The State Of My Ignorance

What Are You Thinking? Or, Why I Like To Stare At Pretty Girls

2012-01-29T20:19:00.000-08:00

I like to think about thinking. So when I was messing around with a girlfriend, and she asked “what are you thinking?” it really got me thinking. As far as I could tell, I wasn’t thinking anything! There wasn’t one thought it my head. All I was doing was acting, not thinking. How could this be? How could I be involved in something so enjoyable, and not have a single thought in my head?

The issue didn’t stop there, though. I realized that even when I look at attractive girls, there is nothing going on in my head. The idea of “men constantly try to picture women naked” or “men think about having sex with every attractive girl they see” doesn’t seem to apply to me, and I am guessing it doesn’t apply to many other guys either. When I see an attractive girl, all I do is stare. There is no thought process whatsoever, I am just looking. End of story.

Why is this? Why do I want to look at attractive girls? Why is it that when I am looking, nothing is going on in my head? And lastly, why am I so good at spotting attractive girls? I can spot an attractive girl in a large crowd basically instantly. Why? How? In this blog post, I hope to answer that question. Though, keep in mind that this theory is based on complete speculation.

There are many, many processes going on in your head all throughout the day. However, for the most part, you (meaning your conscious self) are completely unaware of these processes. You are only aware of a very few things that your brain feels is important enough to bump up to the conscious you, so that you are aware of it. Things that are often important are things that generally relate to our survival, be it food, novel stimuli, a threat, etc. Your brain directs your attention to it, so that you can take the appropriate action. Many neuroscientists think of attention as being a very big part of consciousness, so whatever your brain calls attention to, you are conscious of.

Besides novel stimuli, threats and food, the male brain is also very interested in finding reproductively fit females. Men have evolved to want to reproduce as much as possible--propagate those genes!! As a result, men are very interested in finding attractive girls (which equates to good genes).

We know why men are interested in finding attractive girls, as it is beneficial to reproduction. First, let’s define “attractive girl.” Men across cultures and decades all agree on a few very basic aspects of what makes a girl attractive. One of those features is the size of her waist in relation to her hips. Very young girls have a high waist to hip ratio, as do older women. However, girls who are reproductively fit will have a low hip to waist ratio (the wider hips are necessary for child birth, so they communicate to men that a girl is the right age where she is able to have babies. Studies have been done on this, and it turns out that 10:7 waist to hip ratio is found the most attractive. So in terms of what men are “on the lookout” for, are women who have a 10:7 waist to hip ratio.

Now, onto the question of why guys are so good at spotting these curvy girls! We know that one of the things men's brains are doing, is constantly scanning the visual plane, looking for anything that could be worth directing the conscious mind’s attention toward. And seeing how important it is to reproduce, the brain would also be scanning for reproductively fit females. I imagine that the system that is scanning for them would be very finely tuned to finding attractive girls and bringing them to the attention of the rest of the brain. It is most likely that this system is actually overly sensitive, since it would be beneficial to have a false positive (thinking you see an attractive girl, and being wrong) rather than missing attractive girls because you didn’t see them.

So in terms of why men are so good at spotting attractive girls, it is because our brain has an overly sensitive system which scans the visual plane, looking for anything that fits a 10:7 ratio curve.

That is one question down, so what about why there are no thoughts going on in my head when I have spotted one of these lovely ladies? Well, all the system in question is doing is bringing your attention to the girl—hoping other systems will take over, and you will get the guts to go talk to her or something. But seeing as reproducing is so important—nay, the most important thing an organism can do, the system exerts a lot of energy to make sure you are noticing this girl, so you don’t miss her.

Ultimately, when I am just starring, not thinking of anything, it's because my “find pretty girls” system is going crazy, and it is putting all my attention on the girl. And seeing as that is all that that system does, my brain won't be coming up with any other thoughts.

That’s all I got.

The Gay Gay is Gay: Political Correctness and the Evolution of Words

2012-01-17T13:46:00.000-08:00

Language is an amazing thing. There are many reasons that it is so amazing, but one of the more obvious reasons is because of how fluid it is. Words come into existence (email), go out of existence (affuage¹), change in meaning (“awful” used to mean amazing, or “full of awe”) and can even morph to fit other grammatical categories (google → googled, from noun to verb). And as every high school English student knows, it's amazing how much languages can change over a few hundred years (Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote → When April with his showers sweet with fruit)!

Now, the interesting thing with the examples I just listed is that their changes came about completely naturally. No one ever said “okay, let’s use the word ‘awful’ in a different way!” Much like biological evolution, linguistic evolution is a slow, unguided process. Here are a few other examples of words whose meanings have changed over time...

Nice - This comes from the Latin “not to know.” Originally a “nice” person was someone who was ignorant or unaware.

Artificial - This originally meant “full of artistic or technical skill.”

Manufacture - From the Latin meaning “to make by hand” this originally signified things that were created by craftsmen.

Counterfeit - This once meant “a perfect copy.” Now it means anything but.

However, when you do start to notice a change in word meaning, it can be quite annoying. Over the past few years, people have increasingly started to use the word “literally” to mean the exact opposite. For example, “I literally died of embarrassment.” And while it is annoying to hear people use the word that way, it is also fascinating, since we are witnessing a word slowing changing, right before our eyes.

However, there are also many examples of words whose meanings have been reappropriated by a group, in hopes of reclaiming it, and giving the word a different spin. This isn’t as successful as people tend to think, simply because we don’t really hear about words that haven’t successfully been reappropriated. However, some words have been embraced, and given a positive spin by the group they reference, such as: Geek, Guido, Jesus-Freak, Mormon, Nerd, Nigga and Redneck. Of course, people who don’t consider themselves as belonging to one of those groups probably wouldn’t care to be called one of those things².

That brings me to my main point, which is about the word “gay.” As most people know, it used to mean “full of joy, merry, light-hearted, carefree.” Indeed, this was the main meaning from the late 1300's up until the mid 1900's³. However, in the 1400's, it also took on a meaning of immortality. By the 1600's, it had somewhat of a meaning of promiscuity, as brothels were referred to as “gay houses”, prostitutes were “gay women”, and womanizers were “gay men.” In the early 1800's, it meant “carefree” and then started to take on the meaning of “homosexual” in the 1940s. Finally, in the 1970’s, the homosexual community adopted it, and successfully reappropriated it.

The word “gay” really is a phenomenal example of the evolution of language, and just how diverse word definitions can be over time. However, it is also ironic that since a minority group has adopted it, there now exists a social pressure that tells us that we can’t let the meaning change again.

Political correctness tells us that using the word gay to mean “stupid” or “lame” is inappropriate, mean, offensive, insensitive, etc., since it is equating something bad with homosexuals. The problem here is that this is just another example of language evolving. Just as it has done many times in the past, the word is taking on a new meaning once again. It seems deeply hypocritical for someone to say “Yes, the word ‘gay’ has meant many things in the past, and it was recently adopted to mean homosexual. However, if the word changes again, and means something bad—that’s wrong.” Sorry, but you can’t change a word, and then get upset when it changes again, especially when the change is completely organic. One might argue, “Well, it’s not fair to take a word that describes an aspect of a person, and then let it mean something bad.” Well, this happens all the time, and there are numerous examples of words that we use which were originally used to describe something about a person, but now are meant as something negative.

For example, the words “moron”, “imbecile” and “idiot” were originally terms used by medical professionals to refer to different low IQ levels in adults. An idiot was described as an adult who was so mentally incapacitated that they were incapable of ordinary reasoning. An imbecile was an adult with the mental capacity of a 6-9 year old, and a moron was an adult with the mental capacity of an 8-12 year old.

Because of this, should we throw a hissy fit and boycott Napoleon Dynamite⁴, simply because the filmmakers are being insensitive to adults with a mental capacity of a newborn child? No, that would be retarded⁵. Likewise, should we get upset when someone uses the word gay to refer to something stupid? Only, it seems, if we want to be hypocrites.

As I observe political correctness in action, it seems that the majority of it is centered around a quibble over semantics, as well as the belief that there is some deep atrocity being committed if someone is offended by something. Being offended is part of life, and no one has the right to constrict how someone speaks, simply because they are offended by it. As an atheist, I am part of the second least liked group of people in America (Scientologists are first⁶), and I see/hear things that potentially offend me all of the time. Should I be offended if I sneeze and someone says “God bless you”? No. I realize that it is mostly just a figure of speech, and I don’t give it a second thought. And even if it did bother me, should I really expect everyone I come into contact with to adopt a language change so as not to offend me? Of course not. To make a fuss about it would only embarrass myself and make me look hypersensitive and entitled.

Likewise, some people feel offended if they are not addressed in the proper pronoun. “Yes, my sex is male, but I identify as a woman, so please refer to me as in the gender neutral term ‘ze’”⁷, and feel this should be an option on legal forms and whatnot. This is simply absurd. It would be akin to me saying “don’t call me an atheist, call me a methodological naturalist” and insisting that any form that asks for your religious view have this option (as well as “strong atheist”, “weak atheist” “agnostic-atheist”, etc).

And just so people don’t think I am picking on homosexuals or liberals, conservative Christians have the same problem. Whenever a billboard goes up promoting a positive image of atheism, there is a huge uproar of people saying “I am offended by that! I don’t want to see it when I drive to work every morning”, and demand that it be removed.

The best way to deal with this is not to try and control how people use a word, (as this sort of thing tends to have the opposite effect⁸) but to just realize that language isn’t something you can control, and trying to manufacture linguistic changes is almost always an exercise in futility. Remember, if someone offends you, that is not a crime, and if a word offends you, it’s in your best interest to get over it. Being offended is just part of living with people who have different opinions. Deal with it.

Notes

I assume everyone will understand that the title of this blog post is a point of showing how many different meanings the word "gay" has assumed over the years. How anyone chooses to interpret its meaning is up to them.

1. It meant “the right to cut wood in a forest for a family fire," but stopped being used in the mid 1800’s.

2. This raises the question, have these words successfully been reappropriated if they are only viewed positively by the group they refer to?

3. While the origin of gay is disputed, it may originate from the 12^th century, in which it meant “beautiful and well dressed.”

4. Uuuuhhh! IDIOT!

5. See what I did there, eh!?

6. However, it seems to depend on the options that the survey taker is given. A survey done in 2006 found that atheists are the least trusted group out of all minority groups, including immigrants, gays and lesbians, conservative Christians, Jews and Muslims.

7. There are a number of different “gender neutral pronouns” that have been introduced over the years by different groups. These terms include Ze, Co, Phe, Hy, Ot, as well as others. As you can tell by the list, none have succeeded in making a dent in popular culture. Though, trying to introduce any sort of manufactured language generally fails completely.

8. Ironic Process Theory states that trying to suppress certain thoughts just makes them more persistent!

Thinking Clearly About Religion & Politics

2011-10-16T14:58:00.000-07:00

When it comes to hot topics that are emotionally volatile, it is almost impossible to think clearly about them. We are prone to so many biases that I have come to think that the more certain someone is about their position, the more likely it is that they don’t know what they are talking about. I am not the first to make this observation though, Bertrand Russell said “The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.” Charles Darwin also observed that “Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.”

I first realized this several years ago when I was asked to be the “token skeptic” on an evangelical Christian radio show out of San Diego. Very quickly, it became quite clear to me that the host knew one side of an argument, and had absolutely no idea what he was talking about regarding the other side. What bothered me so much about this was his certainty. He was absolutely 100% convinced he was right, and completely closed off to reconsidering that he might not be familiar enough with the relevant topics to make an informed decision.

