Any American who has steeled him or herself to watch the fur fly in the latest political fray over the debt ceiling knows that civil discourse is anything but civil. […]
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Who you gonna call? Somebody inside your data community, that’s who.
Click the LIKE button at the top of Big Think’s Facebook page to enter for a chance to win a nifty new Big Think t-shirt created in partnership with the Imaginary […]
School reform efforts across the country hang on the notion of annual teacher evaluations based heavily on student test scores. But if this process isn’t consistently accurate, it will get the wrong teachers fired and discourage talented people from entering the profession.
A recent study shows that the decision to have children, and especially to have them early, is a factor that contributes to women’s educational attainment.
President Obama’s answers to the questions from today’s press conference on the debt ceiling talks were more informative than his brief and at times sketchy opening preamble. The president had […]
Things are going to be getting a little hectic for me for the next few days as I get ready for my field/lab season in California (which starts Wednesday). I […]
The march of technology and globalization has played out hugely in favor of high-skilled labor, but that march is now turning against skilled workers, promising to narrow the equality gap.
Chinese President Hu Jintao congratulated South Sudan on its independence, promising strong ties between the two countries as China seeks to retain its access to Sudanese oil.
High unemployment in the U.S. has sharply decreased illegal immigration rates. The U.S. should respond by accepting more legal immigrants, says Nobel Laureate Gary Becker.
European politicians are blaming the escalation of the euro crisis on American credit rating agencies. Some are supporting a German initiative to establish a rival European agency.
The Arab revolutions have emboldened Palestinians to ask for more, both from Israel and from themselves, even if that means preparing for a much longer struggle.
BY JASON SILVA The Imaginary Foundation says “Great art expands the way we see—it uplifts the human spirit from the barbaric and thrusts it toward the numinous.” – An Interview […]
Sales of the doomed News of the World increased by 30% we are reliably informed on the day the newspaper closed, and on the day Rupert Murdoch flew in dressed […]
Well, now that we’re in mid-July, Eruptions will be going on autopilot for a while as I start 2 weeks of field and labwork in California. My trip will involve […]
Well, I find this a little hard to believe, but this is the 1,000th post on Eruptions. Since May 2008, over WordPress, Scienceblogs and Big Think, I’ve now written more […]
In a recent vlog, Skepchick Rebecca Watson had some friendly advice for male skeptics seeking to make women feel comfortable and welcome at skeptical gatherings. She mentioned, offhandedly, that during […]
Several types of personality disorders will be dropped from the next edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. But narcissistic personality disorder will remain.
Recent shootings and the accompanying media coverage have probably fed the public’s perception that most profoundly mentally ill people are violent but studies show just the opposite.
Obsessing over our kids’ happiness may be dooming them to unhappy adulthoods. A therapist and mother reports on what she learned from books and then from patients.
You needn’t commit your life to blissful meditation to receive its benefits. A new study published in Psychological Science shows meditating changes neural pathways in just five weeks.
While online therapy sessions could make counseling services available to a new group of people, there are logistical and financial obstacles including lack of insurance reimbursement.
Three videos worth watching… In Fall 2008, only 6 school districts in Iowa had a 1:1 student laptop initiative in place. In Fall 2011, as many as 90 to 100 districts […]
When the government violates the Constitution, courts should assign blame clearly—not bury it under euphemisms.
Blogging is hard. It’s hard coming up with new ideas from the comfort of your mom’s basement day after day after day. Like most bloggers, I try to steal other […]
A few years ago I was at a conference of economic historians in Toronto where I happened to meet Dr. Mary Yeager, a professor in UCLA’s history department who also […]
“Blessed be the man that spares these stones, / And cursed be he who moves my bones,” Shakespeare’s gravestone famously proclaims. Anthropologist Francis Thackeray, the man currently petitioning the Anglican […]
For the people of Iceland, the past few years must feel like the old saying “when it rains, it pours’: we’ve seen two significant eruptions, one at Eyjafjallajökull and one […]
On August 2nd, the U.S. Government’s Doomsday Machine is scheduled to be triggered automatically, bringing with it unspeakable economic calamity. The financial markets will freeze up, foreigners will stop financing […]
Professor at the Johns Hopkins Business School, Stacy Lee says a recent Supreme Court ruling leaves generic drugs unregulated, putting consumers of the medicines at risk.