EMBO Reports (2019) e47647 The Third Cognitive Revolution has just started. It follows the ones that, first, brought us the alphabet, numbers, agriculture, and urbanization; and, second, the printing press, books, and the scientific method. The Third Cognitive Revolution (TCR) is characterized by digitalization, computers, the World Wide Web, and global research efforts. While earlier revolutions proceeded at a slow pace over centuries, the current one started only a generation ago and is changing all aspects of human society and even human biology at an unprecedented pace. This leaves little time to analyze the profound effects of these changes and to come to terms with the explosion of knowledge and opportunities that the TCR brings with it. This article explores some of the TCR's positive and some of the troublesome consequences for biomedical research and the social sciences. We focus on two problems: the risk of delaying the adoption of available knowledge and the questionable validity of much of the published literature. To address and hopefully prevent these unintended and problematic developments, we propose and discuss topics that would promote inter‐ and trans‐disciplinary communication. > Generally, the exponential increase of knowledge challenges existing structures that struggle to cope with reviewing and validating it… While many, if not most, of the TCR's qualities and effects are still poorly understood, some are obvious [1]. Perhaps the most relevant aspect was described in 1957 by the economist Robert Solow, who discovered that neither labor nor capital was the critical engine of the economy, but an intangible entity: knowledge [2]. While this is good news for science and research, some associated aspects are not. > While earlier revolutions proceeded at a slow pace over centuries, the current one started only a generation ago and is changing all aspects of human society and …