The chances of spouses having things in common are about 100 percent. Likewise the chances are 100 percent that they will find differences from one another. Bringing up children highlights these kinds of differences. So does making decisions, which is a major part of any...
Half the time I am a hyperskeptic; the other half I hold certainties and can be intransigent about them, with a very stubborn disposition. Of course I am hyperskeptic where others, particularly those I call bildungsphilisters, are gullible, and gullible where others seem skeptical. I...
The possibility that empathy is part of our primate heritage ought to make us happy, but we're not in the habit of embracing our nature. When people commit genocide, we call them "animals." But when they give to the poor, we praise them for being...
Researchers at the Kavli Institute for Systems Neuroscience have discovered a network of brain cells that expresses our sense of time within experiences and memories. The area of the brain where time is experienced is located right next to the area that codes for space. Clocks...
The history of the economies of Western nations has, since the early nineteenth century, been one of repeated cycles of growth and recession. Typically, four or five years of expansion have been followed by one or two years of retraction, with occasional massive retrenchments lasting...
The misconception that falling in love is a type of love is so potent precisely because it contains a grain of truth. The experience of real love also has to do with ego boundaries, since it involves an extension of one's limits. One's limits are one's...
TWELVE-ITEM TEST Here are twelve questions about you and your behavior toward institutions and things. Take this little quiz as your personal introduction to this chapter on how institutions and personal attitudes can victimize anyone who is willing to let it happen. Yes No ____ ____ 1. Do...
The number π is a mathematical constant, the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter, commonly approximated as 3.14159. It has been represented by the Greek letter "π" since the mid-18th century, though it is also sometimes spelled out as "pi" (/paɪ/). Being an irrational...
AMHERST, Mass. – Imagine a rubber band that was capable of snapping itself many times over, or a small robot that could jump up a set of stairs propelled by nothing more than its own energy. Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have discovered...
What's happening in genomics, and how this revolution is about to change everything we know about the world, life, ourselves, and how we think about them. If you saw 2001: A Space Odyssey, and you heard the boom, boom, boom, boom, and you saw the monolith,...
