You cannot win with anger

I realize I am not telling you anything new. We've been told this since the beginning of time, be kind to others. Generally I think we all strive to do this, to be kind to others. However, when it comes to politics, it seems more difficult than ever to meet people half way. Why is that? Why is it, that "the other side" must be defeated at all costs? Why even, are they "the other side"? In a recent episode of Hidden Brain, one of my favorite podcasts,...

February 20, 2020

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Dolores Anaicna

Disinformation is probably the biggest existential threat we face

The internet age was supposed to be the age of information. The age in which all information known to humankind, could be shared democratically to all of humankind. It was the idea that someone that lived in the Congo could have the same access to information as someone in Paris, so long as they had a connection to the internet (albeit perhaps not as reliable). That was the promise with which it was launched. A naive and childish promise. Sure, the supporters will pipe up and claim that...

February 19, 2020

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Tiab James

The power of breaking complex action into steps

We have all seen animal trainers manage to get different animals perform very difficult and complex tasks through training. One of the tools they use to achieve this level of communication with the animals is a clicker (though a short-tone whistle is also used). The point of the clicker is to help the animal map the expected action in their brains when the click is perceived. In a recent episode of Hidden Brain, the origins of this training method, and its potential were explored. At our core, we...

February 7, 2020

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Tiab James

The 2020 meltdown

What would happen if there were a meltdown in the 2020 election? Is the United States government prepared to handle this? And even if it were prepared, would the outcome be anything less than disastrous and more divisive? If the state of the union speech, and the subsequent crowing after his formal acquittal are any way to judge, I think we can expect a long-road ahead. Richard Hasen, a law professor at UC Irvine, proposes that we may be in more trouble than we can imagine if the...

February 6, 2020

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Dolores Anaicna

The power of imagination, and how you can practice it

We all know that having an imagination is a powerful gift. We've all had it, and often recall, or even chuckle, those days when we were younger and seemed to have ample reserves of it. Remember thinking you could actually fly like superman, or of unicorns in the forests? Imagination is powerful, it allows us to see things we never thought possible. It breaks those anchors that tend to hold us down to our current reality and lets us think about what it could be, rather than what...

February 4, 2020

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Tiab James

Toilets, sweat and stains

I must admit, that when I first heard of this, I was as ignorant as some of you must be. The tale goes that some people, pregnant women in particular, can leave stains on the seat of the toilet when they visit the bathroom. What makes this such an intriguing mystery is that some people have reported the staining to be blue. It turns out, the stain is due to a chemical reaction between certain toilet seats and certain fats in our sweat. Newer toilet seats have an...

January 28, 2020

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Wen Ruoy

The facts behind the Truth

More often than not, facts and truth are not mutually exclusive. Facts are those bits of information which on their own are true, while the truth is our interpretation of those facts (including some truths). It is how we remember facts that our brains use to construct the truth. Case in point, in this episode of Planet Money, the podcast talked about how many veterans tended to dislike the Red Cross. Their dislike originated from donuts, and the fact the Red Cross charged said veterans for them during...

January 9, 2020

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Dolores Anaicna

Hammer, nails, and our biases

Recently I was listening to a podcast where two intellectuals were arguing with each other about the finer points of intention and the meaning of what people say. You can find the podcast here. The podcast was an interview between Sam Harris and Andrew Marantz and began well and good. Marantz is promoting a book in which he documents his experiences while embedded with social media creators and the anti-social people that use those platforms. This post is not about the contents of the book. It is about...

October 29, 2019

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Doug Dlod

To placebo or not, that is the question

A placebo is a substance or procedure which should have no therapeutic effect. A harmless pill, medicine, or procedure prescribed more for the psychological benefit to the patient than for any physiological effect."his Aunt Beatrice had been kept alive on sympathy and placebos for thirty years" a substance that has no therapeutic effect, used as a control in testing new drugs. a measure designed merely to calm or please someone. This is what we have been taught since childhood. That placebos are all in the mind. However, in...

September 28, 2019

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Wen Ruoy

Recycling. Where did it come from?

The blue bin is for recycling. We all know that. Plastics are bad, paper is good. Recycling saves the environment. Right? But have you ever wondered where it came from? In other words, why do we recycle vs. the landfill? The answer to this question may surprise you as it is less scientific that you would imagine. While recycling is a good thing and something we should do, it began as the dream of an industrial Southerner from Alabama. The story goes that in the 80s, Lowell Harrelson...

August 13, 2019

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Tiab James