Bl: market is crazy!

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&refer=home&sid=aCgQ.Md6Xq7M

In October, the index rose or fell at least 3 percent 13 times, more than half of the 23 trading days during the month, including six moves of at least 5 percent. This month, the S&P 500 moved at least 3 percent on 10 of the 16 trading days, including eight moves of at least 5 percent.

Only November 1929 overshadowed October 2008 as the most volatile month for the index, according to S&P analyst Howard Silverblatt, citing moves of at least 1 percent on 86 percent of last month’s trading days.

Investors are paying $9.24 per dollar of operating profit forecast in 2009 for S&P 500 companies, half the two-decade median of $18.10, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Stock valuations suggest S&P 500 profits may decrease as much as 42 percent next year amid forecasts for the worst recession in more than two decades.

Bl: Recession’s Grip Forces U.S. to Flood World With More Dollars

wow, China now holds more Treasury funds than any other country.


Bl: Recession’s Grip Forces U.S. to Flood World With More Dollars
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aCqvVS7Zk7ZQ&refer=home

E: Start-ups and slow-downs "What impact will recession have on entrepreneurship?"

cool article, fun

http://www.economist.com/opinion/displayStory.cfm?story_id=12625763

What impact will recession have on entrepreneurship?

E: Hawthorne Effect (Group Study, cool)

http://www.economist.com/business/management/displaystory.cfm?source=hptextfeature&story_id=12510632

The Hawthorne effect

Nov 3rd 2008
From Economist.com

The original purpose of the experiments was to study the effects of physical conditions on productivity. Two groups of workers in the Hawthorne factory were used as guinea pigs. One day the lighting in the work area for one group was improved dramatically while the other group’s lighting remained unchanged. The researchers were surprised to find that the productivity of the more highly illuminated workers increased much more than that of the control group.

The employees’ working conditions were changed in other ways too (their working hours, rest breaks and so on), and in all cases their productivity improved when a change was made. Indeed, their productivity even improved when the lights were dimmed again. By the time everything had been returned to the way it was before the changes had begun, productivity at the factory was at its highest level. Absenteeism had plummeted.

The experimenters concluded that it was not the changes in physical conditions that were affecting the workers’ productivity. Rather, it was the fact that someone was actually concerned about their workplace, and the opportunities this gave them to discuss changes before they took place.

A crucial element in Mayo’s findings was the effect that working in groups had on the individual. At one time he wrote:

The desire to stand well with one’s fellows, the so-called human instinct of association, easily outweighs the merely individual interest and the logic of reasoning upon which so many spurious principles of management are based.

Later in life he added:

The working group as a whole actually determined the output of individual workers by reference to a standard that represented the group conception (rather than management’s) of a fair day’s work. This standard was rarely, if ever, in accord with the standards of the efficiency engineers.

Fritz Roethlisberger, a leading member of the research team, wrote:

The Hawthorne researchers became more and more interested in the informal employee groups, which tend to form within the formal organisation of the company, and which are not likely to be represented in the organisation chart. They became interested in the beliefs and creeds which have the effect of making each individual feel an integral part of the group.

Stanford: Steve Blank Serial Entrepreneur 10-01-2008

I really enjoyed hearing his thoughts on startups. It is really interesting
http://ecorner.stanford.edu/authorMaterialInfo.html?mid=2064
Entrepreneurial Though Leader Lecture

• there is a lot of tools to manage product risk. Not tools for customer market risks.
• Assessing Customer and Market Risks
• founders always need to interact with the customers
• Everyone in the team, marketing, etc. needs to be run in a way where ALL of them interact with customers.
  
• if not: You get out of touch. You start to believe the people interacting with the customers are "wrong" "not working hard enough" "not good enough".
  
• Customer interaction is sobering, and keeps you on track.
• How do you figure out if the problems you are solving/product/ are correct?
• Get the hell out of the building and test. No slides, etc.
  