Of course, I was convinced of the truth of other side of the argument. However, I couldn’t even imagine being so certain. In my mind, when thinking about my positions, I used words such as “likely”, “probable” and “suggested” and I would always try to have an example of something that, if true, could disprove my position. The host, on the other hand, spoke in terms of absolute certainty, and acted as if the fact that nothing could change his mind was evidence of how true his position was. It was then that I decided to NEVER let myself be so certain about something.

The theory of cognitive dissonance says that when there are contradicting ideas in our head, or if our behavior disagrees with our actions, we will rationalize it away as to no longer experience the dissonance. For example, the more work you put into something, the harder it is to admit that you might have made a mistake. “I have devoted my life to this… there is no way I could be wrong! My colleagues are just idiots.” Science is aware of this problem, and that is the reason there are things such as peer review, and the emphasis on independent replication of studies. Even movies do this to a small extent. The editor of a movie doesn't (ideally) have ANY part of the production aspect of the movie. He needs to be completely removed from the work that went into filming, in order to make the best decisions while editing. If the director is editing, he might see a shot and say “Ah! We spent 10 hours setting up that shot… we HAVE to use it”, even if it isn’t the best available option. The editor won’t be prone to those biases.

Now, you might be thinking “Sure, Zak. Some people are like that. But I know both sides of political/religious/etc. debates, and my opinions are firmly planted in reality.” Well, maybe. Let’s look at a relevant study:

A study by Geoffrey Cohen found that people would agree with a political policy, as long as they thought that it was their political party proposing it. For example, Cohen took a policy regarding welfare that was proposed by a republican, and presented it to a group of democrats. He told the democrats that the policy was proposed by a democratic leader, and asked if they agreed with it. Yep, they did. He then took a welfare policy proposed by a democrat, and presented it to a group of republicans, telling them it was from a republican leader. Did they agree with it? Absolutely.

But it gets better. Both groups stated that they would NEVER be influenced to agree with a policy, simply because their party was proposing it. Of course, they didn’t realize it at the time, but they had done just that. They did agree, however, that the OTHER party surely would be influenced by such tricks.

What this study (as well as others like it) shows us, is that our opinions of political policies have very little to do with the actual policy, but are mostly just a result of social identity. You are part of party X, so you agree with whatever they say… unless of course that same thing was said party Y. THEN you are against it.

Here is a real life example. Democrats agree with Obama, no surprise. However when Reagan says the same thing, with Republicans agree with him. There is little doubt that those same Republicans disagree with the Obama's similar statements, simply because he is Obama. How is this possible? Social identity.

Lastly, a 2004 study placed “strong democrats" and “strong republicans" in a brain scanner while they listened to speeches by president Bush and presidential candidate John Kerry. Both groups listened to instances where the candidates clearly contradicted themselves. The democrats would blame Bush for the contradictions, but let Kerry off the hook with some mental gymnastics. The republicans did the same thing. What was most interesting though, were the processes going on in the brain at the time. The researcher concluded, “We did not see any increased activation of the parts of the brain normally engaged during reasoning. What we saw instead was a network of emotion circuits lighting up, including circuits hypothesized to be involved in regulating emotion, and circuits known to be involved in resolving conflicts. Essentially, it appears as if partisans twirl the cognitive kaleidoscope until they get the conclusions they want, and then they get massively reinforced for it, with the elimination of negative emotional states and activation of positive ones.”

Do you hold the positions you hold because you have thought them through, or because they feel good? According to the study, the answer is the later. You agree with a position for emotional reasons and THEN come up with reasons to support your stance.

So what now? Are we just to fall back into a sea of postmodern relativism where there is no truth, and there is no way to go about making decisions, since we are too overwhelmed with bias? Absolutely not. What needs to happen is for people to be aware of these biases and act accordingly to try and circumvent them. Here are some tips on how I think one should go about it.

Whenever you hear a politician from the other party say something that you don’t like, stop for a second. Imagine your reaction to it if it had been stated by your favorite politician, and think about how you would feel about it (and vice versa-- do this if your favorite politician says something you like). I have used this tactic for several years, and it is amazing to see just how biased I really am when it comes to who says what. But this technique has also helped me define where exactly I stand on what issues.
Realize where the biases in the media are. Research has shown that the most left of center news outlet is the CBS Evening News, while the most right of center is Fox. The three most neutral outlets were PBS’s NewsHour, CNN’s NewsNight and ABC’s Good Morning America. However, the most politically central news source of all was found to be USA Today. If watching the news, try and find a balance and take everything from the CBS Evening News and Fox with a grain of salt. Or, do as I do, and don’t even bother with them to begin with!
Make an effort to understand and fairly represent the other side’s position. The mathematical psychologist, Anatol Rapoport, said that when it comes to criticizing your opponent, you need to be able to restate their position so clearly, vividly and fairly, that your opponent would absolutely agree with it, and would even thank you for stating the position so well. Once you have done this, only then will your criticisms be valid. So when thinking about how foolish the other side's position is, ask yourself "if I were to describe my understanding of the other groups position to them, would they agree with my assessment?" If the answer is no, you are biased, and need to rethink your position more carefully.
Avoid organizations, clubs or groups that are solely dedicated to a political or religious idea. Nothing breeds biases more than being surrounded by people who already agree with you, will pat you on the back for slamming the other side, who won’t offer you any criticisms, and will reward you for continuing to believe what everyone else already believes. Of course, I realize that this is basically saying “if you want to be an unbiased religious believer, stop going to church.” And I stand by that. Likewise, I avoid any atheist or skeptic groups, since I have learned that they don’t help me think better, but only serve to reinforce beliefs I already have-- even if they are wrong. Ask yourself, “What is more important, fooling yourself into thinking you are right, or actually being right?” Being objective is hard, and very few people care much about it.
Have friends on the other side of the fence, be it political or religious. It is easy to get caught up and think that “all democrats are idiots” or “all republicans are greedy.” We slip into these “us versus them” mindsets extremely easily, and it’s important to realize that people on the other side are just as convinced of their position that you are. It is also important to have an actual face with the position you are against, as not to make the other side out into some abstract villain.

Of course, I don’t mean to come across as some perfectly rational machine. I surely am not. However, I am very interested in learning what biases effect people, and I realize that I am just as susceptible to them as everyone else. Though, knowing these biases exist absolutely helps me fight against them, in an attempt to be just a little more rational. To quote GI Joe, “knowing is half the battle.” The other half is putting that knowledge into practice.

Good luck!

A History of Ridiculous Ideas: Aliens!

2011-10-11T19:31:00.000-07:00

People often tease me because I always seem to come up with ridiculous theories to explain all sorts of random stuff (like why guys are jerks and girls are stupid). However, this tendency is not new. Ever since I was a little kid, I would always think of crazy ways to explain the world, or come up with ideas that seemed quite logical at the time, only to be quite absurd. This is one of those ideas...

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For the majority of my life, I was terrified of being abducted by aliens. It seems that when people have a fear about something, they tend to either obsess over it, or make every effort to avoid anything associated with it. As for myself, I fell into the former group—I was basically obsessed. All I would read were books about aliens, UFOs and the paranormal. I would watch everything I could find about aliens, and the best thing about staying in a hotel was that I could watch the Discovery Channel, which always had something about aliens and UFOs.

Sometime in middle school, I came up with a theory of what aliens were all about and what was going on. Basically, aliens were just humans from the future, coming back to study us. They were probably anthropologists or something. Anyway, the reason that the aliens had overly large heads, and huge eyes was because that was not the actual head of the alien, but was their helmet. And their large eyes were not actually eyes, but were just the eye lenses in the helmet. They were large to help accommodate peripheral vision. And aliens dressed all the same simply because that was their space suit.

As for the idea of aliens not being able to visit earth because the vast distances of space were too large, I agree that that was probably true. But if these aliens were actually just humans from the future, they weren’t traveling and large distances—they were only traveling through time. This also explained why the alien space ships seemed to shoot off and then disappear. It was just like on Back to the Future, the time machine would hit 88 mph, then BAM, it vanishes!

As for why they were coming and abducting people… well, whenever we study any animal, we don’t really tend to sympathize with it too much. Think of apes, we just snatch them from the jungle, put them in a box and ship them away. Likewise with the future humans, they are so far removed from us, that they don’t feel any kinship with us, so they treat us like we treat animals.

And with that, my “theory” explained everything (as far as I could tell) and solved all the problems with the idea of beings from another galaxy coming to visit us. However, as it turns out, these ideas turned out not to be all that original. I watched “Fire in the Sky” while in college, and saw that the idea of the stereotypical alien “look” (big heads, big eyes) being a result of their space suits had already been thought of. And I am sure the whole “time traveling human from the future” isn’t original idea. But hey, I was only a middle schooler. Gimme a break!

Emotional Cues and Subconscious Memories

2011-10-08T23:44:00.000-07:00

For about three years in a row, whenever February 20^th would approach, I would get depressed. The first year it was for an obvious reason—it had been a year since Amy and I broke up. The second year I got depressed, not as much, but knew exactly why. By the third year, I had totally forgotten about the date. However, part of my brain still remembered. At the time, I was living in Putney, and I had driven up to Poultney to hang out with my friend Jenny Lee. I remember driving up there, and just feeling bummed. I was like “wtf is wrong with me?” I had no idea, but I just couldn’t shake it.

Later in the evening, it hit me. It was Feb 20^th! I had forgotten, but somewhere deep in my brain, some part of me remembered, and got bummed out about it. So crazy that that can happen!

Likewise, the past week or so, I have been craving Papa Franks (a BOMB Italian place near my house in Burlington). I didn’t really put any thought into why I was thinking about it though. As far as I was concerned, it was just a random thought, missing amazing food. However, I was thinking about it the other night, and having VERY vivid memories of what it felt like in the restaurant: warm, humid, cozy. I remembered what the bread tasted like with a lot of detail. The only thought I gave this was “wow, interesting how strong that memory is!”

However, about this time last year, I had some very emotionally sharp events take place. After just starting to get settled in and feel good about living in Burlington, having a job I liked, and a few good friends, I got laid off. Devastation! That same day, I met Jacquie. Elation! All the while, I continued to go to Papa Franks probably once a week.

The past week or so, I have been thinking about how it is amazing that it has almost been a year since I left Vermont. It’s amazing how time flies! I remember the details of my house so clearly: what it was like to lie in my bed, what the window sills felt like, what it sounded like walking down the stairs, etc. I have also been thinking about how it’s so odd that I have only known Jacquie for a year. I remember after just hanging out for a week or so, thinking that I felt like I had known her forever-- A very odd feeling to feel.

Anyway, with all these strong emotional events taking place, the experience of Papa Franks got added to the mix. And so, while I remembered these emotional events quite clearly, since they were important aspects to my life, I didn’t consider that other aspects of my life at that time could have gotten caught up in the mix. They did, and here they are.

Apparently, the reason that I have been thinking so much about Papa Franks chicken parm and French bread is because its memory is so closely tied with other emotionally salient events of the time.

The lesson here seems to be that when you are going through something emotional, your brain will often also grab onto other somewhat insignificant events. Those insignificant events then get laced with that same emotional charge, and will bubble up with all the other stuff. Pretty crazy! Though, it’s not surprising, since your brain does things like this all the time, grouping a strong experience with something often insignificant (learned taste aversion, for example). So I have been thinking about Papa Franks for the same reason that I was depressed on the anniversary of my break up with Amy—it was connected with the memory of relevant events a year prior.

