Time to Retire the Political Spectrum
“If the political spectrum is largely meaningless and causes so much confusion, why does nearly everyone buy into it?”
Hyrum Lewis
· 13 min read
Philosophy
A collection of 233 posts
The Sense of an Ending — How the Wired Brain Produces False Memories
We all have our own narratives of life. You have a “version” of that life that is a story you tell to yourself and others, about what your life has been.
Lauren Knott
· 4 min read
Citing a Scientific Study Is Not the End of the Argument
A single study is rarely anything more than suggestive, and often it takes many replications under a variety of circumstances to provide strong justification for a conclusion.
Jonathan Anomaly, Brian Boutwell
· 7 min read
The Crucible of the Application Process
These alterations would ostensibly bolster my chances of being accepted to and receiving funds for graduate programs.
Dillon Bowen
· 14 min read
Reviving Essentialism — Scientific Straw Men
In fact—it’s even more interesting than that. Multiple matings do (perhaps surprisingly) benefit females in all sorts of ways across all sort of species.
Robert King
· 10 min read
Not Everything Is an Interaction
Despite strong genetic influences on IQ (and there are strong genetic influences on IQ), we can’t calculate the proportion of credit for Einstein’s intellect that is owed solely to his genes.
Brian Boutwell
· 4 min read
When Good Men Fail to Stand Up to Danger
If we teach men and boys that simple chivalry is a form of sexism that must be opposed, how do we convince them to commit to the braver, more difficult chivalrous demands?
Charlie Peters
· 6 min read
Why Powerful People Fail to Stop Bad Behaviour by Their Underlings
Although the failure to stop an unethical practice is often attributed to character problems such as greed, sexism or the relentless pursuit of self-interest, our explanation is subtler.
Jessica A Kennedy and Cameron Anderson
· 6 min read
Money Laundering for the Soul — The Unbearable Ease of Moral Self-Exoneration
We do this with surprising ease, often basing sustained bouts of deliberate nastiness on nebulous reasoning.
Noam Shpancer
· 9 min read
On Truth and Beauty
The model was indeed full-figured, and her presence will come as a kind of reassurance to anyone who today considers themselves overweight.
Derek Hopper
· 4 min read
Political Animals — The Limits of Labels and Why We Must Overcome Them
It’s about vision and seeing principles through action. It’s about creativity and intuition blended with pragmatism and fact. Above all, politics is what we make of it.
Theo Zenou
· 9 min read
Our Age of Empathy
The feeling of helplessness that arises from passively consuming distant events is now central to the relationship of the individual to the world.
Wessie du Toit
· 6 min read
How Social Constructionism Created the Sex Addiction Model
And unfortunately, that problem is usually one which is socially constructed, rather than scientifically valid.
Michael Aaron
· 6 min read
Make Expertise Great Again
The Death of Expertise: The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why It Matters is finally out this year.
Sumantra Maitra
· 7 min read
On Moral Outrage and Humility
Much like I try to match my scholarly beliefs with intellectual humility, I rather hope to match my moral outrage with moral humility.
Patrick Chambers
· 5 min read