A few thoughts on your lazy brain. But just a few because, well, you know, the brain likes things nice and easy. The brain normally operates on what […]
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The incredible story of a single simple atom, that just happens to be in your body right now! Image credit: Richard Crisp, via http://www.narrowbandimaging.com/incoming/horse_ap155edf_pl39k_lrgb_15hrs.jpg. “The atoms come into my brain, […]
The wreck of the General Slocum in 1904 broke the spirit of Manhattan’s German enclave
Summer is coming, and with it, the most famous nebula in the night sky. “The self-same atoms which, chaotically dispersed, made the nebula, now, jammed and temporarily caught in peculiar positions, […]
We Earthlings have lots of growing up to do before we reach the shimmering standard of equality set by Starfleet and the United Federation of Planets.
100 years ago, we thought the Milky Way was the full extent of the Universe, containing everything. Now, we know we’re just one of many. But how many? “The human mind […]
The mechanism for changing your mindset through messaging is the same as for changing a physical behavior: a targeted and limited resolution practiced relentlessly until it becomes automatic.
History shows that both those who do not learn history and those who do learn history are doomed to repeat it.
Growing up, I fell in love with Science Fiction watching reruns of Star Trek, the version now known to fans as “The Original Series.” The storylines and (then state of […]
With rare exception, neuroscientists cannot yet translate aberrant brain functions into the legal requirements for criminal responsibility—intent, rational capacity and self-control.
The appeal of the British drama/high-class soap opera Downton Abbey for American audiences has long been a subject of great speculation. Simon Schama called the show “cultural necrophilia” for bringing […]
To condemn the riots that rocked Belfast last Friday as “shameful”, as the British Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Theresa Villiers has done, fails to address the two conflicting […]
We imagine our view of the world like a painting from the Realism movement – rife with detail and comprehensible – but the contents of our conscious mind are more […]
Maybe you’ve never heard of Emmaland or Sophialand, but if you’re reading this in the United States, there’s a better than 90% chance that you live in either one of […]
Waiting in line to pay admission late last month at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City in a sea of heavy-winter-coated humanity, I asked myself why this […]
In honor of Earth Day, I wanted to share an article written by my former colleague Ross Robertson for EnlightenNext magazine called “A Brighter Shade of Green: Rebooting Environmentalism for the 21stCentury.” […]
“All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell….what I’ve come to learn is […]
Fellow pseudonymous neuroblogger Neuroskeptic(to whom I owe a great deal in inspiration) has published a fantastic piece in Trends in Cognitive Sciences ($) on the benefits to science of anonymity. Last November Neuroskeptic became […]
It was this map of Greenland that triggered this post. I say map, but I mean hole in a drainpipe. This picture was sent in by Ruland Kolen, who was […]
To celebrate her Jubilee year, the Queen had a large chunk of Antarctica named after her; possibly upsetting the Argentinians and Chileans.
According to The Independent, a recent Yale-Moscow State University study has found “a modest but statistically significant familiality and heritability element to creative writing.” The conclusion was based on an evaluation […]
Using a two-stage approach that builds on the work of William James, Harvard astrophysicist Robert Doyle says freedom is compatible with even highly determined physical systems.
Imagine that you are making your way through a dense jungle. Thick vegetation makes it difficult to see more than few feet in front of you. Suddenly, you break through […]
William Souder’s 2004 biography of John James Audobon, Under a Wild Sky, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. His newest book, On a Farther Shore, chronicles the life and […]
For Washington, DC readers, Politics & Prose will be hosting a book event Sunday, June 10 at 1pm relevant to many of the themes discussed at this blog. Details below. America the […]
On the one day that we think the most about mothers, grandmothers, godmothers, and all other motherly types, it seems appropriate to ask what is the greatest Mother’s Day portrait […]
In the avalanche of analysis and speculation about Chief Justice Roberts’ stunning decision to side with the Supreme Court’s liberal wing to uphold Obama’s healthcare law, one strain paints Roberts […]
“Philosopher” is one of those job descriptions in America that brings inevitable jokes about unemployability. Carlin Romano’s new book, America the Philosophical, aims at transforming the Rodney Dangerfield of academic […]
Interview with Jason Silva by Frank Rose One afternoon recently I spent a couple of hours with Jason Silva, the longtime Current TV host who’s been making much-talked-about micro-videos about the […]