Why Do We Do It This Way, Again?
Two newlyweds were spending their first Christmas together. Wanting to celebrate properly, the new wife asked her mother for the famous Christmas Ham recipe. The husband was excited. He watched as...
View ArticleA 10 Second Guide To Mastering Capitalism
Capitalism is the ability to accumulate capital, which can then be deployed at will. The key to accumulating capital is delaying gratification.
View ArticleThe Small Change in Perception That Can Change Your Life
Who has a higher tolerance for pain: those who experience an acute injury, lots of pain at one time, or those who constantly suffer from pain? The answer is counter-intuitive, and the potential reason...
View ArticleSelf Delusion And The Dumbest Excuses Ever
You’re almost certain to get two answers if you ask any student why they’re not doing something that would benefit them, whether it’s taking more rigorous (or simply more) classes, getting an...
View ArticleHow To Befriend Anyone
When Ben Franklin was running for Clerk of the General Assembly, one of his colleagues delivered a speech to the legislature skewering him. This was a problem, because this was a guy Franklin couldn’t...
View ArticleThe Hardest Thing About Learning
The hardest thing about learning is figuring out what you don’t know. If you can key in on the small concept you don’t understand, you can avoid having to repeatedly sift through the entirety of the...
View ArticleIt’s The People Who Realize “I Don’t Know Anything” Who Succeed
In every good piece of legal writing, there is a narrative. It’s a plain, easily digestible story that the writer wants you to follow. It cuts through jargon and pomp and circumstance and clues the...
View ArticleFront-Running
Why does it matter who wins the South Carolina primary next week? Why, after votes in only two other states, would a win for Mitt Romney make him the prohibitive favorite? It’s an interesting...
View ArticleFear Breeds Superstition
Superstition, then, is engendered, preserved, and fostered by fear. If anyone desire an example, let him take Alexander, who only began superstitiously to seek guidance from seers, when he first...
View ArticleLanguage and Rationality
Thinking in a different language may lead to more rational decisions: Keysar’s team recruited 54 University of Chicago students who spoke Spanish as a second language. Each received $15 in $1 bills,...
View ArticleLies, Happiness, and The Tyranny of the Biographer
Being happy in your life and being happy about your life are very different concepts. This is a result of the fact that you have, in a sense, two selfs. There is an experiencing self, who lives in the...
View ArticleClothes Make The Man
It has long been known that clothing affects how other people perceive us as well as how we think about ourselves. It turns out, clothing also affects the way we think. If you wear a white coat that...
View ArticleIf You Wouldn’t Wake Up Early For It, Don’t Stay Up Late For It
One of the reasons Reddit is great is that you can find genuinely wise, pithy, and applicable advice from someone named SmellsLikeUpfoo. In this case, the advice is simple: if you wouldn’t set your...
View ArticleWhy We Lie
Nearly everybody lies and cheats. For most of us, we lie and cheat about the small things, the stuff that we convince ourselves doesn’t really matter. But, because everyone does this, the toll adds...
View ArticleBeing Smarter Doesn’t Mean You Make Better Decisions
In fact, being smarter might actually lead you to make worse decisions. Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman and his scientists measured students on four different points of “cognitive sophistication”. All...
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