That is super awesome. The universe is cool.

Okay. Laundry is folded and put away. The room is not awesome, but it is habitable. Off to wish happiness to graduates! I really am happy about this one. About five years ago she OD'd, a botched suicide attempt. But today she's graduating, happy, healthy, with plans for her future. Admittedly she was adopted more or less by the ministry leaders, and that's not going to be the solution for all kids, but it sure was for her. Yay graduation!

OK, add this to the "do we have free will?" debate.

Very interesting....

Disbelieving Free Will Makes Brain Less Free

A test of people who read passages discrediting the notion of free will found an immediate decrease in brain activity related to voluntary action. The findings are just one data point in ongoing scientific investigation of a millennia-old philosophical conundrum, but they raise an intriguing possibility.

“Our results indicate that beliefs about free will can change brain processes related to a very basic motor level,” wrote researchers led by psychologist Davide Rigoni of Italy’s University of Padova in a study published in May’s Psychological Science.

...

Tested on when they decided to press the button, the non-free-will group reported doing so a fraction of a second before their counterparts. To lose confidence in free will seemingly introduced a lag between conscious choice and action.

Earlier psychological studies of free will have found that discrediting free will seems to trigger an increase in cheating aggressiveness, encourage people to be less helpful and generally sap motivation.

The latest findings extend the effects of disbelieving to a more basic physical level. Whether there’s a relationship between free will, motor activity and more complex behaviors is yet to be determined, but “abstract belief systems might have a much more fundamental effect than previously thought,” wrote the researchers.

Evidently, free will is all in your mind.

Evidently, free will is all in your mind.

Duuuuuuuude.

That seems interesting, tommyrot, I need to read up on it.

My very vague, not-a-scientist understanding was that there appears to be a particular neurochemical associated with willful actions. In other words, release of the neurochemical triggers the perception that one has chosen a certain action. And that decisions reached by the brain in the absence of that neurochemical are perceived as involuntary.

I have introduced my sister to the term ladyboner. I feel like my job as an elder sister might be complete.

I came home and my network router was reset (password gone and everything) and my TiVo wasn't getting a cable signal. I've locked down the network again, and rebooting the TiVo took forever, but it seems to be seeing the world again. I have no idea what happened. EMP in my apartment?

No plans for the long weekend. Hope to rest. Can't miss much more work.

The guy in the comic store looked like one of my cousins. Like, a creepy amount like a creepyish cousin. One cousin who liked to cuddle too much, and once deliberately let me walk in on him in flagrante delicto. About which I'm still traumatised. Anyway, people need to not look like him.

Ordering in sushi.

I want to order sushi too, ita. Maybe we'll be dinner twins.

I'm testing O Sushi on Santa Monica. They seemed fair enough, but they are making me get $20 minimum. Hmmph. Extra tuna roll from nowhere.

I want at least one roll where some of it is hot. I hope I picked well. It's depressing when most of the rolls just say "on a california roll". Whatever happened to the restaurants that were too tooty to sell california rolls?

Thank GOD this week is over. And I have a 3 day weekend. So needed.

I need to get some more knit sundresses to lounge around in. Preferably that won't show cat hair. I like shorts and tank, but I'm inspired my my neighbor Sarah, who I always see out gardening in casual sundresses (and she's not a froofroo sort.) And damned comfortable in this weather.

I was planning on just getting a summer short robe for mornings, but this would work better.

Got leaf crap to sweep up tomorrow. Looks like a blizzard out there.

Tom Scola! If a certain LAista were to need a place to crash in the NYC area August 1st, any chance I could borrow your couch?