Tag: science

Science Simplified but Confused?

I talk about science often in these posts (see Science is Our Only Way Forward, Science, Beauty, Evolution, and Progress, Updated: “The Whole: Rethinking the Science of Nutrition”, and many others.) Although I mention it, I need to let you know how I understand science.

Findings from science should be objective, that is they can be replicated by others and they represent reality. While earning my PhD I remember a simple and powerful statement that described the scientific process that helped me and I thought it could help others.

Science DESCRIBEs, so it can PREDICT, which means you can then IMPROVE and then based on what you learn, you can EXPLAIN phenomena. Each level forward builds on the previous.

DESCRIBE: Tell us what happened based on influencing interactions

PREDICT: Be able to say what will happen when variables interact

IMPROVE: After understanding the situation, or being able to describe the phenomena based on related interactions – then it can be predicted what will happen. This knowledge enables the future to be altered or improved. Improvement can happen by manipulating some of the variable interactions described.

EXPLAIN: Knowing what did or did not improve the outcome enables an explanation of our reality. For example, I ate excess calories than I used so I gained weight.

Improvement CONFUSION????

The confusion I see is in the area of improvement. While correcting a problem such as putting out a fire, curing a disease, or even stitching a cut, it is not true improvement because it does not improve beyond our starting point or reference. These actions end a bad with treatment but do not cause a good beyond where we were before. See Resilience is Not Always a Virtue, If that is all it is for…, Best Practices are Contraindicated for Improvement and others.

Kahneman and Tversky explained this by suggesting giving money to poor people was not seen as help, but just a chance to catch up. This then was not improvement but helping level the playing field so improvements could be made.

For instance, my organization is BeWell’r, LLC and our work focuses on helping people(college students right now), organizations and society not just be well, but to be Well’R. This means better than they could have been before. We help people make better choices by efficiently nudging them, via the BeWell’r Web, to use community resources such that they can lead a regenerative lifestyle that helps them become better as they simultaneously also build a stronger, regenerative community, meaning everyone and everything benefits. The BeWell’r Web works like a forest which uses the “Wood-Wide Web” as discovered and explained by Dr. Suzanne Simard. (see Strategic Alliances are Powerful)

Stability then Improvement

As Dr. W. Edwards Deming explained in his quality management seminars. The first goal is to lessen the variance so stable outcomes can be produced. Once a consistent process produces a similar outcome again and again over time, then improvement can be made. If improvement attempts are made prior to stability, it is hard to know if the improvement can last or if it was a real improvement and not just chance. He used simple process behavior charts to document stable processes.

What Does this mean? Scientifically

This means science should first provide a DESCRIPTION of an occurrence or a phenomenon by understanding how it happened. The description should describe the interactions that created that occurrence. Based on that understanding of the situation, a PREDICTION about what will happen can be made. If one does not like the prediction, an IMPROVEMENT can be made by altering some of the interactions described.

As an example my daughter wants to run a marathon. She first had to be able to describe her current state and ability by reviewing the interactions that led to her current reality. Knowing she wants to have more endurance she studied training methods and changed her workouts to hopefully improve her running ability. If she is able to complete a marathon she will be able to explain by saying doing these type of workouts and having good nutrition improved my ability beyond what it was before, even in the best circumstances. In other words, this improvement would be better than she would have been even on her best day – that is true IMPROVEMENT.

I use science to generate comprehensive improvements by discovering and engaging in net-positive, pervasive, reciprocal, selfish, selfless, synergistic interactions so everyone and everything benefits. When I discover these interactions that generate comprehensive improvements such as An All Good Simple Clean Up,A Way to Practice Paneugenesis, and others I share.

Please share how you use science to generate true comprehensive IMPROVEMENTS. I look forward to hearing from you.

BeWellr,

Craig M. Becker, PhD

Be selfish, selfless, & synergistic so everyone and everything benefits!

#SelfishSelflessSynergy

Please share your thoughts and questions below.

Contact me: BeWellr@bewellr

Create All Good – Paneugenesis – in Prisons?

Is it possible to use selfish, selfless, synergy to create all good and generate comprehensive improvements by creating interactions so everyone and everything benefits in prisons? Germany’s new approach to prisons, the same country that created and used concentration camps to break people, now uses a dramatically different approach that may benefit society. The first section of the 60 Minutes video below shows their recent presentation about how they are jailing people in Germany.

This new approach that helps people learn how to be to contributing members of society, rather than punishing them, shows promise. This approach also lines up with Steven Pinker’s findings that suggest society is becoming moral, see this post.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts about this development. Make it a great Holiday!

Be Well’r,
Craig Becker

Be selfish, selfless, & synergistic so everyone and everything benefits!

