On placebos and care. I attended a wonderfully creative gathering of scientists thanks to the Santa Fe Institute recently, where we briefly discussed the placebo effect. The shorthand definition for placebo is that it’s a substance that has no therapeutic effect, but really it is a substance that is not designed to have a therapeutic effect. […]
If you’ve been in New England this last week or two – or indeed, most of the United States or Europe – you’ve been hot. Like, toweling off from a cool shower you are already working up a sweat hot. Just walking down the street you look like you’ve run a marathon hot. Want […]
The opposite of poverty is not wealth. The opposite of poverty is justice. – Bryan Stevenson This week marked the opening of the Legacy Museum and National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, projects led by the Equal Justice Initiative. Many observers noted the painful and compelling need for such […]
I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain. -James Baldwin, Notes of a Native Son Baldwin was telling about seeing his dying father in this passage, how he no longer hated his father, yet […]