• Test the fundamental ideas of the product. Show me there are customers out there that agree this is a big enough problem to use / pay for.
• 20 min exercise. A week of testing would be very sobering.
  
• 
  

Scary article

crazy. it is interesting they are coming out with this now though, since the research appears to be pretty old.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/21/AR2008102100665.html

The researchers found that from 1999 to 2005, the overall suicide rate in the United States rose 0.7 percent. However, among middle-aged white women, the annual increase was 3.9 percent; among middle-aged white men it was 2.7 percent.

The most frequent method of suicide was using a firearm, although the rate of suicide by this method declined. Suicide by hanging and suffocation rose significantly, accounting for 22 percent of all suicides by 2005. Among men, hanging/suffocation rates increased 6.3 percent annually; among women, the yearly rise was 2.3 percent. Poisoning accounted for 18 percent of suicides, the study found.

Century of Self (Edward Bernays)

This is my favorite documentary of all time.
part 1:
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12642.htm

quotes I liked:
human beings could not be trusted to make important decisions on a rational basis.
Walter Lipman (leading political analyist): What was needed was a new elite. They would control the unconscious feeling of the massess using unconscious feeling.
Understand how the popular mind works, specifically figure out how to apply strategies to achieve social control.
Edward Bernays was fascinated by Lipman's arguments. (rofl, no kidding)

• Stumulating inner desires, and creating a new line of products to satiate them. He called it "the engineering of consent"
• Democracy, to my father, was a wonderful concept. But I dont think he felt the public out there had reliable judgement. (Ann Bernays, daughter of Edward)
• They had to be enlightened from above. You can tap into their deepest desires or fears and use that.
  
• In 1928 President Hoover (agreed with Bernays) was the first politician to articulate the idea.
• "Consumerism had become the american way of life. He told corporations: You have taken over desire, and have transformed the people into constantly seeking happiness machines. This is the key to economic progress."
• Ann Barnays: "people who worked for him were stupid, children were stupid" (lololol)
• he would be shocked in 1929. There was a battle Commercialism vs Socialism. The world rejected democracy, it unleashed the selfish demonism, but didnt have the means to control it: example was the depression (chaos, unemployment it lead to).
  
• Humans must be discontent, it is the only way to control them.
• Rooselvelt saved democracy, with the implementation of the New Deal. Lassez Faire could no longer run democracy. Big Business was
  
• Freud book: Civilization is actually constructed to control the dangerous feelings.
• Freedom was impossible. Human beings could never be allowed to express themselves, it was too dangerous. They must always be controlled and thus always be discontent. It was the only way to keep them into limits.
• Rooselvelt temporarily saved democracy, with the implementation of the New Deal. Lassez Faire capitalism could no longer run industrialised economies. Big Business was horrified. The Nazis loved the New Deal. They said "I belive P. Roosevelt has chosen the correct path".
  
• Unlike the Nazis, he believed human beings were rational, and could be trusted to take
  Gallop rejected the idea of Propaganda. They believed opinion polling was the way. Sensible citizens who could take part in the running of the country. To corporations, this was the beginning of a dictatorship. Enemies of him: "The way to get recovery, is to let business alone"
  
• Business decided to fight back and regain power. National Association of Manufactorers (which still exists) was created to fight back. INCREDIBLE!!!!
• Big business now inserted their interests not only on billboards, but in editorials and newspapers.
• The government released a video to watch for signs of hidden bias. It was no match for Edward Bernays.
  
• INSANITY!!
  
• He inferred that democracy and capatilism went together.
• It depending on treating people as passing consumers. People's desires are in charge. Trigger the needs and desires and you can get what you need from them.
• WWII changed everything. The government changed its mind, and decided there were savage desires in human beings. They set out to control these inner desires. (Crazy idea since they came from government in the first place!)
• Edward Barneys did work for not only the government, but the CIA.
• Military use after WWII
  
• 49% of all solders sent back were because of mental problems (home sickness). In desperation, the army turned to psycho analysis.
  