A Clear Message about Climate Change

Amazingly, it has become necessary to go to “Fake” News to get scientifically valid statements about Climate Change. I encourage you to watch John Oliver, and these post, post, post, post, post post or the many of the other posts this site.

Remember making helpful climate choices helps you and everyone and everything benefit because you generate comprehensive improvements. I look forward to hearing how you make your contribution toward making this a better world for all of us to enjoy.

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Be Well’r,
Craig Becker
Be selfish, selfless, & synergistic so everyone and everything benefits!

“Yes and…” Improvisation Helps Science Innovate

“Yes and…” will be my default response to ideas because this response yields more creative and  innovative results. Uri Alon explains, “Why Truly Innovative Science Demands a Leap into the Unknown” in this TED Presentation by describing how Improv training helps him and his students develop and create innovative scientific progress.

The main message I got from Uri reminded me of a lesson I learned from the wise Izzy Gessell about responding “Yes and…” and the value of improvisation training to life. Using these ideas may help you make better even better. I look forward to hearing about how you have said “yes and…” to existing consequences so you learned to create interactions so everyone and everything benefits.

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Be Well’r,
Craig Becker

I look forward to hearing about how you use selfish, selfless, synergy to Practice Paneugenesis by creating interactions so everyone and everything benefits!

How I formed My Thoughts about Climate Change

Nothing means anything until we decide it does. Climate change is a raging debate. To me it is not a debate and it is from information like what Jim Hansen Presents in this TED talk, Why I had to speak out about climate change – that helped me have my opinion.

He is a former NASA scientist and in February 2012 I believe he gave one of the best presentations about the science behind climate change. I encourage you to watch.

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Be Well’r,

Craig Becker

I look forward to hearing about how you use selfish, selfless, synergy to Practice Paneugenesis by creating interactions so everyone and everything benefits!

Flourish by Seligman

flourish_martin_seligman_visionary_new_understanding_of_happiness_well_being

I just finished reading Seligman’s Flourish. As usual, he provides a great book with helpful information. The book provides well documented information and valuable insight into Positive Psychology. In this book he encourages the move toward well-being which he describes as more than happiness for positive psychology. He provides the PERMA model as his theory of well-being which adds to the happiness theory he provided in Authentic Happiness.

PERMA: P-ositve emotion; E-ngagement; R-positive Relationships; M-eaningful life; A-chievement

The book however left me wanting more. It reminded me of the conversation I had with him at his presentation about a Positive Psychology strategies to treat depression he made at APA conference I attended. In his presentation he reported that using these strategies were more effective and people who received these treatments were less depressed.

My question , how is that positive? Being less depressed is wonderful, of course, however that does not mean they are achieving positive health, it just means they have less negative health. I have adopted his idea of categorizing health on a number scale, that is 0 is neither positive or negative, negative means there problems and positive numbers are better than just not bad or the absence of problems. I refer this to as exceed expectations (see video here) and also can be thought of as Flourishing, Thriving or Excelling.

With this in mind, I believe for us to truly achieve positive health we must start by aiming for an idealized outcome, something that would represent +3 and could not happen as things are now. To achieve true Positive health, we must make it happen. Using the idea of paneugenesis (linked to video) we also must think how our +3 also benefits others because benefitting others benefits us. In other words, to achieve true +3 we must create interactions so everyone and everyTHING benefits.

To me, if we are to Flourish, we must practice paneugenesis which is selfish, selfless, synergy so everything benefits.

Make it a Great Day!

Arabic Version of Salutogenic Wellness Promotion Scale

If you are interested I encourage you to look at the article I did with Dr. Al-Hadid in Jordan about the Arabic version of the Salutogenic Wellness Promotion Scale developed.

Article AJHE-Arabic SWPS

Below is the abstract:

Background

Viewing an individual’s ability to not just maintain but improve good health conditions is a positive perspective of health provided by wellness promotion. Although crucial in today’s understanding of health, no Arabic tools were found to measure this concept.

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to validate and measure the psychometric properties of the Salutogenic Wellness Promotion Scale–Arabic version (SWPS–Arabic), a tool designed to measure positive health.

Methods

A cross-sectional design was used on Jordanian university students. The sample consisted of 640 self-selected students to conduct an exploratory factor analysis with a cutoff value of 0.40. A demographic questionnaire and the 26-item SWPS–Arabic were the measures used to collect the data.

Results

The final 20-item, 4-factor SWPS–Arabic had an overall Cronbach’s alpha of .941; the factors had Cronbach’s alpha ranges of .900 to .734. These factors were labeled as follows: socio-spiritual, physico-vocational, emotional, and intellectual. The first 4 items explained 55% of the total variance.

Discussion

The SWPS–Arabic is reliable and valid, but further psychometric evaluation is needed.

Translation to Health Education Practice

Using this tool assists educators in structuring strategies and plans for wellness promotion.