OUT OF OUR HANDS
As humans, we think of ourselves as rational sentient beings, masters of our own minds who only make rational decisions based on sound reasoning. Not so. Research concludes that we are greatly influenced by our environment, the value we place on other's opinions and swayed by subversive messages, particularly when our minds are low in blood sugar.
I wrote earlier in the year about a BBC Horizon series called: How You Really Make Decisions. In it, Nobel Prize winner Professor Daniel Kahneman reveals to us the truth about how our brains are making irrational, biased and lazy decisions more often than we realise. His book (available to download in audio format too) goes into greater detail on the subject and helps us to understand why and when we make the wrong decisions. Essentially, when we are making these decisions, we're pulling resources from two brain 'systems'. The two systems are: (1) fast and the other (2) slow. The fast system (1) intuitive/unconscious decision maker, accesses pre-learned ideas & cemented 'truths', making quick associations to construct easy explanations. Our 'slow' system (2) which we align to our Ego and is the conscious & reasoning part of our brain, often get's left behind as the fast brain kicks in first, telling us 'I've got this covered' and then, 'move on to the next task'.
All too often, we'll let the quick (1) 'gut instinct' decision-making part of our brain take over in favour of using (2) deep, rational thinking, as the (2) takes a lot more energy and we have just a finite amount stored, we are wired to use the quick access memory more, to free up brain power for other tasks and conserve energy at the same time.
Some of our (1) fast-decision making decisions are based on hard-coded rules learned through the evolutionary process - ie. knowing when to run/fight is integral to our survival and this fast brain can give us an advantage for success in other situations too. But not knowing when to give extra focus on making decisions when we're faced with more complex tasks/problems, can lead to errors made through cognitive biases - ie. falling into the trap of making assumptions without thinking things through properly. It's this assumptive mind state that gets us into trouble and stops us from really understanding the world around us.
Studies carried out by psychologist, Roy Baumeister, into our brain's fast/slow system switching and will-power or ego depletion centred around glucose levels being a major contributing factor, have shown clear instances of this effect occurring at higher levels within our society. It was demonstrated for example, that Judges granting parole before and after lunch, awarded parole to a greater percentage of prisoners after lunch than those just before or closer to the end of the day. This is something that knowledgable/well-educated, responsible/powerful and all too self-confident people fail to understand in themselves. Try challenging the reasoning of your doctor next time and possibly you'll witness this phenomena - as they'll often sooner take offence than admit they've jumped to conclusions based on pre-learned information or assumptions.
Studies carried out by psychologist, Roy Baumeister, into our brain's fast/slow system switching and will-power or ego depletion centred around glucose levels being a major contributing factor, have shown clear instances of this effect occurring at higher levels within our society. It was demonstrated for example, that Judges granting parole before and after lunch, awarded parole to a greater percentage of prisoners after lunch than those just before or closer to the end of the day. This is something that knowledgable/well-educated, responsible/powerful and all too self-confident people fail to understand in themselves. Try challenging the reasoning of your doctor next time and possibly you'll witness this phenomena - as they'll often sooner take offence than admit they've jumped to conclusions based on pre-learned information or assumptions.
So, back again to the case of parole decision making for judges....timing was more likely a factor in the decision making process in this example, because of glucose levels. The judge would have unconsciously been conserving brain glucose/energy - as lower levels of glucose were required to make a decision to 'put-off' parole until a later date, rather than make a complex analysed decision requiring more brain power. Additional studies on brain energy have also shown the levels of self-control can diminish - to the point where the 'self' is devoid completely. This is when the emotional, irrational & primitive brain makes itself known - generating unhelpful, unhealthy and at times, just plain crazy outcomes....and good reason why we should always have a brain-boosting refreshment to hand!
We have just a finite amount of glucose energy available over periods of time which can still be replenished, but just like a muscle, the brain fatigues and rest/sleep is required to repair and replenish for full functionality to resume. Good news - the brain can be worked-out like a muscle and focus, required for taking in information, processing and making complex decisions, can be improved/stretched over time by practising some techniques - like these found in Leo Babauta's book (free version here).
I also discovered a couple of easy tricks that worked this morning.
