有趣的灵魂

你的世界太过拥挤，你因为善良而顾全为难，曾经是我一直“诟病”的所在。听你娓娓道来人际往来的趣事，我也曾嘲笑你自带“知心大姐”的体质，轻易就让人敞开心扉倾吐心声，你亦有疑惑，为什么总是能遇到交浅却言深的人。

其实，仔细想来，大概还是因为你一直引以为傲的“有一颗有趣的灵魂”罢。

今天在逛油管时，老梁情商课 ——“如何成为一个有趣的人”被推送到我的眼前，心里突然一动，不妨姑妄听之，没准我也能学上几招，让自己没那么无趣。 何况，他是被你endorse过的人。

开章明义，他从世上不少看似相貌极不匹配的恩爱姻缘引出：好看的皮囊千篇一律，有趣的灵魂万里挑一。至于如何才能成为一个有趣的人，他给出四点建议：

一是保持好奇心，广泛涉猎大量看似“无用”的技能。决定生命的质量往往来自你的好奇心，生活说到底是柴米油盐，但趣味是对生活的不妥协。功利心不要太重，最终沦为一个有用却无趣的人。

二是要有广泛的知识储备。肚子里有货的人，对事物往往有很多有趣的解读，不偏激，不浅薄，包容万象，海纳百川。有知识未必能有趣，但有趣一定要有知识。毕竟，有趣来自知识之杂，来自思想之深，来自阅历之广，来自涵养之良，来自超出同时代人的格局之大。

三是要保持个性，做个性情中人。明人张岱总结得精妙：人无癖不可与交，以其无深情也；人无疵不可与交，以其无真气也。而被称为“鬼才”的黄永玉则用其特立独行的一生书写了“世人笑我太疯癫，我笑世人不好玩”的评价。哪怕时光变迁，初心依旧不改，有趣才能继续。

四是要拥有幽默自嘲的心态。

听完，有果不其然之感觉。回想起以前很多和你的笑语谐论，与他的建议有异曲同工之妙，所差只是归纳总结提炼而已。

《增广贤文》之知人篇

知人识人，是你的强项，是我的短板。

大概，这也是你的人生活得远比我丰富精彩值得的原因之一罢。

近来颇听了几期老梁的脱口秀节目。他很推崇传统蒙学书籍之一的《增广贤文》，以为其深蕴闪转腾挪、进退有度的人生智慧，并专门以此解读成四个系列：知人、晓事、修心、笃行。其中，我比较喜欢“知人”系列。

习惯使然，将其中的解说精华，记录一下，以备后阅。

• 人情猛于虎：《增广贤文》的原话是“虎生犹可近，人熟不可亲”。解读一下，就是朋友之间，也要注意两点：一是心灵上不要过分亲近，这样不会有过高的期望值而致的失望。典型案例，就是秦末张耳陈余列传。 二是行为上不能过分亲近，失了分寸感。举例说明，就是张爱玲和苏青因胡兰成而起的疏远。
• 朋友圈的断舍离：这篇用了《增广贤文》里的三句话来阐述。
• 断——知音说与知音听，不是知音莫与谈。
• 舍——志不同己不必强合。当弃则弃。
• 离——酒逢知己饮，诗向会人吟。交朋友，得分清知己和人脉的区别，知己是志同道合的，用来交换感情的，要珍惜；人脉是用来交换资源的，可以往来，但要保持距离。
• 交友是场交易：初听标题好像很功利，听后发现其实逻辑自洽。《增广贤文》提供了明确的原则：结交须胜己，似我不如无。三人行必有我师，择其善者而从之，其不善者而改之。交友是个互换的过程，朋友要长久，要么是资源互换，要么是优势互补。
• 远离小人：交友的标准在《增广贤文》里也有清晰的表述：栽树要栽松柏，结交要结君子；易涨易退山溪水，易反易覆小人心。怎么慧眼识人呢？可以参考冯道写的《荣枯鉴》，因为他自己是个地道小人，深谙其味，所以能写尽天下小人的各种形态，使小人汗颜、君子惊悚。读者诸君一旦发现周遭有人符合了“无底线、怕规则、善变化和喜君子（君子的仁慈是小人生长的沃土）”这几个特征，建议速速远离为上。
• 熟人成仇：《增广贤文》的解读是“相逢好似初相识，到老终无怨恨心”。也就是说熟人相处，越是熟悉，越是要保持界限感，越要尊重和理解对方。
• 逢人只说三分话，未可全抛一片心：一是别轻易劝人，以免“智子疑邻”；二是交浅别言深，以免说过的话像双刃剑，有朝一日会反噬自己；三是别听别人的秘密，别说自己的秘密。
• 做人要厚道：《增广贤文》给出的经典诠释是“与人方便与己方便，一家打墙两家好看”和“当面留一线，过后好相见”。这个道理很浅显，老梁讲的林志玲和楚庄王的故事比较有趣。

故事汇

夜聊时说到在油管听故事，你提到老梁，说他知识渊博，才气横溢，能言善道。

滨江夜行，听厌了歌曲，于是翻出老梁故事汇来听。

13年的老节目，讲了不少我们那个时代的港台巨星的故事，一下子，沉渣泛起，青少年时代的记忆呼啸而来。那是群星闪耀的黄金时期，是港台流行音乐不可复制的流金岁月，是至今无法逾越的巅峰。从磁带到CD再到MP3，从Walkman到CD Player再到iPod，从歌曲到影视到书籍，曾经的痴迷，已泛黄落尘。如今，是流媒体的时代，是云音乐的世界，却不再有巨星。

晚风里，耳边是熟悉的老歌、半旧的故事、不俗的点评。终于，可以暂时不再分分秒秒的惦记着你。

三个小时，六个巨星，最后记住了几句总结：

• 蔡琴：她的坎坷人生路告诉我们，女人心得大，遇事不能往窄处想。操心不见老，是件好事。爱好要多，关心的事要多，这样当自己痛苦的时候，有充分的关注点分散注意力。
• 费翔：他的不断超越自我证明了人得知道在适当的时机进退攻守。
• 罗文：老一辈音乐人主业、副业分得很清楚，对自己的梦想有坚守，不易被外面的潮流所左右。简而言之，不拜金。
• 张艾嘉：人生能活得如此精彩，不仅仅是运气使然，而是她的胆量和能量兼具，机会来了，能抓得住。
• 邓丽君：和成龙的一段情说明了合适的时间、合适的地点比合适的人更重要。
• 刘文正：退隐后踪影全无，始终生活在人们的传说中。这种隐退，是对他自己演艺生涯最有力量的证明：他来过，他看过，他辉煌过，他爱过，他也恨过，离开得没有遗憾。这就是他最独特的魅力所在。

再看看长长的list上歌神许冠杰、歌圣谭咏麟、歌侠梅艳芳、歌仙张国荣、歌霸罗文甄妮、歌隐林子祥的名字，还有天南地北古今中外的八卦名单，其后几天，应该都不难打发罢。

