Heat. Eye movements. Telling lies.

23 degrees on the temperature display on the billboard down at the roundabout at 9.15 this morning. The weather witch at the bread shop informed us all that it was set to be hotter than yesterday. And yesterday it showed 28 degrees at 9.00 last night when we went to the Midcentury Cafe for a shandy and the use of their wifi. Because it was Saturday, the charming young lady who runs the place had an event going on. She often does this on a Saturday evening. Last night's was a session of hypnosis. Having been told long ago that I am susceptible to hypnosis (that may be why I can talk myself into feeling well and cheerful - the power of suggestion - it's a theory) we opted to sit outside. The wifi works just as well and it was not yet dark enough for the coloured lights at the base of the roundabout fountains to have been switched on. All good, apart from the fact that you don't get the excellent music that she plays inside. Mind you, with a hypnotist on the go, the probably wasn't music inside either. 

Back to today, one of the other customers at the bread shop groaned at the suggestion that it could be hotter than yesterday. Not everyone is happy to be roasted! I went down for a swim late morning before it got absolutely too hot to be out in and before lots of small boys were leaping in and out of the pool. It has to be said, a pool is an excellent thing to have when the weather is hot. Indoors, the air outside being hotter than in, we have battened down the hatches and turned the fan on. The silver foil panels are back on the bedroom windows, keeping them cool in the hope of a good night's sleep. 

In the meantime, I have been reading some stuff about eye movements. In the film Blade Runner they had a machine that measured eye movements to test whether someone was a true human or a "replicant", one of the genetically engineered clones specially "bred" to work in certain conditions and with special skills. Some had escaped and, thinking themselves human, were trying to evade re-capture and elimination. Now new research has been going on about how much of our thinking is revealed by eye movements and size of pupil and so on. Science fiction coming true! 

Here's an excerpt from something I read: "The ubiquity of eye-tracking apps for smartphones and other hand-held devices raises the possibility of altering people’s decision-making process remotely. “If you’re shopping online, they might bias your decision by offering free shipping at the moment you shift your gaze to a particular product.”" 

So, not only will ads pop up telling you that you might be interested in a product similar to one you just bought, nor links to articles on themes related to one you just read. Not only will you just have to fear your finger hovering too long over a particular point on your touch-screen device. Oh, no, now, if you are foolish enough to have added an eye-tracking app, you will only have to look at a certain point to trigger an ad. And of course, new devices will almost certainly come with the eye-tracking app whether you want it or not. 

And here's another stick to beat us women with. A survey, funded by an insurance company, has found that we lie more than men. If it's any consolation, an overwhelming majority of lies were told in order to make someone feel better, to avoid trouble, or to make life simpler (and very rarely for false insurance claims). This was true of both men’s and women’s lies, the only clear difference being that women did it more often – some, apparently, up to 30 times a day. So basically we lie because we are nicer. 

The article where I found this information also told me that one of the differences between male and female brains concerns our use of language. It's all to do with left and right hemispheres. Men apparently process language largely on the left side, while women tend to deal with language across the two hemispheres. This may explain why girls generally outperform boys at the level of language development — because they have access to more complex, emotional, intuitive means of processing verbal information. It sounds like sensible use of the equipment if you ask me. The result of this may be that it’s often easier for females not only to read the effects of speech on others, but also to tailor their own speech to bring about the best possible reaction: in other words, to tell people what they want to hear. 

So, we lie to make others feel good. Who knew? I wonder if we can deceive the eye-tracking apps.