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The Present Minds
Writing archive196 published pieces

All writing.

Long-form essays, personal perspectives and writing on psychology, mental health, the self and modern life.Page 11 of 17

121 Psychology6 min read

Does personality predict support for war? a new study has a disturbing answer

Does personality predict support for war? The question sounds abstract until the week it is published, which happened to be the same week missiles hit Tehran and…

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122 Purusharth8 min read

Kama is not what you think: desire as a sacred goal

Kama is the most misunderstood word in all of Hindu philosophy. Say it to most people and they think of one thing. The Kama Sutra. Dimly lit…

Navneet ShuklaRead article
123 Psychology8 min read

Moral Fatigue: why good people stop caring online

Moral fatigue is not apathy. That distinction matters. The person who has stopped retweeting every crisis, stopped signing every petition, stopped feeling the same spike of outrage…

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124 Psychology7 min read

Pretend play apes: the study that changed what it means to be human

Pretend play apes. That sentence would have been scientifically controversial five years ago. It is now the conclusion of a peer-reviewed study published in the journal Science…

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125 Psychology7 min read

Meaning of home: when home stops being a place

Meaning of home changes. Nobody warns you when it happens, or that it will happen more than once. The first time it happens quietly. You go back…

Shaniya NazRead article
126 Psychology7 min read

Are fireflies disappearing? what the science actually says

Are fireflies disappearing? The short answer is yes, in many places, measurably and quietly, for reasons that have everything to do with how humans have reorganised the…

Navneet ShuklaRead article
127 Psychology6 min read

Why costa rica has no army and what 77 years without one actually looks like

The question of why Costa Rica has no army is worth asking this week more than most. The world is currently spending $2.4 trillion a year on…

Shaniya NazRead article
128 Purusharth11 min read

What is Moksha: why liberation is the aim nobody talks about

Moksha is the fourth and final aim of Purushartha, and it is the one modern life has the least language for. Dharma, we understand, at least conceptually.…

Navneet ShuklaRead article
129 Psychology7 min read

Rainbow sea slug: the most beautiful warning sign in british waters

Rainbow sea slug is one of the most visually extraordinary creatures living in British waters, and almost nobody knows it exists. It is 3 centimetres long. Its…

Shaniya NazRead article
130 Psychology7 min read

Adult ADHD : are we disordered, or just paying attention to the wrong things?

Adult ADHD has become one of the defining medical conversations of the 2020s. A 2024 meta-analysis in The Lancet Psychiatry puts the global figure at 366.3 million…

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131 Psychology6 min read

Proto-Writing stone age: the 40,000-year-old marks that rewrote history

Proto-writing Stone Age artifacts are forcing a rewrite of one of humanity's oldest assumptions. A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on…

Navneet ShuklaRead article
132 Psychology7 min read

Hustle culture is dead. what killed it?

Hustle culture is dead. had a good run. For roughly a decade, the grind was the gospel. Wake up at 5am. Optimise every hour. Sleep when you…

Shaniya NazRead article
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