Monthly Archives: June 2010

Is World Cup fever a nationalistic disease?

By Roman Krznaric | Published: 15 June 2010
As football fever envelops the planet, with all eyes turned towards South Africa, I want you to imagine a different World Cup. Each country sends their national team as usual, but then all the players are pooled together and divided into teams based on their astrological star sign. So Virgos play Leos, and Aquarians are pitted against Aries, with each team having players from a mix of countries. Who would win overall? Perhaps the power of Taurus, the bull, would be no match for the sharp sting of Scorpio. We might imagine other World Cups, where teams are based on shoe size – the clodhopping size elevens against the nimble-toed eights – or maybe the favourite colour of each player.
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Monkeys, mirror neurons and the empathic brain

By Roman Krznaric | Published: 1 June 2010
At a recent talk at the Royal Society of the Arts in London, the American economist and social critic Jeremy Rifkin gave a brilliant overview of his new book, The Empathic Civilization. Part of his argument that we should think ourselves as Homo empathicus - empathic by nature – rests on some of the recent research in neuroscience that appears to demonstrate we have empathic brains. But what is the science really telling us?
Posted in nature, public policy, science | 1 Comment