Personal Growth — May 19, 2010

Wax Wings

Moral dogmatism is the true enemy of free thought, says Jonah Goldberg, not ideology; attention to the facts must supersede commitment to a scripted morality.

bigthinkeditor

Moral dogmatism is the true enemy of free thought, says Jonah Goldberg, not ideology; attention to the facts must supersede commitment to a scripted morality. “We are taught to believe that ideology is the enemy of free thought. But that’s not right. Ideology is a mere checklist of principles and priorities. The real enemy of clear thinking is the script.”

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

The Arab Future

“The Arab world today is ruled by contradiction,” writes David Ottaway; extreme wealth surrounded by crushing poverty will determine the culture’s future.