In the Chinese Zodiac, the snake is a mythical creature that symbolizes academia, wisdom, and the pursuit of knowledge. What better year than this to talk about the coming expansion of Chinese thought and the rise of China’s terminologies.
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One Today, which began a limited pilot Thursday, enables Android users to donate a dollar a day to one of several prescreened charities.
Now that the two suspects Monday’s horrific bombing have been identified, attention turns to their motive. Why would two brothers originally from the troubled region of Chechnya, a republic of […]
To paraphrase Tennyson, in the spring, a young (or old) man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of baseball. It’s “love” in the original, or course. When I saw a notice […]
Before artificial light was bent to our will, most people would retire shortly after dusk, sleep for four or five hours, awaken for an hour or two, then drift back […]
The Eye+ Window can display scenic views of any location and uses sensors to track your eye movements and adapt the image as needed, making it seem as though you’re really looking through a window.
“It’s not crazy,” Bill Nye tells us, that we could hear radio signals from other civilizations.
Perception is not a process in the brain, but a kind of skillful activity of the body as a whole.
The stories come in surprising ways. An unexpected confession over a meal or a few drinks. A warning, perhaps, to keep your distance from a particular person before a conference. […]
If you actually look at Facebook’s effect on our brains, it’s like taking a drug. The problem, according to Jonathan Harris, is that with software that makes you come back over and over again, you become the product.
41 million Americans sleep fewer than six hours each night. But it wasn’t always this way.
At this year’s TED Conference, entrepreneur Elon Musk confidently predicted that, in the end, “solar will beat everything.” All it will take for the solar energy revolution to become a reality is […]
What motivated the perpetrators of the carnage at the Boston Marathon on Monday? Authorities area step closerto identifying those responsible, and we may eventually learn why they decided to detonate […]
A team at the University of Illinois claims their design could lead to microbatteries that deliver the same power as normal-sized ones, as well as normal-sized batteries that are exponentially more powerful.
Teddy Goff will be appearing on Big Think to discuss how the lessons of digital politics can be applied, albeit in smaller scale, to your life or your business.
An MIT engineer has designed a system that links phones together wirelessly, creating a network of shared cameras and, potentially, thousands of different photos to choose from.
The Center for Perceptual Systems at The University of Texas at Austin has just released a free web-app that will denoise and enlarge photos in a heartbeat to an extent […]
Without any perspective on how the Earth has behaved over different periods when it was at those temperatures, I don’t think people really appreciate the seriousness of the issue.
Yes, it has come to this: A researcher has created a system that uses a depth-sensing camera to detect obstacles and displays warnings via a message on your smartphone screen.
Scientists borrowed the latching ability of the spiny-headed worm to create a microneedle device that is over three times stronger than staples and easier to remove, making it ideal for delicate skin grafts.
From Newton to Einstein to quantum physicists today, Smolin writes, “I believe–as strongly as one can believe anything in science–that they’re wrong.”
There’s still time to sign up for the International Space Apps Challenge, in which participants will attempt to provide creative answers to 50 current scientific and technological problems.
Post-rationalist government—where laws and regulations conform to human psychology rather than to the notion that each individual is a logical calculator—is a hot idea these days. Next to old-school policies […]
Two scientists conducted a “thought experiment” using the popular computer science law and came up with some interesting and controversial possibilities on the true origins of species.
Five percent of the world’s CO2 emissions come as a result of holiday travel. Two researchers are looking into ways to encourage vacationers to reduce their carbon footprint by using social media to share rides and information.
It’s hard to absorb and write about stories that break your heart. When I saw the headline about Rehtaeh Parsons, who was gang-raped when she was 15 and committed suicide […]
If the current growth rate continues, the global demand for petroleum will double in the next 40-50 years. According to the IEA we will need to introduce more than 30% […]
According to recent figures, a full 61 percent of the country is experiencing drought conditions, almost double the amount in 2011. Some are warning of a coming “megadrought” in the western US.
It’s hard to walk down a grocery aisle these days and not notice the many food labels that shout out “Rich in Antioxidants!” or “Good source of Antioxidants!” or “Fights […]
Editor’s Note: I recently read and subsequently tweeted about Submergence, the new novel by J.M. Ledgard. Then I asked one of the smartest people I know – Brian O’Neill – […]