Open Facebook and slide the feed is a tic of masochists that we are all too accustomed: in the worst case is a sad reminder of the people who we were, and better still serves to remind us that often we did not make great choices regarding friendships.

Like when I end up on the profile of my former best friend from high school, full of pictures of pugs, post nostalgia of days gone very deep and quotes on life.
"I'm strong because I was weak, I'm on guard because I was betrayed, I laugh because I was sad and I live from day to day because tomorrow is not sure-Anonymous."
Behold, according to a new Canadian study from the University of Waterloo, my ex-best friend and others like her (including me, perhaps) are a bit 'stupid.
In his research, titled "On the reception and detection of pseudo-profound bullshit," the student Gordon Pennycook and his four colleagues explain that there is a correlation between a low level of intelligence and the fact to be impressed by extremely deep quoting apparently .
In their study the researchers have used the site Sebpearce.com, which generates randomiche quotes such as, "Life is made of an oasis ennobling belief in self-awareness," or "Science now tells us that the essence of nature is the direction."
Anything!!!!!
Photo via Flickr / seaternity
"I came across the site and the question arose spontaneously: someone had never dealt with studying the phenomenon?
I wanted to know if people really think that such phrases have some depth, "said Pennycook to VICE.
"I myself often find myself citations [timeline] who maybe are not so embarrassing, but running a lot of motivational phrases ... there is the quote, and in the background a photo of a person who is definitely not one that uttered the phrase.
Of these they see them a lot. "
In the study, the approximately 300 participants are various sentences, including those of the category "bullshit" were subjected, with the request to evaluate the depth on a scale from one to five, from deep to "shit" passing through trivial.
The phrases were built around a table to evoke that feeling that drives a person to share meaningless phrases and without a certain origin.
Each participant was then subject to a test of cognitive abilities and personality.
As shown by this study, people unable to detect bullshit sentences and those who had the tendency to attribute a deep sense of quotes that we had were not even the same with a degree less intelligent, less inclined to reflect and more prone to have paranormal beliefs or related to any conspiracy.
In other words, those people who, as Nietzsche said, are "closed in the glass bell of a reflection of the mind."

From Vice