*I realize that this isn’t all that impressive or insightful, but I find it interesting, regardless. I also should point out that this is based on complete speculation!

How To Ask A Girl On A Date

2011-10-05T16:57:00.000-07:00

Both guys and girls complain about the opposite sex. If you are a girl, guys are dumb jerks. If you are a guy, girls are heartless and confusing. Both sides have valid reasons for thinking such things, and I am sure we have all done something that the opposite sex considered mean, etc.

These problems, I believe, stem from both a lack of communication, as well as a lack of understanding about how the opposite sex thinks. I have touched on this before, and I think it is a result of what I call the Different Minds Fallacy and Motivation Attribution Bias. These fallacies pop up even from the very beginning, when a guy asks a girl on a date. And that is what I want to discuss: what both sexes are going through and thinking when asking/getting asked out on a date.

Here is the classic problem: A guy meets a cute girl, asks her out, the girl says that sounds great, they go out and then the girl doesn’t seem interested at all. The guy is very confused, and the girl feels a little mislead. Why?

Here is why. Guys are often sissies. It is scary to ask a girl out on a date. So, in order to make it not as scary, the guy won’t ask the girl on a date. Instead he asks her if she wants to “hang out” sometime. This is a less scary thing to ask, since it doesn’t imply romance. The girl, however, hears just what the guy says. “Sure” she says, “I would love to hang out.” And she would--she would love to HANG out.

The guy then says he will pick her up and they can go get dinner. “Great” says the girl. So the guy picks her up, and things then seem odd. He opens the car door, he pays for dinner, etc. Meanwhile, the girl is thinking “WTF? Is this a date!?” At the end of the night, when the guy is hoping to kiss her, she just says thanks and hops out of the car. The guy is confused. “We had such a nice time. Why would she agree to go out with me if she wasn’t interested?” The girl is also confused, “Why did he try to make this into a date when he just wanted to hang out?”

It is ironic that girls are so often accused of reading into things, and making guys interpret what they say. Yet, when it comes to dates, guys will expect girls to know that “hang out” actually means “go on a date.”

This comes back to the motivation attribution bias. Guys generally can’t imagine hanging out with a girl just as friends. If there is any hanging out, it will be with a romantic undertone. Girls, on the other hand, don’t think like that. But guys don’t realize that girls don’t think like that, so there is this miscommunication. To guys, “hanging out” with a girl means something like a date, but to a girl, hanging out means exactly that.

Amid all this confusion, what can we do to help people out? Well, first of all, guys need to grow a pair, resist the urge to ask girls to “hang out” and ask them on a proper date. I know, it’s scary, but it is way better to have a girl say “no thanks” to going out on an actual date, than to have her say yes to what you think is a date, and then get disappointed.

Likewise, girls need to realize something. GUYS DO NOT WANT TO BE YOUR FRIEND!! I cannot emphasize this enough. If a guy wants to hang out with you in any capacity, it is because he is interested in you! ZERO EXCEPTIONS!! A guy who asks you to hang out does not want to just hang out and be buddies. He is just too nervous to ask you on a date. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard “there is this guy that always wants to hang out… do you think he likes me?” The answer is, and always is YES. It has NEVER been the case that the guy just wanted to be friends. Never.

If you are a girl and find yourself in this position (a guy asks you to hang out), you have two options. You can essentially say yes or no. If you say yes, he thinks it’s a date, so you better act appropriately. If you think the guy is nice, but you aren’t interested in going on a date with him, you have the option of saying no. Of course, girls often feel like this is mean and don’t like doing it. I will cover more on that in a minute, but in the meantime, here is some advice to help you out. This works well if the guy asks you to hang out, or even if he actually asks you out on a date. When a guy asks you to do something… all you have to say is “Sure! I love friend dates.” Done. It’s over. This guy doesn’t want a friend date. He wants a date date. He will probably feign his excitement at this point, saying he will get in contact with you later to set up said friend-date, but he won’t. You are now safe, and have avoided having to shoot him down (which many girls are too nice to do. Bless your hearts, but it ends up being mean and hurting the guy more, since he gets his hopes up).

So this is what I propose: Guys, if you are interested in a girl, you ASK HER ON A DATE! You say “I would like to take you out to dinner” or something along those lines. None of this “wanna hang out sometime?” nonsense. It really isn’t that scary, and think about how much easier it will be if you both realize it is a date?

As for you girls, if guys are going to be brave and ask you on a date, you have to also be brave! If you don’t want to go on a date, DO NOT SAY OK! Don’t think you are sparing his feelings by saying ok and giving him your number when you have zero intentions of actually going out with him. Just pull the friends date line, or even better, say no thanks. I know it seems mean, but I promise you, it is much better that way. Girls are such sissies about this that it blows my mind. Why should guys be brave if you won’t be?

In conclusion, both guys and girls are sissies and need to get over it. Guys need to actually ask girls on dates, and girls need to actually say no if they aren’t interested. If everyone did this, there would be a lot less confusion and annoyance towards the opposite sex. Of course, you won’t do this, because you are a sissy.

Prove me wrong.

A History of Ridiculous Ideas: Zak's Egocentric Universe

2011-09-28T15:22:00.000-07:00

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When I was very young, I remember driving into town with my parents. I would always look out the window, staring at the telephone poles that we would drive by. I knew that we were in the car, but it seemed odd that it was the telephone poles that appeared to be moving. So I came to the conclusion that in fact, they WERE moving. The car was stationary, and the telephone poles were moving by us.

So I told my parents this, and they disagreed. They tried to explain that while it looks like the telephone poles are moving, the fact of the matter was that the car was moving past the poles, and it just looked like they were moving.

I understood what they were saying. But I realized that they weren’t getting the BIG picture. Yes, to them and their naïve view of things, it did seem that the poles were stationary, and we were moving by them. However, they failed to understand that what was really going on, was that the cars wheels were moving, but the car was staying stationary. How was this possible? Well, the Earth was actually rolling underneath of the car. Sort of like a person on a treadmill—they are moving their legs, but it is the treadmill surface that is actually moving.

However, this posed a problem. If cars were actually stationary, and the Earth was moving underneath them, then what would happen if my brother and stood back to back, and drove cars in the opposite direction? The earth would basically just rip apart! Obviously this wasn’t the case, so how could it be resolved?

Of course, the solution was that this trick only worked for me. Wherever I went, the Earth rotated beneath me. So while my parents thought that the telephone poles were moving past us, in fact, the entire Earth was moving beneath me, and I (and everyone in the car) were completely stationary.

A History of Ridiculous Ideas: The Edge of the Universe

2011-09-09T16:58:00.000-07:00

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If anyone ever spends any time thinking about the universe, the idea of “the edge” surely will pop up. Is there an edge? How could there be an edge? What is beyond the edge? Does such a concept even make sense?

As I kid, I would think about this a lot. Edge or not, I thought that either way, it was crazy! However, one day I stumbled upon what I thought was the answer.

I was thinking about Super Mario Bros, and how if you get the Game Genie, you can jump over the flag pole at the end of the level and just run forever. Unfortunately, I was never able to run very far, because the timer would run out, and I would die. But assuming I had unlimited time and was able to have Mario run far enough, I figured he would eventually hit something. I wondered what it could be! Seeing that Mario’s world is mostly made out of bricks, it seemed reasonable that he would end up running into a brick wall.

I’m not sure why I then extrapolated this logic into the real world, but I did. I figured that if I was able to get in a space ship and just shoot off into space, eventually, I would hit a brick wall, just like Mario would. It seemed perfectly reasonable at the time-- brick walls always seem to be stopping me from getting somewhere, be it in Super Mario or in real life, so a brick wall was most likely what was at the edge of the universe.

Quite proud of my “discovery”, I went and told my mom. Her reaction was simply “so what is behind the brick wall?” And with my mind blown, that put an end to my great, so-called discovery!

The Necessity of Heartbreak

2011-09-07T21:58:00.000-07:00

Every now and then, I will meet someone who ended up marrying their first love. That is all well and good, but it makes me feel two different things: jealousy and pity. I feel jealous, because heartbreak is so unbelievably painful. If I knew that I would never experience another broken heart, or even heartache for that matter, I would be SO happy! What an amazing thing it would be to never have to go through the wretchedness of a broken heart again.

However, at the same time, I feel a little sorry for those people. If dealt with properly, much good can come from the heartbreak. I have had my heart broken several times, and the biggest one of all led to an enormous amount of thought, reflection and introspection regarding my experience and thoughts on love, as well as what I want in a relationship, a girlfriend, etc. The wisdom and clarity that I came out with was absolutely worth it. Of course, I never would have thought that at the time, but in retrospect, there is no way I could deny it.

When I was in college, I was in an RA meeting, and I remember an exercise our boss had us do. He asked everyone: “who here has gone through something tragic in their lives?” A fair amount of people raised their hand. He then said, “okay, now keep your hand up if you think you learned from the experience, and came out a better person because of it.” All of the hands stayed up.

At the time I scoffed, thinking, “Yeah right. These people just say they learned something and are better because of it, because they don’t want to admit that their tragedy was for nothing. They want to think there is some sort of silver lining.” I was very, very wrong about that.

When you are in love, there are all sorts of things going on in your brain. Neurotransmitters such as oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin and norepinephrine are surging through your brain, giving you feelings of ecstasy, comfort and closeness. Unfortunately, your brain responds to those neurotransmitters like a drug. Your brain becomes used to them, even depends on them, and when your brain fails to get them, it FREAKS out! It will make you think that all sorts of stupid things are in fact good ideas. Just like a drug addict, you come up with the most ridiculous rationalizations, and excuses to try to get that feeling back. Your rational brain has taken the back seat, and your emotional brain is driving… like a maniac! You disregard the advice of your friends, saying “they don’t really know what it’s like.” Or, “I appreciate their concern, but I am okay, and I am gonna do what I want.”

Unfortunately, it takes an enormous amount of self awareness and self control to weather the storm, and let your brain return to its original state, in which it wasn’t hooked on relationship chemicals. How to go about that will be the topic of another blog, and for now, I want to try and explain the necessity of experiencing the heartbreak.

When you get your heart broken, or just get broken up with for that matter, you feel like crap. Your self esteem goes out the window, since you feel like you aren’t wanted. You become paranoid, and create (often crazy) theories about why your BF/GF broke up with you. “Maybe they met someone else?” If you are a girl, you might think, “Does he not find me attractive anymore?” If you are a guy, you might think “Maybe she found someone more charming?” The feeling that no one wants you, or that no one is attracted to you is not a fun feeling, and people will often resort to foolishness in order to try to regain that feeling. Your brain goes over every relevant, recent conversation, trying to find holes in their argument, almost as if you could argue the person out of their decision. It’s just a mess.

However, like with my own heartbreaks, if you weather the storm, you often come out a better person. However, this is not easy, and there are often what seem to be shortcuts, which look attractive, but just making things harder in the future. Ultimately, I think girls are more at a risk for this than guys. Let me explain.

When it comes to what the different sexes place the most emphasis on (in terms of what they find attractive), men place an enormous amount of importance on physical looks, whereas girls place an enormous amount of importance on confidence and humor. When a couple breaks up, both parties often go away feeling down, insecure and lacking confidence. The guy, lacking confidence, will probably not be able to meet anyone until he gets over his heartbreak. The reason being, girls just don’t want some mopey guy—they want a guy who is funny and confident. Basically, they want someone that is the exact opposite of what the heartbroken guy is feeling.

