Feel First, Think Never: Your Emotions Are the Exploit

If it made you panic, rage, or rush… it probably bypassed your cognitive defenses. In the latest issue of Deceptive Minds, I dig into the dark cognitive malware of emotional hijacking: how scammers, manipulators, and even well-meaning voices use fear, urgency, outrage, and hope to short-circuit your critical thinking. Inside: 🧠 Why your emotions beat your rational mind to the punch 📞 How scam messages and panic phishing bypass logic 📣 What viral rage-bait and fear-mongering have in common 🔥 Plus: how a single fire reshaped a nation — and how the “lie that felt true” still outperforms facts today The stronger the feeling, the weaker the scrutiny. Want the print version? It's available on LinkedIn or my website. References: The Great Moon Hoax: https://blogs.loc.gov/folklife/2014/08/the-great-moon-hoax/ Moon Shot: Race, a Hoax, and the Birth of Fake News: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/moon-shot-race-a-hoax-and-the-birth-of-fake-news The True Story of the Reichstag Fire and the Nazi Rise to Power: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/true-story-reichstag-fire-and-nazis-rise-power-180962240/ The Missile Gap: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missile_gap Episode 26 of The FAIK Files: Listen here: https://thecyberwire.com/podcasts/the-faik-files/36/notes Watch here: https://youtu.be/2slM09Czy_s?si=D3ZotFEef3zdGbZA Anthropic's Claude 4 Attempts to Blackmail a Researcher: Claude 4 System Card: https://www-cdn.anthropic.com/6be99a52cb68eb70eb9572b4cafad13df32ed995.pdf Something Wild Happens If AI Looks Through Your Emails and Discovers You're Having an Affair: https://futurism.com/ai-email-affair