The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not ‘Eureka!’ but ‘That’s funny…’ —Isaac Asimov
Science depends on replication. Psychology depends on publication. Bullies mar both.
Creative people walk a fine line between brilliance and insanity. We know this, or at least, we think we do. Anecdotal observation tells us the premise is true even if there is no research to support the observation. Science, however, actually does confirm a link between creativity and mental illness. Maybe. That report was published in 2010, but the whole premise was later brought into question when additional studies failed to replicate the results. Arguments between researchers are ongoing, but trust me, we’re all nuts.
Science relies on research that can be duplicated. A scientific theory is just a nice idea until someone can not only prove their concept to a reasonable degree (100% certainty is often impossible), but someone else has to be able to copy that research and achieve the same results. Studies cannot be considered accurate if there is no corroboration. That’s just the way science works.
Well, that’s the way science is supposed to work.
The field of psychology has long had a PR problem and much of that problem revolves around the difficulty that exists in duplicating their research. It’s one thing when scientists are doing research on inert materials or with factors that are relatively absolute. Psychologists, however, have to do their research with humans, which means they’re working with a base set that, at its very core, cannot be duplicated exactly. Sometimes, they can’t even get close. Two different study groups in two different parts of the world may duplicate research methods exactly and still come up with wildly different results, not because the methodology was flawed, but because of basic differences in the humans studied. This makes finding necessary corroboration difficult, and significant when it happens.
So, let’s take a study done some 20 years ago. This study, which involves chocolate chip cookies and self-control, has been the basis for 83 similar studies and almost 200 additional experiments, all coming to the same general conclusion. So, one would think that this passes the scientific requirements for proven theory. Pretty much everyone in the field of psychology accepted this research as fact.
Then, last week an announcement was made that brings all that research into question. There is a paper set to publish next month that directly challenges all the findings from the past 20 years on this particular subject. Most importantly, for this conversation, it challenges how psychological research is performed and the common use of macro-analysis in assessing that research. What the paper seems to infer is that huge bodies of established psychological research are wrong because of errors in macro-analysis.
How does this affect you and me? Everything your therapist told you may be pure bunk. That doesn’t mean psychotherapy isn’t helpful; don’t go cancelling that appointment just yet. But people who rely on the accuracy of that information, which not only includes psychotherapists but aspects of law enforcement, retail planning, marketing, transportation, and everything else that relies on studies of human behaviour, now have more reason than ever to question the veracity of information being presented as fact.
While psychology is the field currently in the hot seat, you should know that questions concerning the accuracy of published research have been around for a while. A study from 2005 claims that most research findings are false. But then, an article for the American Psychological Association questioned whether there is a reproducibility crisis.
There are a crap ton of reasons these fallacies exists, but what they all ultimately come down to are money (no big surprise) and what Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert calls shameless bullies. There are millions of dollars in funding on the line, not to mention tenure, based on a researcher’s ability to publish their findings, and the greater number of scientific publications have shown a distinct bias for publishing papers that are positive and declare new findings that, at least on the surface, seem to move science forward. And while the scientific method requires that research be duplicated, there is considerable animosity between original researchers and those who would reproduce their work. Katie Palmer’s article in Wired last week, “Psychology Is In Crisis Over Whether It’s In Crisis,” had so much back and forth on the issue that my head was nearly spinning by the time I waded through everything. Folks with Ph. D.’s can be just as mean as street hoods, they merely use words that cut sharper than a switchblade.
How does one resolve an issue like this when the very methods that might solve the problems are part of the problem?
Dear science: we need you to get your act together and quickly. We’ve trusted you, put faith in your findings, confident that research that was duplicated was accurate. Now, we are beginning to question whether we know anything at all. Finding out our science is skewed is rather on par with finding out those deities we believed in probably don’t exist. Who and what are we supposed to believe? Who and what are we supposed to trust? Is anything real?
I can handle psychology being in flux for a while. After all, scientists are just as crazy as creatives. Just don’t tell me what we know about gravity is wrong; it’s Monday and I might come unglued.
12 People Who Totally Suck
Indiana Tea Party Republican Governor Mike Pense (2015)
“All photographs are accurate. None of them is the truth.” -Richard Avedon
[one_half padding=”4px 10px 0 4px”]Ha! I bet you thought we were going to give you a list of twelve individuals who totally suck! Okay, we did think about doing that, but then the number of Republican candidates for President grew to 16 and that just made the list too long.
Kidding. Sort of. Almost.
Sure, we preach being nice and inclusive and loving most the time. After all, that really is the only way the world is going to improve. However, there are certain groups of people whose actions as a group are so reprehensible that they need to be called out and shunned. Furthermore, we as a society should do everything we can to encourage the demise of these groups. Some I doubt will ever go away, but many can, and should. Here’s our list of the most despicable.
Real celebrities, those who have some significant talent that thrusts them into the public eye for good reason, can be challenging enough; there have been many in that group whose behavior is less than stellar. Pseudo-celebrities, though, have no significant talent. They have no significant reason for being popular. In most cases, we have reality television to thank for this phenomenon. When networks find amusement in airing the antics of talentless, classless, and too often clueless people, we all suffer. Greatly. Better they all go away. Forever.
These people are just straight up mean. They do not value life in any form, theirs nor anyone else’s. When people don’t value life, they do stupid things such as see how many people they can blow up. Ostensibly, they all have some cause they are trying to defend, but what cause would anyone support that doesn’t value life? Where on the scale of reason does that even remotely make sense? Here’s the thing: not all terrorist are in the middle east or carry guns. There are more in corporate boardrooms. They’re all just as dangerous and all need to be stopped.