Set timers for focus: Tell yourself, you're going to dedicate some quality time to something ie. blog/read/meditate etc. for a set time, eg. 30 mins. Any other thoughts/distractions, push out till after. Have a break - then repeat for the next task. Your brain will stack each and wait.
Adjust your lens: This really simple technique works! Cup your eyes for a tele-focus lens. SO, reading something that requires concentration - laser-in on it. Do this every time and a pavlovian response for conditioning yourself is triggered over time.
Mind Control
If you've ever watched a magician or illusionist perform at a live show or on TV - chances are you've already witnessed the power of suggestion. A friend of mine was on a Derren Brown episode where, as part of a creative duo, he had to come up with the idea for an advert in just 30 minutes. Unbeknownst to him and his colleague, the show's production team had conceived a clever plan to strategically place visual triggers along the route for the taxi drive in to the TV studios. These strong visual messages, fresh in their minds, would play a part in steering them towards creating a very similar advertising campaign to that which Derren himself had scamped-up before they strted. What is amazing about this clip (shown below), is that something so 'complex' like an advertising campaign, which requires experience and creative thinking to achieve well, can be so easily primed in these guys minds to obtain predicted results as the experiment in this illusionist's episode clearly shows. It's this kind of 'priming' that we unconsciously pick up throughout the day which affect and ultimately, make our decisions!
The Power of Suggestion
We have just a finite amount of glucose energy available over periods of time which can still be replenished, but just like a muscle, the brain fatigues and rest/sleep is required to repair and replenish for full functionality to resume. Good news - the brain can be worked-out like a muscle and focus, required for taking in information, processing and making complex decisions, can be improved/stretched over time by practising some techniques - like these found in Leo Babauta's book (free version here).
I also discovered a couple of easy tricks that worked this morning.
Set timers for focus: Tell yourself, you're going to dedicate some quality time to something ie. blog/read/meditate etc. for a set time, eg. 30 mins. Any other thoughts/distractions, push out till after. Have a break - then repeat for the next task. Your brain will stack each and wait.
Adjust your lens: This really simple technique works! Cup your eyes for a tele-focus lens. SO, reading something that requires concentration - laser-in on it. Do this every time and a pavlovian response for conditioning yourself is triggered over time.
Mind Control
If you've ever watched a magician or illusionist perform at a live show or on TV - chances are you've already witnessed the power of suggestion. A friend of mine was on a Derren Brown episode where, as part of a creative duo, he had to come up with the idea for an advert in just 30 minutes. Unbeknownst to him and his colleague, the show's production team had conceived a clever plan to strategically place visual triggers along the route for the taxi drive in to the TV studios. These strong visual messages, fresh in their minds, would play a part in steering them towards creating a very similar advertising campaign to that which Derren himself had scamped-up before they strted. What is amazing about this clip (shown below), is that something so 'complex' like an advertising campaign, which requires experience and creative thinking to achieve well, can be so easily primed in these guys minds to obtain predicted results as the experiment in this illusionist's episode clearly shows. It's this kind of 'priming' that we unconsciously pick up throughout the day which affect and ultimately, make our decisions!
Something that I'm noticing more and more - are the suggestive messages from adverts and junk emails that I'm receiving. I realised just recently (how naive) that if you use Google, Yahoo or MSN mail - buzz words will be scanned from your mail and your profiling will be tweaked to ensure your next adverts are adjusted to fit your preferences. If you don't believe me - try it yourself. I prefer to use adblock and watch TV shows and documentaries without advertising in them which can be streamed/downloaded and your browsing choices hidden from marketeers through use of a VPN.
It's frightening to think that everything we do digitally (and also far beyond) is being tracked through computers and intelligence agencies. It's even more discerning to learn that your decisions are not your own. That's right, you and I are being persuaded through clever marketing techniques day-in and day-out. Whether it's in the form of newspapers or through TV or on the internet - we are all being swayed and primed for parting with our money or being cordoned/shepherded by mass control and the controlling elite. The media have been using a number of tricks and techniques to cajole and control the masses over the years and there's been a number of studies from the likes of Walter Lippman and Carl Jung about using mass media, propaganda and mind control techniques - a lot of which are being widely used today and something everyone needs to be aware of.
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