The Problem with Protesting Violence with Violence
Empirical studies have shown that nonviolent movements are more successful than violent ones at bringing about positive social changes...
Stories by John Horgan
Exposing the World’s Biggest Carbon Emitters
“Energy accountant” Richard Heede does research needed to hold major polluters accountable for their actions...
One of the World’s Most Powerful Scientists Believes in Miracles
NIH director Francis Collins, winner of the 2020 Templeton Prize, answers questions about God, free will, evil, altruism and his Christian faith in a 2006 interview...
Should Scientists Take UFOs and Ghosts More Seriously?
Journalist Leslie Kean investigates topics that many consider to be beyond the pale
Will the Nature-Nurture Debate Ever End?
Biology writer Carl Zimmer answers questions on heredity, CRISPR, human enhancement, immortality and the coronavirus...
A Liberal East Coast Science Writer Talks to a Pro-Trump Texan Strength Coach about COVID-19
A weight-lifting guru, author and podcaster calls the U.S. response to the pandemic an “exercise in hysteria" that might do more harm than good...
Will COVID-19 Make Us Less Democratic and More like China?
The pandemic has revealed the disadvantages of laissez-faire governance and advantages of centralized control
Will COVID-19 Make Us More Socialist?
Pundits hope the pandemic will lead to more humane government policies but fear darker outcomes...
Remembering Big Bang Basher Fred Hoyle
The great astrophysicist Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) named the big bang theory but never embraced it...
Does Surging Existential Dread Help Trump?
As fear of mortality rises, so does tribalism and support for authoritarian leaders, according to terror-management theory...
Jolted by Her Own Illness, Pandemics Scholar Gains Insight into Botched COVID-19 Response
The author of book on the 2009 flu outbreak explains how a lack of effective tests crippled U.S. attempts to contain the coronavirus...
Meditating During the Plague
Is it ethical to seek serenity when the world is suffering?...
Philip Anderson, Gruff Guru of Physics and Complexity Research, Dies
The Nobel Prize winner espoused an antireductionist vision of science in which “more is different”...
Good News: Women Helping Women in STEM
A physics student has founded an international organization for mentoring women in male-dominated fields...
Optimism in a Dark Time
The coronavirus pandemic might have positive consequences...
The Coronavirus and Right-Wing Postmodernism
Does right-wing skepticism toward the coronavirus have anything to do with the postmodern philosophy of Thomas Kuhn?...
Astrology, Tarot Cards and Psychotherapy
With psychotherapists’ encouragement, troubled people are seeking solace in pseudoscientific practices such as astrology and tarot cards...
Scientific Rebel Freeman Dyson Dies
The iconoclastic physicist rejected the idea of an end point to the human quest for knowledge and happiness...
Responses to “The Cancer Industry: Hype vs. Reality”
Readers critique a journalist’s critique of cancer medicine...
The Cancer Industry: Hype vs. Reality
Cancer medicine generates enormous revenues but marginal benefits for patients...
