#easy to understand cognitive biases

[zentarablog]

Top 10 Ways Your Brain Tricks You Every Day (Cognitive Biases Explained!)

Have you ever wondered why you sometimes make choices that don’t quite make sense, or why you’re so sure about something even when the evidence isn’t fully there? Well, get ready for a super cool adventure into the secret world of your brain! Your brain is amazing, a true superstar that helps you learn, think, and explore. But just like even the best superheroes sometimes have a tiny weakness,…

[tanadrin]

I would love to hear the rant about social media doomerism and conspiracy

I’m on my phone right now but the summary version is something like:

Humans are bad at integrating information into their worldview accurately bc of various cognitive biases

Social media incentivizes us seeking out content that excites fear or anger or irritation

Social media thus causes us to form negative impressions of the world bc it mediates so much information consumption and discourse these days

This general negative affective impression is subject to high confirmation bias and ppl in general are really bad at divorcing an affective impression of a thing from their dispassionate reasoning abt a thing

(Bc one of the functions of an affective impression is to “cache” our conclusions about a topic to save time and effort later)

(In general if you are a cynic and pessimist you can fall prey to these biases w/o social media but I think social media makes more ppl susceptible to them)

People don’t want to be dupes so they seek refuge in cynicism. We treat cynicism as wise or worldly when in fact cynicism makes you a dupe and an easy mark for grifters. Cynicism and low trust foster conspiracism, paranoia, and antisocial politics

(This is why so many congenitally contrarian folks seem to flit effortlessly between the far left and far right; it’s not horseshoe theory, they’ve just cooked their brains on this stuff)

This is a world where populist anti-social politicians like Trump and the AfD thrive, bc they will lie about how everything is terrible and people will nod along, bc it explains why their social media is full of awful stories of, like, immigrants eating pets and shit

But it doesn’t just have to be insane lies only a moron could believe. It can be any impression about a fact in the world that it is difficult to personally check and which is vulnerable to being swayed by anecdote

This is how we get a word where people think crime rates are higher than they’ve ever been when in fact crime is falling

Or child predators lurk around every corner when in fact children are safer than ever

Or the American economy is in a recession when in fact it’s doing historically well by just about every available metric (now with full employment AND low inflation!)

Because in a big world even where things are in general good and getting better you can always produce infinite individual examples of shitty things and pipe those in a steady stream into people’s eyeballs, and then point to that and leverage people’s low trust attitudes and their cynicism which tells them they are smarter than the experts and go “statistics is just a fancy way to lie! The world is secretly terrible! Every bad thing is even worse than you thought and every good thing is a lie!”

(Nevermind the whole phenomenon where anything that is complicated or that someone does not themselves understand gets treated like it’s actually secret and a conspiracy.)

And here I know I have to include some disclaimer about how this is not to discount individual cases of suffering or struggle, which are real, or that there are indeed some really awful things happening in the world right now, which there are, but you know what?

I’m tired of doing that. People with reading comprehension operating in good faith ought to be able to deduce that general statements do not obviate particular exceptions, and people who cling to their doomerism as a kind of emotional life raft do not generally argue with me in good faith.

Sometimes doomerism is a load-bearing pillar of their politics, which I think is dumb—I think you can be a leftist or a progressive without being a doomer! In fact I think doomerism is antithetical to useful politics!

Sometimes they are just depressed and treatment-resistant. Sometimes they are just angry misanthropes who want to feel justified in their misanthropy. Some doomers are themselves in bad circumstances and feeling hopeless about that—to them I am enormously sympathetic. Though a lot of doomers will admit they personally are doing OK—this does not seem to be most doomers.

But I think in general cynicism and doomerism and a worldview dominated by a general nebulous air of Everything Is Awful and by abstract nouns with threatening auras is not conducive to wisdom or understanding or useful politics or leading a happy and fulfilling life.

[mystic-for-dummies]

Might be an unpopular opinion, idk

But this needs to be said.

I think the real main problem with astrology is that people treat it like a science instead of a spiritual practice, both on the side of people who hate it and want it erased from existence and on the side of people who are super into it.

On the side of people hating it: I get it. I get that there are people who use astrology as an excuse to be toxic. I get that there are people who are coming up with their own new form of bigotry based on frickin' star signs. I agree that those people need to chill out and go to therapy.

But using the argument "there is no scientific evidence backing astrology" as a reason that it shouldn't exist is not helpful. It's a spiritual practice for a lot of people, like praying or celebrating sacred holidays or what have you. You don't generally use "no scientific evidence" as an argument against those practices.

And also... you need to consider that not all people who use astrology are using it in the way that you hate. I don't think that it's 100% accurate, I don't think that it's going to reveal some cosmic destiny, I don't use it to determine who I should date or befriend, and I don't adapt my personality to better fit what my birth chart says. I'll get into what I do use it for in a bit. (And thank you for reading this far if you do hate astrology; I deeply appreciate you hearing me out.)

On the side of people using it like a science: I get that astrology is fun, and it's easy to get too caught up in something you find fascinating. I get that it would be wild if we had something that could accurately predict the future and/or explain the complexity of the human personality in a learnable system.

But astrology is not a science, as I've said. It's not always accurate, and a science is something that is tested and proven to be accurate. Spirituality is a bit more loose - not always accurate, not currently understandable with our current technology.

Also, I recommend researching cognitive biases. If you're arguing that astrology is an accurate science because [insert examples of the times it was accurate in your life], you may be falling into confirmation bias (and possibly hindsight bias).

What I don't think astrology should be used for:

Judging people (especially without even getting to know them)

Deciding who you should date, who you should be friends with, how you should treat someone, or who you should hire for a job

Psychoanalysis of other people

Telling the future as if the future is set in stone, or using it to dictate the exact method you need to employ to solve your problems

As a framework for how you're "meant to be" or something that you try to change yourself to better fit into

As an excuse for bad behavior (some examples: "Oh yeah, I was a bit crazy when you said hi to my partner, but I'm a Scorpio! We're jealous, y'know." / "I gossip because I'm a Gemini. Geminis are chatty." / "I'm a Leo, and Leos need lots of attention! So it's fine that I started drama at your wedding for attention.")

As some kind of gatekeeping or way to think of yourself as better than other people. (We all fall into the trap of wanting to be special in some way, but your zodiac sign is only the best in your opinion. In the words of Bo Burnham, "Be careful with opinions.")

So, what am I using astrology for, anyway?

Most commonly, I use it for self-reflection and growth. I take a look at my birth chart and read some interpretations of certain sign placements, and I ask myself things like, "Is this flaw accurate to me, and if it is, how should I work on it? Was this issue accurate for me at some point in the past, and is it something I need to address? Is this strength something I actually possess, and if it is, is it something I've failed to appreciate about myself?" I have realized things from this practice, like flaws that of mine that I was not paying attention to and strengths that I had previously ignored. It's been a genuine help with my mental health.

The most "predicting" I ever do with astrology is to get the general feel of a situation, an issue, or where the future might be headed if I continue on my current path. I don't personally believe that the future is set in stone, but I believe that our present course should be evaluated to better understand where we're headed and whether or not we need to make changes. I rarely use astrology for this.

As a writer, I enjoy using it to explore the psychology of my fictional characters, but those are notably not real people lol. I also have a fictional story about characters personifying the star signs, which has been a lot of fun to work on thus far.

Then there's the most easy to explain reason: fun. It's fun to discuss it lightheartedly with my friends, it's fun to read the little "what [blank] is each star sign?" posts, it's fun to read jokes and memes about it. And simple fun, which doesn't hurt anybody, is something I'm sure plenty of people get from astrology.

And then there's a bit of a religious aspect for me. As someone who works with the Greek pantheon in my practice, Greek astrology is a piece of the religion for me. (I'm not saying that everyone who works with a Greek deity or deities considers it a part of their religion. I'm just saying it is for me.) There are tales that go along with the signs. I don't tend to be overly religious or dogmatic - I just appreciate astrology as part of my religious and spiritual experience.

My points with all this:

Astrology is not a science and shouldn't be treated as such. It is a spiritual practice.

You shouldn't use it in unhealthy ways, such as the ones I listed above. If you're using it in those ways and with complete seriousness, maybe go to therapy. (And no, I am not saying "go to therapy" as a joke or an insult. A good therapist is incredibly helpful.)

To the people who dislike astrology: I'm not trying to make you like it or believe in it, or convince you to practice it. The only things I ask are that you don't think less of someone the second you see a star sign listed in their bio, and maybe also just don't lump us all in together. Also... maybe don't list astrology as something only "crazy people" do. I don't like using the word "crazy", but that is literally the word I've heard used in this context.

[28ms28]

Well well well look who wants to understand my driver rankings. Welcome to this long-ass post where i explain my crimes.

Short answer: My top 4 drivers are Charles Leclerc, Max Verstappen, Oscar Piastri and George Russell in that particular order and the rest of them are not fixed and are interchangeable with each other!

and my favourite team is Ferrari but i think you must have gathered that from my pinned post.( I will be biased be warned )(i also support Williams!!)(yes im always suffering thanks for asking)

and my take on RPF you ask? my answer is yeah sure why not. (you might catch me posting about lestappen!)(just memes i lack the cognitive function required to write)(also emphasis on the big F in rpf, I don't think all of them are actually in love with each other obv)(I just like parallels okay.)

mostly this blog is for shits and giggles but sometimes i get serious lmao

Long answer :

well first of all i want you to know that i don't hate any drivers so don't come up to me saying that you hate XYZ cause they have upset you or your driver. i won't like that. keep your hatred to yourself and we'll be fine <3 i will only hate them if they have committed heinous crimes in their personal lives(for example nikita mazepin f that guy).

and if I'm trash-talking a driver or if you think I'm trash-talking a driver (which I don't do) it's probably cause I'm frustrated with them atm, come morning I will forget about it because it does not affect my life and it should not affect yours either

LOL I warned you about this like I get complaints but no I'm very polite i promise no one has ever said a bad thing about me.

As always I'm not forcing my thoughts and rankings on you because you're your own person but you are very much welcome to join forces with me lol

My driver ratings and reasons as to why I love them are all at the end of 2024 season and everything below top 4 isn't fixed and can change!! Also as you will soon find out these rankings are deeply unserious and are NOT solely based on their racing and accomplishments it's a mix of everything and my personal preferences (which CAN change so if you provide me reasons to stan them I'm all ears) so yeah just keep that in mind.

1. Charles Leclerc

(Track Menace who is also Pookie Bear) (unintentionally funny) (just an inchident) (canonically listens to sad songs after bad races) (piano man was at some point higher in the iTunes chart than at the actual championship standings) (clueless cringefail loser) (Ice-cream man) (14 year old Max Verstappen's nightmare) (best qualifier on the grid imo) (idk something about someone who is on course for achieving greatness and will not stop until he achieves it no matter the cost, something about so much sacrifices for something he got soo close to achieving something that did not work out in the end something about how he devotes himself to Ferrari like no one else could before him something about how fate chose him to be in that seat something about how he made it look easy something about how it looked like the way was paved for him something red red red idk something about web weaving) (dogdad) (we love Leo) (went to Lewis Hamilton school of naming his dog after his rival) (oh and dreams about community services with said rival) (very strong mental health and even bigger therapy bills) (did i mention he's il predestinato of the tifosi) (biggest Ferrari fan) (only one who knows how to race max verstappen) (he was an ankle biting child see any photos of his childhood as proof) (everybody is maxplaining victim he's a maxplaining enjoyer) (suffers from middle child syndrome) (Seb's Ferrari child) (committed parricide on Sebastian Vettel in 2019 and 2020)

2. Max Verstappen

(pookiest pookie to ever pookie, track lion, big brother, catdad, certified victim ,4 time world champ, deserves so much more love, so so so incredibly talented, he's just a shy boy your honour ,free my man he did all of it but yeah vibes, because I'm dutch, fifa legend(just online), Danny kvyat has nightmares about him, geography nerd, has zero skills in any other physical sport, is planning to become a sim racer, tu tu tu du max verstappen (fun lore about Max did you know this guy was ranked 21st in the world in ultimate fifa in 2018(or was it 2016?? Doesn't matter) like can you imagine being that insane like bro you are a f1 driver in a top team like pls ??) (community service enjoyer) (certified yapper) (is terrified of fuel stations(jos verstappen when I catch you) ) (#1 lecfosi) (cringefail loser and he knows it) (teammate destroyer) (has read every rule in the rulebook and knows how to break every rule in the rulebook legally ofc all legally) (Seb's redbull child) (on his way to break most of Seb's record just to spite the old man)

(And is friends with an old Austrian man somehow)

3. Oscar Piastri

(Pookie bear, Mark Webbers child that has Sebastian Vettel's evil aura (Mark you will never know peace), koala, polite cat, eldest sibling energy, Android lover, Carlos Sainz's nightmare gremlin, loves cricket(cannot play well bless his heart), #1 lestappen shipper(I respect that) is also somehow the eldest of the lestappen children(his granddads are Webbanso) ) ( Him and Fernando have plotted the downfall of alpine) (I have a feeling he hates Zak brown deep down which I agree with) (grill the grid champ(like I said aura of Seb Vettel))(his one lap pace might not have been that great this season but i assure you he makes up for it in his racecraft)(also its his 2nd year cut him some slack)

