“Now that luxury mind-body spas and juice bars are familiar totems of gentrification, and Fortune 500 corporations roll out “McMindfulness” seminars and on-site wellness centers, engaging in such practices can feel like an endorsement of a superficial, bourgeois mainstream — a mainstream against which many intellectuals define themselves.”
Category: ideas
When Nothing Is Cool How Can Anything Be Good? (Our Contemporary Critical Dilemma)
“Is there something unethical in contemporary criticism? This essay is not just for those who identify with the canaries in the mine, but for anyone who browses through current journals and is left with an impression of deadness or meanness. I believe that the progressive fervor of the humanities, while it reenergized inquiry in the 1980s and has since inspired countless valid lines of inquiry, masks a second-order complex that is all about the thrill of destruction.”
Your Grumpy Old Relative Was Right: Creative People Have More Than A Little In Common With Psychopaths
“If you can’t get enough of the myth of the mad genius, you’ll love the results of this new study: … Researchers suggest that creative individuals share more personality traits with psychopaths than their less creative peers do.”
Simplicity Scale: The Difference Between Science And Art
“Gaudí and Mies remind us that there is no disputing matters of taste when it comes to assessing the value of simplicity and complexity in works of art. Einstein and Newton say that science is different – simplicity, in science, is not a matter of taste.”
Why We Hate Hearing Recordings Of Our Own Voices
“You listen to yourself all day long. Why would a recording of your voice make you feel uncomfortable? The unfamiliarity is quite literally all in your head, although you’re not imagining things.”
The Downsides Of Grit
Yes, perseverance in pursuit of a goal seems to be a crucial ingredient of success. But it has its disadvantages – not least that you probably shouldn’t let people see you exercising it.
Is This The Real Reason You Procrastinate?
“Some researchers have viewed procrastination largely as a failure of self-regulation – like other bad behaviors that have to do with a lack of self-control, such as overeating, a gambling problem or overspending. Others say it’s not a matter of being lazy or poor time management, as many smart overachievers who procrastinate often can attest. They say it may actually be linked to how our brain works and to deeper perceptions of time and the self.”
In The History Of The World, Here’s How Many People Who Have Lived
“Coming up with how many people were born after that is certainly based on informed speculation. Plagued by low life expectancy (up to 10 years during the Iron Age) thanks to lack of medicine, food supply issues, climate changes, killing each other and other problems, human population grew at a slow rate. Early infant mortality was as high as 500 infant deaths per 1,000 births or higher.”
Our Everyday Game And Screen Immersion Experiences Are Reshaping Museums
“Some people like to just observe. Some people prefer to read. Some people prefer to be told a story in a movie. So, in the department of exhibitions, we have people that think in all these different ways and we have to balance it out between all of us to get an exhibition that is attractive to everybody, and tells each one of these stories in the most compelling way.”
Big Data Shows Us The Gap Between Foodie America And Everyone Else In The Country
“In an era of celebrity chefs and recipe-kit delivery services developed by experts, a pasta dish by a Dallas dad who describes his heritage as ‘entirely Anglo-Saxon’ is quite possibly America’s most-cooked meal.”