links for 2007-09-13

• Compromise on Oil Law in Iraq Seems to Be Collapsing - New York Times
• Measuring Happiness and Satisfaction - NBER Digest
• A Utilitarian Rationale for "Social Insurance"? - Kids Prefer Cheese
• Rising-Tide Economics - Gene Sperling
• Fed Reversed Cuts After '87, '98 Market Turmoil - John M. Berry
• Prospection: Experiencing the Future - Science
• Central banks split over credit squeeze action - FT.com

Comments

[ndd]

Courtesy of the blog Natural Rationality, naturalrationality.blogspot.com, we learn that this month's edition of the journal Science is devoted to social cognition. One article in particular looks like it would be of interest to readers of this blog. Psychologists Dan Gilbert and Tim Wilson presents a theory of prospection, the anticipation of future events. Here is the abstract:

All animals can predict the hedonic consequences of events they've experienced before. But humans can predict the hedonic consequences of events they've never experienced by simulating those events in their minds. Scientists are beginning to understand how the brain simulates future events, how it uses those simulations to predict an event's hedonic consequences, and why these predictions so often go awry.

Gilbert, D. T., & Wilson, T. D. (2007). Prospection: Experiencing the Future. Science, 317(5843), 1351-1354.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/317/5843/1351

[Mark Thoma]

Thanks - the list just went up so I added this link...