Category: Life Ideas
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Mapping interactions between adversity and neuroplasticity across development
“Mapping interactions between adversity and neuroplasticity across development” Highlights: The human brain undergoes a protracted course of development that provides prolonged opportunities to be sculpted by experience. Yet, persistent definitional and measurement challenges have complicated efforts to understand how experience interacts with neuroplasticity during human development. Here, we synthesize previously siloed perspectives to propose an…
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The ‘made-up mind’.
“The ‘made-up mind’. Deriving new hypotheses on delusions from general psychological models of belief maintenance” Highlights Contemporary definitions of delusions highlight their resistance to conflicting evidence as the core feature, but there has been little progress in understanding why even explicit confrontation with contradicting evidence seldom leads to belief revision. This review aims to generate…
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Social networks affect redistribution decisions and polarization
“Social networks affect redistribution decisions and polarization” “Whom you observe in your daily life alters your willingness to tax the rich” Recent research suggests that the visibility of extreme wealth within a person’s social circle drives their support for economic redistribution but simultaneously fosters political polarization and personal dissatisfaction. A study published in PNAS Nexus combines computational…
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Nature on the balance sheet …
“Putting nature on the balance sheet: how to account for the ecological costs of our actions” Economists should consider forests and wetlands as well as factories and farms. A book review of “On Natural Capital: The Value of the World Around Us“, Partha Dasgupta (2025) On Natural Capital recaps the roaring economic advances of the past 75…
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Becoming Nature Positive
“Becoming Nature Positive: Transitioning to a Safe and Just Future “, an open access book from the Nature Positive Initiative Becoming Nature Positive: Transitioning to a Safe and Just Futureis a collaborative effort from a wide range of authors, covering many sectors of society. ‘Nature Positive’ is a recently agreed upon global goal to “halt and…
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Harmony in the brain
“Harmony in the brain: A narrative review on the shared neural substrates of emotion regulation and creativity” The contribution of creativity in overall well-being through regulating emotions has sparkled research interest in employing artistic interventions recently for the improvement of mental health. Although the behavioural links between emotion regulation and creativity have been established, the neural networks reflecting…
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October 7, 2025
“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves” William Shakespeare Dear Friends and Fellow Humans, I turn 70 today. For 7 decades I’ve had the privilege of living out my childhood dream, which was simply to UNDERSTAND. After spending more than half a century meeting people from all over the world…
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End GDP mania
“End GDP mania: how the world should really measure prosperity” Last week’s United Nations General Assembly, held in New York City, generated no shortage of headlines. But one notable policy initiative from the world body was not discussed by world leaders when it should have been. UN secretary-general António Guterres has put together a high-level…
