Author: Promise

Promise Tewogbola is a Christian writer, behavioral economic researcher and author of several books. He has a master's degree in Public Health and a Ph.D. in Applied Psychology.

Notes from Cal Newport’s ‘Digital Minimalism’

Newport, C. (2019). Digital minimalism: Choosing a focused life in a noisy world. Penguin.

Introduction

“Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity” – Henry David Thoreau

“You see how few things you have to do to live a satisfying and revenant life” – Marcus Aurelius

Digital declutter: Aggressive action of stepping away from online activities for 30 days.

Part 1 – Foundations

Chapter 1 – A Lopsided Arms Race

  • Many of the changes caused by social media were unexpected and unplanned – even as they were massive and transformational.
  • Social media apps/site make us use them more than we think is healthy.
  • People are susceptible to social media’s compulsion because a lot of money has been invested into making their use inevitable.
  • ‘…checking your likes is the new smoking…’ – Bill Maher (2017)
  • The two drivers of social media addiction are intermittent positive reinforcement and drive for social approval.
  • The thought process that went into building these applications was… ‘How do we consume as much of your time and attention as possible”
  • Early-stage social media had no “like” button. People focused on just finding and sharing information. This is what is salient in people’s mind when they think about the benefits of social media.
  • Human nature evolved to attach importance to social cues, including signals of social approval.

Chapter 2 – Digital Minimalism

  • The goal of digital minimalism is to spend your online time on selected activities that supports things I value (for me, this should be Christian rhema, notes from books I have read or highlights from books I have written or plan to write).
  • In Thoreau’s book ‘Walden’, he describes an economic theory built from the following axiom: “The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it – immediately or in the long run”
  • When people extol the virtues of social media, the opportunity cost of the time and effort spent on social media is not readily salient to them
  • The goal is to treat the minutes of our lives as a tangible, concrete resource which we must best allocate to the ends that are most valuable to us.

  • Amish philosophy: Start from values and work backwards to see whether a new technology supports or hinders those values

Chapter 3 – The Digital Clutter

No notes taken.

Part 2 – Practices

Chapter 4 – Spend Time Alone

  • Solitude doesn’t necessarily mean physical separation. Solitude is more about what’s going on in your mind as opposed as to what’s going on in the environment. It connotes a state whereby the mind is free from input from other minds. It requires moving beyond reacting to other people’s thoughts and focusing on your own thoughts and experiences.
  • “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone” – Blaise Pascal
  • Rejecting close bonds during solitude provide a greater appreciation for interpersonal relationship when they eventually occur.
  • “… we are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate” – Thoreau
  • Consumer goods can change the culture of a people. Not many people wore headsets to work in the early 1990’s. That changed with the iPod and portable music
  • Previous technologies only interrupted solitude occasionally. The iPod was one of the first new technologies capable of interrupting solitude continually
  • Solitude can clarify problems, regulate emotions, help build moral courage and strengthen relationships. By continually interrupting solitude, we miss out on these.
  • Humans were not “not wired, to be constantly wired”
  • “Only thoughts reached by walking have value” – Friedrich Nietzsche
  • The art of writing is one of the most potent tools for forcing oneself into productive solitude

Chapter 5 – Don’t Click Like

  • When not engaged in a specific cognitively demanding task, the brain reverts to the “default network” (technically called the task induced deactivation network) which is essentially the same parts of the brain that lights up during social cognition experiments
  • “We are interested in the social world because we are built to turn on the default network during our free time” – Matthew Lieberman (2013 book, Social)
  • It just happens that social media hijacks the brains tendency to switch to the default the network when not engaged in cognitively demanding work
  • Social media tends to take people away from more valuable real-world socialization
  • In-person communications require sensitivity to a lot of information in order to respond appropriately. Online communication, on the other hand, is dependent on low bandwidth pixels
  • Chronic online communication simulates real in-person communication and can deceive one into believing that one is already serving their in-person relationships adequately – which may not be the case
  • There is a difference between low bandwidth online interactions (connection) and high bandwidth real-world encounters between humans (conversation)
  • Conversation is the only form of interaction that will maintain a relationship. This is because in conversations, the two parties exchange high bandwidth cues such as voice tone or facial expressions. Any communication that does not allow the transmission of high-bandwidth cues (social media, email, text) falls under connection
  • Connection interactions are not bad themselves. They can be used to set up high bandwidth conversations, or to transmit practical information (e.g., location or time of meeting)
  • The more you invest in conversations, over connections, you develop ‘relative price sensitization’ where the more time and effort you devote, the greater the increasing magical returns.

Chapter 6 – Reclaim Leisure

  • Philosophy of the financial independence movement: “If you can reduce your living expenses, you can increase your savings rate and attain your financial independent goals quicker”
  • Expending more energy on leisure can energize you. A good example of this is craft
  • “Boasting is what a boy does, who has no effect in the world, but craftsmanship must reckon with the infallible judgement of reality, where one’s failures or shortcomings cannot be interpreted away” – Matthew Crawford
  • Social media is marketed as how they facilitate connection. Yet, no one who spends a lot of time engaged in social media connection will be able to achieve anything of value
  • It is good idea to schedule ahead of time, periods for low-quality leisure (e.g., social media, streaming etc.)
  • In as little as 40 minutes per week, one can maximise the benefits of social media use
  • The more intentional you are about leisure, the more of it you find

Chapter 7 – Join the Attention Resistance

  • Before 1830 (when Benjamin Day launched the ‘New York Sun’ – the first penny press newspaper), publishers saw the publication as the product which they sold to willing consumers. What Benjamin Day did was convert his readers to the product and then sell their attention to advertisers
  • Market valuation of Facebook at a point (circa 2019) was greater than that of Exxon Mobil. In other words, attention is the new oil. In 2024, Exxon Mobil’s price per share was $120 compared to Facebook’s $511
  • The general innovation of the computer was the fact that it was general purpose
  • The Dunbar number of 150 is the theoretical limit on the number of people a human can maintain social relationships with. Social media tries to inflate this figure for everyone, but the tradeoff is the quality of conversations that one is able to make.
  • The slow media philosophy: Shift attention away from the casual consumption of fast, ephemeral social media to producing and consuming higher quality media
  • An example of high-quality media is reporting done after journalists have had time to process it (compared to faster breaking news that is always lower in quality)
  • Focus attention to a small number of people who have proven to be world-class on the topics you care about
  • For news-related media, look for the best argument against your preferred position.

