Should we stress about stress?
Emotional suffering is real and that there should be no shame in seeking the help of others to diminish it. Whether it has an agreed name and a scientific definition is secondary.
ReadTag: Science
Freedom Regained at Scientia Salon
The undeniable fact is that brains provide the material means by which conscious life is sustained. Without brains there can be no human consciousness. But it does not follow from this that we can explain all human behavior in neurological terms alone and that conscious thoughts contribute nothing to our actions. That is a much stronger claim, which goes against the evidence of experience.
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Do your genes determine your entire life?
The idea that unconscious biological forces drive our beliefs and actions would seem to pose a real threat to our free will. We like to think that we make choices on the basis of our own conscious deliberations. But isn’t all that thinking things over irrelevant if our final decision was already written in our genetic code? And doesn’t the whole edifice of personal responsibility collapse if we accept that “my genes made me do it”?
ReadBusinesses on the mindfulness bandwagon
When people claim that “mindfulness works”, they can mean different things. There are claims that it promotes psychological flexibility, awareness, resilience, better decision-making, job performance, reduced absence rates and the ability to learn new tasks. No wonder businesses are interested.
ReadAre you selfish?
Seeing others act selflessly makes us feel guilty about our own failures to be as virtuous. It’s far easier to dismiss the apparent selflessness of others than it is to challenge our own very real selfishness.
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