20 MAR 2018 by ideonexus
Small Minority Accounts for Bulk of Gun Ownership
Since the 2008 election of President Obama, the number of firearms manufactured in the U.S. has tripled, while imports have doubled. This doesn’t mean more households have guns than ever before—that percentage has stayed fairly steady for decades. Rather, more guns are being stockpiled by a small number of individuals. Three percent of the population now owns half of the country’s firearms, says a recent, definitive study from the Injury Control Research Center at Harvard University.
S...
1 19 DEC 2014 by ideonexus
How the Finance Industry Hurts the Economy
In perhaps the starkest illustration, economists from Harvard University and the University of Chicago wrote in a recent paper that every dollar a worker earns in a research field spills over to make the economy $5 better off. Every dollar a similar worker earns in finance comes with a drain, making the economy 60 cents worse off.
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...the growth of complex financial products has served primarily to boost income for the firms themselves, Philippon said. A new paper from researchers in t... 1 
notes
notes09 AUG 2014 by ideonexus
Greg Epstein Secular Invocation
Mayor-Elect Walsh, and distinguished and honored guests of all backgrounds and beliefs: it is my great honor, on behalf of the Humanist, secular, and nontheistic community, to share this poem, “To Be of Use,” by contemporary Massachusetts poet Marge Piercy, in honor of the important work you and all of us will soon be called to do.
The people I love the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become ...Folksonomies: secularism
Folksonomies: secularism
1 notes
notesGreg Epstein, Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University, was invited to give at the Interfaith Inaugural Celebration for new Boston Mayor Martin Walsh on January 5, 2014, at Old South Church in Boston.
02 MAR 2014 by ideonexus
How Poverty Affects IQ
In a series of experiments, the researchers found that pressing financial concerns had an immediate impact on the ability of low-income individuals to perform on common cognitive and logic tests. On average, a person preoccupied with money problems exhibited a drop in cognitive function similar to a 13-point dip in IQ, or the loss of an entire night's sleep.
But when their concerns were benign, low-income individuals performed competently, at a similar level to people who were well off, said...Fascinating for the fact that IQ appears so plastic in just day-to-day environment. Removing the stressors increases the IQ.
22 NOV 2013 by ideonexus
Stress is Healthy
Your heart might be pounding, you might be breathing faster, maybe breaking out into a sweat. And normally, we interpret these physical changes as anxiety or signs that we aren't coping very well with the pressure.
But what if you viewed them instead as signs that your body was energized, was preparing you to meet this challenge? Now that is exactly what participants were told in a study conducted at Harvard University. Before they went through the social stress test, they were taught to ret...At least it can be, if we don't think of it as being detrimental. If we don't stress about stress, but rather think of it as healthy reaction and seek social connections as a coping mechanism for it, then stress is good for us.
Additional Note: Could this be why parents have longer lifespans? The oxytocin response tempers the detrimental effects of stress, leaving only the beneficial?
02 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
John Adams and the Doctrinal Challenge of Extraterrestria...
Sometime in the summer of 1786 the fifty-year-old John Adams, graduate of Harvard University, man of science and future second President of the United States, turned up one morning uninvited at The Grove. He was shown round all Herschel’s new telescopes, and they embarked on an impassioned discussion of the possibility of extraterrestrial life, and the moral implications of there being a ‘plurality of worlds’. This was the sort of metaphysical debate that Herschel had once had with his ... 1 notes
notesIf there is life elsewhere in the Universe, Adams argues with Herschel that it challenges Biblical doctrine.
28 MAY 2011 by ideonexus
Carl Sagan Punished for Popularizing Science
Yet instead, Sagan was punished by the scientific community for his public endeavors. The persecution began as early as the 1960s, when Harvard University denied him tenure. Nobel laureate Harold Urey, a chemist who had previously served as one of Sagan's mentors, helped quash his chances with a nasty letter objecting to Sagan's budding media and outreach efforts. His outreach efforts were used against Sagan's pursuit of tenure at Harvard.
23 MAR 2011 by ideonexus
1933 Humanist Manifesto
The time has come for widespread recognition of the radical changes in religious beliefs throughout the modern world. The time is past for mere revision of traditional attitudes. Science and economic change have disrupted the old beliefs. Religions the world over are under the necessity of coming to terms with new conditions created by a vastly increased knowledge and experience. In every field of human activity, the vital movement is now in the direction of a candid and explicit humanism....
1 Original humanist manifesto, defining humanism's 15 affirmations.
