Sara Wong for NPR
Welcome to Invisibilia Season 4! The NPR program and podcast explores the invisible forces that shape human behavior, and we here at Shots are joining in to probe the science of why we act the way we do. In Episode 4, they’re asking: are we destined to repeat our patterns or do we generally stray in surprising directions? – a question increasingly relevant in an age when algorithms are trying to predict everything about our behavior. Here’s an excerpt from the episode.
On paper, Shon Hopwood’s life doesn’t make a lot of sense, not even to him.
“I don’t have a great excuse as to why I did these things. And everybody always wants that,” he tells me. “It closes the circle for people. But that’s not really how it happened.”
To the naked eye, it looked like Shon Hopwood was born into a really good pattern. He grew up in the neighborly, low-crime community of David City, Neb., to a great Christian family that encouraged self-reliance. “My parents basically opened the door in the morning and would say, ‘See you in a few hours.’ It was a good childhood.”
Listen To This Episode Of Invisibilia
Invisibilia: Do the Patterns in Your Past Predict Your Future?
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