Notes from Hall and Nordby’s ‘A Primer on Jungian Psychology’

Hall, C. S., & Nordby, V. J. (1973). A primer of Jungian psychology. Penguin.

Chapter 1 – Carl Gustav Jung (1875 – 1961)

  • Jung uses his autobiography ‘Memories, Dreams, Reflections’ (MDR) to analyze and describe his life through the subjective world of dreams, visions and spiritual experiences
  • Schopenhauer influenced Jung with his philosophy of suffering, confusion, passion and evil
  • Jung developed the word-association tests, where patients were asked to give a verbal response to a word prompt. If they hesitated or expressed an emotion before answer, it indicated the presence of a complex
  • Jung went to Tunis, the Sahara Desert, and New Mexico to also study the behaviors of the native people – especially the level of the mind called the ‘collective unconscious’ (reminiscent of Paul’s visit to Arabia after his conversion?)
  • Jung spent more time learning new things, rather than systematizing his concepts

Chapter 2 – The Structure of the Personality

  • Understanding personality entails 3 levels of enquiry:
    • Structural: What are the components of the personality?
    • Dynamic: How are the components of personality activated?
    • Developmental: How does personality develop and change over time?

The Psyche

  • This embodies feelings, thoughts, behavior and adaptation to the physical and social environment
  • The psyche of an individual is a whole, not an assemblage of parts built from experience
  • Man does not strive for wholeness. He already has it and must develop to his psyche to attain and maintain this wholeness.
  • When the psyche lacks wholeness, it leads to a deformed personality. Hence, the goal of psychoanalysis is psychosynthesis
  • Three levels of the psyche are
    • Conscious
    • Personal unconscious
    • Collective unconscious

Consciousness

  • This is the part of the psyche know directly by the individual
  • Conscious awareness has 4 mental functions
    • Thinking
    • Feeling
    • Sensing
    • Intuiting
  • The most dominant mental function determines how character vary from person to person
  • Two attitudes determine the orientation of the conscious mind
    • Extraversion which orients towards the objective world
    • Introversion which orients towards the subjective world
  • A person’s consciousness becomes separated from other people through individuation. This is vital for psychological development
  • The goal of individuation is complete self-consciousness
  • Ego
  • Ego refers to the organization of the conscious mind. It is comprised of conscious perceptions, memories, thoughts and feelings (collectively called psychic material)
  • Unless the ego acknowledges a psychic material, the individual is not aware of it
  • By selecting and eliminating psychic materials, ego provides a sense of identity and continuity that can be called the individual personality
  • Selection or elimination of psychic material depends on:
    • The dominant mental function (thinking, feeling, sensing, intuiting)
    • Degree of anxiety that the psychic material elicits. If high, it is eliminated
    • The level of individuation (separation from the other; self-consciousness) that the individual has already attained
    • Intensity of an experience. Strong experiences can force their way into acceptance by the ego

The personal unconscious

  • Experiences and psychic material not selected by the ego are stored in the personal unconscious
  • The personal unconscious contains psychic materials not selected by the ego, as well as psychic activities that were once conscious but have been either repressed because of the pain they cause, or ignored by the conscious because of their irrelevance
  • Material in the personal unconscious can be recalled as the need arises, as well as during dreams
  • Complexes
    • Groups of psychic material in the personal unconscious may clump together to form a complex
    • Jung elicited complexes through the word-association tests
    • He found that psychic material in the personal unconscious act like separate autonomous personalities within an individual’s personality. They can also control an individual by driving behavior towards another direction that might be separate from the ego
    • An aim of psychoanalysis is to dissolve complexes so that the person may be individuated fully
    • Complexes are not always bad. They can be drawn upon for drive and motivation as the need arises
    • Strong complexes can motivate an individual towards high quality behaviors, while a weak complex has the opposite effect

The collective unconscious

  • The content of the individual’s mind is linked not only to his personal history, but to also his evolutionary history
  • The collective unconscious possesses psychic material not acquired through personal history
  • The psychic material of the collective unconscious is comprised of primordial images inherited from man’s ancestral history
  • These psychic materials predispose the individual to act and respond to the world in a manner similar to how his ancestors might have done
  • The more experiences a person has, the more chances he has to dislodge contents in the collective unconscious which can play a role in facilitating individuation. One way to get these experiences is through an environment with opportunities for learning.
  • Archetypes
    • These are the contents of the collective unconscious
    • The contents of an archetype are only known when they are brought to the conscious
    • Although separate in the collective unconscious, the archetypes can form combinations
    • Archetypes are universal. Everyone inherits the same types of archetypes
    • Archetypes can only be brought into conscious behavior only after combining with complexes containing the relevant psychic materials and experiences
    • 4 Archetypes relevant to everyone’s personality include:
      • The persona
        • This helps the individual portray a character that is not necessarily his own
        • This is a person’s public appearance that enables social acceptance
        • It is also called the conformity archetype
        • People often lead dual lives – one dominated by the persona, and the other dominated by activities that satisfy the psychic needs
        • When a person becomes too involved with the persona, the ego begins to identify solely with it at the expense of other aspects of the personality. This results in inflation, whereby the persona is overdeveloped and other aspects of the personality is underdeveloped
        • Parents often try to project their personas onto their children. Society and groups do the same through customs and laws
        • A person with inflation might also feel inferiority when he’s unable to meet up with the standards of the persona
      • The Anima & the Animus
        • This is the feminine side of the masculine, and the masculine side of the feminine
        • A man who only exhibits masculine traits will have feminine traits that remain underdeveloped. Consequently, the unconscious become weakened.
        • This is typified in the externally macho man who is weak and submissive on the inside
        • A man’s first projection of the anima is his mother; a woman’s first projection of the animus is her father
        • In Western culture, the anima and animus are often deflated because society frowns upon expressions of femininity in men and masculinity in women. A consequence of this is overcompensation whereby the man becomes more feminine than masculine – even to the extent of gender reassignment surgery
      • The shadow
        • This deals with man’s most basic animal instincts
        • To be a part of a community, it is necessary for a man to tame his shadow by suppressing its contents. The effect of this is a civilized man with no Nietzschean ‘Will to Power’
        • Even when tamed, the shadow may express itself in the consciousness when a person is faced with the appropriate environmental situation, such as a crisis or difficult life event. When the ego is stunned into inaction, the shadow can step into the situation and deal with it adequately if it has been allowed to be individuated. If not, the shadow has no response and the individual is overwhelmed and helpless in the situation
      • The self
        • The self is the organizing principle of the personality
        • It harmonizes the archetypes, their manifestations in the complexes and the consciousness
        • When the self archetype is developed, the person feels in harmony. If not, the person feels out-of-sorts
        • The self archetype is not evident until self-consciousness and full individuation has occurred
        • Knowledge of the self archetype is possible through dream analyses, as well as ritualistic practices of certain religions
        • By making contents of his unconscious conscious, man is able to live in harmony with his nature
        • A person unaware of his unconscious self projects the repressed elements of his unconscious unto others
        • The self archetype is inward facing in contrast to the ego which is outward facing

