The Senate report on torture found that the “enhanced techniques” used by the CIA were ineffective as a mechanism for gathering intelligence. In fact, the report stated there was no actionable intelligence…
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Alexander von Humboldt – sometimes called the last Renaissance man – was born in Berlin 250 years ago. His influence on science is still felt today.
A beautiful assassin. A superstrong thug. A star-lost child of the ‘80s. A sentient tree. A gun-toting raccoon. Meet the morally gray protagonists of Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy, the film that raked…
About three years ago, a teenage girl was talking with me and other students about using her cell phone late at night. She told us how she waited until her parents were asleep, then spent at least four…
The recent drop in crude oil and gasoline prices in the United States is a nice stocking stuffer for consumers this holiday season, but it could turn into a lump of coal. A global oil glut has caused the…
The STEM fields of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics supposedly suffer from a shortage of graduates. Conventional wisdom says there’s no one for employers to hire for science and engineering…
On December 3, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a Health Alert Network advisory indicating a possible strain mismatch in this year’s vaccine. After the usual brief flurry…
Despite sluggishness in the world economy, global trade reached an astonishing US$23 trillion last year. The World Trade Organization has been the primary guarantor of this extraordinary growth in global…
Michael Brown’s recent shooting death by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson illustrates the pressing importance of digitally documenting police activity, while Eric Garner’s case illustrates the limits…
If you prefer to order your pizza without going through all the trouble of actually speaking, Pizza Hut has just the thing for you — “the world’s first subconscious menu.” You sit down, glance through…
The Shakespeare First Folio (1623), the first collected edition of his plays and the sole source for half of them (including Macbeth, Antony & Cleopatra, All’s Well, As You Like It, and The Tempest…
Wealth and income inequality have many causes, and it’s pretty much beyond dispute that any well-functioning capitalist society will have some degree of disparity between the richest and the poorest. It’s…
Some experts worry that the Ebola crisis is diverting attention and resources away from neglected diseases with a substantially larger disease incidence.
Congress passed the wind production tax credit (PTC) more than two decades ago to spur development in an industry still in its infancy. The wind sector has since matured into adulthood, prompting thousands…
Deciding to disclose information about a non-obvious disability at work is complicated and potentially risky, no matter what you do for a living. For people with a mental health issue, like bipolar disorder…
So-called cap and trade may be a solution to a problem it was not intended to solve: state budget crises. Cap-and-trade policy was designed to address climate change by putting a “cap” on carbon dioxide…
Abraham Lincoln said that those who shape public opinion exert an even greater influence than judges and lawmakers. In recent years popular sentiment – on issues like marriage equality and legalization…
Over the past decade, drug use in the US has risen dramatically, with heroin use reaching epidemic proportions. The country’s policy for combating abuse has involved incarceration, abstinence-only treatment…
Upon the signing of the Affordable Care Act on March 23, 2010, the public was promised that all US citizens would receive health care coverage. As Vice President Joe Biden put it at the signing of the…
Poaching rhinos for their horns is one of the most publicized conservation issues worldwide. From global trade bans and surveillance drones, to the involvement of celebrities such as British royal Prince…
The United States had just gone through a bruising election, but in Congress Democratic and Republican leaders gathered to unveil the bust of Vaclav Havel, the playwright and first post-Communist Czech…
I was the lead of a team of computer scientists at Rutgers that published a paper this past August titled, “Toward Automated Discovery of Artistic Influence.” In that paper we reported on our research…
Once commonplace, the phenomenon of all-female or all-male workplaces have largely gone the way of the buggy whip. Many of the benefits of this increased diversity might be difficult to measure and quantify…
Early in The Theory of Everything, the student Stephen Hawking strides across the grounds at Cambridge University in the 1960s, his face dreamy. He is lost in thought about the nature of time. Then he…
Foundation essay: This article is part of a series marking the launch of The Conversation in the US. Our foundation essays are longer than our usual comment and analysis articles and take a wider look…