1469651106000

gaia

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Urgent Global Action Needed to Stop Extinction of Earth's Last Megafauna

A swift and global conservation response is needed to prevent the world's gorillas, lions, tigers, rhinos, and other iconic terrestrial megafauna from being lost forever, an influential group of international scientists reported today in the journal BioScience.

"7-1.cover" Their analysis, entitled Saving the World's Terrestrial Megafauna, covers the precipitous loss of large mammal populations around the globe, from the poorly known, such as the scimitar-horned oryx, to more familiar species including tigers, lions, gorillas and rhinoceroses, Panthera, one of the organizations associated with the research, said in a news statement.

The report was written by 43 wildlife experts from six continents. [At least 16 of them are scientists who have previously received research grants from the National Geographic Society.]

Business as Usual = Massive Species Extinction

The report included a 13-point declaration calling for acknowledgement that a “business as usual” mentality will result in massive species extinction; while a global commitment to conservation with support for developing nations is a moral obligation.

Declaration to Save the World's Terrestrial Megafauna

We conservation scientists

Acknowledge that most of the terrestrial megafauna species are threatened with extinction and have declining populations. Some megafauna species that are not globally threatened nonetheless face local extinctions or have Critically Endangered subspecies.
Appreciate that “business as usual” will result in the loss of many of the Earth's most iconic species.
Understand that megafauna have ecological roles that directly and indirectly affect ecosystem processes and other species through- out the food web; failure to reverse megafaunal declines will disrupt species interactions, with negative consequences for ecosystem function; biological diversity; and the ecological, economic, and social services that these species provide.
Realize that megafauna are epitomized as a symbol of the wilderness, exemplifying the public's engagement in nature, and that this is a driving force behind efforts to maintain the ecosystem services they can provide.
Recognize the importance of integrating and better aligning human development and biodiversity conservation needs through the engagement and support of local communities in developing countries.
Propose that funding agencies and scientists increase conservation research efforts in developing countries, where most threatened megafauna occur. Specifically, there is a need to increase the amount of research directed at finding solutions for the conservation of megafauna, especially for lesser-known species.
Request the help of individuals, governments, corporations, and nongovernmental organizations to stop practices that are harmful to these species and to actively engage in helping to reverse declines in megafauna.
Strive for increased awareness among the global public of the current megafauna crisis using traditional media as well as social media and other networking approaches.
Seek a new and comprehensive global commitment and framework for conserving megafauna. The international community should take necessary action to prevent mass extinction of the world's megafauna and other species.
Urge the development of new funding mechanisms to transfer the current benefits accrued through the existence values of mega- fauna into tangible payments to support research, conservation actions, and local people who bear the cost of living with wildlife in the places where highly valued megafauna must be preserved.
Advocate for interdisciplinary scientific interchange between nations to improve the social and ecological understanding of the drivers of the decline of megafauna and to increase the capacity for megafauna science and conservation.
Recommend the reintroduction and rehabilitation, following accepted IUCN guidelines, of degraded megafauna populations whenever possible, the ecological and economic importance of which is evidenced by a growing number of success stories, from Yellowstone's wolves (Canis lupus) and the Père David's deer (Elaphurus davidianus) in China to the various megafauna species of Gorongosa National Park in Mozambique.
Affirm an abiding moral obligation to protect the Earth's megafauna.

“The more I look at the trends facing the world's largest terrestrial mammals, the more concerned I am we could lose these animals just as science is discovering how important they are to ecosystems and to the services they provide to people,” said William Ripple, lead author and distinguished professor of ecology in the College of Forestry at Oregon State University. “It's time to really think about conserving them because declines in their numbers and habitats are happening quickly.”

“To underline how serious this is, the rapid loss of biodiversity and megafauna in particular is an issue that is right up there with, and perhaps even more pressing than, climate change,” said senior co-author and Panthera Lion Program Policy Initiative Coordinator Dr. Peter Lindsey.

