Brain Series Current: The Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon Pareidolia All Posts Change Blindness You learn about a new word, concept, or product. Then, suddenly, you see it everywhere-in articles, conversations, advertisements. It feels like the universe is sending you a message. ...
In 1847, Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis made a horrifying discovery at Vienna General Hospital: doctors were killing their patients. The maternity ward had a death rate of 10-35% from “childbed fever.” But here’s what was strange-the ward staffed by midwives had a death rate of only 4%. Mothers were literally begging not to be admitted to the doctors’ ward. Some women chose to give birth in the street rather than risk dying in the hospital. ...
A software engineer tries to explain their work at a dinner party: “So basically we’re implementing a microservices architecture using containerized deployments with an event-driven messaging pattern…” The eyes around the table glaze over. A doctor explains a diagnosis: “You have acute pharyngitis secondary to a streptococcal infection, so we’ll prescribe a beta-lactam antibiotic…” The patient nods, understanding nothing. An experienced teacher wonders why students don’t grasp concepts that seem obvious. ...
It’s 2 AM. You tell yourself “just one more episode” for the third time tonight. The show ended on a cliffhanger, and your brain refuses to let you sleep until you know what happens next. Or maybe you’re at work, supposedly focused on a spreadsheet, but part of your brain is still churning over that unfinished novel you put down this morning. Why do unfinished stories occupy so much mental real estate? The answer lies in a phenomenon discovered in a 1920s Berlin restaurant-and it might be the most powerful tool in a storyteller’s arsenal. ...
I once spent three weeks building a custom CSS framework. It had exactly the features I wanted. Perfect naming conventions. Elegant utility classes. Beautiful documentation. I showed it to my team. They said, “Why not just use Tailwind?” My response? “Because mine is better.” Was it actually better? No. Objectively, Tailwind had: More features Better documentation Larger community More battle-testing Active maintenance But I couldn’t see that. All I could see was MY framework, MY design decisions, MY time invested. ...
My uncle is intelligent, educated, and successful. He runs a business, reads extensively, and can hold sophisticated conversations about history, economics, and technology. He also believes: COVID-19 was created in a lab as a bioweapon The 2020 election was stolen A global elite controls world events through secret organizations Vaccines contain tracking microchips Climate change is a hoax to implement global government When I try to discuss evidence, he responds with: ...
I once turned down a $40,000 freelance contract because I was afraid of losing my $80,000 salary. The math was simple: take the contract, it would take 3 months, that’s $160k annualized. Way better than my salary. But my brain didn’t see “$160k potential.” It saw “giving up the guaranteed $80k.” The fear of losing my steady paycheck was stronger than the excitement of potentially making more. I said no. The person who took the gig finished it in 2 months, got referred to three more clients, and now runs a six-figure freelance business. ...
I once deployed code to production because a VP told me to, even though I knew it would break things. I was a junior engineer. They were a VP of Engineering. They said, “Ship it now. We need this for the demo tomorrow.” I tried to explain: “The tests are failing. The database migration isn’t ready. This will cause data corruption.” They responded: “I understand your concerns, but I’ve been doing this for 20 years. Trust me. Ship it.” ...
I once rejected a brilliant engineering candidate because their resume had a typo. Not in their work history. Not in their technical skills. In the summary section: “atention to detail” instead of “attention to detail.” My brain went: “Typo → careless → probably writes buggy code → not a good hire.” I passed. Another company hired them. They became a principal engineer there and later gave a keynote at a major conference. ...
I once spent three hours researching React state management libraries. Redux. MobX. Zustand. Jotai. Recoil. XState. Valtio. Context API. useState. useReducer. Each had passionate advocates. Detailed comparisons. Migration guides. Benchmark tests. By hour three, I was paralyzed. Which one was “right”? What if I chose wrong? What if I regretted it? I started with a simple problem: “I need to manage state in my app.” I ended with decision fatigue, imposter syndrome, and zero lines of code written. ...