What makes Mona Lisa’s smile so intriguing? What makes Picasso’s portraits so compelling? Kurt Andersen hosts artists Chuck Close and Devorah Sperber, with neuroscientists Margaret Livingstone, Chris Tyler and Ken Nakayama, as they examine the power of brain imaging technology to illuminate how we perceive the most intimate yet public of features, the human face.
Humans work together on enormous scales to build complex tools as large as cities and create social networks that span the globe. What is the key to our success? This …
Stuntman and special effects coordinator Steve Wolf shows how actors can fall from a 20-story building without injury and how houses can be set ablaze safely in movies…all through science. …
We’re born, we grow old, we die. It’s a rhythm long considered inevitable. But is it? Or is aging merely a disease awaiting a cure? Will science one day stave …
Every generation benefits from the insights and discoveries of the generations who came before. “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants,” wrote Isaac Newton. In a special series, the World Science Festival invites audiences to stand on the shoulders of modern-day giants.
Sexuality and gender play a profound role in shaping identity, but for much of human history how they are determined has remained obscure. How does sexual orientation develop? What is it? Can it be changed?