Psychology

Repeated ad infinitum

January 24, 2012

in Geek stuff,Internet matters,Psychology,Rants

XKCD is right, this is worth a look today: List of common misconceptions From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Note: Nero didn’t fiddle while Rome burned. The ancient Greeks knew that the Earth was spherical, and how large it was. Napoleon was not short. He was slightly taller than the average Frenchman. The Emancipation Proclamation didn’t [...]

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Risk/efficiency trade-offs in pathfinding

January 21, 2012

in Daily updates,Geek stuff,Psychology,The outdoors,Travel

Finding my way to a new building, it struck me that two major strategies are possible in urban pathfinding. You can try to follow the most efficient path or you can try to minimize your odds of getting lost. Call those the ‘efficiency’ and ‘reduced risk’ approaches. Each has some level of appeal. Nobody wants [...]

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Being unwell

January 17, 2012

in Daily updates,Psychology

I’ve noticed something that is both odd and somewhat rational: I find that I feel much sicker after I have seen a doctor and had them share my concern. Before seeing a doctor, I always have a nagging sense that I am going to see them about something excessively trivial and they will feel as [...]

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Ironic liberal / big government libertarian

January 16, 2012

in Canada,Economics,Law,Politics,Psychology

When I think about how to characterize my political views, it seems as though there are philosophical positions that I find appealing, but which need to be tempered in response to the strong counterarguments against them. Ironic liberalism I can see the sense in what Richard Rorty calls ‘ironic liberalism’. All that old-fashioned stuff about [...]

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My first exposure to the value of mindfulness

January 14, 2012

in Books and literature,Psychology,Writing

After having my interest piqued by some iTunes University lectures, I have been reading Mark Williams’ and Danny Pengman’s book Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World. In the midst of a number of urgent projects, I am reading it in fits and starts, so I am not really following the [...]

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A Liar’s Autobiography: Volume VI

January 14, 2012

in Books and literature,Geek stuff,Psychology,Writing

Graham Chapman, one of the Monty Python gang, drank himself to death at 48, having already been an alcoholic for 23 years when he was 37. He died exactly 20 years after the first recording of Monty Python’s Flying Circus. A Liar’s Autobiography: Volume VI was published nine years earlier, written by Chapman, his long-time [...]

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Gabor Maté on addiction and drug policy

January 13, 2012

in Canada,Law,Politics,Psychology,Science

Please listen to this podcast: Gabor Maté on The Human Face of Addictive Behavior Maté makes some excellent points about the psychological basis for addiction, as well as the serious problems with our current approach of treating addiction as a crime. Maté makes a powerful case that criminalization of drug use is ineffective and unethical, [...]

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Advice to supervillains – killing your own scientists

January 13, 2012

in Bombs and rockets,Books and literature,Geek stuff,Psychology,Rants,Security,Writing

One classic mistake made by cartoon supervillains concerns the complicated piece of machinery that is inevitably at the heart of their secret plan. It might be a time travel device of some sort, or a machine that strips the opposing superhero of their power, or a key part of a world domination scheme. As a [...]

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Encouraging re-gifting

December 10, 2011

in Economics,Geek stuff,Psychology

I don’t think it is appropriate that our society has a general stigma against ‘re-gifting‘: the practice of giving away something that was itself received as a gift. In many ways, re-gifting is a rational response to the fundamental problem of gift-giving, namely that gift-givers are not necessarily able to pick things that gift-recipients will [...]

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Two more books

December 2, 2011

in Books and literature,Psychology

Unable to help myself, I have added two volumes to my substantial assortment of unread and partially read books. I got the biography of Graham Chapman, of Monty Python fame: A Liar’s Autobiography: Volume VI. Intrigued by an ongoing series of discussions on iTunes University, I also got a book on ‘mindfulness’ as a means [...]

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