4. George Russell

(British individual(derogatory), king of radio messages (oh crikey), has an evil aura which is probably why he gets along with Nando, makes amazing powerpoints(facts!!), head of the gdpa and he takes it V.E.R.Y seriously probably the admin to the f1 driver group chat, part-time driver part-time strategist, he's a better driver than people give him credit for unpopular opinion but I think he can be a wdc or least a close wdc contender if given the right car I think if he was in lando's car in 2024 he probably would have taken the fight to max idk about winning but he's for sure no easy breeze, f3 and f2 wdc too, very memefiable or wotever the word is) ( T pose)(t.a.l.l.)(one sweaty boi)(a very very good qualifier i swear you guys are sleeping on this guy)

5. Lewis Hamilton

(7-time world champion, goat behaviour, was friends with P Diddy, rich cool wine aunt, #blessed, fashionista, Hammertime, Fernando Alonso's nightmare gremlin, don't ever mention 2016 in front of him, is haunted by Nico Rosberg, is neighbours with Nico Rosberg, will avoid Greece for the rest of his life, had a very public divorce, thus vegan, Silverstone 2008 you will always be famous, this Barbie is an f1 driver, still we rise guys, Toto Wolff and David Croft will sacrifice their bloodline for him, certified Micheal Massi hater, certified Bottas lover, we love him and Seb being the activists on the grid, this is getting manipulated man, did not survive Abu Dhabi 2021, did not survive Abu Dhabi 2016, has had caps thrown at him, Left family for Italian mafia, uncle I beg you please get your qualifying form back pls pls, is embarrassed by those toxic #teamlh and you cannot convince me otherwise, has let 2 baddies named Nico slip from him, ISS THAT GLOCK???, Bono my tyres are gone)

6. Carlos Sainz

(Spanish chilli, smooth operator, dog lover, says bye to his racing career after 2024( no wait let me tell you something let me finish let m- *shot*), certified zoning out( Carlos has been called to the stewards), Lewis Hamilton hater prolly, certified Fred vassuer hater, poor guy really he leaves whenever a team is getting good like come on, has had very good teammates and has been friends with them, in 2025 will become the third person in history to have raced for Ferrari, McLaren and Williams, I feel like he lacks a bit of aggressiveness in his racing like he operates smoothly and intelligently sure but yk you should have a bite yk )(whenever he finds this said bite and aggressiveness it's usually against his teammate I'm observing you Carlos I'm noticing)( loves Lando Norris, golf master but humble about it, Maria Karey, one of the mature drivers on the grid, excellent at all sports, James aeiou has a crush on him, Lana del Ray coded, him and max were torro rosso nepo babies).

7. Lando Norris

(twitch streamer first f1 driver second, McLaren boy, hates papaya rules, has been multi21nd, mental health has been made very public by his own goddamn team, party-boy and DJ, fakes knowing how to play COD and Fortnite, very consistent racing good for him, terrified of first laps and poles, best friends with last laps and fastest laps(let's go Lando), shit at golf and geography but it's okay he makes up for it by being funny, probably misses being Carlos's teammate, but like Carlos lacks a bit of aggressiveness that is required, McLaren PR's nightmare gremlin, opposite of polite cat, has somehow managed to anger every fanbase and his car is the sole reason for the unification of RedBull, Ferrari and Mercedes, has been dealing with the wrath of Australia since 2021, at the end of the day just a curly haired guy ).

8. Fernando Alonso

(Spanish devil , Disney villain ahh character, 2005 and 2006 world champ, is looking for his 33rd win, Michael Schumacher's nightmare gremlin, grumpy old man first f1 driver second, lance lover(rare), Lawrence stroll's sugar baby, fast, prime Alonso I am scared of you, goat behaviour, holds a special grudge against McLaren and Lewis Hamilton(Alonso is sick of his ass), no more radio for the rest of the race, believes in karma, has dated Taylor swift apparently but is in love with Mark Webber( Jenson button is also somewhere in there), is known as El padre and has an el plan(everyone should be afraid), racecraft out of this world, 2005 Suzuka you will always be famous, all de time you have to leave da space, Alonso radio my love, aggressive but good racing the likes of which I have never seen and probably never will, what do mean by "I knew he'd brake earlier because he has 2 kids and a wife at home" like who says that what what??, worse career decisions than Ferrari strategies, bad luck so much bad luck, so chaotic so much chaos, has adopted Oscar and has plotted the downfall of alpine with him, Flavio haunts him, do not bring up Singapore 2008 in front of him especially not if Felipe Massa is present there, has driven the 2014 Ferrari and has not recovered from it, has outlasted Renault in formula one (wild), give Fernando Alonso 5 more points and he would be a 5 time wdc (even more wild), bye bye I'm still the bad guy)

9. Alex Albon

(alabonoo) ( bff with George Russell) ( is bullied by George Russell) (golf wag first f1 driver second) ( James aeiou has a favourite and it's Alex Albon) ( Alex really said I'm Thai first and a colonizer second and good for you Alex) (2020 Alex and 2022 onwards Alex are different people okay?) ( he's a consistent racer much like Lando but he makes mistakes more often, under pressure working is maybe not his forte sorry pals) ( he's a really nice dude tho and really funny as well ) ( dude has a Chipotle member card as one of his essentials and you tell me I'm not supposed to love him come on be reasonable)(he has his own zoo he's a certified pet owner) ( if I had the money for that amount of pets I would do the same Alex I get it ) (also he's a Ferrari fan so you just know bro is always on hopium) (I think he gets put under the radar often but he's great) ( he seems to be a chill dude imo)(we both love lily)

10. Nico Hulkenberg

(German but like in a cool way) ( has been giving dad energy before he was a dad) ( called Hulk but is probably the calmest person on the grid) ( give my man Bruce Banner his podium nah it's not even funny anymore he deserves so much better than that) ( he's won le mans on his first try yk give him the Redbull seat for godsakes) (Nico is so cheeky like I know he's a gen x or something but like I see the genz potential yk) (Audi better have a car good enough for a podium I swear to god if we say bye to him before a podium I'm uhm I'm uh I'm gonna cry).

11. Yuki Tsunoda

(anime boi) (wants a restaurant before he wants a world championship and I respect that Yuki) (has an evil aura) (certified hothead because he's a certified good chef) (has the bitch spirit to be a Redbull driver but is not. because of Horner issues) (Yuki does make the occasional mistakes but like he's far better than the alt no?) (in the words of Yuki "idk man wotever") (too much anger for too small body) (is in love with Pierre Gasly) (is bullied by Pierre Gasly) (everybody loves Yuki even Nando is a fan)(tbf nandos a fan of anyone who has an evil aura) (people are terrified of Yuki radio as they rightfully should be) (Yuki is nightmare gremlin of every race engineer).

12. Pierre Gasly

(French but like from the north of France)(known for being French and Max Verstappen's teammate thus known for being fucked over by Redbull, also known for his revenge win in Monza) ( he's just a great driver like if given the right car he can fight at the top and win he's not on Max and Charles level yet but I feel like around George and better than Lando) ( he's also a good qualifier maybe it has something to do with speaking French who knows but yeah amazing what he can do in that shit alpine) (unfortunately he has a severe case of resting bitch face but he's very nice actually unless you are Esteban then he's not very nice) (yeah he also has the brocedes case of childhood best friends turned enemies but like French and he's very much Lewis in that way which means he would much rather ignore estie bestie than talk about him e.v.e.r)( oh and he loves one Japanese boi)(i swear they got something going on man)(pierreeee gasllyyyyy)

13. Kevin Magnussen

(Kmag the Viking) (my god nobody races like kmag lol) Okay so maybe I put him this high because he's a track terror to everyone but like watcha want me to do? Not acknowledging kmag's great defending is a crime, he is here to cause menace no matter how many penalty points he gains or races he's banned from he's really coming for Ocon's penalty points honour tbh. Shame really that this is his last season... just when things got interesting *sigh* (off the track he's a chill girldad) (hulk and kmag had an enemies-to-lovers story arc and I think that's beautiful)(kmag you legend)

14. Esteban Ocon

(he's French, he's from Normandy in France which is the north of France so you just know he was a bored child) (he and Pierre were bored babies) (which is probably why he races the way he does lol) (5-second penalty for Ocon) (no but seriously this guy has mad potential but also he's a mad teammate killer and not in a good way) (he has made a way for himself in formula one and he belongs here it's just that maybe if he tried targeting people other than his teammates he would make it much easier for himself) (he's a very cheerful person irl)(they love him for his nice kindness friendly boy swag)(big Marvel fan) (gives very early teenage boy vibes) (softie at heart) (cannot for the life of him pronounce squirrel)(oh he also loves lance(rare)) (Estie bestie is on the podium babyyy)

15. Daniel Riccardo

(Aussie Aussie Aussie Oi oi oi ) (damn Daniel) (it's not tears it's athlete sweat ) (I mean I knew it was time to go but still it didn't have to be this way it's okay tho Danny is enjoying retirement and dirt bikes) (yeah the performance was just not there for Danny boi not that we could see it anyway because of vcarbs shit strategy or whatever they call it) (I miss prime Daniel he was such an annoyance to Sebastian)(2014 Daniel took the Australian revenge on Seb for his crimes against Mark Webber) (but yeah Daniel you go out of this sport with lots of love and a fastest lap)(ki ki aye)

16. Valtteri Bottas

(Finnish when he was in Mercedes but is officially Australian since then) ( Bottas more like Bott-ass get what I mean) (I mean that he has a weird obsession with his gluteus maximus) (Valtteri pls I beg you stop this behaviour) (10 time Grand Prix winner Valtteri has nightmares about James aeiou) (Valtteri it's James) (he's pretty chill all he cares about is racing, cyclist girlfriend, and his mullet+moustache(not necessarily in that order)) also here's a sad fact since Valtteri won't be on the grid next year it would be the first time a Finnish racer is not in the grid since 1989 yeah everybody is waiting for Robin Raikkonen now.

17. Sergio Perez

(Checo damn man what happened) (no 2 Redbull driver curse got to checo) (he was doing so good in racing point like Sakhir 2020 my beloved last to first, man what a performance that was) (he is capable of doing such great things but nooo bro gets knocked out in q1 more than he has reached q3) (Redbull killed the dawg in him man) (certain Austrian man haunts his nightmares and no it's not Niki Lauda) (he and Logan are the nightmare gremlins for mechanics)(even when he performs it's usually in no human right countries so he's not really helping the allegations) ( this poor Latina I swear to god) (he can't drive and he's up and about with other women(Taylor swift 1989 reference) aye aye aye(checo go home to your wife and children).

18. Logan Sargeant

(American) (bald eagle noises) (collective groan of William mechanics) (sorry logie bear)(James aeiou shall face the wrath of Jenson button it's ok) (first American to score points in f1 since 1993 that's 30 years so yaaay!!) (American history will be kind to you Logan)(not sure about f1 history tho) (your last gift to us was a sick ass album cover and I respect it) (if only he knew what a kilometre was * sigh*)(bye bye miss American pie).

19. Zhou Guanyu

(China boy) (another alpine escapee) (Zhou I'm sorry but you're not him anymore) (I miss pre-Silverstone 2022 Zhou where has my dawg gone man) (Zhou may not be as good of a racer now but he makes it up by being a fashionista) (tbf to him that Sauber stake monstrosity is not really helpful so) (also he is a catdad and had an emo phase through f3) (Fernando fanboy)(He's the first Chinese to ever race in f1 I think he's done his country proud) (He's also a proud Valtteri lover)

Okay so rookies next I did not include them here well because they have had like on avg 6 races soo

1. Oliver bearman

(ollie) (what a wonderful job he has done my god) (p7 in Jeddah on a day's notice wow dude) (he's driving for Haas in 2025 and his teammate is Esteban and honestly I can't wait for this dynamic both of them wanna impress so bad (also if anything goes wrong we already have a meme for it: my condolences!! ifykyk)) also points in Baku after he passed his teammate (tell me you are a lestappen child w/o telling me you're a lestappen child) what I've seen from him I can tell he's very relentless that's good(also he's the most employed unemployed person ever) (also I heard people criticising him by commenting on his current f2 season like babe did u see his rookie f2 season?? that's why he's here not because of this year but last year and he's not doing bad this year it's just the car is shit but yeah he was at one point higher in the f1 standings than in f2 so I get why people are confused lol) (also he's super likeable very Genz very demure very mindful) (Ferrari has grown him in a lab with utmost care so he's very much a PR baby)(oh yeah also he's in love with Kimi Antonelli) (and the way I see it bearnelli is so much like an old married couple of that are so fond of each other I have no other option than to stan)

2. Franco Colapinto

(Frankie baby) (Argentinian and very proud) (is very funny) (is also very genz) (sent James aeiou into a crisis by doing a better job than Alex Albon) (scored 4 times the amount of points than his predecessor in his 2nd race) (looks like Senna goes for the gap like Senna( in racing!! in racing!! calm down man)) (he deserves his place in f1 next year my god) (like the racecraft he has shown is very impressive I'm impressed and so is very f1 team even if he does not get the seat next year I doubt people are gonna forget about him believe me he will be in the talks still) (like I said he's not even had a full f2 season when he was called in for Williams and yet the incredible pace he has shown is fantastic) (has all the 30+ aged drivers enthralled with him and I don't blame them I would be too) (also he refers to estie bestie as the Frenchman so where do I submit my stan card??) (oh and he has been adopted by Max Verstappen)

3. Liam Lawson

(aka New Zealand's revenge on Australia) (he did a fantastic job in 2023 and has been doing a fantastic job in 2024) (his idol is Lighting McQueen.....so now that everybody knows that he's Genz you can probably understand why he is beefing with Nando and Checo(boomers) (I think he drives aggressively but not as smoothly he is yet to find a balance it looks like but hey it's working out for him no?)(off the track he's quite an expressive person but I don't think we have seen much of his personality he's friendly for sure and I mean he's a cars fan like come on he's a Pixar kid) (idk something about him says yeah I'm Genz but I still go on Facebook) (not that it's bad not saying the vibes are bad just Liam show more personality).

