Does Consciousness Pervade the Universe?
Physical science describes matter “from the outside,” in terms of its behavior. But matter “from the inside”—i.e., in terms of its intrinsic nature—is constituted of forms of consciousness.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/does-consciousness-pervade-the-universe/?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Houseplants can think…
New research by a team of scientists at the University of Western Australia (UWA) shows plants have long-term memory. This adds to a body of research that has shown plants have high-level mental processes, including the ability to feel fear and happiness, the ability to communicate, and even the ability to read your mind.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/your-houseplants-can-think-talk-read-your-mind-new-research-adds-evidence_460659.html
Plants can think…
Plants are far more intelligent and capable than we given them credit. In fact, provocative research from 2010 published in Plant Signaling & Behavior proposes that since they cannot escape environmental stresses in the manner of animals, they have developed a “sophisticated, highly responsive and dynamic physiology,” which includes information processes such as “biological quantum computing” and “cellular light memory” which could be described as forms of plant intelligence.
https://www.collective-evolution.com/2019/03/10/research-reveals-plants-can-think-choose-remember/
Can plants read your mind?
Backster noticed that the plant needed water, and on impulse attached the leads of a lie detector to one of the leaves. The lie detector measures skin resistance and Backster knew that it would indicate when water reached the actual leaf. He poured water over the root system and waited to see how long before this moisture reached the leaves.
http://www.mindpowernews.com/MindPlantCommunication.htm
The Secret Life of Trees: The Astonishing Science of What Trees Feel and How They Communicate
“A tree can be only as strong as the forest that surrounds it.”…[A tree is not a forest. On its own, a tree cannot establish a consistent local climate. It is at the mercy of wind and weather. But together, many trees create an ecosystem that moderates extremes of heat and cold, stores a great deal of water, and generates a great deal of humidity. And in this protected environment, trees can live to be very old.]…[Every tree, therefore, is valuable to the community and worth keeping around for as long as possible. And that is why even sick individuals are supported and nourished until they recover. Next time, perhaps it will be the other way round, and the supporting tree might be the one in need of assistance.]…
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-secret-life-of-trees-the-astonishing-science-of-what-trees-feel-and-how-they-communicate?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Past and the Future of the Earth’s Oldest Trees
Bristlecone pines have survived various catastrophes over the millennia, and they may survive humanity.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/01/20/the-past-and-the-future-of-the-earths-oldest-trees?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Plants can see, hear, smell – and respond
Plants, according to Jack C Schultz, “are just very slow animals“.
http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20170109-plants-can-see-hear-and-smell-and-respond
The Hidden Memories of Plants
It’s telling that Gagliano uses the word “who,” which many people would be unlikely to apply to plants. Even though they’re alive, we tend to think of plants as objects rather than dynamic, breathing, growing beings. We see them as mechanistic things that react to simple stimuli. But to some extent, that’s true of every type of life on Earth. Everything that lives is a bundle of chemicals and electrical signals in dialogue with the environment in which it exists. A memory, such as of the heat of summer on last year’s beach vacation, is a biochemical marker registered from a set of external inputs. A plant’s epigenetic memory, of the cold of winter months, on a fundamental level, is not so different.
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/plant-memory-hidden-vernalization
The world’s 10 oldest living trees
These ancient trees have borne witness to the rise and fall of civilizations, survived changing climates, and even persevered through the fervent development of human industry. They are a testament to the long view that Mother Nature takes in tending the Earth.
https://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/photos/the-worlds-10-oldest-living-trees/taking-the-long-view
The Healing Power of Gardens: Oliver Sacks on the Psychological and Physiological Consolations of Nature
There is something deeply humanizing in listening to the rustle of a newly leaved tree, in watching a bumblebee romance a blossom, in kneeling onto the carpet of soil to make a hole for a sapling, gently moving a startled earthworm or two out of the way. Walt Whitman knew this when he weighed what makes life worth living as he convalesced from a paralytic stroke: “After you have exhausted what there is in business, politics, conviviality, love, and so on — have found that none of these finally satisfy, or permanently wear — what remains? Nature remains; to bring out from their torpid recesses, the affinities of a man or woman with the open air, the trees, fields, the changes of seasons — the sun by day and the stars of heaven by night.”
https://www.brainpickings.org/?s=healing+power+of+gardens
Why You Can Smell Rain
The main contributor to petrichor are actinobacteria. These tiny microorganisms can be found in rural and urban areas as well as in marine environments. They decompose dead or decaying organic matter into simple chemical compounds which can then become nutrients for developing plants and other organisms. […] A byproduct of their activity is an organic compound called geosmin which contributes to the petrichor scent. Geosmin is a type of alcohol, like rubbing alcohol.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/why-you-can-smell-rain?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Human thought can physically change water
The most famous experiments done on the power of the human mind to physically impact water were led by Dr. Masaru Emoto, head of the Hado Institute (IHM Corporation) in Tokyo, Japan, in the 1990s. He exposed water samples to various emotional stimuli—music, words in several languages representing both positive and negative emotions, et cetera. He found that when the water samples were frozen, those that had been exposed to positive human intentions formed beautiful crystals, while those exposed to negative human intentions formed distorted and ugly crystals.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/can-human-thoughts-physically-change-water-a-look-at-4-experiments_731816.html
The Heart is like a little brain
The heart’s structure is similar to that of the brain: it has an intricate network of neurons, neurotransmitters, proteins, and support cells.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/how-the-heart-is-like-a-little-brain-which-is-really-in-control_372362.html
This Is Your Brain on Silence
Neurophysiological research suggests that noises first activate the amygdalae, clusters of neurons located in the temporal lobes of the brain, associated with memory formation and emotion. The activation prompts an immediate release of stress hormones like cortisol. People who live in consistently loud environments often experience chronically elevated levels of stress hormones.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/this-is-your-brain-on-silence?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Are we morally obligated to meditate?
