Morality

5/30/09. Psychologist Jonathan Haidt talks about his research on morality --- looking at morality from a politically liberal and conservative perspective.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/video/conference/2007/haidt

A Compendium of Beautiful Libraries

5/26/09. http://curiousexpeditions.org/?p=78

Spent

5/21/09. Evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey Miller applies science to tell us why buying more stuff doesn't lead to happiness.

http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/loves_labors_and_costs/

Edwin S. Shneidman dies

5/21/09. Dr. Shneidman was a psychologist who established the study of suicide as an interdisciplinary field and was chief of the first national suicide prevention program at the National Institute of Mental Health.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124286145192740987.html

The Climate-Industrial Complex

5/21/09. Bjorn Lomborg is a former member of Greenpeace. He is the director of the Copenhagen Consensus, a think tank, and author of "Cool it: The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124286145192740987.html

The Placebo Effect

5/20/09. This pink pill will relieve your pain...

http://www.skeptic.com/eskeptic/09-05-20#feature

What Makes Us Happy?

5/14/09. Some of the best information in psychology is gleaned from longitudinal studies --- and the Harvard study of men graduates who are now in their 80's is among the most informative. This article reviews the pioneering, creative work of the director of this study, psychiatrist George Vaillant.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200906/happiness

Don't!The secret of self-control.

5/12/09. Science writer Jonah Lehrer reviews the psychology of self-control.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/05/18/090518fa_fact_lehrer?currentPage=all

Monday Quotations

5/11/09.

"Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested."
"Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man."

--- Francis Bacon (1561 - 1626)


"The poem must resist the intelligence, / Almost successfully.

--- Wallace Stevens (1879 - 1955)

Science, Spirituality, and Some Mismatched Socks

5/09/09. Quantum physics is turning up evidence that the world is not only strange, but stranger than we can imagine.

Two particles, for example, seem to communicate with each other instantly, even when they're billions of miles apart. These discoveries are used to improve data encryption, and push philosophers to sit up and take notice of signs of unknown forces perhaps akin to the spiritual dimension.


http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124147752556985009.html

Seven Pleasures

5/7/09. This is a review of Willard Speigelman's delightful book on ordinary happiness.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124105279357871239.html

Why is the Phallus Shaped The Way It Is?

5/6/09. An evolutionary psychologist explains.

http://www.sciam.com/subscribe/index.cfm?lsource=friendmail

Creativity and Mental Illness

5/6/09. Is there a link between creativity and mental illness?

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-wellbeing/features/creative-minds-the-links-between-mental-illness-and-creativity-1678929.html

Monday Quotations

5/4/09.

"Two things people throughout history have had in common are hatred and humor. I am proud that, like Mark Twain, I have been able to use humor to lessen people's hatred."

--- Richard Pryor (1940 - 2005)

"Humour is by its nature, more truthful than factual."

--- P.J. O'Rourke (1947 - )


"There are some ideas so wrong that only a very intelligent person could believe in them."

--- George Orwell (1903 - 1950)

Genius - The Modern View

5/2/09. When asked how he became such a productive professional, a famous psychologist replied, "80/20 --- I put in 80 hours a week for 20 years."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/01/opinion/01brooks.html?_r=1&ref=opinion

Between Experience and Reflection

4/27/09. Theodore Dalrymple reviews "The Only Superpower: Reflections on Strength, Weakness, and Anti-Americanism" by Paul Hollander.

http://www.city-journal.org/printable.php?id=4457

Monday Quotations

4/27/09.

"Objective evidence and certitude are doubtless very fine ideals to play with, but where on this moonlit and dream-visited planet are they found?"

"The moral flabbiness born of the exclusive worship of the bitch-goddess SUCCESS. That - with the squalid cash interpretation put on the word success - is our national disease."

"First, you know, a new theory is attacked as absurd; then it is admitted to be true, but obvious and insignificant; finally it is seen to be so important that its adversaries claim that they themselves discovered it."

William James (1842 - 1910)

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

4/26/09. Some experts say the concept of PTSD is itself disordered.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=post-traumatic-stress-trap

Inside the baby mind

4/26/09. A blooming, buzzing, confusion --- it's not.

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/04/26/inside_the_baby_mind?mode=PF

Enlightenment Therapy

4/25/09. After fourth marriage ends, Zen master meets psychoanalyst.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/26/magazine/26zen-t.html?ref=magazine&pagewanted=print