How have the unsaid understandings between people moulded us - our society, history, culture? In his new book, the Harvard psychologist digs for answers. We laugh at the same jokes (usually for the ...

You’re reading Open Questions, Joshua Rothman’s weekly column exploring what it means to be human. Take your young kid with you as you commute through Penn Station and you’ll find that you have a lot ...

I don’t know about you, but ever since I can remember – from my early teens – I have been bemused about the endless rituals we humans perform; and even more so about what can and can’t be said about ...

The everyday meaning of “common knowledge” is knowledge held in common, often as an open secret. For example, it is common knowledge that publishers like books that seek, via quirky examples, to ...

Xiaohui Wu of Wanhuida Intellectual Property reports on a ruling by the Supreme People’s Court of China that emphasises that the determination of common knowledge in the assessment of inventiveness ...

Yujie Jin of Liu Shen & Associates explains the elements of Chinese patent law that deal with common knowledge, and gives advice on dealing with them during substantive examination Common knowledge is ...

Jamie Q. Roberts does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond ...

I don’t know about you, but ever since I can remember – from my early teens – I have been bemused about the endless rituals we humans perform; and even more so about what can and can’t be said about ...