What is the Big Idea? Vladimir Putin is officially back for his third term as president of Russia, but this time he faces a different political climate than he did […]
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The cover headline caught my eye, and I surprised both the elderly leafletter and myself when I took a copy of the “Watchtower” magazine on my way out of the […]
Much of the technology needed to make sex robots is currently under development, not to mention the fact that, thanks to social media, we already have fairly robotic human relationships.
The FCC is trying to balance the threat of terrorism against the benefits of having wireless networks in an emergency, e.g. to aid first responders. And what about free speech rights?
Sigmund Freud postulated that dreaming is a reflection of the unleashed id; it represents one’s deep sexual fantasies and frustrations implanted during childhood. But what happens when we fall asleep […]
It’s an absolute fixture in children’s libraries worldwide and upon its publication in 1963 was awarded the Caldecott Medal, a distinguished award given to the year’s best picture book for children […]
According to former White House Special Advisor Van Jones, it will require a patient mindset to get us to the place where the country can run on cleaner and more renewable forms of energy.
Yesterday afternoon the Associated Press broke a story about a bomb plot from Yemen, revealing relatively few but still tantalizing details about a plot we still know little about. (ABC […]
The Obama administration has a pronounced tendency to give off mixed signals on controversial issues for an interminably long time before deciding on a particular policy to implement or a […]
To solicit financial support from the public, something the government has made easier recently, it helps to create funding tiers that allow you to connect personally with your audience.
For getting information, building apps proved a dangerous game for publishers. Introducing closed systems into the open Web proved unsatisfactory to readers, advertisers and publishers.
A federal judge has ruled that “liking” something on Facebook does not count as constitutionally protected speech. It is a decision that has confounded some law professors.
If we have access to the same facts and evidence, we ought to reach the same conclusions about any topic. What does it mean when we don’t? We’ve all encountered […]
When people think about the future, at least in many of the progressive circles that I move in, do you know what they think about? Gloom and doom. Generally, our […]
Senator Bill Bradley sits down with Big Think to discuss his latest book, We Can All Do Better, out in hardcover today, May 8, 2012. He talks about what it […]
What is the Big Idea? Dominique Moisi, a special advisor at the French Institute of International Relations, published a few words of advice for president-elect François Hollande inLos Echos. His […]
Editor’s Note: In a previous post, Ali Wyne published the first part of his interview with Ian Bremmer about the main argument of Bremmer’s new book, Every Nation for Itself: Winners and […]
As I wrote last week, the Breakthrough Dialogues launched in 2011 as one of America’s top new thought leader forums, in part because of the cross-cutting ideological discussion and mix […]
Votifi is an online platform that encourages positive, nuanced political exchange. After you sign up, the website sends you daily polls through your browser or mobile device and creates a […]
In November of 1977, Houston hosted a national women’s conference to hammer out a broad agenda against sexual inequality. It was hailed as the most diverse American political gathering in […]
Economics rests on unguarded assumptions that need to be examined, says author and Harvard professor Michael Sandel. He wants to revive a debate over the role of market forces.
While some concerns about GM crops are valid, refusing to pursue them while poor countries suffer malnutrition and starvation is irresponsible, says rights activist Isobel Coleman.
The troubling chronicle of blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng has me thinking about the trial of another dissident who faced a life-changing dilemma of his own 2411 years ago in […]
Momentary enthusiasm, a few nice words at the inauguration, then gridlock: it’s the ebb and flow of electoral politics in America, and it’s lead liberal and conservative insiders alike to argue that representatives ought to capitulate every now and then, if only for the sake of negotiation.
Imagine that someone offered you something and said, “This might give you a short-term performance boost. If it does, we’re not sure how long the effect will last but we […]
Voters in France and Greece have strongly rejected the politics of austerity, electing a president and parliament that vow to soften Europe’s plan to slash government spending.
Given global capital markets, America has no choice but to join the race to cut corporate tax levels. Capital gains should be taxed as normal income to make up for the loss of income.
Deriding the Democratic Party’s “Julia” propaganda yesterday, Ross Douthat recycled a conservative truism. Unlike those admirable (because safely extinct) old-timeliberals, he wrote, today’s Democrats want the government to do what families should: “The liberalism […]
Just before Rip Van Winkle falls into his thirty-year slumber, he encounters the ghostly spectacle of a handful of ancient Dutch colonials playing at ninepins, the thunder rolling across the […]
Vanity Fair has published some revealing letters from the young student Barack Obama to his girlfriend Alex McNear. Some conservatives have been mocking the heck out of them as evidence […]