If someone says something really bad about someone or something, dismiss it right away. Same for really positive things as well. They are all too good to be true. Form your own opinions and conclusions. That means you need to pay attention to everything for which you want to have an opinion or everything you care about. Don’t let other make conclusions for you.

Reinvent the wheel unless it is work. If it is work, just use whatever was already there to get things done. Invent new stuff there. But in life we need to invent everything over and over again.

Statistics is too lame for life. Don’t fall for that. There are more variables in life than todays statistics can handle. May be someday we will figure out everything about life but that is not today or may even be not for another century.

Texas conservatives have won a curriculum change. Read about it here.

I grew up in a country with strong socialist governance. It still is but the country suffered long enough that the government had to open the gates for capitalism. Only then the country started flourishing. The same you can say about China as well. They started progressing only after they allowed capitalism to take advantage of their cheap labor.

Back to our story. The following is my opinion based on my own observation of events occurred in my life time. I don’t practice any religion.

Back home we had a secular state. The state did not push the religious to the corner. They never felt threatened. Schools were free to teach religious text as a non science subject. I grew up reading religious text of all the religions in the region. That was not considered science but were not prohibited from teaching. That was the key. Kids separated science from religion early on. Both had their own place the society. I don’t remember anyone ever questioning the evolution when I was in K-12 in the 80′s. My parents didn’t either. Dinosaurs were as real as Adam and Eve.  I know it is hard for people in the US and most of the west to understand. That is because the conflict is too deep here.

Lot of schools were run by religious organizations. They did not force their beliefs on other people. They did have the option of learning more about it though.

That is just the part of the story. The more important aspect of the story is where there is similarity with what is going on in the US. We had a quota system. People of certain origin were given quotas in schools and jobs. This meant that qualified people from backgrounds that were considered influential could not get in to prestigious schools and jobs a lot of times. They had no choice but to look for private education which also had to implement the quota. Lot of them left the country and came to US and some western countries. I am not one of them. After over half a century of government sponsored inequality, these groups backlashed and took the office. They did not do a lot of damage but the message was clear.

The good way to promote secularism is to accommodate. Me and my parents religion was accommodated by the majority religion in the country. Scientific community accommodated the beliefs of the religions. Religions did not question the science. They were operating in different dimensions. Many large government offices had prayer places for all religions. Even the top scientific institutions promote religious harmony. Bottom line: religion was not ridiculed.

Most people have a need to believe in something. If it is not the established religions, they will look for other things to believe. It could be witch craft, vampires or aliens. We just keep moving from one to another when challenged. Only a handful people find no need to believe in any kind of supernatural or other worldly powers.  When those people get the power and try push it on others, there will be friction. People may admire the accomplishment of these individuals but they would not sacrifice their beliefs for them. You may be able to educate them but that is only transient. Remember, almost a century of communism in the former Soviet Union did not eradicate such beliefs.

Let us all try to accommodate each others beliefs. There is no need to follow them but do not ridicule them or prevent them from following their beliefs. We all know that beliefs that harms others physically, economically or other ways need not be tolerated the state. The definition of those other ways should be very narrow and specific and agreeable to all the sides.

Smart people makes sense. Followers and believers don’t.

If you remember, a particularly interesting person said a while ago that religion is like pot. Now someone with the same political views says it is video games, the new religion masses believe is the new pot.

He also says video games promote the need for cigarettes, alcohol and drug, which is capitalism, the road to hell. OK, capitalism is all about smoking pot and getting drunk. There is also hell?

Here is the article.

PS: I don’t play games with gang or drug related story as its main theme.

I think I have a slightly different take on why there is more negative thinking than there is positive thinking. Seth’s question is why smart people engage in negative thinking?

I think most of the positive thinking and actions automatic and we do not pay attention to it. Things we are comfortable with, we tend to forget easily. What take notice of what hurts us and  remember for a long time. That is the reason we think there is more negative thinking in the world than there is positive thinking.

Think about your typical work day. We commute to work, do our job and so on. What if we thought we were not good in driving, completing assignment or raising our kids? Most of us don’t. We depend on the positive thinking of others to lead our comfortable lives. Most positive thoughts are almost hidden from our perception.

I think the difference is where we are challenged beyond our comfort zone. At that point true leaders show higher levels of optimism, most others look for leadership and a few exhibit negativism. It is not all black and white though. People who show optimism at one problem may fail in another.

Whatever your views are, making an effort to notice your own positive thinking will help improve your own positive thinking.