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POPSRepetition Makes False Beliefs Permanent Politicians and other unscrupulous types have long exploited what psychological studies are now confirming: due to the neurophysiology of the learning process, simple repetitive association between two concepts is enough to make false propositions "feel" true and well-supported. Worse, after enough exposure to such associations, subsequent denials can strengthen the perception of the falsehood instead of weakening it. (This is a major reason why the stigma of a false accusation can persist even after innocence is proven.) Indeed, repetition seems to be a key culprit. Things that are repeated often become more accessible in memory, and one of the brain's subconscious rules of thumb is that easily recalled things are true.
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POPSGlobal Warming Myth Exposed - Devastated I realize the understanding of science in America and Europe especially is ridiculously poor. However, this presenter does a fine job of presenting the facts regarding the claims of the global warming alarmists.
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POPSThe Earth Will Be Just Fine, Thank You Despite its many flaws, I’m a big fan of human civilization. I marvel at our capacity to organize matter and information, at our ability to learn from mistakes and pass that learning down to subsequent generations. Civilization—writing, cities, trade, the whole lot of it—makes us unique on this planet and, as far as we can tell so far, in our part of the universe.
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POPS10 Common Myths about Mental Illness 8. Children can’t have serious mental disorders. 9. Doctor/patient confidentiality is absolute and always protected. 10. Mental illness is no longer stigmatized in society.
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POPSTen Myths of Forgiveness 8. If we forgive, we are being disloyal to those the offending party hurt. 9. We forgive only on the basis of certain conditions such as getting an apology. Forgiveness is unconditional or it is not forgiveness. If we make out forgiveness conditional on what the other party does, such as apologizing or promising new behavior, we have made the perpetrator the decision maker in our process of forgiving. Ironically, this kind of thinking turns our lives over to the very person who has hurt us. 10. Forgiveness isn’t valid unless it is accepted by the other party. This myth is reinforced by the common phrase, “to offer our forgiveness,” as if it has to be accepted to be valid. Forgiveness is not offered, it is granted. It is our gift to ourselves.
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POPSNoah's Ark flood spurred European farming "When the Black Sea flooded at end of last ice age some people have suggested it was the origins of the Noah's Ark myth If you lived in that basin it would have seemed like the whole world had flooded."
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POPSRepublicans: Crazy, Or Nuts?
Who in their right mind would argue with the observations in this article? More: "The Republican Party has become an aggregation of people who prefer to live in a world of fantasy -- and their first fantasy, the Ur-myth on which the entire conceit rests, is (classically) "we are the realists." "It degrades, into farce and Newspeak, from there. The perpetrators and defenders of the outing of a CIA agent are "patriots." Tom DeLay is a "leader" and Newt Gingrich is a "visionary." The President plays guitar while New Orleans drowns, causes a hundred thousand Americans and Iraqis to be killed or injured, and outsources torture, and it's the Democrats who, per the repellent Ramesh Ponnuru, are the "party of death." "It has gotten so that you have to muster all the compassion and understanding of which you are capable just to think of the Republicans as a party of greedy corporatists manipulating the credulous, the provincial, and the bigoted. That's the nice way of putting it.”
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POPSThe Denial Industry very interesting article on climate change denial, its deniers, frontgroups, funding & the so called 'debate'. must read
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POPSDo You Love This Face? Evolutionary biology holds that in any given population, extreme characteristics tend to fall away in favor of average ones. Birds with unusually long or short wings die more often "in storms. Human babies who are born larger or smaller than average are less likely to survive. The ability to form an average-mate template would have conveyed a singular survival advantage."
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POPSAll-girl fish that hasn't had sex for 70,000 years According to the report in the BMC Evolutionary Biology journal, one theory is that the fish may occasionally be taking some of the DNA from the males that trigger reproduction, in order to refresh their gene pool. Dr Laurence Loewe, of the university's School of Biological Sciences, said: "What we have shown now is that this fish really has something special going on and that some special tricks exist to help this fish survive. "Maybe there is still occasional sex with strangers that keeps the species alive. Future research may give us some answers."
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