Leonard Mlodinow of Caltech writes The psychologist Bruno Bettelheim concluded that survival in Nazi concentration camps depended on “one’s ability to arrange to preserve some areas of independent action, to keep control of some important aspects of one’s life despite an environment that seemed overwhelming.” Studies suggest that, even in normal conditions, to be happy, […]
Nicholas D. Kristof writes: The larger point is that liberals and conservatives often form judgments through flash intuitions that aren’t a result of a deliberative process. The crucial part of the brain for these judgments is the medial prefrontal cortex, which has more to do with moralizing than with rationality. Kristof also cites Professor Jonathan […]
Simon Critchley, a New School philosopher, wrote a thought-provoking piece on happiness at the “Happy Days” blog at the New York Times. In it, he quotes Jean-Jacques Rousseau‘s wonderful Reveries of a Solitary Stroller (also called Reveries of a Solitary Walker, Daydreams of a Solitary Walker, etc.): If there is a state where the soul […]