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The renowned magician recently joined Big Think CEO and cofounder Victoria Brown for a wide-ranging discussion.

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At Big Think, we capture the thoughts of the world’s most brilliant thinkers.

 Building Big Think from little more than an idea to 30 million monthly visitors, co-founder Victoria Rachel Montgomery-Brown knows something about being an entrepreneur. Her idea, together with co-founder Peter […]

New York, NY 11/9/18

A seismic shake-up at a venerable literary gatekeeper. Shallow and not-so-shallow consumerism. The Paris Review’s new editor on old ghosts, new voices, and what’s worth keeping.

If you’ve ever heard that there are differences between the “left and right brain”, you can blame Michael Gazzaniga. His new work aims at closing the gap between the meat of the brain and the magic of consciousness, and maybe saving us a lot of future headaches.

Where do cultures come from? The answer is as old as life itself.

God, guns, sex, and mutually exclusive concepts of liberty. The Way Brothers’ Netflix docuseries Wild, Wild Country tells a story that’s about as American as it gets.

Love is like umami. Adulthood is accepting the schmo you are. Wordplay and worldbuilding with novelist Meg Wolitzer.

There’s got to be a thousand ways to reclaim the past, but for Tara Westover, story was the only one that could contain all of it.

We are all of us held together by words.

The myths of an inhospitable land. Imposter Syndrome. That feeling when one of your characters unexpectedly murders another. Literary mage Neil Gaiman on the dark arts of fiction and everyday life.

Dammit, Spock, can your cold, calculating reason fathom the mysteries of the human heart?

Think you’re “post-tribal”? Think again. Attorney and “tiger mom” Amy Chua on groupthink in America and abroad.

Terraforming Mars. Beaming your consciousness to Alpha Centauri. It’s the end of the world as we know it, and Dr. Kaku feels fine.

A bracing splash of cold Laphroaig in the face of some of our biggest misconceptions, from historian Niall Ferguson.   

Wild boars in the sewers of London. Augmented humans of the future. Jason’s high school friend, celebrated children’s author Jacob Sager Weinstein, on imaginary histories and possible futures. 

Bret Weinstein says that we’re at the end of a massive technological and geographic boom, and that we should prepare for the next step in our societal evolution. Yet the future may not be optimistic for all. A cultural backlash to change, he says, is inevitable.

The virtual reality that’s coming is like nothing we’ve ever experienced. Now’s the time to decide what it’s good for. 

If your vision is clear, everything is revelatory. The author of “My Struggle” on writing his way into life. 

  The stories we wrap around ourselves, our neighbors. our children. The invisible stories we struggle against.   

While the unchecked ego might be popular at parties, it can get us into all kinds of trouble. Mark Epstein, MD combines psychotherapy and Buddhism to help people live with the self. 

Fatih Akin has first-hand experience of strong cultural cross-winds. Ethnically Turkish and raised in Germany, he has made many films dealing with sudden dislocation and how people respond to it. 

100,000 years of human history and young adulthood is still getting weirder. Noël Wells on art, power, and our super dark times. 

When was the last time you were well and truly bored? If you can’t remember, you’re not alone. Manoush Zomorodi on what our brains really need, and what they’re getting. 

Terrorism. Technological disruption. Globalization. Life in the 1870’s was wild. Harvard historian Maya Jasanoff on Joseph Conrad, his times, and ours.