Margaret Cho, the “Patron Saint of Outsiders” reveals the secret to overcoming barriers.
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Have you seen “Miss Representation”, the documentary that challenges the sexist, demeaning way the information and entertainment media depict women? See it. It’s important, and spot on…even if it is […]
How could you possibly accept Herman Cain’s position on abortion if you are a conservative? I like Herman Cain’s position on abortion because he takes the government out of the […]
UNESCO could soon grant the Palestinians membership, a move that would see the U.S. resign and could spur a chain of similar situations. At what cost to the U.S.?
Public opinion about climate change, observes the New York Times’ Andrew Revkin, can be compared to “waves in a shallow pan,” easily tipped with “a lot of sloshing but not […]
The world’s population is about to reach seven billion. Can we handle that many humans, let alone the three billion more expected to be added by the end of this century?
Readers in the Washington, DC area may be interested in this free event coming up at American University this week Thurs. Oct. 27 and sponsored by the School of Communication. […]
Digital communication, such as via Tweets, worsens the unhealthy popularity of curt, rapid opinions. Is comment, like a strangler-fig, getting stronger than the politics on which it feeds?
Much of the Arab world has undergone a revolution of sorts, but a leaderless one. The common consensus is that economic conditions will worsen before they improve.
Why are China’s SMEs–the beating heart of the country’s economic dynamism–struggling to get loans from the formal financial sector? Local governments are crowding them out.
The high-tech parents from Silicon Valley are now sending their kids to a school—the Waldorf School of the Peninsula—that sells itself as computer-free. Why? Such technology is a distraction, turning […]
I’ve written in the past about the phenomenon of people who think that their religious beliefs excuse them from doing their job. The correct solution, of course, is to not […]
Often forgotten among our First Amendment rights are our rights to petition the government for a redress of grievances. And while the right, in principle, refers to an individual, well […]
Today, I would like to share some thoughts on social media, particularly about Facebook with you. I started using Facebook in late 2007 but did not get much out of […]
Though people like to believe their convictions are purely rational, a growing body of research links political differences to deep-seated physiological traits.
Scientists were recently surprised to find that brains missing a corpus callosum, which links the two hemispheres of the brain, were still able to communicate quite effectively. But how?
Summarizing a breadth of research on how magnetic fields affect the brain, it is clear that our body’s most advanced organ responds in wild, wonderful and sometimes tragic ways.
Humans do not passively receive the world, we interpret it and retell it to our friends and neighbors. Recent research suggests we are quite eager to bend the truth for a good story.
This essay was previously published on AlterNet. In a campaign speech in September, Rick Perry hit upon some familiar Republican themes: Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry, in an appeal to […]
Confidence in our own decision making abilities can be amazingly misplaced but remain strong even in the face of evidence that clearly shows the decisions we make are wrong.
Wander through most major museums and you’ll find a remarkable number of works with no name. Either lost to the mists of time or never recorded because the work was […]
New genomic technologies allow scientists to read organisms’ genomes as well as make increasingly complex changes to them, creating organisms with new capabilities.
We generally assume that if we use more energy-efficient machines we will use less energy. If we install energy-efficient light bulbs in place of incandescent bulbs, for example, it will […]
Two drug companies are testing formulations of a universal flu vaccine in hopes of bringing a successful version to market in the coming years. It could replace the annual flu shot.
Clinics that take advantage of new technologies to provide ‘upstream’ care can prevent lengthy and costly procedures ‘downstream’. Is technology the best preventative medicine?
Exotic pets are not safe and should not be kept in homes, advocates say. In addition to causing physical harm, exotic animals can spread rare diseases to their human owners.
As use of mobile phones has spiked over the last 20 years, the health risks they present have been much debated. New research rejects a link between phone use and brain cancer.
We now have the power to map the brain, peering into the human mind to decode words from silent thoughts. But what will human consciousness look like, if we ever finally catch a glimpse of it? Neuroscientist Joy Hirsch kicks off the debate.
Recent discoveries in the field of neurobiology can tell us much about the causes of the current financial crisis, and how to treat it, says a former UBS exec.
The Family Meal, Ferran Adrià’s new cookbook, gathers thirty-one three-course meals that the chef created for nightly staff dinners at El Bulli.