From rockets to stock markets, many of humanity's most thrilling creations are powered by math. So why do kids lose interest in it? Conrad Wolfram says the part of math we teach -- calculation by hand -- isn't just tedious, it's mostly...

Plenty of good things are done in the name of religion, and plenty of bad things too. But what is religion, exactly — is it good or bad, in and of itself? Philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah offers a generous, surprising view.

In which John Green teaches you about the life and death of one of history's great explorers, Captain James Cook of the British Navy. He charted large swaths of the Pacific ocean, laid claim to Australia and New Zealand, and died a...

Journalist Andrew Marantz spent three years embedded in the world of internet trolls and social media propagandists, seeking out the people who are propelling fringe talking points into the heart of conversation online and trying to...

Can you turn your pants inside out without taking your feet off the ground?

The bubonic plague, which killed around 1/5 of the world's population in the 14th century, is still around today -- but it now claims only a few thousand lives each year. How did that number shrink so drastically? Sharon N. DeWitte...

Chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, seemed too good to be true when they were first created, and before long astronomers studying Venus' atmosphere discovered what could go wrong with this "miracle molecule."

Crisis interventions often focus on a single aspect of a big, complicated problem, failing to address the broader social and economic context. Kwame Owusu-Kesse describes how the Harlem Children's Zone is taking a more holistic approach...

Social entrepreneur Julie Cordua works on a problem that isn't easy to talk about: the sexual abuse of children in images and videos on the internet. At Thorn, she's building technology to connect the dots between the tech industry, law...

With the Climate Reality Project, Al Gore is helping mold future leaders to build the movement for climate survival and social justice from the ground up. He introduces us to four of the Project's graduates, each of whom confronts...

The world's most valuable tech companies profit from the personal data you generate. So why aren't you getting paid for it? In this eye-opening talk, entrepreneur and technologist Jennifer Zhu Scott makes the case for private data...

For some forms of live, old-age is relative.

The science fiction writer William Gibson has not only written some fantastic scifi novels, but in the process predicted the internet, Miku Hatsune, reality TV, and a crazy amount of other technological and societal developments that...

420 million years ago, some fish were more medieval. They wore armor, sometimes made of big plates, and sometimes made of interlocking scales. But that armor may actually have served a totally different purpose, one that many animals...

The internet uses a lot of energy! But people have come up with ways to make it more efficient.

SciShow takes you on a tour of Canada’s Bay of Fundy, home of the largest tidal range in the world.

How many people does it take to make a cup of coffee? For many of us, all it takes is a short walk and a quick pour. But this simple staple is the result of a globe-spanning process whose cost and complexity are far greater than you...

Plants! We absolutely depend on them. Oxygen, food, and looking super nice to boot! But, plants have a lot more going on than meets the eye. How do we know that? Investigations and Experimentations!

Kids get so excited to meet their favorite characters in real life, but studies show they might not really believe the the princess they met at a theme park is actually the cartoon character.

How does math keep a folded slice from drooping? And what does pizza have to do with the speed of light?

Fossils found around the world suggest that multi-cellular life was not only present before the Cambrian Explosion, it was much more elaborate and diverse than anyone thought. This is the story of the sudden burst of diversity that...

Want to learn more about the topic in this week's video? Here are some keywords/phrases to get your googling started: <b<br/>r/>

soil salinity - when soils have high salt levels that have adverse effects on plants

Hollywood was riding high until their formula got to be stale. In places like Italy and France (as well as other places in the world we'll talk about soon) filmmakers were starting to break out of the mold and make daring films that...

TED talks about what should humans take to space (and leave behind)?