Learn more about philosophy with this collection
How to write clearly and concisely
How to use proper grammar and punctuation
How to structure a business document
Even among the people who seem furthest away from what you consider the ground truth, change is a moonshot away once you understand the nature of resistance and the proper techniques to avoid it. The ability to change our minds, update our assumptions, and entertain other points of view is one of our greatest strengths. It is an evolved ability that comes free with every copy of the human brain. To leverage that strength, we must avoid debate and start by having conversations.
82
350 reads
MORE IDEAS ON THIS
Beliefs aren’t ideas stored in your brain, possessions on a shelf, or files in a biological computer. Belief is a process. To believe or doubt is the result of neurons in associative networks delivering an emergent sensation of certainty, or lack thereof. The speed of change is inversely proporti...
87
776 reads
Imagine attempting to reach the Moon with a ladder and, upon failing, giving up in frustration because now you believe the Moon is unreachable. When we use the wrong tools and approaches, the people on the other side of the issues we care about can seem impossible to reach. That’s why I used to a...
82
356 reads
Disambiguation is what brains do when confronted with novelty and uncertainty. We use what we think we know to disambiguate the ambiguous. I love that term, especially because it comes from reading comprehension: the act of deriving meaning through context when a word, phrase, or entire essay cou...
80
560 reads
The strongest motivation to resist change is the fear of shame and ostracism. As social primates, humans value being good members of their groups much more than they value being right—factually, morally, or otherwise—so much so that as long as we have a group that satisfies our needs, we will cho...
90
574 reads
There’s a term in psychology that pairs well with disambiguation “naïve realism.” This is the certainty one feels when blind to the fact that you are disambiguating, meaning your interpretation doesn’t feel like an interpretation. Since subjectivity often feels like objectivity, naïve realism mak...
85
430 reads
David McRaney is a science journalist, author, and host of the You Are Not So Smart podcast. He shares 5 key insights from his new book, How Minds Change: The Surprising Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion.
86
1.59K reads
Debates have winners and losers, and no one wants to be a loser. But if both sides feel safe to explore their reasoning, to think about their own thinking, to explore their motivations, then we can each avoid the dead-end goal of winning an argument. Instead, we can pursue the shared goal of lear...
82
372 reads
83
394 reads
Brains resist change to some degree because updating when you shouldn’t is dangerous (you might become wrong). But since not updating when you should is also dangerous (you might stay wrong), the brain walks a tightrope, changing its mind carefully given a variety of motivations and goals.
86
788 reads
“We must avoid debate and start having conversations. Debates have winners and losers, and no one wants to be a loser. But if both sides feel safe to explore their reasoning, to think about their own thinking, to explore their motivations, we can avoid the dead-end goal of winning the argument.”
90
405 reads
Persuasion is not coercion. It is also not an attempt to defeat your intellectual opponent with facts or moral superiority, nor is it a debate with a winner or a loser. Persuasion is leading a person along in stages, helping them to better understand their own thinking and how it could align with...
89
1.04K reads
CURATED FROM
nextbigideaclub.com
15 ideas
·9.76K reads
IDEAS CURATED BY
How Minds Change (the process)
“
Read & Learn
20x Faster
without
deepstash
with
deepstash
with
deepstash
Personalized microlearning
—
100+ Learning Journeys
—
Access to 200,000+ ideas
—
Access to the mobile app
—
Unlimited idea saving
—
—
Unlimited history
—
—
Unlimited listening to ideas
—
—
Downloading & offline access
—
—
Supercharge your mind with one idea per day
Enter your email and spend 1 minute every day to learn something new.
I agree to receive email updates