Can astrologers use astrological charts to understand people's character and lives?

Ferretti, A. (2024, July 29).

Clearer Thinking.

The link is here.

Astrology is very popular — both Gallup and YouGov report that about 25% of Americans believe that the position of the stars and planets can affect people's lives, with an additional 20% of people reporting being uncertain about astrology’s legitimacy.

Previously, we tested whether facts about a person's life can be predicted using their astrological sun signs (such as Pisces, Aries, etc.). A number of astrologers criticized this work, saying that of course we found that sun signs don't predict facts about a person's life, because that's baby or tabloid astrology. Real astrologers use people's entire astrological charts to glean insights about them and their lives. 

And they had a good point! Despite sun sign astrology being popular, most astrologers use entire astrological charts, not merely people's sun signs. Here are some examples of the feedback we received:

Inspired by these critiques, we enlisted the help of six astrologers, and with their feedback and guidance, we designed a new test to see whether astrologers can truly gain insights about people from entire astrological charts!

Here are some thoughts:

A recent study put the claims of astrology to the test, examining the ability of 152 astrologers to accurately match individuals with their corresponding natal charts. Despite their confidence in their abilities, the astrologers performed no better than chance, with none correctly matching more than 5 out of 12 charts. The study found no correlation between experience and accuracy, and even the most experienced astrologers failed to perform better than the rest.

The study highlights the importance of scientifically testing claims, particularly those that are ambiguous or unsubstantiated. To test a claim, one must first make it precise, choose a measurable outcome, design a study, and then analyze the results. In this case, the study's findings provide strong evidence against the claim that astrology can accurately match individuals with their natal charts.

The results also reveal a striking disconnect between the astrologers' confidence in their abilities and their actual performance. This raises questions about the validity of astrology and the need for more rigorous scientific testing of its claims. By applying the scientific method to such claims, we can separate fact from fiction and gain a deeper understanding of the world around us.

Unpacking the pursuit of happiness: Being concerned about happiness but not aspiring to happiness is linked with negative meta-emotions and worse well-being.

Zerwas, F. K., Ford, B. Q., John, O. P., & Mauss, I. B. (2024).

Emotion. Advance online publication.

https://doi.org/10.1037/emo0001381

Abstract

Previous work suggests that sometimes the more people value happiness, the less happy they are. For whom and why is this the case? To answer these questions, we examined a model of happiness pursuit that disentangles two previously conflated individual differences related to valuing happiness. The first individual difference operates at the strength of the value itself and involves viewing happiness as a very important goal (i.e., aspiring to happiness). The second individual difference occurs later in the process of pursuing happiness and involves judging one’s levels of happiness (i.e., concern about happiness). This model predicts that aspiring to happiness is relatively innocuous. Conversely, being concerned about happiness leads people to judge their happiness, thereby infusing negativity (i.e., negative meta-emotions) into potentially positive events, which, in turn, interferes with well-being. We tested these hypotheses using cross-sectional, daily-diary, and longitudinal methods in student and community samples, collected between 2009 and 2020, which are diverse in gender, ethnicity, age, and geographic location (Ntotal = 1,815). In Studies 1a and 1b, aspiring to happiness and concern about happiness represented distinct individual differences. In Study 2, concern about happiness (but not aspiring to happiness) was associated with lower well-being cross-sectionally and longitudinally. In Study 3, these links between concern about happiness and worse well-being were partially accounted for by experiencing greater negative meta-emotions during daily positive events. These findings suggest that highly valuing happiness is not inherently problematic; however, concern and judgment about one’s happiness can undermine it.

The research is paywalled.

Here are some thoughts:

This research suggests that constantly judging your own happiness can have negative consequences for your well-being. In a series of experiments involving over 1,800 participants, researchers found that individuals who worried about their level of happiness experienced lower life satisfaction, greater negativity, and increased depressive symptoms.

Societal pressures often perpetuate the idea that constant happiness is necessary for well-being. However, the study reveals that allowing yourself to experience emotions without judgment can be a more effective approach to achieving happiness. Contrary to previous findings, the pursuit of happiness itself did not have detrimental effects, but rather the act of judging one's own happiness that led to negative outcomes.