杂学小得

读书、听故事、走路，这样机械规律的节奏，撑着我熬过这几个月。

听故事，颠覆并重新形塑了我的近代历史观。

书读得杂，间或偶有小得。

• 茶壶风暴：A tempest in a teapot（美式）或 A storm in a teacup（英式），指一件事原本没什么大不了，却被弄得很严重。 A lot of unnecessary anger and worry about a matter that is not important. 对号入座，怒己不争。
• 棘轮效应：Ratchet Effects，经济学理论。棘轮是只能向一个方向旋转的齿轮，不能倒转。被经济学家用来形容人的消费习惯形成之后有不可逆性，易于向上调整，难于向下调整。用咱老祖宗的话来说，就是由俭入奢易，由奢入俭难。国运使然，消费降级，不可避免。
• The more things change, The more they stay the same: 19世纪法国作家 Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr 写的。换句话说，就是 Despite apparent changes or advancements in society, certain fundamental aspects or patterns remain unchanged over time。即表面巨变之下，事物往往一成不变。再用咱老祖宗的话来表达：万变不离其宗。
• Ellipses: A form of eloquence, allowing silence to talk. "Using ellipses help me to say a lot, by not saying. I can not express my enormous need for you. So much unsaid. So much suggested!"
  

记忆力愈发不济。读过的书，默记的金句，转瞬即忘。

大概，可能，Alzheimer's disease，就在街角转弯处，虎视眈眈，等着我......

一万种可能

闲聊时提及我曾经喜欢的作家刘瑜，你看了她两篇文章后有所否定，我亦认同你对她这两篇文章观点的不认可，然则，这并没有动摇我读她所出新书的念头。

《可能性的艺术》是她为”看理想“平台制作的比较政治学课程的讲稿。她借助妙趣横生的事例，以理性而灵动的语言，清晰而缜密的逻辑，对抽象复杂的政治问题，用比较的视野从”此时此地“抽离，先宏观再聚焦微观，通过辨析其中的相似与差异，深入浅出的告诉大家政治是一种可能性的艺术，智慧的本质就是对事物比例的公正判断，并提醒大家：所见的只是现象，而现象未必是真相。

三十节课，分五个章节，她反复强调了政治创造可能，但是政治亦有其边界。政治会被社会结构、历史、地理以及文化约束，政治复杂到令人绝望，但也正是这种复杂，让思考充满乐趣，让自由成为必要，让未来涌现无穷无尽的惊奇。她一再提倡生而为独立的人，除了要有道德觉醒，要有与邪恶做斗争的勇气，更要有与狂热做斗争的自我警醒，要节制追求理想的激情，要有规则和边界意识，要宽容，要有耐心，静待时间开出的花。  

两天的阅读，眼界大开之际，做了不少摘录，以记之。

第一章：全球视野

• 很多时候，观点的不同来自视野的不同。
• 比较是为了抽离，而抽离是为了在另一个高度反观。比较产生冲击，冲击带来思考。
• 社会科学的洞察力：是把熟悉的事物陌生化的能力，把句号变成问号的能力，把”此时此刻“和无数”他时他刻“联系起来的能力，这种能力和每个人的敏感性有关，也和每个人的见识有关 —— 你阅读过的、听过的、走过的、观察过的、思考过的越多，你就越容易把现实当做”一万种可能性之一“来对待，获得了一种”比较的视野“。
• 理解和判断的前提是参照系的存在。
• 衡量现实不能仅仅以理想为尺度，而且要以历史为尺度，因为摧毁进步的不仅仅可能是所谓的保守势力，而且也可能是对完美乌托邦的迷恋。记住英语中的一句谚语：不要让最好成为更好的敌人。
• 光有美好愿望是不够的，自由要有牙齿才能不被吞噬。e.g. 英美在1941年签订的《大西洋宪章》是威尔逊总统在一战后的”十四点原则“的2.0版，但前者因为英美二战后的强大实力成功了，而后者却因为实力不足失败了。
• 个体的命运背后是国家，国家的命运背后是国际体系。
• 经济水平竞争的背后是经济模式竞争，经济陌生竞争的背后是制度甚至是文明竞争。
• 西学东渐中引起的文化反弹，反之亦然。e.g. 西方发达国家中的“优等生”瑞典，不再是一个世外桃源，成了问题国家。原因有三：
• 移民占比高达16.8%，移民容易，融合很难。
• 经济方面，移民失业率远高于本土人口。
• 财政负担
• 犯罪率的上升，尤以二代移民犯罪率最高，说明融合之难。
• 极端主义的兴起。瑞典已经成为“圣战”战士输出比例最高的欧洲国家。
• 瑞典正从一个“和谐社会”变成一个“二元社会”。
• 得益于通知下负担人口结构，有深厚的社会信任为基础的“高税收、高福利”的经济模式受到威胁。瑞典人不再视彼此为兄弟姐妹，愿意通过财富转移来扶贫助弱。
• 在移民问题上，或许“涓涓细流”的方式比较可行。教育、阶层、文化鸿沟的填平需要时间。Size matters, Speed matters。移民的速度和融合的速度可能成反比。

第二章：政治转型

• 民主化有三个浪潮：
1. 第一波是从19世纪早期的美国开始到一战，卷入的主要是西方欧美国家——英、美、法等。
2. 第二波是二战后，卷入的是西方的一些卫星国，如南欧、拉美诸国，还有一些刚摆脱殖民的发展中国家。
3. 第三波是从1974年葡萄牙政变开始到如今的“民主大跃进”，民主国家从37个变成2018年的97个。但这也是今天“民主衰退”现象的起点。
• 民主衰退的表现有二：
1. 民主崩溃：约有五分之二的民主转型国家发生民主崩溃。
2. 民主的伪劣化。
• 历史如此神秘莫测，或许我们只能无限接近却永远不可能抵达它的谜底。
• 从历史的角度来看，民主转型从来没有一帆风顺过，也很少一次闯关成功。它往往是风雨跌宕，进二退一，甚至进二退三。
• 第三波民主浪潮也体现了民主的韧性：
• 就转型过程言，与历史相比，相对平稳。
• 就转型成果言，与历史相比，呈现相当程度的“民主沉淀”现象。留下来的成果更多更稳定，也更少构成对国际秩序的根本性冲击。
• 尽管存在不少民主崩溃现象，但也较为快速的出现“民主反弹”现象。
• 民主韧性从何而来？
• 经济发展 —— 不再有极端的“僧多粥少”
• 国际格局 —— 自由主义处于优势地位
• 技术发展 —— 降低了社会动员的成本
• 观念的变化 —— 愈来愈多人更认同民主，程序性民主优于绩效性民主。
• 相比与早期的英国革命，同期的美国革命，法国革命更民主、更彻底、更具颠覆性。但法国“大革命”却翻船了。究其失败原因，是因为缺乏法治精神，因为“不自由的民主”：民主的高歌猛进与自由（言论出版自由、集会结社自由、宗教自由、财产权和经济自由）的日渐凋零如影随形。
• 民主和自由有交叉之处，但不是同一事物。民主是关于如何产生执政者的规则的，而自由则是关于如何限制执政者的规则的。民主是一种制度，自由是一种习俗。制度改写易，移风易俗难。
• 人类政治文明的变迁没有捷径，它必须穿过千千万万人的心灵。
• 南非民主转型的软着陆得益于胜利者的宽容和失败者的耐心。
• 自由从不降临于人类，人类必须上升至其高度。
• 民主作为一种程序，体现对民意的尊重，但是民主的质量则取决于参与者的判读力和合作能力。
• 当制度的发展超前于文化，文化必然会以暗渡陈仓的方式去把规则悄悄地扭曲为潜规则。e.g. 印度的“表亲的专制”(Tyranny of cousins)，会施加来自水平方向的社会压迫，其后盾就是社会习俗，譬如种姓鄙视链。
• 资本主义在财富方面制造不平等，但在消除社会传统等级方面，有恰恰是一种平等化的力量。它根据你为市场提供的价值而不是你的种姓、宗教来决定你的位置。
• 慢，是民主制的特点，因为它依靠试错而不是强制来实现进步。而试错需要时间。试错依靠人心之变来实现变革。而威权政体的特点则是快。但它往往要么大治，要么大乱。

