ANATOLY IVANOV / PROSE / CATEGORIES / SOCIETY

PEOPLE PREFER TO DO SOMETHING RATHER THAN NOTHING, EVEN IF IT’S PAINFUL

PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / OUTSIDE NEWS / 2019-12-10

A team at the University of Virginia’s Department of Psychology meta-analysed 11 studies, and “found that participants typically did not enjoy spending 6 to 15 minutes in a room by themselves with nothing to do but think, that they enjoyed doing mundane external activities much  + 

DEATH ON SCREEN

CINEMA / PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2019-11-29

We view death countless times on screens, daily. People exploding, shot, bleeding-out, run-over, cut to pieces in so many “creative” ways. And yet, how many of us think about the inescapable fact that at some point in the future, possibly very near future, we’ll be  + 

FAKE EVERYTHING

RELIGION / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2019-11-20

Fake food. Sugar and salt and glutamates. Fake faces. Make-up, lighting and Photoshop. Fake breasts. Silicone-gel. Fake diplomas. For the rich. Fake furniture. Veneered particle boards. Fake vacations. Staged and edited for Instagram. Fake feelings. Benzodiazepines and SSRIs. Fake songs. Auto-tuned studio and live recordings.  + 

PEOPLE LOVE CYCLIC AND REGENERATING STORIES AND UNIVERSES

PHYSICS / PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2019-07-28

People love cyclic and regenerating universes — reincarnation, royal / superhero families of father to son, extreme quantum fluctuation initiating a new Big Bang, etc. — because they appeal to our sense of narrative. They also appeal to our intuition for causality seen in most phenomena  + 

MAYBE THE ONLY METHOD TO “UPGRADE” THE HUMAN CIVILIZATION

EDUCATION / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2019-07-20

Maybe the only method to “upgrade” the human civilization is to implement mandatory annual reasoning, understanding and culture tests… worldwide? Each year, your understanding of the standard physics model, basic math, logic, chemistry, biology, psychology and economics are tested. With terrible, terrible consequences if you  + 

SOCIAL MEDIA VS YOU?

MARKETING / PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIAL MEDIA / ESSAYS / 2019-03-20

Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are platforms run by multi-billion-dollar companies with near infinite resources, best research and development teams, top neuroscientists and unscrupulous user interface designers. Huge companies working to make your experience on social media as sticky and addictive as possible. To take over  + 

WE KNOW EVERYTHING, YET WE DON’T ACT ON ANYTHING

PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / 2018-12-03

For all practical purposes, we, as a species, already possess all the information needed for health, beauty, self-realization, spiritual growth, social harmony… And yet, how many of us are healthy / happy / grown-up / self-realized? Less than 0,05%? Why? Is it lack of access  + 

HUMANS PREFER POWER TO TRUTH

ECONOMICS / POLITICS / RELIGION / SOCIETY / 2018-10-25

“Humans have this remarkable ability to know and not to know at the same time. Or more correctly, they can know something when they really think about it, but most of the time they don’t think about it, so they don’t know it. If you  + 

WHY DO WE MOURN THE DEATH OF CELEBRITIES SO MUCH?

SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2018-09-08

People rely on celebrities for personality templates, which is why celebrity deaths hit them so hard.  + 

HAPPY PEOPLE TEND TO MARRY… NOT MARRIED PEOPLE ARE HAPPIER

PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2018-06-02

Remember the “married people are happier on average than singles” stat? Well, it could be that the direction of causation is actually reversed: happiness _causes_ marriage. Higher levels of serotonin, dopamine and oxytocin bring about and maintain a marriage. ;)  + 

US DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE IN BIOLOGICAL TERMS

BIOLOGY / POLITICS / RELIGION / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2018-04-10

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men evolved differently, that they are born with certain mutable characteristics, and that among these are life and the pursuit of pleasure.” — the American Declaration of Independence translated into biological terms  + 

BERLIN FILM FESTIVAL – A MENTALLY SICK ASYLUM

CINEMA / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2018-02-24

If you care about my opinion about the Berlin Film Festival line-up and awards — except the very, very worthy La Prière — it’s a perfect image of the mentally sick asylum which is our current, past and future global society. I chose to quit  + 

HOW TO PURSUE YOUR PASSION

EDUCATION / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2016-08-06

Here’s how to pursue your passion. First, choose the passion. If you don’t know what it is, then skip to the next step. Second: go to school. If you had a passion, the teachers will most probably beat the crap out of you, intellectually, and  + 

BREXIT: STUPIDITY, HYPOCRISY, XENOPHOBIA AND EGOTISM

POLITICS / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2016-07-04

Well, I’ve waited about a week before saying it… but the whole Brexit thing is a pathetic show of stupidity, hypocrisy, xenophobia and egotism. The good thing is that around half of real-life UKers are OKers (and that includes my friends on the island). So  + 

MAKE ART OR HAVE KIDS?

ART THEORY / PSYCHOLOGY / SOCIETY / ESSAYS / 2014-03-03

Having kids is a weak argument for dropping the ball artistically & professionally. Kids would prefer parents they admire past their teens. Oh, and if you’re projecting your lifelong dreams onto your kids… that’s a big no-no. They won’t be correcting your own life’s mistakes.  + 

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