The girl, on the other hand, is still cute. Heartbroken or not, she still looks the same. So guys are still going to be attracted to her, and she won't have any trouble meeting someone new. However, while this might seem like a good thing—meeting someone new right away—it isn’t. When this happens, it allows you to push all those hurt feelings away, and focusing on this new, interesting person. However, those hurt feelings don’t go away, they sit there, waiting to boil up in the future. Like with any injury, unless you take the time to heal, you won’t ever be back to normal, and may end up weaker overall. Of course, this isn’t unique to girls, as guys do the same thing as well.

Unfortunately, the girl can then get caught in a vicious cycle, where she relies on the attention of guys in order to feel that she has self worth, is attractive, etc. If she isn’t involved with a guy, she feels like no one wants her, she has no confidence, etc. We all know girls like this, who go from boyfriend to boyfriend, and have since middle school. I am not judging, cause I can’t say I wouldn’t do the same thing if in that position. If I was heartbroken, and girls were constantly trying to get with me, I am pretty sure I would have gone with it. Sure, it’s not the attention of the girl I want… but at least it’s something!

So, how does one get around this? Unfortunately, it takes a fair amount of self control and understanding of why it is important to let yourself fully heal. Specifically, you have to make a contract with yourself that you won’t be involved with someone else for x amount of time. It also means recognizing that you will have to deal with a lot of pain in the meantime. It means you will have to deal with sadness, loneliness, anger, confusion, etc. It means you have to recognize that no matter how much it hurts now, the pain will go away, and there will be a day when it doesn’t hurt anymore—and you will be a much better person for it. It means you will be more emotionally stable, wiser about what you want in relationships and how to deal with them. Unfortunately, this is very hard to do in the moment, and I don’t blame people who can’t do it. A guy might do it, but only out of necessity. Unfortunately, I feel that for girls, it would be much harder, and take much more self-control.

In the end, if you are a serial dater, or are the type that ALWAYS has a boyfriend/girlfriend, ask yourself: "do I need the attention of the opposite sex to be happy? Do I get new bf/gfs quickly because I don’t want to deal with the pain of being alone?" If so, maybe it’s time to take a break, work on yourself; get to the point where you don't need the attention of others to make you happy. Being heartbroken sucks, believe me, I know. And while it will be hard at first, I promise the payoff will be well worth it.

Sleep

2011-06-08T12:48:00.000-07:00

It's strange that I enjoy sleep so much. The reason I find this odd is because for the majority of it, I am completely unconscious. If I am unconscious, I am not having any experience of what I am doing, and therefore, can't be enjoying it.* So what gives?

My first guess was that it's not sleep per say that I enjoy, but the process of falling asleep. It's nice to lay in a warm, comfy bed, completely relaxed. However, it’s only enjoyable for so long. If I lay there long enough, I get either bored or annoyed that I am still awake. So it doesn’t seem to be the laying down I enjoy.

My second guess was that what I am looking forward to is actually losing consciousness. This sounds better, though, it seems like one could argue, "well, it's not so much that you want to go to sleep (lose consciousness), but the knowledge that if you DON'T go to sleep, you are going to suffer for it in the morning." I imagine that that could be part of what is going on. But even more importantly, I think that as I lay there, tired, I know that the uncomfortable feeling of tiredness I am experiencing will no longer be upon me. I will be unconscious, and not experiencing it anymore. It’s sort of like if I was in extreme pain, I would want to be knocked out, so I wouldn't have to be experiencing the pain anymore. And at least with sleep, when I wake up, I won’t (hopefully) feel so tired. This would also explain why little kids don't like naps. To adults though, naps are a treat! They are a treat, because we know that sleeping is the best way to rid ourselves of a certain discomfort, and will help us feel better. But kids haven't made that association yet, so to them, it just means they have to stop playing.

In conclusion, it's not that I look forward to sleep (and therefore unconsciousness), it's that I am trying to avoid the discomfort of being tired, and the only way to do that is to go to sleep. Sleep eliminates the discomfort of being tired, and allows me to wake up once the discomfort has passed (hopefully). Therefore, it's inaccurate to say I love sleep. Instead, I should say that I don't like being tired, and if I can opt out of experiencing tiredness, I will.

*There are a few philosophers of religion who, contrary to what cognitive scientists and philosophers of mind have to say, think that the mind exists independent of the brain, and consciousness continues to exist once the brain is destroyed. If they are right, and our consciousness isn’t tied to our brains, it seems rather peculiar that our consciousness completely goes away during sleep. If they were correct, I am not sure how this could even be possible. Any ideas?

My Favorite Movie Trailers

2011-02-11T15:48:00.000-08:00

I am a huge fan of movie trailers. It blows my mind how good some of them are, and how powerful of an experience you can create from just a short compilation of movie clips with some cool music. I have always had a number of trailers that stood out in my mind, and within the last year or so, several excellent trailers have been released. I decided to try and compile a list of the trailers that were my favorite, and that had some effect on me. With all of these, I must have watched them each at least a dozen times within the first week of seeing them.

The list is in no particular order. I don’t know if I would be able to rate an absolute favorite, since many trailers do different for me. Some, like the James Bond trailers, just pump me up. Others make me think “wow, that looks really amazing!” (True Grit). Others just hit some emotional chord for some reason (Social Network, 127 Hours). With that said, here is the list.

GoldenEye

This was the first trailer that I ever really, really liked. The music alone is amazing, but the trailer itself is such an awesome way to reintroduce James Bond after a six year hiatus. I am such a nerd, that in high school, I used to watch this trailer before going to school, cause it pumped me up.

Casino Royale

I am including the teaser and trailer here. Both are just so awesome, and like with GoldenEye, they totally pump me up! Before I saw the teaser, I was a little skeptical of Daniel Craig playing James Bond. But after the teaser, I was totally convinced that he would be great.

Terminator Salvation

I was never a huge fan of the Terminator movies, but this trailer really caught my attention. It made me go and rewatch all the older Terminators, and I was really excited for this one. Unfortunately, the movie was nowhere as cool as the trailer.

District 9

When I first saw this trailer, I thought it was a documentary about some race issue in South Africa. I almost turned it off, cause it wasn’t something that interested me. Then they showed the space ship. Interest peaked!

The Social Network

I don’t know what it is, but something with way the music compliments the images really strikes me as amazing. I also like how dark and serious a story about Facebook can look. It gives me shivers.

The Matrix

This trailer just makes you say “What the F is this? It looks awesome!” As a 17 year old, it blew my mind.

Matrix Reloaded

While the movie wasn’t that amazing, the cinematography, and unique images and what seemed to be some incredible action scenes, really caught my attention. This trailer made me REALLY look forward to the movie.

Star Trek

I was never a Star Trek fan, but when I saw this trailer, I just thought “WOW! That looks freaking awesome!!” And indeed, it was.

Spider-Man 2

Basically a normal action movie trailer, but it highlights so many interesting aspects of the story that it made me really excited to see it.

Unbreakable

A great movie that is totally underrated. The trailer is so creepy, and so intriguing!

Inception

Like with the Matrix trailer, this just blew my mind. The uniqueness of the images and story, as well as knowing that it was from the mind of Christopher Nolan really made me excited for this movie. You can’t watch the trailer and not think “this looks awesome… and seems really interesting!”

True Grit

I never even heard of this movie until it came out. When I heard of it, I thought it was going to be some stupid action movie. But upon seeing the trailer, I was blown away, and couldn’t wait to see the movie. The trailer is simply bad ass. It captures all the aspects of the movie so well, that it blows me away. The last 20 seconds gives me shivers!

127 Hours

Like with True Grit, I had never even heard of this movie until it was already released. Though, like with True Grit, it captures the essence of the movie so well that it is incredible. As usual, the combination of a great song, some powerful images, and good editing gives me shivers.

The Truth About Organic Food

2011-01-18T19:38:00.000-08:00

Every day, organic food is becoming more and more popular. Most people, understandably, claim that they want to eat healthy food, and that organic is a good way to go about it. People also tend to claim it tastes better than regular food. But is this all true? Is it really healthier? Does it really taste better? Is it worth all that extra money? In this blog post, I am going to present what the scientific evidence says.

First, what is organic food? Essentially, it is just food that is grown without genetic modification and which contains no artificial additives or synthetic pesticides.

Lets talk about pesticides. Organic or not, all food has some sort of pesticides used on it. The benefit of synthetic pesticides is that they have been extensively tested, and found to have no effect on people. Does this mean that organic pesticides will make you sick? No. While high amounts of organic pesticides are toxic to fish, cause Parkinson’s disease in rats, and have found to be toxic to other mammals, the levels that humans are exposed to in food are harmless. Just like with synthetic pesticides. Studies have also been done on levels of biotoxins between organic and conventional foods, and no difference has been found.

Measuring toxins and pesticide levels is all well and good, but is organic healthier? Well, as it turns out, a five year study done by Quality Low Input Food (QLIF) found that indeed, organic food had higher levels of good things, and lower levels of bad things. Great! However, no question in science is answered by just one study. There needs to be multiple studies before you can start to reach a conclusion. The QLIF realized this, and concluded that “further and more detailed studies are required to provide proof for positive health impacts of organic diets on human and animal health.”

In contrast, the Food Standards Agency (FSA), in the UK, issued a statement regarding organic food, saying “Consumers may choose to buy organic fruit, vegetables and meat because they believe them to be more nutritious than other food. However, the balance of current scientific evidence does not support this view.” That is, despite the study by the QLIF, basically all the other studies point in the other direction.

For example, a the FSA spent twelve months reviewing all of the literature on organic food, and found that "there is no good evidence that the consumption of organic food is beneficial to health in relation to nutrient content." Other studies have concluded the same thing.

So what about taste? Every organic food fan I have known uses this as the trump card. However, I have always been skeptical of such a claim, since you can trick yourself into believing just about anything when it comes to taste. Your subjective opinion of something is just not a reliable way to answer a question when you are heavily biased from the get go. Conveniently, studies have been done on this too, and as it turns out, one study found that people preferred organic apples to conventional ones. They described the apples as sweeter and firmer.

However, a number of other studies have found just the opposite. In those studies, people were unable to distinguish any difference in taste between organic and conventional foods.

But the most troubling aspect of all this comes from a very recent study which found that influential organic food organizations were guilty of promoting false information. The study stated that these organization's claims were “unreliable” and “harm the consumer.” This really comes as no surprise. When people invest themselves in a certain position, and evidence starts to pile against them, many choose to turn a blind eye, or flat out lie, rather than admit error. They simply have too much invested in their position to give it up. Not good, since that is the territory of science deniers-- the home of creationists, anti-vaxers and others.

In conclusion, it seems that while there are a few studies showing benefits of organic food, the overwhelming majority of studies have shown that the only difference is about a 10-40% increase in price. Ultimately, I would suggest visiting organic food stores, but only to check out the babes in their yoga pants. Buy your food somewhere else.

Farewell, Vermont

2010-10-30T20:31:00.000-07:00

At the end of April 2008, I pulled into the parking lot of Landmark College. As I moved into my new apartment, I was excited for what lay ahead. Though, I was somewhat nervous, as I didn’t know anyone, but was sure I would make friends quickly, as I never had a problem with it anywhere else (like when I went to Film School). Unfortunately, the flaw in my thinking was that I never had a problem making friends as a student. And now, I was no longer the student. This flaw had quite profound effects.

