Guest Thinkers

“Knowledge is limited,” Albert Einstein once said, “imagination encircles the world.” A new program at the CERN physics laboratory, home to the Large Hadron Collider, takes Einstein’s words as their […]

I write and tweet @DrDigipol about the intersection of politics and the digital. These days, digital touches everything. I suppose I could write about anything, then, but I tend to […]

Test writers should be challenged to address the fact that circumstances beyond your control influence how well you do a standardized test, says Shawn O’Connor. But you are not your score – and you have the power to improve your outcome. 

So TRAVEL AND LEISURE has ranked the place where I teach eighth in the nation in terms of beauty.  That’s news, of course, to those who have the leisure to travel […]

In 2005, 45% of gay, lesbian, or bisexual youth attempted suicide in the US, compared with 8% of heterosexual youth. Some individuals have gone on the record to say that […]

When we habituate to something, our physical and psychological response becomes so used to it that whatever the “it” is stops being arousing. 

The very nature of business school is at odds with the idea of creating tomorrow’s leaders, says Drew Hansen. M.B.A. students often lack the big picture as well as people skills. 

My latest article has been posted on AlterNet, Conservatives Want America to be a “Christian Nation” — Here’s What That Would Actually Look Like. In it, I analyze the “Christian […]

Steve Jobs’ death yesterday unloosed a torrent of well-deserved encomia to the man and his genius. Jobs’ abundant talents as an engineer, designer, and capitalist are beyond dispute. But did […]

Not much. At least, that’s what I think. Ron Rosenbaum discusses the question at length in a thorough and thoroughly interesting piece in Slate. Rosenbaum’s discussion confirms my impression that […]

Acute Leukemia was the first issue we fought against at Involver. I’m telling that story today because a great person, Amit Gupta, was just diagnosed with this disease. You can help […]

Companies like Apple need to constantly innovate just to maintain their present position. This is the harsh reality that businesses must face in the increasingly competitive global economy. Harvard Business School’s Linda Hill has advice for leaders in these challenging times. 

To be sure, our incompatible ideas of “work” and the workplace are a huge part of the problem. But so is the informal, perfectionist view that parenthood is something that swallows you up whole.

The theme of Turkle’s indispensable book is in its title.  It’s an old theme, originating, maybe, with the philosopher Rousseau.  Technological progress is at the expense of personal virtue and the relational […]

Today Swedish poet Tomas Tranströmer received the 2011 Nobel Prize in Literature, becoming the first Swedish winner since 1974 and the first umlauted winner since Herta Müller in 2009. The citation mentions […]

The world’s most expensive and complex ground-based telescope Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) has just offered its unique views of deep space, including images of two galaxies colliding, here:

In his new book, 1493, Charles Mann gives us a rich, nuanced account of how the Columbian Exchange continues to reunite the continents and globalize the world. 

–Guest post by Faizullah Jan, American University doctoral student. Single Page View “We are the 99%,” proclaim the protesters participating in the Occupy Wall Street marches and sit-ins.  Without a […]

For most people, there’s little difference between graffiti and street art.  To those within that circle, however, there’s a whole world of difference—even enough to drive them to destroy the […]

Steve Jobs, former chief executive officer and co-founder of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, told Stanford University graduates three stories about connecting the dots, love and death. “Remembering […]

At Big Think, we believe a video is worth a thousand words, especially in this case, when we are so very stunned by a life that was cut off so […]

My inaugural post on Big Think drew a wide range of opinions from commenters. (New site, new community! It takes some getting used to on both sides.) But this comment […]

Mourn for a day. Think Different for the rest of your life. That’s the only thing I can think of. I’m still speechless at the news that Steve Jobs has passed […]

If past trends are any guide, this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature will go to a post-postmodern Francophone novelist from a forgotten duchy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. And yet partisans […]

The winner of the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize will be announced this Friday, October 7th. Last week, a former Norwegian prime minister ignited speculation about this year’s winner by announcing, “It will be an interesting and very important prize … I think it will be well-received.” 

So the Big Think’s AGE OF ENGAGEMENT is advertising a showing of Carl Sagan’s hugely influential film CONTACT.  The film will be shown, appropriately enough, as an excellent example of how […]

Big Think’s newest blogger and atheist-in-residence, Adam Lee, asks magician and author Penn Jillette how he reconciles his atheism with his libertarian philosophy.

Readers in the Washington, DC area may be interested in this free event coming up at American University on Thurs. Oct. 27 and sponsored by the School of Communication.  A […]

Welcome, all, to the new Daylight Atheism! I’m pleased to be officially joining Big Think as a blogger-in-residence. Whether you’ve just come across this site or are a long-time reader […]

–Guest post by Jan Lauren Boyles, American University doctoral student. Eloquent eulogies have wistfully mourned the Ghosts of Journalism Past – the muckrakers, the ink-stained wretches and the shoe-leather reporters. The […]