So that's pretty much it let me kno-what ? what do you mean I forgot someone oh lance?? yeah no I didn't forget I just have nothing to say really just that i expect better from him.

You see i view lance as an outlier, cause i know he's a great person, lovable, fun to be around, you can tell, look at the secret santa videos you can tell just from that, he's got that typical canadian aura, and although I made fun of him saying "lance lover(rare)" it's not actually rare, most of the drivers love lance the person. hell I love lance the person. I just don't understand lance the driver cause sometimes he's good fantastic even but the other times from what I see he does somethings that don't sit right with me. I also understand that people are too quick to jump on the hate train when it comes to lance but I'm not like that I don't hate him just making that clear.

Also I assume many of you saw charles being my fav and must have thought me to be one of 'those' fans(that you people keep talking about idk I've never seen one) but I promise Im not like that 😭 can't believe I have to make this clear lol. I refuse to put down a driver to make mine look good okay?

PLS READ these rankings are in my opinion and my opinion only. no hate to anyone!!

[starryjkoo]

https://www.tumblr.com/starryjkoo/769233955285352448/tkkrs-and-kths-really-going-to-bully-away-one-of?source=share

Taekookers are the downfall of this Fandom lol. and given how they have given feee pass and a big space to tkkrs in the fandom despite knowing how most of them are jimin antis I'd say armys deserve that humiliation. But idt they even care since they do agree with what taekookers say most of the times because otherwise tkkrs wouldn't be getting 10k likes calling jimin abuser would they?

There was a time i used to feel bad/upset/angry that everyone calls armys toxic but it's been long i have accepted that yes it indeed is a toxic Fandom. What's good of this Fandom who lets everyone shit on one member and even hide/defend the people who does so?

Saw them saying that jm solos is because of whom jm gets the most hate as if he deserves getting dea/th threats because of his solos like they're totally justifying the threats and hate he gets so by their logic armys are the reason BTS are getting shitted on with 100k likes tweets every other day it seems? Well should i say deserved then?

I’ll almost always take ARMYs side over general kpop stans because I believe most kpop stans (not the normal ones minding their business) are bitter, hypocritical losers who are always looking for an excuse to hate on and discredit other idols (especially BTS) BUT -

Yeah, I’m never going to fully get over my resentment towards ARMYs for enabling tkkrs and allowing them to grow such massive platforms and have such presence in the fandom. Sometimes I look at how toxic things are and just think, deserved. And I agree, tkkrs are the main reason for the deterioration and division. There are other factors at play, but tkkrs sit at the center imho. And because I’m petty, I’ll admit that I have enjoyed the few times ARMYS were humiliated because tkkrs and their psychotic behavior were put on the jumbotron (like the post-Paris walk tkkr incident).

Anyways, yeah the Tetris situation is particularly upsetting because he didn’t do anything wrong and yet he’s getting mass harassed (literal threats and slurs, hundreds of ppl doing this) and you can tell how genuinely upset he is. And you don’t see a single big or even medium sized ARMY account in the quotes trying to shut that down or sincerely apologize to him (also no hit tweets about how nasty and vile KTHs & tkkrs are…). Maybe things have changed since I last went online (I hope so), but I was only seeing jkkrs, PJMs and some JM-biased in the quotes and comments. And I agree, I think one of the main reasons is because half of this fandom are tkkrs who agree with him getting harassed ngl, or they already dislike him because they think he’s too JM biased and resent him for it. It’s so messed up.

I want to say that it’s easy to miss these things sometimes so I understand why more ARMYs aren’t talking about it, but nah this time I’m genuinely perplexed. I’ve seen ARMYs bring attention to much lesser issues and this is actually pretty horrifying and could have lasting consequences for the group - so why aren’t they all over this trying to clean it up? Weird as hell and inexcusable to me. If he stops reporting on BTS it would be absolutely deserved.

Mind you, he was the one who wrote the article ARMYs were hyping up a few weeks back where he mentioned BTS paving the way. I bet he also advocated for them being included that high up on that list to begin with (greatest pop stars of the 21st century iirc). They don’t like him because he’s visibly JM biased and because he doesn’t fully understand all the insane fandom rules and nuances, but Tetris has actually been a source of such positivity for the whole group and a rare ally in western media. But they’ll throw all of that away because they think he’s too biased (& bc apparently he’s a “jkkr” because his two favorite members happen to be jkk, the two literal most popular members where he's from).

And on your last point, yeah 100%! The cognitive dissonance with some ARMYs and their logic sometimes? The way that literally the same day they were in the quotes fighting for their lives against the kpop stans who were blaming the harassment BTS receives on ARMYs, ARMYs were trying to blame the harassment Jimin receives on PJMs? Like, so which one is it? Don't they see the flaws in their own logic, because they're basically giving the greenlight to hate on BTS then. Even today that same gang of TH biased tkkrs I’ve complained about on here before were blaming Tetris for the hate Jimin was receiving instead of their buddies, tkkrs and KTHs. The hypocrisy of a lot of this fandom is realllllllllly frustrating sometimes.

TBF I have seen ARMYs call this kind of thinking out several times, once even in defense of Jimin, but obviously it’s an opinion that’s still pretty prevalent in the fandom and it’s frustrating and massively hypocritical.

Anyways, sorry for yapping so much. Maybe one day I’ll answer an ask without writing a whole essay 🥴 But today really bothered me, and I feel bad for Tetris. And my usual disclaimer, ofc I know it’s not all ARMYs and there’s plenty of normal ARMYs who love and support Jimin too. But yeah some days I really feel like this fandom is seriously cooked and they mostly have themselves to blame for it.

[hellomynameisbisexual]

Abstract

The question whether some men have a bisexual orientation—that is, whether they are substantially sexually aroused and attracted to both sexes—has remained controversial among both scientists and laypersons. Skeptics believe that male sexual orientation can only be homosexual or heterosexual, and that bisexual identification reflects nonsexual concerns, such as a desire to deemphasize homosexuality. Although most bisexual-identified men report that they are attracted to both men and women, self-report data cannot refute these claims. Patterns of physiological (genital) arousal to male and female erotic stimuli can provide compelling evidence for male sexual orientation. (In contrast, most women provide similar physiological responses to male and female stimuli.) We investigated whether men who self-report bisexual feelings tend to produce bisexual arousal patterns. Prior studies of this issue have been small, used potentially invalid statistical tests, and produced inconsistent findings. We combined nearly all previously published data (from eight previous studies in the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada), yielding a sample of 474 to 588 men (depending on analysis). All participants were cisgender males. Highly robust results showed that bisexual-identified men’s genital and subjective arousal patterns were more bisexual than were those who identified as exclusively heterosexual or homosexual. These findings support the view that male sexual orientation contains a range, from heterosexuality, to bisexuality, to homosexuality.

The status of male bisexuality as a sexual orientation—that is, the idea that some men are sexually aroused and attracted to both sexes—has a controversial history (1). Although some men identify as bisexual and have sexual experiences with men and women, the extent to which this reflects an underlying bisexual orientation has been questioned. Early sex researchers Krafft-Ebing (2) and Hirschfeld (3) believed that bisexual behavior and identification occurred primarily among monosexual (i.e., either heterosexual or homosexual) men for reasons other than a bisexual orientation. For example, some homosexual men identify as bisexual, or engage in sex with women, due to social pressures that favor heterosexuality. In response to those who doubted the existence of a bisexual orientation, Kinsey proposed a quasi-continuous scale of sexual orientation, proclaiming: “Males do not represent two discrete populations, heterosexual and homosexual. The world is not to be divided into sheep and goats. Not all things are black nor all things white” (ref. 4, pp. 638–639). With his scale, Kinsey demonstrated that self-reported bisexual attraction and behavior are not rare. However, because the scale relied on self-reports, results could not provide definitive evidence for bisexual orientation. For example, surveys have shown that a large proportion of men who identify as gay or homosexual had gone through a previous and transient phase of bisexual identification (5, 6).

Other reasons why bisexual men’s self-reported sexual feelings have sometimes been questioned likely include cognitive and emotional biases of the questioners. Some heterosexual and homosexual men may find it relatively easy to understand each other’s monosexuality because both have strong sexual attraction to one sex and virtually none to the other. For this reason, these men may have more difficulty accepting bisexuality as it challenges their binary conceptualizations of sexual orientation (7). Furthermore, bisexual individuals may be mistrusted and stigmatized by both heterosexual and homosexual people, and perceived as untrustworthy, promiscuous, and unable to commit (8–10).

Self-reported measures of sexual attraction, interest, and arousal are useful and ubiquitous in sex research. When self-reports are questioned, however, other valid measures are desirable. One promising approach to empirical verification of self-reported male bisexuality as an orientation uses penile plethysmography (i.e., a strain gauge around the penis) to study genital sexual arousal patterns to erotic stimuli featuring men or women (but not both). Examples of stimuli used in these studies include videos of sexual interactions between actors or of solitary actors masturbating (11, 12). Such an approach has several advantages: It relies on physiological processes rather than self-report; it is difficult to consciously manipulate (13); and, for men, sexual arousal to attractive women or men is arguably equivalent to sexual orientation (1). This approach has been used in a handful of studies focusing on male bisexuality with mixed results. Some studies failed to provide evidence that bisexual-identified men had bisexual arousal patterns (11, 14). One other study with stringent recruitment criteria (i.e., minimum criteria for both sexual and romantic experience across sexes) found evidence for bisexual arousal (12). A recent study using less stringent recruitment criteria also found evidence that bisexual-identified men had bisexual physiological arousal patterns (15). All existing studies have been of small to modest size; the largest had 114 participants. Notably, across these studies, bisexual-identified men self-reported subjective arousal to both male and female stimuli, even in samples where their genital arousal did not reflect such a pattern.

Previous research may have not employed sufficiently rigorous statistical tests, further complicating the question of whether bisexual-identified men show bisexual physiological arousal patterns. Crucial predictions regarding bisexual orientation concern U-shaped (or inverted U-shaped) distributions, which previous studies tested via quadratic regression. However, this test may be insufficient to reliably detect U-shaped distributions (16). This is because significant quadratic regressions can occur if a linear regression changes slope over the range of the predictor, even if the sign of the slope does not change. Demonstrating U-shaped distributions without the threat of incorrect interpretation requires showing slope sign reversal from low to high values of the predictor. For example, if the left arm of the estimated regression slope is significantly positive, then the other arm needs to be significantly negative in order to result in a valid, inverse U-shaped estimate.

With the limitations of previous work in mind, the aim of this study was to examine the extent to which men who self-report bisexual orientation exhibit bisexual genital and self-reported arousal patterns. Our study is unique with respect to its large sample and its employment of a version of Simonsohn’s (16) “two-lines” test of U-shaped (or inverted U-shaped) distributions. Data included 606 male participants (with 474 remaining for genital analyses and 588 remaining for self-reported analyses following exclusions) (Materials and Methods) from American, Canadian, and British studies that collected data on men’s self-reported Kinsey scores and their genital and self-reported arousal to male and female erotic stimuli and to neutral stimuli (e.g., footage of landscapes and wildlife). These studies were conducted over the course of approximately two decades, from the years 2000 to 2019. Kinsey scores range from 0 (exclusively heterosexual) to 3 (equal attraction to both sexes) to 6 (exclusively homosexual). Scores of 0 and 6 are usually considered monosexual, and 1 to 5 nonmonosexual. Scores of 2 to 4 are generally accepted to comprise the bisexual range of the Kinsey scale (17).

