Guest Thinkers

“Life,” my brother-in-law tells me, “is 90 percent maintenance.” I’ve no complaints about my husband’s chore contribution in our marriage. Our “dreariness index” as I call it seems fair enough. […]

Notre Dame philosopher Gary Gutting examines the extent to which the American system of government is democratic. Drawing on Plato’s five kinds of government–aristocracy, timarchy, oligarchy, democracy, and tyranny (we […]

A new experimental cancer vaccine that targets the immune system has shown some early progress in improving survival in women with metastatic breast or ovarian cancer.

The Republican presidential debates have accomplished the impossible. President Obama, despite the terrible economy, now looks like a strong contender for re-election. This year’s Republican debates have all the essential […]

After a French doctor extracted stem cells from a patient’s bone marrow to create blood artificially, the cells were pumped into the patient’s body for a successful transfusion.

“As a man is,” wrote William Blake, “so he sees. As the eye is formed, such are its powers.” No doubt my tumultuous childhood is a part of the reason […]

A drug born of a revolutionary approach to cancer treatment causes rapid weight loss and improved metabolic function in monkeys, scientists have found.

Here’s some miscellany to accompany your morning coffee: • 70 major U.S. corporations and civic organizations call for DOMA to be struck down in a friend-of-the-court brief supporting a federal […]

Your whole life, reduced to a single number. That’s the goal of an increasing number of companies that are attempting to analyze specific aspects of your life and quantify certain […]

Whatever the facts of the crimes in this week’s pair of institutional scandals (and it bears saying that trials in the Afghanistan “kill team” case are ongoing, while Jerry Sandusky […]

Math Problem for Today: 111111 X 111111 = ? Follow Daniel Honan on Twitter @DanielHonan

This post was written by Preetika Rana and originally published on the Wall Street Journal blog India Real Time. Recent claims that the Taj Mahal is in danger of collapsing […]

A new venture aims to foster stability in war-torn regions through an act of creative destruction: acquiring AK-47s and transforming them into rare jewelry, watches and accessories.

At Pennsylvania State University, morality has taken a back seat to football glory. How could academic leadership have failed so spectacularly in the face of overtly reprehensible behavior?

Grosset & Dunlap/Price Stern Sloan President and Publisher Francesco Sedita had a meeting with his entire team of editors, art directors and designers recently. The subject? A mustache. “We’ve been […]

In my previous post, I quoted the letter I wrote to John Buehrens, Unitarian Universalist minister, to ask if he stood behind the anti-atheist denunciations in his book A Chosen […]

As I’ve told you before, we’re having this big conference at Berry College funded by the Science of Virtues Project at the University of Chicago on November 17-18. We’re going […]

In today’s article I would like to share a video of my old friend Jon Bischke who recently gave a talk on TEDxManhattanBeach about his thoughts on combining the Learning […]

The multi-million dollar estates of the stars in Beverly Hills and the “abandominiums” of impoverished neighborhoods in rustbelt cities such as my own of Baltimore have something in common: they’re […]

Why do American voters remain prejudiced against atheists, especially when groups like Mormons hold beliefs that are equally incompatible with mainstream Christianity?

It is remarkably easy to report false-positive findings, or results that support an effect that, in reality, does not (or may not) exist.

Of all the surreal moments in the Penn State sex scandal surrounding the actions of former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, the most surreal for me was watching on a […]

The Telesar V Robot Avatar delivers touch, audio and sight data to its human operator from a remote location using a series of sensors and a 3-D head-mounted display.

Whether you see him as Herman Cain, The Herminator, or Herman the Horrible—any way you slice it, the Cain Controversy owns the GOP presidential nominee narrative for the foreseeable future. 

Joe Therrien, an OWS activist and semi-employed drama teacher, has become infamous since the Nation included him in an article on “The Audacity of Occupy Wall Street,” which began like […]

The International Energy Agency, known for its typically conservative estimates when it comes to climate change, has produced a disturbingly gloomy report on the future of the planet.

While I voted yesterday, I thought about the Occupy movement.  As I cast a “yes” ballot for the right to buy alcoholic beverages on Sundays at package shops in John’s […]

Under a new energy proposal from the Obama administration, the Atlantic and Pacific coasts would remain off-limits to further oil drilling schemes but the Arctic would be opened up.

Will the people sounding dramatic warnings about the latest risk-du-jour ever realize that in some cases the fear they cause may well do more harm than whatever it is they’re […]

“There’s always an opportunity to give money, if that’s an option,” says Mary Ellen Iskenderian. “But giving money is just not sufficient.”