Daily Archives: May 3, 2022

Dan is a psychopath. But he is smart, charming, and successful. You would not know from first meeting him that he feels pride rather than remorse when he regularly plays the system, deceives people, and exploits others to get what he wants.

But does Dan have a psychological disorder?

Lesleigh Pullman and colleagues recently set out to assess the hypothesis that psychopathy might not be a mental disorder, but rather an effective life strategy. To do so, they analyzed a surprising sign of mental disorders: handedness.

Psychopathy is characterized by emotional and interpersonal deficits such as callousness, grandiosity, and a lack of empathy and remorse. It sometimes involves deviant behavior like aggression and violence. Diagnosis is generally based on interviews or self-reported questionnaires that assess selfishness, remorseless use of others, and lifestyle.

Though the term is often used for run-of-the-mill jerks, less than 5 percent of the population maybe even less than 1 percent is selfish and remorseless enough to qualify as a psychopath.

Pullman and her colleagues take an evolutionary perspective on what constitutes a mental disorder, specifying that it must be a harmful dysfunction. To add up to a mental disorder, in other words, behavior cannot just fall outside of the norm. Instead, the behavior must constitute a failure to perform a function that evolution selected because it helps a person.

In other words, psychopathy must harm a persons functioning or wellbeing if we are to consider it a disorder.

It might seem obvious that psychopathy is in fact harmful. Psychopaths struggle to maintain relationships. They are more likely to die prematurely and to be incarcerated. Hart and Hare, for example, argue that given its negative impact on society, psychopathy is perhaps second only to schizophrenia as a public health concern.

Moreover, psychopathic traits are integrated into the criteria for disorders formally recognized by the American Psychological Association and the World Health Organization. Though Antisocial Personality Disorder and Dissocial Personality Disorder more heavily influence observable antisocial behaviors such as lawbreaking and violence, both personality disorders incorporate lack of empathy, lack of guilt, and deceitfulness.

Still, there is some reason to believe psychopathy, at least in moderation, might be a reasonable evolutionary adaptation.

Imagine for instance that it is 6,000 BCE. You live in a tribe where most people are honest and considerate, but there is not enough food for everyone. In such a case, if you are willing to cheat your trusting tribemates out of some of their food, you are more likely to survive and pass along your swindling genes to children.

Even today, psychopathic traits might be common and helpful in competitive settings like Wall Street, especially when the psychopath is able to keep any violent or criminal behavior under wraps.

To evaluate whether something is a mental disorder, it helps to understand what causes disorders in the first place.

Scientists are still uncovering the various causes, but one likely influence is neurodevelopmental perturbations that is, anything that upsets the normal course of brain development. Perturbations can occur for numerous reasons before or after birth. Causes include maternal infection or stress while pregnant, childhood malnutrition, head injury, and emotional trauma. Neurodevelopmental perturbations are linked to various mental disorders including depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, autism, and schizophrenia.

Directly assessing neurodevelopmental perturbations is difficult. It generally involves scanning brains with special equipment or collecting in-depth data about a persons childhood, maternal wellbeing, and so forth.

But one marker of neurodevelopmental perturbations is handedness.

Sorry lefties, but left-handedness and ambidexterity in short, non-right-handedness are associated with maternal stress during pregnancy, birth complications, and low birthweight. Compared to their right-handed counterparts, non-right-handed people are also more likely to have mental illnesses ranging from depression to schizophrenia.

And these differences are not small. For example, around 11 percent of the population is left-handed, but estimates suggest that around 40 percent of people with psychotic disorders are left-handed. (On a positive note, lefties might be more creative!)

Left-handedness and ambidexterity may be linked to mental disorders because they result from the brains failure to effectively lateralize during development. Brain lateralization confers many benefits, including avoiding duplication and allowing for the specialization of different brain areas.

To test their hypothesis that psychopathy is an adaptation rather than a mental disorder, Pullman and her team combined data from 16 prior studies. The studies involved 1,818 people from various populations. They measured handedness and psychopathy, and calculated whether psychopaths were more likely to be left-handed or ambidextrous than their kinder counterparts.

In short, psychopathy was not reliably related to handedness. Tiny differences did show up, but they gave no reliable answer.

