Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn paid the price of losing his job after last week’s revelation that software designed to circumvent emission testing was installed on as many as 500,000 “clean diesel” vehicles sold in the US and as many as 11 million worldwide.

VW has long burnished...

Over the years, we’ve seen quite a few scandals in the automotive industry. However, the recent one at Volkswagen sets the bar at a whole new level. This isn’t your garden variety crisis involving a mechanical or safety issue.

While...

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio) called it quits Friday. He will leave his position – and his seat – at the end of October. Three scholars of American politics tell us what forced Boehner out and predict how his abrupt departure will resonate in the US Congress.

The...

How did the world sound to our ancient human relatives two million years ago?

While we obviously don’t have any sound recordings or written records from anywhere near that long ago, we do have one clue: the fossilized bones from inside their ears. The internal anatomy of...

Pope Francis this week made an historic presentation to the Joint Sessions of the US Congress. And in so doing, he took his message straight to the American people: “Today I would like not only to address you, but through you the entire people of the United States.”

Indeed, a...

Pope Francis is going to prison.

After visiting with incarcerated individuals in a correctional facility in Philadelphia, he might offer us a simple suggestion: treat prisoners better.

But this advice hides an inconvenient truth.

The conditions experienced by...

As the world’s leaders gather at the United Nations Sustainable Development Summit in New York City this week, they face a busy agenda. Among their many tasks is the adoption of new global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) guiding actions toward 2030 – a major and much-needed...

Studies have long shown that a college student’s odds of achieving financial security and a better quality of life improve when he or she earns a degree.

But what are some of the obstacles that prevent degree attainment?

At the Wisconsin HOPE...

Following a healthy diet can be hard. From deciding when and what to eat to how much food you actually put on your plate, the average person makes over 200 food-related decisions each day, most of which are automatic. These automatic choices – dubbed “mindless eating” by some...

When you begin to delve into the question of what money really is, you must be prepared for some metaphysics. Money, currencies and other such media of exchange differ markedly in their backgrounds and means of operation, and have changed quite recently...