Daniel Honan
Former Managing Editor, Big Think
From 2011-2014, Daniel Honan was the Managing Editor at Big Think. Prior to Big Think, Daniel was Vice President of Production for Plum TV, a niche cable network he helped launch in 2002. The production team he oversaw won over two dozen Emmy awards. Daniel has created numerous shows and documentaries for television, and his film credits include Stealing the Fire, a documentary on the black market for nuclear weapons technology.
Follow Daniel on Twitter @DanielHonan
The U.S. military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has the unique mission of protecting national security by maintaining technological superiority. If the new DARPA-funded “cheetah” robot is any indication, the agency is […]
While private enterprise is not going to take us back to the Moon or to Mars, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson says there is still a role for these companies to play.
A forthcoming paper explores the biomedical modification of humans in order to stop us from consuming red meat. This would have a mitigating effect on climate change.
Like many others I mistook the first John Carter trailer I saw for a Pepsi commercial. And like so many others, I did not go to see the film when it opened […]
Danny Strong appeared LIVE on Big Think the day before the premiere of his controversial new HBO film Game Change, which dramatizes the decision by the McCain campaign to add […]
In the annals of heroic human defenses against sharks, Polish kite surfer Jan Lisewski might just take the cake. Lisewski is the first person to kite surf across the Baltic Sea, a […]
2012 is shaping up to be the year of the solar storm. In late January, the largest solar storm in years erupted, sending a cloud of particles streaming from the Sun toward […]
With its space shuttle program grounded, NASA has found a great way to stay relevant with its daily release of images and videos, which we are happy to serve up to […]
In a previous post, we asked Dr. Michio Kaku which threats pose the greatest danger to humanity in 2012. Dr. Kaku listed, along with global warming and the laser enrichment of […]
Given the fact that Mormons were a key group that helped Mitt Romney win important victories in states such as Nevada and Arizona, it may seem counterintuitive that many Mormons are uncomfortable with a Romney candidacy.
A tearful Vladimir Putin claimed a “clean” victory in the Russian presidential election. Critics, on the other hand, have charged that Putin’s win is tainted by reports of widespread abuses, […]
The near earth asteroid 2012 DA14 discovered last year is not going to hit Earth next year, scientists say. Phew. And yet, it will still be coming in way too close for comfort, raising the question of how prepared we are.
The Red Planet will be the closest distance to Earth in over two years tonight in an event called The Mars Opposition. That means martian features and polar caps will […]
Imagine if Rip Van Winkle fell asleep in 1992 and woke up yesterday. He would probably be amazed at the extent to which our national conversation on reproductive health has […]
We’ve all been forced at some point to listen to someone yammering obnoxiously on their cell phone in a public place. But now we can fight back. Japanese engineers have […]
If Julius Caesar hadn’t accidentally burned down the Library of Alexandria, the story goes, we long ago would have colonized Mars. That notion, popularized by Carl Sagan, among others, is that the […]
A new study has isolated stem cells in human ovaries that could be developed into mature eggs, or ova. This discovery “opens the door for development of unprecedented technologies to overcome infertility in women and perhaps even delay the timing of ovarian failure.”
What’s the Big Idea? Evolution is the fundamental idea in all of life science, in all of biology. According to Bill Nye, aka the science guy, if grownups want to […]
Your personal decisions don’t make a difference, argues Gernot Wagner in a provocative new book called But Will the Planet Notice? How Smart Economics Can Save the World.
Bill Nye has always mixed science and comedy, dating back to his early career when he balanced his day job as an engineer at Boeing with his nighttime routine as […]
Thanks to federal restrictions that hamstring research,” a new paper argues, “opportunities to further study marijuana’s risks and benefits and develop new pharmacotherapies are squandered.”
There has been growing interest in finding ‘second generation’ alternatives to food crops that “don’t grow on arable land and instead can be used specifically for bio-fuels.”
There’s been an alarming spike in lethal shark attacks on sea otters by sharks off California’s Central Coast, and no one seems to know why. While attacks by sharks — […]
In the past month, the debate over whether to legalize gay marriage has become front page news due to legislative battles in Washington, New Hampshire, New Jersey and now Maryland. The issue only promises to […]
In a new book, John Horgan argues that humans didn’t begin to fight with each other until 10-12,000 years ago. Horgan seeks a scientific explanation for how humans became lethal through culture, not biology, and how we can choose to end it.
While the president is “the ultimate authorizer of Armageddon,” what if his mind “is deranged, disordered, even damagingly intoxicated?
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, actively dislike basketball, or subscribe to Time Warner Cable in New York City, you have probably heard that a phenomenon called Linsanity has […]
Harvard Business School professor Robert Kaplan says if you want to get promoted “you need to work starting day one on developing a successor.”
To commemorate Valentine’s Day Google altered its logo today by embedding an animated video of a cute love story. Most of the video depicts a guy and a girl romance, […]
It used to be that if you went to an elite school you didn’t have access to the best minds unless you were physically in their presence. That is not […]