A growing body of neuroscience research shows that meditation can make us better to each other.[…]…meditators’ brains tend to be enlarged in a bunch of regions, including the insula (involved in emotional self-awareness), parts of the cingulate cortex and orbitofrontal cortex (involved in self-regulation), and parts of the prefrontal cortex (involved in attention).[…]A host of other studies showed that meditation can also change your neural circuitry in ways that make you more compassionate, as well as more inclined to have positive feelings toward a victim of suffering and to see things from their perspective.
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/1/10/21013234/meditation-brain-neuroscience-moral-obligation?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Secret Algorithm Behind Learning
The famous Nobel winning physicist Richard Feynman understood the difference between “knowing something” and “knowing the name of something” and it’s one of the most important reasons for his success.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-secret-algorithm-behind-learning
I Biohacked for 10 Weeks to Try to Live Forever
The annual conference (the next one is in March) is thrown by biohacking activist Dave Asprey, the founder of Bulletproof coffee and author of Super Human: The Bulletproof Plan to Age Backward and Maybe Even Live Forever. Asprey defines biohacking as “the art and science of changing the environment around you and inside you so that you have full control over your own biology.”
https://gen.medium.com/i-biohacked-for-10-weeks-to-try-to-live-forever-300cf1376cdf
Herding breeds can have an adverse reaction to Ivermectin
Recognizing that the collies and other herding breeds that were sensitive to ivermectin were similar to the mdr knockout mice, Dr. Katrina Mealey at Washington State University, College of Veterinary Medicine, demonstrated that a deletion mutation of the mdr gene was present in ivermectin-sensitive collies (2).
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1636591/#!po=56.2500
Protective shoeing for horses – I
Many people think horses feet that break up and disintegrate in warm weather do so because they are drying out, indeed I used to think the same. But there is a considerable hole in this argument. That is, if drying out is the problem, how come horses that live in warm dry climates, such as Spain, or Arizona, or Arabia, rarely ever need shoes at all? Their feet are almost invariably rock hard and incredibly tough, but if lack of moisture causes breakup, they should be the very worst affected by this process. Clearly this is not the case, and there is something far more complex going on.
http://protectiveshoeing.com/Protective%20Shoeing%20P3.html
Protective shoeing for horses – II
Some horses cannot cope with barefoot and need shoes, but find after a while they then have problems because of the shoes.
http://protectiveshoeing.com/index.html
Understanding the Horse’s Sole
The sole of the foot is the most abused and misunderstood part of the domestic horse (with the possible exception of its digestive system).
http://www.hoofrehab.com/HorsesSole.html
How Elephants Listen … With Their Feet
“When an elephant vocalizes, it’s like a mini-explosion at the source,” said O’Connell-Rodwell. The sound waves spread out through the ground and air. By triangulating the two types of signals using both ears and feet, elephants can tune in to the direction, distance and content of a message.
https://www.kqed.org/science/1926248/how-elephants-listen-with-their-feet
The structure of the cushions in the feet of African elephants (Loxodonta africana)
The uniquely designed limbs of the African elephant, Loxodonta africana, support the weight of the largest terrestrial animal. Besides other morphological peculiarities, the feet are equipped with large subcutaneous cushions which play an important role in distributing forces during weight bearing and in storing or absorbing mechanical forces. Although the cushions have been discussed in the literature and captive elephants, in particular, are frequently affected by foot disorders, precise morphological data are sparse.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2048995/#!po=1.61290
The elephant as a person
When you’re with a herd of elephants, you’re not alone at all; you’re in a highly charged atmosphere, shimmering with presence and feeling. To an outside observer, elephants appear to have highly responsive minds, with their own autonomous perspectives that yield only to careful, respectful interaction.[…] I believe it’s possible that elephants have all the cognitive and emotional capacities it takes to be persons.
https://aeon.co/essays/if-elephants-arent-persons-yet-could-they-be-one-day
Hostility and telomere shortening
Hostility, particularly difficulties controlling anger, is associated with peripheral telomere shortening in U.S. military veterans. Prevention and treatment efforts designed to reduce hostility may help mitigate risk for accelerated cellular aging…
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0306453016304449
Social Isolation Shortens Telomeres in African Grey Parrots
Telomeres, the caps of eukaryotic chromosomes, control chromosome stability and cellular senescence, but aging and exposure to chronic stress are suspected to cause attrition of telomere length. We investigated the effect of social isolation on telomere length in the highly social and intelligent African Grey parrot (Psittacus erithacus erithacus).
