Most of us have undergone general anesthesia and remember counting back from 10, getting to about 7 before drifting off to … where exactly? What are our brains doing while under the influence of anesthesia? Typically anesthesiologists do not spend a whole lot of time pondering that question, focusing instead…
It sure sounds like the logline for a Hollywood thriller. In late 2016, U.S. Embassy personnel in Havana, Cuba, began to report an unusual, perplexing set of symptoms. Loud noises accompanied by pain, pressure, or vibration. Dizziness, vertigo, and cognitive difficulties. Then personnel in the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou, China,…
After a year of extreme weather that brought the risks of climate related disasters into sharp focus, the world’s attention is focused on climate negotiations in Glasgow for the COP26 climate conference. According to the Washington Post, at least 85 percent of the world’s population is already experiencing weather made…
Here’s the conventional wisdom: The increasingly violent relationship between the police and the citizens they are meant to serve and protect has been in direct response to escalating and widespread crime. But is that the right way to think about this dynamic? As we reflect on recent events that have…
About 1% of people may meet the clinical criteria for psychopathy… give or take. So if the average American has about 250 Facebook friends (according to The Atlantic) and claims a network of about 600 people (per The New York Times), by our reckoning, just about everyone knows a psychopath.…
From writer/director Alexis Gambis comes the poetic Sundance award-winning film, Son of Monarchs. Tracing the journey of a Mexican butterfly biologist as he travels from New York to his hometown nestled in the majestic butterfly forests of Michoacán, the film deftly explores issues of identity, migration, and transfiguration. Forced to…
The rate of imprisonment in the United States has more than quadrupled during the last four decades. With a penal population of 2.2 million adults, America has almost one-quarter of the world’s prisoners in its custody. Our current rate of incarceration is 5 to 10 times higher than the rates…
Nathan Seidle failed to live up to his parent’s fears of a life defined by delinquency. Yes, he did drop out of college to work at the stadium during the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics. But a year later he founded the geek commerce site SparkFun, which has grown to…
Stereotypes feel synonymous with many of the characters that we see on TV and in the movies. All Asians know martial arts or own small stores. Black women are sassy, while Latino men are dashing. Germans are efficient, most Brits are evil—but also classy, even if they’re uptight and mean—and…
We take most of our rituals for granted. From the social conventions that dictate how we greet one another to the ways that we express our religious faiths, we follow familiar patterns that are often simply accepted. But these rituals were not established arbitrarily or by happenstance. Indeed, by digging…
