We're living in an age where new technology offers gigantic upsides - artificial intelligence has the potential to diagnose cancer, catch serial killers and reduce prison populations.

The future doesn't just happen. We are building it, and we are building it all the time.

Our long-range predictions - especially those which anticipate extreme-weather events - rely on an assumption that the future will be similar to the past. Lose that, and we lose the tools that have allowed us to prepare for such eventualities.

On average, the higher the novelty score a film had, the better it did at the box office. But only up to a point. Push past that novelty threshold, and there's a precipice; the revenue earned by a film fell off a cliff.

The very idea that you could have separation between mosque and state from Islam's perspective is the imposition on them of Christian practice. Islam doesn't really have a place for state. They are a universalistic faith like Christianity, but they think there is no country that bounds Islam.

No poem in the world could do my mom justice. Despite circumstance and adversity, she had an unwavering love for her kids and a faith-based, boundless capacity for forgiveness.

When I think about 'Since U Been Gone,' I think the first thing that comes to mind is 'Livin' On A Prayer' - they're kind of like sisters, a little bit. And 'Call Me Maybe' was so wildly original, and so quirky, and so satisfying.

I was in seventh grade at St. Matthew's. The teachers would tell me, 'God loves you,' and then whack a ruler across my hand. 'Well,' I'd say, 'if God loves me, can you call God? Can you ask Him if it's all right that I didn't do my homework? If it's not, then let Him hit me.'