Word: thingness
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...brain loathes uncertainty. In laboratory experiments, humans actually fear uncertainty more than physical pain. We are simply wired this way. When we encounter uncertainty, the first thing we do is try to beat it back. The problem is, uncertainty may not be the biggest threat. It may be a distraction - the kind we have to cope with while we do the actual work of keeping ourselves alive...
...blame for the confusion? Absolutely. But no more than usual. What about the government? So far, officials have done a relatively decent job of explaining what they know and what they don't and planning for the worst. "It's going to be a unique flu season. The only thing certain is uncertainty," says Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). "Even with the best efforts, influenza will cause severe illness and, tragically, some death...
...rely on emotions to make decisions about risk. We can't possibly mull over every new piece of data our brains collect, so our emotions give us shortcuts, helping us make split-second judgments about that information. The more uncertainty, the more shortcuts we use. This is a good thing. People who have suffered brain damage that removes emotions from their calculations cannot function. They can't make decisions, even simple ones. So we need our emotions to make sense of the world. But our emotions also can lead us astray - particularly when we encounter an exception to a lifetime...
With the team's heads protected, the only thing that remains to be seen is whether or not the new helmets can help bring Harvard back to the NCAA tournament for the first time in four years...
...think a lot of people did have this feeling of ‘What’s this privileged person doing complaining?’” she says. “Although I think I make this point in the book that that’s the thing about depression–it’s ridiculous. It’s about being sad about nothing...