Categories
Archives
Recent Comments
- HOW BANKS PREPARED FOR A U.S. DEFAULT. (2)
- GREECE’S ADVANTAGE IN THE CHICKEN GAME. (2)
- Nick: That makes sense. It reminds me of the stories Pater Familias would tell me about how in Boston the person with...
- Dick Weisfelder: Greece seems to me to be playing a game that Karl Deutsch called “underdog.” While one...
- FOOTBALL PLAYERS DELIBERATELY CAUSING CONCUSSIONS? (3)
- Nick: It was my understanding that boxing gloves were to protect the puncher’s hands and not the...
- Dick Weisfelder: Remember the Roman arenas? Bare knuckled boxing? Such injuries were taken as natural and accepted in...
- Mary Jane Schaefer: This isn’t about football. Or even sportsmanship. Well, it is about sportsmanship. But what...
- A 25 % CHANCE OF A EURO DEFAULT? (1)
- Nick: The fact that this has gone on for so long is pretty perplexing. The Economist is referring back to articles it...
- DECIDING WHAT KIND OF PATIENT YOU ARE. (1)
- Dick Weisfelder: One can be very open to new technology, but also risk averse. The recent debates about how to...
- THE EUROZONE—A CHICKEN GAME WHERE EVERY MEMBER CAN BLOW IT UP? (1)
- Mary Jane Schaefer: This is not a matter of chicken. These are all turkeys.
- PLAYING WITH MATCHES NEAR A GASOLINE TANK. (1)
- Mary Jane Schaefer: Why would the French care? As long as they take down Britain?
- NORWAY’S CHRISTMAS BUTTER SHORTAGE. (1)
- Mary Jane Schaefer: Christmas with a butter cookie shortage–in Scandinavia. This isn’t even Scrooge. This...
Meta
Monthly Archives: November 2008
HOW NEUROSCIENCE SUPPORTS VIRGINIA WOOLF.
HOW NEUROSCIENCE SUPPORTS VIRGINIA WOOLF. Jonah Lehrer explains how neuroscience supports Virginia Woolf’s view that the mind is, as her character Mrs. Ramsay says, “always ‘merging and flowing and creating.’” Experiments show that short-term memory can hold an experience for … Continue reading
Posted in Literature
2 Comments
THE SELF EMERGES BY PAYING ATTENTION.
THE SELF EMERGES BY PAYING ATTENTION. Jonah Lehrer illustrates Virginia Woolf’s view of the mind with a passage from TO THE LIGHTHOUSE. Mrs. Ramsay has stopped paying attention to the dinner table conversation, which is about mathematics. Her eyes drift … Continue reading
Posted in Literature
1 Comment
COMPETING SELVES OR SIMPLY A MYRIAD OF IMPRESSSIONS?
COMPETING SELVES OR SIMPLY A MYRIAD OF IMPRESSIONS? I posted recently on the research of psychologists who view the human mind as made up of competing selves. Jonah Lehrer writes in PROUST WAS A NEUROSCIENTIST that Virginia Woolf‘s view was … Continue reading
Posted in Literature
1 Comment
MODERNISM AND THE MIND—AND A BOOK RECOMMENDATON.
MODERNISM AND THE MIND—AND A BOOK RECOMMENDATION. Almost two years ago, I posted here on how Proust seemed to have anticipated some of the findings of behavioral psychologists described in Daniel Gilbert’s STUMBLING ON HAPPINESS. I then found out and … Continue reading
Posted in Literature
Leave a comment
TESTING THE BROKEN WINDOW THEORY.
TESTING THE BROKEN WINDOW THEORY. This article in the Economist describes experiments at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands which tested the Broken Windows Theory. The most striking experiment for me (and for the Economist) was “the one that … Continue reading
Posted in Economics, Politics
Leave a comment
CHANGING MY MIND: BROKEN WINDOWS.
CHANGING MY MIND: BROKEN WINDOWS. For years, when I lived in New York, I was impatient with efforts by the city to stop graffiti. It seemed to me self-evident that police efforts should give priority to major crimes. There were … Continue reading
Posted in Economics, History, Politics
Leave a comment
THANKSGIVING 2008.
THANKSGIVING 2008. In one of the first posts on this blog, I gave “thanks for all that the Americans who have gone before us have given us” and I listed the names of some of those heroes. As you can … Continue reading
Posted in History
Leave a comment
THANKS TO THOSE WHO WENT BEFORE.
THANKS TO THOSE WHO WENT BEFORE. When Annalisa and Nick first saw LES MISERABLES as children, they had the same reaction to the two young leads, Cosette and Marius. They thought that Cosette and Marius were bland and undeserving of … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
1 Comment
FINDING A PATTERN IN RANDOMNESS.
FINDING A PATTERN IN RANDOMNESS. I posted here on the Random Walk Hypothesis in response to Annalisa’s comment that stock prices seem to move randomly. Humans see patterns even when there is no pattern and look for causation where none … Continue reading
THE WILL POWER OF A TRUE STOIC.
THE WILL POWER OF A TRUE STOIC. The Sidestep blog posted here on a good example of the will power of a Stoic for whom an exception to a principle is unthinkable. The example comes from A MAN IN FULL … Continue reading
Posted in Literature
2 Comments