Interactions among the structures of the personality

  • If extraversion is the dominant attitude of the conscious mind, the unconscious mind compensates by developing the repressed introversion. The unconscious always compensates for weaknesses in the personality
  • There is always conflict between the parts of the personality. When conflict leads to shattering of the personality, neuroses develop. If the conflicts are tolerated, they provide the energy, drive and motivation for achievement

Chapter 3 – Dynamics of Personality

The Psyche: A relatively closed system

  • What happens with the energy added to the psyche from external sources is determined by the kind of energy already within the psyche
  • Energy from external sources is derived from the senses
  • The slightest addition of energy to an unstable psyche can lead to large effects on behavior, e.g., an innocent comment leading to a transfer of aggression
  • At certain points in time, new experiences may overcrowd the psyche leading to a disruption in balance. At points like this, meditation and withdrawal might be needed to help the individual rebalance. Conversely, a person’s life might be too boring such that novelty and new experiences will reactive the psyche into a state of vigor
  • A completely open psyche is chaotic; a completely closed psyche is stagnant; a healthy psyche is somewhere in the middle

Psychic energy

  • Psychic energy (also called libido) is the energy by which the work of the personality is done. It is manifested through appetite, striving, desiring and willing.
  • Psychic energy expresses itself as either actual or potential drive to perform psychological work
  • Experiences are consumed by the psyche and converted into psychic energy
  • The psyche is always active – even in sleep
  • Psychic energy can be converted to physical energy and vice versa, but they are not the same.

Psychic values

  • A value is the psychic energy committed to a psychic element. When high, the psychic element exerts a high force on one’s behavior
  • Although the absolute value of an element cannot be determined, its value relative others can be determined by simply observe how much time, energy and choice is devoted to various activities
  • A conscious value that disappears without expression in overt behavior is kept in the unconscious
  • Power of complexes to attract values discarded from the conscious can be accessed indirectly through the following methods:
    • Direct observation and deduction from circumstantial evidence and dreams
    • Complex indicators such as exaggerated emotional reactions
    • Emotional reactions
    • Intuition whereby people perceive the slightest emotional disturbance in others

The Principle of Equivalence

  • Psychodynamics deals with the transfer and distribution of psychic energy throughout the psychic structures
  • The principle of equivalence states that energy is never lost in the psyche, but transferred from one position to the other
  • When sums of psychic energy seem to have disappeared, it implies that they have been transferred from the conscious to the unconscious
  • When a personality system has finite amount of energy at one point in time, there is competition between the psychic structures for this energy
  • During the transfer of energy from one structure to the other, some of characteristics of the previous structure are also transferred to the next. For instance, psychic energy drawn from the ego to the persona leaves the individual striving less to be himself and more to meet expectations of others

The Principle of Entropy

  • This states that if two values are of unequal strength, psychic energy will pass from the stronger value to the weaker one until balance is reached. This balance, though, is never reached in practice, otherwise, energy flow will stop indefinitely
  • Intrapsychic conflict shares a lot in common with interpersonal conflict because, most times, the latter is a projection of the conflicts going on within our personality
  • When people close their minds to new experiences, they are able to approach a state of balance
  • New experiences are often not as upsetting for older people as they are for younger people. This is because new experiences hold less psychic energy for older people in comparison to younger people
  • When  a psychic structure becomes highly developed within the personality, it outcompetes other structures in getting access to psychic energy within and entering the psyche. A strong complex will attract more experiences to it

Progression and regression

  • Progression refers to the daily experiences of the individual that advances his psychological adaptation
  • For proper psychological development, progression must not be one-sided, but must flow towards a psychic function and its opposite
  • Regression refers to the loss of psychic energy on account of collision and interactions between the psychic structures
  • Progression adds energy, while regression subtracts energy
  • Man can adapt to the world only when he’s in harmony with himself; man can only be in harmony with himself when he’s adapted to the world. In Western civilization, emphasis is placed on adaptation to the world at the expense of inner harmony
  • Periods of withdrawal from the world during retreats and sleep are essential for renewing one’s energies from the reservoirs of the unconscious. Modern man does not do enough of this
  • Progression shouldn’t be confused with development. The former deals with energy flow into the psyche, while the latter deals with individuation/ self-consciousness

Canalization of Energy

  • Psychical energy can be channeled, converted and transformed
  • The instincts (shadow? id? reptilian brain? motivating operations? appetites?) is the source of natural energy. It needs to be diverted to other channels for work to be done
  • Natural man, unlike civilized man, is guided solely by his instincts. Hence, he has no culture, symbolic forms, social organizations and so on.
  • Work, according to Jung, is the conversion of instinctual energy to cultural and symbolic channels. Imitation and analogy-making is the process by which instinctual energy is diverted to cultural and symbolic channels
  • Rituals and ceremonies are a means through which a person can be psychologically prepared for a task at hand
  • Civilized/Modern man depends more on his will than on ceremonies and rituals. However, these “acts of will” form analogies/conversions of the original instincts
  • Libido (instinctual energy) can be converted via an ‘act of will’ only when there is a strong symbol to divert the energy to it
  • Excess libidinal energy helped man transform from being solely instinctual to subduing nature through science, technology and art

Chapter 4 – The development of personality

Problems of the first half of life are those of instinctual adaptations (channeling of libido); problems of second half of life are those of adaptation to being

Individuation

  • The individual begins life in a state of undifferentiated wholeness. Development goes in the direction of self-consciousness
  • Development occurs not only when the person is differentiated from the other, but also when the intrapsychic systems are differentiated from each other. For instance, the underdeveloped ego can only express itself in a limited amount of overt behaviors. The developed ego has more responses in its repertoire
  • The better the symbols a man seeks, the closer he is towards attaining individuation
  • Although individuation is an autonomous process, the personality needs proper experiences and education for healthy individuation to occur. All aspects of the personality must be given the appropriate experience for a well-rounded development
  • Individuation can only occur when the person is conscious. The goal of education is to make the unconscious conscious