“Human communities stand to lose key elements of their natural heritage if these large wildlife species are allowed to go extinct,” Lindsey continued. “The disappearance of such species could also significantly undermine the future potential for communities to benefit from eco-tourism operations. Urgent measures are needed to address poaching, and to allow for the co-existence of people and wildlife if megafauna is to persist in the long term.”

Action Needed on Two Fronts

The scientists call for action on two fronts, Panthera explained: conservation interventions expanded to scales that address animals' extensive habitat needs, and policy shifts and increased financial commitment to alter the ways in which people interact with wildlife.

“Among the most serious threats to endangered animals are the expansion of livestock and agricultural developments, illegal hunting, deforestation and human population growth. Large wildlife species are extremely vulnerable to these threats because of their need for extensive spaces to live and low population densities, particularly for carnivores.”

Panthera President and Chief Conservation Officer and co-author Dr. Luke Hunter, said: “Among the world's largest animals, apex predators like the tiger, lion and leopard are increasingly under assault. The protection of these big cats the great white sharks of our terrestrial Earth and other large mammals is paramount to the health and survival of thousands of animals and their ecosystems.

“Today, 59 percent of the world's largest carnivores and 60 percent of the world's largest herbivores are categorized as threatened with extinction on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List. This situation is particularly dire in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia, home to the greatest diversity of remaining large mammals.

“Yet the resources for effective implementation of conservation strategies are seldom available in regions with the greatest needs. The onus is on developed countries, which have long ago lost most of their large animals, to support conservation initiatives where the world's most celebrated wildlife still remain.”

"Graphic — Graphic courtesy of BioScience

Saving the World's Terrestrial Megafauna Authors

WILLIAM J. RIPPLE, GUILLAUME CHAPRON, JOSÉ VICENTE LÓPEZ-BAO, SARAH M. DURANT, DAVID W. MACDONALD, PETER A. LINDSEY, ELIZABETH L. BENNETT, ROBERT L. BESCHTA, JEREMY T. BRUSKOTTER, AHIMSA CAMPOS-ARCEIZ, RICHARD T. CORLETT, CHRIS T. DARIMONT, AMY J. DICKMAN, RODOLFO DIRZO, HOLLY T. DUBLIN, JAMES A. ESTES, KRISTOFFER T. EVERATT, MAURO GALETTI, VARUN R. GOSWAMI, MATT W. HAYWARD, SIMON HEDGES, MICHAEL HOFFMANN, LUKE T. B. HUNTER, GRAHAM I. H. KERLEY, MIKE LETNIC, TAAL LEVI, FIONA MAISELS, JOHN C. MORRISON, MICHAEL PAUL NELSON, THOMAS M. NEWSOME, LUKE PAINTER, ROBERT M. PRINGLE, CHRISTOPHER J. SANDOM, JOHN TERBORGH, ADRIAN TREVES, BLAIRE VAN VALKENBURGH, JOHN A. VUCETICH, AARON J. WIRSING, ARIAN D. WALLACH, CHRISTOPHER WOLF, ROSIE WOODROFFE, HILLARY YOUNG, AND LI ZHANG

This post was compiled from materials sent by Panthera and published in BioScience

gaia

1469645853000

robots

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r0B0t: Dyson's First Robovac Sucks Up All Your Dirt and Cash

"Dysons — All images: Andrew Liszewski/Gizmodo

You'd think that the first robot vacuum from a company like Dyson, who reinvented the vacuum, fan, and hair dryer, would rival R2-D2 when it came to functionality. But with the 360 Eye, Dyson instead focused on creating a robovac that did one thing very well: cleaning. It delivers as promised, but is that worth $1,000?

The no-frills approach to its robot vacuum is surprising when you consider that Dyson has actually been developing its robovac for close to 18 years now. Before the Eye 360, Dyson created the DC06 which, until recently, has only existed in a handful of leaked photos outside the company.

It cleaned well, but the DC06's size, weight, less-than-amazing battery life, and price tag didn't quite meet the company's expectations. As a result, the DC06 was scrapped, the five working models the company created went into exile, and Dyson's robotics division then spent the next 12 years developing the 360 Eye instead.