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0093839
Emotional Detachment And Compartmentalization
This type of compartmentalization might help him function well in two disparate worlds but it’s also going to create conflict at the deeper level of his psyche, conflict that will bubble up and manifest in troubled personal relationships, nightmares, anxiety, depression, and other forms of mental illness. He’s not going to connect the dots, he’ll try to ignore the visible manifestations of that deeper conflict or rationalize them away, blaming a hectic work schedule or the demands of family life for his problems.
https://evolutioncounseling.com/emotional-detachment-and-compartmentalization/
Not Just a Pretty Boy
…many people forge a profound bond with birds, and love their winged animals with a fiercely felt reciprocity. This is especially true of parrots. Talk to dedicated parrot owners, especially owners of the bigger parrots, and they will tell you that their avian relationship has changed their lives.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/not-just-a-pretty-boy?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Neuroscience Says Doing This 1 Thing Makes You Just as Happy as Eating 2,000 Chocolate Bars
It also gives you the same neurological boost as receiving $25,000.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/neuroscience-says-doing-this-1-thing-makes-you-just-as-happy-as-eating-2-000-chocolate-bars?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Horses can read and remember human emotions, study finds
Horses have a memory for human emotion, a British study has found, even showing an ability to interpret emotional expressions in photographs.
https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2018/04/28/horses-remember-human-emotions-study/
Horses never forget human friends
Horses also understand words better than expected, according to the research, and possess “excellent memories,” allowing horses to not only recall their human friends after periods of separation, but also to remember complex, problem-solving strategies for ten years or more.
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/35911274/ns/technology_and_science-science/t/horses-never-forget-human-friends/
Are horses as smart as humans?
“…the horse’s brain is similar to our own with a few differences. The most important difference is that much of the human brain is used for fine-motor skills and language development, while most of the horse’s brain is used for analyzing information received from the environment.”
https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2017/12/25/horses-smart-humans/
Animals are not things
A View on Animal Welfare Based on Neurological Complexity, by Temple Grandin
http://grandin.com/welfare/animals.are.not.things.html
The Beginner’s Guide to Deliberate Practice
Mindless activity is the enemy of deliberate practice. The danger of practicing the same thing again and again is that progress becomes assumed. Too often, we assume we are getting better simply because we are gaining experience. In reality, we are merely reinforcing our current habits—not improving them.
James Clear, https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-beginner-s-guide-to-deliberate-practice?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Survival of the Friendliest
One of the best ways to relax selective forces is to work together, something that mathematical biologist Martin Nowak has called the “snuggle for survival.” New research has only deepened and broadened the importance of cooperation and lifting of selective pressures.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/survival-of-the-friendliest?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Does training method matter?: Evidence for the negative impact of aversive-based methods on companion dog welfare
Dogs from Group Aversive displayed more stress-related behaviors, spent more time in tense and low behavioral states and more time panting during the training sessions, showed higher elevations in cortisol levels after training and were more ‘pessimistic’ in the cognitive bias task than dogs from Group Reward. These findings indicate that the use of aversive-based methods compromises the welfare of companion dogs in both the short- and the long-term.
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/823427v1
Found Frozen and Almost Perfectly Preserved in Permafrost, this 18,000-Year-Old Puppy Could Be a Huge Deal
As to which species this animal belonged is now an intriguing question, as the DNA analysis was inconclusive. The little critter doesn’t seem to fit the genetic profile of a dog or a wolf, and it quite possibly represents an intermediary stage during the domestication of dogs.
https://gizmodo.com/found-frozen-and-almost-perfectly-preserved-in-permafro-1840093915
How Accurate Is “Alpha’s” Theory of Dog Domestication?
How did dogs go from being our bitter rivals to our snuggly, fluffy pooch pals?[…]A study last year provided some possible genetic support for this theory. Evolutionary biologist Bridgette von Holdt, of Princeton University, and colleagues suggest that hypersocial behavior may have linked our two species and zero in on a few genes that may drive that behavior.
Brian Handwerk, Smithsonian Magazine, https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-accurate-is-alpha-s-theory-of-dog-domestication?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Toxic Coastal Fog Linked to Dangerously High Levels of Mercury in Mountain Lions
Marine fog appears to be responsible for elevated levels of mercury in coastal terrestrial food webs, and it’s trickling all the way to the top, according to new research published this week in Scientific Reports. Pumas living in the fog belt of the Santa Cruz Mountains have three times the amount of mercury in their systems compared to their cohorts living outside of the fog zone.
https://earther.gizmodo.com/toxic-coastal-fog-linked-to-dangerously-high-levels-of-1840094947
The Sea Was Never Blue
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, too, observed these features of Greek chromatic vision.[…](he) noted that ancient colour theorists tended to derive colours from a mixture of black and white, which are placed on the two opposite poles of light and dark, and yet are still called ‘colours’. The ancient conception of black and white as colours – often primary colours – is remarkable when compared with Isaac Newton’s experiments on the decomposition of light by refraction through a prism. The common view today is that white light is colourless and arises from the sum of all the hues of the spectrum, whereas black is its absence.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-sea-was-never-blue?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Note: Goethe considered the Newtonian theory to be a mathematical abstraction in contrast with the testimony of the eyes, and thus downright absurd. In fact, he claimed that light is the most simple and homogeneous substance, and the variety of colours arise at the edges where dark and light meet.Maria Michela Sassi is professor of ancient philosophy at Pisa University. She has written a number of essays published in international journals on diverse topics in ancient thought, from pre-Socratic philosophy to Aristotle. She is the author of The Science of Man in Ancient Greece (2001).