Transcendence and Integration

  • The transcendence function unites all opposing ends in the personality towards attaining the goal of wholeness. The unity of self occurs during transcendence
  • Transcendence is a synthesis of opposing ends in the personality such the whole is greater than the sum of the parts
  • Factors responsible for hindering personality development include:
    • The role of the parents
      • In the first years of life, the child’s psyche is a reflection of that of the parents. Psychic disturbances in the parents are likely to be reflected in the child
      • At school, the child’s identification with the parents weaken. Some parents respond by being overprotective and preventing the child from experiencing a wide range of experiences. Others also try to overcompensate their weaknesses by encouraging the child to overdevelop areas in his personality that are really the parents’ weakness
      • A boy child’s relationship with the mother determines how the anima is developed; relationship with the father determines how the shadow is developed. The reverse holds true for girls
    • Education
      • Skilled teachers make the unconscious conscious and also provides a wealth of experiences that attracts energy away from the instincts
    • Other influences from the larger society such as culture and religion

Regression

  • Progression implies that the conscious ego is harmonizing the environment with the needs of the psyche
  • Regression refers to the flow of psychic energy from the environment to the unconscious
  • Regression into the unconscious, during retreats, meditations and sleep, can provide information on impediments to development, as well as how to overcome them. People in modern times do not pay attention to these – particularly dreams. Instead, they resort to drinking, sensuality, etc., which is not as informative

Stages of Life

  • Childhood
    • Birth to sexual maturity
    • No problems because of the absence of a conscious ego
    • Psychic life is governed by the instincts until the ego starts to form
  • Youth and young adulthood
    • Puberty
    • Psyche is burdened by problems and adaptations to social life
    • Problems of youth arise from clinging to a childhood level of consciousness
    • Goal of this stage is external values to make one’s place in the world
  • Middle age
    • 35 – 40
    • Person is adapted to external values
    • Goal of this stage is to form a new set of values. These values are spiritual
  • Old age
    • Similar to childhood; absence of a conscious ego to an extent. Sinking into the unconscious

Chapter 5 – Psychological Types

The Attitudes

  • In extraversion, libido is channeled towards the objective, external world; in introversion, libido flows towards the intrapsychic structures
  • The presence of an attitude in the conscious means that the mutually exclusive opposite attitude manifests itself in the unconscious. Although in the unconscious, the opposite attitude can influence behavior indirectly when the individual behaves in an unusual manner

The Functions

  • Thinking involves connecting ideas to arrive at a concept or solution; Feeling involves rejecting or accepting an idea based on the pleasant or unpleasant emotions they arouse; Sensation refers to the perception of experiences through the senses; Intuition refers to the perception of experiences through sources exclusive of the senses (extrasensory perception)
  • Thinking and Feeling are rational functions; sensation and intuition are irrational functions

Combination of attitudes and functions  + Types of individuals

  • Extraverted thinking: Events in the external world activate thinking (inductive thinking)
    • Learns as much as possible about the external world
    • More pragmatic
    • Perceived as impersonal or cold
    • Represses feelings which may leave thoughts sterile
  • Introverted thinking: Events in the inner mental world activate thinking (deductive thinking)
    • Loves ideas, especially the ideas of being
    • Ideas might bear little relevance to reality
    • Doesn’t value people
    • May be stubborn and inconsiderate
  • Extraverted feeling: Feeling is governed by external/traditional criteria
    • Conservative and conventional
    • Feelings change as situations change
    • Emotional, gushy moody
    • Form attachments with people, but can lose them easily
  • Introverted feeling: Feeling is governed by subjective criteria
    • original, creative, unusual, bizarre
    • Keep their feelings to themselves
    • Silent, inaccessible, indifferent
    • Melancholic, depressed
    • Appearance of inner harmony
  • Extraverted sensation: Sensation determined by objective reality
    • Sensation governed by facts
    • Realistic, practical, hard-headed
    • Not concerned with the meaning of things
    • Sensual, pleasure-loving
  • Introverted sensation: Sensation determined by subjective reality at a particular time
    • Sensation governed by psychic state
    • Considers the world banal and uninteresting compared to the inner world of the mind
    • Expresses self with difficulty – except by the arts
    • May appear calm but in reality is uninteresting because of a lack of thought and feeling
  • Extraverted intuition: Intuition governed by possibilities of objective situations
    • Intuition moves from object to object
    • Restless, always looking for new worlds to conquer
    • Deficient in thought and they cannot pursue intuitions for long
    • They can promote new enterprises but cannot sustain interest for long
    • Routine bore them
  • Introverted sensation: Intuition governed by possibilities of mental phenomena
    • Intuition moves from image to image
    • Enigma to friends, misunderstood genius by self
    • Cannot communicate effectively with others
    • Isolated from others
    • May have brilliant intuitions which others may help develop

Practical Considerations

  • Role of parents is to respect the child’s rights to develop his inner nature and offer the child every opportunity to do so
  • Best friendships and marriages are achieved between fully individuated persons

Chapter 6 – Symbols and Dreams

  • Symbols are outward manifestations of the archetype
  • Archetypes are only expressed via symbols, since they are buried in the collective unconscious. Only by interpreting symbols, dreams, visions, myths and art can one access the contents of the collective unconscious

Amplification

  • The goal of amplification is to understand the symbolic significance of a dream, fantasy, painting or any human product

Symbols

  • Purposes of a symbol
    • Attempt to satisfy an instinctual impulse that has been frustrated
    • Transformations of libidinal energy into cultural or spiritual values, e.g., sex is transformed to dance; aggression is transformed to competitive games
  • Man’s history is a record of his search for better symbols that individuate the archetypes
  • Modern symbols (machines, tech, corporations, political systems) are expressions of the shadow and the persona at the expense of other aspects of the psyche
  • Knowledge in the symbols must be amplificated before the message is known
  • Two aspects of a symbol
    • Retrospective which exposes the instinctual basis of a symbol
      • Causal
    • Prospective which reveals man’s yearnings for harmony
      • Teleological, finalistic
      • This has been neglected

Dreams

  • Dreams are the clearest expression of the unconscious mind
  • Big dreams, which are remote from the day’s preoccupations, are disturbances in the unconscious due to ego’s failure to deal with the external world. They are messages to be read, and guides to be followed
  • Dreams try to compensate for the neglected, undifferentiated parts of the psyche
  • Dream series
    • Look within the psyche for answers to your relationships with other people, since we project our psychic states on them
    • Conflicts are also caused by disharmony within the personality

Chapter 7 – Jung’s Place in Psychology

  • Jung’s scientific orientation also included teleology/finalism, whereby man’s present behavior is determined by his future goals
  • Synchronicity – When events occur together in time but are not the cause of one another

Musings on non-ChatGPT Writing

Although, I’m not the best writer, one thing I’ve noticed is that very few people vomit thousands of words into a word processor in one sitting. The more you read the literature within and outside your field, the more you’d realize the following:

– Many writeups have a central argument that can usually be stated in a few sentences, or one page at most.

