More on Revolution from Clay Shirky
“If it’s a revolution it can’t be predictable. And if it’s predictable it can’t be a revolution.”
-Clay Shirky
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On Parenting Adam Lanza, the Sandy Hook Shooter
ByadminAndrew Solomon wrote a wonderful article in the New Yorker recently about Adam Lanza’s father and his search for answers to his son’s awful behavior. The piece included a quote I thought I would share with you today: All parenting involves choosing between the day (why have another argument at dinner?) and the years (the…
A Clever Example of Psychological Priming
ByadminOne of the more useful phenomena employed in psychological research is what’s known as “priming.” This idea is simple: get a thought into people’s heads, and it lingers, thereby affecting future thoughts. Hold a cup of hot tea while riding an elevator, and the next person you meet might seem to have a warmer personality!…
Be Careful What Standards You Use to Judge Historical Figures: The Case of Abraham Lincoln
ByadminIt’s always tricky to judge anyone’s moral character, much less that of historical figures who lived during times very different from our own. Most of the great people who founded the United States, for example, had slaves. Some even sired children with those slaves – like Thomas Jefferson. Hard to know how to judge that….
Partisan Drift Over the Environment: Are Republicans Wandering Away from their Voters?
ByadminThere’s a fascinating new analysis available, looking at parallels between the politics of health care and the environment. It is led by Theda Skocpol, a social scientist at Harvard (whose writing about health policy and the Tea Party are wonderful). I am reproducing one figure from that report. It shows, in lines, where Congress has…
A New Look at Self-Deception
ByadminAs a behavioral scientist, I have long been interested in self-deception. But I’ve never thought about it this way before, as pictured in a tremendous drawing by Jonathan Bartlett: (Click here to view comments)
On Reading Rick Atkinson's The Day of Battle
ByadminI don’t read much war history. I’m fascinated by what causes humans to end up in a state of war, but not so interested in the bloody details of how they fight their battles. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed The Day of Battle, a book by Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Atkinson. The book covers the war…