Category: Science for Lay People

29/06/2017 Adaptative Behavior | ancestors | Claudia Feitosa Santana | Color | Darwin | European Journal of Personality | game | Jonason Li | Sergio Almeida | sex Feitosa-Santana

Love Games: Playing Hard to Get

Our ancestors lived in a colorless world and had sex without love. But we’ve lived with both of them for a long time, and no one wants to live in shades of gray or have sex like the gym. Color is easy but love is complicated. It’s still a mystery the stage before full love […]

27/06/2017 Claudia Feitosa Santana | Horizon Perception | Unreachable Sky Feitosa-Santana

A World of Illusions: The Moon

The Moon looks big, right? And when it goes up it looks smaller, like it’s farther away? So, it’s all illusion. All in our heads. In fact, it’s always the same size, but in the photo it looks closer and bigger. Looks like it but isn’t. Several theories try to explain why we have this […]

22/06/2017 Claudia Feitosa Santana | Darwin Hamilton Human Behavior | Evolutionary Behavior | Giambologna Florence | Neuroaesthetics Feitosa-Santana

Giambologna (1574-1580) Ratto delle Sabine em Galleria dell’Academia

Darwin would not be surprised and Hamilton would explain mathematically. What does this work mean? An older man defeated by a younger man. The still-controversial translation sculpture depicts a legendary episode of Roman men who would have obtained wives for themselves by kidnapping the daughters of neighboring Sabine families. A very common event among non-human […]

20/06/2017 Chua Zou | Churchill Effect | Claudia Feitosa Santana | Luxury Decision Making | Machiavel Luxury Corruption | Money Effect | Neuroaesthetics | Neuroeconomics Feitosa-Santana

Visiting Machiavelli: Luxury Also Corrupts

The devil may not wear Prada, but science knows he likes luxury. Mere exposure to luxury items can change the way we perceive the world, changing our thinking and our choices. People who were exposed to luxury made more choices based on their own interest than those who weren’t. Despite prioritizing themselves, they did not […]