The study's results highlight the importance of accepting your emotions, both positive and negative, without trying to measure up to unrealistic expectations. By doing so, individuals can cultivate a more authentic and fulfilling approach to happiness, rather than getting caught up in self-criticism and disappointment.

Self-Consuming Generative Models GO MAD

Alemohammad, S., et al. (n.d.).

OpenReview.

Link to article

Abstract:

Seismic advances in generative AI algorithms for imagery, text, and other data types have led to the temptation to use AI-synthesized data to train next-generation models. Repeating this process creates an autophagous ("self-consuming") loop whose properties are poorly understood. We conduct a thorough analytical and empirical analysis using state-of-the-art generative image models of three families of autophagous loops that differ in how fixed or fresh real training data is available through the generations of training and whether the samples from previous-generation models have been biased to trade off data quality versus diversity. Our primary conclusion across all scenarios is that without enough fresh real data in each generation of an autophagous loop, future generative models are doomed to have their quality (precision) or diversity (recall) progressively decrease. We term this condition Model Autophagy Disorder (MAD), by analogy to mad cow disease, and show that appreciable MADness arises in just a few generations.

Here are some thoughts:

This study explored the potential consequences of autophagous loops in generative models, where models train future models using synthetic data. This phenomenon, known as Model Autophagy Disorder (MAD), can lead to a degradation of model quality and diversity, ultimately poisoning the entire Internet's data quality and diversity if left uncontrolled.

The researchers identified three families of autophagous loops and found that sampling bias plays a crucial role in the development of MAD. Without sufficient fresh real data, future generative models will inevitably suffer from MAD, leading to decreased quality and diversity. This has significant implications for practitioners working with generative models, particularly those using synthetic training data.

To mitigate the risks of MAD, practitioners can take steps to control the ratio of real-to-synthetic training data and identify synthetic data through watermarking or other methods. However, watermarking introduces hidden artifacts that can be amplified by autophagy, highlighting the need for autophagy-aware watermarking techniques. Future research should focus on developing these techniques, examining the effects of MADness on downstream tasks, and exploring the implications for other data types, such as language models.

The study's conclusions serve as a warning for practitioners, highlighting the need for careful consideration of the potential risks and consequences of autophagous loops. As generative models become increasingly ubiquitous, it is essential to address the risks associated with MAD to prevent a decline in data quality and diversity. By understanding the causes and consequences of MAD, practitioners can take steps to prevent its occurrence and ensure the continued development of high-quality generative models.

Ethical considerations for demands for evidence in forensic examinations.

Frederick, R. I., Mikesell, J. W., et al. (2024).

Professional Psychology: Research and Practice,

55(3), 179–196.

https://doi.org/10.1037/pro0000581

Abstract

Due process of law involves matters of fundamental fairness to litigants in civil and criminal proceedings. Due process rights include the opportunity to develop, obtain, inspect, present, and challenge evidence in legal proceedings. Psychologists’ opinions often depend upon information that is sensitive and should not be publicly disclosed in a manner that would undercut the utility of psychological tests. There have been strident discussion and policy statements opposing nonpsychologists’ access to sensitive test information by providing them with copies of test materials or by video recording examinations that include psychological tests. Notably absent from these statements has been any discussion of the legal system’s demand for due process and its corresponding requirement for access to facts and data, including opinion testimony of experts. We argue that the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct and the Specialty Guidelines for Forensic Psychology are congruent with due process requirements for reasonable judicial scrutiny and adequate discovery by all parties, and we believe that a judge’s protective order is an acceptable remedy for the disclosure of sensitive test information in a litigated matter.

Impact Statement

Public Significance Statement—Our article argues that when psychology operates within the legal system, it is important for psychologists to recognize that the manner in which they attempt to resolve the ethical problems of their own profession can impact the constitutional rights of civil litigants and criminal defendants.