As far as form factor goes, small and tall is the best way to describe the 360 Eye. Compared to the Samsung POWERbot VR9000, which could easily play a droid in Star Wars, the 360 Eye looks like a tiny can of cookies. Of all the consumer-level robot vacuums currently on the market, the 360Eye has the smallest footprint, by a longshot, but it also comes at the cost of it being a little on the tall side.

Life is all about trade-offs, and Dyson's engineers decided that being able to squeeze into the small gaps in-between your furniture was more important than being able to squeeze under your couch. As a result, the 360 Eye didn't even come close to fitting under my Ikea couch, but neither could Samsung's POWERbot VR9000, nor a Roomba. I even have trouble squeezing a mop under there, so I feel Dyson's engineers made the right decision by focusing on keeping the 360 Eye's footprint as small as possible.

Instead it allowed the robovac to squeeze into tight areas that I assumed would always have to be cleaned by hand. Will the 360 Eye be able to clean every hard to reach area in your home? No. You'll still need to have a manual vacuum on hand to ensure every last inch of your floors get cleaned. But it should at least be able to autonomously clean the most visible areas, so your friends don't think you're a complete slob.

The 360 Eye's design continues Dyson's unintentional approach of creating appliances that look like science fiction props, with its silvery faux-metal plastic housing and bulging 0.33-liter dust bin on the front. But other than a large button on top that lights up with various patterns to signal what the 360 Eye is currently doing or what it needs (charging, connecting to your Wi-fi network, cleaning, etc.), the only real distinguishing feature atop the robovac is an ominous-looking dome that gives the bot its name.

That dome is a 360-degree camera (looking eerily like HAL 9000's unblinking eye) that feeds a wraparound image of a room to the 360 Eye's processor. You might assume the panoramic camera on top photographs a room's ceiling so the robot can plot its course. But that's not how it works.

The 360 Eye takes a simpler approach to cleaning. Once the robot starts vacuuming it sticks to a five-meter square section of a room that it cleans by spiraling out from the center. Then it moves onto a neighboring square, and so forth, until a room is clean. This makes for more efficient use of its 45-minute run-time.

The 360 Eye's camera can really only see as high as a room's walls, which it photographs up to 30 times per second. Those images are processed by a special algorithm to detect and track distinct corners, like you'd find on tables, windows, or even paintings on a wall, which the robot uses to keep tabs on where it is, where it's been, and what's left to clean.

A simple map of a room is built up as the robovac navigates a space, but is wiped from the bot's memory after a cleaning cycle is complete. This makes it better suited for a home where things are constantly getting moved, creating new obstacles for the robovac to navigate every time it starts cleaning.

The 360 Eye adds extra collision security in the form of infra-red sensors. For the most part, the combination of these two technologies worked seamlessly, and on many occasions I was surprised at how deftly the tiny robovac was able to tightly navigate around table legs and other hard-to-spot obstacles. Collisions did occur from time to time, but thanks to the bot's small form factor, there was barely an impact.

The 360 Eye met its match when cleaning underneath an Ikea chair. It ended up beaching itself on a wooden crossbeam that it didn't see coming. Before I got up to rescue it, the robot just sat there, happily sucking away without moving for about five minutes.

It also had hang ups in dark spaces. On several occasions, while cleaning underneath a piece of furniture it was barely able to squeeze under, the Dyson 360 Eye needed rescuing. Presumably because its 360-degree camera was essentially blinded. The camera is a key part of its ability to navigate a room, and as a result, the robovac won't even turn on if there's not enough light for its camera to work. If you want to schedule it to clean the living room at three in the morning while you're asleep, you'll need to leave some lights on.

Yet these problems could potentially be resolved in future software updates, which the Dyson 360 Eye receives via Wi-Fi. The inclusion of Wi-Fi also allows the 360 Eye to be activated, monitored, and scheduled from the Dyson Link app on iOS or Android devices.

Pairing the app to the 360 Eye was a little tricky, but only because the app looked like it had failed when in reality it had successfully connected to the robovac, and functionality is limited. The most complex thing you can do through the app is schedule the robot to clean throughout the week. It does show you the map of a room it created after a cleaning is complete, so you can see what areas it might have missed. But it feels like a half-feature because you can't then click on the map and direct the robot back to a certain area.