This study focuses only on male sexual orientation, despite the equal scientific importance of understanding female sexual orientation, for several related reasons. The question of whether bisexual arousal patterns exist has been less controversial about women than men (1). Historically, there was no parallel debate about female sexual orientation to that between skeptics [e.g., Krafft-Ebing (2) and Hirschfeld (3)] and proponents (e.g., Kinsey) (4) of the validity of male bisexuality. Recent scientific developments have supported important and potentially relevant differences in the expression of male and female sexual orientation. In laboratory research, the large majority of women exhibit similar subjective and physiological sexual arousal to both male and female stimuli, despite heterosexual identification (18, 19). Furthermore, the idea that female sexuality is especially “fluid” with respect to gender, with some women situationally attracted to men or women depending on circumstances, has been well-established (20). Male, but not female, self-reported sexual orientation shows a bimodal distribution (21), supporting the idea that male bisexuality is relatively uncommon whereas female bisexuality is less so. Thus, converging lines of evidence suggest that there are important differences in the expression of male and female sexual orientation, perhaps especially bisexuality. Consequently, research exploring the validity of bisexual identification–and especially research comparing the genital response of bisexual and monosexual persons–has been pursued more vigorously for male than for female sexual orientation. The men cumulatively studied in the research on male sexual orientation have been aggregated to comprise the large sample used in the present study.

Results

Fig. 1 presents participants’ ipsatized (i.e., standardized within subjects across erotic and neutral stimuli) genital and self-reported arousal to female and male stimuli across the Kinsey scale, in within-subject SDs. Only participants who produced adequate arousal for our main analyses were included. The figure shows that the relative response to female and male stimuli closely tracked the Kinsey scale, on the whole. The difference in genital arousal to females minus males correlated strongly with the Kinsey scale (r[472] = 0.838, 95% CI [0.809, 0.863], P < 0.0001). The analogous correlation of self-reported arousal with the Kinsey scale was also strong (r[586] = 0.916, 95% CI [0.902, 0.928], P < 0.0001).

Exclusively heterosexual and homosexual men (who have Kinsey scores of 0 and 6, respectively) showed larger mean differences in their arousal to male and female stimuli compared with men who have intermediate Kinsey scores (i.e., scores of 1 to 5). Although this pattern is consistent with the possibility that intermediate Kinsey scores are associated with relatively bisexual arousal patterns, it is also consistent with an alternative explanation. It would be possible to create the mean arousal scores of men with Kinsey scores 1 to 5 (which appear relatively bisexual) by mixing men with arousal patterns similar to the means for Kinsey 0 (exclusively heterosexual) with those similar to Kinsey 6 (exclusively homosexual). Therefore, simply averaging each Kinsey group’s responses to male and to female stimuli can in principle produce misleading results. Thus, results depicted in Fig. 1 by themselves cannot provide conclusive evidence that men who report bisexual attractions have a more bisexual arousal pattern than monosexual men.

Two alternative analyses can provide more definitive evidence (11, 12). Both rely on variables depicted or derived from those in Fig. 2: responses to the more-arousing sex and responses to the less-arousing sex. These variables were determined empirically for each individual. Men have relatively bisexual arousal patterns if 1) their responses to their less arousing sex exceeds that of other men, and 2) the difference between their responses to their more and to their less arousing sex is less than that of other men.

The first criterion for bisexual arousal patterns is demonstrated by considering that men with a bisexual arousal pattern should show more arousal to male stimuli compared with heterosexual men and more arousal to female stimuli compared with homosexual men. Heterosexual men’s less-arousing sex will usually be “male” and homosexual men’s “female.” (Measurement error may prevent this generalization from always being true.) Thus, the first criterion is that bisexual men should show more arousal to erotic stimuli depicting their (empirically defined) less-arousing sex, compared with homosexual and heterosexual men. The second criterion is demonstrated by considering that men with a bisexual arousal pattern should show an especially small unsigned difference between their arousal to male and female stimuli, compared with heterosexual and homosexual men. This difference is equivalent to that between responses to the more arousing sex minus responses to the less arousing sex.

We henceforth refer to the two key dependent variables as Minimum Arousal (i.e., responses to the less arousing sex) and Absolute Arousal Difference (i.e., the unsigned value of the difference between arousal to female stimuli and arousal to male stimuli). The two dependent variables derived from Fig. 2 were almost perfectly negatively correlated with each other: for genital arousal, r = −0.976 and for self-reported arousal, r = −0.944. This strong correspondence is partly an artifact of standardizing within participants using only three scores (i.e., average arousal to male, to female, and to neutral stimuli), especially when two of the scores tend to be similar to each other and different from the third score. Because Minimum Arousal and the Absolute Arousal Difference are not generally so highly correlated (for example, for the unstandardized data we analyzed subsequently, their correlation for genital arousal was r[474] = −0.028), and because they are conceptually distinct, we have retained both variables in our main analyses.

In addition, we created a composite variable using Minimum Arousal and Absolute Arousal Difference, by standardizing both across participants, changing the sign of the Absolute Arousal Difference and then taking their average. We refer to this variable as the Bisexual Arousal Composite, and men with a relatively bisexual arousal pattern should have high scores on it. Although the composite was almost entirely redundant with Minimum Arousal and Absolute Arousal Difference—as the latter are with each other—for the ipsatized data, we retained all three variables because in some subsequent analyses using untransformed data, they were much less highly correlated.

If men who self-report Kinsey scores in the bisexual range indeed have relatively bisexual arousal patterns, then both Minimum Arousal and the Bisexual Arousal Composite should show an inverted U-shaped distribution across the Kinsey range (i.e., men who self-identify as 0 [exclusively heterosexual] and 6 [exclusively homosexual] should have the lowest scores for these variables; men in intermediate groups should have greater values, with the peak resting at a Kinsey score of 3); the Absolute Arousal Difference should show a U-shaped distribution (i.e., exclusively heterosexual and exclusively homosexual men should have lower values than bisexual-identified men). Conversely, if men who indicate that they are relatively bisexual have monosexual arousal patterns in actuality, then the values for these three variables should be evenly distributed across the Kinsey scale, and we should have a flat, horizontal line, rather than a U-shaped distribution. A rigorous demonstration that bisexual men have relatively bisexual arousal patterns requires a change of sign of regression slopes across the Kinsey scale. The method proposed by Simonsohn (16), the two-lines test, requires establishing that, for some break point on the predictor variable, if one conducts separate regression analyses using data on either side of the point, both regression slopes are statistically significant but of opposite sign.

We modified this method as follows. Instead of using Simonsohn’s algorithm for locating one optimal break point, we conducted two sets of analyses using two different break points: 2.5 and 3.5. Our modification was motivated by both necessity and a desire to explore robustness. The middle of the Kinsey distribution is 3, and a Kinsey score of 3 signifies the greatest degree of bisexuality. As such, that score is the best guess for the inversion point of the hypothesized U-shaped and inverted U-shaped distributions. However, the Kinsey score 3 is unavailable as a break point because the break point should not include scores that actually exist in the data. The analysis with 2.5 as the break point compares the correlations between the Kinsey scores and the dependent variables in the range of Kinsey 0 to 2 with the respective correlations in the range of Kinsey 3 to 6. (Note that, because our Kinsey score variable includes only whole numbers, any break point between 2 and 3 is equivalent to a break point of 2.5; all provide exactly the same separation of points.) The analysis using the break point 3.5 compares the correlations in the Kinsey range 0 to 3 with those in the Kinsey range of 4 to 6. Examining results using two different break points in separate analyses allowed us to examine the robustness of results across them. Fig. 3 presents the regression lines comprising the two lines tests for both sets of break points, for both Standardized Minimum Genital Arousal (Fig. 3, Left) and Standardized Absolute Genital Arousal Difference (Fig. 3, Right).

Table 1 includes results of the two-lines analyses for both break points. For analyses of genital arousal, we included data from 474 men with sufficient genital responses. For analyses of self-reported arousal, we included data from 588 men who provided adequate self-reported arousal data. We present standardized correlations because the scale of the variables is more intuitively interpretable than unstandardized coefficients. All correlations were in directions consistent with more bisexual arousal tending to occur toward the middle of the Kinsey scale. The 95% CIs for all correlations excluded zero, usually by a large margin.

We conducted additional analyses to examine the degree to which our results depended on data analytic decisions. At least two such decisions for Table 1 could have influenced our results even though we had scientific justification for making those decisions and have consistently made them in past research: analyzing standardized rather than unstandardized arousal data and excluding participants with low genital responses. Neither of these decisions was required to test our hypotheses, however, and some other researchers have not made them (e.g., ref. 22). Seemingly innocuous decisions such as these can hide a lack of robustness of results had other analytic paths been taken (23).

One way to explore the robustness of results across different data analytic decisions is to conduct “multiverse analyses” in which data are analyzed with respect to all combinations of relevant decisions (24). In our case, this required three additional sets of analyses. Each used the two-lines approach, but each used different data: unstandardized arousal data for men who met our inclusion criteria for sexual response; standardized arousal data for all men regardless of degree of response; or unstandardized arousal data for all men regardless of degree of response. Each set of analyses was conducted for each of the dependent variables: Minimum Arousal, Absolute Arousal Difference, and Bisexual Arousal Composite. Furthermore, each analysis was conducted for both break points (i.e., 2.5 and 3.5), and tests with unstandardized data were repeated for the analyses of self-reported arousal. Because each analysis yielded two separate tests (for points left of the break point and for points right of it), this resulted in a total of 48 tests.

SI Appendix, Table S1 provides the results for these multiverse analyses. All results were in the direction consistent with increased bisexual arousal for more bisexual Kinsey scores. SI Appendix, Fig. S1 also presents the frequency distribution of the 36 exact probabilities for the additional analyses of genital data. Only one P value, 0.0503, exceeded the conventional statistical significance threshold, and most of the other 35 P values were much smaller. Results for the analyses of self-reported arousal were also consistent, with all P values less than 10−8. Thus, our general findings persisted regardless of the data analytic decisions we reconsidered.

Which Kinsey score was associated with the greatest degree of bisexual arousal? To answer this question, we focused on the standardized genital and self-report arousal composites, which correlated r(470) = 0.507, 95% CI (0.437, 0.572), P < 0.0001. Fig. 4 shows the mean genital and self-report bisexual composites for all Kinsey scores. Higher scores represent greater bisexuality. With respect to the genital composite, Kinsey 2’s showed the strongest evidence for bisexual arousal patterns. With respect to the self-report composite, Kinsey 3′s provided the most bisexual responses. Notably, both contrasts increased steadily to the maximum and then decreased steadily, consistent with a gradation model of sexual orientation.

How bisexual were the arousal patterns of men with bisexual Kinsey scores, compared with other men? It is possible, for example, that bisexual men’s sexual responses are only slightly (albeit statistically significantly) more bisexual than the responses of monosexual men. Or alternatively, the two groups could differ substantially. Answering this question requires a direct comparison of magnitudes of indicators of bisexual response. Two of the main dependent variables we have examined—Minimum Arousal and Absolute Arousal Difference—could be especially informative. Ratios of their means comparing men with bisexual Kinsey scores to men with monosexual scores could helpfully express the answer. To be meaningfully interpreted, ratios require ratio-level measurement, with a true value of zero and interval scaling (25). For example, six inches is twice the length of three inches, but a rating of six on a seven-point Likert scale of current happiness is not meaningfully interpreted as twice a rating of three. Because the data we have primarily focused on so far have been standardized within subjects, it is unsuited to provide meaningful ratios for two reasons. First, the standardized data do not have true zeros, with zero indicating an absence of a quantity. More importantly, standardizing within subjects induces a nonlinear between-subjects transformation of the raw scores, and so the ipsatized data do not have interval-level measurement.

Fortunately, the raw genital arousal data have a ratio scale, and so we focus on these data for our final analyses. Fig. 5 presents men’s raw genital responses to their more and to their less arousing sex, by Kinsey score. The figure demonstrates that increased bisexuality toward the middle of the Kinsey range is primarily due to increased responding to the less arousing sex. (Neither a two-lines analysis nor a quadratic regression reveals significant evidence for an inverted U effect for the more arousing sex.) Kinsey scores of 0 and 6 were associated with especially low (though not zero) responding to the less arousing sex, which was one of our main indicators of bisexual response. Men with Kinsey scores in the bisexual range (i.e., 2 to 4) produced 3.30 times more response to their less arousing sex compared with the (unweighted) average of men with monosexual Kinsey scores (i.e., 0 and 6). The difference between responses to the more and less arousing sex should be smaller for men with more bisexual Kinsey scores if those scores reflect men’s sexual orientations. Consistent with this prediction, men with Kinsey scores in the bisexual range produced an average difference that was 0.59 times the difference of men with monosexual scores. Both ratios were markedly different from 1. Still, men with Kinsey scores in the bisexual range produced, on average, penile circumference changes that were notably larger to one sex than to the other. The ratio of bisexual men’s genital arousal to their more arousing sex to genital arousal to their less arousing sex averaged 2.62; for monosexual men, it was 10.13. Note that these numbers comprise the ratio of each group’s mean arousal to the more arousing sex divided by their mean arousal to the less arousing sex. They are not the averages of each individual men’s ratios. Some individual ratios are extreme because the denominator is near zero.

In general, results suggested that bisexual men’s arousal patterns were markedly more bisexual than monosexual men’s, and that bisexual men were typically more aroused by one sex than by the other. The combination of our results and the fact that male sexual orientation is bimodally distributed (21) suggests that men with similar high degrees of sexual arousal to both men and women may be especially uncommon.

