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In each generation, our most brilliant thinkers lay the foundations on which lesser lights will build a new, bloated bureaucracy of the mind. Can experimental philosopher Jonathon Keats help us break the cycle? 

If you know the name of artist Chris Burden, you probably think pain: shooting, electrocution, and even crucifixion. Although Burden ended his agonizing exploits over 35 years ago, those performance […]

After our last go-round, Peter Hitchens has posted a further reply. I encourage you to read it in full before reading my response, which follows below: Once again, Peter Hitchens […]

“As a man is,” wrote William Blake, “so he sees. As the eye is formed, such are its powers.” No doubt my tumultuous childhood is a part of the reason […]

Love is an epiphany. Maybe that’s the sweetest romantic dream of all. By the big bang theory of mate selection, our soul mate is out there somewhere, and they’re going […]

Throughout this spring and summer, while Yemen’s protesters have continued their call for President Salih to step down, myself and several other Yemen observers have repeatedly warned the US not […]

Remember back in June when President Salih narrowly escaped an assassination attempt and flew to Saudi Arabia for medical treatment?  A number of people predicted that was the end.  Analysts […]

The state of Georgia just killed Troy Davis. Which is to say, a number of individual human beings acting under the imagined authority of the state of Georgia killed Troy […]

While the tech talk on Google’s acquisition of Motorola is all about patents, small business owner Gene Marks sees a nightmare of vertical integration ahead, forcing users to take sides. 

Days after dramatically returning from Saudi Arabia, President Ali Abdullah Salih did what he does in these situations: he gave a speech. The international media will likely lead with the […]

If we heard anything this winter from Eruptions readers in California like Diane, it was that it was snowy in the mountains. Very snowy. We’re talking 50-100% more than usual […]

Content on the Internet is growing like weed. Every minute there are 48h of video uploaded to YouTube. One year ago at a conference, Eric Schmidt shared that every two […]

On the morning of September 11th, 2001, artist Elena del Rivero was in her native Spain, far away from her second home in New York City. When the towers fell, […]

We live in the age of instant punditry, and I am as guilty of it as anyone else. On the basis of having reported from inside Libya three or four […]

I confess that I’m a marriage rubbernecker. I was a fiendish eavesdropper even as a young girl, much to my mother’s embarrassment, and the dubious habit has finally been put to good use.

As a native Vancouverite and a Canucks fan, I was heartbroken by the riots that followed Game 7 of the Stanley Cup final. Dave Zirin of The Nation has a […]

Neo liberalism is in crisis. Discuss. If only I were back at some red brick university and being asked this question by one of my lecturers! Neo liberalism is in […]

Early this morning, a number of prisoners escaped from a Yemeni central prison in the eastern coastal city of al-Mukalla. The details, as with most stories – particularly breaking ones […]

Obsessing over the injustices of Guantánamo Bay may become a surrogate for a wider hatred of America. But read the files and you’ll realise that obsession is the only humane response.

Is chaos the natural order for the innately diverse and fragmented nature of music and its associated industry, asks singer-songwriter Catherine Hol. 

A friendly, but unequivocal rebuttal by the authors of a recent policy paper on Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula to Gregory Johnsen’s critique of their suggested counterterrorism measures. 

Why and how online ad sites need to catch up in terms of aesthetics and usability. They should integrate social recommendations and filter the chaos, for starters.

It has now been one year since the eruption that closed the skies over Europe and captured the world’s attention. Before April 13-14, 2010, most people outside Iceland (or this […]

One of my favorite trend-watching e-newsletters has always been Jeremy Gutsche’s Trend Hunter – a site chock full of innovation that always seems to have its hand on the pulse […]

Get ready for a rocky year. From now on, rising prices, powerful storms, severe droughts and floods, and other unexpected events are likely to play havoc with the fabric of global society.

With governments toppling around the Middle East, what will this moment bring to bear on Iran? Its nuclear program continues while intervention is considered riskier than ever.

When it comes to design and innovation, the overwhelming consensus amongst practitioners is that “simplicity” is better than “complexity.” When Apple designed the iPod, simplicity of design and operation was […]

Essentially, Saudi Arabia has to make a choice: is it worse to have chaos and civil war in Yemen or to have yet another regime fall in the Middle East with all potential implications for Bahrain and at home?

In much the same way Hosni Mubarak (former president of Egypt) constantly and consistently made the argument that he was the only thing standing between Egypt and a radical Islamic […]

Embracing intellectual messiness goes against our instincts and training as educated people, but writers and artists should accept and understand it as crucial to the creative process.