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Blog postMany years ago while out jogging, I ran into a store because I had to pee badly. The person at the counter was a middle-aged woman with a thick southern accent and a smile on her face that would light up any room. I asked if they had a bathroom I could use, and the cheerful woman informed me that the bathroom was for customers only. I explained to her that I did not have my wallet on me, but otherwise I would be happy to buy something. Without dropping her smile, she said “I am sorry about tha.
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Blog postEven bad press gives candidates exposure, which can end up being more beneficial than harmful, and bad press won't cause die-hard Republicans (or Democrats) to abandon their candidate. But assuming we are talking about really bad press and politically-leaning moderates, the sunk cost fallacy can explain why bad press does not have as much of an effect on election outcomes as one would expect. We can see that this phenomenon applies to any candidate, from any political party, in any election.You
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Blog postIn short, I can't give you a direct answer to your question without knowing specific examples of your arguments. But dismissing ideas based on one's race or sex rather than the ideas themselves is both fallacious and a prime example of prejudice. My own views on social issues that I hold as a social psychologist are data-driven, science-based, and sometimes in contrast with many of the statements and claims of groups advocating "social justice". We can take a look at some general guide
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Blog postDisclaimer: I am a social psychologist and a researcher, not a clinical psychologist licensed to diagnose disorders. My expertise in this area is in understanding research, scientific consensus, and how disorders are defined and legitimized within the scientific community, not in diagnosing addiction.As usual, the answer to this question is far more complex than most people like to acknowledge. There exists a socially conservative, scientifically and sexually ignorant segment of the population
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Blog postWhen I was a child, my mom would often remind me to say my prayers before going to bed. The prayer was fairly secular as far as prayers go, besides the fact, of course, that I was directing my prayer to a god. The prayer was a list of all the good things in my life for which I was thankful. This exercise reminded me of the good things in my life and helped me to understand the concepts of gratitude and appreciation. Today, as a secular humanist, I no longer hold beliefs in any gods, and, unders
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Blog postIt has been estimated by the top researchers in the area of psychopathy that about 1 out of every 100 people are psychopaths (Viding, McCrory, & Seara-Cardoso, 2014). This means that statistically speaking, we all have at least one and maybe two psychopaths in our lives. More often than not, psychopaths function within the rules of society and go unnoticed. In fact, their unique traits often allow them to excel at business, in positions of leadership, in the military, and in many areas of li
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Blog postLet me begin by unpacking the question. The question implies that there is a simple relationship between the will and actions, when, in fact the relationship is actually quite complex. The question juxtaposes predictability with acting in one's best interest when, in fact, much of the human behavior that is predictable is against one's own best interest. The claim that our will is determined does not require our behavior to be predictable. Conversely, predictable behavior does not require our w
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Blog postAccording to a report by Stanford University, from the turn of this century to August 26, 2015, there have been 138 documented mass shootings in the United States resulting in 555 victim fatalities and a total of 1092 victims. To put that number in perspective, that is more than the total number of documented mass shootings in the entire second half of the 20th century. In this context, a mass shooting is defined by three or more shooting victims (not necessarily fatalities), not including the
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Blog postSince you are asking me, a scientist, I can tell you that I believe science literacy is extremely important, but there are those who will disagree. The United States is indeed a meting pot, not just of cultures, but of ideas and values. Some people value belief and faith far more than reason and science, meaning that the subjective state of personal well-being is more important than accepting a scientific fact that risks decreasing that personal well-being. Of course, being scientifically illit
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Blog postBefore I get to the heart of the question, I want to make the distinction between rationality and reason in the domain of argumentation (these terms have specialized meanings when referring to different topics). The two terms are often used interchangeably, and one could argue that the current usage of the terms have, for all practical purposes, made them synonymous. However, when exploring this area in detail, the distinction is an important one. Reason is defined as the "capacity for cons
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Blog postIn the 1994 movie Dumb and Dumber, Lloyd (Jim Carey) sells a dead bird (Petey) to a blind kid in a wheelchair. Clearly one would have to have psychopathic tendencies to find dead birds or handicap children funny, yet despite personal preferences and tastes for comedy, people who enjoyed this film overwhelmingly found this scene hilarious. More recently, jokes about Jared, the former pitchman for the Subway chain, have been flooding social media. Many of these jokes have to do with him getting r
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Blog postAs a social psychologist, I study stereotype, prejudice, and discrimination using scientific methodology—a process that is designed to minimize bias regularly found in personal anecdotes that seem to fuel this movement. As a white male, I am protected from the most common forms of racial and sexual discrimination. So while my views may indeed be objective as an observer to and researcher of racial inequality, I cannot provide first-hand personal experience of such inequality, which to many peo.
