The Ashtray: The Ultimatum (Part 1) - The New York Times - 0 views
You're Not Going to Change Your Mind - The New York Times - 0 views
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A troubling feature of political disagreement in the United States today is that many issues on which liberals and conservatives hold divergent views are questions not of value but of fact. Is human activity responsible for global warming? Do guns make society safer? Is immigration harmful to the economy? Though undoubtedly complicated, these questions turn on empirical evidence.
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Unfortunately, people do not always revise their beliefs in light of new information. On the contrary, they often stubbornly maintain their views. Certain disagreements stay entrenched and polarized.
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A common explanation is confirmation bias
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For Trump and G.O.P., the Welfare State Shouldn't Be the Enemy - The New York Times - 0 views
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Historically, however, the level of government spending and the level of regulation have been packaged together and treated as a single variable. This has forced a choice between two options: the “liberal” package of big government and heavy regulation or the “conservative” package of small government and light regulation.
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But this is a false choice. Regulatory policy and fiscal policy are independent dimensions, and they can be rebundled in different packages. Mr. Trump’s gestures toward a big-government, low-regulation package — rooted more in instinct than intellect — proved popular with Republican voters
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Government spending reliably rises as economies grow. When countries get richer, one of the first things their people do is vote for more generous government social services. This pattern, which economists have labeled Wagner’s Law, has held more or less steady for a century in dozens of developed democratic countries.
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How Inoculation Can Help Prevent Pseudoscience | Big Think - 2 views
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It is easier to fool a person than it is to convince a person that they’ve been fooled. This is one of the great curses of humanity.
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Given the incredible amount of information we process each day, it is difficult for any of us to critically analyze all of it.
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The state of Minnesota is battling a measles outbreak caused by anti-vaccination propaganda. And Discussion over the effects of misinformation on recent elections in Austria, Germany, and the United States is still ongoing.
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Fake news and alternative facts are things that mess up our perception a lot. As we learned in TOK, there are a lot of fallacies in human reasoning. People tend to stick with their pre-existing worldview or ideas. I found it very interesting that people reduce the effect of misinformation by having an "inoculation". I think our TOK class is like the "inoculation" in a way that it asks us question and challenge us with the idea that everything might not seem as definite or absolute as it seems. TOK class can definitely help us to be immune of the fake news. --Sissi (5/25/2017)
Human-Like Thinking Is up to 1.8 Million Years-Old, Study Finds | Big Think - 0 views
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I have a confession to make, I think I’m pretty smart.
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And is it something we can measure?
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Shelby S. Putt conducted the study. She’s a postdoctoral researcher with The Stone Age Institute at Indiana University.
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Why Silicon Valley Titans Train Their Brains with Philosophy | Big Think - 0 views
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To alleviate the stresses and open their minds, the execs have been known to experiment with microdosing on psychedelics, taking brain-stimulating nootropics, and sleeping in phases. What’s their latest greatest brain hack? Philosophy.
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The guidance focuses on using reason and logic to unmask illusions about your life or work.
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He thinks that approach can obscure the true understanding of human life. In an interview with Quartz, he says that rather than ask “How can I be more successful?” it’s actually more important to ask - "Why be successful?”
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I found this very interesting that philosophy can be linked to the modern silicon valley. The silicon valley always gives me a modern impression as if it is the lead of human technology and a believer of science. I am surprised that actually many people in silicon valley are interested in philosophy, something that I consider being not practical at all. I think this shows the importance of being cross-disciplined. --Sissi (5/23/2017)
We Aren't Built to Live in the Moment - The New York Times - 2 views
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Looking into the future, consciously and unconsciously, is a central function of our large brain, as psychologists and neuroscientists have discovered — rather belatedly, because for the past century most researchers have assumed that we’re prisoners of the past and the present.
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Behavior, memory and perception can’t be understood without appreciating the central role of prospection. We learn not by storing static records but by continually retouching memories and imagining future possibilities
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Our emotions are less reactions to the present than guides to future behavior
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When scientists saw the mouse heads glowing, they knew the discovery was big - The Wash... - 0 views
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have found evidence linking problems in the lymphatic and glymphatic systems to Alzheimer’s. In a study on mice, they showed that glymphatic dysfunction contributes to the buildup in the brain of amyloid beta, a protein that plays a key role in the disease.
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several colleagues examined postmortem tissue from 79 human brains. They focused on aquaporin-4, a key protein in glymphatic vessels. In the brains of people with Alzheimer’s, this protein was jumbled; in those without the disease, the protein was well organized. This suggests that glymphatic breakdowns may play a role in the disease
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The vessels have also been implicated in autoimmune disease. Researchers knew that the immune system has limited access to the brain. But at the same time, the immune system kept tabs on the brain’s status; no one knew exactly how. Some researchers theorize that the glymphatic system could be the conduit and that in diseases such as multiple sclerosis — where the body’s immune system attacks certain brain cells — the communication may go awry.
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Breakfast was the most important meal of the day - until America ruined it - The Washin... - 1 views
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It’s probably more accurate to call breakfast the most dangerous meal of the day. Not only because of the sugar in so many breakfast cereals, but also because the refined grains they’re made of are virtually the same thing, once they reach your bloodstream.
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All the cereal, whole grain or not, is processed in a way to give it indefinite shelf life. As the nutritious parts of our food are what goes bad on the shelf, just about every processed-grain product on the shelf is nutritionally barren.