– The art of writing simply involves finding and articulating that central argument. After this has been done, your core sentences are hedged/supported by other arguments, which in turn may be supported by other arguments.

– Your job as a writer, especially in the beginning, is to assemble evidence for your argument. This means that you rarely have to start your article from the scratch. If you’ve been a diligent student in your field, you will always know the foundational literature in your field that you can start building from.

– Finally, many stellar writers invest a lot of time editing. Venkatesh Rao, one of my writing models, would argue that for excellent writers, the ratio between actual writing and rewrites is probably about 10:90. If you feel like you’re an untalented writer, your goal is to “out-edit and out-rewrite” everyone else. The beauty of most writing you see truly comes out during the rewrites. Write. Let what you’ve written breathe a bit. Edit. Rewrite. Write again. Let it breathe. Iterate.

Four Big Ideas at 4: On MLK, Overhead Aversion, The Ring of Gyges, The Beloved Sleep

On MLK

One price of success is the higher scrutiny you will be subject to.

Perhaps the reason you’re still at your current level is because of the private battles you’ve not won yet.

Perhaps God is protecting you and you’re experiencing a dimension of grace to change your ways before it’s too late.

Everyone knows the role that Martin Luther King Jr (MLK) played in the civil rights movement.

Naturally, because of his prominent role in the struggle against inequality, MLK was subject to greater scrutiny by the powers that be.

What they found wasn’t pretty.

Behind the cool, calm and charismatic Reverend that gave the “I have a dream” speech, the FBI allegedly found a man who drank, smoked, spoke vulgar and had multiple sexual partners.

While some of the FBI findings were released sometime in 2019, this image of MLK had been painted by his associates in books they wrote as far back as the 1980s.

If you look through the annals of history, you’d find it littered with the blood and bones of great men who may have gotten public victories but were limited by their private battles.

I’m reminded of the story of the two wolves:

‘A fight is going on inside every person. It’s a terrible fight between two wolves. One is evil and the other is good. The wolf that will win is the one that is fed”

This story is instructive.

Take care of your private battles. Do everything in your power to avoid joining the list of casualties on the road to destiny.

Overhead Aversion

In their 2014 paper, “Avoiding overhead aversion in charity”, economic researchers, Ayelet Gneezy, Elizabeth Keenan, and Uri Gneezy observed that people are usually hesitant to donate to charities that spend too much on admin costs (e.g., staff salaries, supplies, utilities, etc.). They called this phenomenon overhead aversion. But charities that don’t spend money on these overhead costs will not have the infrastructure in place to meet their goals. Thus, these researchers conducted a study to find out the contexts where overhead costs won’t prevent people from donating to charities. In their study, they sent a donation request on behalf of a charitable organization to 40000 potential donors in the US. One group of potential donors were told that the charity had already received $10,000 from a private donor; another group was told that every dollar donated up to $10000 would be matched; a third group was told that the charity had already received $10000 from a private donor that would be used specifically for overhead and administrative costs; the final group were simply asked to donate. Ayelet and her collaborators found that the third group – the one where donors were told that a private donor had covered overhead costs – made the largest donation!

Ring of Gyges

In his classical book, The Republic, Plato has his brothers, Glaucon and Adeimantus, engage Socrates in a conversation about whether it is being just, or having a reputation for being just that makes people to happy. The brothers construct their argument by invoking the mythical ring of Gyges which was supposed to make people invisible at will. The brothers hypothesized that if such a ring existed, one can tell the true nature of human beings. A person wearing the ring of Gyges will have no constraints on his actions but will be steal, kill and live wildly without any fear of negative consequences. Since there is no real ring of Gyges, Glaucon and Adeimantus argue that people only act virtuously to escape consequences in the form of damage to their reputations when they are caught.

The Beloved Sleep

For years, I read Psalms 127:2 as,

“It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep”

But the original Hebrew, in which the Old Testament was written, did not have commas and full stops; and this may have posed a challenge to the English translators.

Now, watch what would happen if you’d place a comma in the second part of that verse…

“…for so He giveth, His beloved sleep”

The Lord is doing the giving, while His beloved ones are doing the sleeping!

Pretty cool, right?

The truth is that until you receive a revelation of the love that God has for you, you’d never be able to sleep and rest in His Love.

You can only rest and sleep when you secure yourself in the fact that your Heavenly Father loves you deeply!

Just take a look at what John the Beloved called himself. Do you know that Jesus didn’t bestow John with special preferential treatments? The truth is that Christ loved all His disciples the same – even Judas Iscariot.

But what distinguished John from the other disciples?

Well, John simply secured himself with the revelation that the Mighty God in human form could actually love him. He meditated on this, and magnified the love that Jesus had for him in His heart.

The truth is that until you receive the revelation that you are God’s beloved, you cannot rest and sleep and allow Him to give His benefits to you.

Instead, you’d always want to do things to earn/merit God’s blessings, favor and all. You’d wake up early and sleep late, all in a bid to merit God’s blessings by your works!

But there’s a better way!

Receive a revelation that YOU are the Lord’s beloved. And then you can rest and sleep, as your Heavenly Father does ALL the giving, while you do the receiving!!!

Four Big Ideas at 4: Third-order Effects, Austrian Wills, Whorf’s Hypothesis, Digging for Gold

Third-order Effects

In the early 1440s, German craftsman Johannes Gutenberg introduced the printing press which revolutionized the way books were produced. Prior to this invention, books were extremely expensive to produce and only available for the elite. With the printing press, that changed. Books could be produced much more quickly and at a much lower cost. This had the first-order effect of making them more widely available to people, which, in turn, led to a second-order effect – an explosion of knowledge and ideas. One of the people who was influenced by this new availability of knowledge was Martin Luther. He read a copy of the Bible for himself and had a revelation that people could connect with God through faith alone, without needing to rely on middlemen or the infrastructure of the Church. The idea that people could acquire knowledge and understanding without gatekeepers was a natural extension of this concept. With books more widely available, people could acquire their own personal copies and interpret the meaning for themselves. This also meant that people from all walks of life could access specialized information about new technologies, business strategies, and financial opportunities, which ultimately had the third-order effect of driving innovation and economic growth, first in Europe, then to the rest of the world.

