Guest Thinkers — August 16, 2010

Framing Science Goes to Venice, Italy

Tonight I board a plane for Venice, Italy where I will be presenting as part of an expert workshop on science communication, sponsored by the EU, Istituto Veneto di Scienze, observa Science in Society, and the University of Trent.

Some of the top European researchers in the field will be at the workshop, so I hope to be able to report on innovative ideas and themes from the two day event. And for those that read Italian, I have an op-ed appearing in tomorrow’s edition of La Stampa, focusing on new directions in science communication. More on that to come.

a computer generated image of a human brain.

Thinking

The great free will debate featuring Michio Kaku and Steven Pinker

Who — or what — really controls your mind?

Building destroyed by the Halifax Explosion. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

The Past

The largest accidental explosion of all time

More than a century ago, Halifax suffered an accidental blast one-fifth the size of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

a collage of photos of a man with a hat and a book.

High Culture

6 great books with wildly unreliable narrators

Dive into the twisted truths and concealed realities told by literature’s most unreliable narrators.

a group of five matches on a pink background.

The Well

Signs you’re burned out — and how to bounce back

If you don’t feel better after the weekend, the “burnout paradox” could explain why.

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7 min

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with

Laurie Santos

Starts With A Bang

The trick to instantly identifying JWST images

If you can identify a foreground star, the spike patterns are a dead giveaway as to whether it’s a JWST image or any other observatory.

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