On the underside of the 360 Eye you'll find a pair of metal contacts the robot vacuum uses for charging, its spinning brush bar, and a pair of bright blue rubber tank treads.

They might be more complicated than a simple pair of wheels (more parts means more parts that can break), but the treads also provide better grip since there's more surface area making contact with your floors, and the large teeth improve the 360 Eye's ability to clamber over obstacles, and transition from hard floors to carpeting. They also help the robovac maintain a straighter course—taking the tiny bot smoothly to its tiny charging base, which easily unfolds and sidles up against a wall.

Because it's first and foremost a Dyson vacuum, running off the company's tiny but mighty V2 digital motor, the 360 Eye sucks up dirt and debris as efficiently as any of the company's manual vacuums.

The spinning disks of whiskers used by robots like the Roomba to sweep debris from the edges of the bot inwards don't exist on the 360 Eye. Instead it features the same edge-to-edge brushbar that the company's manual vacs use so that it cleans as close to the edge of a wall as possible. It still leaves about a half-inch gap, but its ability to suck in dirt and debris along walls easily outperformed other robovacs I've tested.

After using the Dyson 360 Eye for some time, I can understand why the company decided to focus on its ability to clean. That's where its competitors have made compromises, which makes no sense for a product that's supposed to save you work and make your life easier. But there are a few features I would like to see added to help justify the 360 Eye's $1,000 price tag.

The ability to manually steer the robot from the app to hit missed spots, or move it to another room, would be helpful. For comparison, Samsung's $1000 PowerBOT VR9000 can follow a red crosshair projected on floors to help it navigate to a specific area. That's a genuinely useful feature—not a gimmick. There's also no way to limit where the Eye 360 is cleaning except for setting up physical obstacles in doorways to keep it contained, and notifications, or an alarm, for when the robot got stuck, would be useful too.

Of all the robot vacuums I've tested, Dyson's 360 Eye is the first that will genuinely clean your floors as well as a manual vacuum cleaner can. That being said, it won't completely eliminate vacuuming from your weekly chore list. It will save you a lot of time, though, which is what Dyson is really selling here for $1,000. The company's first robot vacuum feels a little light on features given the steep price tag, but through software updates and improvements to its app, eventually you could, one day, never need to touch a vacuum ever again.

README

The first robot vacuum that's a vacuum first. Does a very good job at cleaning your floors thanks to solid battery life and a full-width brushbar.
The 360 Eye is a little on the tall side, but it also means it has a small footprint for squeezing into hard to clean areas.
The use of treads instead of wheels lets the 360 Eye easily climb over obstacles or transition between floor surfaces.
Automatic software updates over Wi-fi add functionality and improve performance so you don't have to reach for a USB cable.
At $1,000 you'll have to really hate pushing a vacuum around to buy one.
If you want to schedule a cleaning in the middle of the night, you'll need to leave some lights on.
Lacking a few useful features like the ability to remotely steer it from the app, or set up cleaning zones.

robots

1469635459000

culture

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The Danger of Making a Backup Plan

Whatever your creative ambition is, you know it could fail. Tough, but true. Your book proposal might get rejected, your start-up might tank. Your client pitch might fall flat. That's an uncomfortable prospect for anyone, and a sensible antidote is often to make a backup plan. You tell yourself that if the book proposal flops, then you'll start applying for staff writer positions. Or if your start-up fails, then you'll take that job at your friend's company.

A backup plan is like an emotional safety net it's comforting and helps combat the fear of failure. And yet, ironically, the very act of devising this secondary plan could make it more likely that your primary goal will fail.

The very act of devising this secondary plan could make it more likely that your primary goal will fail.

Business scholars at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Pennsylvania advised recently that this adverse effect is most likely if your primary goal takes effort (which of course is true of most creative ambitions). The reason, as shown in their new paper in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, is that backup plans can sap our motivation. Fear of failure is actually a powerful driver toward success, and by ameliorating that anxiety, a backup plan makes it more likely you'll enter cruise mode, rather than forge ahead with single-minded ambition.

