The useful ideas project

Cultural dementia

Prof. Andress explains why we love simple solutions to complicated problems.

Oct 13 • 

Ciarán Ryan

1

1

1

June 2025

You will never experience this precise sequence of events ever again in your lifetime

Unless you're reading this while sitting completely still in an otherwise empty vacuum and even then your eye would be twitching or something.

Jun 2 • 

Ciarán Ryan

May 2025

We can electrify everything

Or nearly everything.

May 26 • 

Ciarán Ryan

1

November 2024

Neoliberal deceit

If every politician is lying to you, the guy that doesn't pretend to care about the truth looks (like a version of) honest.

Nov 18, 2024 • 

Ciarán Ryan

2

2

October 2024

Marginal gains

Small improvements can make a big difference.

Oct 21, 2024 • 

Ciarán Ryan

Political lobbying exploits bounded rationality

Why aren't more of us concerned about paid lobbying in politics? Perhaps because many of us won't consider the outsized efforts undertaken to sway…

Oct 18, 2024 • 

Ciarán Ryan

January 2024

The double slit experiment and the limits of intuition

A reminder that pre-existing beliefs and prejudices are often inaccurate and insufficient.

Jan 22, 2024 • 

Ciarán Ryan

Why social media algorithms manipulate us

A succinct explanation.

Jan 8, 2024 • 

Ciarán Ryan

1

1

The tragedy of the commons is not inevitable

People are not always purely self-interested.

Jan 1, 2024 • 

Ciarán Ryan

December 2023

Reality tunnel

A useful metaphor that can remind us to check our biases.

Dec 25, 2023 • 

Ciarán Ryan

September 2023

Courage calls to courage everywhere

I like the modern interpretation of this famous quote.

Sep 25, 2023 • 

Ciarán Ryan

Thought-terminating cliché

A form of loaded language that can be used to stop arguments from proceeding and end debate.

Sep 13, 2023 • 

Ciarán Ryan

1