Tag Archives: cognitive framing

Is it “good”? Or is it “sweet”?

This year on Easter, after a lovely dinner with my partner and son, and after we each looked to see what the Easter Bunny had put in our Easter baskets, we settled down to consider playing the board game Bunny … Continue reading

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Beyond love/hate binaries

Quick! What do e-cigarettes, fossil fuels, and Downton Abbey all have in common? E-cigarettes are great – if you used to be a heavy smoker and managed to switch your nicotine addiction entirely to e-cigarettes, which are much less likely … Continue reading

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From clickbait to transcendent meaning

This evening the weather was perfect for reading outside, and that’s what we were doing, enjoying the rustling leaves overhead, the trickle of water from our little fountain, and the antics of four of our cats, when my phone gave … Continue reading

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Growing up “meta”

Our young friend Maddie recently celebrated her first birthday. Maddie loves berries and books! We do too! And thus, my partner and I gave her three books about berries. One is a book about colors of fruit. One is a … Continue reading

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Mindset and “genius” – life lessons from the Schumanns

One of the most popular – and practically useful – concepts to emerge in psychology in recent decades has been Carol Dweck’s concept of “fixed” versus “growth” mindsets. Dweck, a Stanford researcher, found that in any given context, people tend … Continue reading

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All the “porns”

The last time I was in our neighborhood supermarket, I narrowly avoided buying the latest special issue of Good Housekeeping, full of recipes for the Mediterranean diet. Although I was tempted, $13.99 was non-trivial, and I reminded myself that if … Continue reading

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Empirical and conceptual science: a vital partnership

It’s great fun to be an interdisciplinary thinker. It’s exciting to make connections that shed new light on old problems. I love the world “outside the box.” Or rather, here’s the graphic on my ironic Halloween t-shirt: Even though it’s … Continue reading

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The secret to social change

We all have a lot of ideas about what people should be doing differently. What am I talking about? Well, pretty much everything – every topic of laws and norms and morality that affect other people’s decisions. It could be … Continue reading

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Stories-About-Us: How They Work

In my last few blog posts, I’ve been focusing on our “stories about us” (“metanarratives”) – the topic of the book I’m writing. I hope the book will reach a broad audience, because it’s vital information we all need to … Continue reading

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“The only thing we have to fear…”

International terrorists are trying to ratchet up our fear. They’re devoting their lives to getting us to invest a lot of energy into making ourselves far more secure (in one specific dimension or another) than rationally called for. They’re working … Continue reading

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