When looking at typical people from throughout the community, as well as incarcerated inmates, those who scored high on psychopathy were slightly more likely to be non-right-handed. When looking at mental health patients, however, psychopathic offenders were slightly less likely to be left-handed than their non-psychopathic counterparts. All of these differences were so small and unreliable as to be likely due to chance.

The meta-analysis of more than 1,800 people failed to link psychopathy with handedness. This supports the hypothesis that psychopathy is an adaptive life strategy passed down through genes thanks to evolution, and not a mental disorder resulting from neurodevelopmental perturbations.

Taken alone, however, these findings are not especially convincing, for a few reasons. First, the data did show some patterns suggesting that people higher in psychopathy may be more likely to be non-right-handed. But, the sample size may have been too small to detect real differences.

Moreover, psychopaths had about the same rates of non-right-handedness as incarcerated inmates and mental health patients.But if psychopathy isnevera mental disorder, we would expect psychopaths to havelowerrates of non-right-handedness than these groups (since these groups probably have more mental health disorders, and thus higher rates of non-right-handedness, than the general population).

Another interesting possibility is that psychopathy is helpful, but only when people can keep violent and criminal behavior under control. This is supported by Pullman and teams finding that people high in the traits of psychopathy (for instance, callousness or lack of remorse) were slightly less likely to be left-handed or ambidextrous, whereas those high in behavioral psychopathy such as committing violent or criminal acts were more likely to be non-right-handed. Though these results were not statistically significant, the conclusion seems reasonable.

Though this single study does not convince me that psychopathy is necessarily an adaptive, evolution-based life strategy, it does add to a growing body of research supporting that possibility.

For example, it is consistent with data showing that people high in psychopathy are likely to commit calculated, goal-directed crimes rather than emotional ones; prioritize their own wellbeing as well as the wellbeing of their offspring; and tend to have more children.

So, while the jury is still out, know that psychopaths like Dan might not have a mental disorder at all. They might just be self-serving jerks.

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How psychopathy might be an evolutionary adaptation - Big Think

The vacation rental business has seen many, many changes in the last two decades.The industry has grown from an alternative vacation option, made up exclusively of small mom and pop operations in one location to a behemoth of multi-million-dollar companies who manage thousands of properties all around the world.Coastal Carolina has certainly seen a similar evolution.

Weve gone from basic, simply furnished beach houses where guests had to provide their own beddingto massive, luxury villas with every bell and whistle, including luxury 600-thread count Egyptian cotton sheets, pools, hot tubs, tiki bars, and home theaters. As properties have grown more sophisticated, so have guests expectations. Garage sale furniture and chipped dishes no longer cut it. Thats the way it should be. Todays guests are smart and savvy, and their vacation rental choices reflect that.Weve seen similar evolution in the way vacation rental managers operate too. No more, weve always done it that way. This industry requires growth and innovation. The journey in the industry and at Carolina Retreats has been a fascinating one.Technology and AutomationOne of the areas in which Carolina Retreats has seen unparalleled growth is in technology and automation. There have been incredible advances in vacation rental companies making the life of a rental manager, rental guests, and rental owners more seamless and streamlined. Long gone are the days of receiving a rental contract via mail and sending it back with your deposit check. Also gone are the days of checking in at the rental office and hanging around toreceive your keys. Now its all about automation and real-time technology.

At Carolina Retreats, we are proud of staying on the forefront of emerging technologies and sharing them to create the best possible experience for our guests. As technology continues to evolve, we have received overwhelmingly positive feedback from guests.Carolina Retreats keeps them informed and up to date on every aspect of their vacation rental. Guests and owners truly appreciate knowing what to expect, what comes next, and feeling like theyre in the loop.Before all of this became available, there was virtually no interaction between rental companies and guests prior to the actual arrival. The only communication was when payment was due. If a guest wanted additional information, they had to work for it.This dynamic not only created friction, but sometimes even avcombative relationship between guests and the rental company.Today, Carolina Retreats provides a proactive approach to our guests overall experience.We offer an abundance of information because we want guests to be informed. We offer our suggestions and recommendations to provide a personal touch. We stay in touch throughout the stay so that we can easily answer any question or remedy any issue that arises. And we stay in touch after the stay to continue cultivating that positive relationship, and to let our guests know their business is appreciated. We strive to be both a partner and a resource for each of our guests. This business is far more hands-on than it used to be, and we recognize our responsibility to both our guests and owners to stay ahead of that evolutionary curve.Part two of the series will provide more details on how Carolina Retreats stays at the forefront of integrating automation and technology in the vacation rental industry.

