The scattered toponyms that delight us by their unvarnished expression of downheartedness, defeat and despond.
All Articles
Sure their students won a debate against Harvard, but that’s only one reason the Bard Prison Initiative is changing the way we think about criminals.
Words of wisdom from Maya Angelou: “I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.”
This is a great way of understanding the difference between artificial intelligence and genuine intelligence, i.e., human intelligence.
Most Americans want reasonable gun safety laws, and in a democracy, the majority is supposed to win. Why isn’t it working that way with gun control?
Human motorists can’t handle their do-goodery driving.
A look at the techniques the show’s producers use to whip the contestants into a superstitious frenzy, and the host’s own bizarre beliefs.
Men probably aren’t ready for this one.
Could we redesign shopping as a system of “catch-and-release,” so that, like sport fishing, it’s the adventure and not the prize that becomes central?
Is everything astonishingly simple, though? Or is this a grandiose claim that falls flat when confronted with the evidence? “My main interest is the problem of the singularity. If we […]
Late night comedians are taking on The Man like it’s their job.
It’s an app that creates more fear than love and has more potential to ruin lives than boost them.
Shame is an all-purpose word these days, but how does that affect the real victims?
Words of wisdom from President Franklin Delano Roosevelt: “A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.”
Personal attacks on a speaker, especially about their funding, are a sign that the attacker can’t dispute the facts the speaker is presenting. Beware the attacker too.
Vilhelm Hammershøi’s tranquil, yet unsettling interiors make him the most influential artist you’ve never heard of.
In order to bring conflicting countries closer together mentally, experimental philosopher Jonathon Keats wants to bring them closer together physically. He proposes action that would speed up Earth’s tectonic activity and lead to the rapid formation of a new supercontinent.
The death throes of a Sun-like star announce its funeral to the whole galaxy. “The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.”–Rabindranath Tagore Image credit: Adam Block/Mount […]
NASA just posted all 8,400 photos from all 12 Apollo missions to Flickr. Here are the best in full, original resolution. “Suddenly, from behind the rim of the Moon, in […]
Instead of watching a horror movie this season, what if you could be in one?
Can history offer us clues on happiness? Yes, argues Yuval Noah Harari, if we’re willing to listen.
What’s your verdict?
Our Sun gets its energy from fusion in its core. But can any light be made from the surface? “Birds sing after a storm; why shouldn’t people feel as free […]
Words of wisdom from the late playwright: “It is not the literal past, the ‘facts’ of history, that shape us, but images of the past embodied in language.”
Free markets aren’t like gravity. They’re ruled by neither laws of nature nor commandments carved in stone. Delegating our ethics to markets risks costly error. All things are not equally auctionable.
Envy hurts, and it can devolve into nastiness and even violence, but envy can also encourage us to aspire to our better or our best selves at work, school or at home.
It’s been more than three years since we’ve found the Higgs boson. So how does it give particles mass? “This is evidently a discovery of a new particle. If anybody […]
Have we learnt nothing from the racist, ineffective laws that form the basis of America’s longest war: the War on Drugs?
Until the Internet was allowed on commercial flights, the solution to assuage my fear of flying was to find the nearest airport pub and throw a few back before boarding the plane. That’s all changed.
If you’re going for quantity over quality, go lift some weights.