Michael Shermer: The Believing Brain
The Center for Inquiry-New York City and NYC Skeptics hosted noted skeptic and bestselling author Michael Shermer for a talk about his new book, The Believing Brain: From Ghosts and Gods to Politics and Conspiracies – How We Construct Beliefs and Reinforce Them as Truths. His thesis is straightforward: We form our beliefs for a variety of subjective, personal, emotional, and psychological reasons in the context of environments created by family, friends, colleagues, culture, and society at large; after forming our beliefs we then defend, justify, and rationalize them with a host of intellectual reasons, cogent arguments, and rational explanations. Beliefs come first, explanations for beliefs follow. Dr. Shermer also provides the neuroscience behind our beliefs. The brain is a belief engine. From sensory data flowing in through the senses the brain naturally begins to look for and find patterns, and then infuses those patterns with meaning. The first process Dr. Shermer calls patternicity: the tendency to find meaningful patterns in both meaningful and meaningless data. The second process he calls agenticity: the tendency to infuse patterns with meaning, intention, and agency. We can’t help believing. Our brains evolved to connect the dots of our world into meaningful patterns that explain why things happen. These meaningful patterns become beliefs. Once beliefs are formed the brain begins to look for and find confirmatory evidence in support of those beliefs, which adds an emotional boost of further confidence in the beliefs and thereby accelerates the process of reinforcing them, and round and round the process goes in a positive feedback loop of belief confirmation. Dr. Shermer outlines the numerous cognitive tools our brains engage to reinforce our beliefs as truths and to insure that we are always right.
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Michael Jacksons third single from his 1995 album HIStory: Past, Present and Future, Book I, a very socially conscious song dealing humanity, the environment and animal cruelty.
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Michael Moore goes into New York City after the shooting of Amadou Diallo where the NYPD shot Amadou Diallo 41 times mistaking his wallet for a gun. Michael Moore hits on the streets of New York City to warn African Americans and exchange their black wallets.Persons: Michael Moore
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Renowned psychiatrist and writer Iain McGilchrist explains how the 'divided brain' has profoundly altered human behaviour, culture and society.
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In this new RSAnimate, renowned psychiatrist and writer Iain McGilchrist explains how our 'divided brain' has profoundly altered human behaviour, culture and society. Taken from a lecture given by Iain McGilchrist as part of the RSA's free public events programme.
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Do you have to choose between a healthy, fun, modern lifestyle and a fair, sustainable, compassionate lifestyle? No, you can have it all! Watch Making the Connection and decide for yourself. Making the Connection is a new film which invites you on a journey – together with a chef, a farmer, an MP, an athlete, a dietitian, a poet. Explores an exciting lifestyle which combines delicious, healthy food with tackling many of the global challenges facing us today. Will you make the connection and become part of the solution?
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In 1996, in a documentary called The Money Masters, we asked the question why is America going broke. It wasn’t clear then that we were, but it is today. Now the question is how can we get out of this mess. Foreclosures are everywhere, unemployment is skyrocketing – and this is only the beginning. America’s economy is on a long, slippery slope from here on. The bubble ride of debt has come to an end. What can government do? The sad answer is – under the current monetary system – nothing. It’s not going to get better until the root of the problem is understood and addressed. There isn’t enough stimulus money in the entire world to get us out of this hole. Why? Debt. The national debt is just like our consumer debt – it’s the interest that’s killing us. Though most people don’t realize it the government can’t just issue it’s own money anymore. It used to be that way. The King could just issue stuff called money. Abraham Lincoln did it to win the Civil War. No, today, in our crazy money system, the government has to borrow our money into existence and then pay interest on it. That’s why they call it the National Debt. All our money is created out of debt. Politicians who focus on reducing the National Debt as an answer probably don’t know what the National Debt really is. To reduce the National Debt would be to reduce our money – and there’s already too little of that. The economy of the U.S. is in a deflationary spiral. Nothing can stop it — except monetary reform. 1. No more national debt. Nations should not be allowed to borrow. If they want to spend, they have to take the political heat right away by taxing. 2. No more fractional reserve lending. Banks can only lend money they actually have. 3. Gold money is NOT the answer. Historically gold ALWAYS works against a thriving middle class and ALWAYS works to create a plutocracy. 4. The total quantity of money + credit in a national system must be fixed, varying only with the population.
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It’s the world’s worst spree killing. Discovery Channel Norway Massacre: The Killer’s Mind examines the terrible events of that day. In 90 minutes of madness, 32-year-old Anders Behring Breivik killed 69 young people. The film pieces together Breivik’s day of terror hour by hour, from the time of the bomb he set off in Oslo, to the cold blooded shooting of defenseless youngsters on the remote island beauty spot of Utøya. Who is this man, and what made him act? This film examines the criminal mind and motives of one of the world’s worst killers, offering psychological analysis, as the day of the massacre unfolds. It examines his motives, analyzes his likely psychological journey through the planning stages and over the course of the day itself and asks what drove him to plan and carry out this massacre. Was he a terrorist as he claimed, a madman, or was he indeed both? The film will have first-hand accounts from eyewitnesses and survivors who have not spoken on camera before. Including: taxi driver Arild Tangen who was the last man to speak to Breivik before his attack; survivor Adrian Pracon who was shot in the shoulder and tried to swim away from the island. He pleaded with Breivik to spare him; Bjørn Kasper Ilaug who rescued some of the kids whilst the shooting was happening by pulling bodies on to his boat; and Brede Joherraaten – Camp owner, was there and recovered bodies and saved swimmers. The killer’s action are analyzed by a host of experts, including: renowned criminologist Professor David Wilson; Katherine Newman from Princeton university who is one of world’s the top experts on spree shootings; Matthew Goodman, the leading authority on British and European right wing terror groups; and terror and weapons expert Charles Shoebridge. And foremost, above all, is the memory of those who died. What were the warning signs? What could have been done? By investigating this appalling crime, there is the hope that an atrocity like this can never happen again.
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The Bethlem Royal Hospital in London became infamous in the 1600′s in regards to the inhumane and cruel treatment of its patients as revealed by psychiatric historians. Bedlam: The History of Bethlem Hospital reveals why Bedlam came to stand for the very idea of madness itself. It was satirized for centuries as both a human zoo and a university of madness and for 100 years was one of London’s leading tourist attractions, as Madame Tussauds is today. Britain’s leading psychiatric historians discuss Bedlam and its inhabitants as we reveal the incredible history of one of U.K’s most notorious institutions.
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As the credit crunch continues to leave Britain cash-strapped and high street banks report huge losses, Dispatches investigates who is responsible for the current crisis. Reckless lending and risky investments have been blamed for directly driving up mortgage rates and increasing the numbers of people losing their homes. Dispatches investigates how the bank chiefs allowed this to happen and if lessons have been learn from the Northern Rock crisis. Former investment banker James Max tracks down the banking bosses who have presided over the colossal losses to see if they will be held to account. He examines the billion pound bonus culture and lifestyle of the City’s wide boys and investigates how the banks are now seeking to make back the money they lost before the credit boom hit the buffers. Featuring the results of an exclusive survey of bank lending rates, and how much money banks are re-claiming through them, the film also offers expert advice on how to cope with higher interest rates and shows how customers can take banking into their own hands.
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