To test their theory that backup plans sap motivation, the researchers conducted four experiments involving hundreds of people who were asked to decipher scrambled sentences in a given timeframe. The rewards for success varied across the experiments and included a free snack or extra payment.

In each case, some of the participants were asked to devise a backup plan. For example, if the reward for success at the task was a free snack, the participants in the backup condition were asked to think about other ways they could obtain free food on campus.

The consistent finding was that participants who devised backup plans unscrambled fewer sentences. The purely mental act of coming up with other ways of obtaining the task reward meant that their performance suffered. Questionnaires administered to participants afterwards showed this wasn't because participants with a backup plan had been distracted, but because they felt less motivated.

One clarification this new research is about backup plans that involve identifying a new goal if your primary goal fails (like applying for a staff position if your book proposal gets rejected). It isn't about identifying multiple means to achieve the same primary goal for example, doing research to find as many agents as possible to whom to submit your proposal. Lots of research suggests that finding multiple strategies towards the same goal increases commitment and motivation.

Based on their findings, the researchers Jihae Shin and Katherine Milkman advised that “although making a backup plan has well-known benefits [such as reducing anxiety about the future…], it also has costs that should be weighed carefully”.

These new results lack a certain amount of realism performance on an online word game is not equivalent to launching a new company or penning a novel. Nonetheless, the experiments support a compelling intuition that by dousing your fear, a backup plan can also extinguish your burning passion. Logic suggests this is most likely to be a problem when your goal depends on dogged determination, much less so for “punts” the success of which depends much more on luck in this latter case, backup plans are a shrewd idea with no apparent downside.

To make a plan B, or not to make a plan B?

The findings suggest that one way to decide is to weigh up whether your bigger concern for a particular goal is excessive anxiety or flagging motivation. Say you're terrified that your client pitch is going to bomb and the reason is not through lack of preparation then it makes sense to have a backup plan in place (for example, you could make parallel plans to approach different clients). On the other hand, if your problem is one of motivation you're struggling to switch off the football game and getting to work on your pitch it might well be better not to give yourself the comfort of a backup plan. In this case, thinking through a backup risks undermining your energy still further, giving you the perfect excuse to keep watching the game.

There is also a third way make a habit of devising backup plans but do so mindful of the potential harm to your drive and focus. If you can offset the motivational drag of the backup plan, then you have the best of both worlds.

culture

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culture

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Martina Flor: An Introvert's Approach to Kicking Ass

When you speak to Martina Flor you'll immediately notice just how aw-shucks friendly she is. She'll never boast about her industry-leading lettering ability and is reluctant to go to into the sort of bold proclamations that “iconoclastic” creative minds tend to spout. But the soft-spoken Argentinian-native is the furthest thing from passive. Call it an introvert's approach to kicking ass.

Her well-established freelance lettering business is thriving and is the result of some super-aggressive career path (and world map) navigation as she bounced from in-house designer to agencies across two continents the same way she bounces around in conversation — quietly but unmistakably confident.

Whether it's going freelance or launching a fun side project, Flor dives in and hopes for the net to appear. And lately, it always does. In an era of over-the-top self-promotion and social media sniping, is there still space for the friendly woman that believes in the altruism of creative education? We spoke with the Berlin-based letterer on how she built an enviable career, one which mixes fun side projects, notable clients like Vanity Fair and HBO, and gaggle of 12,000 devoted students.

It seems like Instagram and Pinterest are just packed with letterers. Are we at peak lettering?

There's definitely a lettering boom and I can imagine why letterers might find it hard. Overall I find this opportunity and possibility of sharing things online amazing. I use these networks all the time in my creative work and they've influenced my work. I'm not against this “oversharing” era as I think it encourages a lot of people who tend to stay behind the scenes.

I don't have a judgement on whether any work should be out there or not, everything has the right to be out there. But we as designers, we need to be aware of why we think work is good or bad. We should know how to choose the right lettering, the ones that are good. That's one of the reasons I talk and lecture. I want to convey tools art directors can use to filter the sea of stuff that's out there.

