Technology & Innovation — April 11, 2014

10 Facts About Bitcoin

Bitcoin is the virtual currency that’s all the craze right now. It even has some powerful allies, like Overstock.com’s C.E.O. Patrick Byrne whose popular shopping site accepts Bitcoin and promotes reward programs to push the use of the currency.

But as Daniel Altman wrote for Big Think, there’s still so much we don’t know about Bitcoin, indicating potential problems.

Subscribe for counterintuitive, surprising, and impactful stories delivered to your inbox every Thursday

Here are 10 things we do know, including some facts about Bitcoin that may surprise you:

Videos

“I don’t have imposter syndrome and neither do you”

An inclusion expert explains why women of color are held back.

▸

7 min

—

with

Ruchika Tulshyan

The Present

Why GPT-3 and other AI language models write pseudo-profound bullshit

While text-generating AI can be very useful in some applications, it generates pseudo-profound bullshit — that is, content that sounds good to humans but whose truth value is unknown.

Neuropsych

Study shows people more likely to lie when using a laptop instead of a smartphone

While most participants fibbed a little bit, laptop users were much more likely to lie – and by a lot more.

Starts With A Bang

Why the Moon’s two faces are so different

The far side of the Moon is incredibly different from the Earth-facing side. 63 years later, we know why the Moon’s faces are not alike.

Neuropsych

Even your hands betray your emotions

If you’re trying to hide how you feel about something, be careful with your hands.

Up Next

This is Your Brain on Ukraine: Can People Be ‘Nudged’ Away From Crazy Behavior in a Conflict?

Over the past few years, government has discovered that it can accomplish a lot when it sets aside the notion that human beings are rational. Rather than giving people good […]