For many people, even those most enlightened when it comes to art and culture, Africa remains “the dark continent” out of which little emerges that sparks interest. The Museum for […]
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Called “the hardest exam in the world” by the Telegragh, the entrance test necessary for those keen to spend graduate careers at All Souls, Oxford, included a celebrated element, the […]
Newspapers may be dying, but the news business is not. The paper part of the business—the physical newspaper itself—is doomed. It no longer makes any sense to print and distribute […]
A few weeks ago, we looked at how designers were revolutionizing sight for the vision-impaired. Today, we focus on another kind of sensory disability — can design make deaf people […]
Americans may talk a good game about “work-life balance,” but according to this study, they’re biased against working mothers. More surprisingly, those who liked working moms less also liked the […]
The chief rabbi of a West Bank settlement decreed that women are ineligible to run for municipal office because women should only be heard through their husbands: The chief rabbi […]
Chinese people are still suffering from the most gruesome biological warfare attacks in modern history. Judith Miller looks at Japan’s “forgotten” biological crimes against China.
Might the Internet serve as a deterrent thanks to its ability to lay bare truths? Vet Patty Khuly comments on a video of the “most horrific scenes bullfighting has ever offered.”
What is it about Foxconn, the factory in China which makes most of Apple’s devices and has already shed thousands of its workers, that is driving so many of them to suicide?
Are non-verbal behaviours reliable in the detection of people with mal-intent? Sharon Weinberger says researchers are increasingly dubious of passenger screening programs.
Emanuel Derman says that people will do what they feel they have to do despite their own reservations to the contrary—Wall Street will be greedy and the Congress will grandstand.
I was on Tybee Island earlier this week, sitting in my usual spot on the 17th street crosswalk just after dawn, when a young man carrying an ocean going kayak […]
After talking with thousands of ordinary Americans, R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr. concludes they have arrived at a historic turning point—accepting that they must forego some entitlements.
Valuable climate change data collected every day by military satellites remains classified diminishing global health and security, writes Daniel Baker for the New York Times.
Instruction often assumes that students build knowledge sequentially, but what if it’s much more haphazard than that? Science Magazine explains how video helps convey difficult ideas.
It’s nuclear-armed and seems increasingly unstable yet we lack a contingency plan for a sudden collapse of the North Korean regime, warns The Economist.
David Jays speculates on why no play was shortlisted for a recent major literary award. Is theater too “brazenly collaborative and transient ” for the literary gatekeepers?
A recent Washington Post article by Jacqueline Trescott and Dan Zak made the bold, but hard to argue with statement that United States museums foil thieves much better than their […]
This could be an ideal time for creatures touched by the Gulf spill to pick up yoga and/or meditation. Here’s why. Consider the iguana. When iguanas get stressed out about […]
Different species have their different tricks for getting by. Human beings are smart, quick-moving and numerous. We’re also pretty large, as mammals go. Sloths, on the other hand, take a […]
Today we take a computer’s speed for granted, but it wasn’t so long ago when it was normal to sit and wait for several minutes every time we booted up […]
The relationship between art and society has been deconstructed for what seems like forever. But as the definition of art and performance has broadened over time, some members of society […]
Achieving sustainability can be a tricky balance for businesses. Even if adopting sustainable practices makes clear sense for the long-term, Copenhagen Business School professor Bjørn Lomborg notes that businesses face […]
“What Bert Sugar doesn’t know about baseball, nobody knows,” reads a quote from the great Yankees catcher Yogi Berra on the back of Sugar’s new book about the Baseball Hall […]
In a press conference yesterday, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg announced that the company is planning to make it much simpler for users to figure out how much information they are making […]
Urban studies theorist Richard Florida came by the Big Think offices recently to talk about what he’s coined “The Great Reset”—the effects of the economic crisis on our country, and […]
A pair of Canadian paleontologists say that anigmatic fossilized organism called Nectocaris pteryx (literally “swimming crab with wings”) was the great-grandmammy of the modern-day squid, octopus, and cuttlefish: In the […]
Nobel Laureate Gary Becker and Judge Richard Posner consider whether a central bank like the Federal Reserve should remain independent of the government.
Do men have the right to choose? After being divorced and sued for child support, one man testifies that he and his ex-wife had agreed to get an abortion if she became pregnant.
A lifetime ban on donating blood for men who have slept with other men, created to protect recipients from HIV, is being challenged as outdated and unfair by two Canadian physicians.