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Blog postFirst, we need to understand that the belief in a literal Hell is not ubiquitous among religions. Even within Christianity, roughly 30% of Christian Americans don't believe in a literal Hell according to a 2007 Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life / U.S. Religious Landscape Survey. Also, the answer to this question is very different if we are talking about the non-religious who never believed in Hell and the non-religious who used to believe in Hell. For those non-religious who never believed
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Blog postRecently, the proposition that marriage can be between two men or two women has been a hot topic in social media, with people both for and against speaking out aggressively on the issue. If you are for the proposition, you would likely refer to the issue as "marriage equality," which implies fairness. If you are against the proposition, you might call it "gay marriage" or better yet, refer to your position positively as in the term "traditional marriage" (assuming,
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Blog postFirst I have to say how sorry I am for your loss. I can't imagine losing a child to suicide, let alone an only child. My deepest sympathies.Let's start by clearly stating the implied alternative hypothesis here. At the most generic level, we can hypothesize that the known laws of physics are being broken by some supernatural force related to your son's death. More specifically, we might create a narrative to make the hypothesis more emotionally appealing, such as your son is trying to communica
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Blog postI was about 22 years old, just graduated college, and moved to Boulder, Colorado to live "the good life." In the city of Boulder, there is a park called Chautauqua Park with very impressive rock formations known as the Flatirons. The Flatirons, as the name suggests, is a flat rock structure with about a 60-degree incline. While still in my invincibility phase, I thought it would be a good idea to climb the Flatirons—alone and without any equipment, experience, or common sense. About .
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Blog postAccording to a 2014 Marketdata report, the weight-loss market in the United States was about $60 billion, with an estimated annual revenue of about $20 billion. To put this in perspective, that is about $63 per US citizen (infants included) spent each year on products and services that offer hope to those looking to lose weight. It's a huge market built on a complicate science that few people really understand—a breeding ground for pseudoscientific fads.A "fad" is defined as an inten.
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Blog post{date-time stamp}Friday, Jun 05, 2015 07:02 PM{/date-time stamp} This article was edited. There was a section that referred to an event that occurred a few years back. I erroneously used information that was only part of the story. I removed this section, and apologize to the 12 readers who accessed it before the change, and to the person whom it misrepresented. I promise to be more careful with all my research in the future, not just with science-related issues.This question can and should be
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Blog postScience tells us that the brain and the mind are different only in that the brain is the physical organ and the mind is a word we use to describe a function or product of the brain. The mind/brain relationship is not unique. For example, our voice is a result of our physical bodies—without our bodies, there would be no voice. The voice, like the mind, is a word we use to identify the immaterial product of a collection of physical systems in the body. Other possibilities surround the general th.
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Blog postBefore we attempt to answer this question, we need to unpack it. We will find a) that the question itself is flawed in the sense that it presupposes an outdated and incorrect causal view of heredity, b) the term "gay" can be redefined based on one's political views, c) there are flawed implications involved, and d) the science is often misunderstood. The Flaw in the Question, "Are People Born Gay?"The question is predicated on a simplistic view of causality. No more than 20 y
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Blog postI started training in martial arts when I was in the eighth grade because I wanted to learn how to fight. By that time in my life, I had many encounters with people who were physically stronger and certainly more intimidating than I was, and thought that I needed Jackie Chan-style skills to minimize my chances of personal bodily harm. With the help of Miyagi-like instructors, I realized that fighting was only a small part of personal safety—the defensive part. It was the strategies for avoidin.