A project for 11 Freunde, a German soccer magazine for their “Das Spiel meines Lebens” (“The Game of My Life”) issue. Here, a quote from former Manchester United forward Teddy Sheringham. Translated: “It was heaven, it was hell.”

It sounds like you believe it's a meritocracy, that the people with talent will get the work they deserve.

Sort of. There will be an audience that is not educated on design and typography. But there's another layer of a creative community that should be able to tell good from bad. If you know a little bit and you're educated, you can filter.

Have you ever seen work that wasn't up to snuff get a lot of social media attention? How did that affect you and is it discouraging?

I don't look at my competition that much and in those terms. It's not a good mindset to work while constantly thinking of other people stealing your clients. I'm grateful that I keep having work coming in and that I'm too busy on my own stuff. But it's true that this lettering boom has made it a bit over-worn. Again, that's why those of us who do lettering seriously have a responsibility to educate clients and art directors as to what is good lettering and what is not.

How do you judge your success?

It changes all of the time. I have weeks where I feel like nothing is moving, that I should be doing more side projects or a client project I did wasn't successful. I have other times when I leave the office where I think “that's the best thing I've ever done!” At the end of the day, what makes me happy is when I look at my body of work and see that I'm moving forward, when I see things I did in the past and think “I can do that much better.” I also try to revel in the little successes. I can change the curve of an “N” and that will make my day.

“I try to revel in the little successes. I can change the curve of an “N” and that will make my day.”

How did you make the leap to freelance?

It started when I worked for Levi's in Argentina and Uruguay, and I had to learn to speak to different audiences, people that will by the basic line versus the premier line. People who spoke different languages. The communication and strategies are things I apply all the time to my own brand. I was a designer or art director for a long time, and only focused on lettering six years ago. "martina-work-3"

What spurred the final decision?

After Levi's, I went to work for an agency as an art director and, on the side, I was doing illustration work for children's magazines. I was coming home at night and just doing illustrations until midnight, sleeping, and then going to work, every day. I was scared that I wouldn't have any clients if I went freelance. But in retrospect, most people who go freelance make a mistake hesitating. Just leap. After all, what client wants to work with someone at 12 at night as part of some side work? It's a pity I didn't take the chance to go freelance earlier.

Most people who go freelance make a mistake hesitating. Just leap.

How did you get your first clients?

An important part of that was telling the world I was only a lettering artist and only showing work related to that. It really made an impact, people said “Oh she's a letterer? I should only call her when I need lettering.” The message you give to the world comes back to you in terms of clients and work.

How long did it take for your income to reach full-time levels?

Between one and a half to two years. At the same time, I moved to Berlin which is a city where there is a big typographic community here. You live and breathe typography here. I think this community contributed a lot to motivate and inspire my work. I don't know if this would have worked anywhere else.

If you were to make a pie chart of your income what would it look like?

I'd say 80 percent comes from commercial client work and 20 percent from teaching. The side projects don't bring any money, in fact it's the opposite — I invest money in them. But they do contribute to me getting commercial work and they feed my portfolio. A lot of things I create for my side projects, I include in my portfolio and clients respond to that. If you don't feed your portfolio somehow then your clients will come after the old work and you'll start replicating yourself a lot.

The message you give to the world comes back to you in terms of clients and work. I told the world I was a lettering artist and I only show work related to that.

There's a lot of people that love to debate whether it's okay to work for free, but it looks like you advocate doing that as long as it's for yourself.

I don't have this “never work for free” attitude. Sometimes I do commissions that don't pay well, but if you're interested in the job you can always find a way to make it a win-win for both sides. Maybe it's licensing or promotion. Money isn't the only way you can be paid. I don't like the mindset where people think “I will only take a job if I'm paid very well.” That puts you in the position to only get a certain type of job and you'll miss a lot of potential good pieces you could do. "martina-work-4"

I read you work 9 to 6 in the studio? Is that still true?

