You are browsing the Blog for Big Think.
Why US Aquatic Life Isn’t Doing So Well These Days
According to an Environmental Protection Agency report released Tuesday, 55 percent of the 1.2 million miles of river and stream lengths in the US are in poor biological condition for aquatic life. In addition, only 21 percent of waterways were given a rating of "good," down from 27 percent in 2004.
Mexico Gets Universal Health Care. Will the US?
What's the Latest Development? While Mexico's reformers admit there is still work to be done, the country as a whole has just crossed the goal line of offering universal health care. Like health care reform in the US, many Mexicans were skeptica...
Air Pollution Causes Heart Attacks
What's the Latest Development? A new survey of air pollutants from cities all over the world takes the broadest look yet at how breathing harmful chemicals affects the heart. The results are dramatic. Even short term exposure, defined by the stu...
Women Would Lead a More Peaceful World
What's the Latest Development? Were more women in positions of political power, the Earth would be a more peaceful place, says former secretary of defense Joseph Nye. Referencing Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker's latest book, Nye says women's...
Support African Americans for Humanism
As NPR recently reported, there's a high price to pay for being a black atheist in America. African Americans who come out of the closet as nonreligious may be cut off by their own families, may be labeled a "race traitor" or an "apostate", or accused ...
Good Health Is Knowing How to Eat
What's the Latest Development? Health experts, including a Harvard nutritionist, believe a healthier body is achieved by concentrating on how we eat, not just the kinds of food we consume. Called 'mindful eating', the practice has its roots in B...
Clean Water is the Best Prophylactic
"The most fecund population on the planet is the rural poor," Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler observe in their recent book Abundance: The Future is Better Than You Think . Demographers have found alarming birth rates in the developing world, and ...
Forget Search Engines: Web 3.0 Is a Knowledge Engine
What's the Latest Development? The Semantic Web, also known as the Web 3.0, is set to come of age this week when a powerful data crunching service becomes available to the public. Wolfram Alpha has been online since 2009 but has had trouble gai...
Income Disparity Tops the List of Global Risks
Severe income disparity and fiscal imbalances are the biggest threats to globalization, according to the 2012 Global Risks report released last week. The content of the report will be on the agenda for the annual World Economic Forum taking place in...
Study: If You Like a Food’s Politics, You’ll Find It More Nutritious
Anything "organic" or "low-fat" must be good for you, right? Ask people how fattening those organic chocolate-covered peanuts are, and they'll guess a lower number than they did for the non-organic version. They'll also eat more than they would have ot...
