The Harmless Sociopath

Braaaains

Today I want to talk about brains.  Or, more specifically, how there seem to be two different ‘camps’ of people when it comes to how they function and interpret the world.

Of course, i’m no neuroscientist, but after reading books by Sam Harris and having started Steven Pinker’s “The Blank Slate”, I felt compelled to write something about this phenomenon i’ve observed.

It seems there are people who interpret the world according to the evidence they can see and measure, and there are people who interpret the world based on how they emotionally feel about what they see.  The former uses facts and data to determine their values and decisions, while the latter makes choices based on emotional appeals regardless of the information available.

If you haven’t noticed yet, I have a biased slant towards the empirical thinker rather than the emotional one, because that is how i personally perceive the world.

This has lead to a great deal of frustration when dealing with the emotional thinkers.  This includes the majority of people I know, and likely ever will know; parents, best friends, ex-girlfriends, etc. Many of my discussions with them about almost any topic turns into an argument as I make a statement based on the ‘latest scientific studies’ whereas they only deal in their preconceived and often ignorant opinions.  Instead of accepting more relevant information, they fiercely defend their ‘side’, as if I were attacking them personally.

It’s very difficult to deal with.  If not science and data, what then should I use to make decisions? My uninformed opinion? Intuition? Magic?

As Sam Harris says (paraphrased), “What evidence can one use to convince someone who does not value evidence? When someone does not accept evidence in their reasoning, the conversation is over.”

It’s not easy to accept.  From political discussions with parents, to religious ones with significant others, any carefully selected data and evidence I may have is brushed aside in favor of how they “feel” about it.  It’s maddening.  It feels like they are choosing to live in a fantasy world, and when I figuratively try to “shake them awake” they get angry and “go back to sleep” rather than wake up and see the daylight.

I wish I had some kind of clever conclusion for this problem, but I’m at a loss.  I may have to just accept that most people are going to believe what they want to believe, no matter what information they have available.  It seems once a pattern of confirmation bias has set in, it’s an incurable disease that fights any kind of treatment.

Sleepy

First real post here. I’m new to tumblr. I’ve decided to start off by talking about a recent problem i’ve been having concerning sleep.

For the past week i’ve been feeling like i’m constantly in a daze.  And sometimes I get the strange sensation where I can’t tell if i’m dreaming or awake.  I’m not sure what is causing this, but it seemed to start around the time I got a fairly nasty cold last week that had me staying in bed for the majority of two days.

Of course, I can perform a few checks to make sure i’m awake; pinching, looking in a mirror, reading, remembering what happened 10 seconds ago, etc. It’s just getting to be annoying.  I feel lethargic all the time. Perhaps i’ve just been over-sleeping.

Hopefully this will stop soon.