While some aspects of my job really annoyed me, I enjoyed other parts. I met a lot of great students, and had some great coworkers/bosses. Though, I didn’t really feel like I had any friends. I absolutely dreaded weekends, where I would have absolutely nothing to do. Or, if I did have something to do, it was almost always alone. Going to a movie by myself. Going to dinner by myself. I wasn’t allowed to hang out with residents that I was friendly with, and my coworkers all had their own lives, so I was very lonely. I was used to having lots of friends, and not having any was really hard. Often, by Sunday nights, I seriously thought I might be suffering from depression. I couldn’t wait for Monday morning meetings, where I would actually have social interaction with my coworkers.

Towards Christmas, I decided that I wanted to go into speech pathology. I then had to decide if I would stay in Vermont, or go back to Washington. Seeing that I was already in Vermont, and could do a Masters program quicker here, I opted to stay. So that summer, I moved to Burlington. It was instantly a relief. While I didn’t have any friends, I had roommates who were all cool. Just being able to watch a movie with someone was a huge improvement. I was also in a very happening town. Unlike Putney, there were tons of things going on, and tons of people around my age.

As school started, I took a cognitive neuroscience class and started to feel happy again. I made a really good friend, and she and I could just talk and talk and talk. I also became friends with my professor, which was awesome! It was so fun to just go chat with her and pick her brain about neurology and other related topics I found interesting.

In speech pathology, the field is dominated by girls. In the higher level classes, there was only one other guy besides me. That was great and all, and while I did have a couple of friends, I started to miss my guy friends even more. I would often come home, and one of my roommates would have all of his buddies over. They would be hanging out, having a BBQ, etc. It made me really miss Washington.

When I got my video production job, I was a little concerned that that might keep me here in Vermont longer than I wanted. I had a job I loved, and knew it was just a matter of time before I met a girl. I could feel myself starting to get comfortable. I liked where I lived, I liked my roommates, I liked my stuff, I liked the few friends I had, and as I mentioned, I loved my job. So perhaps it was a blessing that I was let go when I was. I wasn’t able to get too comfortable, or too settled in. While losing my job really caught me off guard, I almost immediately saw the silver lining to it: I had no reason not to go back home. The previous day, my friend had texted me, saying something to the extent of “come home!” It felt good to be able to say “I am.” Rather than “someday…”

So as my final days in Vermont are upon me, I have to admit that while I will miss certain aspects of it, especially the few friends I have… I can’t wait to get back to Washington! I’m sorry I was gone so long.

Peace, VT. I’m outta here!

Guys & Girs: Room Differences

2010-10-20T07:38:00.000-07:00

When I was a freshmen in college, my roommate and I had an awesome room! We put a lot of work into it, and because of its awesomeness, it was often used as the “example room” when campus tours would come through the dorms. If you were to come in to see our room, you would have noticed a few things. First, the room was quite large for a dorm room. Part of this was because it was on the third floor, and had vaulted ceilings (making it feel larger). Second, we had a LOT of stuff in that room, including a small foam couch. Third, the walls were absolutely covered with posters, specifically, posters of scantily clad women and cool cars. The posters were not only on the walls, but the vaulted ceiling as well.

As basically anyone can probably tell you, this is not unique at all. Most college guy’s bed/dorm room walls are covered with posters and pictures of bikini babes and sleek cars. However, the typical guy’s room stands in stark contrast when compared to a typical college girl’s dorm/bed room. Girls tended to have pictures of their friends, families, post cards, and other sentimental things.

I am curious why this happens. My first reaction was that it seems girls were surrounding themselves with things they have and have experienced, while guys were surrounding themselves with mostly fantasy. Girls have pics of their pets and vacations with friends, while guys have pics of girls they will never sleep with, and cars they will probably never drive.

Though, it seems vastly unfair to claim that girls live in reality, while guys live in a fantasy land. And I can’t think of any other evidence that would suggest such a thing. So I am going to guess that that is not what is going on here. What’s more likely is a difference between what the different sexes find stimulating. Guys are more visually stimulated, so they surround themselves with things they like to look at. Girls are more emotion based, so they surround themselves with things that elicit positive emotional responses.

I could be wrong, but that’s all I got.

Too Hot To Handle

2010-06-03T20:17:00.000-07:00

A couple years ago, I was working on a video project for a college, and one scene was about respecting your room mate. The scene consisted of a student trying to study, while his roommate had a dance party, right there in the room. At one point, there was a shot of an extremely attractive girl, dancing on a table. She wasn’t dancing provocatively or anything, and she was just wearing a tshirt and jeans. There were also tons of other people dancing in the room, and on tables. However, because she was so attractive, I was told that I would need to take the shot of her out, because it was not appropriate. What was inappropriate about it? She wasn’t doing anything scandalous or different from anyone else in the video. All that she was doing wrong was looking how she naturally looked: super hot.

This made me start thinking, and I realized that extremely attractive women will ALWAYS be considered to be scandalous or inappropriate, no matter what they are doing. If a girl has a fantastic body, and is dressed professionally, she will still be considered to be inappropriate, simply because she will make whatever she is wearing look fantastic. If you have a great body, whatever you wear will show it off. A great body will still look great, and a gorgeous face will still be gorgeous, no matter what sort of clothes you wear.

On a number of occasions, I have been in the presence of a professional woman who was wearing professional clothes, and all I could think was “god damn she is hot.” It’s terrible, I know. These women weren’t doing anything different than other women, they were dressing exactly the same as everyone else, they just had better bodies.

There are several examples of this in other capacities as well. For example, recently, a curvaceous, brunette bombshell (pictured above) was fired from her 70k job, simply because she looked too good in business clothing. She didn’t do anything different or dress differently than the women around her, but nevertheless, was told that she dressed inappropriately (inappropriate clothing consisted of turtlenecks, pencil skirts, high heels and fitted suits. All of which are standard business attire for women), and would have to be let go. Her employer, Citibank, told her that "as a result of the shape of her figure, such clothes were purportedly 'too distracting' for her male colleagues and supervisors to bear."

Another example comes from the mormon university, BYU. A few years ago, ad was placed in the school paper, advertising a funny shirt stating, "I can't... I'm mormon." The model wearing the long sleeved shirt was extremely attractive. However, besides BYU having issues with what the shirt implied, officials also stated that "the woman modeling the T-shirt in the ad was posed in an overly provocative manner." As you can see, nothing about how she is posing is overly provocative or sexual. The only provocative thing about it is that the girl is super hot.
So I think these examples completely vindicate my hypothesis. Gorgeous women get a lot of perks, but if you are a super hottie with a killer body, no matter what you wear, no matter what you do, you will still be looked upon as being inappropriate, provocative, etc.

God, Sex and the Meaning of Life

2010-04-21T06:36:00.000-07:00

According to the Westminster Shorter Catechism, the purpose of life is to “glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” Indeed, this same sentiment is found all throughout Christian theology and philosophy. Some Christians, such as William Lane Craig, have stated that “the chief purpose of life is not happiness per se, but the knowledge of God.”

In light of this, it is pretty clear that the Christian purpose of life is not to do good to others, to give back to society, etc, but to come to know God, and worship him. Though, Christians would surely argue that once you know God, good deeds etc would subsequently emanate.

This is all well and good, but it seems to me that this meaning of life could ONLY be known if you were living in a time and place in which Christianity was around. No one would ever come to this conclusion on their own. That is, no one would ever figure that the meaning of life was to worship Jesus, unless they were told this. This seems to be a problem.

It seems that if the creator of the universe made a species of people, specifically for the reason of coming to know, worshiping, and glorifying him, it would be much more obvious. I would think that such a desire would be almost instinctual. It would be a drive that all of humanity shares. Something we all wanted, all yearned for, and all thought about. It would transcend gender, race, class, social status, etc. Obviously, this isn’t the case. Granted, there are many people who do do this. But as I mentioned before, this was taught to them, it wasn’t from some inborn desire.

However, there is indeed something that every human, regardless of race, sex, creed, etc desires. That thing is sex. Or more specifically, the urge to reproduce. This urge, in fact, is so strong, that it actually transcends our own species. Every living organism on the planet shares this urge!

From the naturalistic point of view, in which there is no supernatural creator; humans and all other life were “created” through the forces of natural selection, the most important thing that we can possibly do (from a biological perspective) is reproduce. Our genes want nothing more than to get themselves copied into the next generation.

How does theism, especially Christianity, account for this? As it has already been pointed out, our desires should be to come to know and worship God. So why is it that our actual desires are in no way related to what God wants of us, but exactly what evolution predicts?

I can think of only one answer. It would seem that the Christian would have to argue that our desire for sex is part of our sinful nature. Certainly this is consistent with Christianity’s terror over sex, but it seems very awkward and ad hoc. Today, most thoughtful Christians claim that sex is a gift from God. But if it is a gift from God, why would he have made it so powerful of an urge-- a more powerful urge than what he actually wants us to do? Why not give us a desire to seek, know, and worship him instead?

If God wanted sex only to exist for reproductive reasons alone, he could have made it not so pleasurable. He could have made it just be like so many other biological things. Blowing your nose, going to the bathroom, cutting your nails, etc. These things aren’t bad, but people don’t sit around obsessing over them, wanting to do them constantly.

On the other hand, if evolution alone is responsible for our existence, sex would be the most important thing there is. Evolution would have done everything it could to make sure that organisms reproduce and pass their genes on to future generations. Some species will go to great lengths, risking (even sacrificing) their own lives, just to mate. Even among humans, we will risk ruining our careers, destroying marriages, etc just for sex. God must have known that such a thing would consume us, so why make our urge for it so strong? It seems that he could have just as easily made the desire to know him and worship him as strong. And if that truly is what he wants of us, why didn't he create us with the desire to do so?

As a perfect case study, look at Catholic Priests. They have chosen to devote their lives to what the Christian meaning of life is: coming to know God. However, like everyone else alive, the biological meaning of life is much, much stronger, and in many cases, they give in.

In conclusion, I have to ask: seeing how sex is, without a doubt, the strongest urge that any living organism has, is that what we would expect to see if our purpose in life was to worship God? Subsequently, isn’t this exactly what we would expect to see, if indeed we were shaped by the impersonal forces of evolution, whose main "goal" is the survival and replication of our genes? Obviously, the fact that the strongest urge in existence is reproduction is explained much better by the naturalistic worldview, rather than theistic one. Therefore, we can conclude that it is more reasonable to presume that we were created without the help of God, than with.

A Case for Wikipedia

2010-01-28T12:14:00.000-08:00

I effing LOVE Wikipedia. It is basically my number one source for information on any topic I want to look up. However, whenever I mention that “I was reading about something on Wikipedia”, I am almost immediately met with comments like “Wikipedia isn’t a reliable source”, or “I would never use it, cause you can have it say whatever you want”, and other such comments. I have heard this from professors, teachers, friends, and even one random lady I was chatting with in an airport.

While I would never ever cite Wikipedia in an academic paper, I do think that its un-reliability is HIGHLY overblown. I don’t think these sorts of comments are fair to how good of a source of info Wikipedia actually is. In this blog, I am going to try to convince you that it is indeed a reliable source of information. I have several arguments, and will start with the weakest, ending with the strongest. By the end, I hope you will agree that at the least, it is not as bad as you might have once thought. Let’s begin…

1. Everything that I have ever looked up, that I know anything about, has been highly accurate. I challenge you to look up a topic you feel knowledgeable about, and see how accurate/inaccurate it is. I am sure you will be surprised. Even Richard Dawkins has stated that (something to the extent of) "you would never think such a thing would work. But everything I have ever read on Wikipedia, which I have known something about, has been surprisingly accurate."

