Michael Shermer on strange beliefs

Twelve Virtues of Rationality by Eliezer Yudkowsky by Eliezer Yudkowsky The first virtue is curiosity. A burning itch to know is higher than a solemn vow to pursue truth. To feel the burning itch of curiosity requires both that you be ignorant, and that you desire to relinquish your ignorance. If in your heart you believe you already know, or if in your heart you do not wish to know, then your questioning will be purposeless and your skills without direction. 6 Questions That Will Make You Fee Peaceful and Complete “The best place to find a helping hand is at the end of your own arm.” ~Swedish Proverb When I was in my mid-twenties an unhealthy relationship with an unhealthy guy sent me packing off to the corner of New Mexico to find myself. In a new age, self-discovery kind of world—a hubbub of a town filled with people in transition—I was graced to meet many powerful healers, gurus, shamans, and teachers. I became a workshop junkie. I went on Shamanic power journeys to spiritual centers around the world, chanted with Indian gurus, and became a certified yoga instructor and Reiki master.

The Online Learning Blog from Study2U Supposedly browsing the internet requires more brain power than watching television. Although judging from some of the websites we’ve come across that assumption is cast into doubt. Here’s some of the sites we like that might get your brain to sit up and listen. Ted A Lesson on Forgiveness The Buddha was sitting under a tree talking to his disciples when a man came and spit on his face. He wiped it off, and he asked the man, “What next? What do you want to say next?” The man was a little puzzled because he himself never expected that when you spit on somebody’s face, he will ask, “What next?” He had no such experience in his past. He had insulted people and they had become angry and they had reacted. Buddhism and the Brain ? SEEDMAGAZINE.COM Credit: Flickr user eschipul Over the last few decades many Buddhists and quite a few neuroscientists have examined Buddhism and neuroscience, with both groups reporting overlap. I’m sorry to say I have been privately dismissive.

Lucid Dreaming By lucid dreaming, you can gain complete control over the one place that no one will ever care about: your imagination. Just The Facts Lucid dreaming is a scientifically proven phenomenon. While some get into lucid dreaming in order to treat chronic nightmares, or to experience all facets of the human experience, approximately 99.8% of people use it as a tool for cheap and interactive 3D porn. A lucid dream is a dream in which the dreamer is aware that he or she is dreaming, and he or she can even choose to control and manipulate his or her dream. Thought Files of the Young Broken Reckless Why do people commit crimes? There are a multitude of reasons, but Dr. David Eagleman believes that it really comes down to states of the brain. There have been many cases in which violent murderers or sick pedophiles are found with tumors in their brain — and in the cases where these tumors are removed, the behavior of these criminals ceases to be criminal, and in fact they often revert back to being healthy and happy members of society.

The Brain: A Secret History In a compelling and at times disturbing series, Dr Michael Mosley explores the brutal history of experimental psychology. Mosley embarks on three journeys to understand science's last great frontier - the human mind - as he traces the history of the attempts to understand and manipulate the brain. Experiments on the human mind have led to profound insights into how our brain works - but have also involved great cruelty and posed some terrible ethical dilemmas. Ben Stein’s Flunked: No Intelligence Applied Expelled : No Intelligence Allowed subjected viewers to the fact burning, logic twisting, psychedelic head trip of Intelligent Design propagandists and their conspiracy-theory ravings. This under-appreciated exposé by YouTubes own PrometheusWithLight delves into the seedy underworld of ID and it's noisy, clumsy, paper trail laying transmutation from Creation Science, meticulously dismantling claims of Academic Intolerance. ID propagandists continually whine that Mainstream Science is suppressing evidence of Forethought and Design in nature, and that ID research is being similarly suppressed. The reality?

Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph, they can become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on this scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatred. Our posturing, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in this universe are challenged by this point of pale light. As the ancient myth makers knew, we're children equally of the earth and the sky.

Fractals: Hunting the Hidden Dimension Mysteriously beautiful fractals are shaking up the world of mathematics and deepening our understanding of nature. You may not know it, but fractals, like the air you breathe, are all around you. Their irregular, repeating shapes are found in cloud formations and tree limbs, in stalks of broccoli and craggy mountain ranges, even in the rhythm of the human heart. In this film, we takes viewers on a fascinating quest with a group of maverick mathematicians determined to decipher the rules that govern fractal geometry.