• Stress of combat brought back memories from when they were a child.
• The ratio of the irrational vs the rational influence in america is in the favor of the irrational. There is much more suffering & unhappiness. It is sad compared with the impression from the advertisements.
• 
  

On this topic, my favorite documentary of all time covers everything:
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12646.htm

The engineering of consent is the very essence of the democratic process, the freedom to persuade and suggest.
– (Edward L. Bernays, "The Engineering of Consent," 1947)

The example highlights the fact that nobody has an interest in encouraging people to care. Big Business wants the people to consume. Government wants the people to stay uninvolved in anything that creates real change.
.... so if you feel yourself making decisions based on being pissed off, excited, or scared, know you are being manipulated. If Advertising, articles, TV, "media" was not able to do this... then why would companies pay $Trillions for the service?

• Democracy, to my father, was a wonderful concept. But I dont think he felt the public out there had reliable judgment. (Ann Bernays, daughter of Edward)
• Edward Bernays convinced big business and government: The people had to be enlightened from above. You can tap into their deepest desires or fears and use that.
• In 1928 President Hoover (who agreed with Bernays) was the first politician to articulate the idea.
• Humans must be discontent, it is the only way to control them.
• * President Hoover: "Consumerism had become the american way of life. He told corporations: You have taken over desire, and have transformed the people into constantly seeking happiness machines. This is the key to economic progress."

self-medicate by overeating or indulging in unhealthy foods.

Sort of a financial article, I loved reading this about stress
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-10-07-stress-economy_N.htm

Economic stress is taking its toll on the USA's emotional and physical health ....More than half of Americans report irritability or anger, fatigue and sleeplessness, and almost half say they self-medicate by overeating or indulging in unhealthy foods.

That is exactly how I self-medicate.

In the past few weeks, tension likely has escalated, says the APA's Katherine Nordal. "Stress that people don't feel they have any control over" causes more concern. "It's almost like a different threat level."

Last week's USA TODAY/Gallup Poll about the financial news of late September reflects similar worries. Of 1,021 adults surveyed, 40% felt afraid, 53% angry. More than half said their financial situation was harmed; two-thirds said it will suffer long-term.

Tom Kochan, a professor at MIT's Sloan School of Management in Cambridge, Mass., says many adults today grew up in "relative prosperity, with minor downswings in the economy. This is the first time people look at the situation and say, 'We are going to take a big hit in our standard of living, and hope that it doesn't snowball into something worse.' "

The rise in symptoms indicates more chronic stress, which can weaken the immune system, disturb sleep, increase appetite, raise blood pressure and lead to unhealthy habits, says Rajita Sinha, director of the Yale Stress Center at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Conn.

Chronic stress creates a vicious cycle, she adds. "We are wired to feel the stress and come up with solutions and solve it. When uncontrollable stress hits, that's when the stress system starts to go into overdrive."

SYMPTOMS OF STRESS

More Americans this year than last reported signs of stress from worrying about the economy: Irritability or anger 2008: 60% 2007: 50% Fatigue 2008: 53% 2007: 51% Sleeplessness 2008: 52% 2007: 48% Overeating/unhealthy eating 2008: 48% 2007: 43% Source: Harris Interactive surveys for American Psychological Association

2 interesting articles

Chinese capitalism: The long march backwards
http://www.economist.com/books/displayStory.cfm?source=hptextfeature&story_id=12333103
Latin America's economies: Keeping their fingers crossed
http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displayStory.cfm?source=hptextfeature&story_id=12341669

watchdog and leak sites corporate America doesn’t want you to see.

interesting, I didnt think people organized enough to push back against "bad" corporations and policies.

http://www.portfolio.com/news-markets/national-news/portfolio/2008/06/13/Anti-Corporate-Websites?TID=advert/wired/anti-corporate-sites
watchdog and leak sites corporate America doesn’t want you to see.

