Stories of German film director Werner Herzog’s calm under pressure are legendary. Not only did he continue an on-camera interview after being shot in the stomach by a sniper, but he saved Joaquin Phoenix from a car wreck that could have exploded.
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Who knew that Jorge Luis Borges, the great Argentine fiction writer and maestro of high literary culture, was a Martian Chronicles fan? Now that you know, doesn’t it seem fitting? […]
There are so many things wrong with this story. First, a children’s author parodied the famous Aesop fable of The Tortoise and the Hare, substituting a pineapple for the tortoise. […]
Remember the 1960s? It was a decade so radical that even the President of the United States could publically declare that public funding of contraceptives would increase economic prosperity. Lyndon […]
Today’s breaking news was, of course, that the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as “Obamacare”. In what will doubtless go down in American history […]
It’s obvious why we are motivated to eat, drink and reproduce; the origins of our desire to push musical boundaries, on the other hand, are less clear.
With affordable genomic testing within reach, should you rush out to have your genome sequenced? Probably not, say medical experts. The tests in and of themselves will be of limited use.
UPDATE: Steve Jobs famously said, “Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life.” I wanted […]
Given that the brain’s synaptic components last but a short time, it has been a mystery to scientists how the brain stores memories, which can last nearly an entire lifetime.
Are we somehow becoming “more than human”?
I’ve been thinking in speculative directions lately, and nothing is more speculative than the question of whether we’ll one day be able to extend the human lifespan. The notion of […]
If you asked me how being a single parent has affected my economic prospects I would have to say for the worse…and for the best. You see, while parenting young […]
On the one day that we think the most about mothers, grandmothers, godmothers, and all other motherly types, it seems appropriate to ask what is the greatest Mother’s Day portrait […]
“Are great musician born or made?” That question was posed by Gary Marcus, who at the age of 38, wondered if he could overcome a lifetime of musical failure – […]
In this Q&A with Dr. Meg Jay, the clinical psychologist explains why the twenties matter, and how to make the most of them.
by Nika Sabasteanski (guest blogger) Immanuel Kant proposes a one-ingredient recipe for enlightenment: freedom. Provide individuals with the freedom to use public rationality, give them the tools to escape their […]
Want something else to worry about? Worry about worrying too much. The evidence is building that chronically elevated stress shrinks your brain! A study in press at the […]
A recent article suggests that allowing polygyny would increase violent crime to such a degree that it would stifle economic growth. This is a logical conclusion if you assume that […]
Without feeling like the victim of my own lust, I experienced freedom for the first time in my life.
Last week, the blogosphere was in an uproar over a sermon given by a North Carolina pastor, Sean Harris, who seemingly advised parents to beat their children if they show […]
What separates the greatest achievers from the rest of us?
The Boston Review is hosting a forum centered the claim of Michael Sandel, a Harvard political theorist, that “markets crowd out morals.” Sandel’s essay is well worth reading. He clearly gives voice to […]
The former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, characterized “cyber” as an “existential threat to the United States of America” in a recent issue of Fortune […]
Why is democracy so difficult? Could be because it demands that each of us accept, as the anthropologist Clifford Geertz said to me way back when I wrote this, “that […]
In 1962, the latest and greatest form of artificial illumination was invented; the light emitting diode (LED). In recent years, they have reached a level of illumination suitable for most applications of indoor lighting.
Does knowing that sweets are dulces in Spanish help a child learn to resist a tasty treat? It may indeed, as people who learn two languages gain cognitive advantages that extend well beyond the ability to communicate with others.
What’s the Big Idea? There’s a revolution going on in neuroscience, says science writer Kayt Sukel, and it’s happening on two fronts. One way the science is changing: researchers are […]
What’s the Big Idea? The idea of “brain training” conjures up visions of children playing educational computer games and senior citizens solving Sudoku puzzles, but a great workout for the […]
The buzz surrounding physicist Stephen Hawking‘s newest experiments with communication technology has been a bit overexuberant, along the lines of “new technology could help Stephen Hawking communicate via brain waves!” […]
The troubling chronicle of blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng has me thinking about the trial of another dissident who faced a life-changing dilemma of his own 2411 years ago in […]