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Blog postRecently, yet another woman came forward accusing Bill Cosby of sexual assault, or more specifically, "forcefully" kissing her. In the interview, the woman was clearly emotionally disturbed recounting this event... that happened almost 50 years ago. What is it about an unwelcome forceful kiss that can cause so much emotional damage to a person over the course of a half century? As we will see, it is not the kiss but what is referred to in psychology as the appraisal of the event or sit
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Blog postOf course it is reasonable but to what extent? According to a recent review published by Princeton, financial interest is a common reason for distrust in scientists. Anecdotally, in my discussions with people about science, money seems to be the top reason for their distrust in science. But there is a line between healthy skepticism and irrational distrust when parties have financial interests in scientific outcomes. The question is, where do we draw that line? Every study or area of research m
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Blog postThe term victim-blaming implies injustice, or victims being either fully or partially blamed for something they don't deserve. There are several common reasons why people do this, but there is also an accurate assessment of responsibility that is often labeled "victim-blaming" by people often with good intentions. This last point is important to focus on because by ignoring contributing factors and shared responsibility, we as a society cannot address these problems in the most effecti
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Blog postFirst, you have to accept that any answer you come up with will be a probabilistic one. All experiences are filtered through our minds, and our minds are far from perfect reality detectors that can be in any sense of the word "certain," aside from some arguably self-evident philosophical certainties such as "I exist". While the word "personal" implies subjectivity, many people often confuse a personal experience with their interpretation of a personal experience tha
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Blog postThe problem of political polarization is characterized by a large number of people holding extreme political views (also know as hyper-partisanship) with fewer political moderates, to the point where healthy political disagreement becomes destructive. Here in the US, this problem exists both on a systemic and personal level. Some have suggested this is one of the most serious problems our country faces since the signs only point to the problem getting worse, whereas others are less pessimistic,
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Blog postThis is what is called a loaded question, or a question that contains an unjustified assumption. The unjustified assumption is that there is a secret to success. The question also incorrectly implies that "success" is unidimensional, that is, its definition is simple enough that such a secret could exist that if known, would allow people to achieve success. Since there is no standard measurement of success, it is best to focus on something more measurable that is often synonymous with
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Blog postThe word "placebo," Latin for "I shall please," is generally understood in modern terminology as an inert (inactive) substance or procedure that affects the outcome of a treatment. The placebo effect (or placebo effects) is generally understood as the improvement in a person's condition due to the presence of the placebo. However, this concept is far more complex than most people realize, but it is within this complexity we find understanding. There has been an enormous amou.
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Blog postWith the measles outbreak at DisneyLand beginning in December of 2014, the debate on the need and safety of vaccines has been reignited. While I am not going to get into the science of vaccine safety and effectiveness, I am going to cover the psychology of the anti-vaccine movement, and some potential factors that lead to people denying scientific facts.Out of Sight, Out of MindWe tend not to think much about what we don't experience. For example, most of us (in the United States) take for gra
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Blog postThe non-sexist answer would be "of course not, you sexist moron," but I am not here to offer politically correct answers; I am here to offer scientifically correct ones. The actual answer is more complex than a yes or no answer, and not at all sexist since it considers both genders equally. So before you get offended with the idea that sticking to traditional and even stereotypical gender roles can possibly result in a more satisfying marriage, domestic partnership, or intimate relatio
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Blog postIn science it often happens that scientists say, ‘You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again... . I cannot recall the last time something like that has happened in politics or religion. - Carl Sagan, 1987 CSICOP addressYou should trust science as a process for separating fact from fiction because of its flexibility to update theories and findings based on new information, and becau.
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Blog postSelf-licensing or the licensing effect is relying on reasons to justify subsequent gratification (Witt Huberts, Evers, & De Ridder, 2012). In other words, it is the process we go through when we convince ourselves that we deserve an indulgence. This is different than simply lacking will-power, and as such, different strategies need to be used to mitigate the harm this can do to us in terms of our goals. Although self-licensing can be applied to any area of our lives that require self-discipl
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Blog postScientists are people, and like all people, they are susceptible to biases, have self-interests, and are corruptible. In fact, corporations, lobbyists, political parties and action committees, defendants and plaintiffs will hire their own team of science "experts" who agree with their claims (or will, for the right price). Given the number of studies that have been done on any given issue (especially the major ones), finding data to support virtually any conclusion is not that challeng
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Blog postI apologize in advance if I come across as a party pooper—that person at magic shows who ruins the fun for everyone by giving away the magician's secrets, but there is no magic involved in what is usually referred to as "group levitation." Levitation, spoon-bending, and the Ouija board are all based on similar, completely natural, psychological and physiological phenomena. There are a few scientific principles at work here. Group levitation usually begins with a person telling the ot.