The Shortness of Life: Seneca on Busyness and the Art of Living Wide Rather Than Living Long
“The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today…The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.”
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-shortness-of-life-seneca-on-busyness-and-the-art-of-living-wide-rather-than-living-long
How to Be Alone: An Antidote to One of the Central Anxieties and Greatest Paradoxes of Our Time
The choice of solitude, of active aloneness, has relevance not only to romance but to all human bonds — even Emerson, perhaps the most eloquent champion of friendship in the English language, lived a significant portion of his life in active solitude, the very state that enabled him to produce his enduring essays and journals. And yet that choice is one our culture treats with equal parts apprehension and contempt, particularly in our age of fetishistic connectivity. Hemingway’s famous assertion that solitude is essential for creative work is perhaps so oft-cited precisely because it is so radical and unnerving in its proposition.
https://www.brainpickings.org/2014/09/03/how-to-be-alone-school-of-life/
Before You Can Be With Others, First Learn to Be Alone
If we lose our capacity for solitude, our ability to be alone with ourselves, then we lose our very ability to think.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/before-you-can-be-with-others-first-learn-to-be-alone
How to Survive Solitary Confinement
Solitary confinement has been linked to a variety of profoundly negative psychological outcomes, including suicidal tendencies and spatial and cognitive distortions. Confinement-induced stress can shrink parts of the brain, including the hippocampus, which is responsible for memory, spatial orientation, and control of emotions.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-to-survive-solitary-confinement?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Eleanor Roosevelt on Happiness, Conformity, and Integrity
Someone once asked me what I regarded as the three most important requirements for happiness. My answer was: ‘A feeling that you have been honest with yourself and those around you; a feeling that you have done the best you could both in your personal life and in your work; and the ability to love others.’
https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/11/16/eleanor-roosevelt-on-happiness-conformity-and-integrity/
How the Western Diet Has Derailed Our Evolution
When he (microbiologist Justin Sonnenburg) fed mice a fiber-poor, sugary, Western-like diet, diversity plummeted. (Fiber-starved mice were also meaner and more difficult to handle.) But the losses weren’t permanent. Even after weeks on this junk food-like diet, an animal’s microbial diversity would mostly recover if it began consuming fiber again.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-the-western-diet-has-derailed-our-evolution
Why Your Brain Hates Slowpokes
The high speed of society has jammed your internal clock.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/why-your-brain-hates-slowpokes
Empathy Is a Clock That Ticks in the Consciousness of Another
In a very real sense, we are each a temporally open book and empathy a clock that only ticks in the consciousness of another.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/empathy-is-a-clock-that-ticks-in-the-consciousness-of-another-the-science-of-how-our-social
Reclaiming Friendship
We call “friends” peers we barely know beyond the shallow roots of the professional connection, we mistake mere mutual admiration for friendship, we name-drop as “friends” acquaintances associating with whom we feel reflects favorably on us in the eyes of others, thus rendering true friendship vacant of Emerson’s exacting definition. We have perpetrated a corrosion of meaning by overusing the word and overextending its connotation…
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/reclaiming-friendship?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Link Between Self Compassion and Peak Performance
Research shows that individuals who react to failure with self-compassion get back on the bandwagon much more swiftly than those who judge themselves. That’s because if you judge yourself for messing up, you’re liable to feel guilt or shame, and it is often this very guilt or shame that drives more of the undesired behavior. The same is true with cognitive and emotional states: resisting an unwanted thought or feeling usually makes it stronger.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/stop-judging-yourself-the-link-between-self-compassion-and-peak-performance
Parents: let your kids fail. You’ll be doing them a favor
Dweck’s advice is easy: praise effort, not outcomes.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/parents-let-your-kids-fail-you-ll-be-doing-them-a-favor
The Art of Unlearning
“It ain’t what you know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” – Mark Twain
We must let go of something we thought we understood to make way for a new understanding. – Scott Young
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-art-of-unlearning?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Why Your Brain Needs Exercise
…exercise alone was good for the hippocampus, but combining physical activity with cognitive demands in a stimulating environment was even better, leading to even more new neurons. Using the brain during and after exercise seemed to trigger enhanced neuron survival.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-your-brain-needs-exercise/?utm_source=pocket-newtab
5 Habits That Will Help Your Brain Stay in Peak Condition
What you do or don’t do daily is literally changing your brain for better or worse.
https://medium.com/kaizen-habits/5-habits-that-will-help-your-brain-stay-in-peak-condition-7f830d7ae0b9?