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The Changing Vacation Rental Industry- Part One: The Evolution of Technology and Automation by Mike Harrington | Sponsored Insights - Greater...

In 2008, the year I moved to the state, the Louisiana Science Education Act was passed with the backing of the then governor, Bobby Jindal. The name of the law is misleading, as it allowed schools in Louisiana to teach the Biblical account of creation in science classes as an alternative to evolution.

Jindal went as far as to say that local schools should determine how science is taught in classrooms. That meant that if the local public schools science teacher wanted to teach that all living land animals were the descendants of creatures carried on Noahs Ark, then well, that was just fine with the governor and the supporters of the law.

At the time, I presumed that Bobby Jindal (born Piyush Jindal) was probably a smart person who was somehow misled. I jokingly called him my uncle Bobby because as an Indian person I could claim all other Indians as kin, and maybe saying the governor was a relative could get me out of a speeding ticket (it couldnt).

My Uncle Bobby should have known better than to pass anti-evolution legislation. He was, after all, someone who held a Biology degree from Brown University and a Rhodes Scholar (but going to an Ivy League school and Oxford doesnt necessarily make you smart, just educated).

So whats the big deal anyway? Well, you just dont teach your own religious views in a public science class. Science is about observing and testing natural phenomena in order to give a reasoned, evidence-based explanations for those events. Religion, on the other hand, can provide answers to questions science doesnt cover (eg, what is the meaning of life?) but it can also provide answers that cant always be tested.

For instance, lets say your answer to why apples drop to the ground when they fall out of a tree is god made it happen; that isnt something I can prove false, because I cant test it. There isnt room for questioning things or scientific inquiry if you believe flatly that god controls everything that happens.

The other problem with teaching religion in a science class is that there are many religions with a variety of beliefs. Faith-based beliefs about creation differ by your religious persuasion. In one version of the Hindu creation myth, the Earth was part of the lotus flower that grew from the navel of Vishnu, and then the world was populated by Brahma and will be destroyed by Shiva.

The problem again with the teaching god controls everything is that you cant prove or disprove it. In order to respond to a Noahs flood scenario I say, There is no boat that can fit a pair of all living land animals, and having just a pair of each species wouldnt provide enough genetic variability to restock the Earth; also it cant rain for 40 days and 40 nights worldwide because we have a finite amount of water on Earth; and also all the freshwater animals would go extinct as they would be inundated by salty marine water; and where did all that water go afterwards? And there is no evidence of a huge worldwide flood from a few thousand years ago

The reply is just always, God did it, so anything is possible. Well, I guess that would be the end of the conversation. God did it can be your go-to answer, and that is fine. I am not here to judge or tell you how to live. My only issue is using that explanation to shutdown scientific discourse in an academic setting.

Science is all about testing explanations of natural phenomena to see if they hold up to rigorous testing. If you can explain everything away with God did it and controls everything, whats the point of the testing? Whats the point of school? Whats the point of curiosity? Religions ask for your faith in explaining the untestable and unprovable; science is here to help explain the rest by making testable predictions.

However, does science require some faith? Yes, I would say. You have to believe that the results and observations you make are based in reality and that the results are the outcomes of predictable phenomena. (This idea dates back before Aristotle but is explicit in the writings of religious philosophers such as Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, Avicenna, Averroes and surely many others in every culture / religion / region.)

However, that latter scenario isnt the case. We scientists can have faith in the fact that what we observe is an unmanipulated reality because our inquiries yield consistent and reliable results that allow us to reveal the secrets of our planet and of our universe ever more exactly. To paraphrase Galileo, Religion shows the way to go to heaven, not the way the heavens go.

