Ambigamy

Insights for the deeply romantic and deeply skeptical

Jeremy E. Sherman Ph.D., MPP

Strategic Distancing, Upstaging and Jading

If your willpower isn't enough to keep temptations at bay, there are other options.

I Once Was Lost But Now I'm Blind Syndrome

Often, we drop a dogma without letting go of the high-horse self-certainty we gained from it.

Virtue-Maxing: A Stupifying, Universally-Popular Moral Myth

Stop worrying that you're failing to maximize some popular virtue as though one always should? Virtue maximizing is extremely popular nonsense that will dumb you down.

The Trap of Over-accommodating Others

Why did you let them walk all over you? Perhaps because you subscribed to the half-truism that we should give everyone the benefit of the doubt.

Sophology: Research to Understand What Wisdom Really Is

We all know wisdom is good. We quest for it and sometimes claim to have it. But what the heck is wisdom anyway? Without a science of wisdom, it's anyone's guess.

For Genius Like Theirs, Cultivate Your Inversatility

There are two sides to every coin. More of something is less of other things. This simple insight has led to many scientific breakthroughs and could explain life itself.

The Silent Self: You, Beneath Thought and Feeling

We feel and think about ourselves a lot. And we tend to overlook our vegetative sentience, our silent selfhood, unconscious and unfelt even though it's what keeps us alive.

Tricked Into Choices You Regret? Here’s the Trick They Used

Weaponized words will change your life, usually for the worst. But what does it mean to weaponize? Here's the answer from linguistics.

Do You Allow Yourself to Be Bullied and Gaslit?

When barked at, conscientious people tend to back down and back off. That's a great reflex for dealing with other conscientious people but terrible when dealing with total jerks.

The Dark Triad Shell Game Explained

The four traits universal to all organisms become the four traits we idealize as infinite in our understanding of God—and then become the four traits essential to the Dark Triad personality (yes, four).

Checks and Balances Explain a Lot More Than Just Governments

Want to better understand yourself and your relationships? Revisit that concept from high school civics: Checks and balances.

Is It True Love? An Answer from Origins of Life Research

Some say love is undefinable. Here's a definition grounded in scientific understanding of the emergence and nature of living beings at the origins of life.

Ignore This Distinction and You’re Vulnerable to Gaslighting

It's polite, convenient, and dangerous to assume people believe what they insist upon most passionately. To guard your gourd, distinguish between "belief" and "relief."

The Dark Triad Shell Game

How can anyone play God, eternally right, righteous, and mighty? By means of a shell game.

Don’t Prevent Vanity; Vent It

Do not be ashamed that you have a big ego. It's perfectly fine, so long as you exercise it safely.

'It's a Wonderful Life' Helps Explain Life

The biggest breakthroughs in the social sciences have come from paying attention to what doesn't happen, as in the movie "It's a Wonderful Life."

A Healthy Fear of Feeling

You haven't lived unless you've experienced every emotion to the fullest versus Zen inertness.

Stir Crazy Cabin Fever? Try Virtual Reality

For exercise, intimate conversations at a distance, and everyday therapeutic escapism, virtual reality is a technology that comes just in time for COVID-19.

Ventertainment: Blowing Off Steam

People need to vent. We do a lot of that through "ventertainment" — entertainment that has no redeeming value other than that it enables us to blow off steam.

How to Make the Most of Your Midlife Crisis

The trick is to come out of a midlife crisis settled into the inescapably unsettling nature of one's life.

The Difference Between Hypocrisy and Irony

With irony and hypocrisy, we talk out both sides of our mouths. Here's the difference and a test for deciding which you're hearing.

How to Play God

Declare a spindoll—something or someone to be Godlike in its perfection. Embrace and identify with it and call all your rivals the opposite of it. Simple, compelling, deadly.

How to Care About Making a Difference

Pace yourself. It all comes down to this month, and it doesn't. It's ongoing, uphill work.

Invincibility Fetishism

The denial of death would be a trait common to any intelligent life form anywhere in the universe.

Proud Boys and Bullsh*tdozing

"Get out of my way!" is a natural human impulse. It often all that's really driving demagogues and their cult followings.

Wising Up About Ad Hominem Arguments

It's illogical to assume that someone is proven wrong about facts because they're of bad character. It's not wrong to suspect it.

The Shortest Path to Absolute Safety and Freedom

On the road to all destinations, there are detours that take you swiftly to a fantasyland where you can't fail. Avoid those detours.

The Mind-Eating Virus Most Likely to Cause Human Extinction

The viral switch that turns on absolutism, narcissism, and total jerk behavior is a toggle switch freeing people to identify as both proud saint and proud sinner.

Content-Deafness: Not Caring About Word Meanings

You love the rock anthem: The lyrics just sound so true and proud, even though you don't know what they mean. That's content-deafness. At the extreme, it's easy and very dangerous.

3 Non-Partisan Gullibility Tests

People often justify their brand loyalty with generic rhetoric. For example, "make America great again." Who doesn't want that? Here are three tests to prevent gullibility.

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