Marcelo Gleiser
Marcelo Gleiser is a contributor to the NPR blog 13.7: Cosmos & Culture. He is the Appleton Professor of Natural Philosophy and a professor of physics and astronomy at Dartmouth College.
Gleiser is the author of the books The Prophet and the Astronomer (Norton & Company, 2003); The Dancing Universe: From Creation Myths to the Big Bang (Dartmouth, 2005); A Tear at the Edge of Creation (Free Press, 2010); and The Island of Knowledge (Basic Books, 2014). He is a frequent presence in TV documentaries and writes often for magazines, blogs and newspapers on various aspects of science and culture.
He has authored over 100 refereed articles, is a Fellow and General Councilor of the American Physical Society and a recipient of the Presidential Faculty Fellows Award from the White House and the National Science Foundation.
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In Star Wars, the Force may represent a cosmic consciousness — an abstract picture of a deity — in which case we are told, even in the divine, good and evil must coexist, says Marcelo Gleiser.
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If we have the power to create a hypothetical universe in a game like No Man's Sky, we can unleash the human exploratory drive to go where no one has gone before, says astrophysicist Marcelo Gleiser.
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Genetically-modified plants show promise as a way to deliver nutrients at low cost. Marcelo Gleiser asks: Can opposition groups, scientists and businesses work together to safely implement GMO crops?
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As Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity turns 100, the scientist would surely be pleased with the revolution he started, a source of wonder and inspiration for all, says Marcelo Gleiser.
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Religious belief offers a sense of community with the unknown — with what transcends the confines of our humanity — as science aims to extend our reality, says astrophysicist Marcelo Gleiser.
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Improvements in technology don't necessarily lead to more leisure time for people, but they allow us more freedom to choose what we spend our time doing, says astrophysicist Marcelo Gleiser.
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In examining the universe's origins, maybe we need a way of depicting the laws of nature as emerging behaviors that unfold and take hold as time elapses, says astrophysicist Marcelo Gleiser.
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Let's assume that we could preserve someone's brain after death — and reconstruct the architecture of the brain in great detail. This would be only part of the task, says commentator Marcelo Gleiser.
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A curious personalization of science is underway — it's as if scientific issues are simply matters of opinion and not the product of a very thorough process, says commentator Marcelo Gleiser.
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Humans toy dangerously with things we barely understand — and the consequences could be cataclysmic — but astrophysicist Marcelo Gleiser says these five experiments shouldn't have driven such fear.