Why Speaking To Yourself In The Third Person Makes You Wiser
Scientific research suggests that you should adopt an ancient rhetorical method favoured by the likes of Julius Caesar and known as ‘illeism’ – or speaking about yourself in the third person — the term was coined in 1809 by the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge from the Latin ille meaning ‘he, that’.
How Ads Follow You Around The Internet
You’ve seen the pop-ups: “This site uses cookies to improve your experience. Please accept cookies.” Without cookies, the online world we know today couldn’t exist. But that world relies on advertising, which gives three kinds of companies a strong incentive to track your online behavior.
Grandma’s Dementia Made Her Forget Her Homophobia
After watching how my family treated my lesbian mom, I assumed it would all repeat when I came out. But as my grandma’s memory faded, her disapproval of gay people vanished too. My grandma had lost a lot of her memory, and she’d apparently forgotten her disapproval of same-sex relationships too.
What Does It Really Cost To Run A Restaurant?
Restaurants have notoriously slim margins. Irene Li, the chef and owner of Chinese-American restaurant Mei Mei in Boston, reveals just how slim they really are.
We’re Getting Closer To The Quantum Internet, But What Is It?
Instead of the bits that today’s network uses, which can only express a value of either 0 or 1, the future quantum internet would utilize qubits of quantum information, which can take on an infinite number of values. A quibit is the unit of information for a quantum computer; it’s like a bit in an ordinary computer.
What To Do When You’re Feeling Lost
If you’ve ever pushed hard or cared deeply about something then you’ve probably experienced a feeling of being lost. Perhaps this manifests as being unsure of what to do next; unsure of how to do it; or even unsure of why you’re doing what you’re doing in the first place.
The Food Expiration Dates You Should Actually Follow
Here’s the first thing you should know: Expiration dates are not expiration dates. Food product dating, as the U.S. Department of Agriculture calls it, is completely voluntary for all products — with the exception of baby food. Not only that, but it has nothing to do with safety.
The Age Of Envy: How To Be Happy When Everyone Else’s Life Looks Perfect
We live in the age of envy. Career envy, kitchen envy, children envy, food envy, upper arm envy, holiday envy. You name it, there’s an envy for it. Social media has created a world in which everyone seems ecstatic – apart from us. Is there any way for people to curb their resentment?
Your Brain Can Only Take So Much Focus
In keeping with recent research, both focus and unfocus are vital. The brain operates optimally when it toggles between focus and unfocus, allowing you to develop resilience, enhance creativity, and make better decisions too.
We Are Living In A Failed State
When the virus came here, it found a country with serious underlying conditions, and it exploited them ruthlessly. Chronic ills—a corrupt political class, a sclerotic bureaucracy, a heartless economy, a divided and distracted public—had gone untreated for years. We had learned to live, uncomfortably, with the symptoms.
How Offshore Oil Rigs Work
Offshore oil rigs are inherently a higher-cost, higher-risk method of oil extraction, but the oceans are, of course, home to a huge proportion of the world’s oil reserves so, if there are no more low-cost oilfields on land, that’s where the companies go.
How Eating Alone Is Radically Changing Our Diets
Eating alone has become a defining feature of modern life: the breakfasting commuter; the household members with conflicting schedules; the widower who receives few visitors.
How Ketamine Became The Drug Of Choice For Our Dissociated Moment
Technically speaking, ketamine is a dissociative anesthetic, meaning that it numbs your body and makes you feel apart from your environment — like you’re watching your own life happen instead of living it. But that doesn’t begin to capture the weirdness of what it feels like to get high on K.
How Philadelphia Became “The First City That Bombed Itself”
In 1985, an armed standoff between Philadelphia police and members of a radical black liberation group, resulted in the deaths of eleven people. No police officers or city officials were ever charged for their role in what’s known as the MOVE bombing.
How We’ll Forget John Lennon
The report, “The universal decay of collective memory and attention,” concludes that people and things are kept alive through “oral communication” from about five to 30 years. They then pass into written and online records, where they experience a slower, longer decline.
The Unlisted: How People Without An Address Are Stripped Of Their Basic Rights
Without an address, it’s nearly impossible to get a bank account. And without a bank account, you can’t save money, borrow money or receive a state pension. But large parts of the world’s population still live off the map.
Young Men Embrace Gender Equality, But They Still Don’t Vacuum
Young people today have become much more open-minded about gender roles — it shows up in their attitudes about pronouns, politics and sports. But in one area, change has been minimal. They are holding on to traditional views about who does what at home.
I Was a Proud Non-Breeder. Then I Changed My Mind.
When I hear younger women confidently describe how they’ll feel when they’re older, sometimes I feel a pinch of such condescension myself. Not because I think they’ll all necessarily want kids, or that they should have them, but because one tricky thing about your 20s is the need to make decisions for a future self whose desires are unknowable.
Children of Scientology: Life After Growing Up In An Alleged Cult
For many raised in the church, escape presents a singular problem. “They have an identity to go back to,” says one former Scientologist. “We’re trying to discover our identity in a vacuum.”
Death On Demand: Has Euthanasia Gone Too Far?
Countries around the world are making it easier to choose the time and manner of your death. As the world’s pioneer, the Netherlands has also discovered that although legalizing euthanasia might resolve one ethical conundrum, it opens a can of others – most importantly, where the limits of the practice should be drawn.
The Price Of Dominionist Theology
Because my father believed that debt was sinful, and believed God wanted him and my mom to have as many kids as possible, they were too broke to help me pay for college. Because of this anti-debt theology, I wasn’t allowed to take out student loans, and had to attend a really conservative Christian college because it was so cheap.