Guest Thinkers

Former New York Times Ethicist Randy Cohen tackles the ethics of asymmetrical relationships.

My post attributing the death of Borders to Amazon’s sales tax advantage raised some hackles among commenters and fellow bloggers alike. Matthew Nisbet over at Age of Engagement countered that the reasons […]

There is a new radio ad for the Oprah Winfrey Network’s new show Ask Oprah’s All Stars in which Dr. Phil proclaims “60% of you are not having sex!” Well, […]

This past spring semester, American University hosted an event featuring Roger Pielke Jr., a Professor of Environmental Studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder and author of The Climate Fix: What […]

As KQED’s Climate Watch team reported this week at NPR, the 103 nuclear reactors in the United States power the equivalent of 3 million households.  Since 1982, these nuclear energy […]

            What do Rush Limbaugh, John Boehner, James Inhofe, and George Will have in common? Several things. They are influential members of society, ‘elites’ who have a big effect on […]

So last night at the ISI honors program (after a long and luxurious dinner at a great restaurant), we actually had a speaker from CANADA—a brilliant professor of political philosophy […]

Dan Mourlam said in his recent post that he didn’t think 1:1 laptop initiatives were the starting point for transforming education. Instead, educators should begin with a critical examination of […]

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills and Fablevision have just released a short animated film, Above and Beyond, that emphasizes the value of the 4 Cs: communication, collaboration, critical thinking, […]

The Tea Party has definitely put their money where their mouth is when it comes to their stance on raising the U.S. government’s debt ceiling. If I were a member […]

“Doomsday.” “Lehman times ten.” “A catastrophe.” “A political basket-case.” The ways of describing the potential outcome of the current U.S. government debt imbroglio continue to pile up, with the adjectives […]

Monday I posted on the reasons for the fall of Borders, reasons that go much deeper and broader than simply blaming Amazon.  But how are the most treasured of urban […]

Words can be like tiny doses of arsenic: they are swallowed unnoticed, appear to have no effect, and then after a little time the toxic reaction sets in after all. […]

Today, we say goodbye to Sherlock Holmes (for the rest of the series, on the importance of true observation, seeing what isn’t there and not just what is, and preventing […]

            What if you could radically reduce how many people get sick from foodborne diseases like e.coli and salmonella and norovirus; one American in six (48 million people) gets sick, […]

In a recent Big Think interview, Daily Beast blogger Andrew Sullivan offered his advice and thoughts on blogging.  First, says Sullivan, you have to post at least twice a day […]

On Morning Joe this morning, Mavin Kalb and Deborah Kalb discussed their new book “Haunting Legacy,” an examination of how Vietnam has shaped the thinking and policy of presidents over […]

So today at the ISI honors program we were graced with a beautiful presentation on  liberty in American poetry and song.  The classy and distinguished presenter asked the students to […]

83 year old T. Boone Pickens’ C.V. reads like that of a small-to-medium-sized nation. How does he remain extraordinarily productive past the age when most people retire? 

When Captain America was defrosted from a block of ice floating in the North Atlantic in Avengers #4 (1964), writer (and now national treasure) Stan Lee used an old idea […]

I’ve spent the last two days at the Iowa Education Summit. Now that it’s over, I have a multitude of thoughts and observations swirling around in my head. Here are eight… […]

Earlier this summer I was feeling down in the dumps about libraries. I was spending the month of June in Flushing, Queens, a melting-pot neighborhood where the local library bustles […]

The first time you see the name Robert Henri, it’s natural to pronounce it “ahn-ree.” Although the artist was partly of French descent, he preferred “hen-rye,” perhaps as a nod […]

So I’m spending the week speaking at and otherwise participating in the national honors program of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute–a conservative educational foundation. The students are spectacularly impressive. They come from […]

If you are 15 years old, 50 or 50 x 2 step away from the screen right now and go to a mirror and look…. Did you look carefully? Who […]

Earlier today many of the internet jihadi forums posted an official audio tape from the al-Malahim media wing, which released all AQAP’s statements.  (A note of caution: if it doesn’t […]

City investigators have determined that a great horned own found dead in Inwood Hill Park last month succumbed to avian herpes. The virus is not transmissible to humans. [Photo credit: […]

While I’ve been busy thinking and blogging about drones these past few weeks, things on the ground have continued to evolve even if there hasn’t been a great deal of […]

Rosetta Stone CEO Tom Adams explains why most mission statements are terrible, how you can write a great one — and how to get others on board.

John Boehner’s budget proposal would cause the greatest increase in poverty in U.S. history, according to an analysis from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities: House Speaker John Boehner’s […]