Some would argue that there is room for studying nature in the slightly different religious take of god started everything and made the rules. That is, you can study the rules (eg, gravity, evolution) and their consequences, without having to determine the origination of those rules. This playbook suits the non-overlapping magisteria Stephen Jay Gould describes in his book Rocks of Ages.

In that book, Gould argues that science and religion can complement each other without interfering with one another, as it does for many. I would perhaps state it more plainly as, Science should not be anti-religion; and religion should not be anti-science. There is certainly room for compromise, and improved cultural competency on both sides.

That anti-evolution law is still on the books in my state. I dont mean to pick on Louisiana I genuinely love the state and am proud to call it my adopted home. My kids were born in Baton Rouge, and Ive lived here for more than ten years. Louisiana isnt the only state with issues over the teaching of evolution.

In Alabama, biology textbooks include a disclaimer sticker warning you about the theory of evolution. In 2018, Arizona briefly had all references to the word evolution deleted from the states science education standards. It isnt just the so-called conservative states; Ive met anti-evolution people in liberal Ann Arbor (where I obtained my PhD in evolutionary biology) and New York City (where I grew up).

It isnt just the US either only 26% of people in Afghanistan accept human evolution, and in 2017 Turkey removed references to evolution from its textbooks. Notably, the US ranks near Turkey in terms of how human evolution is accepted by the general public. Indians appear to be much more accepting of evolution and science despite also being deeply religious.

Again, Im here with no other motive but to explain the scientific facts that are available. The science is why the vast majority of people who understand those facts accept evolution. Im not here to challenge your beliefs we all have our own truths. We get to pick our own beliefs, but we dont get to pick our own facts. Im here to help you better understand how science explains the origin of our species and of all life on Earth.

In discussions with many people who actually accepted evolution and science, I came to realise that a good percentage of them didnt really understand the science of evolution. They just accepted evolution as fact because they trust science. They may understand even less than some people who dont accept evolution because those people dont trust science or may see some conflict with their religion.

I want to help more people on both sides to understand evolution, so that hopefully it will be less divisive. (I think difficult subjects, like politics, are so acrimonious because no one really knows what they are talking about.) It is ultimately up to you to accept scientific facts (or not), and to convince yourself of whatever truth you are willing to acknowledge.

Evolution isnt the easiest topic to understand nor the hardest either (It aint rocket surgery, as they say), but it is easy to misinterpret, and it is often portrayed incorrectly. For instance, evolution is often depicted as something like the March to Progress / Road to Homo sapiens mural by Randolph Franz Zallinger, but that is very wrong.

Evolution isnt goal-oriented or progressive. This mischaracterisation led one Louisiana state senator to ask, They evolved into a person? when told of a long-term evolution experiment on bacteria. That experiment, actually called the LTEE (Long-term evolution experiment) provided a surprising example of an evolutionary adaptation observed as it occurred.

That experiment in the lab of Dr Richard Lenski found that some E coli populations (from over 70,000 generations), all captive reared from the same source population, had evolved an adaptive trait. That is very clear evidence of evolution (eg, change in the inherited characteristics of a population). What that state senator believed, based on that common misunderstanding of evolution, was that the only definitive evidence of evolution from that experiment would be if the bacteria turned into humans.

Even given an infinite number of generations reared in those lab conditions, those bacteria would never turn into humans thats not how evolution works.

Excerpted with permission from Explaining Life Through Evolution, Prosanta Chakrabarty, Penguin Allen Lane.

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Why it is necessary to understand the development of life through evolution and not religion - Scroll.in

How many episodes should a season or series of television be? Depending on who you ask, answers vary. Were in a TV era overflowing with options on broadcast and streaming, and episode count is playing a major role in our television habits more than ever.

Theres a verifiable cornucopia of content for viewers to consume and how many episodes a piece of media has can be the deciding factor when it comes to watching it or not. This includes bingeing classics that have shaped pop culture.

Of course, there will always be TV lovers who give shows like X-Files, Friends, The Office, Smallville, and Supernatural a chance despite being over 200 episodes long, or in Supernaturals case over 300, but the time of the long running series is drawing to a close outside of procedurals.

Much of this has to do with an overabundance of television. Theres simply too many programs to watch with very little time to watch them. Not to mention viewers are less willing to spend season upon season with a show thats begun to deteriorate in quality. Also, a drop in the required number of episodes for a show to reach syndication plus the birth of streaming has shifted the landscape.