A Johns Hopkins Study Reveals the Scientific Secret to Double How Fast You Learn
“What we found is if you practice a slightly modified version of a task you want to master, you actually learn more and faster than if you just keep practicing the exact same thing multiple times in a row.”
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/a-johns-hopkins-study-reveals-the-scientific-secret-to-double-how-fast-you-learn?utm_source=pocket-newtab
3 Ways Senior Leaders Create a Toxic Culture
Whether presiding over the entire company, a function, a region, or a business unit, the people at the top of an organization have a disproportionate level of influence over those they lead. Those further down in the organization look to their leaders for cues on what’s acceptable (and what isn’t), and the team’s habits — both good and bad — will be emulated.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/3-ways-senior-leaders-create-a-toxic-culture?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Most Common Type of Incompetent Leader
Researchers have studied managerial derailment — or the dark side of leadership — for many years. The key derailment characteristics of bad managers are well documented and fall into three broad behavioral categories: (1) “moving away behaviors,” which create distance from others through hyper-emotionality, diminished communication, and skepticism that erodes trust; (2) “moving against behaviors,” which overpower and manipulate people while aggrandizing the self; and (3) “moving toward behaviors,” which include being ingratiating, overly conforming, and reluctant to take chances or stand up for one’s team. The popular media is full of examples of bad leaders in government, academia, and business with these characteristics. However, my friend was describing something arguably worse than an incompetent boss. His manager was not overtly misbehaving, nor was he a ranting, narcissistic sociopath. Rather, his boss was a leader in title only — his role was leadership, but he provided none. My friend was experiencing absentee leadership, and unfortunately, he is not alone. Absentee leadership rarely comes up in today’s leadership or business literature, but research shows that it is the most common form of incompetent leadership.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-most-common-type-of-incompetent-leader?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Why Do Toxic People Get Promoted? For the Same Reason Humble People Do: Political Skill
Sometimes the wrong people get promoted. They might be deceitful and unscrupulously manipulative (what psychologists call “Machiavellian”); or impulsive and thrill-seeking without any sense of guilt (psychopathic); or egotistically preoccupied with themselves, having a sense of grandiosity, entitlement, and superiority (narcissistic). Employees with one or more of these three personality traits, known as the “dark triad,” are more likely to cheat, engage in fraudulent or exploitive workplace behavior, and make unethical decisions. It can be frustrating for honest and humble people to watch these employees get ahead. Why, given their toxicity, do they rise through the ranks? How do such people manage to succeed?
https://hbr.org/2018/07/why-do-toxic-people-get-promoted-for-the-same-reason-humble-people-do-political-skill
Are You Really the Product?
There are at least two alternative ways of viewing our relationship to Facebook that hold more promise for making that relationship a healthier and less exploitive one.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/are-you-really-the-product?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Interesting concept, especially if we think about horses in our shoes…and that they don’t have the choice or ability to demand better conditions.
Metacognitive Failure as a Feature of Those Holding Radical Beliefs
An unjustified certainty in one’s beliefs is a characteristic common to those espousing radical beliefs, and such overconfidence is observed for both political and non-political issues, implying a general cognitive bias in radicals.
https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(18)31420-9?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0960982218314209%3Fshowall%3Dtrue
Why Do We Gesture When We Talk?
When we speak, we put our thoughts into words, and when we gesture, we put our thoughts into our hands. But gestures don’t just show what we’re thinking—they actually help us think. Toddlers who are encouraged to gesture tend to start producing more words. Adults involved in various problem-solving tasks do better when they are encouraged to gesture. There is something about putting ideas into motions that brings us closer to grasping what we need to grasp.
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/62479/why-do-we-gesture-when-we-talk
Note: Correctly interpreting a horse’s body language directly effects the quality of our horse/human relationships. Who would know more about how we can begin to experience and communicate using body language without speaking, but the famous mime, Marcel Marceau?
Marcel Marceau Quotes
Marceau defined mime as “the art of expressing feelings by attitudes and not a means of expressing words through gestures.”
Mime is an art beyond words. It is the art of the essential. And you cannot lie. You have to show the truth.
To communicate through silence is a link between the thoughts of man.
Music and silence combine strongly because music is done with silence, and silence is full of music.
https://www.brainyquote.com/authors/marcel-marceau-quotes
Speaking in the language of silence
One cannot help using words to describe the man known as the master of mime, Marcel Marceau. But even the master himself could not elude speech Tuesday during a visit to UB, articulating-and, of course, gesticulating-“the strong grammar” of mime, which he describes as singing in silence.
http://www.buffalo.edu/ubreporter/archive/vol32/vol32n13/n1.html
Marcel Marceau: Creating With Only the Soul
“The audience loves to see the actor use nothing but his own soul and his own body to create magic,”…
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-09-26-ca-1025-story.html
13 Signs of High Emotional Intelligence
In 1995, psychologist and science journalist Daniel Goleman published a book introducing most of the world to the nascent concept of emotional intelligence. The idea–that an ability to understand and manage emotions greatly increases our chances of success–quickly took off, and it went on to greatly influence the way people think about emotions and human behavior. But what does emotional intelligence look like, as manifested in everyday life?
