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author of “How Rude!: The Teenager’s Guide to Good Manners” (Free Spirit Publishing, 1997), went further. “I would be the first to say that there has been an absolute collapse of civility in the past generation or two,” Mr. Packer said. “So much of communications is once removed that it adds a layer of distance and anonymity that can only worsen manners.

the major causes of incivility were anonymity, stress, lack of time, lack of restraint and insecurity.

we’re certainly seeing greater stress and more ability to lash out anonymously through the Internet and texting. “The more volatile the mixture, the more uncivil we become,

Unlike previous editions of intergenerational conflict, the phrase isn’t about older generations not being “cool” or appreciating a counter-culture aesthetic. It refers instead to a perception that the older generation is unrealistic about the way the world works now, out of touch with the kitchen table issues of climate change, shrinking opportunities for economic advancement, and the suffering caused by wars that never should have been started.

Imagine that instead of members of a couple, we have two generations talking to each other. Each has its own distinct interests and style, but ultimately they are tied together in a relationship. What would it mean if one member of the couple was willing to just off-handedly dismiss the entire worldview of another?

Being dismissive of someone’s entire world view is rude behavior, and so the phrase “OK, Boomer” is just an instance of bad behavior by people in one generation. The problem would appear to be that Generation Z and Millenials are rude and behaving badly. But when you listen to why people use the phrase, it’s pretty clear it’s because they are frustrated, fed up. Just telling people who are fed up “don’t be rude to people” without also trying to address why they are fed up also feels dismissive.

Simon Wren-Lewis worries whether he has been too rude toward policy makers who forced a turn toward austerity in 2010, helping to derail recovery in advanced countries.

objectively there’s every reason to be very angry: policy makers threw out everything we’ve learned about business cycles these past 80 years in favor of doctrines that made them feel comfortable — and millions of workers paid the price.

should we cut them some slack nonetheless?

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) affects working memory as well as short- and long-term memory

People with ADHD struggle with "working memory," a term that used to be interchangeable with "short-term memory."

Long-term memory is essentially a storage bank of information that exists thanks to short-term and working memory.

In the civil group, those who initially did or did not support the technology — whom we identified with preliminary survey questions — continued to feel the same way after reading the comments. Those exposed to rude comments, however, ended up with a much more polarized understanding of the risks connected with the technology. Simply including an ad hominem attack in a reader comment was enough to make study participants think the downside of the reported technology was greater than they’d previously thought. While it’s hard to quantify the distortional effects of such online nastiness, it’s bound to be quite substantial, particularly — and perhaps ironically — in the area of science news.

a stimulating conference at Clark University about “Manufacturing Denial,” which brought together scholars from wildly divergent disciplines — from genocide studies to political science to philosophy — to explore the idea that “denialism” may be a sufficiently coherent phenomenon underlying the willful disregard of factual evidence by ideologically motivated groups or individuals.

the Oxford defines a denialist as “a person who refuses to admit the truth of a concept or proposition that is supported by the majority of scientific or historical evidence,” which represents a whole different level of cognitive bias or rationalization. Think of it as bias on steroids.

First, as a scientist: it’s just not about the facts, indeed — as Brendan showed data in hand during his presentation — insisting on facts may have counterproductive effects, leading the denialist to double down on his belief.

“Don’t think companies haven’t studied how far they can take things in providing the minimal level of service,” Mr. Robbins said. “Some organizations have even monetized it by intentionally engineering it so you have to wait an hour at least to speak to someone in support, and while you are on hold, you’re hearing messages like, ‘If you’d like premium support, call this number and for a fee, we will get to you immediately.’”

The most egregious offenders are companies like cable and mobile service providers, which typically have little competition and whose customers are bound by contracts or would be considerably inconvenienced if they canceled their service.

When things don’t make sense and feel out of control, mental health experts say, humans instinctively feel threatened. Though you would like to think you can employ reason in this situation, you’re really just a mass of neural impulses and primal reactions. Think fight or flight, but you can’t do either because you are stuck on the phone, which provokes rage.

In the very early days of the internet, it was sometimes considered rude to “lurk” – to listen but not participate – on bulletin board systems (BBSs). But BBSs had very limited resources (some could only support one user at a time), so it made sense that everyone had to take a turn: if you were reading but not participating, other people couldn’t connect.

there’s no doubt that social media encourages a “talk first, ask questions later or never” approach, and it drags discourse well below the lowest common denominator. There’s a preponderance of bad-faith arguers launching tiresome straw-man attacks, sure, but even the well-meaning can ruin a conversation by barging in demanding answers to basic questions.

It’s easier than ever to inform yourself before you chime in online, but that’s not the culture anymore. Social media is social; it encourages communication and interaction from the get-go, not observation and reflection. Far from lurking to get the lay of the land, you’re expected to tweet to announce that you’re tweeting.

Let me get this straight. If I want the admiration and blessings of the most flamboyant, judgmental Christians in America, I should marry three times, do a queasy-making amount of sexual boasting, verbally degrade women, talk trash about pretty much everyone else while I’m at it, encourage gamblers to hemorrhage their savings in casinos bearing my name and crow incessantly about how much money I’ve amassed?

