With controversial headline “This brazen Islam” a French magazine in 2012 claimed Muslims were infiltrating hospitals, cafeterias, swimming pools, schools
Commentators in France and elsewhere have taken the recent terrorist attacks in Paris as an occasion to reflect more broadly about Muslims in France. Many read the attacks as a sign of French Muslims…
The unfinished Crazy Horse memorial in Custer County, South Dakota.
Bernd00/Wikimedia Commons
More than a century after he died, the Lakota warrior Crazy Horse, who famously fought General Custer in the Battle of Little Bighorn, is thought of as transcendent force – attuned to the universe in a…
Selfish, cooperative – or doesn’t understand the rules of the game?
Woman image via www.shutterstock.com.
Behavioral economists have revolutionized the standard view of human nature. No longer are people presumed to be purely selfish, only acting in their own interest. Hundreds of experiments appear to show…
The sex ratio in your community may affect what you’re looking for in a relationship.
Hearts image via www.shutterstock.com.
The US’s top auto safety agency last week fined Japanese car company Honda Motor a record US$70 million for failing to report hundreds of fatal accidents and injuries over the last 11 years. The unfiled…
Easier access to marijuana doesn’t necessarily lead to more addicts.
Image of person smoking via Stanimir G.Stoev/Shutterstock
At present, cannabis is fully legalized in Colorado and Washington and will soon be fully legalized in Oregon and Alaska. Additionally, medical cannabis is legal in 23 states. The writing is on the wall…
A depot used to store pipes for Transcanada Corp’s planned Keystone XL oil pipeline is seen in Gascoyne, North Dakota.
Andrew Cullen/Reuters
Big energy infrastructure projects – power plants, coal mines, long distance transmission lines – take time, resources and, typically, some political muscle. They create highly visible if short-lived construction…
The aftermath of a double suicide bombing in Kano, Nigeria
Stringer/Reuters
Ethan Zuckerman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Consider two tragic events that took place last week. A small cell of Islamic terrorists attacked cartoonists at the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and shoppers in a Paris supermarket, killing 17 people…
Prices of gas are approaching $2 a gallon. Does that make it a good time to raise the gas tax?
Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
It is well known that the US has a major infrastructure problem with our national highway system. Many of our bridges are in a very poor state of repair and highway maintenance is not keeping up with needs…
During these dark winter months, spare a thought for artificial lights. From strings of lights adding holiday cheer to artificial sunlamps alleviating seasonal affective disorder, they brighten our days…
Greece is again making headlines, and markets are concerned the euro crisis is back. Actually, the crisis never left. It is just that for a little while both the authorities and the markets chose to cherish…
But can the promise be delivered? President Obama at Pellissippi State College in Knoxville, TN
Kevin Lamarque/Reuters
Last week, President Barack Obama announced a proposal to guarantee that students could attend a community college for free for their first two years. The announcement was one in a series of previews of…
How dissent is being dealt with in Egypt
Abd El Ghany/Reuters
The deadly attack in Paris by French Islamists with ties to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) provokes several basic responses. One major response is a broad affirmation that the actions of the violent…
In states like Massachusetts, heroin overdoses have skyrocketed in recent years.
vidguten/Shutterstock
In the 1930s, Harry J. Anslinger, the first head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, embarked on a fierce anti-marijuana campaign. Highlighted by the 1936 anti-marijuana film Reefer Madness – where marijuana…
Tourism isn’t just for sunshine and beaches. It can also be for unapproved medical interventions.
IV via ARZTSAMUI/Shutterstock
Medical tourism is the practice of seeking medical care across international borders. Countries with established medical sectors like the US, Europe, India and Thailand have been traditional destinations…
A screenshot from the account while under hostile control.
Reuters
The Twittersphere is abuzz about the news on Monday that ISIS or their affiliates are suspected of hacking and compromising the US Central Command’s official Twitter account. As of Monday afternoon in…
A demonstrator is held down during a simulation of waterboarding outside the Justice Department in 2007.
Reuters
The release of the CIA Torture Report in December re-opened the debate about using contractors to perform national security functions. Indeed, when Saturday Night Live mocks contractors for their role…
Tri colored bat with white-nose syndrome.
Pete Pattavina
It’s been roughly eight years since white-nose syndrome (WNS) was first documented decimating bat populations in upstate New York. The disease is caused by the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans which…
Before patients can state their preferences about dying, they need to talk about them first.
Doctor and patient via michaeljung/Shutterstock
Conversations around end-of-life medical care can be challenging. Consider someone I’ll call Mrs. Jones, an elderly patient with advanced heart disease. When her doctor asked her to discuss the kind of…
At this moment, there are likely many eyes on you. If you are reading this article in a public place, a surveillance camera might be capturing your actions and even watching you enter your login information…
Laughter and violence have two things in common: they’re both non-verbal and they both occur when words fail.
Cloud Mine Amsterdam/Shutterstock
It should come as no surprise that comedians would feel threatened by the attack on Charlie Hebdo: the freedom to offend is the source of their livelihood, and many who have offended have been threatened…
A man holds a placard reading “I am Charlie” to pay tribute to the victims following a shooting by gunmen at the offices of weekly newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris.
Reuters
The media spotlight on Cherif Kouachi’s life rekindles questions about prisons and radicalization. As an alleged participant of the Charlie Hebdo attacks, Kouachi has seemingly led many lives. In one incarnation…
Solidarity with France and Charlie Hebdo in Taipei.
Pichi Chuang/Reuters
In his 1998 novel, The Elementary Particles, Michel Houellebecq argued that Charlie Hebdo played a pivotal role in the redefinition of social values in post-1968 France. For self-appointed troublemaker…
Award-winning French author Michel Houellebecq is no stranger to controversy.
kojoku/Shutterstock
When gunmen (thought to be radicalized Muslims) burst into the offices of Charlie Hebdo on the morning of January 7, the front page of the satirical newspaper’s most recent edition featured a caricature…
The movie Selma takes King – best known to Americans as an orator – and turns him into an organizer.
Wikimedia Commons
It’s been almost 60 years since Martin Luther King, Jr. became a household name during the 1955-1956 Montgomery Bus Boycott, and some may find it astonishing that, until the recent release of Selma, he’s…