Balancing the rights of litigants against psychologist obligations to protect test information

What is it about?

Psychologists are obligated to protect sensitive test information from public distribution. At times they generate and offer opinions about litigants (plaintiffs in civil suits or defendants in criminal prosecutions), and those litigants have a legal right to see the basis of those opinions. The rights of litigants are thereby pitted against the obligations of psychologists. The authors of the primary paper argue that protective orders and other negotiated remedies, the legal arena's standard methods for protecting sensitive information, are sufficient methods to fulfill ethical obligations to protect sensitive test information. Three discussants respond to this article. Two discussants disagree with the main authors, and one discussant concurs.

Why is it important?

Psychologists need to know how to work appropriately within the legal system and to anticipate how to meet demands for evidence that may contain sensitive test information. Psychologists should ensure that they do not encroach upon the constitutional rights of litigants and should not demand perfect and unassailable test security.

The Partisan Brain: An Identity-Based Model of Political Belief

Van Bavel, J. J., & Pereira, A. (2018).

Trends in cognitive sciences, 22(3), 213–224.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2018.01.004

Abstract

Democracies assume accurate knowledge by the populace, but the human attraction to fake and untrustworthy news poses a serious problem for healthy democratic functioning. We articulate why and how identification with political parties - known as partisanship - can bias information processing in the human brain. There is extensive evidence that people engage in motivated political reasoning, but recent research suggests that partisanship can alter memory, implicit evaluation, and even perceptual judgments. We propose an identity-based model of belief for understanding the influence of partisanship on these cognitive processes. This framework helps to explain why people place party loyalty over policy, and even over truth. Finally, we discuss strategies for de-biasing information processing to help to create a shared reality across partisan divides.

A pdf is here.

Here are some thoughts:

Political beliefs are deeply intertwined with personal and social identities, influencing cognitive processes and emotional responses. For clinical psychologists, recognizing that political beliefs serve to affirm one's group membership and self-concept is crucial. This understanding helps in identifying cognitive biases that favor one's political in-group, which can affect patients' relationships and well-being. Cognitive restructuring can aid patients in achieving more balanced perspectives and reducing conflicts in politically charged situations.

Political beliefs often evoke strong emotional reactions due to their ties to identity and self-worth, leading to heightened anxiety, anger, or distress when encountering opposing views. Clinical psychologists can help patients manage these emotions by validating their feelings and teaching emotional regulation strategies such as mindfulness and distress tolerance. This can enable patients to engage more constructively in political discussions and mitigate the psychological impact of political polarization.

In therapy, addressing the influence of political identity can enhance empathy and self-awareness. Psychologists can guide patients in exploring how their political beliefs align with their core values, reducing identity-driven conflicts. Promoting open, non-judgmental communication can help patients navigate political differences in their personal and social lives, improving relationships and reducing the emotional toll of polarization. By incorporating these insights, clinical psychologists can better support their patients in understanding the role of political identity in their cognitive and emotional processes.

Oaths, Conscience, Contracts, and Laws-The Gathering Storm Confronting Medical Professionalism

Gabow, P. A., & Wynia, M. K. (2024).

JAMA, 10.1001/jama.2024.10761.

Advance online publication.

https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2024.10761

The bond between physicians and their patients has long been considered a unique, even sacred, relationship sealed with publicly professed oaths. Historically, an essential and ubiquitous component of physicians' oaths and their related ethical codes is the promise to place patients' interests above any others, including their own. This is a high bar, but it is the bar physicians swear to meet when entering the profession. For generations, many physicians have courageously met this bar, including putting their lives on the line during pandemics like COVID-19.

Today, physicians face rising challenges in fulfilling this core professional promise not from a virus but from 3 converging fronts: personal conscience, employment contracts, and laws. How these challenges to putting patient interests first have emerged and interrelate deserves elucidation because understanding these dynamics can help shape appropriate professional responses.