Discussion

The primary question motivating this research is whether men who identify as bisexual have sexual arousal patterns that are also relatively bisexual. Results strongly confirmed that men who report attraction to both sexes are more genitally and subjectively aroused by both sexes compared with men who report that they are attracted only to one sex.

The highly consistent evidence for bisexual arousal and orientation from the present study contrasts with inconsistent findings of the past (e.g., ref. 11 [not finding bisexual arousal] and ref. 12 [finding bisexual arousal]). For example, applying the two-lines methodology to the eight individual studies and focusing on the ipsatized genital Bisexual Arousal Composite yielded 29 relevant correlations (i.e., correlations for values on one side of either a 2.5 or 3.5 Kinsey break point, which should be statistically significant for a successful test). Only 12 of these were statistically significant, the median probability equal to 0.073. (SI Appendix, Table S2). The comparison of the inconsistent study-level results with the robust results using combined data from all studies demonstrates the increased statistical power of the latter approach.

A second factor that may have contributed to inconsistent results across individual studies is systematic differences between samples of bisexual men. Men who describe themselves as bisexual likely comprise a diverse set of men, some of whom have a bisexual arousal pattern and others who do not. Examples of the latter likely include transitional bisexual men (5, 6) and some paraphilic men who have sexual fantasies involving men but who are not sexually attracted to them (26). Past studies that did not show correspondence between bisexual self-report and bisexual genital arousal had far fewer subjects than the present analyses, and some may have included a higher proportion of men whose bisexual identification was due to reasons other than bisexual arousal. For example, it is possible that the sample of Rieger et al. (11) contained a higher proportion of transitional bisexual men than other samples. Recruitment of participants for that study included advertisements in both alternative and gay-oriented publications, and the bisexual-identified participants may have responded to the advertisement in the gay-oriented publications.

The present research represents the most systematic and extensive assessment of bisexual men’s arousal patterns to date. The data we analyzed comprise all relevant data that the coauthors had collected as of January 2019, and nearly all relevant data of which we are aware. Although we were unable to obtain data from two other studies with relevant data, their inclusion would not have altered our general conclusions even if we assume that those subsamples would not have shown significant bisexual arousal patterns (SI Appendix, Supplementary Text).

The primary limitation of this study is that participants were necessarily volunteers. Thus, the degree to which they are representative of men across the Kinsey scale is unknown. This limits confident generalization about the magnitude of our results. However, it is unclear how the basic pattern of results—greater bisexual response for men with more bisexual Kinsey scores—could be entirely an artifact of volunteer bias. Additionally, the fact that participants were volunteers sampled exclusively from a few Western countries prevents us from knowing how general the patterns we have observed are. However, we are unaware of promising theories specifying how these patterns might vary cross-culturally.

In a recent highly publicized article on genetic determinants of same-sex versus opposite-sex sex partners, there was no clear genetic gradient distinguishing persons with a high proportion of same-sex partners from those with opposite-sex partners (27). The authors asserted that, because of their negative findings, the validity of the Kinsey scale should be reconsidered. Our findings support the opposite conclusion, and we believe they are more relevant with respect to the validity of self-reported sexual orientations. When we ask men to assess themselves on the Kinsey scale, we do not mean for them to guess their underlying genotypes. Rather, we are asking them about their relative sexual feelings for women and men. Sexual arousal patterns are closely related to these feelings in men; indeed, they are detectable and likely lead to the subjective experience of attraction and desire (1). We have demonstrated that both genital and self-reported sexual arousal to male and female erotic stimuli form a gradient over the Kinsey scale, regardless of their underlying causes.

Materials and Methods

Participants.

Participants comprised those of available studies known to us that included genital measures of sexual arousal in men who also reported their Kinsey scores, with four exceptions. Two studies focused on men with paraphilias (26, 28), and those data were intentionally excluded. Two other studies containing relevant data could not be included because the authors did not respond to our requests for data (14, 23). The unavailable studies comprised genital assessment data of a total of 89 men, including 23 who identified as bisexual.

Participants for the constituent studies were recruited by researchers at four sites: Northwestern University in Evanston, IL (6, 11, 12, 29), the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (18), the University of Essex in Colchester, UK (15, 30), and Cornell University in Ithaca, NY (17). Individual sample sizes and methodological differences between the studies are reported in Table 2.

Across the constituent studies, data for 606 participants were available. All participants were cisgender (i.e., no participants were transgender). Of these, 474 participants were included in our main genital arousal analyses. Of the 132 excluded participants, 96 participants were excluded for exhibiting insufficient genital arousal for meaningful analysis. In any given study of male sexual arousal, there is a proportion of low-responding participants who do not become substantially aroused to any of the stimuli (among the constituent studies, this proportion ranges between 4.95% and 26.73%): Typical self-reported reasons for low response include discomfort and disinterest in the actors or actions featured in the stimuli. We counted as low responders (and excluded from initial analyses) participants who either 1) did not exhibit an average change of at least 2 mm in penile circumference to male or female stimuli compared to a baseline value; or 2) did not produce standardized mean genital arousal to at least one erotic stimulus category that exceeded that to neutral stimuli by more than half of an SD. These criteria have been used in most of the studies included herein (6, 11, 12, 15, 17, 29). Another 36 participants were excluded from genital analyses because their data were incomplete or of poor quality (e.g., impossible values because of technical difficulties when running those participants). Regarding the self-report analyses, 12 participants were excluded from self-reported arousal analyses due to not providing self-reported data, and an additional six participants were excluded for reporting arousal scores of 0 for all stimuli. This resulted in a sample size of 588 men for self-report analyses.

Within the total sample of 606 men, 178 participants self-identified as exclusively heterosexual, 102 identified as mostly heterosexual, 46 as bisexual leaning heterosexual, 34 as bisexual, 37 as bisexual leaning homosexual, 70 as mostly homosexual, and 139 as exclusively homosexual. Note that this distribution of sexual identities is not representative of the overall population. Homosexual- and bisexual-identified men were over-sampled because the focus of the component studies was typically on sexual orientation variation. This nonrepresentative sampling increased statistical power to detect differences in arousal patterns in different regions of the Kinsey scale. The average age was 28.63 y (SD = 9.03). Data for educational attainment were available for 359 participants and were coded as 1 (no high school), 2 (some high school), 3 (high school diploma), 4 (some college), 5 (college graduate), and 6 (postgraduate student or degree). The average level of educational attainment was 4.76 (SD = 0.85), and the most common response was “college graduate” (n = 133). Data for ethnicity were available for 502 participants. Of these, 326 (64.94%) were White/Caucasian, 60 (11.95%) were Black, 42 (8.37%) were Asian, 29 (5.78%) were Hispanic/Latino, and 45 (8.96%) reported other. Distributions of age, ethnicity, and educational attainment by sexual orientation are reported in Table 3.

Measures.

Sexual orientation.

Participants reported their sexual orientation using the seven-point Kinsey scale (4) ranging from 0 (exclusive heterosexual orientation) to 6 (exclusive homosexual orientation), with 3 representing bisexual orientation with equal attraction to men and women. In most studies, the prompt for the scale was worded such that it framed sexual orientation as one’s relative attraction to men versus women. However, two of the included studies (11, 12) (n = 203, or 33% of the overall sample) framed sexual orientation as one’s relative frequency of sexually fantasizing about men versus women.

Genital arousal.

Each study assessed changes in the penile circumference of participants when viewing erotic stimuli, with increases in circumference denoting increased genital arousal (31). The majority of the data were collected using an indium/gallium strain gauge connected to either an MP150 or an MP100 data acquisition unit alongside AcqKnowledge software. Data from Rieger et al. (11) were collected using a mercury-in-rubber strain gauge. Chivers et al. (18) used the Limestone hardware and software and a mercury-in-rubber strain gauge.

Subjective arousal.

Participants subjectively reported their arousal to male and female erotic stimuli and to neutral stimuli following each stimulus. The particular range of each study’s subjective arousal measure varied (e.g., an 11-point scale was used in Jabbour et al. (29) whereas a seven-point scale was used in Rieger et al. (11)). Thus, all subjective ratings for arousal to male stimuli and arousal to female stimuli were rescaled as proportions of the maximum possible response.

Procedure.

In each constituent study, participants privately viewed various erotic video clips while a penile strain gauge was used to measure changes in the circumference of the penis. Most of the studies utilized 3-min clips; Rieger et al. (11) used 2-min clips, and Chivers et al. (18) used 90-s clips. Neutral stimuli (e.g., footage of landscapes and wildlife) were included in each paradigm to assess a baseline level of arousal. Erotic stimuli were presented in random order; these included either a male stimulus (depending on the study, either male–male sexual acts or one male masturbating) or female stimulus (female–female sexual acts or one female masturbating). During or after each stimulus, participants provided a subjective arousal rating. If participants were still aroused before the presentation of the next sexual stimulus (e.g., if their penile circumference exceeded the previously assessed baseline by 2 mm), they were instructed via intercom to perform a distracting task (e.g., “in your head, count all of the multiples of 9”) until they returned to their baseline level and the next stimulus began. After each session, participants were debriefed and compensated for their time.

Data Analysis.

Each individual’s raw genital responses to appropriate stimuli were averaged to provide three values: average arousal (i.e., penile circumference) to neutral stimuli, to male stimuli, and to female stimuli. Raw genital measures were in units of millimeters. Analogously, self-reported ratings were averaged to provide the same three values, in units of proportion of maximum possible ratings. These values were used to produce all subsequent metrics.

For the main analyses, genital and self-reported arousal scores were standardized within participants, using each participant’s average arousal scores for male, female, and neutral erotic stimuli. This practice, also called ipsatizing, is useful to remove unwanted sources of variation, including those attributable to penis size and general responsiveness (32). Each man’s standardized arousal to male and to female stimuli was then transformed by subtracting arousal to neutral stimuli.

The primary analyses in Table 1 comprised a version of the two-lines test (16). The rationale of the test is that, if the relation between two variables is U-shaped (or inverted U-shaped), there must be a point on the predictor range, xC, such that the regression line using values below xC has an opposite sign of the regression line using values above xC. Our analysis diverged from that outlined by Simonsohn in two ways. First, we presented Pearson correlations rather than unstandardized regression coefficients to make it easier for the reader to assess the magnitude of line slopes. Second, instead of allowing Simonsohn’s algorithm to find the ideal break point, xC, we present results for two different break points, one on either side of the midpoint of the Kinsey scale. (One must not use a value for xC that exists in the data, and thus 3 could not be used.) This meant that, for both tests, the middle of the Kinsey scale provided the most bisexual scores on the dependent variables as well as an examination of the robustness of results.

[the-river-rix]

💢 bandstand >:)

Oooo okay! I absolutely adore Bandstand but I have a few minor gripes

This only really applies to the papermill/Broadway productions (rip tour you could’ve gone far) but it’s always felt extremely strange to me that the entire cast is white (or at least looks white) except for one person like idk theater is such a diverse industry and black people both created swing and played a crucial role in WWII and like the voices of POC are especially important in the examination of the mistreatment of veterans especially after WWII (thinking about how commonly veterans of color were denied benefits or dishonorably discharged)

They had absolutely no reason to cut Jimmy’s coming out scene it’s not for time the scenes like a minute long and it adds so much meaning and nuance both to Jimmy’s character and his relationship with Donny/the rest of the band

This is very much personal to me and very biased but Nick and Wayne should’ve actually been gay it’d be easy you’d barely have to change anything like give me a quick kiss or an extra short scene outside their hotel room or something like that pleaseee

Also I understand why and it makes sense and like time restraints but I wish the show spent more time with all of the members of the Donny Nova Band not just Julia and Donny because they are such great characters with such unique experiences and perspectives like I’d happily sit down to a 3 hour show for it

I wish we got to see more of give me a solo from Jimmy about seeing the injustices of the world and fearing for his future as a queer man give me a duet between Nick and Wayne about struggling to consolidate their neuroticisms and traumas in order to live together give me a solo/sequence about Johnny grappling with his chronic pain and cognitive issues give me a solo from Davy about trying to forget the things he’s seen and steadily drinking more and more

Ty very much! I love yapping about them.

[mbti-notes]

Anon wrote: Hi! I need to ask about my enfp mother's behaviour. Is there cultural reason why she believes so strongly in highly superstitious, almost witchcraft like things despite growing up in a religious and conservative household? I understand a lot of superstitions can exist in Asian culture, but there's something especially strange about your mother accusing your romantic love interest of using love potions, curses, or spells on you to win you over all because he isn't attractive in her eyes.

For more context: my dad passed away a few years ago, and ever since then I feel like my mom's been a different person. I originally thought she was clinging onto religious beliefs to cope with the grief, but I now feel like it's gone beyond just using religion for comfort. It has absolutely dictated her life, all because she believes there's something malicious after me and my sibling, and she feels obligated to protect us from what this is. Whenever we ask her what she's protecting us from, she doesn't really give a straight answer.