第三章：国家建构

• 国家的定义：特定疆域内合法的垄断暴力的机构。
• 国家建构有二个方面
1. 权力的集中化
2. 势力范围的清晰化
• 国家能力的三大功能
1. 对于秩序建构的重要性 —— 暴力的集中化意味着分散暴力的减少
2. 提供公共服务 —— 具有强大征税能力的政府
3. 经济发展 —— 保护产权
• 我们倾向于把自己最熟悉的事物当做理所当然的事物，然而，在常常不堪一击的人性面前，任何秩序都可能只是海市蜃楼。
• 战争缔造国家，国家制造战争。
• 国家能力从何而来？
• 推动常备军建设
• 促进中央财税机制的建立
• 推动官僚行政体系的建立和扩张
• 文官制对于中国的国家能力意义重大
• 文官制中的官，也就是官僚集团，通过一个细密的政治经纬线组成网络，把一个庞大的帝国捆到一起，产生了巨大的组织红利。
• 文官制中的文，则通过了抑武、抑商、抑宗教，把社会精英引流到了读书做官，为皇帝服务的道路上。
• 文官集团给皇帝带去的是软约束，是道德压力，而武人集团、财阀集团，对王权的约束是硬约束。
• 这个世界上，比悲惨更可怕的，是不为人知的的悲惨。一旦有了信息的开放和流通，社会就有了推动变化的杠杆。e.g. 摄影家Lewis Hine 拍下了数千张反映劳工悲惨生活的照片，通过唤起公众的关注，直接推动了美国相关改革。
• 美国的另类国家观：反国家主义的国家观。他们视中央集权为洪水猛兽，处处对之进行提放和约束。导致政治上是弱中央，强地方。经济上是弱政府，强市场。
• 美国从“勉强的国家”到“自觉的国家”分三个阶段：
1. 进步主义时代：19世纪90年代到20世纪20年代。征收联邦税，干预市场经济，规范公司活动。
2. 罗斯福新政：民意汹涌，政府扩权。成立了69个新联邦政府部门提供公共服务。
3. 民权运动时代：20世纪五、六十年代。打破了“神圣不可侵犯的州权”。
• 美国国家建构的道路呈现了另一种可能的道路：核心动力不是密集的战争或者发达的文官制，而是社会运动。当然社会运动需要制度空间，它以自由为前提，以民主为传导机制。社会运动的力量本质就是政治权利的力量。
• 美国经验的真正特色：一个强大的政府，被一个更强大的社会和市场环绕。
• 阿富汗的国家建构的失败原因：
• 地理因素 —— 多山地形，意味着政府的触角有限，叛军很容易找到藏身之所，并死灰复燃。
• 地缘位置 —— 地处大国的交界地带，成为大国征战的通道，频繁内战是大国的代理战争。
• 宗教因素 —— 伊斯兰极端主义盛行。塔利班实际上是由沙特、巴基斯坦传入的伊斯兰原教旨主义的“进口文化”
• 民族结构 —— 民族主义带来的离心力、碎片化的族群格局是大一统政治的障碍。
• 阿富汗最大的教训就是以极权追求乌托邦的危险。
• 对于一个国家而言，命运指向何方，常常取决于“沉默的大多数”是否继续沉默下去。

第四章：政治文化

• 观念的变迁引发制度的变迁：观念的力量如此强大，它甚至可能突破经济利益的考虑、暴力机器的压制、国际格局的约束，撬动制度的变化。只有建立在观念变革基础上的制度变革，才是扎实的、可持续的。因为观念一旦形成，有其韧性所在。
• 鸡蛋如何战胜高墙？高墙也是由人组成的。当整个社会的观念发生变迁，整个观念会发生一个“上渗”的效应，软化坚硬的高墙。e.g. 韩国以学生为核心主体推动的民主运动就是一个这样不断渗透和扩散，鸡蛋对抗高墙的过程。
• 当所有政治的泥沙沉淀，所有理论的波涛平息，所有的流行趋势过去，最终，这种源于道德直觉的正义感还是会从水底浮现。它所具有的令人敬畏的天真，熠熠的光芒，还是会诱惑你向它伸出手去。
• 泰国真正困难的，是实现民主稳固而不是推动民主转型。它是现代史上发生政变次数最多的国家。20世纪30年代以来，共发生过21次政变，13次成功，简直就是一言不合就民主转型，一言不合，又民主崩溃。究其原因，主要是泰国人民无限制的参与精神、过度的政治热情、过高的政治要价，过于急迫的政治通牒以及战斗精神，而且没有规则和边界意识。
• 真正的民主文化应该是参与精神、服从意识以及政治冷淡三者混合。参与精神助推民主所需要的政治动员，服从意识助推民主所需要的政治秩序，热情形成政治改革的动力，而一定的政治冷感则给过热的政治氛围降温。
• 耐心比勇气更难达至，节制比热情更需要技艺。
• 平庸之恶是由权力制造的。生产“暴力”的机制有三：
1. 高压：恐惧制造沉默
2. 利益：利益诱惑造就积极分子
3. 意识形态则令人狂热。
• 现在进行时的文明的冲突：价值冲突是所有文明都不得不穿越的风暴。危险的不是观念的差异，而是这种差异的极化。当保守派走向进步，进步派早已绝尘而去。两者的相对距离还是在那里甚至更大。遗憾的是，人类往往要经历无数次撕裂才学会宽容，要被激情的烈焰烫伤后才意识到激情的危险。在一个价值迅速变迁的时代，世界最终可能会变得更好。但是在此之前，它常常会变得更糟。

第五章：政治经济 

• 由于人类恼人的健忘，陈旧的过去看上去常常像是崭新的未来。
• 恶的大门也可以被善的手指敲开。历史上，无数通往悲剧的道路由斩钉截铁的道德激情所铺陈，恶只是意外的结果，而不是最初的动因。
• 塞壬的歌声实在太美好了，人类一再被其魅惑，为其触礁，而海底的每一艘沉船，都是对人类理性之傲慢挥之不去的讽刺。
• 贫富悬殊带来的问题
• 道义上的不公平
• 影响经济发展
• 政治极化带来的动荡
• 不平等问题之所以棘手，是因为平等并非我们所追求的唯一目标，它必须和其他价值并存：自由、秩序、创新、责任感等等。历史一再展示，追求平等这事，我们或许有一种方式把它做对，却有1000种方式把它做错。
• 诸善之争是人类最大的困境。
• 很多时候，比左右之争、东西之争、普世与民族之争更重要的，是狂热和温和之争，是斩钉截铁和怀疑主义之争，是感叹号和问号之争。
• 社会科学的知识，更像是西西弗斯在推石头，推上去，掉下来，再推上去，再掉下来。或许有人认为西西弗斯的努力是一种徒劳，殊不知，原地踏步或许正是对自由落体的抵抗。

Politics is the art of the possible, the attainable —— the art of the next best.

