Sarah Jessica Parker’s Manolo Blahniks are out and Grandma Walton’s sensible apron is in in The Economist’s depiction of the world in the aftermath of the age of easy credit.
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When you celebrate yourself online, are you part of a brave new social future, or are you just being an ass? Evan Ratliff, in Wired, says it’s the former, if you strike a balance.
Science journal Nature defends the World Health Organization’s handling of the H1N1 pandemic, amid a European council’s claims of unjustified fears and wasted spending.
“The greatness of Australia was on display…when a migrant woman became the nation’s 27th prime minister”, The Australian newspaper writes of new leader Julia Gillard.
Thanks to years of conservative pushback, the United States Census looks like a huge waste of time and taxpayer money to many Americans. Even worse, many Americans misconceive the census […]
Sharron Angle is running for U.S. Senate in Nevada on the GOP ticket, but the Tea Party darling wasn’t always a Republican. Angle’s political career began in the far-right fringe […]
Is it fun to watch our finest writers being witty with one another, as it’s fun to watch Federer play Nadal? There are similarities. They rise to the occasion. Lauren […]
Juries are disproportionately white. Although it is illegal to dismiss potential jurors on the basis of their race, lawyers can give any reason they want for dismissing a juror, and they […]
Actor and activist Judith Light, who has played a wide variety of major roles on and off the screen over the past three decades says that preparing for a role […]
2010 is barely halfway through and it’s already been the most disastrous year in modern history. Suddenly, disaster relief becomes not just a playground of humanitarian agency manifestos but a […]
We received a lot of great contributions for our Bret Easton Ellis question contest! Some of our favorite contributions came from the following Big Thinkers: Arlinda Shtun, who asked: “If […]
Eliot Spitzer will be returning to media spotlight once again, albeit under very different circumstances. The New York Times reports that Spitzer, the former Democratic governor of New York, has […]
Jill Tarter, Director of the Center for SETI Research, is searching for signs of extraterrestrial life. But what kinds of signals is she hoping to find? Tarter explains that her […]
One of industrial life’s strange traditions is the pinup calendar that shows nubile young women posing provocatively around tractor parts and turbines. Eizo, a maker of medical-imaging technology, decided to […]
Manute Bol’s dream of building schools in his war-torn home of Sudan lives on through his charity, Sudan Sunrise. His untimely death brings to life the magnanimity of an NBA curiosity.
Buyer beware: cigarette companies, no longer allowed to use words like “light” or “mild” to advertise, are turning to the psychology of colors to “reframe” the hazards of smoking.
Garrison Keillor on the myth of merit: “I was brought up imagining that cream rises to the top, merit wins out, the race is to the swift and riches to men of understanding, but it ain’t necessarily so.”
From solar and hydrogen powered concept planes to better designed, more fuel-efficient standard aircrafts, the airline industry is slowly turning greener, says The Christian Science Monitor.
“Who would have thought that the sound of God would be so whiny?” quips The Independent. Physicists at the LHC say “the God particle” sounds like “a bunch of coins spinning in a wine glass.”
Former Islamabad CIA station chief Rob Grenier calls the row over General McCrystal’s remarks a “foolish spectacle” and sees in it evidence of the impossible situation in Afghanistan.
Robert Pinsky says that only Marcus Aurelius can compete with Abraham Lincoln for the distinction of world class writer and politician. Pinsky looks at Lincoln’s poem, “My Childhood-Home I See Again.”
Neuroscientists believe they have located the part of the brain that allows some blind people to process visual information to sense the presence of objects without seeing them.
A federal judge has dismissed Viacom’s suit against Google’s You Tube for copyright violations. What does the verdict mean for the future of internet file sharing? Wired analyzes the court’s decision.
High school media literacy courses could build on civics lessons to nurture critical thinking and help bridge the digital divide, says The Atlantic; it’s increasingly difficult to separate fact from fiction.
This summer at The Phillips Collection there’s a different kind of colorblindness going on. White is the “new black,” or at least the color telling the most interesting stories in […]
BP has been using controlled burns to limit the spread of oil in the Gulf of Mexico. In the process they are burning much of what wildlife remains in the […]
“American Psycho” novelist Bret Easton Ellis stopped by the Big Think offices today to chat about his new book, “Imperial Bedrooms,” and the future of fiction writing. Ellis talked about […]
Last month, we looked at a design vision for sight – how designers are revolutionizing low-cost corrective eyewear. This month, a new device out of MIT Media Lab’s Camera Culture […]
The Obama administration has announced plans to bolster security along the U.S. border with Mexico, The New York Times reported today. In a letter sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi […]
When we asked author and Vanity Fair columnist Michael Wolff what’s he thought the future held for Rupert Murdoch, he came right out with it: “The future for Rupert himself […]