Guest Thinkers — April 4, 2011

Civil War Simmers in Ivory Coast

The United Nations has started to evacuate its staff from Abidjan, the commercial capital of Ivory Coast, ahead of a bloody final battle for the city that is expected to start today.

bigthinkeditors

The Ivory Coast began a slow descent into civil war last year when former president Laurent Gbagbo refused to step down after losing a popular election to the now president-elect Alassane Ouattara. Now the city of Abidjan, the country’s commercial capital, is at the center of a gruesome battle for control. France has taken control of the country’s airports to allow for evacuations of foreign nationals, and while tens of thousands of U.N. peace keepers have been deployed to West Africa, the international community’s response to Ivory Coast has been much less forceful than the no-fly zone it imposed on Libya.

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.

▸

7 min

—

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

Yemen’s Leader Must Go, Says U.S.

In a reversal of the long support Yemen’s president has received from the U.S., the Obama administration has quietly told allies it is time for regime change in the Gulf state.