Global population growth, box by box

Einstein's General Theory of Relativity | Lecture 1

Emily Levine's theory of everything

National Geographic Live!: Face-Off with a Lion

Meet The Author: Richard Dawkins

The Rise of Intellectual Reform in Islam

Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

Well behanved women rarely make history

David Deutsch: A new way to explain explanation

Aimee Mullins on running

Authors@Google: Steven Pinker

Taryn Simon photographs secret sites

Talk by Naomi Wolf - The End of America

Paul Romer's radical idea: Charter cities

How can a struggling country break out of poverty if it's trapped in a system of bad rules? Economist Paul Romer unveils a bold idea: "charter cities," city-scale administrative zones governed by a coalition of nations. (Could Guantánamo Bay become the next Hong Kong?)

Totally cool idea, which could be employed in Africa, for instance.

Ants: The Invisible Majority with Dr. Brian Fisher

The Electric Horizon: Shai Agassi

The Language of Swearing with Steven Pinker

Steven Pinker - The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature

Our conceptions of human nature affect every aspect of our lives, from the way we raise our children to the political movements we embrace. Yet just as science is bringing us into a golden age of understanding human nature, many people are hostile to the very idea. They fear that discoveries about innate patterns of thinking and feeling may be used to justify inequality, to subvert social change, to dissolve personal responsibility, and to strip life of meaning and purpose. In The Blank Slate, Steven Pinker, bestselling author of The Language Instinct and How the Mind Works, explores the idea of human nature and its moral, emotional, and political colorings. He shows how many intellectuals have denied the existence of human nature by embracing three linked dogmas: The Blank Slate (the mind has no innate traits), The Noble Savage (people are born good and corrupted by society), and The Ghost in the Machine (each of us has a soul that makes choices free from biology). Each dogma carries a moral burden, so their defenders have engaged in the desperate tactics to discredit the scientists who are now challenging them. Pinker tries to inject calm and rationality into these debates by showing that equality, progress, responsibility, and purpose have nothing to fear from discoveries about rich human nature. He disarms even the most menacing threats with clear thinking, common sense, and pertinent facts from science and history. Despite its popularity among intellectuals during much of the twentieth century, he argues, the doctrine of the Blank Slate may have done more harm than good. It denies our common humanity and our individual preferences, replaces hardheaded analyses of social problems with feel-good slogans, and distorts our understanding of government, violence, parenting, and the arts.

The stuff of thought

In an exclusive preview of his book The Stuff of Thought, Steven Pinker looks at language and how it expresses what goes on in our minds -- and how the words we choose communicate much more than we realize.

Coaching for people, not points

With profound simplicity, Coach John Wooden redefines success and urges us all to pursue the best in ourselves. In this inspiring talk he shares the advice he gave his players at UCLA, quotes poetry and remembers his father's wisdom.