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refined wheat, rice and corn, what most mainstream American breakfast cereals are primarily composed of, is quickly converted to sugar on entering your system, requiring that exact same insulin response.
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Bile, venom and lies: How I was trolled on the Internet - The Washington Post - 1 views
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In a comprehensive new study of Facebook that analyzed posts made between 2010 and 2014, a group of scholars found that people mainly shared information that confirmed their prejudices, paying little attention to facts and veracity. (Hat tip to Cass Sunstein, the leading expert on this topic.) The result, the report says, is the “proliferation of biased narratives fomented by unsubstantiated rumors, mistrust and paranoia.”
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The authors specifically studied trolling — the creation of highly provocative, often false information, with the hope of spreading it widely. The report says that “many mechanisms cause false information to gain acceptance, which in turn generate false beliefs that, once adopted by an individual, are highly resistant to correction.”
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in recent weeks I was the target of a trolling campaign and saw exactly how it works. It started when an obscure website published a post titled “CNN host Fareed Zakaria calls for jihad rape of white women.
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How a Polymath Mastered Math-and So Can You - WSJ - 0 views
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How do you strengthen your mind as you age?
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Physical exercise helps encourage neuron growth. Some forms of meditation improve creativity, while others sharpen focus. In one study, “reading a book for around 3½ hours a week was shown to extend the lifespan . . . by something like two to three years.” Learning a foreign language “gives a workout to the very centers of the brain that are most affected by the aging process, so it’s super healthy.”
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“Action videogames are incredibly helpful in keeping you sharp,” Ms. Oakley says. “They’ve been shown by research—top-notch research—to make a big difference in your attentional centers.”
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The meaning of life in a world without work | Technology | The Guardian - 0 views
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As artificial intelligence outperforms humans in more and more tasks, it will replace humans in more and more jobs.
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Many new professions are likely to appear: virtual-world designers, for example. But such professions will probably require more creativity and flexibility, and it is unclear whether 40-year-old unemployed taxi drivers or insurance agents will be able to reinvent themselves as virtual-world designers
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The crucial problem isn’t creating new jobs. The crucial problem is creating new jobs that humans perform better than algorithms. Consequently, by 2050 a new class of people might emerge – the useless class. People who are not just unemployed, but unemployable.
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E.P.A. Dismisses Members of Major Scientific Review Board - The New York Times - 0 views
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Members of the board say they have reviewed the E.P.A.’s scientific research on the public health impact of leaking underground fuel tanks, the toxicity of the chemicals used to clean up oil spills, and the effects of the spread of bark beetles caused by a warming climate. Advertisement Continue reading the main story A larger, corresponding panel, the 47-member Science Advisory Board, advises the agency on what areas it should conduct research in and evaluates the scientific integrity of some of its regulations.
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Both boards, which until now have been composed almost entirely of academic research scientists, have long been targets of political attacks. Congressional Republicans and industry groups have sought to either change their composition or weaken their influence on the environmental regulatory process.
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“In recent years, S.A.B. experts have become nothing more than rubber stamps who approve all of the E.P.A.’s regulations,” Mr. Smith said at a House hearing in February. “The E.P.A. routinely stacks this board with friendly scientists who receive millions of dollars in grants from the federal government. The conflict of interest here is clear.”
Daniel Kahneman On Hiring Decisions - Business Insider - 0 views
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Most hiring decisions come down to a gut decision. According to Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman, however, this process is extremely flawed and there's a much better way.
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Kahneman asked interviewers to put aside personal judgments and limit interviews to a series of factual questions meant to generate a score on six separate personality traits. A few months later, it became clear that Kahneman's systematic approach was a vast improvement over gut decisions. It was so effective that the army would use his exact method for decades to come. Why you should care is because this superior method can be copied by any organization — and really, by anyone facing a hard decision.
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First, select a few traits that are prerequisites for success in this position (technical proficiency, engaging personality, reliability, and so on. Don't overdo it — six dimensions is a good number. The traits you choose should be as independent as possible from each other, and you should feel that you can assess them reliably by asking a few factual questions. Next, make a list of those questions for each trait and think about how you will score it, say on a 1-5 scale. You should have an idea of what you will call "very weak" or "very strong."
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we cannot always use simply a 'gut feeling' from our so called 'reasoning' and emotional response to make big decisions like job hiring, which is what happens much of the time. this is a really interesting way to do it systematically. you still use your own perspective, but the questions asked will hopefully lead you to a better outcome
Why Instagram Is Becoming Facebook's Next Facebook - The New York Times - 1 views
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Instagram has thus triggered an echo — it feels like Facebook. More precisely, it feels the way Facebook did from 2009 to 2012, when it silently crossed over from one of those tech things that some people sometimes did to one of those tech things that everyone you know does every day.
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But last year, you might have said there was a question whether a picture-based service like Instagram could have reached similar scale — whether it was universal enough, whether there were enough people whose phones could handle it, whether it could survive greater competition from newer photo networks like Snapchat.
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Mr. Systrom said this plan to rapidly speed up Instagram’s pace of change to attract more users was deliberate.
Why Kids Shouldn't Sit Still in Class - 0 views
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"Daily physical activity is an opportunity for the average school to become a high-performing school," said Jesper Fritz, a doctoral student at Lund University and physician at the Skane University Hospital in Malmo who was the study's lead author. "Activity helps the brain in so many ways," said James F.
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