Quotes from Keith Henson

As for leadership, I am the kind who leads reluctantly and more by example than anything else. Someone had to be on the incorporation papers as president.

I suspect that a substantial fraction of human problems in the world today, not just cults, result from the mismatch between the current environment and the environment in which we evolved.

Most of the suicide hijackers came from Saudi Arabia, a place not lacking in wealth. But due to rapid population growth, the wealth per capita has fallen by about half in a generation.

I much prefer the modern world.

The information that is passed from person to person and from generation to generation is the primary factor that gives humans a competitive advantage over other animals.

Action leads to Attention. that in the short-term releases Rewarding brain chemicals and in the long term improves reproductive success.

Perhaps teachers should be instructed in a program where they lie to their students on a regular basis to sharpen up their skills at detecting lies.

The rare person is still interested in new advances when they are adults. There is possibly a correlation with intelligence. In any case, you have to be fairly bright to keep learning and changing attitudes as you get older.

Fighting hard to protect yourself and your relatives is good for your genes, but when captured and escape is not possible, giving up short of dying and making the best you can of the new situation is also good for your genes.

People repeat behaviour that leads to flooding their brains with pleasurable chemicals. The short-term reward loop acts over hours to years, and the long-term reproductive success loop over generations.

Primates will continue to play social games without the least insight into what is killing them.

Could people be trained to be less gullible? Or are you as stuck with gullibility as you are with skin colour?

Children do not have to learn that streets are dangerous places by potentially fatal trial and error.

Evolution acts slowly. Our psychological characteristics today are those that promoted reproductive success in the ancestral environment.

Successful cult memes induce intense social interaction behaviour between cult members. This trips the attention detectors.

Lie detection is like language there is a learning window. Telling whoppers to small children seems to be a family tradition in many families.

Evolution acts slowly. Our psychological characteristics today are those that promoted reproductive success in the ancestral environmen.

As for leadership, I am the kind who leads reluctantly and more by example than anything else. Someone had to be on the incorporation papers as president.

People can undergo a sudden change of thinking and loyalties under threat of death or intense social pressure and isolation from friends and family.

People under the influence of cults is similar to that we observe in addicts. Typical behaviour for both includes draining bank accounts, neglecting children, destroying relations with family and losing interest in anything except the drug or cult.

The rare person is still interested in new advances when they are adults. There is possibly a correlation with intelligence. In any case, you have to be fairly bright to keep learning and changing attitudes as you get older.

People repeat behaviour that leads to flooding their brains with pleasurable chemicals. The short-term reward loop acts over hours to years, and the long-term reproductive success loop over generations.

The drug or cult has major if not exclusive sources of brain rewards.

Anyone who has ever had the feeling of being higher than a kite after giving a public speech is well aware of the effects of attention.