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Blog postStrangely, one of my strongest childhood memories is when I called my brother an idiot, and two minutes later I stubbed my toe. My brother told me that God was punishing me—that seemed to make sense to me given the Catholic framework in which I was raised. Perhaps if I were raised as a Buddhist, my brother would have told me it was "Karma," or a spiritual theory of moral causation that states people get what they deserve. This is a fairly common belief adopted by many
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Blog postIt is no secret that much of the information found on the Internet today is strongly influenced by its monetary value, or to put another way, how many clicks an article can get. Unfortunately for science and humanity, accuracy, journalistic integrity, and truth are of far less monetary value than shock, emotional appeal, and fear. As a result, if scientific information does manage to make its way into the mainstream media (assuming nothing is going on with the Kardashian's that day), it is ofte
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Blog postDetecting if someone likes you or not is similar to detecting if someone is lying or not. "Lie detectors," human or machine, are actually anxiety detectors since the physical signs of anxiety are associated with lying. While a person can have anxiety about lying, he can also have anxiety about being accused of dishonesty—or he can simply be an anxious person. Sociopaths rarely show signs of anxiety when lying, so these detection methods can be more than useless, but lead to false ne. .
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Blog postFirst let me say that it is reasonable to be wary of virtually any claim (including "I think, therefore I am"). However, being wary of something and rejecting it are two different things.Understanding the ScienceThe claim that "there are no long-term negative effects" is not falsifiable (i.e., it cannot be proven false). Long-term negative effects (or risk factors) are a possibility with the introduction of every new medicine, technology, and ideology. Science does not wor. .
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Blog postNo. In fact, it is pretty much a terrible one. Here's why.Your health is too important for a simplistic heuristic such as this one. Quick rules-of-thumb are useful in many mundane circumstances such as choosing a line with the fewest people in it at the grocery store or choosing a movie based on the fact that you enjoy similar movies in that genre. However, using a 4 word heuristic for deciding what foods you should eat and avoid, how much and how often, along with what drugs you should use
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Blog postLet me start by being perfectly clear that we should always employ reasoning when it comes to making decisions that matter. However, an important part of the reasoning process is knowing when to defer to those who know more than you on a particular issue, especially when "common sense" is anything but common, and often in conflict with reality. Further, personal freedoms to reject the scientific consensus on certain issues can have a devastating impact on others. For these reasons an.
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Blog postIf you have ever been referred to as "creepy" (and you probably have—at least behind your back), worry not. There are things you can do to significantly reduce your level of creepiness. Perhaps the most effective would be to become a woman if you are not already. Females do have the distinct advantage of being described as "creepy," far less than males do*—at least in a social perception sense. Also, creepiness can be pictured on a bell curve that peaks around age 50, . . . S
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Blog postScience is a method for separating fact from fiction. Doctors and therapists are trained in science—the two are not the same thing. We shouldn't reject science because of bad doctors for the same reasons we shouldn't reject education because of bad teachers. This rejection tendency is a prime example of a heuristic gone wrong.Scientists can loosely be put in two categories: practitioners and researchers. I say "loosely" because there are many practitioners who are also researchers, o.
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Blog postI am glad I asked... what a perfect question for the first episode!The Cliff's Notes VersionI take a critical thinking-, reason-, and science-based approach to answering questions on issues that matter with the goal of both educating and entertaining. You create the show by submitting your questions at http://www.drboshow.com. I have a PhD in social psychology, but I cover a broad range of topics including: Science Education (scientific method, what is / is not science, etc.), Success, Entrepre
Books By Bo Bennett
Logically Fallacious: The Ultimate Collection of Over 300 Logical Fallacies (Academic Edition)
Nov 20, 2013
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Positive Humanism: A Primer
Nov 5, 2014
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Reason: Book I: A Critical Thinking-, Reason-, and Science-based Approach to Issues That Matter
Jun 6, 2016
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Uncomfortable Ideas
Oct 21, 2016
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