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3MM: Milgram, Mites & Marriage
3 MINUTE MONDAYHi friend, The question “What makes a woman attractive?” is a unique type of framing known as a Milgram Question. In these situations, the social penalty for an unflattering answer is much higher than the reward for telling the truth. Named after the famous Milgram psychology experiment where electric shocks were administered for wrong answers. Because of this, we simply can’t trust the answers we receive, even if they’re coming from friends. Other famous Milgram Questions that similarly back you into a corner: “When did you stop beating your wife?” “Does your dad know you’re gay?” “Why are white people/men/heterosexuals so ignorant to racism/misogyny/homophobia?” Any conventional answer to the question confirms its assumption. You are le trapped. It’s kind of like an ascended version of a Kafka Trap - a fallacy where if someone denies being X it is taken as evidence that the person is X since someone who is X would deny being X. If someone is accused of something, and if they defend themselves then it's considered proof of their guilt. It lumps together people who genuinely are not guilty of a perceived offence in with people who have committed the perceived offence and are trying to escape punishment. To escape the trap you need to call out the question. But in practice you don’t see this type of situation happen much, it’s really just a rhetorical gimmick. The most important and common type of trick question sounds more like “Do you love Big Brother?” It’s a question where an unacceptable answer, regardless of whether it’s true or false, will be punished, and the punishment is greater than the reward for a true answer. Some Milgram Questions are intended as genuine questions. But often they only pretend to be a query on the semantic content of the words. The question “Do you love Big Brother” is actually asking “Do you submit to my power?” Or more generally, “Will you agree with me, or suffer the consequences?” “When punishment for what people say becomes widespread, people stop saying what they really think and instead say whatever is needed to thrive in the social environment.
Thus, limits on speech become limits on sincerity.”
— h/t J. Sanilac & Gurwinder Bhogal MODERN WISDOMI do a podcast where I pretend to have a British accent. You should subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. This week’s upcoming episodes: Monday. Thursday. Saturday. THINGS I'VE LEARNED1. “Marital quality is, far and away, the top predictor of life satisfaction in America. Specifically, the odds that men and women say they are ‘very happy’ with their lives are a staggering 545% higher for those who are very happily married, compared to peers who are not married or who are less than very happy in their marriages. When it comes to predicting overall happiness, a good marriage is far more important than how much education you get, how much money you make, how often you have sex, and, yes, even how satisfied you are with your work.” — Brad Wilcox 2. Adactylidium is a genus of mites known for its unusual life cycle. An impregnated female mite feeds upon a single egg of a thrips, rapidly growing five to eight female offspring and one male in her body. The single male mite mates with all his sisters when they are still inside their mother. The new females, now impregnated, eat their way out of their mother's body so that they can emerge to find new thrips eggs, killing their mother in the process (though the mother may be only 4 days old at the time), starting the cycle again. The male emerges as well, but does not look for food or new mates, and dies after a few hours. 3. “In the U.S., there are now more daily or near daily marijuana users than daily or near daily alcohol users. Quite a cultural shift, I’d say.” — Rob Henderson LIFE HACKDid you feel motivated watching the Super Bowl last night? You’ve just seen elite athletes at the peak of their preparation and performance leave everything on the line. Even if you’re not an athlete, this sensation is open to you too. You’d be amazed at how much progress and satisfaction can be achieved simply by dedicating yourself to one thing, consistently, for a few years. The bar is set very low. Go and step over it. Big love, Try my productivity drink Neutonic. PS |
3 Minute Monday
Podcaster with 1bn+ plays. I write about the most important lessons from the best thinkers on the planet. 300,000+ people read my free newsletter. Press subscribe to join.
3 MINUTE MONDAY Hi friend, It is a sad fact that it’s more socially acceptable to be your own biggest critic rather than your own biggest cheerleader. This creates a fertile environment for external criticism to make you doubt yourself more than it should. Here are some strategies you may have used to try and avoid the pain of criticism with varying degrees of success: Get bitter and think of any critic as a hater just throwing envy and shade; recite the quote “Don’t take criticism from...
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