Finding a job 90% students use word of mouth. 41% of firms use word of mouth

Even the younger, tech-savvy generation still relies on good old-fashioned word-of-mouth networking. According to a Schwab Institutional 2008 survey of graduate and undergraduate students in Texas Tech University's division of financial planning program, nearly 90% of students said that word-of-­mouth networking with professional contacts, family and friends is the most useful tool in their job search. While word-of­mouth is one of the most popular tactics used by job seekers, only 41% of firms reported using it to find candidates, according to another 2007 Market Knowledge Tools report: Best-Managed Firms: Recruiting and Retaining Top Talent.

all about liver shots & why they are baddie:

http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f11/liver-shot-406492/


Great picture! It displays just how large the liver is, and also illustrates how transmitted force would transfer to the Vagus nerve, running roughly close to where the inferior vena cava is (the blue pipe in the upper midline area)

QUESTION:
What exactly happens when a person gets KO-ed by way of liver shot? What physiological things occur? And when Bas Rutten said he "broke" Jason DeLucia's liver, what happened there?

Help much appreciated.

ANSWER:
"I tried to go for the liver, because that is the most painful knockout there is" Bas Rutten
...
I think it was a guy on sherdog actually who described being hit in the liver as "being kicked full-force in the balls, only your balls are below your right pec instead of between your legs". I thought it was a pretty good description. You get instantly winded, your legs get stiff if they don't outright buckle, your chest/abs just lock up and I get this... I dunno, I don't want to say burning sensation, I can't describe it, I'd think taking one in the groin is the closest pain I can describe to it, except it lingers for the better part of a round.

physiologically? It just fucking hurts like hell. I think as soon as someone is hit solidly in the body, they're SOLD on bodypunching. It took me about 2 rounds with my coach of him feeding me body shots to appreciate the effect they have in all fightsports, and I've been working my body punching ever since
...
Video of a liver shot
http://www.youtube.com/v/OK2zxY_GrNg&hl
They show it in slow-mo from a few angles. When they film the guy taking the shot, you can see his ribcage press against his back as he takes the shot from the front. ow

Bas Rutten has some of the most famous liver shots
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A9SjPhC0pM

Bas Rutten explains the liver shot with a hot babe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AXX8dCtkeqQ
...
Being KO'd via liver shot is the worst feeling in the world. You don't lose consciousness, you just lie there crumpled like a little bitch writhing in pain.
...
" Things you feel like doing when hit in the liver :
-Vomitting
-Suffocating
-Shitting in your shorts
-Passing out
-Crying for your mama
-Stop taking part in any kind of violent sport....... "
...

How much does body-type in the torso affect the viability of the Liver Shot? Will someone skinny and Schilt-like be easier to apply it to? Is someone like Emmanuel Yarborough 'Immune' to the Liver Shot?

Great question, but really hard to answer. I suppose musculature and abdominal conditioning may come into play a bit, but the actual anatomical area that's being struck isn't densely covered with a lot of muscle.

IMO, it's a vulnerable area, regardless of bodytype.
...
I had literally just got there when i got my stuff on and jumped in. First round, I thought, hey, I'll warm up a bit and ease into it.
Last 30s I throw a right straight a bit lazily just as he's throwing a left mid. Hit me right on the liver the fucker.
I have never EVER had to take a break, but the burning sensation was so bad and my legs just buckled. I couldn't breath for maybe 5 seconds because my lungs wouldn't work. It took me what was left of the round and the minute rest to get back to a normal sparring ability

Tap yourself with your knuckle by your right pec and keep doing it around the area until you feel your body slightly spasm. Thats your liver.

What a waste (Economist)

http://www.economist.com/daily/chartgallery/displayStory.cfm?story_id=12032417&source=features_box_main
comment i liked:

Product pricing is generally based upon production/overhead costs only, ignoring consumption externalities like disposal costs (or greenhouse gas emissions). This is a market distortion which can be minimized by incorporating components of the price of disposal into every product and its packaging. I would integrate this with the overall environmental/health impact surcharge I have mentioned in other posts, possibly as a replacement of sales or value added taxes. This could be revenue neutral while allowing market forces to shape consumption patterns to more accurately reflect true ecological and societal costs. By extension, this would result in more optimal levels of consumption and incentivize the development or adoption of superior solutions.

