Your brain decides someone is trustworthy, intelligent, and competent based on whether they have nice teeth. The Halo Effect explains why attractive people get lighter sentences, better jobs, and higher grades – despite zero evidence they deserve them.
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Cognitive dissonance makes your brain rewrite reality to protect your self-image. Each time you justify a bad choice, the next justification gets easier. This is how reasonable people end up defending the indefensible.
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Your brain is desperately committed to proving it was right all along. Confirmation bias operates below conscious awareness, quietly filtering reality so you only see the parts that confirm your existing beliefs.
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Priming plants ideas in your mind that influence your actions later – and you have no idea it’s happening. From wine choices to political opinions, your System 1 is being manipulated constantly by stimuli you never noticed.
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That warm feeling when something “just makes sense”? It’s not truth – it’s your unconscious mind running a con on your conscious one. Welcome to cognitive ease.
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Think plane crashes are more dangerous than car rides? Convinced crime is skyrocketing? Your brain’s taking shortcuts that feel right but lead you straight to wrong conclusions. Here’s why.
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Your brain treats effortful thinking like an expensive operation that needs justification. The Law of Least Effort guarantees you’ll rely on fast, error-prone intuitions when careful analysis would serve you better.
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Your brain has two systems: one that’s fast and wrong, another that’s slow and lazy. Guess which one runs your political opinions? We’re all operating on autopilot while wondering why everyone else is so stupid.
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