“There is no room in the universe of Hawking or most other scientists for the activist God of the Bible.” Philosopher Julian Baggini charts the evolution of Western religion’s deity.
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Given a visual illusion with two interpretations, like the duck and the rabbit, our brain will switch between meanings. The phenomenon is an important evolutionary mechanism, say neurologists.
When a journalist mistakenly wore shorts to visit Guantanamo Bay, he was refused entry into the prison. Instead, he was taken to the library where the prisoners’ art was hung on display.
As California prepares to vote on a ballot initiative essentially legalizing marijuana, The Atlantic looks at the pop music—from Louis Armstrong to Ben Harper—that found peace with the drug.
“The former English prime minister Tony Blair argues the West has become too imbued with doubt and lacking in mission.” Blair’s new memoir speaks on restoring purpose to government.
“Is human uniqueness really nothing more than a neurological phenomenon?” A philosopher and author calls neurology’s entry into the human sciences the emergence of ‘neurotrash’.
“Like Southern Europe, the US economy must move away from the consumption/housing-led growth model of the last decade.” Can stimulus facilitate a structural change in the economy?
“The Internet has been a great unifier of people, companies and online networks. Powerful forces are threatening to balkanise it.” The Economist on the future of the Internet.
The Simple Dollar blog reviews nine ways to accomplish more by working smarter, not harder. Conquering technology and building stronger relationships are two recommendations.
The benefits of keeping plants in living spaces have long been documented, both in science and in popular wisdom. But plants were not designed to handle, let alone counter, many […]
Associated Press’ standards editor Tom Kent says the war in Iraq is not over. Jim Romenesko posted a memo Kent distributed to AP staffers this week, instructing them not to […]
Not exactly volcanic, but… Not many details yet, but the USGS Earthquake list shows a M7.2 earthquake ~25-30 km from Christchurch, New Zealand. I’ll post more details as I find […]
THE Dean of Columbia’s School of Journalism recently bemoaned the lack of public broadcasting in the United States, and went on to argue that America needed its own version of […]
Internet dating sites in India report that educated women are now less interested in meeting US men who work on Wall Street and more interested in marrying resident civil servants.
Activity at Sinabung continues to be a cause for concern as the volcano experienced another set of explosions overnight. Surono, head of the Indonesian Center for Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation […]
“Culinary Luddism has come to involve more than just taste; it has also presented itself as a moral and political crusade—and it is here that I begin to back off,” says one historian.
After a recent paper showed that immigrants do not steal jobs from Americans, economic pundits are highlighting other ways immigration benefits the national economy.
Nicholas Rombas at n+1 reviews films as an homage to French surrealists André Breton and Paul Éluard by walking into theatres randomly and leaving as soon as the plot makes sense.
“Colombia is no longer the most dangerous country in the Americas.” Government grants for would-be drug farmers and an increased provincial presence have stabilized many areas.
While diets often prescribe eating right or eating less, The Economist says dieters seek out excuses to cheat. In situations where non-dieters would be content, dieters continue to eat.
To what extent do we treat computers like humans? If computers praised our abilities, told us we were doing a good job, would it flatter us or would we see through the artificial compliments?
“People are more likely to acquire new health practices while living in networks with dense clusters of connections—that is, when in close contact with people they already know well.”
“Policies that generate more widely shared prosperity lead to stronger and more sustainable economic growth—and that’s good for everyone.” Robert Reich on how to fix the recession.
“TV shows are emerging as a new front in the war over digital media between Amazon.com Inc. and Apple Inc., amid their ongoing battles over electronic books and online music.”
“The universe arises from scientific processes, not God—as Hawking himself would have agreed decades ago.” Hawking hasn’t changed his mind about God, says a former interviewer.
“Politicians don’t know the difference between a server and a waiter,” declared Andew Rasiej, founder of the Personal Democracy Forum, at Hybrid Reality’s recent salon on the emerging revolution in […]
It’s a good year to die. Right now—for the first time in 94 years—there’s no estate tax. So if something should happen to you, your beneficiaries won’t have to pay […]
In 1895 Sigmund Freud and Josef Breuer published “Studies on Hysteria,” a series of case studies of female patients with bizarre symptoms that had no obvious biological cause. Some patients […]
Is a person’s propensity toward evil a matter of malfunctioning synapses and neurons? Michael Stone, professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University and author of “The Anatomy of Evil,” says […]
It has come to a pretty pass indeed, when we have to rely on the New York Times to report a British political and media scandal, while much of the […]