2. If you don't cite sources, the things you write will either be rejected, or the article will warn readers that some statements are in need of references (and tell you which ones).

3. If you write nonsense, it is corrected almost immediately. When wikipedia first started getting popular, I would go to the Tieton, WA page (my home town), and change it to say that my dad was the founder (see picture below). Within minutes, I got a pop up from a Wikipedia monitor saying "Hey, we appreciate your enthusiasm, but make sure you cite your source." So I created another Wikipedia page, about my dad, as an attempt to cite that as my source. Didn't work. And by the next morning, everything was back to normal. If you continue to break Wikipedia’s rules, not citing sources, or trying to enter in false information, your computer will no longer be allowed to access the edit ability on Wikipedia.

4. Most convincingly, in a 2005 study, Nature had experts of their field review scientific articles from Wikipedia and Encyclopedia Britannica (not knowing which was from which, obviously). They found that articles from Wikipedia had an average of 3.86 errors per article, while Encyclopedia Britannica had an average of 2.92 errors per article. Hardly significant, if at all.

More recently, a 2008 study concluded that their "results increase confidence in Wikipedia as a good information organizer for science in general."

If citing Wikipedia is seen as bad, then citing the Encyclopedia Britannica should be seen as bad too. Earlier, I mentioned that I wouldn’t cite Wikipedia as a source. What I would do, though, is find the source that the Wikipedia article cites, and use that. Easy.

As a final point, it takes years for new editions of encyclopedias, or even just regular books to be released, which include updated information. Wikipedia, on the other hand, can be updated immediately. I wonder how many textbooks and encyclopedias have a "criticism" section on mirror neurons, citing Greg Hickcok's 2009 paper? I would venture to say probably none.

In conclusion, you can see that Wikipedia isn’t just a free range sort of site where anyone can get away with saying any crazy thing that comes to their mind. It is monitored (not only by Wikipedia volunteer experts, but by people who do care about keeping it accurate), moderated, and always tells you when something is not quite right. And what it does have, is nearly as accurate as your encyclopedia! From these reasons, I think we can reasonably conclude that Wikipedia isn’t nearly as bad as people make it out to be.

The end.

Homeopathy = FAIL

2009-10-04T16:25:00.000-07:00

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16125589

“This finding is compatible with the notion that the clinical effects of homeopathy are placebo effects.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12492603

“It is concluded that the best clinical evidence for homeopathy available to date does not warrant positive recommendations for its use in clinical practice.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16376071

“Our analysis of published literature on homeopathy found insufficient evidence to support clinical efficacy of homeopathic therapy in cancer care.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17285788

“The evidence from rigorous clinical trials of any type of therapeutic or preventive intervention testing homeopathy for childhood and adolescence ailments is not convincing enough for recommendations in any condition.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14973954

“There is not enough evidence to reliably assess the possible role of homeopathy in asthma.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12535487

“In view of the absence of evidence it is not possible to comment on the use of homeopathy in treating dementia.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14583972

“There is insufficient evidence to recommend the use of homeopathy as a method of [labor] induction.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11212088

“The authors conclude that the small number of randomized clinical trials conducted to date, although favoring homeopathic treatment, do not allow a firm conclusion as to the effectiveness of homeopathic remedies in the treatment of patients with osteoarthritis.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14651731

“Ultramolecular homeopathy had no observable clinical effects.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11872551

“There was no difference in most outcomes between placebo and homeopathic immunotherapy.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9251877

“Overall, there was no significant benefit over placebo of homeopathic treatment.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12614092

“Evidence suggests that homeopathy is ineffective for migraine, delayed-onset muscle soreness, and influenza prevention.”

http://rheumatology.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/40/9/1052

“We found no evidence that active homeopathy improves the symptoms of RA.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11212083

“No discrete signals suggesting a difference between remedies and controls were seen.”

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6882/4/15/abstract

“In conclusion, published results from NMR research on homeopathy indicating differences between homeopathic solutions and control samples could not be reproduced.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15500843?dopt=Abstract

“None of the homeopathically treated groups differed significantly with respect to any of the parameters from the non-medicated, infected control group. It is concluded that the results of this study do not justify use of these homeopathic remedies for treatment of colibacillosis in broilers.”

http://veterinaryrecord.bvapublications.com/cgi/content/abstract/124/1/15

“There were no discernible differences between the treated and control groups in their manifestations of resistance to D viviparus or their clinical responses to the disease produced.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14650548?dopt=Abstract

“These results support the widely held opinion that scientific proof for the efficacy of veterinary homeopathy is lacking.”

http://vetpath.co.uk/voodoo/mastitis.pdf

“There were no significant differences between the SCC of the two groups.”

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118788810/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0

“Evidence of efficacy of homeopathic treatment beyond placebo was not found in this study.”

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8255290?dopt=Abstract

“Following as closely as possible the methods of the original study, we can find no evidence for any periodic or polynomial change of degranulation as a function of anti-IgE dilution.”

http://www.springerlink.com/content/h46222021483827m/

“We found no evidence for a different effect of strongly agitated dilutions, compared to dilutions made with minimal physical agitation. In fact, in our hands no effect of extreme dilutions was shown at all.”

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/14973976

Current evidence does not support a preventative effect of Oscillococcinum-like homeopathic medicines in influenza and influenza-like syndromes.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/105581

Dr. Jack Killen, acting deputy director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, says homeopathy "goes beyond current understanding of chemistry and physics." He adds: "There is, to my knowledge, no condition for which homeopathy has been proven to be an effective treatment."

Why Boys are Jerks and Girls are Stupid

2009-10-02T19:30:00.000-07:00

Originally written May 2009

To explain this, we are going to break the problem down into three levels of explanation, working from the bottom, up: Theory of Mind, Different Minds Fallacy, and Motivation Attribution Bias. Once we explore these concepts, we will have the tools to answer the individual questions of why boys are jerks and why girls are stupid.

THEORY OF MIND (ToM)

This is the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. More specifically, it is the ability to attribute mental states—beliefs, intents, desires, knowledge, etc.—to oneself and others, and to understand that others have beliefs, desires and intentions that are different from your own.

For example, if I have a picture of a tree laying on a table in front of me, and there is someone sitting across from me, I am able to understand, via a ToM, that the person across the table sees the tree as being upside down.

This seems trivial and obvious. And it is. But while it is easy for most people to realize that a picture they are looking at would appear to be upside down from an observer across the table, there are other areas of life that are much more difficult to understand from a different perspective.

DIFFERENT MINDS FALLACY (DMF)

I made this term up, so there might be a different term describing the same concept. If so, I don’t know about it. The DMF is the false assumption that your mental experience of something is the same as someone else’s.

Everyone has something they are really good at, mentally speaking. There are things that come easy to some of us, while there are other things that might be quite difficult. With myself, I am quite good with visual/spatial problems. I can rotate shapes in my head quite easily. However, I am extremely bad at math. I always have been, and I imagine I always will be.

Some people are very, very good at math. Just as visual/spatial problems are easy for me, math is easy for them. No matter how hard I try, there is no way that I can imagine what it would be like to be in that persons mind—the person who is good at math. The only things that I can comprehend are things that my mind is able to comprehend or understand. I know that sounds trivial, but think about it.

What would it be like to be someone like Albert Einstein or Richard Feynman, where extremely advanced math equations just come easily to you? What would it be like to be someone who has Down’s syndrome, and can only understand the world in a very limited way? Or what would it be like to be someone with synesthesia—where you can taste colors, or see music?

Unless we have similar brain states, we have no idea what it would be like to experience that state of mind. We can understand that it happens, but we in no way can comprehend what it would be like.

A more appropriate example might be this: I have no idea what it would be like to not have a girl’s attractiveness be the most important trait. I can’t even comprehend how that would work. Likewise, girls have no idea what it would be like to have a guy’s physical attractiveness be the most important trait. Girls just don’t get it what it is like to place so much emphasis on someone’s looks, as opposed to their personality (such as confidence and sense of humor). And neither sex ever will get it, simply because we can’t understand what our minds aren’t programmed to understand.

So all that we are able to comprehend and understand is limited by our own minds. And we are unable to break out of that understanding, and completely understand what it would be like to be someone with a different mind. All you can know is what you know.

MOTIVATION ATTRIBUTION BIAS (MAB)

I introduced this concept in a previous blog, but I will explain it again.

This is when you attribute someone’s behavior, beliefs, actions, etc. to what you think the motivation is, rather than just asking the person about the actual motivations. Most likely, you are assuming that the person is doing something for the same reason that you would do such a thing.

Whenever someone does something, we have to guess about their motivation and reasoning (unless they tell us what it is). Often times, we might be right about their motivation. However, we are usually coming to our conclusions by trying to imagine why WE would do such a thing if we were in the same situation. However, we all think differently, and have different reasons for doing certain things. I might see someone do something and think “well, they did that because of X”, but I could be completely wrong, since that person might have a different reason for acting that certain way.

For example, people often claim that I am an atheist, simply because I want to lead a life of meaningless sex, and hard core drug abuse—all guilt free. Obviously, this isn’t true. But to those people, the only reason they can think of for being an atheist, would be so that they could do those things. And since that would be their motivation for not believing in God, they assume it is also my motivation.

So the bias is essentially the false assumption that everyone does things for same reasons that you do. Obviously, this is not true at all.

ALL TOGETHER NOW

Now that we have laid a groundwork on some of the basic assumptions that our minds operate with— and the problems that those assumptions—we can start to explain the questions.

WHY BOYS ARE JERKS

Guys tend to have a lot of other male friends. They might think differently about some things, however, there will be a general consensus about the most important thing in the world (from a biological perspective), the survival of our genes. Because of this basic instinct to reproduce, all men share the same basic instincts. That is, all men generally want the same thing: an attractive girl.

Now while the small details might different (blonds vs brunettes, for example), most guys can come to a consensus on what is attractive, and what is not.

So guys grow up, talking to each other about girls, checking out the same girls, and thinking about girls in a similar way. There is sort of a group reinforcement that goes on, since guys will come to see that “oh, you think the same way I do about girls, and like the same things that I do.”

So to guys, we share these ideas, such as “it would be cool if some random girl just came up and wanted to make out” or “wouldn’t it be sweet if that hot girl just grabbed my butt?” Most guys would agree, yes, that would be quite awesome.

And since this mentality is reinforced among other guys, guys will then think “well, I think it would be cool if a girl grabbed my butt while standing at the bar, and my friends think the same thing. So the girl standing at the bar would probably like it if I grabbed her butt too.”

So we can see some of the problems we have discussed earlier already popping up. The guy is unable to put himself in the position of the girl (ToM), and think about what he is going to do, from her perspective (DMF). This false perspective is because he is unable to understand her perspective to begin with. And this then causes him to assume that if he liked it, she would like it too.

So whenever a guy does something stupid, like grabbing a girls butt, or whistling/honking as a girl jogs down the sidewalk, or makes some crazy proposition, the guy is only doing it, because in his mind, he would LOVE it if a girl did the same think to him. He thinks “I would like it, so she probably would too.”

