#662 - Gurwinder Bhogal - 18 Psychology Lessons To Understand People Better
Aug 3, 2023
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Gurwinder Bhogal, a programmer and insightful writer, dives deep into human behavior, cognitive biases, and social media dynamics. He explores the concept of 'opinion shopping' and its impact on personal growth while highlighting how misunderstandings in debates often stem from semantic disagreements. Bhogal critiques the allure of nostalgia for past eras and discusses the psychological implications of identity crises within social justice movements. Furthermore, he reflects on the creativity boost that comes from walking, emphasizing the need for diverse perspectives in today's digital age.
Curate your social media feed to filter out hasty and thoughtless posts.
Desire for external achievements can hinder true happiness; find contentment in appreciating the small things.
Fighting against injustice can become an ongoing cycle to maintain identity and purpose.
Confirmation bias leads to biased sources as authorities, hindering critical thinking.
Opinion shopping and selective information search validate preconceived notions and spread misinformation.
Deep dives
Twitter and the Avalanche of Garbage
Many social media posts are impulsive and not well thought out due to the ease of posting. It is important to curate one's feed to filter out hasty and thoughtless posts.
The Frictionlessness of Social Media
The ease of posting on social media allows for quick and impulsive opinions to be shared. People often don't think deeply about what they post, leading to overinterpretation of their comments and unnecessary scrutiny.
The Illusion of Happiness
Happiness is fleeting and constantly evolving as we chase new goals. Desire and the pursuit of external achievements can prevent us from finding true and lasting happiness. Contentment can be found by appreciating the small things in life and learning to be happy with less.
The Continuation of Identity through Injustice
Some individuals define their identity by fighting against injustice. When one form of injustice is defeated, the need for a new cause arises to maintain their sense of purpose and identity. This can lead to an ongoing cycle of finding new injustices to fight against.
Opinion Shopping and Confirmation Bias
Many people conduct online research by ignoring sources they disagree with until they find one that supports their existing beliefs. This confirmation bias leads to the use of biased sources as authorities, hindering objective analysis and critical thinking.
The Intricacies of Online Information Seeking
People often engage in opinion shopping, where they selectively search for information that aligns with their preconceived notions. This behavior is driven by a conscious desire to validate their worldview, potentially leading to misguided conclusions and the spread of misinformation.
The Dangers of Distorting Reality for Attention
In the age of social media, victimhood and oppression have become sought-after status symbols. Some individuals compete for public sympathy by collecting real or imagined injuries, even provoking others to attack them in order to capture and immortalize proof of their prestigious oppression.
The Allure of Fake Disorders and Self-Victimization
On platforms like TikTok, individuals fabricate conditions and disorders, such as Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), for attention and validation. This trend highlights the commodification of sympathy and the pursuit of identity through victimhood, potentially leading to a culture of false narratives and exploitation.
The Importance of Struggle in Character Development
One of the ways that screenwriters make characters beloved to an audience is by giving them struggles that they can identify with. Universal struggles, such as the desire for love or overcoming poverty, create a connection between the character and the audience. However, when characters are too ideal and instantly overcome every obstacle, they become unrelatable and unrealistic role models. This holds true not just in movies but also in our perception of real-life role models.
Tellic vs. Atelic Activities and Presentism
There are two types of activities: tellic and atelic. Tellic activities are done with a specific goal in mind, while atelic activities are done for the sake of the activity itself. In today's productivity-focused society, even leisure activities have become about achieving goals and being productive. We judge historical events and people through presentism, often failing to consider the context and alternatives available to them. Similarly, we fail to acknowledge the suffering of animals in factory farms because we are accustomed to it, but the availability of alternatives like lab-grown meat could lead to a shift in our ethical choices.
Gurwinder is one of my favourite Twitter follows. He’s written yet another megathread exploring human nature, cognitive biases, mental models, status games, crowd behaviour and social media. It's fantastic, and today we go through some of my favourites.
Expect to learn why every debate is fundamentally an argument about the definition of words, whether modern men are right to believe they would be better off living in medieval times, why people fighting injustice might actually be suffering with an identity crisis, why so many people go shopping for their opinions online, how the culture divide we have today stemmed from our tribal roots, why over analysing Tweets is a waste of your time and much more...