What's more, recently I've noticed she's been describing a lot of strange beliefs that resemble, for a lack of a better description, witchcraft. I honestly have no idea where this came from, but it seems like this is something she grew up learning about. I can't really find a lot of information about Vietnamese witchcraft, so I honestly have no idea if this is pure delusion, or actually a part of the culture. I'm really trying to understand where she's coming from, but it's so hard when she doesn't want to open up about anything.

--------------------

I'm not a member of Vietnamese culture and don't know anything about Vietnamese folklore, so I'm not sure why you believe I can answer anything about that. The only thing I can say is that certain psychological characteristics/issues make some people more prone to adopting fantastical or conspiratorial beliefs. For example:

- Struggling With Trauma: Losing a loved one, especially the central relationship of one's life, is a very traumatic experience. Such grief is very difficult to process and endure, psychologically. When someone isn't able to accept and understand a traumatic event, they can't help but seek out answers, and this makes them susceptible to any beliefs that might bring some measure of emotional relief. Perhaps you have underestimated the depth of your mom's trauma and grief. If that's the case, empathy is called for.

- Struggling With Self-Esteem: People at low levels of ego development are more likely to suffer from low self-esteem due to often making more errors in judgment. There are healthy and unhealthy methods to boost self-esteem. One unhealthy method is to find ways to feel superior and/or to feel more unique than others (both points are likely to apply for ENFP). Thus, some people are drawn to odd beliefs because it makes them feel smarter or it gets them special attention, which provides temporary relief from deep-seated fears about being inferior or ordinary.

- Security Through Simplicity: The world is a very big and complicated place with lots of stuff going on. It's easy to feel scared, powerless, helpless, or cynical in the face of human suffering. It can be very difficult for a caring or sensitive person to make sense of all the bad things in the world. If a person lacks the intellectual skills to understand complex issues (e.g. due to lack of educational opportunity), they are more likely to reach for easy answers or answers that provide a sense of certainty. Fantastical or conspiratorial theories provide easy answers because they do not require any justification or evidence. The explanations can seem logical on the surface, so it's easy to get sucked in by them when one is already emotionally primed to believe.

- Cognitive Biases: By default, the human mind is riddled with cognitive biases that distort perception and judgment. For example, many people don't realize that they mistake correlation for causation. A person with good logic knows that, just because two things occurred together, doesn't mean that one caused the other. It could be the case that both were caused by some hidden third factor. You have to take extra mental steps to properly prove that causation actually happened. When people aren't aware of their cognitive biases and don't work to counteract them, it is very easy for them to fall victim to bad logic, and they won't be able to detect the logical errors in their own belief system.

- Dependence on Intuition: The fact of the matter is, as one person, you can't know everything. There are many situations where you have no choice but to fill in gaps in your knowledge with "gut feelings" or random ideas that seemingly come out of nowhere. The more heavily someone relies on gut feelings without being aware of it, the more likely they are to make errors in judgement, because they are not giving enough consideration to concrete facts and evidence. For example, when you have experienced one senseless and unfair tragedy after another, it becomes more and more difficult to avoid thinking that you're being singled out for punishment, which easily leads to believing in curses. Of course, people with a dominant or overactive N function are very likely to trust intuition a little too much.

In some cases, these issues can be remedied by providing more and better learning resources to people. For example, you can help people overcome their cognitive biases by teaching them the critical thinking skills they need to analyze issues systematically and break down complex problems into more manageable steps. It's also important to nurture intellectual humility and intellectual curiosity in order to be open-minded enough to entertain being wrong.

However, deep and unresolved emotional or psychological developmental issues are much more difficult to resolve, which is why such individuals usually need counseling or therapy. It sounds like your mom could have a combination of cognitive and emotional factors contributing to her adoption of such troubling beliefs. If she's refusing help or won't open up, there's not much you can do but keep trying to provide an emotionally supportive environment in the event that she finally decides it's time to talk. You can lead her to water, but you can't force her to drink.

Your tone is somewhat judgmental, probably because you are feeling exasperated, so I have to warn you that, if she picks up on it or has already, she won't believe you are a safe person to open up to. From what I know about East Asian cultures (through studying cross-cultural psychology and Eastern philosophy), people are extremely reluctant to discuss psychological issues because of social stigma and the fear of becoming a social pariah. And this might also contribute to you treating her as an inconvenience rather than a human in pain. If you are battling against such deep cultural currents, then it's imperative that you can guarantee a safe, supportive, nonjudgmental, and empathetic space for her to explore what's really going on, deep down.

[overwritesblog]

The Psychology of Cybersecurity: Understanding Human Vulnerabilities

Cybersecurity is often thought of as a domain of information technology, but it also has a lot in common with psychology. Human error remains a key factor in numerous cybersecurity breaches, and there’s growing interest in applying psychological principles to this field. The “intersection of psychology and cybersecurity,” as the term is sometimes referred to, is the focus of new research efforts and a number of training programs.

The Psychology of Cybersecurity: Understanding Human Vulnerabilities Psychological research and behavior change theory offer a range of valuable contributions to cybersecurity. For example, studies of social pressures and group dynamics show how peer influence can lead employees to take risks they wouldn’t otherwise. This insight can help to guide techogle.co the design of security systems that account for these types of factors. Other psychological insights can be applied to cybersecurity in the form of interventions that seek to modify underlying motivations or to reduce risky behaviour.

The first step to improving cybersecurity is understanding what drives attacks in the first place, explains Hadlington. People often become vulnerable to phishing and ransomware scams because of specific cognitive biases, such as optimism bias or the tendency to overweight recent experiences when making decisions. A greater awareness of these biases can lead to better cybersecurity protocols, such as requiring users to enter strong passwords or encrypt data.

Changing behaviours is a crucial aspect of any cybersecurity program, but it’s not always easy to accomplish. For example, attempts to dissuade individuals from engaging in hacktivism or cybercrime are often met with resentment, especially among younger individuals. This type of reaction, known as reactance, occurs because the individual feels they are being forced to adopt a certain attitude. The more they resent being told what to do, the less likely they are to comply.

Some cybersecurity researchers are working on ways to mitigate the effects of these psychological factors, such as by ensuring that all stakeholders are involved in creating cybersecurity policies. By allowing employees to make decisions about what procedures to implement and by providing regular opportunities for feedback, they may feel more invested in their work and more prepared to handle threats when they arise.

The intersection of psychology and cybersecurity is a rapidly developing field, with many researchers aiming to develop systems that are more effective technology news at protecting against human vulnerabilities. For example, ReSCIND is a project funded by the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity that is using psychology to understand attackers’ blind spots and create defense software that exploits these weaknesses. The goal is to eliminate the human factor as the weak link in cyberattacks. The results could have far-reaching implications for global cybersecurity.

[tanadrin]

@sadoeconomist

Something politically aware people on every part of the political spectrum from the left to the right think is true and leaders of the Russian, Chinese, Israeli, etc. governments believe in enough to talk about publicly and make major geopolitical decisions based on maybe is not just a crazy fringe conspiracy theory, could be that there's some truth to the CIA, NED, etc. having more involvement in these events than the video author thinks I watched all this stuff happen in real time, and I read your notes, which went over how Russian hybrid warfare succeeded in Crimea in 2014. Every major power takes hybrid warfare seriously, what's objectively stupid is your mischaracterization of how it works. Trying to astroturf a revolution out of nowhere simply by paying random citizens en masse to overthrow the government would indeed be stupid but that's not what it is. Your notes seem to suggest that the video says US was paying little attention to eastern Europe until 2013 but Russia was frequently reacting to imaginary US provocations because they are stupid. It's like there's a giant America-shaped hole in the video's narrative. Ukraine was understood to be a NATO-Russia geopolitical battleground long before Euromaidan, it wasn't just Putin shadowboxing imaginary opponents out of pure stupidity that led to this.

You seem to be operating on the basic assumption that governments don't do stupid things for no reason, or fall prey to obviously inane conspiracy theories. That's simply not true; governments are led by human beings, human beings are subject to a common set of cognitive biases, and when you're an authoritarian right-winger (as the leaders of Russia, China, and Israel all are right now), an explanation for your apparent unpopularity that pins all the blame on the CIA instead of your shitty policies and your attempts to cling to power flatters those biases.

But we don't need to speculate about the propensity of governments to do stupid shit, because we have plenty of historical and contemporary examples of governments believing in nonsense: Havana Syndrome in the US, AIDS denialism in South Africa, anti-Semitic conspiracy theories in Nazi Germany and Imperial Russia, etc., etc. And often these false beliefs lead to real strategic blunders: the Bay of Pigs, the Iraq War, World War II, etc. Sometimes world leaders are stupid! Like, leadership probably tends to select for some kinds of intelligence and ability--charisma, social intelligence, and so forth--but it doesn't automatically make you a geopolitical genius, or make you immune to believing false things about the world.

And the biggest problem with the conspiracy theory outlined here isn't just that we can trace its origin to a fringe American political cult, it's that it's not necessary to explain any development in politics since 1989. There is no problem in understanding the revolutions of '89 or 2000-2014 that CIA involvement is necessary to solve. Indeed, as the videos point out (if you would actually watch them), trying to use "the CIA did it" as an explanation adds considerable problems, bc color revolution theory doesn't work. It's based on misconceptions, misunderstanding of data, and a healthy dose of paranoia.

The only real problem is trying to explain Putin's behavior--and that doesn't require color revolution theory to be true, only that Putin believes it is true. And why he would believe something is true, when he has the supposedly vast power of the Russian state at his beck and call, is easy to explain: authoritarian dictators surrounded by yes men do not have accurate pictures of the world! From Idi Amin to Saddam Hussein to Vladimir Putin, there is a common pattern of authoritarian dictators losing touch with reality, getting really weird, and coming to believe all kinds of counterproductive stuff that flatters their egos. It would be an even bigger problem to try to explain why Putin was immune to that dynamic after 24 years in power.

"World leaders don't shadowbox opponents out of pure stupidity" is an assumption that seems wholly ungrounded to me. Why not? World leaders do foolish things all the time on large and small scales. World leaders make mistakes. World leaders can become paranoid and out of touch--and if they lead countries without functioning electoral democracies, they can stay in power regardless. World leaders are not a magic special class of human being. They're just people. And whether it's because they're your uncle who watches nothing but OANN and Fox, or they're the President of Russia and they have yes-men and the Global Research guys telling them only what they want to hear, they can end up making absolute nonsense a load-bearing part of their worldview.

[ozimac]

Perception & Attention

Amodal Completion & Illusory Perception in Birds and Primates, Fujita et al. (2012)

Reaction-time Explorations of Visual Perception, Attention, and Decision in Pigeons, Blough (2012)

Experimental Divergences in the Visual Cognition of Birds and Mammals, Qadri & Cook (2015)

The article "Amodal completion & illusory perception in birds and primate" by Fujita et al. (2012) explores the perceptual processes of nonhuman animals, emphasizing the importance of understanding their cognitive abilities. It discusses the role of perception in providing information for higher cognitive processes and highlights potential evolutionary constraints that shape species-specific perceptual characteristics. 

The study involves experiments with pigeons and primates, investigating their responses to completion tasks and visual illusions. Pigeons have even been observed to have difficulty completing ecologically relevant stimuli, which proves the relevance of using ecologically meaningful stimuli, such as seeds and artifacts, in testing pigeons' completion abilities not necessary (e.g., Ushitani & Fujita, 2005). Another question that arises is if pigeons lack a visual perceptual system to complete an image at all, or do they just decline the completed image. Fujita & Ushitani (2005) developed a task to test pure perception, not just completion, where they trained pigeons to find and peck a punched red diamond among complete diamonds. Then put white square next to diamond with a small gap. Finally, tested pigeons with punched diamonds that had a white square filling the punched part using reaction time as a measure of perceived confidence in their choice. Their results found that this was easy for pigeons (with shorter RTs!), but difficult for humans (longer RTs)! Which, to me, suggests employment of an exclusionary process, and with the authors concluding that it seems as if completion seems to be the last resort of pigeons, whereas it is the first choice for other species tested. Further exploration questions whether pigeons lack an early perceptual system for completion or if they choose not to complete images. Other experiments, including investigation of the Ponzo illusion and Muller-Lyer illusion, reveal that pigeons exhibit biases towards expected illusions, though individual variations exist. The article concludes by emphasizing the concept of "umwelt," highlighting differences in sensory processes among species and suggesting that a species' visual perceptual system is tuned to its own ecological niche in the wild.

-

The chapter "Reaction-time Explorations of Visual Perception, Attention, and Decision in Pigeons" by Blough (2012)* aims to highlight the utility of reaction times (RTs) in unraveling psychological processes in pigeons during their interactions with the environment. The experiments primarily involve discrimination tasks with computer-generated stimuli, and the emphasis is on using RTs as a key behavioral measure. The introduction underscores the unique properties of RTs, serving as a valuable measure to understand the duration of processes underlying discriminative responses.

