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Cities live forever, while companies die all the time. As Jonah Lehrer points out in this video, the design ethos of the city is human-centered. The kinds of interactions that happen in cities make us more productive, whereas companies tend to silo knowledge, rely on old ideas, and then die off.

The Matrix is real… and everyone here at NASA for the GSP has taken the red pill.  If you recall in the movie, Neo is startled, puzzled, and quite frankly […]

Americans for the past decade seem more caught up than ever in the idea of what it is to be an American, especially in an election year and perhaps never […]

Fashion never sleeps apparently, and nowhere is that more apparent than in Asia where lifestyle related online start-ups are springing up faster than you can say “buy me that Birkin.” […]

When the Concorde was retired in 2003, our technological ambitions had been checked by practical concerns about noise, cost and fuel consumption. Today, engineers are working on new solutions. 

Our power was out all weekend, along with that of millions of other electricity refugees.  Our city’s patience and civility were fraying. Cannibalism loomed just around the corner, so my […]

The Being Human Conference, which took place at San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts this weekend, was designed to explore the science of human experience. The speakers ranged from neuroscientists, […]

The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, or SETI, is turning to individual citizen-scientists to help fine-tune its complex algorithms that search for patterns in noise received from space. 

A quiet suburban street set in the leafy suburbs of Cheadle, Manchester, Northern England on Monday, witnessed a coming together of a former Leader of Manchester City Council, Labour MP Graham Stringer […]

David LaChapelle changed the course of his career from commercial photography to fine art because “I want pictures that shine a light on this time we live in” rather than just add to “the distraction and the noise,” he says. 

Right after my recent post on “psychopunditry,” I came across signs of this kerfuffle between the writer Jonah Lehrer and the psychologist Christopher Chabris (not to be confused with this […]

As I’ve written before, I’m a skeptical of claims, like Jonathan Gottschall’s, about the power of stories to make us better people. Adam Gopnik of The New Yorkeris skeptical too. […]

The news service for the College of Life Sciences at the University of Wisconsin has a good summary of a recent article at The Scientist by several colleagues who spotlight […]

Clay Johnson, author of The Information Diet, says you can’t rely on “the media” or the internet to control your information consumption. Here he suggests a few pieces of software that have helped him to regulate his own information diet. 

Near the end of his 2001 book, Does America Need a Foreign Policy?, Henry Kissinger quotes Otto von Bismarck’s observation about the limits of diplomacy: “The best a statesman can […]

Intro This post may be mostly about what’s happening in gaming culture, but it concerns online conduct in general.  Some background: online video blogger, Anita Sarkeesian, started a campaign to […]

A new book dispels some popular myths about the difference between introverts and extroverts. In the modern age, the author explains, our culture has shifted to valuing extroverts.

At the end of a long and weary day, with the last drops of twilight bleeding out of the darkening midsummer sky, I turned my key in the lock of […]

Kids, want to be an artist when you grow up? We’ve got a check-list for how to tell your parents. Parents, oh no, you accidentally raised an artist? Don’t despair: […]

The New York Giants won the Super Bowl and now they will get their parade down New York City’s Canyon of Heroes. And yet, according to Paul Rieckhoff, there’s another parade […]

What is the Big Idea? Vladimir Putin’s waning popularity is prompting the opposition to allege that voter fraud is the primary explanation for his inevitable win in Sunday’s presidential elections. […]

The ability to sustain focus is one of the building blocks of organization. It is step two in our process to help you become more organized. The first step is to establish emotional control—to “tame the frenzy.” Now we are ready to take the next step—to sustain attention and to stay focused for greater lengths of time.    

Like doctors, artists should obey one rule above all, “To do no harm.” When you’re Christo and you specialize in “environmental art,” that rule takes on an even greater importance. […]

Pay attention, get focused, be vigilant, stay on task, keep your eye on the ball, listen up, get your head in the game: these are just a few of the […]

Tomorrow, February 21, will mark the last day of President Ali Abdullah Salih’s nearly 34 years in power, at least officially. In his place, Yemenis will head to the polls […]

     Here is a version of The Trolley Problem, a classic experiment in ethics. Let’s say you are next to some train tracks, and down the tracks and behind a […]

     Here is a version of The Trolley Problem, a classic experiment in ethics. Let’s say you are next to some train tracks, and down the tracks and behind a […]

In Defence of Hamza Kashgari The chalk outline of societal protection is increasingly being coloured in by personal offense and we’re left with a corpse called justice. Yet, whatever name […]

If you ever want to make even the most cosmopolitan of your friends speechless, telling them you have volunteered to travel to Newark, New Jersey, so you can masturbate to orgasm in an fMRI is a great way to start.  Once they overcome the shock, chances are they will start to ask questions. Most I was able to answer.

BY ABHIJNAN REJ A Jurassic Park in the Canary Wharf? On the 6th of May, 2010, at around 2:45 pm, the Dow fell unusually  rapidly losing over 9% of its […]