We are often unhappy because we live with erroneous assumptions. But because we have lived with them for so long, they are familiar and even comfortable.
Questioning those assumptions will be crucial to changing them, and finding happiness.
Scientists, doctors, and all of us, are snake blind: it was true for Galen, Vesalius, and William Harvey, and it is true for today’s doctors & scientists.
Drive-by journalism undermines the essential role of a free press in the democracy. As media explodes, the news paradoxically becomes narrower and dumber.
We are often hurt by those people and things we care about most, and confused about why they cause us so much pain. I see this in the ER with patients, co-workers, and everyone. I also see it in the democracy, in education and in my own life. Love is a good thing. Love should … [Read more…]
The world is changing rapidly – politically, socially, technologically – and progress requires us to pursue critical thinking, and to resist authority.
It is interesting that scientists rail against Christian fundamentalists, because so many scientists are equally fundamentalist about their own disciplines. Let us begin with examples, data; let us use science against the scientist. I have previously mentioned Bernard Barber’s paper, ‘Resistance by Scientists to Scientific Discovery‘, and Thomas Kuhn’s slender but essential – and largely … [Read more…]
In high school it was a great surprise for me to discover that the United States is overwhelmingly protestant. Living in Cajun country, I had simply assumed that most of the country was Roman Catholic. There are so many fascinating quirks and oddities that living in a ‘foreign’ culture offers. There are the differences of … [Read more…]
South Louisiana is famous for a number of things, the food, the festivals, the language, the joie de vivre. But most all, it is the music that has carried the culture into the international spotlight. It wasn’t always that way. You can buy t-shirts that read ‘Chank-a-Chank’, which is one of those pejorative-cum-pride things. Chank-a-chank … [Read more…]
The real problem with prejudice is closed-mindedness: too often our first impression – our prejudice – remains our only impression.
I want to tell a nice story about myself, not to brag, but in the hope that others might do similar things. I try to head overseas every year or two, and so far my wife and I have been able to do that with our children. It requires some hard choices and some clear … [Read more…]