Search Results

You’d think in the age of Uber and Airbnb someone would have figured out how to put Big Textbook in its place. Unfortunately, it’s a lot more complicated than just waving a magical disruption wand and putting Follett out of business.

And if it were, is there any way we could detect that this were the case? “Do I believe, for example, that by using magic I could fly? No. How would […]

Named by The New York Times as a potential nominee to the Supreme Court, Cory Booker points out that strict constitutionalists should want a new appointee put forward before too long.

Before he “jumped ship to the useless, unemployable arts”, young Salman wanted to be a physicist. This and more on Big Think’s weekly podcast, Think Again. 

One of the fathers of string theory proposes a new equation that may reconcile general relativity and quantum mechanics.

A noted neuroscientist’s new study illuminates what remarkable invention made our brains the largest of all the primates.

It’s worse — and better — than you think. 

We can all rattle off a few Greek philosophers to win a trivia prize, but how many Golden Age philosophers are you familiar with? Here’s a primer.

Experimental philosopher Jonathan Keats dives into the work of Buckminster Fuller, an early 20th century oddball scientist whose visionary ideas we are only now catching up to.

You know what self-driving cars will help reduce? Phantom traffic jams. You know the ones, where traffic seems to just halt. You see no accidents, no construction, no state trooper—everything has just slowed for what seems like no reason at all.

Looking at how our technology and culture compare to Star Trek’s vision of the future.

Wilt Chamberlain dominated basketball. Yet given the chance to improve one critical element of his game, he let popular opinion override physics.

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 […]

The darkness we see from Earth can never be 100% dark. “All I want is blackness. Blackness and silence.” –Sylvia Plath If you take a look at the night sky […]

How Costa Rica achieved 100% renewable energy, and what it means.

Professional women are at a disadvantage due to what’s called “the confidence gap,” an idea popularized by Claire Shipman and Katty Kay. Shine is a new company that seeks to close that gap one text message at a time.

Ontological design is way cool.

Studies confirm that having experiences makes us happier than material possessions.

Big Think+ is a video-driven platform that catalyzes happiness and performance in professional environments by cultivating leadership, creativity, and self-knowledge. Learn more at edge.bigthink.com.

If you thought the Kuiper belt was just icy worlds of various sizes orbiting like Pluto, think again. “There have only been two true planets discovered since ancient times, and this […]

Experimentation-out-of-love is often inefficient and hard to measure. It isn’t always “solution-oriented.” But it’s as necessary and natural to us as breathing, and all too easily swept under the rug. 

A learning collaboration between Pixar and Khan Academy helps aspiring animators familiarize themselves with the basics of the craft. The free course is called Pixar in A Box.

Each might be as heavy as an asteroid and as tiny as a decimal point.

Before the Big Bang… after the Big Freeze… will everything look the same? “What is wild cannot be bought or sold, borrowed or copied. It is. Unmistakeable, unforgettable, unshamable, elemental as […]

Just the thought of money causes your brain to react in ways similar to being high on cocaine.

Norway announced plans this week to construct a system of cycleways safely connecting nine of its biggest cities to outer suburbs. The project is estimated to cost just under $1 billion and is part of a broader transportation initiative to be completed by 2030.

In Netflix’s “Stranger Things” characters enter a parallel dimension. Could this actually happen?   

Disagreements over income inequality are always present in democracies, but at times the topic submerges. Today, the topic has reemerged and is driving the next presidential election.

Take a deep breath, you’re in for a ride. Here is Penn Jillette on Libertarianism, taxes, Trump, Clinton, Sanders, Gary Johnson, sex, drugs and Kurt Cobain.

Part art installation, part green design. Completely cool.