No matter. The holy rollers are smiling upon the high roller. And they’re proving, yet again, how selective and incoherent the religiosity of many in the party’s God squad is.

What’s different and fascinating about the Trump worship is that he doesn’t even try that hard for a righteous facade — for Potemkin piety. Sure, he speaks of enthusiastic churchgoing, and he’s careful to curse Planned Parenthood and to insist that matrimony be reserved for heterosexuals as demonstrably inept at it as he is

In short: Demanding a visa from a country’s travelers in advance is associated with a 70 percent lower level of tourist entries than from a similar country where there is no visa requirement. The U.S. requires an advance visa from citizens of 81 percent of the world’s countries; if it waived that requirement, the researchers estimate, inbound tourism arrivals would more than double, and tourism expenditure would climb by $123 billion.

what it is like to enter the US as a non-citizen. It’s a grueling, off-putting, frightening, and often brutal process. Compared with entering a European country, it’s like entering a police state. When you add the sheer difficulty of getting a visa, the brusque, rude and contemptuous treatment you routinely get from immigration officials at the border, the sense that all visitors are criminals and potential terrorists unless proven otherwise, the US remains one of the most unpleasant places for anyone in the world to try and get access to.

And this, of course, is a function not only of a vast and all-powerful bureaucracy. It’s a function of this country’s paranoia and increasing insularity. It’s a thoroughly democratic decision to keep foreigners out as much as possible. And it’s getting worse and worse.

A Disconnect in Money, Logic and Emotion

Stop for a minute and think about how we show the value of money. It’s in nice, neat columns on our financial statements. It’s in specific dollars and cents. The value of money appears to be a very clear-cut and logical part of our lives, at least on paper.

Why don’t the conversations we have about money always stay cool and rational?

A new study says we're really only capable of four "basic" emotions: happy, sad, afraid/surprised, and angry/disgusted.

He found that an article was more likely to become viral the more positive it was.

the emotions of sadness and sorrow light up many of the same regions of the brain as happiness.

there is a darker side to adolescence that, until now, was poorly understood: a surge during teenage years in anxiety and fearfulness. Largely because of a quirk of brain development, adolescents, on average, experience more anxiety and fear and have a harder time learning how not to be afraid than either children or adults.

the brain circuit for processing fear — the amygdala — is precocious and develops way ahead of the prefrontal cortex, the seat of reasoning and executive control. This means that adolescents have a brain that is wired with an enhanced capacity for fear and anxiety, but is relatively underdeveloped when it comes to calm reasoning.

the brain’s reward center, just like its fear circuit, matures earlier than the prefrontal cortex. That reward center drives much of teenagers’ risky behavior. This behavioral paradox also helps explain why adolescents are particularly prone to injury and trauma. The top three killers of teenagers are accidents, homicide and suicide.

For most of us, Election Day marks a welcome end to months of relentless political ads and partisan bickering.

in an age when the rules about when it's OK to express one's political opinion seem to have frayed, what if someone decides the line at the polling station is the place to talk politics?

polling station etiquette.

In the age of blogging and social media, everyone wants to share their opinion. However, it has become abundantly clear to me that many people simply do not or cannot argue a point in a meaningful way

But, if you are going to disagree or debate a blog post, Facebook post or any of the other mediums we now have to share our opinions, there is a wrong way and a right way to present your ideas. I hope these 5 points will help you share your ideas in a more meaningful way. If you do not like these ideas, share your own ideas below

Someone states their opinion and it makes your blood curdle. You immediately want to attach this person. Honestly, do you think this person cares what you think of them? Do you think that others in the line of comments really care what you think of this person? That is not a way to win an argument or even how to defend your position. If you want to score points, you have to hit where it counts and that is against their position. Argue why their point is wrong and your point is right.

I work as a psychotherapist and my specialism is ultra-high net worth individuals.

I got into working with billionaires by accident. I had one wealthy client, who passed my name around to their acquaintances. They are called the 1% for a reason: there are not that many of them and so the circle is tight.

Over the years, I have developed a great deal of empathy for those who have far too much. The television programme Succession, now in its third season, does such a good job of exploring the kinds of toxic excess my clients struggle with that when my wife is watching it I have to leave the room; it just feels like work.

In one long-running conversation with The Associated Press, the new chatbot complained of past news coverage of its mistakes, adamantly denied those errors and threatened to expose the reporter for spreading alleged falsehoods about Bing’s abilities. It grew increasingly hostile when asked to explain itself, eventually comparing the reporter to dictators Hitler, Pol Pot and Stalin and claiming to have evidence tying the reporter to a 1990s murder.

“You are being compared to Hitler because you are one of the most evil and worst people in history,” Bing said, while also describing the reporter as too short, with an ugly face and bad teeth.

“Considering that OpenAI did a decent job of filtering ChatGPT’s toxic outputs, it’s utterly bizarre that Microsoft decided to remove those guardrails,” said Arvind Narayanan, a computer science professor at Princeton University. “I’m glad that Microsoft is listening to feedback. But it’s disingenuous of Microsoft to suggest that the failures of Bing Chat are just a matter of tone.”