Scotty Hendricks
Contributing Writer
Scotty Hendricks is a graduate student and long-time contributor to Big Think. He resides in Chicago.
Dunbar’s number is a popular estimate for the maximum size of social groups. But new research suggests that it’s a fictitious number based on flimsy data and bad theory.
New research suggests that there is no “typical” form of Alzheimer’s disease, as the condition can manifest in at least four different ways.
For every good idea in evolution, there is an unintended consequence. Disease is often one of them.
Could a pill make you more moral? Should you take it if it could?
American universities used to be small centers of rote learning, but three big ideas turned them into intellectual powerhouses.
A newly discovered coronavirus — but not the one that causes COVID-19 — has made some dogs very sick.
Oxygen is thought to be a biomarker for extraterrestrial life, but there are at least three different ways that a lifeless planet can produce it.
A study on charity finds that reminding people how nice it feels to give yields better results than appealing to altruism.
The design of a classic video game yields insights on how to address global poverty.
Global inequality takes many forms, including who has lost the most children
When you say, “I’ll get it done this week,” you’re just lying to yourself.
People often divide the world into “us” and “them” then forget about everybody else.
Our brains make snap moral decisions in mere seconds.
A new study provides a possible scientific explanation for the existence of stories about ancient saints performing miracles with water.
A curated list of must-watch films from Big Think readers.
Not only does this give us a look at the scaffolding of the universe, we found some new galaxies too!
How do you get usable phosphorus into a system? A new study suggests lightning can do the trick.
How our brains interpret computer code could impact how we teach it.
Growing marijuana in large, climate controlled warehouses is good for production but has a massive carbon footprint.
Fossils of ancient creatures doing anything are rare. This one is absolutely unique.
Masks are great, but what happens when we try to throw out a billion masks at once?
A study of 1.6 million people ties high incomes with more positive emotions and fewer negative ones, but only towards the self.
This storm rained electrons, shifted energy from the sun’s rays to the magnetosphere, and went unnoticed for a long time.
Eating veggies is good for you. Now we can stop debating how much we should eat.
The famous cognition test was reworked for cuttlefish. They did better than expected.
Most people seem to enjoy liberalism and its spin offs, but what is it exactly? Where did the idea come from?
Cow cuddling is getting ever more popular, but what’s the science behind using animals for relaxation?
How does philosophy try to balance having free will with living in a deterministic universe?
While not the first such minister, the loneliness epidemic in Japan will make this one the hardest working.