FORSAN ET HAEC OLIM MEMINISSE IUVABIT

难得一个浏览网页的中午，看见一份令人“贪欲”丛生的书单和一句话“FORSAN ET HAEC OLIM MEMINISSE IUVABIT"。 网上总是有eager beaver为大家做贡献，据说此句出自维吉尔的《埃涅阿斯纪》，意为“也许有一天，这一切给你带来帮助”。而书单，是出自麻省理工人类智能事业（HIE)的推荐。我虽然不是学科带头人，但对于书籍和智慧的热爱并不逊色。于是，记录如下，希望有时间一一找来读一读。

Twelve Classics for Every Aspiring Leader’s Bookshelf

Writing instruction

You cannot lead if you cannot communicate. A corollary is that you should hone your writing skills for the rest of your life.

The Elements of Style, William Strunk

Just after I distributed a draft of my first textbook, a student lobbed the dreaded question at me. “Have you read Strunk and White?” she said. I was betrayed because I had not deployed active verbs. 

BUGS in Writing: A Guide to Debugging Your Prose, Lyn Dupre 

Once Strunk and White is in your blood, read Dupre. She is a developmental editor; that is, she not only performs the lessor, comma-correcting function of a copy editor, she also comments on clarity and structure. After I wrote a few books, I thought I had learned what ordinary copy editors have to teach, so I asked my publisher to find an editor who could make me cry. The found Dupre. She did. 

The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Edward R. Tufte 

Because we think with our eyes as well as our mouth, illustrations should properly stimulate your reader’s visual problem solving apparatus. In this domain, Tufte book reigns supreme. Look at the illustrations and discover what he has to say about them. Note, however, that you are likely to be disappointed by the writing style at the sentence and paragraph level. 

Writing Models 

We mimic what we read, so before you write, read something you admire. 

Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era, James M. McPherson 

If I don’t feel like Shakespeare, I read McPherson, who does Strunk and White great honor in the way he uses verbs. The Battle Cry of Freedom is the best one-volume treatment of the American Civil War and takes you beyond high-school simplifications toward an understanding of the complex economic and political roots of a horrible war. 

Molecular Biology of the Gene, James D. Watson

Before you write a textbook or documentation, study Watson’s first edition if you can find it (the Sixth is now available, but multiply authored, so I expect it is less well done). Do not study the biology, study the way Watson explains the biology. 

How science works

The Trouble With Physics: The Rise of String Theory, The Fall of a Science, and What Comes Next, Lee Smolin 

In the final chapters of The Trouble with Physics, Smolin explains that tenure decisions focus on maximizing short term reputation of the tenuring university. Accordingly, paradigm shifting geniuses often end up as false negatives because they do not necessarily develop the expected portfolio of papers in refereed journals while they are thinking their deep thoughts. My experiences in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science run amazingly parallel. 

The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA, James D. Watson 

If Watson were to tire of molecular biology, he could become a great mystery writer, on the level of Arthur Conan Doyle. His account of the discovery of the structure of DNA exposes a level of competition, politics, deception, and sexism, and mystery that you would expect to find in a board room, not in a scientific community. 

Management and leadership 

Out of the Crisis, W. Edwards Deming 

McArthur brought Deming to Japan after World War Two. He transformed Japan from a maker a junk into the industrial envy of the world. The Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers have awarded The Deming prize annually for the past 60 years or so in his honor. In his book, he emphasizes that a good leader makes it clear to each person in his/her organization that that person is valued, that his/her work is valued, and his/her work makes a difference. Annual reviews are not for grading, they are for identifying what is done well and where improvement would have the most impact. 

Deportment 

A Message to Garcia, Elbert Hubbard 

 Lieutenant Rowan got the message to Garcia. You should too. 

Lord Chesterfield’s Letters, Lord Chesterfield 

Chesterfield wrote his letters in the first half of the eighteenth century, but much of his advice remains valuable. My grandfather gave me a copy in 1963, with particular parts underlined for my benefit. 

Speaking 

You cannot actually put these on a bookshelf, but they are useful nevertheless. 

How to Speak, Patrick Henry Winston 

Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death, Patrick Henry 

If you are thinking of starting a revolution, read Henry’s speech and adapt it to your purpose. 

Shifts Happen

In the end of day, the teacher did the wrap up as usually, the famous and also fantastic video coming again:





As he mentioned, this is the essence why we are here. Changes happen, shifts happen. Adapt to it, live with it, harness it instead of whinning, crying over spilled milk.

Justice 听后记(5)

第十讲：The Good citizen

Aristotle believed the purpose of polities is:

• shape the character
• cultivate the virture of citizens
• inculcate civic excellence
• make possible a good way of life
  

He thought as a good citizen, you must practice in communities and politics because only during excercising you can discern paritcular features which can't be learned from reading books.

Aristotle's theory of justice is teleological, it is a matter of fit the person with their virtues and excellence to the approriate roles.

Using Casey Martin v. PGA tour case as example，Prof. Sandel helped students to understand deeply that Golf debate is not only a debate of the purpose, the teleological feature, but also the debate about allocation of the honor. If it was allowed to use golf cart in tournament, Golf is no longer viewed as a sports, a competition, instead, it would become a game of skills, an entertainment.

Further, Sandel addressed the contradiction of Aristotle's teleological theory with freedom: Be free is to be independent of any pariticular roles, traditions, conventions. Tie justice to some particular conceptions of goods restricts the freedom of individuals.

第十一讲: Obligations and Loyalties

Aristotle v.s Kant & Rawl on Freedom and Justice:

• Aristotle: We are free insofar as we have the capacity to realize our potential.
• Kant: We are free when we have the capacity to act automonously and capable of choosing our ends.
  
• Aristotle: Justice consists in giving people what they deserve, and a just society is one that enables human beings to realize their highest nature and to live the good life.
• Kant: A just society is to set up a fair framework of rights within which citizens may be free to pursue their own conceptions of the good for themselves.

The comparison between Aristotle and Kant also leads to the communitarian view of self: The self is claimed or encumbered to some extent by history, tradition, the family, the communities, the country.

There are two kinds of moral obligations defined by libertarian:

1. Universal duties that we owe to every human being;
   
2. Voluntary obligations that we acquire by consent, as when we agree to help someone or promise to be faithful to our partners and friends.
   

