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Karstica

[audio] Values Don't Matter — 24 Jan 2026
Values are virtue ethics in disguise—traits we’re expected to cultivate. But virtues are context-dependent (courage for a soldier isn’t courage for a teacher) and the situation overwhelmingly drives behaviour. The real task is designing the context, not listing the virtues.
[article] AI Hallucination is just Man-Guessing — 1 Nov 2025
Human reasoning isn’t flawed, it’s a social tool we use in the wrong places. It’s about sharing and evaluating intuitive claims, not generating rational ones. AI is fundamentally this but crippled: without the grounded intuitions and social friction that makes it work.
[audio] Stress is Good — 1 Nov 2025
Stress isn’t poorly calibrated to modern life. It’s the energising force that allows us to perform. Optimal performance requires optimal stress. The difference between eustress and distress isn’t biological—it’s psychological. Controllability matters more than the stressor itself.
[article] On Motivation — 15 Sep 2025
We can think of motivations in terms of three things. There is the content: what things motivate us. Then there is the process: how things motivate us. And lastly, we have those things that maintain our motivation.
[article] Navigating Moral Terrain — 1 Sep 2025
I describe five levels that help understand how good people do bad things—neural, cognitive, situational, social, and cultural. Inject some norms into the stack, and you can explain (and predict) moral behaviour.
[article] The Neuroscience Con — 6 Jun 2025
The neuroscience confidence game trades content for cosmetic filler, making vacuous advice look smart.
[article] Positive Intelligence pt.III — 30 May 2025
This might be the most comprehensive example of the neuroscience confidence game I’ve ever written about. That and a heavy dose of self-indulgence. Neuroscientific self-help, not so much.
[article] Positive Intelligence pt.II — 23 May 2025
Chamine’s ‘Positivity Quotient’ is based on nothing beyond ‘being happier is better than being sad’, and unless they appeal to you, there’s no reason to pick his ‘ten saboteurs’ over any of the other inner-critics out there.
[article] Positive Intelligence pt.I — 16 May 2025
It says it’s based on the latest research, but actually it’s based on a 40 year old version of the concept of an ‘inner critic’, and a pack of very well worded porky-pies.
[article] Uncertainty vs Risk — 9 May 2025
Our brains track two kinds of uncertainty. Expected uncertainty makes us trust our model of the world more and exploit familiar patterns (be biased). Unexpected uncertainty makes us explore and update our model (prefer noise). Correctly diagnosing the uncertainty is the key.
[article] Preferring Coherence — 2 May 2025
Cogntive dissonance often describes a bias towards seeing ourselves as coherent. Sure, it’s sneaky and prevalent, but entirely necessary. And, other times we tolerate how noisy we are, keeping us open to new insights and better equipped for a complex world.
[article] Cognitive dissonance isn't discomfort — 25 Apr 2025
Cognitive dissonance is often thought of as the discomfort we have with conflicting cognitions. But it’s really about how the brain will smooth over dissonant cognitions, whether they’re uncomfortable or not. It happens a lot.
[article] Sacrificing the Self — 4 Apr 2025
When we want to identify with a group, we bias ourselves to filter out all theother ways we could be. It helps us cut down all our competing priorities to the group. The trade-off is the benefit in diversity of thought.
[article] Stress and Creativity — 28 Mar 2025
Stress promotes bias—stereotypical thinking and behaving. Less stress promotes cognitive flexibility—an openness to new ways of thinking and behaving. Neither is better than the other. It’s about the situation you deploy them in.
[article] Bias vs Noise pt. I: Bias vs Bias — 21 Mar 2025
The behavioural economists treat bias as an error. But the brain isn’t an economist. It’s more like a statistician, using bias as a trade-off. Bias ignores noise to see something more clearly, though of course, sometimes the noise shouldn’t be ignored.