Not that I have dinner parties, but I feel like studying psychology has impaired my ability to have an opinion.

Everyone is interested in psychology. Everyone is a human and/or spends a lot of time around them. We all carry with us our own little theories of what make people tick. Interest in people has survival value. So I would argue, that it's probably the most talked about scientist. Certainly, people gossip far less about particle physics or oceanography.

Sometimes I get carried away. This past year i've quite taken a liking to empiricism. All of this reading about research methodology and the scientific method is sinking in. The science geek in me has awakened. I like to be accurate. But as a student at the bottom of the academic mountain, there's a strong feeling that what I don't know yet stretches out to infinity. And whenever a issue of human behaviour comes up casually in conversation, I feel like I need to call time-out, consult a few journal articles, and then come back in a week with my opinion. "Meet me in the library in an hour, and we'll finish our conversation there".

It's getting kind of ridiculous. And after all, untested personal theories are a natural part of life. It's half the fun. There's always that terrible safe position of "it's a complex interaction of many factors, and depends on the circumstances", but I don't want to say that. So my new weeks resolution, is to adopt random philosophies in all my conversations and see what happens.

Confucius says: "Instead of being concerned that you have no office, be concerned to think how you may fit yourself for office. Instead of being concerned that you are not known, see to the (be?) worthy of being known."