In additon to the above, Communitarian think people also have obligations of membership, solidarity, and loyalty which are not necessarily based on consent.

Several examples to weigh loyalty over duty are presented in the course, among discussion, most students voted for moral obligations to do more for people who are closer to them, even though it might compete with a universal duty to humanity.

第十二讲：Same Sex Marriage

In beginning, Prof. Sandel summarized: The love of humanity is noble sentiment, but most of time we live our lives by smaller solidarities. This may reflect certain limits to the bounds of moral sympathy, but more important, it reflects the fact, that we learn to love humanity, not in general, but through its particular expressions.

After hosting a heated debate about same sex marriage, after telling the story how the Massachusetts supreme judicial court changed its standpoint in the same-sex marriage case, Sandel concluded that government can't be neutral on difficult moral questions and reasoning about good, about purposes, and ends is unavoidable feature of aruging about justice. Put it another way, it has to figure out the essential point and purpose of moral issues before to reach a just conclusion. In that case, the exlucsive and permanent commitment of the partners to one another is the essential point and purpose of the marriage, therefore, the same-sex marriage is permitted.

Unavoidably, there is persisting disagreement about the good life and about the moral and religious questions in mordern pluralist society. Sandel suggested we can apply the method of moral reasoning which was proposed by Rawls——the method of reflective equlibrium. That is moving back and forth between our considered judgements about particular cases and the general principles we would articulate to make sense of these judgments. In Rawls opinion, a conception of justice is a matter of the mutual support of many considerations, of everything fitting together into one coherent view.

Finally, Sandel told us the aim of this course is to awaken the restlessness of reason, the purpose of the philosophy is by estranging us from the familiar, by unsettling our settled assumptions. Once the familiar turns strange, Once we start to reflect on our circumstance, it's never quite same again.

Justice 听后记(4)

第八讲：What’s a Fair and Deserved?

什么是一个公平的开始？什么才是我们应得的？

这一讲从John Rawls的"veil of ignorance" 理论开始，探讨了收入、财富、机会和资源分配的公平程度。

根据Rawl的理论，一个社会是否公正，取决于社会制度是否是在戴上“无知的面纱”以后制定的。只有在人们不知道自己的年 龄、性别、种族、宗教、智力、社会地位、家庭背景、个人优势和人生目标的情况下，他们所制定的规则才不可能倾向其自身利益，也因此，更客观公正。他的理论 包含三大原则：

1. Equal basic liberties: Everyone should have the same set of basic liberties, including the freedoms of speech and conscience, the right to hold office and to vote for elected officials, the right to hold personal property, and so on.
   
2. Fair equality of opportunity: People with the same natural talents and the same willingness to use them should have the same chances of success, no matter how rich or poor their parents, no matter their sex, or race, or any other social distinction.
3. Difference Principle: There should be no differences in income and wealth, except those social and economic inequalities will work to the benefit of the least well-off.

学生针对人类历史上存在的几种社会财富分配体系，探讨了不公平存在的地方和各种体系的优劣：

• 封建贵族体制: 没有公平的起点，出生的偶然性决定了财富的分配。
• 自由主义体制：纯粹由市场来决定。但家庭背景、成长环境等因素决定了不可能有均等的教育机会，针对146个精英学校的学生家庭经济背景所做的调查表明，仅有3%来自穷困家庭，而70%都来自富裕的家庭。
• 精英领导体制: 看似有公平的起点，面对均等的教育机会，但天赋的差异仍旧决定了不平等的存在。特别需要指出的是：这种制度下，不可否认，个人通过自身努力抵达成功，但真 正起决定性作用的，是个人对社会的贡献结果而不是个人所付出的努力多少，这其中，依旧有与生俱来的才能、优良的家庭环境、运气等各种偶然性因素存在，而这 些并不是个人所能控制并努力就可以获取的，就此而言，成就和财富也并不完全是应得的。
• 平等主义体制：在这种体制下，人们允许发挥自己的天赋并获利，但他们的财富会被再分配，以服务于社会最底层。

Rawls因此在moral desert和entiltments to legitimate expectation之间划下分界线，他的differnence principle就是针对后者而言的。

第九讲：Affirmative Action and Purpose

这一课，从Cheryl Hopwood起诉德州法学院的官司开始，针对“平权行动”展开了激烈的讨论：学校是否有权利在招生时优先考虑少数种族？

赞成和反对的，势均力敌。其中赞成派给出的论据有:

• corrective: 修正不均等的教育背景带来的不平等
• compensatory: 补偿过去的不平等政策带来的伤害和不平等后果。
  
• diversity: 从社会使命的目的出发，为教育注入多元性的元素。
  

反对派则声称个人不应该为自己不能控制的因素而被拒之门外。

接着，亚里士多德粉墨登场，有别于kant和Rawls，他关于公正的理论则是从目的论出发点，其中涉及两个主要因子：资源，以及分配得到该资源的人。亚里士多德认为关于公正的判断应该以终为始，从目的出发，目的决定了资源的分配。

延伸阅读：刘瑜的《谁有特权上大学》，对“无知之幕”、“平权行动”、“程序性正义”及“补偿性正义”均有涉及，而且论述简洁精妙。

Justice 听后记(3)

第六讲：Motives and Morality

此讲，Sandel介绍了哲学家Immanuel Kant关于自由和道德的观点。

首先，自由是与必然相对的，换言之，所谓自由，即你的行动必须是完全自主的，你必须是跟据自己的自由意志，自己设定的规则来行动，而不是被自身的本能、欲望所驱策，不是受限于独裁者的法律，不是被环境所限制的，也不能是被他人诱导的。也就是说，autonomous 和heternomous的区别，为自由确定了界限。

也因此，对kant而言，自由和道德产生了联系。他认为道德不应该取决于行为的后果，而应该取决于初始的意图和行为的动机。也就是说，行为的道德价值，取决于行为的动机是基于自主选择的责任义务所在，还是基于自身的利益计算。Kant 认为，doing the right things for the wrong reason，不属于道德的范畴.

为此，Kant给出了三种对比：

• 关于reason, 你必须仔细区分categorical v.s hyperthetical imperatives: 其中，Kant也给出了两套规则加以区分categorical imperatives
• the formular of universal law
• the formular of humanity as ends
• 关于motive,你必须仔细鉴别duty v.s. inclination
• 关于freedom，你必须根据意愿、决断来界定autonomous v.s heteronomous.

有且只有一种行为，出自categorical imperative的reason, 自主选择的，基于责任而触发的，才是道德的。

听的时候，我不可避免得想起当初和你关于intention和effect的讨论，想起你曾引用的一句话：“A path to hell is paved with good intentions", 我不禁疑惑，究竟是intention更重要，还是effect更重要？我们是否可以因为good motive而不去计较或者原谅bad effect？我们是否可以因为good effect而不去计较bad motives？如果是Kant，他又会如何反驳这句话呢？

此外，有趣的是，在Sandel讲述必须尊重人类，不能以他人为手段来达成自己的目的时，我想起最近刚看到的一篇心理学报道，在该报道中，提到最新的实验结果表明：人类潜意识中有视他人为可利用的工具并加以类别化记忆的倾向。看来，越来越多的证据指向，”人之初，性本恶”哦。

Watch it on Academic Earth

第七讲：Lying and Principles

According to Kant, white lie is not moral. However, there is moral disticntion between outright lie and carefully evasion from truth, because the latter shows a certain homage and the elemantary respect to the diginity of the law of moral.

