Search
Science and Tech
The great books aren’t just classics — they’re cultural Schelling points that give our minds a place to meet up in the world of ideas.
The first world beyond Earth for human habitability should be the Moon, not Mars. This is why we should terraform our lunar neighbor first.
Fibonacci’s "Liber Abaci" not only revolutionized commerce — it also helped nudge the world towards reasoned, quantitative enquiry.
Times dilate and lengths contract near the speed of light. Bizarre and confusing? Sure. But under relativity, it can't be any other way.
In this excerpt from "The Shortest History of AI," Toby Walsh explores the history of the Logic Theorist, the first AI to prove mathematical theorems.
Stellar streams are faint trails of stars that appear to "stream" out of galaxies. A new one, escaping galaxy M61, may point to many others.
How did Jobs revolutionize tech, not once but continually? Aspiring innovators — and today's Apple — should look to The Bard and seek out singularity.
When dying, Sun-like stars have binary companions, spectacular sights arise from the ionization. JWST spots the Red Spider Nebula in action!
There's some, but not overwhelming, evidence that dark energy is evolving. What would it take for a "Big Crunch" to be our cosmic fate?
Scientists are notoriously resistant to new ideas. Are they falling prey to groupthink? Or are our current theories just that successful?
Maybe — just don't expect a carbon copy.
Physicist Daniel Whiteson challenges the notion that all intelligent species would eventually uncover the same laws of nature. Do you agree?
Rivals may try to outnumber us with fleets of cheap vessels. Our path is to out-innovate them.
Wales shares with Big Think his thoughts about the future of media, the promise of AI, and our need to build a culture on trust.
Introverts have social batteries that will drain over time, but they can be recharged with good energy hygiene. Here’s how.
Nearly 100 years after being theorized, the strange behavior of the neutrino still mystifies us. They could be even stranger than we know.
An ode to the data visualization tools that help us see what is too vast, complex, or interconnected for the naked eye — from planetary systems to pandemic trends.
The planet, the Solar System, and the galaxy aren't expanding. But the whole Universe is. So where does the dividing line begin?
A look at how criminals are using unrestricted chatbots and how cyber defenders are fighting back.
Natural navigator Tristan Gooley joins us to discuss the philosophy of reading nature’s hidden clues — and how relearning this ancient skill can help us see the world, and ourselves, with greater awareness.
Welcome to The Nightcrawler — a weekly newsletter from Eric Markowitz covering tech, innovation, and long-term thinking.
Dark matter has never been directly detected, but the astronomical evidence for its existence is overwhelming. Here's what to know.
Investment in quantum is growing. Anastasia Marchenkova wants to make sure funders still ask the tough questions.
In this excerpt from "One Hand Clapping," Nikolay Kukushkin makes the case that neurons reveal how memory, meaning, and even consciousness emerge from the same biological roots in humans, sea slugs, and beyond.
Red dwarfs are the Universe's most common star type. Their flaring now makes potentially Earth-like worlds uninhabitable, but just you wait.
It's time to write the human genome, argues microbiologist Andrew Hessel.
Found by Hubble before JWST's launch, GNz7q looked like a mix of a galaxy and a quasar. Was it actually our first known "little red dot"?
Bold megaprojects could turn dry depressions into thriving new hubs of life.
Observations with the Hubble space telescope helped cement dark energy and reveal the Hubble tension. How are these two things so different?
The whole isn't greater than the sum of its parts; that's a flaw in our thinking. Non-reductionism requires magic, not merely science.