Five Websites That Will Make You Smarter

The Intertubes isn’t just lolcats and YouTube videos. There’s actually some really good stuff out there that will make you not only smarter, but generally more awesome as well. Here are five websites that you should be visiting:

TED

Short for “Technology, Entertainment, Design”, TED is an annual conference that brings together the worlds best thinkers to give 20-minutes talks on science, the arts, politics, culture, business, global issues, technology, and entertainment. They’ve had people like Al Gore, James Watson, and Jonathan Haidt come and talk, and they release a new video every week. TED is definitely the granddaddy of them all, so be sure to bookmark this website.

ScienceBlogs

As an invitation-only blog network and virtual community, ScienceBlogs is dedicated to enhancing the public understanding of science. As of March 2008, ScienceBlogs hosted around 70 blogs dedicated to various fields of research. Each blog has its own theme, specialty, and authors, and is not subject to editorial control. Authors are almost always scientists in industry, college professors, professional writers, graduate students, and post-docs.

BigThink

Billing itself as a public forum designed for interaction between users and scholars, BigThink has recorded thousands of hours of footage from interviews of numerous experts. This allows users to see what today’s leaders feel about broader issues, such as global warming and the two-party system. Users can respond to these ideas by posting their own videos or questions to experts, creating a conversation in the public sphere. It’s like YouTube for intellectuals.

Frontline

Originally an award-winning documentary program on public television, Frontline has expanded to include a deeply detailed website for each of its broadcasts. It publishes the full video of the show, extended interview transcripts, in-depth chronologies, original essays, sidebar stories, related links and readings, and source documents, including photographs and background research. Most videos are about an hour long, but some can be even lengthier. [previously]

The Long Now

Established in 1996, The Long Now Foundation is a private organization that seeks to become the seed of a very long-term cultural institution. It aims to provide a counterpoint to what it views as today’s “faster/cheaper” mindset by promoting “slower/better” thinking. To emphasize this, the group writes years using five digits instead of four: 02008 instead of 2008. Their seminars are available for free on their website or via podcast.