Throughout the chapter, the author explores manipulations of sensory, perception, attention, and incentive variables. The chapter highlights the connection between research conducted on pigeons and studies involving humans, enhancing our comprehensive understanding of these subjects across both species. Specifically, citing that pigeons “like to search”, which like the article above, tells me that there has to be some sort of exclusionary process (e.g., choice by exclusion) that is integral to pigeons’ survival in their ecological niche. Various other topics, such as inhibitory interactions between rods and cones, search processes, display size, and similarity, are discussed. In terms of attention, Blough (1991) found pigeons’ search RTs were shorter after a run of trials with the same target letter than during equivalent sequences in which alterative targets appeared in random order. Perhaps, expectancy makes a perceptual object stand out in the same way that a distinctive feature does. Expectation and priming could be a remedy. The chapter explores the distinction between serial and parallel processing in pigeons, noting similarities and differences with humans.

It also discusses search asymmetry, examining the role of distinctive features and potential influences of experience on search behaviors. Attention, expectation, and search RTs are investigated, with evidence supporting attentional influences on pigeon search RTs. Attention becomes a focus, with evidence supporting two attentional influences on pigeon search RTs, used to compare the pigeon's search-image with a recognition-controlling representation. The chapter concludes by developing complex models of discriminative processes using RT distributions. Models include a mixture of response types, a two-component model for visual-search RTs, and a random-walk model based on reward and stimulus similarity variations. The findings contribute to understanding pigeon discriminative processes, with implications for related processes in other species, including humans. Some results surpass comparable human work (e.g., assymetry in Blough & Blough, 1997), some align, and others suggest intriguing differences in visual information processing between humans and pigeons. Overall, the chapter provides a comprehensive exploration of visual perception, attention, and decision processes in pigeons through a measure of reaction time.

-

The article "Experimental Divergences in the Visual Cognition of Birds and Mammals" by Qadri & Cook (2015) again, explores visual cognition in birds, particularly pigeons, and compares it to human visual cognition. The introduction highlights the evolutionary divergence in diurnal and nocturnal pathways between birds and mammals, leading to distinct nervous system structures for visually guided behavior. Despite the smaller avian brain, pigeons serve as a model for understanding visual cognition, presenting both similarities that rival and differences with human visual behavior.

One significant difference highlighted is pigeons' propensity to attend to smaller local features rather than grasping the larger global form, possibly linked to their ecological needs for searching in dense environments. The article discusses various experimental findings, such as search asymmetry, vertices and edges processing, glass patterns, and perceptual completion, revealing discrepancies and divergences in perceptual behaviors across species. Pigeons exhibit complexities in processing lines, edges, and object completion, often showing resistance to perceptual completion tasks.

It also delves into potential explanations for these differences, including attentional mechanisms, stimulus size, feature weighting, and the ecological relevance of completing separated objects (e.g., Watanabe & Furuya, 1997; Aust & Huber, 2006; Ushitani & Fujita, 2005). The analysis suggests that pigeons may process spatially extended and disconnected information differently from humans, potentially due to limitations in connective or grouping processes. The ecological context of pigeons is considered, questioning whether completing separated objects is crucial in their natural environment at all. 

My thoughts

All three articles touch on the same things, with considerable overlap. All three articles revolve around studies or experiments related to the visual perception and cognition of animals. They involve investigations into how different species, such as birds (pigeons specifically) and primates process visual stimuli, make perceptual decisions, and exhibit behaviors related to visual cognition. The studies explore aspects like amodal completion, illusions, reaction times, attention, and decision-making processes. While each work has its specific focus, they all explore visual cognition in animals from various perspectives and using different experimental approaches.

Throughout the three articles, my current particular interest lies within visual perceptual completion and occlusion. Naturally, it is difficult to replicate a 3D image, or concept (i.e., food), on a 2D space, and furthermore, reflect some sort of depth perception on it. That is, unless subjects are given targeted depth perception training. To just display images on a screen without this training could lead to a number of interpretations: e.g., a “partially occluded” image of a star by a rectangle the same color as the background for example could merely be representative of a new shape, some sort of asymmetrical object with multiple vertices. Even if the occluder was a different color than the background, it could still be seen as an entirely new object, just with this new shape as a feature of it. This could be achieved through a number of ways. 

Engaging in mental imagery through occlusion not only relies on working memory and attention, possibly influenced by long-term memory of the stimulus, but also involves a sense of object permanence. The concept of object permanence becomes complex in a 2D space, where partially occluded images might be perceived as entirely new to birds rather than as the same object covered (object unity). To address this, priming birds with a potentially occluded stimulus during training could be explored as a means to prompt them to mentally imagine it during testing.

In comparing humans' capacity for mental imagery with pigeons, humans have received extensive training through various life experiences which leads them to have a more developed depth perception. This is evident in our ability to distinguish between landscape, midground, and forefront elements in any form of art medium, aided by experiences like viewing paintings and developing depth perception through real-life exposures. In contrast, pigeons are primarily exposed to 2-dimensional shapes, posing depth perception as a challenge. Perhaps, pigeons may benefit from prior depth perception training to show evidence of understanding occlusion on the 2D space. This training could involve introducing moving occluders over static objects to simulate dimensions in the 2D space - an approach I plan on exploring.

Paralleling occlusion literature with rats (e.g., Fast & Blaisdell, 2011; Gonzalez et al., 2022), which demonstrate mental imagery in a 3D space where they can touch and interact with objects, occlusion experiments with birds are presented stimuli solely in a 2D space. Thus, there is a need for exploring potential methods to enhance pigeons' depth perception training, suggesting the possibility of a moving occluder to introduce dimensions in the 2D space that could perhaps facilitate mental imagery.

On another note, I do think there are issues with the MTS (matching-to-sample) procedure, particularly when studying occlusion or the aforementioned illusions, as suggested in the Fujita et al. (2012) paper. Similar to challenges observed in symmetry studies, there's ambiguity in interpreting results because it remains uncertain whether birds are genuinely matching to the sample (e.g., choosing a “long line” comparison when presented with a “long line” sample) at test and were relying on habitual responses during training, (e.g., when A, pick B). An alternative approach could incorporate use of a reward contingency, akin to the procedure employed in our lab's rat mental imagery experiments. This reward contingency, previously utilized in Fujita (2001) for investigating line length estimation, moves away from interpreting MTS information and instead involves inferences from a distinct type of outcome, which could lead to cleaner data and provide a more insightful understanding of how birds categorize and perceive stimuli.

* Chapter from Zentall, T. R., & Wasserman, E. A. (2012). The Oxford handbook of Comparative Cognition. Oxford U. Press. 

[zelda-larsson]

How Collaboration Unlocks What Solo Efforts Can't

Great ideas rarely emerge in isolation. The most groundbreaking innovations, resilient companies, and transformative solutions are usually the product of collective effort—diverse minds working in concert to achieve what no single individual could. While our culture often celebrates lone geniuses, the reality is that sustained success almost always depends on effective collaboration.

Michael Shvartsman, an investor who has observed hundreds of teams across industries, puts it simply: "Talent wins games, but teamwork wins championships. The organizations that consistently outperform don’t necessarily have the smartest people—they have the best-connected people."

The Cognitive Power of Combined Perspectives.

Human thinking tends to follow well-worn paths. We approach problems with our own biases, blind spots, and habitual ways of reasoning. Collaboration disrupts these limitations by introducing alternative viewpoints that challenge assumptions and reveal new possibilities.

A designer might see a product’s aesthetic flaws while an engineer spots functional limitations. A marketer understands customer psychology in ways a financial analyst doesn’t. When these perspectives intersect, they create solutions that satisfy multiple requirements simultaneously—something solo efforts often miss.

Michael Shvartsman notes: "The magic happens when differing specialties communicate in shared language. I’ve watched teams achieve in weeks what would take individuals months, simply because they combined their lenses on a problem."

The Momentum of Mutual Accountability.

Working alone, it’s easy to procrastinate, cut corners, or settle for "good enough." Collaborative environments create natural accountability—when others depend on your contribution, you’re more likely to deliver quality work on time. This gentle pressure raises everyone’s performance.

This dynamic also helps sustain motivation during challenging projects. The energy of a team pushing toward a shared goal often carries individuals through moments when they might otherwise give up.

"Early in my career," Michael Shvartsman recalls, "I noticed something interesting: the most productive teams weren’t those with the most stringent managers, but those where peers genuinely cared about each other’s contributions. That social contract is more powerful than any deadline."

The Innovation Accelerator.

Collaboration doesn’t just combine existing ideas—it generates entirely new ones. The friction between different viewpoints often sparks creative breakthroughs. A casual comment from someone outside your specialty can trigger an insight you’d never reach alone.

This explains why companies that break down silos between departments often out-innovate competitors. When R&D regularly interacts with customer service, or when finance teams engage with product designers, unexpected connections emerge.

Michael Shvartsman observes: "The best ideas usually have multiple parents. When you hear ‘This came from marketing’ or ‘That was engineering’s idea,’ you’re probably looking at incremental thinking. The transformative solutions typically emerge from cross-pollination."

The Resilience Factor.

Collaborative teams weather storms better than collections of individuals. When challenges arise—a missed deadline, a technical failure, a market shift—team members can redistribute work, brainstorm solutions, and provide emotional support. This adaptability makes collaborative organizations more resilient to disruption.

"During the 2020 pandemic," Michael Shvartsman notes, "the companies that adapted fastest weren’t those with the most brilliant CEOs, but those with the strongest collaborative muscles. When everyone contributes to problem-solving, you get more shots on goal."

The Leadership Imperative.

Fostering true collaboration requires intentional leadership. It means:

Creating psychological safety so team members risk sharing imperfect ideas.

Breaking down information hoarding by rewarding knowledge sharing.

Designing workspaces (physical or virtual) that encourage spontaneous interactions.

Modeling collaborative behavior at the executive level.

"Too many leaders say they want collaboration while rewarding individual heroics," says Michael Shvartsman. "The tone gets set by what gets celebrated. If you only recognize solo achievements, don’t be surprised when teamwork suffers."

The Future Belongs to the Connected.

As problems grow more complex—whether in technology, business, or society—solutions increasingly require interdisciplinary approaches. The organizations that will thrive are those that can harness diverse talents toward shared purposes.

Michael Shvartsman concludes: "We’re entering an era where connectivity beats raw intelligence. The ability to collaborate effectively—to listen deeply, integrate perspectives, and build on others’ ideas—is becoming the ultimate career advantage."

Individual brilliance opens doors, but collaboration walks through them. The most meaningful achievements await on the other side.

[charles233]

Systems of Intelligence: Building the Infrastructure Behind AI

We often imagine AI as a brain—a single, powerful model making decisions or answering questions. But in reality, the most impactful AI systems today aren’t standalone minds. They are systems of intelligence: distributed, modular, data-driven architectures where multiple components work together to deliver human-like capabilities.

Whether it’s a customer support bot, a self-driving vehicle, or an enterprise analytics agent, modern AI is less about one genius algorithm—and more about the infrastructure that surrounds it.

In this article, we’ll unpack how AI development is shifting toward systems thinking, what that means for developers, and why building intelligent systems is now as much about orchestration as it is about models.

From Models to Ecosystems

Early AI research focused heavily on model performance: how accurate a classifier is, how fluent a language model sounds, how well a vision system can detect objects. But as AI moved into production, it became clear that a powerful model is only one piece of the puzzle.

Real-world AI systems need:

Clean, high-quality data pipelines

Scalable inference infrastructure

Tool use and memory integration

Human feedback mechanisms

Logging, versioning, and security layers

In other words, they need an ecosystem. And developers are now tasked with designing, maintaining, and evolving that ecosystem.

The Components of a Modern AI System

To understand today’s AI development, consider what a full-stack AI system includes:

1. Foundation Model

The core intelligence—often a pre-trained transformer model (like GPT, Claude, LLaMA). It can understand and generate language, code, or visuals.

2. Retrieval System

To ground outputs in real-world or domain-specific knowledge, developers use vector databases (e.g., Pinecone, Weaviate) to inject relevant context.

3. Memory Management

Modern AI agents need long-term memory to track user sessions, preferences, and history. This enables continuity and personalization.

4. Tool Integration

AI models use tools—search engines, APIs, calculators, internal systems—to extend their functionality. Agent frameworks like LangGraph, AutoGen, and CrewAI manage this orchestration.

5. User Interface

Interfaces matter. Whether through chat, dashboards, or voice, the design of human-AI interaction shapes how users experience intelligence.

6. Observability & Governance

Developers must log activity, detect drift, ensure alignment, and audit for fairness and compliance. Tools like PromptLayer, Weights & Biases, and Truera help with this.

Each of these layers is independently important—but together, they form a living, learning system.

AI as Infrastructure: The New Cloud

Just as cloud computing changed the way software was delivered, AI is now becoming a foundational layer in digital infrastructure.

We're entering a phase where:

AI agents coordinate internal operations

Knowledge workers delegate cognitive tasks to digital copilots

Applications include embedded intelligence as a default

This means AI development is no longer about building apps with AI features—it’s about building apps on top of AI.

Developers are designing workflows where:

AI handles 80% of a task

Humans verify or intervene on the edge cases

Feedback loops improve system performance over time

Think of it as AI-as-a-platform, not AI-as-a-tool.