I always say I'm a freelancer that has a fixed full-time job in a studio. I like to have that space where I know that I can get certain things done. Though, I don't have such a clear line between my personal and work life. Sometimes I'm playing with my son and I think of a commission, or sometimes I am working and think of my son and go see him. I have a schedule, but I don't leave my studio and just forget about work. I live with what I do and it doesn't stress me.

How has becoming a parent in the past few months affected the way you approach your freelance routine? If at all?

With parenting or with career there's a lot of insecurities that come together. I enjoy being a parent, but I am sometimes afraid of what I'm missing for my job. I had to admit at times I was a little insecure and wondered if I could enjoy my work as I did before now that I had this wonderful child in my life. But things are starting to organize now, I think a lot of that had to do with my mindset. I really wanted to keep my career going. From my colleagues I got these questions like “Oh, so you're stopping your work for a while, right?” Which is not a question it's more of a “You know you should stop for a while, right?” I didn't feel like I should do that. Although I enjoy my baby so much, I had to struggle a bit to do it my way instead of following what I “should have” done. I have to say that ten months in, there's a structure I had before that has changed into one where I can parent and continue my career. But I had months when I thought, “How am I going to do this?”

Sounds like you love to jump into tough choices.

In my workshops there is often someone who comes with a bunch of plans before tackling something. “Oh I'm going to move this ‘A' to the right. Or this swish on the ‘S'” And I always just look at them and say “Just draw it!” I think this parallels my life: Draw it first and then see if it works.

culture

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science

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The Science Behind Hillary Clinton's Problems With Trust
By Jillian Jordan, Yale University and David Rand, Yale University

Large swaths of the American public want Donald J. Trump to be their president - maybe even a majority, according to an analysis from Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight in late July.

Many people - Democrats and Republicans alike - find this shocking.

Trump made his name as the "You're fired" guy. He has never held political office, has arguably failed to generate concrete or realistic policy proposals, regularly changes his positions on issues and consistently gets the facts wrong.

This stands in sharp contrast to Hillary Clinton, who has served as secretary of state, senator from New York and first lady of the United States. In his endorsement of her, Barack Obama described Clinton as the most qualified presidential nominee in U.S. history. Presumably experience with, and knowledge of, the system and issues are qualities that make for a good president - so why is this race even close?

How to build trust

Research, including new work from our Human Cooperation Laboratory at Yale, suggests Trump may be successful precisely because of his hotheadedness and lack of carefully thought-out proposals. Being seen as uncalculating can make people trust you.

Hillary Clinton is the opposite of hotheaded. She is careful and calculating - which, despite being a strong asset in actually carrying out the duties of public office, has become a liability in her presidential campaign by undermining the public's trust in her.

In a recent paper, we found that if you take an action that people like, you come off as much more trustworthy if you decide to act without doing a careful cost-benefit analysis first: Individuals who calculate seem liable to sell out when the price is right.

What's more, the desire to appear trustworthy motivated participants to act without too much forethought.

Our research didn't focus on perceptions of politicians, but rather looked at behavior in a more abstract context. We conducted a series of experiments involving economic decisions between anonymous strangers on the internet. Our goal was to create a scenario that would capture the classic trade-off between self-interest and helping others. This is something that comes up in a lot in politics, but also in all sorts of social interactions, such as in our relationships with friends, coworkers and lovers.

Our experiments occur in two stages, with participants assigned to specific roles.

In the Helping Game stage, "Helpers" are given some money and have the opportunity to give some of it away to benefit another participant.

The second participant is a total stranger who is assigned to the "Recipient" role, and not given any money.

Helpers know that helping the Recipient out will come at a cost - sacrificing a predetermined, but undisclosed, amount of money.

We then give Helpers a choice. They can decide whether to help the Recipient without "looking" at the cost (i.e., without knowing how much money they'll be giving away). Or, they can choose to find out how much money they'll be giving away and only then decide whether to help.

Next, in the Trust Game stage, Helpers engage in a new interaction with a third participant. This person is called the "Truster." The Truster learns about how the Helper behaved in the first interaction, and then uses it to decide how much the Helper can be trusted.