According to John Rawls, the principle of justice are the princples that we would all agree to if we were choosing rules for our society and no one had any unfair bargaing power. Based on this, an agreement is only fair when it is made both voluntarily and against a background of equality.

Watch it on Academic Earth

Justice 听后记(2)

从第三讲开始，Sandel教授离开了功利主义，转向了自由主义这一流派。

第三讲，Freedom to Choose

与功利主义忽视个人权利截然相反，自由主义声称个人的权利是不可侵犯的，人拥有他自己。他们反对政府的家长式作风，反对道德立法，反对财富再分配，认为财富再分配等同于劳力剥削和奴隶制。这其中的代表人物是Robert Nozick。

Watch it on Academic Earth

第四讲，Natural Rights

这一讲，Sandel从Nozick的观点自然过渡到John Locker的。Locker不是纯粹的自由主义者，他既是自由主义某些观点的支持者，又是反对者。他的两大主张是：

Private property

• The state of nature is a condition we decide to live
• The natural right to life, liberty and property is inalienable rights, we can't give up or take away from anyone else.
• The goverment is limited by the obligation on the part of majority to respect and enforce the inalienable rights, and based on consent.

Consent:

• It is the collective consent in society.
• We are giving our "implied consent" once we decided to live in society
• As long as the rule of law is not arbitrary to take of life, liberty or property-- then it isn't a violation of the fundamental rights of individuals.
• If the majority decides a generally applicable law and if it votes duly according to fair procedures, then there is no violation.

Watch it on Academic Earth

第五讲：Army system & Surrogacy

这一讲，Sandel触及了consent的限度。围绕美国内战的征兵系统和伊拉克战争的自愿参军方式，Sandel带领学生展开了激烈的争论，并比较了三种军队征兵方式的公正程度：

• Increase pay and benefits to attract more soliders
• Military conscription
• Hire mercenaries

紧接着，针对新泽西州1988年"Baby M"的官司，Sandel要求大家投票表决是否应该强迫这个代理母亲遵守合同，放弃孩子的抚养权。他要求大家为各自的观点辩护并陈述理由，经过激烈讨论，他最后总结，公平有时并不仅仅有双方自愿的承诺和协议即可确保，因为：

• 交易双方，有可能因为地位、经济条件的不对等和环境压力而导致隐性的强迫和不公平的存在；(bargaing power)
• 交易双方，有可能因为信息不对称、不完整，并不完全意识到协议后果而导致事先的许可失去完全的公平性。(equally information)

更进一步，Sandel说明，有些东西是不可以被交易的，因为一旦以金钱来衡量，会去人性化，会被低估本身的价值，譬如尊重、爱、感激、荣誉等等。

To summarize, something can not be bought by money. Merely because conduct purchased by money are "voluntary" and consented do not mean that it is good or beyond regulation and prohibition.

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Justice 听后记(1)

对公平、公正的追求，一直左右着我的人生选择，也为我带来不少困惑。感谢互联网，今日，我有缘能在academic earth上聆听哈佛教授Michael Sandel的“Justice, What's the right thing to do？"讲座，What a Serendipty!

Justice一课，是哈佛史上影响深远也是最受欢迎的课程之一。讲课过程中，Sandel常常先抛出颇具道德争议的案例来拷问学生 的良知，既有假设性的，又有真实发生的，一旦学生给出观点，他会继续追问他们的判断依据和推理过程，然后再改变事件发生的情境和条件，进一步挑战他们的道德底 线。学生往往在不知不觉中被引导入左右为难的困境，难以为继之下，Sandel开始概况、总结与之相关的哲学各流派的观点，引经据典，旁征博引，带领学生重新审视曾经习以为常、不假思索的选 择与道德判断。

在第一讲里，他首先用一个假设性问题——”如果你可以选择，会不会牺牲1个人的生命来挽救另外的5个人？”抛出主题 -The Morality of Mude。其中，发人深省的是，为什么能产生同样后果的不同行为，在不同的情境下会导致不同的选择？是什么道德准则在支配他们做出这样的选择？在师生互动 和脑力激荡后，Sandel水到渠成的说明了这之中其实隐含了两种道德判断(Moral Reasoning)标准:

• Consequentialist: 他们的道德判断是基于行为所带来的后果。 功利主义者属于这一类。
• Categorical: 这一类的道德判断是不管行为所带来的后果优劣，都必须受到一定的权利和责任的限制。一旦某种行为属于这一类别，哪怕它能带来再好的后果，也是不道德的。

紧 接着，他讲述了一个发生在19世纪的真实案例——“海难船员合谋杀死同伴，食其肉饮其血最终生还。” 模拟的学生陪审团中，就存在基于这两种评判标准而做出的不同的虚拟审判。最后，Sandel为大家介绍了功利主义的鼻祖边沁，和他们所宣扬的行事原则：最 大化群体的幸福指数，最小化痛苦总额。

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第二讲伊始，Sandel用福特公司通过比较改善其中一款汽车安全隐患的收益开支后，基于功利主义 的原则做出不作为决定这一事例，进一步提出问题：生命是否有价？如果有价，又该如何计量？是否存在一种通用的统一的衡量价值的手段？该如何衡量群体的快乐 指数？为了大多数群体的利益，是否就可以牺牲少数族群的权利？这些问题其实也间接指出功利主义的三个软肋：

• 将幸福与高兴简单得等同起来。能力、成就、友谊和爱，只有在它们能给人们带来快乐的时候才意味着幸福，否则就不做计量。
• 只要是快乐，不分类别都具备一样的权重。痛苦亦然。
• 允许为多数人而牺牲少数人的利益。

自 边沁以降，反对功利主义的自然不在少数。于是，Sandel又为大家引见了另一位哲学家——J.S.Mil. 身为边沁的朋友和功利主义的忠实追随者，J.S. Mill一直试图修正并完善其中的一些论断，譬如快乐的确有高等和低级之分，譬如如何界定什么是更高层次的幸福等等等等。有趣的是，在试验Mill的界定 标准时，大部分学生都认可哈姆雷特是更高层次的精神享受，但又更愿选择能带来笑声的Simphson影片。这也侧面推翻了Mill关于快乐层次的高下之分 的定义。

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Illusion v.s Delusion

Recently, I am confused by 3 terms: illusion, delusion and hallucination. After doing a little "research" on web, I finally know how to distinguish one from another.

An illusion is a misleading perception, usually visual. It deals with stimuli that are actually present, but it is misinterpreted in terms of length, shapre motion or direction, or sometimes hard to interpret.

A hallucinations involve sensing something that is not actually present. It is most frequently auditory.

A delusion is a deeply held false belief that is maintained, even when other information contradicts the belief. The contradictory information is either ignored completely or discounted in some way.

