It's fascinating to me that, despite all of humanity's incredible progress over the last few thousand years, so many profound mysteries about the nature of reality remain. Below is my list of what I see as the deepest mysteries.  What would you add to the list? — LIST OF DEEP MYSTERIES ABOUT THE NATURE OF REALITY — 1. THE UNIVERSE 1.1 Eternity - Will our universe la...

Written: March 27, 2019 | Released: August 30, 2021 In my experience, many obvious-seeming psychological concepts explode in complexity when you attempt to dissect them. For instance, trying to respond to a question about "why we forgive" made me realize there are a vast number of motivations for forgiveness. After someone wrongs you, you can forgive them based on:UNDERSTANDING • Empathy...

Have you noticed that people often talk more (or less) than their share in one-on-one conversations? What percent of the time should you talk when you are one-on-one with a close friend, acquaintance, or stranger? I ran a study to investigate that question using our Positly.com platform (n=143 participants in the US). See an image summarizing the results here: You might think that introver...

Written: May 17, 2019 | Released: July 9, 2021 A little game for you related to power: suppose that each of the supervillains listed below actually existed and that each had "become dictator of the world" as their only high-level goal. That is, their primary and permanent desire is to become the highest leader of a single world government. Based on each of their listed superpowers, which do yo...

Here’s a link to a recording of me giving a talk about this topic in 2019. The idea that you should "just trust your gut" - that is, make many life decisions solely based on intuition (as opposed to based on reflection) - is obviously very popular. But I think that there are pretty much only four types of situations where we're best off relying on intuition alone: when a decision is Fast, Irre...

Here’s a framework I use to think more clearly about complex debates and philosophical questions about whether something is “true,” “exists,” and is “real” (e.g., “is this painting art?”, “is everything subjective?” and “is morality real?”). I find that thinking in terms of this framework can make it easier to figure out what’s being claimed and to clarify what I myself believe. The framework ...

Written: February 2, 2019 | Released: June 27, 2021 Change my mind! Below are my very tentative, weakly held perspectives on ten very complex policy topics. If you have strong evidence or solid arguments against (or for) any of these viewpoints, I'd be really interested to know. Please post in the comments, referencing which topic you are referring to (e.g. "#1 - Heath insurance", "#5 - Death ...

Written: January 23, 2019 | Released: September 16, 2021 There is a simple formula for thinking about how to be more productive that most people aren't familiar with. It breaks down productivity into the product of three factors, namely: PRODUCTIVITY = TIME x EFFICIENCY x OBJECTIVE More explicitly:PRODUCTIVITY(i.e., the total value - according to your own values - of your work each week ...

There is a vast number of hypothetical traditions that could be practiced, compared to the few that actually are. If you were inventing a new tradition that you and millions of others would practice one day each year for many years to come, and you wanted it to produce positive effects on the participants, what would your new tradition be? Below are a few ideas for hypothetical traditions. I’m...

TLDR: become a looper of questions to know how to program the machine that will polish the stone while you outlast the jungle. 1. Looping the Question “What don’t I know that I must know?” This Meta Question is your obsession. The answer to that Meta Question is itself a question, and it leads you to create your first data loop (say, conducting a series of interviews with experts). Afte...