To measure trust, we give the Truster 30 cents. He then chooses how much to keep and how much to "invest" in the Helper.

Any money he invests gets tripled and given to the Helper. The Helper then chooses how to divide the proceeds of the investment.

Under these rules, investing is productive, because it makes the pot grow larger. But investing pays off for the Truster only if the Helper is trustworthy, and returns enough money to make the Truster a profit.

For example, if the Truster invests all 30 cents, that amount is tripled and the Helper gets 90 cents. If the Helper is trustworthy and returns half, they both end up with 45 cents: more than the Truster started with.

However, the Helper may decide to keep all 90 cents and return nothing. In this case, the Truster ends up with zero and is worse off than when he started.

So the Truster bases his decision of how much to invest in the Helper on how trustworthy he thinks the she will be in the face of a temptation to be selfish - that is, how much he trusts her.

We found that Helpers who agree to help the Recipient without "looking" at the cost are trusted more by Trusters. Moreover, they really are more trustworthy. These "uncalculating Helpers" actually return more money to Trusters in the face of the temptation to keep it all for themselves.

Somebody is watching you

We also found that Helpers are motivated by concerns about their reputation.

For half of participants, there were reputational consequences of calculating: The Truster was told whether the Helper looked at the cost before deciding whether to help - and thus Helpers could lose "trust points" by calculating. For the other half of participants, Trusters found out only whether Helpers helped, but not whether they looked at the cost. Our results showed that Helpers were less likely to look at the cost when they knew it would have reputational consequences.

This result suggests that people do not make uncalculating decisions only because they cannot be bothered to put in the effort to calculate. Whether this strategy is conscious or not, uncalculating decisions can also be a way to signal to others that you can be trusted.

Uncalculating cooperation in daily life

Our studies demonstrate that there are reputation benefits to seeming principled and uncalculating.

This conclusion likely applies broadly to social relationships with friends, colleagues, neighbors and lovers. For example, it may shed light on why a good friend is someone who helps you out, no questions asked - and not someone who carefully tracks favors and remembers exactly how much you owe.

It may also reveal an unexpected reason for the popularity of rigid ethical guidelines in philosophical and religious traditions. Committing to standards like the golden rule can make you more popular.

To trust Trump or Clinton?

Our studies may also help to shed light on Trump's appeal. One of his greatest advantages appears to be the authenticity that he conveys with his emotionally charged behavior.

But it's important to understand uncalculated decisions will benefit your reputation only if the actions you end up taking are perceived positively. In our experiments, Helpers who decided not to help without calculating the costs seemed especially untrustworthy - presumably because they seemed committed to be selfish no matter what. Similarly, Trump's impulsiveness may be a plus for those people who support his values, but a huge turnoff to those who do not.

In contrast, Clinton's persona is often unattractive even to those who support her values - because it suggests that she may not stand by those values when the cost is too high. This may shed light on why she does not inspire more enthusiasm among some liberals, despite her experience and progressive record.

However, there's an important nuance to what it means to be "calculating." One sense of "calculating" is self-interested: Before you agree to adhere to your ethical principles, or to sacrifice for others, you consider the costs and benefits to yourself - and you follow through with doing the "right" thing only if you conclude that it will be best for you.

Another way to be "calculating" is to carefully consider what's right for others. Instead of acting on her gut, a policymaker could conduct a complex analysis to figure out the best way to implement a policy to maximize its benefit to the population.

Our theory and experiments apply only to the first sense of "calculating": They suggest that engaging in self-interested calculations is what undermines trust.

But in what sense is Trump uncalculating - and in what sense is Clinton calculating?

Of course, there's room for debate, but a common argument in support of Clinton is that her calculations reflect her ability to effectively play the game to deliver the most progressive policies possible, given the constraints of our two-party system.

To win, Clinton needs to convince voters that her calculations have their best interests at heart - a major goal of this week's Democratic National Convention.

Jillian Jordan, Ph.D. Candidate in Psychology, Yale University and David Rand, Associate Professor of Psychology, Economics, Cognitive Science and Management, Yale University

"The This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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