Culture & Religion — April 29, 2010

Multilingual City

Experts believe that New York City is home to as many as 800 languages, many of which are heard more commonly in the five boroughs than anywhere else.

bigthinkeditor

“New York the most linguistically diverse city in the world,” home to “a remarkable trove of endangered tongues … born in every corner of the globe and now more commonly heard in various corners of New York than anywhere else.” Experts believe that New York is home to as many as 800 languages, and Daniel Kaufman, an adjunct professor of linguistics at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, has helped start a project to identify and record dying languages.

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.

Up Next

Guest Thinkers

Lucky Charms

New research indicates that superstition may be able to influence the outcome of event. Study subjects who were told they were playing with a “lucky” golf ball, on average, sank more putts.