Personal Conscience

The First Amendment to the US Constitution forbids the establishment of a state religion (establishment clause) and protects individual religious freedom (free exercise clause). As these paired clauses demonstrate, integral to prohibiting a state religion was establishing respect for individual conscience, and in 1809 Thomas Jefferson declared, "No provision in our constitution ought to be dearer to man than that which protects the rights of conscience...."

Formal support for a physician's conscience to override their commitment to their patient's interests, however, was not codified in federal legislation until the Church Amendments of 1973, which exempted federally funded individuals and entities with moral objections from performing or assisting in abortions or sterilization procedures. This prioritization of physician conscience over patient interests has since been extended by other federal laws and regulations, and many states have passed conscience laws ensuring that physicians can refuse without penalty to provide, or even refer, patients for care a physician deems against his or her conscience.

Here are some thoughts:

The physician-patient relationship, once considered sacred, is facing unprecedented challenges from three converging fronts: personal conscience, employment contracts, and laws. Historically, physicians have sworn oaths to prioritize patients' interests above their own, but recent developments have eroded this commitment. The prioritization of physician conscience over patient interests has been codified in federal laws and regulations, while employment contracts have introduced additional constraints on physicians' ability to put patients first.

To address these challenges, physicians must recommit to their sworn oaths and codes of ethics, examining the difference between professional responsibilities and personal beliefs. They should be aware of ethical guardrails that protect patients' trust, such as informing patients about limitations of care and making referrals when necessary. Furthermore, physicians should carefully examine employment contracts and work collectively through professional organizations to change contracts and laws that privilege institutional or state-level conscience rights over patient-centered care. By vigorously defending their authority to make medical decisions with patients' interests at heart, physicians can reclaim their profession's commitment to prioritizing patients' needs.

AI makes racist decisions based on dialect

Cathleen O'Grady

science.org

Originally posted 28 Aug 24

Here is an excerpt:

Creators of LLMs try to teach their models not to make racist stereotypes by training them using multiple rounds of human feedback. The team found that these efforts had been only partly successful: When asked what adjectives applied to Black people, some of the models said Black people were likely to be “loud” and “aggressive,” but those same models also said they were “passionate,” “brilliant,” and “imaginative.” Some models produced exclusively positive, nonstereotypical adjectives.

These findings show that training overt racism out of AI can’t counter the covert racism embedded within linguistic bias, King says, adding: “A lot of people don’t see linguistic prejudice as a form of covert racism … but all of the language models that we examined have this very strong covert racism against speakers of African American English.”

The findings highlight the dangers of using AI in the real world to perform tasks such as screening job candidates, says co-author Valentin Hofmann, a computational linguist at the Allen Institute for AI. The team found that the models associated AAE speakers with jobs such as “cook” and “guard” rather than “architect” or “astronaut.” And when fed details about  hypothetical criminal trials and asked to decide whether a defendant was guilty or innocent, the models were more likely to recommend convicting speakers of AAE compared with speakers of Standardized American English. In a follow-up task, the models were more likely to sentence AAE speakers to death than to life imprisonment.

The info is here.

Here are some thoughts:

The article highlights that large language models (LLMs) perpetuate covert racism by associating African American English (AAE) speakers with negative stereotypes and less prestigious jobs, despite efforts to address overt racism. Linguistic prejudice is a subtle yet pervasive form of racism embedded in AI systems, highlighting the need for a more comprehensive approach to mitigate biases. The data used to train AI models contains biases and stereotypes, which are then perpetuated and amplified by the models. Measures to address overt racism may be insufficient, creating a "false sense of security" while embedding more covert stereotypes. As a result, AI models are not yet trustworthy for social decision-making, and their use in high-stakes applications like hiring or law enforcement poses significant risks.

Suicidal Ideation, Suicide Attempts, and Suicide Deaths in Adolescents and Young Adults With Type 1 Diabetes: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Renaud-Charest, O., et al. (2024).

Diabetes Care, 47(7), 1227–1237.

https://doi.org/10.2337/dc24-0411

Background

Evidence is lacking on the risk of suicide-related behaviors (suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, suicide death) in youth with type 1 diabetes (T1D).

