Aside from destroying the social fabric of our society, Facebook has enabled a whole generation of parents to post endless photos of their little rug rats doing all sorts of nauseatingly cute things. New parents are probably the worst, celebrating the life of their child every few weeks, as if we still lived in the […]
While we’re still a couple of months out from the release of the final installment of the Star Wars triple trilogy, you can already buy tickets to watch the good guys blow up the Death Star for the fifth or sixth time (we’ve lost count). The 42-year-old franchise has raked in more than $9.3 billion […]
If you took all the blood vessels in an adult human and laid them out in a single line it would stretch to almost 100,000 miles, enough to circle the entire globe four times. Imagine designing a pump to push liquid through that massive nest of blood vessels and you’ll end up with a newfound […]
Former Vice President Al Gore was back in the news this month, raising millions for a new campaign. No, not the one crowded with 22 candidates and counting. His Generation Investment Management firm just raised $1 billion for what those who know anything about impact investing might call a do-gooder fund. Socially responsible investing, which […]
If you have Internet access that allows you to read this article, then you’ve probably had an injection at some point in your life. According to the World Health Organization, there are 16 billion injections that take place every year in developing and transitional countries. Of those injections, 90% are therapeutic, 5% are given for […]
As medical devices become more pervasive, there’s an increasing concern about cybersecurity. Cyber-attacks have been targeting practically every connected device available in the market today, with an average of one hack attempt every 39 seconds. Medical devices being hacked also damages brand reputation very quickly. (The notion of someone stealing your password is a whole lot […]
If you’ve ever taken an introductory cultural anthropology class, you might recall reading a paper on “Body Ritual among the Nacirema.” Written in 1956, it’s an account of an anthropologist who visits a tribe and observes all kinds of weird behavior – like medicine men who jab coated needles into the flesh of the natives. […]
Lately we’ve been taking a long look at diseases which have no cure. It’s surprising that we’re now able to create synthetic life, yet there are still some very nasty diseases that afflict humans which we can’t yet cure. Most of these diseases will kill you, thus the sense of urgency behind finding a cure. […]
Intuitively, it seems unlikely that the human brain will ever be capable of truly understanding itself. Technology changes all that. We’re learning more and more, and some of what we’re learning may be uncomfortable to talk about. For example, there are noticeable gender differences in the human brain – like hundreds of differences. These differences may help us […]
The ongoing existential threat about robots taking our jobs – even the ones that suck – led us to wonder what sort of work we could find in the future. Then we came across this little factoid that the human body at rest produces enough energy to power a 100-watt light bulb. You’ll recall that […]