Sleep tips from execs

http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2008/fsb/0808/gallery.sleep_tips.fsb/8.html
Points program could be used for sleep as well, a thoughts log you can go back to & search

Corporate Gaming Is Good For Business

http://games.slashdot.org/games/08/08/27/188247.shtml
http://www.fastcompany.com/articles/2008/07/serious-games.html

Corporate Gaming Is Good For Business

Posted by Soulskill on Wednesday August 27, @02:53PM
from the just-doing-my-part,-boss dept.

The Economist is running a story about how gaming is on the rise in corporate environments, and how games are also becoming a popular tool for advertising. From internally developed games to commercial offerings to simply creating a framework in which employees can interact, game-based competitions and community building are leading to increased productivity, even for Fortune 500 companies. Quoting: "Take Microsoft's own experience. Before it releases a new version of its Windows operating system, it asks staff to help debug the software by installing and running the system. In the past, project managers had to spend a great deal of time and effort persuading busy Microsoftees to help them with this boring task. So for Windows Vista, the system's latest incarnation, Microsoft created a game that awarded points for bug-testing and prizes such as wristbands for achieving certain goals. Participation quadrupled."

--------------------------- good comments:

"A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of coloured ribbon" - Napoleon
The concept has been long-observed that people will work their asses off for a symbol of accomplishment.

http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=910927&cid=24769751
So, one of my 'coming-up-to-speed' techniques was to write a program that interested me. In this case, I wrote a program that would randomly roll up and print out D&D monsters and NPCs, complete with stats. By the time I had that program working, I pretty much knew how to use the system and how to do software development on it. I think I still have some of those printouts in my files at home. ..bruce..

If You’re Open to Growth, You Tend to Grow

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/06/business/06unbox.html?em&ex=1216180800&en=6d320cea30cf8918&ei=5087%0A

Great article.

After three decades of painstaking research, the Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck believes that the answer to the puzzle lies in how people think about intelligence and talent. Those who believe they were born with all the smarts and gifts they’re ever going to have approach life with what she calls a “fixed mind-set.” Those who believe that their own abilities can expand over time, however, live with a “growth mind-set.”
...
After reading her book, Scott Forstall, senior vice president of Apple in charge of iPhone software, contacted Ms. Dweck to talk about his experience putting together the iPhone development team. Mr. Forstall told her that he identified a number of superstars within various departments at Apple and asked them in for a chat.

At the beginning of each interview, he warned the recruit that he couldn’t reveal details of the project he was working on. But he promised the opportunity, Ms. Dweck says, “to make mistakes and struggle, but eventually we may do something that we’ll remember the rest of our lives.”

Only people who immediately jumped at the challenge ended up on the team. “It was his intuition that he wanted people who valued stretching themselves over being king of their particular hill,” she says.

People with a growth mind-set tend to demonstrate the kind of perseverance and resilience required to convert life’s setbacks into future successes. That ability to learn from experience was cited as the No. 1 ingredient for creative achievement in a poll of 143 creativity researchers cited in “Handbook of Creativity” in 1999.

Marketing... here to save the day! Marketing is on its way!

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/business/13habit.html?em&ex=1216180800&en=893d6d16b2643e20&ei=5087%0A
Val Curtis knew soap could save lives, if only people would use it. So she turned to marketers, the masters of creating habits.

If you look hard enough, you’ll find that many of the products we use every day — chewing gums, skin moisturizers, disinfecting wipes, air fresheners, water purifiers, health snacks, antiperspirants, colognes, teeth whiteners, fabric softeners, vitamins — are results of manufactured habits.

“OUR products succeed when they become part of daily or weekly patterns,” said Carol Berning, a consumer psychologist who recently retired from Procter & Gamble, the company that sold $76 billion of Tide, Crest and other products last year. “Creating positive habits is a huge part of improving our consumers’ lives, and it’s essential to making new products commercially viable.”

