Kathryn Schulz Discusses the Possibility of Being Wrong at TED

It's difficult to imagine that I, at this very moment, am wrong about anything. Yet we all know, in retrospect that we were often wrong about many things. But it never felt like it at the moment. At TED, Kathryn Schulz discusses the dangers and opportunities of looking more closely at these moments.

Most of us do everything we can to avoid thinking about being wrong, or at least to avoid thinking about the possibility that we ourselves are wrong. We get it in the abstract. We all know everybody in this room makes mistakes. The human species, in general, is fallible -- okay fine.

But when it comes down to me, right now, to all the beliefs I hold, here in the present tense, suddenly all of this abstract appreciation of fallibility goes out the window -- and I can't actually think of anything I'm wrong about.

And the thing is, the present tense is where we live. We go to meetings in the present tense; we go on family vacations in the present tense; we go to the polls and vote in the present tense. So effectively, we all kind of wind up traveling through life, trapped in this little bubble of feeling very right about everything.

I think this is a problem. I think it's a problem for each of us as individuals, in our personal and professional lives, and I think it's a problem for all of us collectively as a culture. So what I want to do today is, first of all, talk about why we get stuck inside this feeling of being right. And second, why it's such a problem. And finally, I want to convince you that it is possible to step outside of that feeling and that if you can do so, it is the single greatest moral, intellectual and creative leap you can make.

So this is one reason, a structural reason, why we get stuck inside this feeling of rightness. I call this error blindness. Most of the time, we don't have any kind of internal cue to let us know that we're wrong about something, until it's too late . . .

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A Television Fire Provokes Me to Check My Smoke Detectors

I watch very little TV, but Renée Youree Kennison recently convinced me to watch the pilot episode of “This is Us.” Wow. Incredible acting, writing, editing, lighting and music. We have been watching a few episodes per week and we are now almost at the end of Season 2 (out or four completed seasons).

I’m writing this post wondering how many lives might have been saved due to the most recent episode we watched. It involved a horrifically vivid fire of a family residence (I won’t say more because I don’t want to spoil it). Maybe I reacted so emotionally to this episode because 18 years ago I woke up out of a deep sleep (thanks to a smoke detector) with my own house on fire. I was astonished that the smoke hadn’t awakened me earlier. I emptied two fire extinguishers on the fire before the fire department arrived. After watching the TV episode, Renée and I found ourselves walking around our houses evaluating our needs for smoke detector and fire extinguishers. I suspect that other people watching that episode did the same thing. I have my fire extinguisher out in the open and visible. I have smoke detectors on every floor and several rooms.

I know that some fire departments are giving out free smoke detectors. Extinguishers and fire blankets are cheap. COVID-19 is not the only danger out there. Please be safe in all ways!

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Front Porches Come Alive During the Pandemic

How many thousands of dissertations will be written about the many ways that this Pandemic has affected us as a society? Here's something that many of us are noticing in my neighborhood. I live in a diverse St. Louis City neighborhood with houses that are often more than 100 years old. These house typically have front porches designed with lots of room for people to spend time on them, but (I suspect) some combination of air conditioning and TV has caused many of these porches to be vacant much of the time. My neighbors and I are seeing a resurgence in the use of these front porches by people seeking to socialize. Increasing numbers of families are out of their porches visiting with each other, visiting with neighbors and chatting with strangers passing by on foot.

I haven't quantified this, but it is apparent and it's a beautiful thing to behold. As a photographer, I would be tempted to use my long range camera to capture a collage of these highly-social images, but I don't want to invade the privacy of my neighbors. Are other people in other neighborhoods around the U.S. noticing anything similar?

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Mike Pence Claims He Didn’t Know He Was Supposed to Wear a Mask at Mayo Clinic

We've all seen the photo of Mike Pence failing to wear a mask at the Mayo Clinic in the middle of the pandemic. I can't shake this image of America's "Point Man" for the Coronavirus Pandemic. He claims that he supposedly did not know that a mask was required inside of the Mayo Clinic, even while surrounded by a sea of people wearing masks.

Of course he knew that he was supposed to be wearing a mask for the safety of those around him.

We have officially arrived. Maybe we arrived many months ago, but now for sure.

“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.” ― George Orwell, 1984

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Flowbee: An Easy and Economical Option for a Haircut in the Age of Coronavirus

Over the past 15 years, people have chuckled when I told them that I don't pay other people to cut my hair. I use a Flowbee. [I can imagine people laughing as I write this].

I was introduced to Flowbee by a well-coiffed gay man, the head of HR at a prominent law firm, who told me that he and many of his friends used a Flowbee to cut their own hair. Yes, it seems ridiculous that people would cut their hair with a device connected to a vacuum cleaner but it does a nice job giving a layered cut quickly and easily (I merely trim around my ears with a trimmer after using the Flowbee). I've saved 15 years of paying someone else to cut my hair and it is immensely satisfying that I no longer need to schedule haircuts - I can cut my own hair whenever I want, and sometimes that is 2 am.

I'm getting ready to cut my hair again today, and it occurred to me that many people out there might want to consider this option, especially in the age of COVIC-19. I'm not getting paid anything for this post, but I am adding this link to Flowbee in case you are interested. As I expected, they are backlogged with orders because of coronavirus. Apparently, others are catching on.

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