Austrian Wills

Sigmund Freud, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Viktor Frankl were all prominent figures in the fields of psychology and philosophy who lived in Vienna, Austria at some point in their lives. They were all interested in human nature and wrote extensively about the motivating forces powering human drives. Freud was a proponent of the Will-to-Pleasure perspective which suggests that people are driven by the need to maximize pleasure and minimize pain in their lives. Nietzsche, on the other hand, posited Will-to-Power approach where people are driven by the need to overcome obstacles and be in control of their lives; Frankl, for his part, came from the Will-to-Meaning perspective where people are driven by the need to make meaning out of their different circumstances. Most people are driven by a combination of the three wills: Will-to-Pleasure, Will-to-Power, Will-to-Meaning

Whorf’s Hypothesis

In his now classic 1940 journal article, Science and linguistics, Benjamin Lee Whorf proposed the controversial position that the way we think about the world is influenced by our language.

As humans, we like to hold ourselves up as rational beings that have used the power of intellect to bring nature to its knees. We cite the examples of Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein – the great men of science whose elegant mathematical formulas form the foundations upon which our present understanding of the physical world is built.

Yet, we take for granted the role that the language they spoke played on the way they thought.

For instance, in English, sentences take the form of actor-action. So, we say, ‘The boy is running’ or ‘Lightning is striking’. In contrast, in Hopi, a language spoken by a Native Indian tribe in North America, sentences take the form of action duration. Therefore, instead of saying ‘The boy is running’, the Hopi people will say ‘Running’, and instead of saying ‘Lightning is striking’, they will simply say ‘Lightning’.

This slight distinction in language implies that to those who speak English, an action can never occur in isolation – there must always be an actor responsible for causing the action. In contrast, the Hopi are satisfied with actions without a cause.

The same event occurring in the world evokes a reaction in the observer that is dependent on the language he/she thinks in!

Digging for Gold

Proverbs 21:5 says, “The thoughts of the diligent tend only to plenteousness, but everyone that is hasty only to want”

In the original Hebrew text, the word translated “diligent” implies the continual act of mining for gold or digging a trench.

No one digs for gold by striking the topsoil once with a shovel before giving up.

Yet, when we think, we don’t hold our thoughts and spiritual impressions long enough for them to take root.

The Bible promises that if you’re diligent with the thoughts that God impresses upon your heart in the same manner a man mining for gold continues to digs, you will lead a fulfilling life.

Consider this: Perhaps the reason you’re facing chaos in your life is because you’re too hasty in thought – refusing to consider a thought long enough before jumping into your next bout of busyness and distraction.

Four Big Ideas at 4: The Drake Treasure, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Contexts for Cooperation, Wellsprings of Counsel

The Drake Treasure

In the early 1900s, Oscar Hartzell made a lot of money by running a scam involving Sir Francis Drake’s supposed fortune. He called up people in Iowa with the last name “Drake” and told them he was a distant relative. He claimed that Sir Francis Drake’s estate, worth $100 billion, had never been paid to his heirs, and he promised to give everyone who invested $500 for every dollar they put in. At the height of the scam, even people outside of Iowa and without the last name Drake fell for Hartzell’s scheme. Around 1917, Hartzell went to London to meet with the supposed heir of the Drake estate, but he ended up staying there and living a luxurious lifestyle. He kept telling his investors that he was negotiating with the British government for the money and needed more donations for expenses. His agents in the Midwest collected the money, even though some of them believed in the scam. Hartzell was eventually found out and deported back to America where he stood trial in 1933. By that time, he had collected $800,000 (almost $20M in 2023 dollars) from the scam, and during the trial, his followers sent him a further $68,000 for legal fees. This is a story that demonstrates how people, with different histories, interests, passions and backgrounds can be united by a common belief, even if that belief is based on a falsehood.

The Theory of Moral Sentiments

Adam Smith is today known for his concept of “the invisible hand” where people, in pursuit of their selfish interests, could create products and services that other people wanted. When this happens, there is increased economic growth and prosperity for everybody. However, in his lesser-known book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, Smith argues that people’s behavior are also influenced by another kind of “invisible hand” – the approval or disapproval of others. Although people are inherently selfish and self-centered, the approval or disapproval of others serves as feedback for the kinds of behavior that should be repeated in the future. Hence, majority of the time, most people will behave in a prosocial manner because doing so is likely to be rewarded with social approval while not doing so will be met with social disapproval.

Contexts for Cooperation

In their 2013 study titled, “Religious context and prosociality: An experimental study from Valparaíso, Chile“, researchers Ali Ahmed and Osvaldo Salas wanted to find out whether being in a religious environment could make people act more cooperative. To find out, they conducted an experiment called a one-shot public goods game. In this game, people in a group are given some money or tokens and have to decide whether to keep it for themselves or put it in a shared pool. Whatever money or tokens put in the shared pool is then multiplied by some factor and divided equally among everyone in the group. Because the tokens are multiplied, everyone benefits if they put everything they have into the pool. However, if one person holds back while others contribute, he can get extra money or tokens while others lose out. In Ahmed and Salas’ study, some groups of people played the public goods game in a church building while others played in a regular lecture hall. They found that people who played in the chapel had a higher expectation of cooperation from other players compared to those who played in the classrooms. Interestingly, how religious someone said they were didn’t affect the results of this study.

Wellsprings of Counsel

Proverbs 20:5 says, ‘Counsel in the heart of a man is like deep water; but a man of understanding will draw it out’

As you are seated there, quietly poring over the letters of this mail, you have counsel bubbling up within you.

But there is no way you would be able to draw out counsel out of your heart if you do not take a pause from the noise that you would encounter in your life.

The term ‘noise’ isn’t limited to external disturbances to the sound waves in our immediate environment. Noise also includes all forms of mental clutter that fill our minds throughout the day.

When you find yourself constantly and continuously anxious about what you would eat or what you’d wear or what people say or think about you, you are unwittingly filling your mind with mental clutter.