https://www.inc.com/justin-bariso/13-things-emotionally-intelligent-people-do.html
Emotional Intelligence: The Social Skills You Weren’t Taught in School
Emotional intelligence is a shorthand that psychological researchers use to describe how well individuals can manage their own emotions and react to the emotions of others. People who exhibit emotional intelligence have the less obvious skills necessary to get ahead in life, such as managing conflict resolution, reading and responding to the needs of others, and keeping their own emotions from overflowing and disrupting their lives.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/emotional-intelligence-the-social-skills-you-weren-t-taught-in-school
6 Smart Habits That Will Lead to a Fulfilling Life
Every successful person arrived there by choosing to repeat the same habits over and over until they reached the top.
https://www.inc.com/marcel-schwantes/6-inspiring-lessons-about-success-most-people-will-learn-too-late-in-life.html
Why the Simple Life Is Not Just Beautiful, It’s Necessary
…with the advent of industrial capitalism and a consumer society, a system arose that was committed to relentless growth, and with it grew a population (aka ‘the market’) that was enabled and encouraged to buy lots of stuff that, by traditional standards, was surplus to requirements. As a result, there’s a disconnect between the traditional values we have inherited and the consumerist imperatives instilled in us by contemporary culture.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/why-the-simple-life-is-not-just-beautiful-it-s-necessary?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Forgotten Art of Squatting Is a Revelation for Bodies Ruined by Sitting
“Every joint in our body has synovial fluid in it. This is the oil in our body that provides nutrition to the cartilage,” Jam says. “Two things are required to produce that fluid: movement and compression. So if a joint doesn’t go through its full range—if the hips and knees never go past 90 degrees—the body says ‘I’m not being used’ and starts to degenerate and stops the production of synovial fluid.”
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-forgotten-art-of-squatting-is-a-revelation-for-bodies-ruined-by-sitting?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Way You Think About Willpower Is Hurting You
…holding on to the idea that willpower is a limited resource can actually be bad for you, making you more likely to lose control and act against your better judgment.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-way-you-think-about-willpower-is-hurting-you?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Stress and the Social Self: How Relationships Affect Our Immune System
…interpersonal relationships play a significant role in our experience of stress — either contributing to it and or alleviating it. And the way we connect — something psychologist Barbara Fredrickson has termed “positivity resonance” — is deeply patterned through our earliest experiences of bonding, which train our limbic pathways.
https://www.brainpickings.org/2015/10/07/esther-sternberg-stress-relationships/
Physics Can Explain Human Innovation and Enlightenment
…the metaphorical tree that blocks the river’s rush leads a persistent and creative person to an innovation or an insight. They push the tree out of the way somehow, with thought and application. This, in turn, causes more cortical connections and more ideas to flow.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/physics-can-explain-human-innovation-and-enlightenment?utm_source=pocket-newtab
IMPLICIT THEORIES OF INTEREST
Abstract – People are often told to find their passion as though passions and interests are pre-formed and must simply be discovered. This idea, however,has hiddenmotivational implications. Five studies examined implicit theories of interest—the idea that personal interests are relatively fixed (fixed theory) or developed (growth theory). Whetherassessed orexperimentally induced, a fixed theory was more likely to dampen interest in areas outside people’s existing interests(Studies 1–3). Those endorsing a fixed theorywere also more likely to anticipate boundless motivation when passionswere found, not anticipating possible difficulties (Study 4). Moreover, when engaging in anewinterest became difficult, interest flagged significantly more for people induced to hold a fixed than a growth theoryof interest (Study 5). Urging people to find their passion may lead them to put all their eggs in one basket but then to drop that basket when it becomes difficult to carry.
http://gregorywalton-stanford.weebly.com/uploads/4/9/4/4/49448111/okeefedweckwalton_2018.pdf
People Aren’t Born Afraid of Spiders and Snakes: Fear Is Quickly Learned During Infancy
The original research by Ohman and Mineka with monkeys and adults suggested two important things that make snakes and spiders different,” LoBue says. “One is that we detect them quickly. The other is that we learn to be afraid of them really quickly.” Her research on infants and young children suggests that this is true early in life, too—but not innate, since small children aren’t necessarily afraid of snakes and spiders.
https://www.psychologicalscience.org/news/releases/people-arent-born-afraid-of-spiders-and-snakes-fear-is-quickly-learned-during-infancy.html
Microbes Help Produce Serotonin in Gut
“More and more studies are showing that mice or other model organisms with changes in their gut microbes exhibit altered behaviors,” explains Elaine Hsiao, research assistant professor of biology and biological engineering and senior author of the study. “We are interested in how microbes communicate with the nervous system. To start, we explored the idea that normal gut microbes could influence levels of neurotransmitters in their hosts.”
https://www.caltech.edu/about/news/microbes-help-produce-serotonin-gut-46495
Pain Researcher Awarded NIH Grant to Study Light-Induced Analgesia
Non-pharmacological strategies are essential to help resolve the opioid/pain conflict, but these strategies are limited in efficacy, applicability, and can be challenging to integrate into existing clinical care. “Opioid-sparing approaches that are broadly-effective and easily-adoptable are of considerable value,” says Gulur, professor of anesthesiology. “The recent preclinical studies have shown that exposure to green light can produce robust and sustained pain relief in animal models of both acute and chronic pain. We are excited to receive funding to study this phenomenon in a clinical trial where patients will be exposed to green light and their pain relief and response will be measured.”
