Arguments on both sides of this question were aired at a thought-provoking colloquium sponsored by the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College on September 21-22: “Does the President Matter? A […]
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Data gathered for a new study suggests that some parents’ beliefs on children and alcohol exposure are dangerously misguided.
A new study shows that, contrary to expectations, people are much better at intuiting others’ emotional states when there’s no financial incentive involved.
A cafe in London is doing its part to make its customers more aware of their true water usage by allowing scientists to label each menu item with its “water footprint” value.
Cognitive science exists in a golden era. The amount of resources pouring into research that examines human nature is unmatched by any other time in history.
Small and nimble research labs are proving that they have a method for speeding the pace and reducing the cost of discovery.
Researchers at the University of California-Davis are embarking on a study designed to determine whether the type of bottle closure really makes a difference in wine quality.
A new study says that sure, the carrot-on-a-stick method works to get citizens involved in their communities, but it doesn’t always sustain that involvement over time, requiring the use of other techniques.
Dear Paris Hilton You probably don’t remember me. We met briefly once, years ago. It was when you bought a book on numerology and astrology from a store I worked […]
The second generation of MakerBot’s desktop 3D printers is a sturdier, faster, easier-to-use version with a price that starts at just under $2,200.
Can an idea that looks backward also look forward? That question hangs over the the Tate Britain’s new exhibition Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde at the same moment that it celebrates the […]
Borrowing from nature, an engineering company has created a robot that mimics the nimble maneuvers and speed of real tuna.
Back in July, I wrote about how the Secular Student Alliance’s website had been targeted by denial-of-service attacks. In that post, I called on Christians and other theists to donate […]
PSY’s viral hit Gangnam Style is testing two longstanding trends: mainstream American culture as a monolingual culture and the global dominance of the English language.
It’s no secret that future disruptive demographic changes will have profound implications for the relationship between employers and employees. But what’s less well known is that some of those demographic […]
In our last post, Meet The New “Power Woman,” we discussed the emergence of the Power Woman as a positive archetype in popular culture and we also pointed to the changing roles […]
Scientists have created a type of artificial soil that, when combined with a special solution, becomes transparent, allowing 3D imaging of plant roots and the organisms that live in them.
“We see on the basis of what we believe, not the other way around,” Errol Morris told Big Think in a recent interview. In other words, our relationship to the truth is never neutral nor “value-free.”
TechShop, which bills itself as “America’s 1st Nationwide Open-Access Public Workshop,” gives the average person access to 2D and 3D building tools that are normally reserved for well-trained professionals.
What is this thing called love? I took my own stab at understanding the neurobiological circuits underlying love and sex with my own book, DIRTY MINDS: HOW OUR BRAINS INFLUENCE […]
A report released Tuesday says that several obstacles stand in the way of a 2015 deadline allowing civilian drone aircraft in the US, including concerns about privacy as well as overall safety.
Since my post on the U.S. embassy riots had so many good comments, I thought I’d write a sequel and continue the discussion. I’d like to offer some further thoughts […]
Is the effort extended to identify the problem matched by the effort to solve that problem? How many times have you seen an institution devote extraordinary efforts to identify a […]
Shakespeare’s Caius Martius Coriolanus isn’t really suited to politics, but his family and friends urge him on, and so he makes a game effort at putting up with the smelly […]
The introduction of tablets to the kindergarten crowd sounds like a phenomenal opportunity to assert the leading role of American innovation.
Mitt Romney dug himself a deep hole this week when Mother Jones released a secretly recorded video of him speaking to a group of millionaires and complaining that 47 percent […]
“What are you thinking?” is a booby-trapped marriage question. I know this, but I can’t always resist its shiny lure. My husband John and I were on a long […]
“Americans censure nepotism on the one hand and practice it as much as they can on the other.” –Adam Bellow (the son of Saul Bellow)
As scientists attempt to tell the story of the last 120,000 years of human history, patterns emerge that more clearly connect the movement of humans across the continents to changes in climate.
While much of the news about ice melts has come from the Arctic, a study published this week describes interior “ice streams” and their effect on the integrity of the Antarctic ice sheet.