When you are filled with doubt, uncertainty, negative self-talk, personal prejudices influenced by your cultural background, upbringing, and so on, you are unwittingly giving in to these mental noises.

Read this carefully: If you are in a quiet, noiseless environment, far away from the rumbles of the city, but your mind is in a state of clutter, you’d still be unable to tap from the wellsprings of counsel available within you!

You’re only going to be able to discern and draw out what you’ve got within you if you are able to still your mind from the noises from everyday living and negative self-talk.

Four Big Ideas at 4: Khrushchev’s Heckler, The Parable of The Mad Man, Subtractive Changes, Identity-Based Excellence

Khrushchev’s Heckler

Sometime in the 1950s, former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev gave a speech denouncing the crimes of his predecessor Joseph Stalin. During the speech, a heckler interrupted Khrushchev and asked why he did not stop Stalin. Khrushchev did not see the heckler, and asked “Who said that?” When no one responded, Khrushchev replied, “Now you know why I didn’t stop him.”

Khrushchev did not use rhetoric and rationality argue his position. All he had to do was replicate the visceral feeling of fear in the mind of his heckler. That was more convincing than any argument he could have made.

The Parable of the Mad Man

In his book, The Gay Science, German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, tells the story of tells the story of a man who ran into a marketplace yelling that he seeks God. The people begin mocking him instead of helping him. In response, the madman then proclaims that they have killed God, and that everyone is responsible for his murder. Although Nietzsche was an atheist, he used the parable to highlight what happens in a society that pushes God out of its consciousness in the name of scientific innovations and technological breakthroughs. A society that has ejected God has no foundation upon which it can erect its morality and ethics. For people living in such a society, everything else loses its meaning and value – leaving people feeling lost and uncertain without a sense of identity and purpose.

Subtractive Changes

In their paper titled, People systematically overlook subtractive changes, Adams and colleagues conduct a series of experiments where participants were asked to improve various designs, such as recipes, golf course layouts, travel itineraries, and Lego bridges. Despite scenarios where subtracting was the better strategy for improvement, participants overwhelmingly kept on adding to the designs. This tendency is likely due to the fact that people simply did not consider subtraction as a possibility and instead instinctively defaulted to adding. This may explain why individuals often find themselves adding more to their already busy schedules, or why some interventions cause more harm when they are introduced into a system.

Identity-Based Excellence

Daniel 1:8 says, “But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king’s meat, nor with the wine which he drank: therefore he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself.”

To manifest excellence, you must have a God-inspired identity. Daniel’s example illustrates this point. He was determined and uncompromising about his convictions, but at the root of his convictions was his identity as an Israelite Jew. Daniel saw himself as a member of a nation chosen to be in covenant with God, and this sense of identity governed every aspect of his life.

In the same way, you need to find your identity in God’s Words and who He says you are. The devil will try to shake your sense of identity by tempting you to shift our sense of worth away from who God says you are. But it is only when your identity is centered in God’s Word that you can manifest excellence in everything you lay your hands to do.

Four Big Ideas at 4: Inversion, Teleology, Lindy Effect, Length of Days

Inversion

Carl Jacobi was a renowned 19th-century German mathematician who made profound contributions to the field of differential equations. One aspect that set Jacobi apart was his unique problem-solving approach. Jacobi believed that when one inverts known facts in a particular discipline, additional knowledge can be revealed that was previously unknown. He always encouraged his graduate students to invert the known confines of the field and examine what they found there.

Jacobi’s approach, known as “inversion,” involves thinking in a contrarian way and challenging assumptions. By asking questions that invert a problem, such as “What would happen if we did the opposite?” or “How can we make the problem worse?”, one can identify the things that are preventing them from achieving their goals and find new solutions and insights that they may have missed otherwise. Inversion is now considered an analytic strategy fundamental to scientific and mathematical thinking, and it can be applied to many other areas of life, such as business, personal relationships, and self-improvement.

Inversion is not just about thinking differently but also about challenging one’s assumptions. By questioning preconceived ideas and beliefs, one can identify the things that are preventing them from achieving their goals. Inversion can thus help people to break free from the constraints of conventional thinking and achieve success in many areas of life.

Teleology

Aristotle’s conceptualization of the universe was based on the idea of teleology, that is, everything had a purpose or a final end point – which is rest. Thus, a ball’s final resting place is the ground and when it is thrown up, it moves towards that final resting place on the floor. Thanks to Newton’s first law of motion, Aristotle’s idea no longer relevant in a scientific context. However, I think it still has a metaphorical extension that is still applicable in a psychological and spiritual sense. This metaphor suggests that the human soul has a natural tendency to strive towards a higher purpose or state of being, which can be seen as the final resting place of the human spirit.

However, negative emotions and actions can act as weights that draw the soul towards a state of unrest, which can be seen as the depths of hell. This metaphorical extension of Aristotle’s universe has implications for how we live our lives. It suggests that we should strive towards a higher purpose or state of being, and avoid negative emotions and actions that can weigh us down. By doing so, we can achieve a state of spiritual rest and fulfillment. The metaphor of the soul as a traveler on a journey towards a final resting place can help us understand the importance of living a purposeful and virtuous life.

Lindy Effect

In a paper titled, “Implications of the Copernican principle for our future prospects”, astrophysicist J. Richard Gott III describes how in 1969, he visited the Stonehenge (which was estimated to be over 3000 years old) and the Berlin Wall (8 years at the time). Gott then wondered which of the two structures will outlast the other. As you probably know, the Berlin Wall was destroyed in 1991, while Stonehenge continues to exist to this day. Gott then mathematically proposed an argument that the longer a thing exists, the more likely it will continue to exist. This has been popularly called the Lindy Effect. This principle also applies to other areas of life, such as literature and medicine. Older books, which have stood the test of time, often contain more wisdom and practical knowledge than newer books, which may be trendy but lack staying power. The same is true of medicine, where herbal remedies that have been used for centuries are often more effective than newer drugs, which may have side effects or other problems. Using the Lindy Effect as a guide, we can focus on systems and structures that have been vetted by time, rather than always chasing the latest fad or trend. This can help us to make better decisions and achieve more lasting success.

Length of Days

Proverbs 3:1-2 says, ‘My son, forget not my law; but let thine heart keep my commandments: For length of days, and long life, and peace, shall they add to thee.’ The text encourages us to keep God’s commandments, and promises that doing so will result in “length of days” and “long life.” While these two concepts may seem similar, there is a subtle difference between them.

