6 Chapter 5: How Cults Rewire the Brain
Diane Benscoter spent five years as a “Moonie.” She shares an insider’s perspective on the mind of a cult member, and proposes a new way to think about today’s most troubling conflicts and extremist movements.
Diane Benscoter, an ex-Moonie, is now invested in finding ways to battle extremist mentalities and their potentially deadly consequences.
https://www.ted.com/talks/ex_moonie_diane_benscoter_how_cults_think
- Rebecca Newberger Goldstein and Steven Pinker
- The Long Reach of Reason
Here’s a TED first: an animated Socratic dialog! In a time when irrationality seems to rule both politics and culture, has reasoned thinking finally lost its power? Watch as psychologist Steven Pinker is gradually, brilliantly persuaded by philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein that reason is actually the key driver of human moral progress, even if its effect sometimes takes generations to unfold.
https://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_and_rebecca_newberger_goldstein_the_long_reach_of_reason
- Daniel H. Cohen
- For Argument’s Sake
Why do we argue? To out-reason our opponents, prove them wrong, and, most of all, to win! Right? Philosopher Daniel H. Cohen shows how our most common form of argument — a war in which one person must win and the other must lose — misses out on the real benefits of engaging in active disagreement.
Cooling Down After the Lecture
The notes you take are like another book for your class. You need to use them like you would a book to study for your class, which mean that your notes have to have some of the same qualities a book does. Here are some ways to organize your notes:
- Create an “index.”
- Use a highlighter to mark important terms.
- Use a different colored pen and/or highlighters to go back to your notes and make your own headings and subheadings.
- Tab your notes.
Having well-organized notes is a great start, but it isn’t quite enough. After you organize your notes, you need to review them. Here are some ways to review your notes:
- Ask yourself why your instructor decided to lecture over this material in the way that he or she chose to do. What type of lecture is it? Hand-in-Hand or Jumping-off-point? Why do you suppose he or she chose to deliver that type of lecture to the class today? How does the lecture relate to other course materials you have to read for the course?
- Make sure you understood the lecture itself. When you review, pretend you need to tell a classmate who missed the lecture what the main ideas were. Actually explain the notes—either out loud or silently.
- Add additional notes of explanation you didn’t get a chance to add in class. Make sure you understand any abbreviations you might have used.
- Identify concepts that were not clear to you. Mark confusing parts up with questions marks and find a classmate, a tutor, or your instructor to get the concepts clarified.
- Share notes with a classmate. What did he or she write down? How is it different from what you wrote down