Every time a guy makes some ridiculous pass at a girl, and you think “What the hell is he thinking? Why does he think that would impress her?” just realize that he was thinking (assuming, actually), “I would like this. So she would probably like it too.”

Of course, as we have seen, this train of thought has a number of different problems with it. And unfortunately, no guy will ever be able to completely comprehend this, including myself. We can be told “that is not good”, and hopefully understand the reasoning behind it (“girls don’t like it”). However, we will never truly be able to understand the underlying reasons of why exactly girls don’t like it. And this is for the same reason that I will never know what it is like to be good at math. The male brain works one way, and it is impossible to imagine it working in another way.

So guys really aren’t trying to be jerks. They just are making a mistake, assuming girls think like they do.

WHY GIRLS ARE STUPID

While guys have their fair share of thinking gone awry, girls are nowhere near from off the hook. The main thing that drives girls, and often guys, insane, is their ability and willingness to analyze every little detail of something, picking apart every word that was said in a conversation, or trying to find hidden, underlying meaning in any sort of interpersonal event – especially if boys are involved.

Like with guys reinforcing each other regarding how to think about girls, girls reinforce each other in terms of overanalyzing things, and this is done via their girl talk sessions.

From what I have gathered, girl talk consists of not only one girl rehashing every event that has her interest, and giving her theories about it, but all of the girls in the girl talk, giving their opinions and theories on every minute detail of the event in question.

Of course, having multiple opinions on something is very good, and can be quite helpful. However, the goal of girl talk is not to find the most reasonable answer, or the most rational conclusion. The goal is to find the most dramatic conclusion (since that is also the most interesting conclusion). If a girl went on a date, and the guy gave her a small kiss goodnight, it just CAN’T be that the guy didn’t put much thought into the length of the kiss. The REAL reason must be that he was scared to kiss her, because he doesn’t have much experience, or that he was nervous, because she is so pretty, or that he recently got out of a long relationship, and kissing had devolved to being short, and not as long and passionate.

There are a million reasons that girls could come up with in an attempt to explain the length of a kiss. Just taking a flip through a magazine like Cosmo reveals how much girls love to do this. There are always sections on “decoding what your man says” or “what your man’s bathroom reveals about his commitment issues” and other tripe. The worst I have ever seen was an article on the meaning behind the day a guy takes you out on a date, and what this can tell you about the guy!

Of course, girls don’t consciously make the choice to try and find the least objective, most dramatic reasoning behind a situation. They are doing this for the same reason that guys whistle at jogging girls. That is, the girls are looking for underlying meaning in things that guys do, because THEY themselves put meaning into everything they do. Humans are pattern seeking animals, and are able to find patterns and meaning where none actually exists. Girls just exploit this shamelessly.

A guy going on a date might put a little more thought into what he is wearing than on an average day. But girls put enormous amounts of thought into what they are going to wear every day, and especially on a date!

A guy might think “I will wear this shirt, because it is clean, looks good on me, and it might be a little warm, so I can always roll up the sleeves if I need.” A girl would think “Does this make me look sexy? Maybe too sexy? I don't want him to think I am a slut. But I don't want to look too conservative. Maybe if I wear this top with these pants I will look more mature.” Everything from shoes to hair style is there for a very specific reason.

Unfortunately, the guy won’t pick up on any of the meaning the girl has put into her outfit, while the girl will attempt to find meaning behind the guys outfit, even though none exists. And then after the date, the girl will have girl talk with her friends, and attempt to find even more meaning where none exists.

The reason that girls analyze, and overanalyze every little thing a guy does and says, is because girls assume that since they puts meaning into things, guys must do the same thing. And since girls are unable think any other way than how they think (DMF), they assume that guys think and act with the same reasoning that they do (MAB).

So girls really aren’t stupid. They just are making a mistake, assuming that guys think like they do.

CONCLUSION

As we can see, the main complaints that are thrown between the opposite sexes are actually a result of a few missteps in thinking. We assume that the opposite sex thinks the same way that we do, and in turn, act in ways that reflect that false assumption. When in reality, guys need to recognize that most girls don’t find the idea of getting groped or whistled at to be very appealing. Likewise, girls need to realize that there isn’t any hidden meaning behind what a guy says or does, and not feed into the lure of overanalyzing every little detail, even when your friends insist.

Unfortunately, it is easier to acknowledge the differences in thinking than it is to really internalize it. But recognizing the mistakes in our own mental processes are the first steps to understanding the seemingly bizarre behavior of the opposite sex, and understanding why boys can seem like such jerks, and why girls can seem to be so stupid.

The End.

Gentlemen Prefer Brunettes

2009-10-02T19:28:00.001-07:00

Originally written June 2009

One of the biggest non-debates out there is in regards to human psychology, and what is responsible for it. Is it nature or nurture? No serious scientist thinks that you can explain all of human psychology with just one of these explanations. You need both, since they have each had a role in shaping who we are. The trick is to try and tease out which aspects of ourselves are the result of which, and to what extent.

Unfortunately, there are lots of people who often want to only attribute human psychology solely to either nature or nurture. Some post modernists and feminists make the mistake of trying to attribute all aspects of human nature to the environment someone was raised in (nurture), while another group often attributes everything to the nature side. These people are evolutionary psychologists.

Evolutionary psychologists (EPs) are given the task of explaining why human psychology is the way it is. Unfortunately, they are often a little too hasty, and attempt to find evolutionary reasons (nature) for our behavior, when a nurture explanation would be a much better explanation. For example, some EPs will try to explain something like color preference. The EPs see that women tend to like the color pink, so they come up with a reason that explains why women would like the color pink. Their answer is that women like pink, because back in hunter/gatherer societies, it would be advantageous to see red berries, and collect them.

Clever, very clever! But berries aren’t generally pink when they are ripe. They are red or blue. So that explanation, while clever, doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny. It is more likely that pink has just become associated with femininity because of societal pressures, and nothing else. If blue was considered feminine, women probably like it too.

In order to tell if something is the result of nature (and not nurture), there is an easy test: cross cultural studies. If every culture has the same opinion on something, it is highly probable that the characteristic in question is the result of biology, rather than culture. Or more simply put, traits that transcend culture are the product of our biology.

If it turned out that women in every culture preferred the color pink, then the EPs would have something to go by. Until then, the evidence suggests that women’s preference of pink is completely a product of American culture, and has nothing to do with our evolutionary past.

Another one of these clever explanations is an attempt to explain why “gentlemen prefer blondes.” There have been several attempts to explain this, and scientists from other disciplines found it so ridiculous that one neurologist, V.S. Ramachandran, actually wrote a satirical paper, proposing an explanation.

Ramachandran argued that men prefer women with blonde hair, because blonde hair tends to go hand in hand with fair skin, which is a sign of youth, which is one of the key factors in beauty. However, Ramachandran later revealed that the “article was a hoax, designed to reveal evolutionary psychologists' gullibility.”

While his paper wasn’t supposed to be taken seriously, EPs didn’t realize it was a joke, and bought onto it. Two scientists (one neurologist and one EP) even referenced Ramachandran’s paper in their books!*

In the first example, it seems obvious that the EPs prematurely assumed that color preference is a result of nature, and didn’t bother to check if that was true or not. The same thing goes for EPs who assume that men prefer women with blonde hair. Instead of questioning if this was true or not, they assumed it was, and went searching for an explanation. Unfortunately for the EPs, men do not prefer blondes, and there are multiple lines of evidence to support this.

I first was tipped on to this, when I looked at my own personal preference. Over the course of my life, only 16% of girls that I have liked have been blonde, only 12% of the girls I have kissed have been blonde, and 0% of girls I have dated have been blonde. But I am just one person, so those stats don’t mean much. Men might still prefer blondes, and I could just be the outlier on the bell curve.

I then asked my friends what they prefer. Overwhelmingly, guys I have asked claim to prefer brunettes. And as an interesting observation, if you happen to flip through a Victoria’s Secret catalog, (as I often do, hahaha) the majority of models are brunette (only 28% of the models in the particular catalog I looked in were blonde).**

Finally, for some legitimate scientific evidence: research from Florida State University has shown that men prefer women with long brown hair to anything else. Of the men polled, 46% preferred women with brown hair, 27% preferred black, 19% preferred blondes, and only 7% preferred redheads (if you are a redhead, don't be sad. Oddly, research shows that redhead women have more sex than brunettes or blondes.).

A few decades ago, men might have indeed preferred blondes. Though, this is probably because Marilyn Monroe, who was the dominant sex symbol at the time, had blonde hair. Since women realized that men found her incredibly attractive, they tried to copy her, which meant trying to be blonde.

As for right now, why would men prefer brunettes? This brings us back to the question of hair color preference being a result of nature or nurture, or a little of both. The first thing we can see is that blonde hair is not that common. It’s only seen in people with Northern European ancestry. The vast majority of the world’s women have dark hair. So it’s not likely that we would have evolved the attraction to blondes over brunettes in such a short amount of time.

Also, light skin is viewed as less attractive than darker skin (at least nowadays). But fair skin is a common trait of many young children. So if men preferred women with blonde hair, because it is a sign of youth, they should also like women with light skin. But this isn’t something we see at all.

So do gentlemen prefer blondes? Apparently not. There is no biological reason that men would. And the evidence seems to suggest the opposite-- that men prefer brunettes. As for if this preference is based on nature or nurture… I don’t know. Like many things, it’s probably a combination of both.

*"Survival of the Prettiest" by Nancy Etcoff and "Incognito" by David Eagleman.

**I looked at a Victoria’s Secret magazine and counted how many of the pictures featured blonde or brunette girls. There were 191 brunettes and 68 blondes. Though, for the blondes, I also counted brunettes who had a lot of blonde highlights.

To Live… or Not to Live (Together)?

2009-10-02T19:27:00.001-07:00

Originally written September 2008

Today, it is pretty much the norm for people to date, move in together, and then get married. It seems like everyone does it, so there probably isn't much harm in it. But what is actually the case?

Unfortunately, there isn't much data to support the idea that living together prior to marriage is a good idea. I am not going to attempt to analyze it or present any theories I have about it. I am just going to present the data, and you can take it as it is.

A study by Columbia University found that only 26% of women and 19% of men are currently married to the person they were once living with. That means that for every 100 couples that are living together, approximately 78 of those couples will not end up married to each other.

A more comprehensive National Survey of Families and Households study found about 40% of relationships in which the couple lives together, break up before the couple gets married. This is based on interviews with 13,000 different people.

So we can conclude fairly confidently that living together prior to marriage is not a good idea, when it comes to protecting your relationship. But what about the couples who live together, and do end up getting married? Are they better off because of it?

Well, in a study by Cornell University, it was found that women who married their boyfriends that they had been living with were 28% LESS likely to get a divorce than women who had not lived with their boyfriends.

Western Washington University surveyed 6,577 women who lived with their boyfriends prior to marriage, and found that they had no greater risk of divorce than women who did not live with their boyfriends prior to marriage. However, it was also found that if a women lived with someone else, in addition to her eventual husband, then there was indeed a high risk of divorce.

However, the National Survey of Families and Households found that based upon a survey of 3,300 different families, couples who had lived together prior to marriage were 46% more likely to get divorced than couples who did not live together prior to marriage.

Another study from Yale University found that women who live with their boyfriends prior to marriage were 80% more likely to get divorced than women who did not live with their boyfriends prior to marriage.