In summary, an illusion is a perceptual disturbance, while a delusion is a belief disturbance.

"Introduction to Psychology" Notes (16) —— Mental Illness

Lecture 19 - Mental Illness

Mental illness:

• Schizophrenia: a split from reality, schizophrenia do not have multiple personalities.
• Multiple personality disorder: a split of personality. It's a sort of dissociative disorder.

Five symptoms of schizophrenia:

• hallucinations: the most typcial are auditory
• Delusion: The difference between a hallucination and a delusion is a hallucination is a sensory experience that's wrong, that just didn't really happen. A delusion is a belief that isn't right. It's a belief that you shouldn't be having.
• disorganized speech
  
• disorganized behaviors
• absence of normal thought or affect (emotion).

The root of problems: an inability to put together your thoughts and perceptions, to sequence them and coordinate them, to impose a logical structure and a reasonable, realistic temporal sequence on your experience. As a result of this is you lose contact with others, you lose social contact and don't get much reality checking.

Types of anxiety disorders:

• generalized anxiety disorders: very anxious, worried all the time and it could be paralyzing. It could give you physical symptoms like headaches, stomachaches, muscle tension and irritability.
• phobias: intense, irrational fears. They could focus on objects, events, and social settings.
• obsessive-compulsive disorder:irrational disturbing thoughts that intrude into your consciousness.

Dissociative disorder: a dissociation of memory; become somehow unaware, separated from some part of your identity or history and unable to recall them except sometimes under special circumstances

Three types:

• dissociative amnesia: memory loss, selective or global without identity replacement.
• dissociative fugue: global memory loss with identity replacement
  
• dissociative identity disorder: Multiple personality disorder, 2 or more distinct personalities manifested by the same person at different times

Personality disorders:

• narcissistic personality disorder: 自恋型人格障碍
• Multiple personality disorder：多重人格障碍
• avoidant personality disorder：回避型人格障碍
• histrionic personality disorder：剧化型人格障碍
• dependent personality disorder：依赖型人格障碍
• borderline personality disorder：边缘型人格障碍
• paranoid personality disorder：偏执型人格障碍
• antisocial personality disorder：反社会性人格障碍

"Introduction to Psychology" Notes (15) —— Mood Disorder

Lecture 18: Mood Disorder (Guest Lecture by Professor Susan Nolen-Hoeksema)



The judement of mood disorder are heavily influenced by factors:

• social norms. Whether you get labeled as having a mental disorder or a problem depends very heavily on what your social or cultural norms are.
• characteristics of targets: gender roles, gender stereotypes
  
• context:the context in which you exhibit a particular behavior

Tthese characteristics of abnormality in clinical psychology are three Ds:

• distress: behaviors that cause the individual or others significant distress. (Depression-cause himself; antisocial personality disorder-cause others distress)
• dysfunction: a set of behaviors prevents the person from functioning in daily life
• deviance:the behaviors or feelings are highly unusual. (heavily influenced by the social norms.)

Types of mood disorder:

• unipolar depression disorders: depression only
• bipolar disorders: the person cycles back and forth between debilitating depressions and manic episode.

Symptoms for Depression:

• sadness
• anhedonia:a diminished interest or pleasure in their usual activities
• show significant weight or appetite change
• sleep disturbances--insomnia or hypersomnia,
• psychomotor retardation or agitation
• feelings of worthlessness or excessive guilt
• diminished ability to concentrate or indecisiveness
• suicidal ideation or behavior

Mania episode: the person has an abnormally and persistently elevated expansive or irritable mood. Symptoms:

• inflated self-esteem or grandiosity
• Decreased need for sleep
• pressure to talk
• Flight of ideas, racing thoughts
• Distractibility
• increase in "goal-directed activity."
• get involved in all kinds of "pleasurable but dangerous activities"

Biological Theories:

• genetics are involved in the mood disorders, especially bipolar disorder.
• a number of neurotransmitters been linked to both of the mood disorders, both bipolar disorder and depression. the receptors for neurotransmitters like serotonin don't function efficiently.
• brain areas that seem to be involved in the mood disorders

1. The prefrontal cortex: involved in higher order complex thinking and problem solving and in goal-directed behavior. lowered activity in the prefrontal cortex may play a role in the difficulties in concentration, in goal-directed behavior, in planning and problem solving and in regulating emotion.
2. The amygdala: involved in the processing of emotional information. overactive amygdala responses to emotional information play role in depression.
3. The hippocampus: involved in memory and in concentration. shrinkage in the hippocampus may be related to problems in concentration and attention.
4. the anterior cingulate (前扣带）: involved in a lot of different activities, such as stress and the choice of behaviors. dysregulation of the anterior cingulate may be involved in the person's difficulty in responding appropriately to stress, in choosing good coping behaviors and changing their behaviors whenever their behaviors aren't working well.

Cognitive and Behavioral Theories:

Aaron Beck's "negative cognitive triad" theory: People who are depressed have a negative view of the self, of the future and of the world.
distortions in thinking:

• "All-or-nothing thinking": is thinking that things are either all good or all bad.
• "emotional reasoning" : an example of that is just if I feel like a loser I must be a loser. Of if I feel stupid, I must be stupid.
• "personalization": self-blame

Cognitive behavioral therapy: based on Beck's theory, very structured, focused on the present

• Identify themes in negative thoughts and triggers.
• challenges the truth value of these
• change aspects of the environment that are related to depressive symptoms.

Interpersonal therory: negative views of the self and expectations about the self and relationships are based on upbringings that really fostered these kinds of negative self-views.

IPT(Interpersonal therapy): less structured, more focused on the past, explore patterns of relationships and roots in childhood, look for four types of interpersonal problems:

• Grief or loss
• Interpersonal role disputes
• Role transitions
• Interpersonal skills deficits

"Introduction to Psychology" Notes (14) —— Self and Other

Lecture 16: Self and Other

Interestingly, in this lecture Paul Bloom mentioned Malcolm Gladwell and his book 《The Tipping Point》again. Seems he is a loyal reader of Gladwell. And there were also some familiar concepts, experiments refer to the topic of self perceptions and interactions with others.

3 aspects of the self: (From William James)

1. the material: our awareness of the physical world
2. the spiritual:the part that thinks of ourselves as thinkers -- the inner witness to events
3. the social: the part of the self that focuses on the images we create in the minds of others is called the social self.

Self and Situation:

• Self-efficacy(自我效能感): people's beliefs in their capabilities to exercise control over situations that affect their lives.
• Behavioral confirmation: our beliefs, our sense of self, create their own reality
• One of the most important factors that influence our identity is the cultural context in which we live. Culture is a matter of the common ideas and the common ways of doing things.We can view culture and self as a collaboration: culture shapes self and self perpetuates culture.

Six degree of separation: people are connected to one another via chains of people.