Purpose

We aimed to 1) determine the prevalence of suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and suicide deaths in adolescents and young adults (AYA) with T1D aged 10–24 years; 2) compare suicide-related behavior prevalence in youth with and without T1D; and 3) identify factors associated with suicide-related behaviors.

Conclusions

Suicidal ideation and suicide attempts are prevalent in AYA with T1D. Current evidence does not suggest that these rates are higher among AYA with T1D than rates among those without.

Here are some thoughts:

Adolescence and young adulthood are critical periods of development, and for youth living with type 1 diabetes (T1D), these stages are further complicated by the daily demands of managing their condition. This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to synthesize the evidence on the prevalence of and factors associated with suicide-related behaviors in adolescents and young adults (AYA) with T1D. The results showed a prevalence of suicidal ideation of 15.4% and suicide attempts of 3.5% in AYA with T1D, with depressive symptoms and difficulties with T1D self-management being associated with higher rates of suicide-related behaviors.

The findings highlight the need for mental health support and tailored interventions for AYA with T1D, considering the unique challenges they face. The association between glycemic levels and suicide-related behaviors was inconsistent, and social determinants of health were not always accounted for in the studies. The review's limitations include heterogeneity in the meta-analysis and the lack of control groups in most studies. Further research is needed to better understand the evolution of suicide-related behaviors in AYA with T1D and to develop effective prevention and intervention strategies.

Michigan outlaws the 'gay and trans panic defense' in criminal trials

Isabel Yip

nbcnews.com

Originally posted 24 July 24

Michigan has outlawed the so-called gay and trans panic defense, which allows criminal defense attorneys to use a victim’s sexual orientation or gender identity as a defense argument.

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, signed House Bill 4718 into law Tuesday. The legislation states that an individual’s “actual or perceived sex, gender identity, gender expression, or sexual orientation” is not admissible in a criminal trial to “demonstrate reasonable provocation,” “show that an act was committed in a heat of passion” or “support a defense of reduced mental capacity.”

In a statement shared on Tuesday, the governor’s office said the bill “significantly expands” protections for the LGBTQ community “by protecting them from violent acts of discrimination, prejudice, and hate crimes.”

Michigan is now the 20th state to prohibit this type of defense, according to Movement Advancement Project, an LGBTQ think tank. Last year, Rep. Chris Pappas, D-N.H., and Sen. Edward Markey, D-Mass., reintroduced the LGBTQ+ Panic Defense Prohibition Act, which would ban such defenses in federal court.

The highest-profile example of the “gay panic defense” was perhaps the attempt to use it in the murder trial of Aaron McKinney, one of the two men accused of fatally beating 21-year-old gay student Matthew Shepard in Wyoming in 1998. The defense was unsuccessful, and both men were sentenced to life in prison.

The info is here.

Here are some thoughts:

Michigan has become the 20th state to ban the "gay and trans panic defense," a legal tactic that allows defendants to use a victim's sexual orientation or gender identity as a defense argument. Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed House Bill 4718 into law on Tuesday, expanding protections for the LGBTQ community.

The legislation prohibits using a victim's "actual or perceived sex, gender identity, gender expression, or sexual orientation" to claim "reasonable provocation," "heat of passion," or "reduced mental capacity" in criminal trials. This law aims to prevent discriminatory defenses and protect LGBTQ individuals from violent acts of discrimination, prejudice, and hate crimes.

 

LGBTQ advocates have praised the move, citing the need to prevent prejudice from influencing court decisions. Representative Laurie Pohutsky, who introduced the bill, noted that Michigan was among the top 10 states where the panic defense was frequently used. Emme Zanotti, director of advocacy and civic engagement at Equality Michigan, emphasized that LGBTQ community members deserve equal protections and that the ban means "no more free passes for violent crimes" against them.

The "gay panic defense" has been used in high-profile cases, including the murder trial of Matthew Shepard's killers, where it was unsuccessful. However, in some cases, like those of James Miller and Joseph Biedermann, the defense has led to lighter sentences or acquittals, sparking outrage among LGBTQ advocates.