https://anesthesiology.duke.edu/?p=850556
Healing Touch for Animals ®
When a horse’s energy system is off balance, the energy that usually flows through and around his body becomes congested. Any type of stress, whether physical or mental causes this congestion. When his energy becomes depleted due to illness or injury, his immune system will have difficulty functioning properly.
https://holistichorse.com/equine-therapy/healing-touch-for-animals-%C2%AE/
Energy Healing for a Strong Immune System
The world is comprised of a universal life force, also known as energy. Everything within the universe runs on vibrational frequencies.; Energy healing works on the premise that any disease or illness causes an imbalance in a person’s (or horse’s) energy (mind/body/spirit); The practice of energy healing works to remove those imbalances and blockages to allow energy to flow more freely; A healer facilitates the healing through visualizations, intentions, and simply by infusing the person with loving energy. You don’t need to be certified in a particular practice or method; you just need to come from a place of love and good intentions as well as being healthy yourself.
https://holistichorse.com/equine-therapy/energy-healing-for-a-strong-immune-system/
Medical Papers – Reiki on PubMed
The quality of health care depends in part on the accuracy of information published in medical journals. The peer-review process is designed to maintain scientifically credible information and research standards. Papers are critiqued and approved by at least two experts (usually researchers or physicians) prior to being accepted for publication. The following are Reiki papers published in peer-reviewed medical journals and indexed on PubMed. All of the papers mentioned in the citations have been carefully vetted.
https://reikiinmedicine.org/medical-papers/
Chinese Medicine and the equine tongue
In Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), the tongue’s appearance – including its shape, color, thickness, movement and coating – tells a story about what’s going on inside the body.
https://equinewellnessmagazine.com/chinese-medicine-equine-tongue/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Calm+your+horse+the+chemical-free+way%21&utm_campaign=EW+Weekly+Hoof+-+January+30%2C+2019
10 Safe and Natural Alternatives to Roundup
Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, is not only destructive to the delicate balance of the ecosystem, but it has been linked to non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in humans, as well as nervous system damage and hormonal imbalance.[…]Aside from humans, glyphosate and Roundup are incredibly hazardous to plants, animals, invertebrates and micro-organisms. These ‘non-target’ organisms may experience direct toxic effects from the herbicide, or be indirectly affected by changes to ecosystems or food resources (6).
https://livelovefruit.com/10-natural-alternatives-to-roundup/
What Crops Are Sprayed with Glyphosate? Over 70 of Them To Be Exact
Ever since Dewayne Johnson won a landmark lawsuit against agricultural giant, Monsanto (now Bayer), people have been scrambling to find ways of avoiding the popular weedkiller, Roundup.[…]Glyphosate, the main ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide, is one of the world’s most popular weed killer. It isn’t only found in Roundup, though. It is registered to be used in hundreds of other products, including household products as well as non-Roundup herbicides.[…]The complete list of crops is shown below, taken from an EPA memo from October 2015.
https://livelovefruit.com/what-crops-are-sprayed-with-glyphosate/
The Dangers of NSAIDs
NSAIDs have become well-known for their link to stomach bleeding, but now even the FDA has made its overall NSAID warning stronger. It wants consumers to be aware that NSAIDs cause an increased risk of heart attack and stroke, especially in higher doses. (3)
https://draxe.com/health/dangers-of-nsaids/
Do Seed Companies Control GM Crop Research?
Scientists must ask corporations for permission before publishing independent research on genetically modified crops. That restriction must end.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-seed-companies-control-gm-crop-research/
Treasure Fever
The discovery of a legendary, lost shipwreck in North America has pitted treasure hunters and archaeologists against each other, raising questions about who should control sunken riches.
https://www.hakaimagazine.com/features/treasure-fever/?utm_source=pocket-newtab
PS: Fantastic illustrations!!
Emma Willard’s Maps of Time
In a map, great countries made up of plains, mountains, seas, and rivers, are represented by what is altogether unlike them; viz., lines, shades, and letters, on a flat piece of paper; but the divisions of the map enable the mind to comprehend, by proportional space and distance, what is the comparative size of each, and how countries are situated with respect to each other. So this picture made on paper, called a Temple of Time, though unlike duration, represents it by proportional space. It is as scientific and intelligible, to represent time by space, as it is to represent space by space.4
https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/emma-willard-maps-of-time?utm_source=pocket-newtab#4-1
Love is a joint project
Ethical love, by contrast, consists in what Beauvoir calls ‘equilibrium’ and ‘reciprocity’. In equilibrium there is self-giving without self-loss: lover and beloved ‘simply walk side by side, mutually helping each other a little’. Because people don’t always feel equal to each other – or worthy of love at all – Beauvoir discusses the dynamics that threaten this equilibrium: dynamics in which one person sees him or herself as inferior or superior. The ‘most fruitful’ type of love, Beauvoir claimed, was ‘not a subordination’, but rather a relationship in which each person supported the other in seeking an independent, individual life.
