THE MISCONCEPTION: After you learn something new, you remember how you were once ignorant or wrong. THE TRUTH: You often look back on the things you’ve just learned and assume you knew them or believe...
Subjective Validation THE MISCONCEPTION: You are skeptical of generalities. THE TRUTH: You are prone to believing vague statements and predictions are true, especially if they are positive and address...
Remember, there’s always someone out there willing to sell eyeballs to advertisers by offering a guaranteed audience of people looking for validation.
Psychologists call missing information in plain sight inattentional blindness. You believe with confidence your eyes capture everything before them and your memories are recorded versions of those cap...
One of the greatest discoveries in recent years was to find that mirror neurons fire also when you do things. It is as if part of your brain is observing yourself as an outsider. You are a story you t...
Jokes and movies, comic books and professional wrestling, television shows and news programs—they all present dramatic interpretations of facts and fiction in the format of a narrative for the same re...
It is not a fallacy to trust the consensus of thousands of researchers on how to interpret the evidence provided by decades of studies.
In the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.
If you neglect your personal space and allow chaos and clutter to creep in, it will affect you, and perhaps encourage further neglect. Positive feedback loops should improve your life, not detract fro...
Calling someone a bigot, or an idiot, or an asshole feels good, but it does not prove you right or that person wrong.
Believing you understand your motivations and desires, your likes and dislikes, is called the introspection illusion. You believe you know yourself and why you are the way you are. You believe this kn...
All brains are bards, all selves audiences to the tales of who they are.
Who you think you are is sort of like a movie based on true events, which is not necessarily a bad thing.
The future is the result of actions, and actions are the result of behavior, and behavior is the result of prediction.
THE MISCONCEPTION: When you are joined by others in a task, you work harder and become more accomplished. THE TRUTH: Once part of a group, you tend to put in less effort because you know your work wil...
THE MISCONCEPTION: Clothes as everyday objects are just fabrics for protection and decoration of the body. THE TRUTH: The clothes you wear change your behavior and can either add or subtract from your...
Social Loafing THE MISCONCEPTION: When you are joined by others in a task, you work harder and become more accomplished. THE TRUTH: Once part of a group, you tend to put in less effort because you kno...
Once people started coming up with ways to maintain larger groups, like armies, cities, and nations, humans started subdividing those groups. Dunbar’s number explains why big groups are made of smalle...
Just spending time together is not enough, he said. The sorts of activities you engage in are vital. Graham concluded you are driven to grow, to expand, to add to your abilities and knowledge. When yo...
If you see yourself as the kind of person who owns Apple computers, or who drives hybrids, or who smokes Camels, you’ve been branded. And once a person is branded, that person will defend the brand by...