Category Archives: Behavior

Confronting Aging

I had signed up to substitute teach yesterday and today for an English/language arts teacher at the middle school. While I was working another job earlier in the week, he made it a point to come find me. In order to teach his eight-graders, I was going to have to prepare, so he gave me

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Time To Hug Your… Rice?

Of all the adaptations forced on us by the pandemic, I’ve found one that really takes the cake… er, prize. Perhaps the worst part of the pandemic is the cutoff from human contact. From routine family visits to special events like weddings and graduations, we haven’t been able to get together. The worst is when

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Declared Insane For Speaking Up

Nancy Pelosi needs help fast! There is either something wrong with her “upstairs,” or she just plain doesn’t like our great Country. She had a total meltdown in the White House today. It was very sad to watch. Pray for her, she is a very sick person! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 17, 2019

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Why Do Humans Dominate?

Most people might think this is a dumb question. Our dominion over the Earth was the Divine plan. But scientists approach such questions from a different angle. Consequently, they get a different answer. From a purely scientific viewpoint, the key to humanity’s world domination is our use of energy. First came our mastery of fire.

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The Laws of Stupidity

In the Disney animated feature The Lion King, when the royal usurper Scar exclaims, “I’m surrounded by idiots!”, he may have been onto something. Carlo M. Cipolla certainly thought so. In 1976, Cipolla, a professor of economic history at the University of California, Berkeley, published an essay entitled “The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity” (http://harmful.cat-v.org/people/basic-laws-of-human-stupidity/).

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Why Do We Like To Be Scared?

Did you have a scary Halloween? If so, how did that make you feel? A recent study published in the journal Emotion examined brain activity after a voluntary scary experience. The researchers found the experience put people better moods and with overall decreased brain activity. “We think it’s very similar… to the runner’s high experience,

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Fall Asleep the Army Way

If you have trouble falling asleep, the U.S. Army has a method that might help.  in the military, a good night’s sleep can literally be a life-and-death matter.  Hence the development of this method. Here’s what the Army recommends — Sit on the edge of your bed. Make sure only your bedside light is on,

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Are You More Attentive Than a Goldfish?

Time magazine is reporting that according to a recent Microsoft study, our average attention spans are now down to about eight seconds.  This actually puts us as less attentive than goldfish, whose attention spans average about nine seconds. Time reports that Canadian researchers surveyed 2,000 participants and studied the brain activity of 112 others using

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