https://aeon.co/essays/simone-de-beauvoirs-authentic-love-is-a-project-of-equals?utm_source=pocket-newtab
21 Phrases You Use Without Realizing You’re Quoting Shakespeare
Famous quotes from his plays are easily recognizable; phrases like “To be or not to be,” “wherefore art thou, Romeo,” and “et tu, Brute?” instantly evoke images of wooden stages and Elizabethan costumes. But an incredible number of lines from his plays have become so ingrained into modern vernacular that we no longer recognize them as lines from plays at all.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/21-phrases-you-use-without-realizing-you-re-quoting-shakespeare?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Physics Is Pointing Inexorably to Mind
…according to the Greek atomists, if we kept on dividing things into ever-smaller bits, at the end there would remain solid, indivisible particles called atoms, imagined to be so concrete as to have even particular shapes. Yet, as our understanding of physics progressed, we’ve realized that atoms themselves can be further divided into smaller bits, and those into yet smaller ones, and so on, until what is left lacks shape and solidity altogether. At the bottom of the chain of physical reduction there are only elusive, phantasmal entities we label as “energy” and “fields”—abstract conceptual tools for describing nature, which themselves seem to lack any real, concrete essence.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/physics-is-pointing-inexorably-to-mind?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Is Matter Conscious?
The nature of consciousness seems to be unique among scientific puzzles. Not only do neuroscientists have no fundamental explanation for how it arises from physical states of the brain, we are not even sure whether we ever will. Astronomers wonder what dark matter is, geologists seek the origins of life, and biologists try to understand cancer—all difficult problems, of course, yet at least we have some idea of how to go about investigating them and rough conceptions of what their solutions could look like. Our first-person experience, on the other hand, lies beyond the traditional methods of science. Following the philosopher David Chalmers, we call it the hard problem of consciousness.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/is-matter-conscious
Consciousness Isn’t Self-Centered
Think of consciousness like spacetime—a fundamental field that’s everywhere.
http://nautil.us/issue/82/panpsychism/consciousness-isnt-self_centered?utm_source=pocket-newtab
How Brain Scientists Forgot That Brains Have Owners
According to Krakauer, the unspoken assumption is that if we collect enough data about the parts, the workings of the whole will become clear. If we fully understand the molecules that dance across a synapse, or the electrical pulses that zoom along a neuron, or the web of connections formed by many neurons, we will eventually solve the mysteries of learning, memory, emotion, and more. “The fallacy is that more of the same kind of work in the infinitely postponed future will transform into knowing why that mother’s crying or why I’m feeling this way,” says Krakauer. And, as he and his colleagues argue, it will not. That’s because behavior is an emergent property—it arises from large groups of neurons working together, and isn’t apparent from studying any single one. You can draw parallels with the flocking of birds.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/personal-kanban-a-life-changing-time-management-system-that-explodes-the-myth-of-multitasking?utm_source=pocket-newtab
The Surprising Reason Zebras Have Stripes
The flies had no problem finding the zebras or approaching them, but couldn’t stick the landing. “You get a quarter as many landings,” Caro said. “The flies just can’t probe for a blood meal with the zebras.”
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-surprising-reason-zebras-have-stripes?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Standing in the Light
“…he (Johan Boswinkel) and the hundreds of people he has trained in the past 20 years have helped thousands of people banish serious diseases and trouble-some ailments. “Our approach should become primary health care. We have a success rate of 80 percent without harmful side effects…”
https://www.biontologyarizona.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Standinginthelight_Boswinkel.pdf
How to Reduce Digital Distractions: Advice From Medieval Monks
A more advanced method for concentrating was to build elaborate mental structures in the course of reading and thinking. Nuns, monks, preachers and the people they educated were always encouraged to visualise the material they were processing.[…]The point wasn’t to paint these pictures on parchment. It was to give the mind something to draw, to indulge its appetite for aesthetically interesting forms while sorting its ideas into some logical structure.
https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-to-reduce-digital-distractions-advice-from-medieval-monks?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Umberto Eco’s Antilibrary: Why Unread Books Are More Valuable to Our Lives than Read Ones
Nassim Nicholas Taleb (author of The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable), uses legendary Italian writer Umberto Eco’s uncommon relationship with books and reading as a parable of the most fruitful relationship with knowledge: The writer Umberto Eco belongs to that small class of scholars who are encyclopedic, insightful, and nondull. He is the owner of a large personal library (containing thirty thousand books), and separates visitors into two categories: those who react with “Wow! Signore professore dottore Eco, what a library you have! How many of these books have you read?” and the others — a very small minority — who get the point that a private library is not an ego-boosting appendage but a research tool. Read books are far less valuable than unread ones. The library should contain as much of what you do not know as your financial means, mortgage rates, and the currently tight real-estate market allows you to put there. You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. Let us call this collection of unread books an antilibrary.
Maria Popova – https://getpocket.com/explore/item/umberto-eco-s-antilibrary-why-unread-books-are-more-valuable-to-our-lives-than-read-ones?utm_source=pocket-newtab
Coherent Horsemanship 