And Rutgers University found that unmarried couples who lived together reported having lower levels of happiness, lower levels of sexual exclusivity, lower levels of sexual satisfaction and were three times more likely to suffer from depression.

So apart from the study by Cornell, and somewhat by WWU, most of the data seems to suggest that your chance of divorce goes way up when you live together prior to marriage.

Of course, we need to be careful, and remember that correlation does not equal causation. There could be a third variable.

For a fantastic resource with data regarding relationships, marriage, divorce, etc. go here. You can read all of their research findings, under the "Publications" link.

God and Neurology

2009-10-02T19:04:00.000-07:00

Originally written November 2008

Consciousness stands alone today as a topic that often leaves even the most sophisticated thinkers tongue-tied and confused. And, as with all of the earlier mysteries, there are many who insist -- and hope -- that there will never be a demystification of consciousness. –Daniel Dennett

It is no surprise that many theists are not fans of evolutionary theory, and it is not hard to understand why. If the scientific view of earth's history is correct, the entire basis of Christianity, and reason that Jesus had to die on the cross (sin), is rendered as nothing more than mythology.

However, many theists are able to square the circle of biology with Christian theology. Many point out (and I would agree) that evolution does not disprove the existence of God. In my mind, it just disproves the traditional monotheistic religions.

As someone who is interested in cognitive science, philosophy of the mind and consciousness, I have always found it odd that such topics are met with resistance from theists. I have never understood why this was. What is so scary about the brain?

Upon reflection of this issue, I recently came to realize what the threat of cognitive science was to theology. God is defined as an immaterial mind. Christianity teaches that each person has an immaterial mind -- a soul that will survive death. That is, our mind, our awareness, and our consciousness survive after our bodies have perished.

The threat from cognitive science is this: If the mind and consciousness are found to just be products of a physical brain, that means that not only does our mind/consciousness not survive bodily death, but that God (an immaterial mind) does not exist either. If everything mental requires something physical, an immaterial God (who is a mind) cannot exist.

In this blog, I will attempt to show you that theism has no hope of surviving modern cognitive science. I will not be attempting to explain consciousness in general. But I will argue, I think successfully, that what we already know about the brain does not leave any room for the immaterial or the supernatural. There is no soul which can survive our bodily death, and the idea of God being an immaterial, disembodied mind, is completely impossible.

Split-Brain Patients

Many people suffer from epilepsy. A select few of these people suffer from seizures that are so severe, that the only thing that will relieve them is to have the neural pathway that connects the left and right hemisphere, the corpus callosum, cut. When this pathway is severed, electricity from each hemisphere can no longer be passed back and forth, and the seizures stop. However, the pathway is also the only way to get information from one hemisphere to the other. Because of this, there are very strange effects that occur as a result.

For example, if you were to whisper into the left ear of one of these people, and say "my favorite fruit is an apple" and then whisper into the right ear, asking "what is my favorite fruit?" the person will have no idea! But if you return to the left ear and quietly ask "what is my favorite fruit?" the person will answer "apple."

Now this comes as no surprise, since information cannot be passed between the two hemispheres. However, it also turns out that both hemispheres do not always agree with each other. If you ask one side "do you prefer chocolate or vanilla?" one side may say chocolate, and the other might say vanilla. One side might prefer blondes, the other brunettes. And interestingly enough, in one case, one side believed in God, and the other did not!

The point is that when you cut the brain in half, you then have someone who has two spheres of consciousness—two minds, separate from each other. So if someone has two spheres of consciousness as a result of their brain being cut in half, we have to ask: is this something we would expect to see if the mind was a result of the physical brain, or if the mind was immaterial? Obviously, this only makes sense in light of the fact that the brain is not controlled by an immaterial mind. If it were, then there is no reason for there to be two spheres of consciousness, or two minds, when the brain is cut in half. Physically changing the brain should have no effect on something immaterial.

This, in my opinion, is the nail in the coffin for theism. Looking at this evidence, there is no doubt that the mind is completely a product of the physical brain. But to drive the point home, let's go through some more examples, and then counter the one (and only) argument theists have against this.

Brain Damage

There is a certain part of the brain that control your ability to recognize faces. If this part is damaged, your ability to recognize faces no longer exists. This disorder is called prosopagnosia. Recognizing faces is definitely part of our consciousness, and losing that ability undoubtedly renders one aspect of our consciousness inoperative.

So are we to believe that when part of the brain is damaged, we can't recognize faces, but if the brain is completely destroyed, we float through a bright tunnel, and are able to recognize grandma?

If you have damage to the language part of the brain, often times you will suffer from what is called aphasia. People who have suffered such brain damage have all sorts of strange problems regarding speech and language. In some cases, people are unable to comprehend language. In others, they are unable to name certain objects, other times they can no longer read, sometimes they cannot write. In some cases, when trying to speak, instead of saying "the dog needs to go out, so I will take him for a walk" they might say "You know that smoodle pinkered and that I want to get him round and take care of him like you want before." These people have no idea that they are engaging in such a thing, and become frustrated when no one can understand what they are trying to say.

Language is an enormous part of our conscious experience. It is how we communicate, and it is how we think. People who have not been exposed to language have very limited abilities in regards to abstract thinking. So language is a hugely important aspect to our consciousness, and suffering from aphasias wipes that aspect of ourselves out.

Another part of the brain controls your body image. I don't mean how you feel about yourself, but the model of your body that your brain uses to figure out where your body stops, and everything else begins. If this area is damaged, the person feels disconnected from their body (stimulation on parts of the brain can also induce out of body experiences). People have suffered damage to this part of the brain, which then causes very strange results to occur. One patient went as far to state that his own leg was actually a severed leg that someone had put in his bed, and was not his own! Your body image, the ability to recognize that your hand is your own hand, and control it, is obviously part of your conscious experience-- part of your mental world. And if damage to that part of the brain occurs, part of your consciousness is destroyed.

Other parts of the brain, if damaged, render you unable to process things on the left (or right) field of vision. This is simply called neglect. With neglect, not only do you not see anything to the left side of the field of vision, but you become completely unaware that it even exists. People have this problem won't eat food on the left side of the plate, won't shave the left side of their face, are unable to turn left, etc. The entire left (or right) side of the universe is no longer exists for them.

Of course, your ability to recognize and comprehend the world (not just the left or right side), is part of your conscious experience-- part of your mental world. And if damage to that part of the brain occurs, part of your conscious awareness is gone forever.

Most people know that there are specific parts of the brain that store certain types of memories (visual, auditory, etc). Likewise, there is an area in the back of the brain, the visual cortex, which processes all of the information that is received through the eyes.

In one case, a man had damage to both the visual cortex, as well as the part of the brain that stored his visual memories. So not only did he lose his vision, he lost his visual memories—memory of anything he had ever seen. So he went blind, and had no idea! As a result, he no longer understood what was meant by "light" or "color". He couldn't comprehend it, since, as far as he was concerned, he had never had any experience vision in the first place.

Your perception of the world is made up mostly from your experience with it (your memories). All of these past memories help create the conscious experience that you currently have. But if such memories, as well as the ability to see are taken away, you lose a very large part of your conscious experience in the world.

There are many other examples of this sort, but with these few, a pattern has started to emerge. The people that have suffered such brain damage have lost part of their consciousness. But why? If we have a soul or immaterial mind that is responsible for these things, like consciousness and memories, then there should be no problem. But if consciousness is a result of the brain, then isn't this exactly what we would expect? Absolutely!

Anesthesia

Now, if we were to anesthetize you with halothane (a form of general anesthesia), you wouldn't be able to move. You wouldn't even be able to wiggle a finger. Why not? If your brain is responsible for moving your limbs, this makes sense. But if your immaterial mind is responsible, then why is your arm unable to be moved? Why is your immaterial soul/mind being affected by something physical--anesthesia?

If immaterial minds are all that are needed for consciousness, and immaterial minds able to affect physical objects (like brains), then what is the point of a brain to begin with? Our brains are big, heavy, and biologically expensive. They are delicate, take a lot of energy to run properly, and are easily damaged. If it weren't for modern medical science, many women would die giving birth to babies with enormous heads.

If the brain was only around to run things like the heart and lungs, that would be a good argument for the existence of an immaterial mind. If there was no evidence that our brains stored memory, or ran all the programs necessary for us to perceive and understand the world around us, theism might have a chance. But modern brain imaging techniques have tied literally every thought and emotion to neural activity. Literally everything your mind does has a neural correlate.

Counter Argument

The only argument that exists in response to this type of argument follows as such: The brain is like a television, whereas the mind/soul is the signal. Sure, you can fiddle with the knobs on the TV, which will change the color, brightness, etc. But that doesn't change the signal that the TV receives. And if you unplug the TV, that doesn't mean that the signal still isn't out there.

Likewise, the brain can be fiddled with, changing our perception of the world. You can even turn off the brain, but that doesn't mean that the mind/soul does not continue to exist.

While this argument is clever, it fails on multiple counts.

First of all, it completely ignores the first line of evidence I presented. Sure, tweaking with TV knobs will change the picture, but will cutting the TV in half create two separate signals? Not a chance. So already, that example takes care of the attempted counter argument.

Secondly, it doesn't explain what the purpose of a giant brain would be. If the immaterial mind can somehow control the physical brain, which then controls the body, why not skip the middle man and leave the brain out of it?

Thirdly, it presumes that an immaterial entity has causal power in the material world. This has been a problem for theists for centuries. And to this day, there is absolutely no explanation on how such an event could possibly occur.

There are many other objections to this counter argument, and many other examples of consciousness being eclipsed by damage to certain areas of the brain. But I think it is safe to say, that while consciousness on a whole may still be a mystery, it is no mystery that it is purely a result of our brains. When we die, our brains decompose, and all of our memories and experiences, everything that made us who we are, die as well.

And since immaterial minds cannot exist independent of a physical brain, it is safe to say that the immaterial mind in the heavens, God, cannot exist either.

God is a conscious, immaterial mind.
Conscious, immaterial minds exist independently of physical brains.
A change in a physical brain will change the conscious mind.
Therefore, conscious minds are not immaterial or independent of physical brains, and an immaterial mind (such as a soul or God) cannot exist.

To wrap things up, here are a few quotes by some of the very top neuroscientists and philosophers of the mind around...

It never ceases to amaze me that all the richness of our mental life, all our feelings, our emotions, our thoughts, our ambitions, our love life, our religious sentiments, and even what each of us regards as our own intimate, private self, is simply the activity of these little specks of jelly in our head, our brain. There is nothing else. –V.S. Ramacahndran

All mental processes, even the most complex psychological processes, derive from operations of the brain. –Eric Kandel

Modern neuroscience has shown that there is no user. "The soul" is, in fact, the information-processing activity of the brain. New imaging techniques have tied every thought and emotion to neural activity. And any change to the brain—from strokes, drugs, electricity or surgery—will literally change your mind. –Steven Pinker

There's a scientific consensus that hard-core dualism, which says that people can think without using their brain or that memories will survive the death of your body, is just flat mistaken. Your mental life is a product of your brain. –Paul Bloom

There is something approaching a consensus among philosophers and cognitive scientists: no immaterial mind/soul makes any sense at all. –Daniel Dennett

No dualist has ever been able to give an account of how a brain can affect a mind, or how a mind can affect a brain. Dualism, for most philosophers today, is not a real option. –John Searle

All conscious states are caused by brain processes. There aren’t any exceptions. Every single conscious state is caused by brain processes. –John Searle