Why Systems Thinking Matters

As AI gets more capable, systems thinking becomes essential. That means considering:

Interdependence: How model outputs affect other components and users

Emergent behavior: How small changes in one module lead to large effects in the system

Scalability: How performance and cost change as usage grows

Resilience: How the system handles uncertainty, failure, and drift

Developers who understand systems design can build AI that is more robust, flexible, and aligned with human needs.

Challenges in Building Intelligent Systems

Creating a system of intelligence is not easy. Developers face several core challenges:

1. Latency and Cost

Querying large models or multi-step agents can be expensive. Caching, distillation, and async orchestration are crucial.

2. Context Limits

Models like GPT-4 and Claude have token limits. Developers must chunk, summarize, and prioritize information intelligently.

3. Security and Access

When AI tools control APIs or company data, access control, auditing, and identity management become critical.

4. Bias and Misalignment

Complex systems can produce unexpected or harmful behavior. Governance frameworks and red-teaming practices are now standard.

5. Interoperability

Integrating AI with legacy systems, real-time data streams, and third-party services requires robust APIs and middleware.

Solving these issues demands a cross-functional team: AI engineers, MLOps specialists, UX designers, data scientists, and compliance experts working together.

The Shift Toward Modular, Composable Intelligence

One major trend in AI development is modularity. Developers are building systems that can swap out components (e.g., models, memory, tools) without needing to rebuild everything.

This includes:

Plug-and-play LLMs (e.g., switching from GPT-4 to Claude 3)

Swappable vector stores

Reusable agent templates and chains

Language model routers (e.g., based on task, latency, or cost)

This makes it easier to innovate, test alternatives, and scale across teams or domains. It's AI development at the speed of infrastructure.

The Developer’s New Role: System Architect

The AI developer of today is no longer just a model trainer or API wrangler. They are a system architect—someone who:

Designs intelligent workflows

Balances tradeoffs between cost, performance, and safety

Thinks holistically about user experience, context, and trust

Orchestrates not just software, but behavior

AI development is now as much about building experiences and ecosystems as it is about building models.

Conclusion: From Algorithms to Architecture

We’ve moved past the age of standalone algorithms. The future of AI lies in systems of intelligence—modular, adaptable, and deeply integrated into the fabric of our digital lives.

As developers, the challenge isn’t just to make AI smarter. It’s to build infrastructure that can support, scale, and steer that intelligence responsibly.

To succeed in this new era, we must think like systems engineers, design like product architects, and build with the humility that intelligence isn’t just in the code—it’s in the connections.

[aadityachand]

What Economics and Finance Taught Me About Navigating a Connected World

When I first chose to study economics and finance, I imagined I’d spend most of my time memorizing theories and crunching numbers. While I certainly encountered plenty of formulas and charts, what I didn’t expect was how much these disciplines would shape my perspective on the world. Over the years, my studies taught me to understand not just markets and money but also the relationships, incentives, and behaviors that bind people and nations together. Today, those lessons shape how I think about risk, opportunity, and the far-reaching consequences of decisions—both big and small.

Understanding Choices and Scarcity

At the heart of economics is a simple but powerful idea: resources are scarce, and choices matter. Early on, I learned to look at the world through the lens of opportunity cost. Whether a person decides to spend or save, a government decides to invest in health care or defense, or a company decides to enter a new market, every choice carries trade-offs.

This mindset became more than an academic exercise. It taught me to be deliberate in how I allocate my own time and money and to appreciate why nations sometimes struggle to prioritize among competing needs. When people criticize policies as wasteful or inefficient, I now look deeper to understand what was sacrificed in exchange and why that trade-off was made.

Global Interdependence

One of the most eye-opening lessons was the realization of how interconnected the global economy has become. Learning about trade flows, currency markets, and foreign investment revealed how no country stands alone. A labor strike in a port city can disrupt supply chains across continents. A debt crisis in one region can erode investor confidence worldwide.

For instance, in studying the 1997 Asian financial crisis, I saw how capital flight and currency devaluations in Thailand quickly spread to neighboring economies and then rippled out to affect stock markets globally. These events demonstrated that globalization is not just a buzzword—it is a defining feature of modern economic life.

This understanding made me more mindful of news stories from abroad and more aware that what happens in other countries can have a direct impact on households and businesses where I live.

Behavioral Biases in Markets

Economics and finance are often portrayed as purely rational disciplines. Yet some of the most fascinating insights I gained came from behavioral economics and finance. Humans are emotional creatures, prone to biases and cognitive errors that can lead to surprising outcomes.

I learned about herd behavior, where investors unthinkingly follow the crowd, driving bubbles to unsustainable heights before they suddenly crash. The dot-com bubble of the late 1990s and the housing boom of the early 2000s were vivid examples. Fear of missing out and overconfidence created market distortions that eventually collapsed under their weight.

Understanding these tendencies didn’t just help me interpret past crises—it taught me to be more skeptical of hype and to question whether rising asset prices are supported by absolute value.

The Power of Data and Critical Thinking

Economics and finance thrive on evidence. From the start, I was trained to gather data, test assumptions, and avoid concluding too quickly. Whether it was a set of GDP figures, a company’s balance sheet, or labor market statistics, I learned to dig beneath the headline numbers to see the whole story.

For example, a country might report strong economic growth, but a closer look might reveal that growth is fueled by unsustainable borrowing or concentrated in a narrow sector. Without careful analysis, it’s easy to be misled.

This discipline of critical thinking has served me beyond the classroom. In an era when information moves quickly, and narratives often outpace facts, the ability to scrutinize data has become an essential skill.

Risk, Reward, and Uncertainty

One of the most practical lessons I learned was about the relationship between risk and reward. Finance taught me that higher returns usually require accepting greater uncertainty. Whether investing in emerging markets, launching a business, or lending money, understanding risk is key to making sound decisions.

I studied how diversification can reduce exposure to any single setback and how hedging strategies can protect against unforeseen events. Yet, I also came to understand that no approach eliminates risk.

This perspective has shaped my attitude toward decision-making. Instead of avoiding risk altogether, I’ve learned to measure it, prepare for it, and accept it as a part of pursuing opportunity.

The Role of Policy and Institutions

Economics also taught me about the vital role of policy. Governments and central banks have tools to guide economies through cycles of boom and bust. Interest rates, tax policy, regulations, and public spending all significantly influence outcomes.

For example, I studied how the Federal Reserve’s response to the 2008 crisis—cutting rates and injecting liquidity—helped stabilize financial markets. Yet, I also saw that prolonged low rates can encourage excessive borrowing and inflate asset prices.

This nuanced understanding of policy made me more aware of the delicate balance policymakers must strike between stimulating growth and preventing excesses.

Ethics, Trust, and Transparency

While economics and finance can sometimes seem purely analytical, my studies revealed that trust and integrity are indispensable. Markets run on confidence: in institutions, in contracts, and in the information that companies and governments share with one another.

Scandals like Enron and the collapse of Lehman Brothers were reminders that when transparency and ethics break down, the damage can be enormous. These cases taught me that success in business and finance is not just about profits—it’s also about credibility, accountability, and doing the right thing, even when it’s hard.

Long-Term Perspective

Finally, the most valuable lesson has been the importance of long-term thinking. Short-term gains often attract the most attention, but sustainable success—whether for a person, a business, or a country—requires patience and resilience.

I learned how companies that invest in innovation, talent, and customer trust tend to outperform over time. Similarly, nations that build strong institutions and invest in education and infrastructure create foundations for enduring prosperity.

This outlook has shaped my personal and professional goals. It reminds me to look beyond immediate results and to focus on building something that can last.

Economics and finance have given me far more than technical knowledge. They’ve shaped the way I see the world and taught me to think carefully about the complex forces that connect us all. From understanding opportunity costs and behavioral biases to appreciating the importance of ethics and long-term thinking, these lessons have become a guiding framework for my decisions.

In a world where change is constant and uncertainty is inevitable, the insights I gained from studying these fields have equipped me to navigate challenges with greater confidence, curiosity, and perspective.

[llort]

2.5 Reconstructing Physical and Mental events in VSMs If my theory about physical monism is correct then it should be relatively more straight forward to be able to “trace” the developing ontology of experience, behavior's, and cognitions. An example of this is the exposure of a host to a novel word or association and tracing this learning to a subsequent ethological instance where this word or association is referenced or used in some sort of communication and cybernetic based control system or secreted to the cyberphysical environment memetically. There is plenty of literature on this concept which is called "the extended phenotype", I am not sure that in the research that they state that they presume monism to be an objective truth or not. Logically every word a human knows or can utilize (outside of words generated via grammar rules or other mechanisms) has to either be learned or synthesized based on linguistic logic (or just a mistake))(but a mistake is still a creative iteration of a previous cyberphysical event) Some philosophy is extremely biased towards the human perspective. One key experiential phenomenon experienced when manic is the misattribution of allocentric interactions to a egocentric frame. This indicates that there are frames where an individual does not consider themselves as an agent in a social interaction These core axioms and sets mapped to human experience can be used to construct an easy to manage, modify and comprehend model of the totality of experience and to study the interactions of the axioms and any emergent properties. Hopefully the model can provide an individual with a far greater and deeper understanding of themselves, others, society and the universe they live in. The model also can be used to make and test predictions As the model is based on axioms, the model itself can be changed in a similar way by removing axioms, adding new ones or changing existing ones potentially allowing for very powerful and complex simulations for exploring the big questions and even the small ones. Perspective theory in itself is modular however the interaction of specific modules by specified relationships or rules may lead to non modular emergent memeplexes Current ISR, mass data and bio-metric technologies also including spectrum analysis could falsify any hypothesis that this adductive theory generates. On could potentially see the expression of culture as an sort of extracellular matrix in which human creates/secrete pCurrent ISR, mass data and bio-metric technologies also including spectrum analysis could falsify any hypothesis that this adductive theory generates. On could potentially see the expression of culture as an sort of extracellular matrix in which human creates/secrete physical structures in the real world as result of physical, technological or biological processes.hysical structures in the real world as result of physical, technological or biological proCurrent ISR, mass data and bio-metric technologies also including spectrum analysis could falsify any hypothesis that this adductive theory generates. On could potentially see the expression of culture as an sort of extracellular matrix in which human creates/secrete physical structures in the real world as result of physical, technological or biological processes.cesses.

[vdvsdvdsvdz]

Thinking Fast and Slow Summary – Free Chapter-by-Chapter Guide (No Signup Needed!)

If you've ever wanted to understand the psychology behind your decisions or wondered why people often make irrational choices, Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow is a must-read. This groundbreaking book explores how our minds work, introducing two systems of thinking that govern our judgments and actions. Now, you can dive into a Thinking Fast and Slow summary—completely free and without any signup—for the first three chapters on our website.

We offer a unique and user-friendly experience where you can read or listen to key takeaways, get a chapter-by-chapter summary, and even interact with the book using AI. Whether you're a student, a professional, or a curious reader, this resource will help you grasp the core concepts of the book in a fraction of the time.

What is Thinking, Fast and Slow About?

Written by Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow delves into how humans think. It introduces two modes of thought:

System 1: Fast, intuitive, and emotional.

System 2: Slow, deliberate, and logical.

The book explains how these systems interact and often conflict with each other. Many of our daily decisions, biases, and mistakes stem from the overuse of System 1, which jumps to conclusions without thorough analysis.

Why Read a Summary of Thinking, Fast and Slow?

Let’s face it—Kahneman’s book is rich and informative, but it’s also dense and academic. Not everyone has the time or background to digest 500+ pages of cognitive psychology.

That’s where our Thinking Fast and Slow summary comes in. It simplifies complex ideas, breaking them down into accessible language and organized chapters. You can get the key takeaways without reading the entire book, saving you hours while still gaining valuable insights.

Features of Our Free Chapter Summaries

Here’s what sets our summary apart:

✅ No Signup Required for Chapters 1–3: Jump right in and start learning.

🎧 Listen or Read: Choose between audio and text summaries.

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What You'll Learn in the First Three Chapters

Here’s a quick glimpse into the free content you’ll find on our site:

Chapter 1: The Characters of the Story

Kahneman introduces the two systems—System 1 and System 2. You’ll learn how System 1 operates automatically and quickly, with little effort, while System 2 allocates attention to effortful mental activities.

Chapter 2: Attention and Effort

This chapter digs into the mental energy required to engage System 2. You’ll see how multitasking is less efficient than you think and why focused attention is so mentally draining.

Chapter 3: The Lazy Controller

System 2 is capable of complex reasoning but tends to be lazy. Kahneman explains how System 1 often takes over because System 2 doesn’t want to be activated unless absolutely necessary.

These summaries highlight the psychological principles without overwhelming you with jargon or academic language.

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Imagine being able to ask Kahneman himself to explain a difficult concept. Our website brings you as close to that as possible with a built-in AI assistant trained to understand and discuss the book’s content.

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Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow is one of the most influential books in behavioral science. With our Thinking Fast and Slow summary, you don’t need to spend weeks reading or pay for an expensive

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