Word: instinct
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Although he doesn’t know the names of past recipients of his generosity—“I go by faces,” he says—Chen claims that he has a good instinct for picking those likely to succeed. According to Chen, one of his favorite seniors is now a mayor in Long Island, and another works in the White House...
...never done that before, even in 1993 when a bomb exploded in the basement, trapping her in an elevator. This time, Zedeo grabbed her desk and held on, lifting her feet off the floor. Then she shouted, "What's happening?" You might expect that her next instinct was to flee. But she had the opposite reaction. "What I really wanted was for someone to scream back, 'Everything is O.K.! Don't worry. It's in your head...
...crisis, our instincts can be our undoing. William Morgan, who directs the exercise-psychology lab at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, has studied mysterious scuba accidents in which divers drowned with plenty of air in their tanks. It turns out that certain people experience an intense feeling of suffocation when their mouths are covered. They respond to that overwhelming sensation by relying on their instinct, which is to rip out whatever is in their mouths. For scuba divers, unfortunately, it is their oxygen source. On land, that would be a perfect solution...
What happened? Aren't disasters supposed to turn us into animals, driven by instinct and surging with adrenaline...
...fire or on a sinking ship, however, such a strategy can be fatal. So is it possible to override this instinct--or prevent it from kicking in altogether...