AACU Opening Night -Jonah Lehrer- Wed. January 21, 2010

Jonah Lehrer - author "How We Decide"



Opening at the AACU.

What do we know? What do we do? What can we do?

What does it mean to cross to the sea in everyday moment?

See Jim Harris' "campus compact"- includes public-private two-year and four-year institutions.



Jonah Lehrer "leaving the palace is leaving the school", or leaving the college.

Emotions underlying most decisions.He told two stories about people behaving interestingly: a trolley is going down the tracks and can go left or right. If it goes left it will get one person if it goes right it will hit many people. Most people surveyed said they would go left to save the many. Another scenario is there is a large man watching the trolley from a bridge and you're standing on the bridge near him. You can push this large man over the bridge and stop the trolley from hitting anyone would you do that? Most people say no.

Students in 2/3 grade ... after getting a good grade on a test some were told they were smart, and some were told they tried hard. The "smart" ones stopped taking risk, and the "tried hard" group learned mistakes are part of learning. STUDY your mistakes.

(Story of monkeys loving apple juice/behavior and excitement changes if it comes regularly, then withheld and real excitement at the mere thought of getting it. Also, Parkinson's drug sometimes leads to gambling addiction, because of the release of dopamine. Loss Aversion: Loss=feel bad. Win = feel good.

Stocks- we'll sell when the are up. If we sell when they are down it locks in the loss and we feel bad.

Word problems with Buddhist Monk - release of Alpha Waves. Understanding poetry = understanding complex vague connections. That is why when we "don't think about it", the answer will often come. We turn in thoughts and close off outside world. In the shower..before sleep.. long walks (leave the cell phone behind). Don't focus on words - get the alpha waves going. This is why Google offices have ping-pong. The answers come when you don't think about it.

Walter at Stanford did an immediate/delayed gratification test with young kids. Called the Marshmallow Project. Kids were told they could have a marshmallow now, or wait and have two marshmallows. Later he found the immediate gratification kids seemed to have problems in high school. There are tools to help these kids with early intervention - even if they just watch a video of what other kids do to pass the time (sing, don't look a the treat, tie shoes, etc) it helps them learn to cope with temptation. We can teach time how to cool off the stimulus and delay gratification.

Meta cognition - tip of tongue - mental hiccup ... How do you know what you don't know.