To explore the consequences of viewing one’s virtual doppelgänger, we ran a simple experiment using digitally manipulated photographs (Ahn & Bailenson, 2011). We used imaging software to place participants’ heads on people depicted in billboards using fictitious brands, for example holding up a soft drink with a brand label on it.

After the study, participants expressed better memory as well as a preference for the brand, even though it was obvious their faces had been placed in the advertisement. In other words, even though it was clearly a gimmick, using the digital self to promote a product is effective.

Basic physics dictate that, in order to become more sustainable, technology must become ever lighter, quieter, and less hungry. Is it merely a coincidence that these engineering constraints also mirror our favored model of femininity? In a recent study, pollsters found that 82 percent of respondents felt that going green is “more feminine than masculine.” The risk of feminine contamination, the researchers concluded, “holds men back from visible green behavior like using reusable grocery bags or carrying around reusable water bottles.” Add to that the reproachful tone that environmentalists often resort to in their attempts to spread the gospel of Deep Ecology—which stresses the rights of the ecosystem over those of man—and you glimpse how environmentalists came to be miscast as sanctimonious nags.

The psychologist Ellen Langer once had subjects engage in a betting game against either a self-assured, well-dressed opponent or a shy and badly dressed opponent (in Langers delightful phrasing, the dapper or the schnook condition), and she found that her subjects bet far more aggressively when they played against the schnook. They looked at their awkward opponent and thought, Im better than he is. Yet the game was pure chance: all the players did was draw cards at random from a deck, and see who had the high hand.