Mental virtue

In the January 17 issue of the New Yorker, David Brooks has a very nicely written summary of work in psychology and social science title "The Social Animal." He uses the device of a composite character named Harold to convey the work and this is somewhat annoy (especially at the beginning and end where there seems to be some kind of light satire that isn't particularly amusing) but it works very nicely in the parts about human spouse-selection.

I have removed the "biography of Harold" aspects from one part of the article I found very insightful.

There is an important distinction between mental strength, which is the processing power of the brain and mental character, which are the cognitive virtues that lead to practical wisdom. The four virtues are:

1. Collect conflicting information before making up your mind.
2. Calibrate your certainty level to the strength of the evidence.
3. Endure long stretches of uncertainty while waiting for an answer to become clear.
4. Correct for your own biases.