Quotes About Cognition

ideas do not truly sink in when emotions come into play;

It means that rational thinking has little, very little, to do with risk avoidance. Much of what rational thinking seems to do is rationalize one's actions by fitting some logic to them.

we are likely to unwittingly simplify the problem because our minds routinely do so without our knowing it.

people's understanding of probability does not translate into their behavior).

thanks to the literature on cognition—that, counter to what everyone believes, not theorizing is an act—that theorizing can correspond to the absence of willed activity, the "default" option.

We do not spontaneously learn that we don't learn that we don't learn.

just as with the color blue, having a word for something helps spread awareness of it.

our actions are not quite guided by the parts of our brain that dictate rationality. We think with our emotions and there is no way around it.

The problem lies in the structure of our minds:

we do not have the mental power to absorb all information and tend to be confused by details)

Because your memory is limited and filtered, you will be inclined to remember those data that subsequently match the facts

Once your mind is inhabited with a certain view of the world, you will tend to only consider instances proving you to be right. Paradoxically, the more information you have, the more justified you will feel in your views.

Likewise, it is not possible to hold a situation in one's head without some element of bias.

The implication is that we feel emotions (limbic brain) then find an explanation (neocortex). As

Our inferential machinery, that which we use in daily life, is not made for a complicated environment in which a statement changes markedly when its wording is slightly modified.

Even from an anatomical perspective, it is impossible for our brain to see anything in raw form without some interpretation. We may not even always be conscious of it.

people look for books that support their mental program.

without being conscious of it.

We know more than we think we do, a lot more than we can articulate.

Memory knows before knowing remembers," William Faulkner wrote.

Sentence Completions to Facilitate the Art of Living Consciously

Each person has a unique mixture of intelligences, or ways of understanding the world—linguistic, logical, mathematical, spatial, musical, physical

The practice of living consciously is the first pillar of self-esteem.

To be in focus does not mean that one must be engaged in the task of problem-solving every moment of one's waking existence. It means that one must know what one's mind is doing.