Mistakes Were Made

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Reagan may not have been the first person to say it, but I think he was the notable popularizer of it. My source (dad!) says that Nixon was not known for having said it. This is a circuitous way of saying that you can't help but recognize and feel the pain of the human condition when you read this fantastically well executed, educational and therapeutic book.

One of the most disappointing realizations for me, as an educator, is that clear explanation with ample evidence generally will not change people's minds. Many people who think they've been abducted by aliens are well aware of the phenomenon of sleep paralysis, but - for no justifiable reason - reject it as an explanation of their experiences. I've spoken with a climate change denialist who swore up and down that they understood the greenhouse effect just fine - and then immediately turned around and said something clearly contradicting this theory. The authors' examples are fascinating and it's a great topic. Their explanations are arguably a little facile. Can we really know what's going on inside someone's head? Are all self-justifications a matter of cognitive dissonance? Are people ever correct for clinging to a belief or course of action even in the face of conflicting evidence? The fact that the points feel belabored at times suggests that the thesis may be too simple and one-dimensional to explain all the various anecdotes. The passive voice makes the subject the person or thing acted on or affected by the action represented by the verb. Passive voice is for when the state does violence. Active voice is for when a protester does? Got it. https://t.co/2ror8Sen1K— Rebecca Traister (@rtraister) May 31, 2020

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I found this a remarkably challenging book to read. There was a time when I thought psychology was an odd sort of discipline. As someone who had studied physics for a while I couldn’t really bring myself to call it a science and as someone who studied philosophy I also felt it had failings on that score too. My understanding of psychology was fairly limited, but Freudian, Jungian, Behaviourist and god knows what other –isms all seemed to me to depend too much on a foundation that seemed much too arbitrary. The books I’ve been reading lately on psychology, however, are much less ‘ideological’ and much more scientific. There was one area where Stevens didn't feel the pressure to find that one right answer but instead could learn for learning's sake: in the lab. "Trial and error is more accepted in labs. You're trying out a hypothesis," she says. During college at Brown University, she worked on a summer research project that was all about trial and error. "It was 50 failures on trying to make something that inhibited bacteria growth. By the end of the summer, I hadn't come up with a positive outcome, but I was able to look at how well my lab techniques had grown," she says. "My productivity had improved." Mistakes were made” simultaneously conveys an admission and a distancing, a delicate rhetorical maneuver that has made it a mainstay in the political landscape. Use of “Mistakes Were Made” in a sentence

Then came the request from the poet Margaret Anna Alice for a creative collaboration. Would I read her poem, along with a few kindreds, and have a recorded discussion about it afterwards? Art is a powerful tool and one I had not yet tried. I decided to accept. From the critically acclaimed author of Something To Talk About comes a sharp and sexy rom-com about a college senior who accidentally hooks up with her best friend’s mom. Isherwood, Charles (February 27, 2011). "A Producer, His Telephone and Desperation". The New York Times. Bart, Peter (January 24, 2019). "Peter Bart: Streamer Mania Means Greenlights Galore, But Slate Strategies Still Baffle Creatives". Deadline Hollywood . Retrieved January 24, 2019. Sometimes, I think that the world is full of hypocrites. The news is full of politicians who preach family values and then are caught in an affair. Everyday we see religious advocates who call for peace and in the same breath state that their God is the only true God. Then, there's the business world where lying and cheating seem to be part of the game.As someone interested in the psychology of religion, it's always interesting to me how cognitive weaknesses play a role in establishing and maintaining religious beliefs. Some atheists are wont to believe that religion is a kind of mental illness, but this book (and others) make it clear that's really not so. The vast majority of religious people are cognitively normal. It's just that normal human cognition is very prone to making certain kinds of errors, and religious memes propagate very easily on this substrate. As an example, for a religious person to admit that there are no gods, they have to confront the enormous cognitive dissonance that they think of themselves as smart, well-educated, pragmatic - but have, for many years, been putting vast amounts of effort, emotion, thought, and perhaps money into something that hasn't the slightest basis in reality. For someone who was devoutly religious, this is the granddaddy of all cognitive dissonance. That so many people manage to confront this and deal with it is quite impressive. The passive voice is often distinguished by its use of a linking verb form (e.g., was, had been) followed by another verb in its past participle form (e.g., "I have been given an opportunity"). Usefulness of Passive Voice There's an emotional nature to the classroom and making mistakes," she says. "If you're not in a safe place, you're not willing to take risks." Memmot, Mark (May 14, 2013). "It's True: 'Mistakes Were Made' Is The King Of Non-Apologies". NPR . Retrieved 17 July 2014.