【推荐2】On the eve of this week’s rail strikes, it was reported that the industry bosses are planning to weed out paper train tickets and close almost 1,000 station ticket offices in England. The transport secretary, Grant Shapps, has made no secret of his desire to see costs saved in this way. Some stations sell only a handful of tickets each week and the vast majority of transactions (交易) have moved online.

In the name of cost-cutting, station ticket offices are likely to follow the telephone booth on the corner and become memory. For those who have grown used to the benefits of organizing travel via smart phones, there will be little to feel sorry for. But for people without online access or skills, who tend to be older, poorer, and more fragile, another social barrier will have been built.

From medical appointments to payment apps for parking, more and more key services are now delivered digitally. As this revolution takes place, the interests of a significant minority are being ignored to some extent. In the case of health and social care, for example, it will often be those most in need of assistance who are least able to employ electronic devices.

The debate over ticket offices offers an opportunity to reflect more broadly on the increasing role of technology in our social landscape. The unavoidable trend towards technology is predictable, but its possible consequences need to be managed with more care. With the expanding range and increasing complexity of digital requirements, the aged are gradually withdrawing from increasing social services in their lives. Ros Altmann, the former pensions minister, recently wrote of being contacted by an elderly woman who no longer drives to her local park, because she cannot download the car parking app required.

Much more needs to be invested in helping gain easy online access. Alternative offline options must be maintained for important services. Contactable telephone numbers of relevant staff should always be available. These will cost more. But that is the price of digital transformation.

【推荐1】Rumors (谣言): we've all heard some and we've all spread some. In more traditional times they shook entire families. Today, they travel differently because the way we share information has also changed.

The fact is that rumors have great potential to upset things, whether socially or personally. We don't enjoy being on the receiving end of one, since they usually don't have good intentions. They are somewhat veiled (掩饰的) messages.

Normally rumors are oral messages: word of mouth. The paradox (自相矛盾) is that there is no evidence to support rumors, but the more people share it, the more they see it as true. To finish explaining rumors, we think that they follow certain very clear laws. Secrecy: The source is unknown. There is also a proven phenomenon that human beings usually forget the source of a message before they forget its content. Certainty: We hardly question rumors simply because of the mental effort involved. On the other hand, no one likes to doubt a person who convinces us that the information they spread is true. Change: It acts like a tree. New rumors branch out to fill in the gaps left by the first rumor.

Another property (属性) of rumors is that they tend to become viral. Each receiver is at the same time a potential transmitter (传输者) of the information. The receiver often adds their own opinion. Their manner and tone of transmitting it also changes it.

How can we end rumors? The answer is as simple as it is impossible: preventing people from communicating. A more realistic response is equally difficult, although less than the first one. It is that we should be critical of the information we receive. We should ask ourselves if the source is reliable. Ask (if possible) the person you heard it from whether they also trust the information. We should also think about if the rumor benefits someone, and if that someone started the rumor.

One rumor to be especially cautious of is a rumor about groups relatively unable to defend themselves. That's why we say, "History is always told by the winners." The first payment the defeated must make is to accept the victor's version of the story.

We’ve all been there. You’re around new people and you just want to impress them. It can be easy to pretend you know about movies, politics, or science just to get through an awkward situation. But contrary to what feels most natural, a new series of five studies from Pepperdine University shows that those who can admit when they don’t know something tend to actually have more knowledge. If you want to make those people think you’re smart, maybe the best thing to say is “I don’t know.”

For the study, which was led by Elizabeth Krumrei-Mancuso, the team of researchers had one question: Is there a knowledge benefit to admitting intellectual fallibility? To find out, they ran not one, not two, but five separate experiments. They engaged nearly 1,200 participants in their study, and evaluated them using a number of questionnaires testing their cognitive abilities, measuring their own predictions of their cognitive abilities, and, of course, rating their levels of intellectual humility.

For that last part, they used different methods in different studies to get a more well﹣rounded set of results. One IH survey used eight questions to assess participants on two elements: the “Knowing﹣It﹣All” subscale, which judged their attitudes of intellectual superiority, and the “Intellectual Openness” subscale, which assessed how open they were to learning from others. In other studies, they used the 22-question “Comprehensive Intellectual Humility Scale,” which assesses participants on four elements: independence of intellect and ego, openness to revising one’s viewpoint, respect for others’ viewpoints, and lack of intellectual overconfidence. The five studies were used to examine past learning, thinking styles, traits, and motivations.

What the researchers may agree is that the best thing to remember is that curiosity seems to be a good thing. The world is big, and it’s impossible to know everything. At your next dinner party, ask questions and admit your own cluelessness. It might make you a little less clueless next time.