When I was little, I would get excited every time I heard a knock on the door because it almost always meant a friend had come to play or the UPS guy had dropped off a package. Now, the UPS and FedEx guys just ring the doorbell and disappear. So help me, I swear they’re using teleporters. I’ve not seen a truck in front of our house in years. Now, when there is a knock at the door, it’s someone wanting to change my religion or ask me for money. I’m not interested in doing either and, quite honestly, even if I was looking to do either I wouldn’t wait to see who showed up on my front porch. If I didn’t invite you or you’re not bringing me something fun, go away. Forever.
This is one of those groups that, no matter how much we rail against them or point out how totally ridiculous they are, they’re probably not going to go totally away. Why do I think this? Because racists have been here pretty much from the moment hominids developed and separated into different tribes. Just because they won’t go completely away doesn’t mean we should in any way, shape, or form tolerate their unacceptable behavior. To the degree we ignore them, they fester and grow like an untreated cancer. We have to stay on top of them, stopping them at every possible juncture, or else they will take over.
Here we have one group who can, should, and must go completely away. More than anything else, these people are quite simply ignorant. We can’t even complain that they’re believing in ancient myths. These fools are making up nonsense out of the clear blue. While we would like to think we can love them into accepting everyone regardless of their sexual orientation, history would seem to indicate otherwise. We must instead focus on educating younger generations correctly, dismantling the nonsense before it has a chance to grab hold, and hoping that those who refuse to learn die out quickly.
Rapists. Pedophiles. Anyone who sexually takes advantage of another person, or commits any sex act against them without their permission and compliance, is someone who needs to be immediately removed from society. There’s actual science to tell us that recidivism among sexual predators exceeds 80% no matter what type of treatment or intervention they receive, or who their parents are, or what reality show they’re on, or which presidential candidates have had their picture taken with them. If we want to keep them from committing further crimes, they have to be removed from society. We simply have no choice at this point.
Compared to the previous group, this one may seem completely insignificant. However, I challenge that people who don’t hold doors and/or elevators, especially when they see the person approaching is in some form of distress, are more than just rude: they have no respect for other people. Those who have no respect for other people not only don’t hold doors/elevators, they are capable of doing any despicable and mean act of which one can think. Murder is not off the list of choices for these people, given the correct set of circumstances. Note, we’re not talking about someone who is just having a bad day and lets one instance slip. These are the people who, every day, despise everyone else on the planet and do their best to be mean. They can all go away.[/one_half]
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I’m relying on statistical analysis for this one. I’m not sure I’ve ever had the displeasure of actually running into a true Bieber Believer. I don’t go to the places where they are likely to congregate and run in the opposite direction at the first sound of anything that might possibly be the beginning of that noise Bieber calls music. Bieber fans elicit screams and other sounds that exceed the measurable quotient of the human ear. Rumor is they’ve actually had to re-route aircraft to avoid the shockwave of disruptive noise caused by Bieber Fans. Many cities are considering a ban on indoor Bieber concerts due to the screams of fans compromising the structural integrity of the buildings. Fortunately, most Bieber Fans grow up, discover real music, and move on.
You know at least one. They are convinced that they know better than everyone and no amount of evidence to the contrary is ever going to convince them otherwise. They believe they have the best religion, went to the best school, drive the best cars, live in the best houses, and could have just as easily invented Facebook themselves accept for the fact they’ve never been a loser geek. These people delight in putting everyone else down in an effort to make themselves look better. We have another word for them, too: Bullies. Like many others on this list, we have to stand up to them to keep their numbers from growing. Fortunately, there is evidence they can be converted when shown the error of their ways. We have no choice but to try.
If you’ve never worked for tips in the United States, you don’t understand the severity of this crime. All over the country, we hear people talking about the minimum wage being too low. What rarely gets any publicity is that groups of very necessary people work for even less, roughly 75% less, on the promise that if they do a good job people will tip them. Your server’s base wage is a mere $2.75 an hour. Who can live on that? No one! And while the concept of tips sounds good, the fact is that as meal prices have gone up, and the quality of food has in many cases declined, tips given to servers, who control neither prices nor food quality, get shafted. Not tipping should be a crime. The punishment: working three doubles in a row at a busy restaurant … with no tips.
This one is a no-brainer as well. Murder is probably the worst crime of them all, and often the most difficult to catch. Police can’t look for a murderer until they have evidence that the crime has been committed and contemporary murderers have all kinds of methods preventing that from happening. Murderers can be divided into two groups: passionate murderers who were simply pushed to far and killed in the heat of the moment; and psycho murderers who think, plan, and prepare before carrying out their nefarious deed(s). The first group probably isn’t all that dangerous with a little psychiatric help. The fact that they killed once was totally related to a specific situation. The second group, though, can’t be trusted no matter what. That there are still a huge group of them running loose should make all of us afraid to go to bed at night.
The Republican party has a grand tradition and holds a valuable place in political conversation. At least, it did until this small group of jackasses calling themselves the Tea Party started taking over. Tea Party Republicans have done more damage to the country, especially at the state level, than ISIS or any other terrorist group ever could. Consider their list of crimes:
Sadly, that list is just the most common grievances to be held against Tea Partiers. These folks are nothing short of insane. Running on a platform of fiscal responsibility and smaller government, once elected they decimate every necessary program that does not kick back funding to their cronies. They are the very definition of a real and present danger that, if not completely removed from the political system, could single-handedly destroy the country.
See, I made it all the way through the list without naming anyone specifically. Well, okay, there is the idiot in today’s picture, but that’s more implied, don’t you think? Besides, he’s already proven this year just how much he sucks. He doesn’t need my help.[/one_half_last]
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