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Did "Clean" Water Increase the Murder Rate?
The construction of public waterworks across the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was one of the great infrastructure investments in American history. As David Cutler and Grant...
View ArticleThe Nordic Paradox
By virtually every measure, the Nordic countries – Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden - are a paragon of gender equality. It doesn’t matter if you’re looking at the wage gap or political...
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What Can Toilet Paper Teach Us About Poverty?
“Costco is where you go broke saving money.”-My UncleThe fundamental paradox of big box stores is that the only way to save money is to spend lots of it. Want to get a discount on that shampoo? Here's...
View ArticleWhy College Should Become A Lottery
Barry Schwartz, a psychologist at UC-Berkeley and Swarthmore, does not think much of the college admissions process. In a new paper, he tells a story about a friend who spent an afternoon with a...
View ArticleWhen Is Ignorance Bliss?
The first line of Aristotle’s Metaphysics begins with a seemingly obvious truth: “All men by nature desire to know.” According to Aristotle, this desire for knowledge is our defining instinct, the...
View ArticleNobody Knows Anything (NFL Draft Edition)
Pity the Cleveland Browns fan. Seemingly every year, the poor performance of the team leads to a high first-round pick: in this year’s draft, the Browns are making the first selection. And every year...
View ArticleIs Facebook Bad for Democracy?
We are living in an era of extreme partisanship. As documented by the Pew Research Center, majorities of people in both parties now express “very unfavorable” views of the other side, with most...
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Can Love Help You Forget Painful Memories?
"Perfect love casts out fear." -Gospel of John 4:18It's now a firmly established fact that loving attachments are an important component of good health. According to dozens of epidemiological studies,...
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Does Divorce Increase the Risk of the Common Cold, Even Decades Later?
On November 30, 1939, 450,000 Soviet troops stormed across the Finnish border, setting off nearly five years of brutal conflict. The cities of Finland were strafed by bombers; severe food rationing was...
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The Increasing Value of Social Skills
The progress of technology is best measured by our obsolescence: we have a knack for creating machines that are better than us. From self-driving trucks to software that reads MRIs, many of our current...
View ArticleDoes Anyone Ever Change Their Mind?
Democracy is expensive. During the 2016 general election, candidates spent nearly $7 billion dollars on their campaigns. (More than $2.5 billion was spent just on the presidential contest.) This money...
View ArticleHow A Tired Mind Limits the Body
When it comes to our self-understanding, we have been held back by an extraordinary philosophical mistake. It’s a forgivable error, since it reflects our most basic intuitions. The mistake I’m talking...
View ArticleHow Your Smartphone Camera Is Affecting Your Life
Like many people, I despise my smartphone. I mean, it’s an astonishing piece of technology – a slab of touch sensitive glass connected to the universe—but I resent its chronic temptations, the way it...
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What Tennis Can Teach Us About Technology
In the winter of 1947, Howard Head, an aerospace engineer, was skiing down Stowe Mountain when he decided that wooden skis were a terrible idea. He kept tripping on the long hickory blades; the...
View ArticleThe Scars of Separation
The question of what happens when you separate young children from their parents is not a political one. It’s a scientific one.And the answers are tragic.In 1937, John Bowlby began working at the Child...
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How To Fix the Smartphone
The astragalus is the heel bone of a running animal. It’s an elegant part of the skeleton, so curved it looks carved, with four distinct sides. It fits in the palm of your hand.The astragalus is also...
View ArticleThe Psychological Benefits of Horror Movies
I’ve never understood the appeal of horror movies. The world is terrible enough — why pay money to endure more terror? These days, I’m all about counter-programming reality, soothing my amygdala with...
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