Were in a new frontier, one kicked off by Netflix. The binge model of television watching changed audiences expectations for the shows they watch. New series premiering on streamers cant be up to 22 episodes or more like broadcast (though there are shows clocking in at 13 episodes per season on TV). Its just not feasible especially when episodes drop all at once on premiere day.

Could you imagine trying to binge 22 episodes of a Stranger Things release? In a time when you have to log out of all social media accounts and basically not surf the web in order not to be spoiled, it would be stressful and not worth anyones time to binge it. Thats a limitation of streaming in the era of binge television.

The measure of how many episodes is too many is dependent on where a piece of media has made its home. If youre still tuning into week-to-week broadcast television, you know youre typically in for 18-22 episodes a season. The pandemic has shortened that episode count for many shows, especially on The CW, but TV viewers know what to expect.

18-22 episodes gives shows the opportunity to experiment with filler content such as bottle episodes, flashbacks, crossovers, etc. Its the kind of entertainment that can have fans going up with excitement or groaning over yet another detour from the overall plot but at least theres room for expanded storytelling.

Streaming series dont have that luxury. Theyre in and out of their stories between 4-13 episodes. Its a model that works well for the platforms even when a season or show releases weekly. However, there are drawbacks. There isnt a set runtime for episodes so a short season doesnt mean you wont be caught off guard by long episode.

For example, Stranger Things season 4 episodes will clock-in at over an hour. K-dramas on Netflix often do have episodes that run up to 60 minutes and can even be as long as 90 minutes. Obviously, established shows or vehicles with big name actors can get away with feature length episodes of television, but thats still a lot of time for viewers to invest in a series.

So, this isnt only a question of episode count, its also a question of episode length. Its great that creators are pushing boundaries in the medium of television on streaming. But the amount of episodes a season has on top of how long those episodes are can make or break audience retention for shows just starting out.

While there isnt a consensus on how many episodes is the sweet spot for streaming shows, it does seem that 8-10 episodes per season works well for shows. 45 minutes to an hour in run-time per episode is the preferred standard thats carried over from broadcast.

As for network television, some shows would benefit from breaking away from the 18-22 episode standard. 13-15 episodes would likely produce tighter storytelling especially for series where theres clearly not enough material to stretch past that marker.

What do you think? How many episodes is too many for a TV show? Let us know in the comments!

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The evolution of the episode count: How many episodes is too many? - Hidden Remote

Mario Isola says there is a lot of excitement about the forthcoming Miami Grand Prix, but being a new venue means Pirelli are being conservative when it comes to tyre compound choices.

Pirelli are bringing their C2 (white-walled hard), C3 (yellow-walled medium) and C4 (red-walled soft) compounds to the track, the middle of their range of available compounds in 2022.

On a track that has some high-speed sections much like the Jeddah Corniche Circuit in Saudi Arabia as well as some slower, more technical sections, Isola, the Motorsport Director at Pirelli, is expecting a lot of track evolution and a lot of initial grip levels.

With cars likely to run at a medium level of downforce, Isola foresees some sliding around the higher speed corners, but he is interested to see the first Miami Grand Prix and how Pirellis tyres face up to the challenges of the brand-new circuit in the United States.

Theres been a huge buzz of excitement around the first Miami Grand Prix, where the track has some similarities to Jeddah, although there are some parts that are slower and more technical than Saudi Arabia: especially the section from Turns 11 to 16, said Isola.

The rest is a very quick layout, running anti-clockwise, which puts the emphasis on the tyres on the right hand side of the car. Were expecting the usual rapid track evolution and a smooth surface with the new asphalt, but the track has been jet-washed at high pressure, which means that it should offer quite good grip from the beginning.

Because its a fast track the cars are likely to run a low to medium downforce set-up, which could lead to a bit of sliding in the high-speed corners on the hard compounds in particular.

For any new track our choice tends to be on the conservative side, so it will be interest to confront the simulations with real data.

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Pirelli Expecting 'Rapid Track Evolution' and 'Good Grip' on Miami Grand Prix Debut - The Checkered Flag