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Livingstone
The David Livingstone centre, bless, will always try to paint him in a positive light. His biographer Tim Jeal, however, makes clear that he was imperfect, obsessive, perverse and often misguided man. He wrote lovely letters to his wife, but it was probably a marriage of convenience, at least to begin with. He risked their…
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Vulnerability
Vulnerability is emotional risk, exposure, uncertainty. It is, according to Brene Brown, our most accurate measurement of courage. Shame focuses on individual, guilt on behaviour. Shame drives 2 scripts – “you’re not good enough”, and “who do you think you are?”. Shame correlates with addiction, depression, violence, aggression, bullying, suicide, eating disorders. Guilt however is inversely related. Guilt…
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Folk Devils and Moral Panics
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It’s Just Not Acceptable Any More
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Mating intelligence
Creativity is a trait that women find attractive in a mate, and mating motives enhance actual creative ability in men. For men, artistic accomplishment for visual art is related to sexual success. These tendencies clearly have an evolutionary basis, and the fact that prestige in the arts is not the only factor suggests that the genetic advantage rather…
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Soundtrack
Stravinsky apparently said he hated listening to music without something to look at – part of the reason he loved writing for the ballet!
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Optimism bias
Some people say the secret to happiness is low expectations… So it’s a very good theory, but it turns out to be wrong for three reasons. Number one: Whatever happens, whether you succeed or you fail, people with high expectations always feel better. Because how we feel when we get dumped or win employee of…
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Most affluent postcodes in Britain
God love the Sunday Times and its obsession with money! So they have looked at UK postcodes and combined property price, mortgage debt, income, spending/saving patterns to come up with not just the most expensive places, but where people genuinely have tons of money. The ones that stood out for me (none are in Scotland,…
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Caesar on death
Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once. Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, It seems to me most strange that men should fear Seeing that death, a necessary end, Will come when it will come. [Shakespeare’s Caesar]