The idea of reflection is Cartesian to its core: a stand-alone consciousness, calmly observing the parade of thoughts and feelings, assuming a higher vantage point, drawing lessons and extracting principles: a wise Self.
Sometimes the straw man is a “hollow man”, i.e., a complete fabrication of the opponent’s views. These are pretty easy to refute, since they can’t be supported by actual evidence. Harder to refute are strawman arguments based on half-truths.
Other countries, including Germany and South Korea, have added far more industrial robots per worker than the US over the same time period and yet have lost fewer manufacturing jobs than we have.
So it's more accurate to say humans are prediction machines: "devices that constantly try to stay one step ahead of the breaking waves of sensory stimulation, by actively predicting the incoming flow." (Clark, 2016)
The urge to label hovers before the stream of consciousness, ready to take the wind out of its sails. Of course, the weather's always changing and the wind often comes out of nowhere.
The study authors speculated that these characteristics may foster “Openness to Experience” (OE), which has been positively correlated to paranormal beliefs in other research.
Benefits often come with a cost... Burdens may yield benefits.... Benefits and burdens may be certain but small or uncertain but large...immediate but brief or delayed but long-lasting. Moral principles only go so far in helping us sort it all out.
Those who are truly stuck in poverty need different kinds of government help than those who are suffering brief periods of hardship.
To be a fearmonger is to traffic in fear. Fearmongering is one way ideological and religious movements gain adherents and then keep them. The world is a scary place. We offer the way out.
Air capture can remove far more CO2 per acre of land than trees. It also has the potential to pay for itself by producing a commercially viable product – low-carbon fuels – from the recycled CO2.
...research on treatment effectiveness should include a comparison condition that controls for personal factors: how the researchers interact with subjects. That means the same amount of compassion, touching, attention, encouragement, and all-around support given to subjects across groups.
Others don’t want to move forward with SRM research because they consider it a distraction from what our main focus should be: cutting greenhouse gas emissions. These critics want us to embrace the necessity of sacrifice, not rely on the hope that technology will save the planet before disaster strikes. Such hope would reduce the sense of urgency to act now, so we mustn’t feed that particular wolf.
Here we have the themes of impending catastrophe, warfare, and paranoia. Advocates of geoengineering are vilified, their motives suspect. Pragmatic explorations are redefined as ideologies. So what’s the deal?
Indignation is pretty much a knee-jerk reaction to perceived injustice and is associated with a desire to punish the guilty party. The guilty party may be seen as having too much of a good thing or too little of a bad thing.
Right now there are about 3 US workers for every retiree. By 2050, there will be 2 workers for every retiree. Also by 2050, the U.S. proportion of GDP spent on just Social Security and Medicare is projected to rise from 8.6% today to 11.5% if no changes are made in these programs.
No one likes being told they're an ideologue or that their profound observations are profoundly ideological.
Thing is, what gets you in isn't what keeps you there. The hardest part is to jump in. To place yourself within a new web of experience and influence. If monetary incentives are what it takes to make you jump, so be it. New reasons for being there will unfold as new rewards are discovered.
The effects of self-determined actions and non-actions come with varying degrees of certainty, immediacy, importance, magnitude, and vividness, as do the effects of restricting self-determined actions and non-actions.
Many employers have reported delaying capital investments because they haven't been able to find enough workers who would be able to operate and trouble-shoot their fancy new machines and equipment.
Unfortunately, new generations of Americans are falling even further behind. Despite unending school reform and the expansion of adult basic education, literacy levels of young adults are lower today than they were a decade ago.