“Long life” refers to growing to a full, old age before expiring. This is a concept that most people are familiar with. However, “length of days” refers to the ability to make the most of each day. This means being able to accomplish more in a day than others can in a month or a year.

This idea may not be intuitive to everyone, but it is a powerful concept that can transform one’s productivity. Time is a property that is bound to the physical realm, but God is spirit and transcends the physical. This implies that when you partner with God, you unlock the potential for greater productivity and efficiency. By tapping into God’s wisdom, guidance, and strength, we can achieve more than we ever could on our own.

Four Big Ideas at 4: Mesmerized, Ergodic Systems, Mere Exposure Effect, Sacrifice

Mesmerized

Franz Mesmer was an 18th century Viennese doctor and scientist who was a pioneer in animal magnetism – the idea that people have magnetic matter within them that can be harnessed by specialists for healing purposes. Mesmer’s work faced opposition in his hometown of Vienna and he was forced to move to Paris in 1788 where his theories were met with more enthusiasm.

In Paris, Mesmer adapted his approach to suit the love for theater and spectacle among the French. He added elements like incense and harp music to his treatments and started treating patients in groups, which allowed for the belief of one person to infect others and ultimately overcome any disbelief in his methods.

Despite being discredited in his day, Franz Mesmer’s legacy lives on today. He is remembered as the patron saint of charlatans, cult leaders, and snake oil salesmen. In fact, the word “mesmerize” was derived from his name and means to hold someone’s attention with a captivating and alluring display.

Ergodic Systems

Ergodicity is the idea that the outcome for a group aligns with the lifetime outcome of each individual within the group. A simple coin toss is an example of an ergodic system – the results will always tend towards 50% heads and 50% tails, regardless of whether one person flips the coin 100 times, or 100 people flip the coin once. However, when it comes to decision making, it’s human nature to assume that everything is ergodic. But in reality, most human systems are non-ergodic. During the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, that the average number of ICU beds in a country were above some threshold did not mean that all hospitals could handle a local outbreak. In many cases, local health professionals were overwhelmed with COVID-19 cases because public health administrators had assumed ergodicity where it did not exist.

Mere Exposure Effect

In his 1968 paper, “Attitudinal effects of mere exposure.”, Robert Zajonc asked participants to rate their liking for various things such as geometric shapes, Japanese pictograms, Chinese characters, and nonsense words in a made-up language. To his surprise, he found that the mere frequency of exposure to these items, even if it was only for a fraction of a second, greatly influenced people’s liking for them. This phenomenon, known as the mere exposure effect, has been exploited by the advertising industry to shape public desire and drive consumer behavior.

Sacrifice

2 Kings 3 tells the story of Mesha, king of Moab who had rebelled against the king of Israel, ceasing his yearly tributes. In response, the King of Israel solicited help from the king of Judah and the king of Edom to reclaim Moab. But as the battle raged on, King Mesha realizes he is losing. In a desperate move, he sacrifices his own crown prince to his idol, Chemosh. What happens next is remarkable. 2 Kings 3:27 says that there was a great indignation against Israel and the allied armies withdrew their troops! Why was there an indignation against Israel even though it had been Mesha who offered his son as a sacrifice? It appears that the dynamics of the spiritual realm are sensitive to sacrifice. When we choose to give up something we hold dear, whether it’s certainty or immediate gratification, we open up opportunities for the spiritual realm to influence human activity. The question now is what will you sacrifice?

Four Big Ideas at 4: The Dreyfus Affair, The Narcissism of Small Differences, Descartes’ Error, A Tale of Two Brothers

The Dreyfus Affair

In 1894, a French military officer, Alfred Dreyfus, was wrongly accused of passing secrets to the Imperial German Army. With Anti-Semitic tendencies rampant in French society, Dreyfus’ Jewish heritage made him an easy target.

When Dreyfus stood before the jury, his calm but colorless tone was interpreted as guilt. Despite his innocence, Dreyfus was condemned to life imprisonment and publicly dishonorably discharged from the military. Even during the discharge ceremony, onlookers interpreted Dreyfus’ stoic demeanor as further proof of his guilt.

The truth soon emerged and Dreyfus’ innocence was proven, but not until after he spent three grueling years in exile. The lesson of the Dreyfus Affair? People will take the slightest emotional cues – tone of voice, for instance – and use that information jump to conclusions that support their preconceived notions.

The Narcissism of Small Differences

In a society where everyone has equal rights, such as in a democracy or on the internet, the gap between a person and the model(s) they want to imitate can shrink, leading to an increase in the potential for rivalry.

This is because in a world where everyone is equal, the smallest differences between individuals become magnified. People’s self-identity becomes shaped by the differences they have with others and hatred towards the “other” becomes a crucial component in defining themselves. People become alike in their desire not to be alike.

This phenomenon is even more relevant in contemporary times as traditional social structures that once imposed physical or metaphysical distance, such as the family, church, and monarchies, are no longer present to prevent or channel conflicts. The result is a world where the smallest differences between individuals can escalate into intense rivalries and potentially violent confrontations.

Descartes’ Error

In his book, Descartes’ Error, neuroscientist Antonio Damasio explored the role of emotions in the decision-making process. In a study comprising of patients with damage to their ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), Damasio found out that even though these individuals were emotionally unexpressive when presented with either pictures with gruesome images or those with joyous one. Despite having normal IQ scores, these individuals struggled to make even basic decisions in their personal and professional lives.

Through his research, Damasio discovered that the vmPFC integrates emotions into rational deliberations, highlighting the fact that emotions are not just disturbances that prevent us from living a full life, but are actually essential for rational decision-making. Without emotions, decisions would be based solely on weighing the pros and cons of the physical attributes of different options, which can easily become overwhelming.

A Tale of Two Brothers

In Luke 15:11-32, Jesus tells the parable of the Prodigal Son. The traditional interpretation is that there are two types of people – the wild and the responsible. But there’s so much more to this story than just that. Jesus was actually uncovering a fundamental truth about human nature in this parable.

We all have a part of us that’s impulsive, short-sighted, and driven by instant gratification – just like the Prodigal Son. But we all also have the personality of the Older Brother, who is calculated, rational, and judgmental. Both sides of human nature are united by a common thread of pathological self-centeredness.

But, there’s one constant in this story that shines through – the love of God. It’s this love that remains ever-present, no matter how far we stray or how much we judge ourselves and others.