Walter Mischel

Imagine yourself as a child, staring at a plate of marshmallows. Would you have had the willpower not to eat them? The answer likely correlates with your SAT score.

New York Times science writer John Tierney , co-author of Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength, talks about self-control. He's joined by Dr. Walter Mischel, Niven Professor of Humane Letters in Psychology, Columbia University. They'll explain how to build willpower and how conserve it for crucial moments.

Fate may not be written in the stars, but what if it’s written in our genes? First, Paul Auster raises the specter of "rhyming events," his term for those spooky coincidences that seem more than ordinary mathematical flukes.

Then, a seemingly simple experiment devised by Walter Mischel ...