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Big Think · 实时热榜

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  • 01
    What has more power: Earth’s aurorae or fireworks shows?
    Here on Earth, brilliant spectacles occasionally illuminate our night skies. The peak of January 19, 2026’s auroral display was brief, and visible in spectacular fashion only for the short period of time where the Earth’s and Sun’s relevant magnetic fields were anti-aligned during the intense solar radiation storm that sent charged particles rapidly from the Sun to Earth. The resulting photograph, from northern Scotland, is one of the best views of this brief light show. Credit : Phil Hawley/MetEthan Siegel
  • 02
    The full story of the dinosaurs, from extinction to extinction
    Steve Brusatte, the paleontologist behind Jurassic World’s science and author of The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs and The Story of Birds, walks through what fossils actually prove versus what Hollywood invented. Brusatte traces dinosaurs back to footprints smaller than a house cat, found in Poland just after the worst mass extinction in Earth’s history, and explains why those early survivors spent millions of years as background characters next to car-sized salamanders and armored crocodiles. Steve Brusatte
  • 03
    He won a major short story prize. Then he was accused of using AI.
    Earlier this year, Jamir Nazir, a retired Trinidadian civil servant with no public writing career to speak of, won both the regional and overall Commonwealth Short Story Prize for “ The Serpent in the Grove .” The story follows Vishnu, a Trinidadian man and alcoholic, who tries to kill his wife, Sita, in an attempt to escape his life. Within days, the win sparked controversy, as readers, writers, and critics accused Nazir of using AI to write the story, citing evidence like its “heavily polishedJasna Hodžić
  • 04
    Ask Ethan: Could we spot an extinction-level asteroid?
    65 million years ago, the trajectory of life on Earth was changed in an instant: when a massive asteroid, speeding through the inner Solar System, crashed into our planet. In the blink of a cosmic eye, thousands upon thousands of species that had previously dominated the world for millions of years went extinct, including 100% of the flying reptiles, non-avian dinosaurs, ammonites, and the giant marine reptiles, as well as massive populations of mammals, insects, clams, and land-based plants. DuEthan Siegel
  • 05
    The myth of genius, and who it intentionally leaves out
    A philosopher who walked away from an elite academic career to spend 3 years washing dishes in a monastery says that intellectual life has nothing to do with degrees. Zena Hitz argues that the real philosophers are taxi drivers, office clerks, and prisoners: Everyday people who exist outside the cult of academia. This video The myth of genius, and who it intentionally leaves out is featured on Big Think .Zena Hitz
  • 06
    The myth of a shared reality
    Dan Carlin has spent decades explaining history’s collapses. Now he’s watching one happen in real time. In conversation with Kmele Foster, Carlin unpacks the state of societal collapse, the erosion of our nation’s shared truth, and the sharp comparison between the 80’s’ Xeroxed flyers on windshields and the present day flooding of information. He explains why the Constitution was designed to prevent tyranny, not efficiency, how that tradeoff is finally being tested, and why Congress’s refusal toDan Carlin, Kmele Foster
  • 07
    How to not overestimate the number of stars in the Universe
    Here in our cosmic backyard, the Sun is the ultimate source of light, heat, and energy that powers life on our planet. It therefore only makes sense that we’d want to know, if the Sun is just an ordinary star like so many others in the Universe, how many of them there are within our cosmic horizon. Calculating the number of stars within the presently observable Universe is a daunting task to take on, but one that astronomers and cosmologists have risen to, and now have determined with only very Ethan Siegel
  • 08
    5 dangerous lies we tell ourselves, according to philosophy
    We live according to our beliefs. Some beliefs we know well. A Christian knows they believe in God. An ethical vegetarian knows they believe eating animals is wrong. But other beliefs swish around in the rock pools of our unconscious. They are tacit assumptions that motivate our actions but never appear on an employment contract or in a legal document. And even though we rarely pause to examine them, these beliefs or narratives will steer our lives. They are why we get out of bed, think the way Jonny Thomson
  • 09
    Is it finally time to take dark matter-free galaxies seriously?
    Out there beyond the Milky Way, there’s much more than a typical telescopic view reveals. While our eyes might be drawn to the enormous, massive, bright spirals and ellipticals that can be found all across the Universe, the reality is that for every Milky Way-like galaxy out there, there are dozens or even hundreds of small, low-mass, very faint galaxies: the dwarf galaxies of the Universe. Even though large, bright, massive galaxies contain the majority of our Universe’s stars, the majority of Ethan Siegel
  • 10
    The “women are better multitaskers” stereotype is messier than you think
    In a TikTok video that has racked up 1.4 million likes , men are handed scissors and a sheet of paper and asked to cut out a Christmas tree while describing their favorite memory with their partner. The men start telling a story, but most trail off as they concentrate on the cutting. In another clip, a woman calmly juggles four different chores while her husband struggles to put on socks and hold a conversation simultaneously. These videos are designed to make you laugh. But they also reflect anClarissa Brincat