The Guinness Book of World Records Editor Answers Your Questions
…allowing you to catapult a small thing far or a heavy thing not so far and still be considered for the record.) 3. Breakable: Apart from those rare cases in…
The White House is hosting an anti-terror summit next week. Summits being what they are, we try to offer some useful advice.
Hit by Covid, runaway costs, and a zillion streams of competition, serious theater is in serious trouble. A new hit play called Stereophonic — the most Tony-nominated play in history…
In pursuit of a more perfect economy, we discuss the future of work, the toxic remnants of colonization, and whether giving everyone a basic income would be genius — or…
How American food so got bad — and why it’s getting so much better.
Also: does multitasking actually increase productivity?…
…allowing you to catapult a small thing far or a heavy thing not so far and still be considered for the record.) 3. Breakable: Apart from those rare cases in…
In this special episode of People I (Mostly) Admire, Steve Levitt talks to the best-selling author of Sapiens and Homo Deus about finding the profound in the obvious….
…and 3rd on the Nuggets in 2005-06). Thus far this season, Melo ranks 10th – out of 14 players on the Knicks – in true shooting percentage. So Melo isn’t…
The Hydrogen Education Foundation’s 2007/08 contest challenge: fix airports. (Earlier) Does Dunbar’s “magic” 150 apply to social networking sites? South Korea creates camps to cure Internet addiction. (Earlier) The realities…
A reader named Tony Trout, a 40-something data analyst in Madison, Wisc., wrote us a while back with a proposal for a fundamental change in how baseball is played. His…
Date Length The U.S. Is Just Different — So Let’s Stop Pretending We’re Not We often look to other countries for smart policies on education, healthcare, infrastructure, etc. But…
Photo: martinstelbrink That’s the judgment of the esteemed Richard Posner, whose forthcoming book, to be published in May, is called A Failure of Capitalism: The Crisis of ’08 and the…
A new paper (PDF here) by Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, a Harvard Ph.D. economics student, attempts to measure whether “racial animus” cost Barack Obama votes in 2008. Using location-specific Google searches for…
The Noel Coward song suggests that “only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun.” Following Saturday’s Stockholm Marathon, I’ll add marathon runners and thousands of cheering Swedes…
Stephen Dubner’s conversation with the former C.E.O. of Yahoo!, recorded for the Freakonomics Radio series “The Secret Life of a C.E.O.”…
While partisan rancor over health care continues in the U.S., Australia is forging its own health care path. Its government, hoping to encourage doctors to treat diabetics outside the hospital,…
BusinessWeek recently reported on the creative product-placement deals that daytime TV shows employ. The highlight of the article is Martha Stewart — the self-described “most trusted guide to stylish living”…
Is it just me, or does it seem that the failure of the abortion-ban referendum in South Dakota hasn’t gotten much attention? It’s certainly understandable why, what with the Democratic…
…nothing other than analyze the effect of every intervention that is going to be tried, we would be far more likely to close the achievement gap. One thing we have…
Remember when the Michigan Wolverines kicked off their football season last year with a loss to Appalachian State University? Some people called it the biggest upset in college football history….
We’ve posted before on the subjects of randomness and luck. Along those lines, there’s a fascinating article by Jim Yardley in today’s N.Y. Times about the Chinese appetite for lucky…
America’s top colleges are facing record demand. So why don’t they increase supply? (Part 2 of our series from 2022, “Freakonomics Radio Goes Back to School.”)…
Sure, medical progress has been astounding. But today the U.S. spends more on healthcare than any other country, with so-so outcomes. Atul Gawande — cancer surgeon, public-health researcher, and best-selling…
In a special episode of No Stupid Questions, Angela Duckworth and Mike Maughan talk about unfinished tasks, recurring arguments, and Irish goodbyes….
What’s the best way to carry out random acts of kindness? What’s wrong with making an “Irish exit”? And why is Mike secretly buying lottery tickets?…
Stephen Dubner’s conversation with the founder and longtime C.E.O. of Bridgewater Associates, recorded for the Freakonomics Radio series “The Secret Life of a C.E.O.”…
How is aging different today than it was in the past? What do young people get wrong about happiness? And what does it mean if you impulsively decide to get…
In 2010, CBS and Turner Broadcasting agreed to pay $10.8 billion to broadcast the NCAA men’s basketball tournament from 2011 to 2024. As a result of this contract, fans of…
Steve loved Michael Lewis’s latest, The Premonition, but has one critique: Why aren’t there even more villains? Also, why the author of best-sellers Moneyball and The Big Short can barely…
Stanford professor Carolyn Bertozzi’s imaginative ideas for treating disease have led to ten start-ups. She talks with Steve about the next generation of immune therapy she’s created, and why she…
