When our imaginations run wild, it’s important to remember that’s our fault, not the data’s. “Otherwise we are trying to communicate with someone who doesn’t exist with a system which doesn’t […]
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Hawking’s greatest achievement is also the greatest source of misunderstanding. “Maybe that is our mistake: maybe there are no particle positions and velocities, but only waves. It is just that […]
Mariam Sultana became her country’s first woman with a Ph.D. in astrophysics. This is her story, with an update on where she is now. Mariam Sultana, Pakistan’s very first woman […]
With three spatial dimensions, the possibilities are tremendous. But only one answer fits what we see. “Never erase your past. It shapes who you are today and will help you […]
If everything began with a Big Bang and is expanding, is there a center? “I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out […]
All you need are clear skies, a telescope, and a plan. Make it a great one. “For my confirmation, I didn’t get a watch and my first pair of long […]
There are monster galaxies in the Universe thousands of times the size of ours. But none of them are spirals like us! “Sometimes, I sit alone under the starsand think […]
With the iconic pillars and fairy inside, this star-forming region in our galactic plane just might be the most spectacular of them all. Image credit: ESO, via http://www.eso.org/public/images/eso0926a/. “The most […]
But with its gaps and unusual structure, we’re lucky it did. “But touch a solemn truth in collision with a dogma of a sect, though capable of the clearest proof, and […]
Big Think Mentor connects world-class mentors with a global community of smart, driven users to teach the habits of mind and people skills we need to live happier, healthier, more productive lives.
Jesse Bering is the author of the new book, “Why is the Penis Shaped Like that?: And Other Reflections on Being Human.” He is well known in my circles as […]
While researching creativity for his book Imagine: How Creativity Works, Jonah Lehrer spent some time at 3M, analyzing the company culture that earned it the title of third most innovative company in the world in a recent survey of executives.
When I was in high school in the USA in the late 1980s, the big Asian language that many of my peers wanted to learn was Japanese. A half-decade later, […]
It’s plain to see that I’m an optimist, sometimes more than is socially comfortable. The ease with which I dismiss the disastrous economic decline above serves as one example of that. I wrote that the recession will benefit our political system, and, before I cut this line, as having “rewarded our company for methodical execution and ruthless efficiency by removing competitors from the landscape.” I make no mention of the disastrous effects on millions of people, and the great uncertainty that grips any well-briefed mind, because it truly doesn’t stand in the foreground of my mind (despite suffering personal loss of wealth).
Our species is running towards a precipice with looming dangers like economic decline, political unrest, climate crisis, and more threatening to grip us as we jump off the edge, but my optimism is stronger now than ever before. On the other side of that looming gap are extraordinary breakthroughs in healthcare, communications technology, access to space, human productivity, artistic creation and literally hundreds of fields. With the right execution and a little bit of luck we’ll all live to see these breakthroughs — and members of my generation will live to see dramatically lengthened life-spans, exploration and colonization of space, and more opportunity than ever to work for passion instead of simply working for pay.
Instead of taking this space to regale you with the many personal and focused changes I intend to make in 2009, let me rather encourage you to spend time this year thinking, as I’m going to, more about what we can do in 2009 to positively affect the future our culture will face in 2020, 2050, 3000 and beyond.
On TV, Neil deGrasse Tyson uses narrative to dramatize the importance of basic research.Last week in San Diego, I participated on a panel at the BIO 2008 meetings that focused […]
Alan Boyle, the science editor for MSNBC.com, answers our questions about science, the mainstream media and the fallout of the Chilean earthquake coverage.