Self Perceptions:

• Spotlight effect: you believe that people are noticing you all the time but they aren't. They're busy noticing themselves.
• The transparency effect: we believe that we're more transparent than we are. We often feel like things bleed out of us and so people will systematically overestimate the extent to which other people notice their secrets.
• Lake Wobegon effect: involves a systematic bias to see ourselves as better than average.
• One possibility is the nature of the feedback we get. For a lot of aspects of your life you only get feedback when you're good, when you do something good.
• Another possibility is there's different criteria for goodness.
• Self-serving bias: You think that you're terrific and because you're terrific the good things that happen to you are due to your terrificness; the bad things are due to accident and misfortune.
• Confirmation bias: People want to have information that confirms what they believe in and that supports it.
  
• Cognitive dissonance: what you do makes sense. If it doesn't make sense or, more to the point, if it's something that you do that's foolish or makes you look manipulative or cheap, you'll distort it in your head so that it does make sense.
• The fundamental attribution error: we tend to over-attribute things to a person's personality or desires or nature and not enough to the situation or the context. (An attribution is a claim about the cause of somebody's behavior)
• Enhancement of the self v.s. Oversimplification of the other: When things go badly, we'll blame the situation. When things go well, the self-serving attribution bias, we'll credit ourselves. To other people we're a lot less forgiving. When things go badly, we'll blame others themselves.
• A Mattew effect: the rich get richer and the poor even lose what they hath.
• The Pygmalion effect/Self-fulfilling prophesy: if I believe you have a certain characteristic this might cause you to behave as if you have that characteristic.

Towards Others:

• The mere exposure effect: simply seeing something makes it likable.
• Impression formation：
• first impressions matter a lot
• we form impressions very fast, very quickly, and this is a literature known as "thin slices."

Stereotype: refer to information we have about categories and intuitions we have about the typicality, our frequency of certain features of categories.

• Purpose: collecting information about categories is essential to our survival because it allows us to respond adaptively to novel instances.
• Pros:
• Stereotypes are often positive;
• Stereotypes tend to be accurate
• Cons:
• Not always accurate:confirmation bias with stereotypes；misleading data from media
• Moral problems: people should be judged as individuals, not as group members
• negative stereotypes have all sorts of bad effects.

Stereotype threat: if your race or your group has a negative stereotype associated with it in any particular domain, being reminded of it serves as a stereotype threat and hence damages your performance in all sorts of domains.

3 levels of stereotypes: public, private, implicit (Use of priming: subject might not know stereotype is being activated, can’t work to suppress it)

Trish Devine's automaticity theory, which goes something like this. The idea is that everybody holds stereotypes. These are automatically activated when we come into contact with individuals. In order to not act in a stereotyped fashion, we have to consciously push them down, we have to consciously override them, and that's possible, but it takes work.

The power of situation: the situation matters not only in terms of its objective reality, but also in terms of the way it's perceived, understood, and interpreted by the people inside it.

The power of cognitive control: the power of people's beliefs to give different meanings to the situations in which they find themselves.

"Introduction to Psychology" Notes (13) —— Morality

Lecture 15 : Morality


3 facets of morality:

• moral feelings: emotions like shame, condemnation, pride, righteous anger, affection, caring, being upset if an injustice is to be done, empathy (to feel what others are feeling) etc.
  
• moral judgments: notions like something is good or bad, fair or unfair.
  
• moral action

How could moral feelings evolve?

• kin selection:Selfish genes lead to altruistic animals
• cooperation

3 hallmarks for moral judgments:

• Evaluation
• Obligation
• Sanctions

3 different frameworks of moral thought:

• an ethics of autonomy: rights, equality, freedom.
• an ethics of community: duty, status, hierarchy, and interdependence.
• an ethics of divinity: purity, sanctity, pollution and sin.

2 forces for evil:

• Deindividuation of self: There is a sense of reduced accountability and shifted attention away from the self that occurs in the context of groups. That is so-called diffusion of responsibility. The famous case is Milgram's conformity study.
• Denigration of others:
  
• Keep psychological distance or physical distanceDistance
  
• Use euphemism (‘cargo’, ‘extermination’) to think about you not as a person
• Use humor to denigrate and demote people
• Take away their names
  
• See them as disgusting can make others matter less

2 forces for good:

• Contact and interdependence:
• Perspective taking:

"Introduction to Psychology" Notes (12) —— Gender Differences

Lecture 14: Sex



By biologist's definition, males are animals that have a little sex cell, which carries genes and nothing else – sperm cells. Females are animals that have a big sex cell, which has genes but also food and a protective cover and all sorts of other stuff.

Why is the animal with the tiny sex cell typically larger and more aggressive than the animal with the large sex cell?

• Parental investment (Bob Trivers):investment that's going to increase the offspring's chance of survival at the cost of the parent's ability to invest in other offspring.
• Difference in the size of sex cells leads to differences in typical parental investment, leading to differences in the sorts of psychological and physiological mechanisms that evolved.
• Males have to compete not merely with other males to get reproductive access but also to woo females.
• So it is able to predict the size differences and aggression differences based on differing parental investment.

Gender Difference:

• Aggression: males are more physically violent.
• Sexual choosiness: the parental investment theory predicts females should be more picky.
• Sexual attractiveness: Females focus more on power and status and more on interest in investing in children.
• the capacity for math and science: refer to Gender Differences Debate between Steven Pinker and Elizabeth Spelke as below.
  

Steven Pinker: intermediate positions -- that the difference is explainable by some combination of biological differences in average temperaments and talents interacting with socialization and bias.

Why study sex differences?

• differences between the sexes are part of the human condition.
• the topic of possible sex differences is of great scientific interest.
• The nature and source of sex differences are also of practical importance.

Similarity between sexes:

• general intelligence
• basic categories of cognitive:objects, numbers, peoples, living things, etc

Six relevant difference:

• life priorities: men on average more likely to chase status at expense of familiy and other valuable things in life
• interests: people versus things and abstract rule systems.this difference in interests will tend to cause people to gravitate in slightly different directions in their choice of career.
• men are the more reckless sex: intellectual risk taking, participate in risky experiment
• 3-D mental transformation: mental rotation, spatial perception, spatial visualization (correlated with mathmatical problem solving, dynamic spatial imagery prominent in physicist, chemist.)
• mathmatical reasoning: women are better at mathmatical calculation; men are better at mathmatical word problem and test of mathmatical reasoning
• variablity:males are the more variable gender.(more prodigies, more idiots.)as a result there are more men at the extreme upper end of the ability distribution from which scientists and mathematicians are drawn.

Elizabeth Spelke: the nurture position -- that males and females are biologically indistinguishable, and all relevant sex differences are products of socialization and bias. That is social forces including overt and covert discrimination and social influences that lead men and women to develop different skills and different priorities.

Humans are endowed with the core system for representing numbers and space. The system develops equally in male and female.

female advantage:

• verbal fluency
• mathmatical calculation
• memory of spatial positions of objects;

Male advantage:

• verbal analogies
• rapid mathmatical reasoning
• memory of layout geometry, mental rotation

Why are fewer women scientists?

• biased perception by fellow scientists will week out some talented women directly
• unequall opportunity will deter some talented women from attempting careers in science
• biased perception in earlier life will deter some talented girls from studying science
• the gender gap in science faculties will lead some students view high-level science as a man's world.