologetic mercantilist power throwing its weight around.
The communal aspect of public education is under attack by advocates of public school privatization promoting “parental choice.”
Mr. President, you could use a few storytelling classes. As it stands now, you are an above average reciter of facts, when you aren’t tired, but you seem to lack […]
When I divorced many years ago, I quickly tired of friends’ inquires as to how I was coping with all the household chores. The only difference to my workload post-marriage […]
University of Oxford professors Ian Goldin and Geoffrey Cameron argue that both receiving and sending countries benefit from the migration of people in an interconnected world.