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Name and Appearance Connection

46:55 recording · EN · 3 speakers

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Brief overview

Body-language tells reveal what people really think, plus a tour of the world's most extreme records.

  1. Liars look more, not lessCollette says liars overcompensate on gaze and often go still, so the usual averted-eyes and fidgeting cues mislead.
  2. Feet point where attention goesThe Crufts judge's right foot pointed at the poodle he chose; feet pointed at the door signal an intention to escape.
  3. Extremes stretch from Vegas to KrakatoaThe brightest earthly light is a Las Vegas resort beam, while Krakatoa's 1883 explosion reached a reckoned 310 decibels heard 3,000 miles away.
Executive Summary AI
  • Mike Carruthers opens with a study published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finding that children and adults can guess adults' names from photographs better than chance, but cannot do so for children, suggesting people grow into their names.2:04
  • Social psychologist Peter Collette, author of How to Tell What People Are Thinking, argues the two beliefs most people hold about lying are wrong: liars look at you more, not less, because they know the gaze assumption, and many become almost frozen rather than fidgety.9:16
  • Collette says foot direction is highly informative, recalling that he predicted the Crufts best-in-show winner because the judge's right foot pointed at the poodle, and advises that in conversation you should be enclosed within the lines extended from the other person's toes.17:59
  • Science writer David Darling, author of Kaboom! The Science of Extremes, says the brightest light on Earth shoots up from a Las Vegas resort and draws bats and insects from miles around.26:37
  • Darling compares the Cray-1 supercomputer, which sold for around $7-8 million in about 1980, with an iPhone 13 that is 3,000 times faster, has 3,000 times the storage and 750 times the RAM for maybe $1,000.32:41
Key Quote
“In other words, if your name is Susie over time, you start to look like a Susie.”
— Mike Carruthers2:41
Key Quote
“So what they do is they overreact by looking at you more.”
— Peter Collette9:54
Key Quote
“Men think they do, but in this regard, as so many others, they're completely mistaken.”
— Peter Collette13:28