For years, many public health campaigns that aimed at changing habits have been failures. Earlier this decade, two researchers affiliated with Vanderbilt University examined more than 100 studies on the effectiveness of antidrug campaigns and found that, in some cases, viewers’ levels of drug abuse actually increased when commercials were shown, perhaps in part because the ads reminded them about that bag of weed in the sock drawer.

A few years later, another group examined the effectiveness of advertising condom use to prevent AIDS. In some cases, rates of unprotected sex actually went up — which some researchers suspected was because the commercials made people more frisky than cautious.

Procter & Gamble introduced Febreze in 1996 as a way to remove odors from smelly clothes. Consumer surveys had shown that people were leaving their jackets and blouses outside after an evening in a smoke-filled bar. P.& G., which at the time already sold products that cleaned one out of every two laundry loads washed in American homes, decided to spend millions to create a spray to remove offensive smells.

The company ran advertisements of a woman complaining about a blazer that smelled like cigarette smoke. Other ads focused on smelly pets, sweaty teenagers and stinky minivan interiors.

But Febreze flopped. In fact, early sales were so disappointing that the company considered canceling the entire project.

One of the biggest problems, P.& G.’s researchers discovered, was that bad smells simply didn’t happen often enough in consumers’ lives. Interviews showed that consumers liked Febreze when they used it, but that many customers simply forgot that it was in the house.

At about the same time, the company’s staff psychologists were beginning to extend their understanding of how habits are formed.

“For most of our history, we’ve sold newer and better products for habits that already existed,” said Dr. Berning, the P.& G. psychologist. “But about a decade ago, we realized we needed to create new products. So we began thinking about how to create habits for products that had never existed before.”

Academics were also beginning to focus on habit formation. Researchers like Wendy Wood at Duke University and Brian Wansink at Cornell were examining how often smokers quit while vacationing and how much people eat when their plates are deceptively large or small.

Those and other studies revealed that as much as 45 percent of what we do every day is habitual — that is, performed almost without thinking in the same location or at the same time each day, usually because of subtle cues.

For example, the urge to check e-mail or to grab a cookie is likely a habit with a specific prompt. Researchers found that most cues fall into four broad categories: a specific location or time of day, a certain series of actions, particular moods, or the company of specific people. The e-mail urge, for instance, probably occurs after you’ve finished reading a document or completed a certain kind of task. The cookie grab probably occurs when you’re walking out of the cafeteria, or feeling sluggish or blue.

Our capacity to develop such habits is an invaluable evolutionary advantage. But when they run amok, things can become tricky.

Consider a series of experiments Dr. Wansink performed with a bowl of tomato soup that was secretly connected to a tube that pumped more and more liquid into the bowl. Diners ended up eating almost twice as much soup as usual, though they didn’t report feeling any fuller after the meal.

I always knew this shit!!!

“Habits are formed when the memory associates specific actions with specific places or moods,” said Dr. Wood, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke. “If you regularly eat chips while sitting on the couch, after a while, seeing the couch will automatically prompt you to reach for the Doritos. These associations are sometimes so strong that you have to replace the couch with a wooden chair for a diet to succeed.”

“We learned from consumer interviews that there was an opportunity to cue the clean smell of Febreze to a clean room,” Dr. Berning said. “We positioned it as the finishing touch to a mundane chore. It’s the icing that shows you did a good job.”

In a sense, a product originally intended for use on piles of smelly, dirty clothes was eclipsed by its exact opposite — a product used when women confronted a clean and tidy living room. And the more women sprayed, the more automatic the behavior became.

Today, Febreze is one of P.& G.’s greatest successes. Customers habitually spray tidied living rooms, clean kitchens, loads of fresh laundry and, according to one of the most recent commercials, spotless minivans. In the most recent fiscal year, consumers in North America alone spent $650 million buying Febreze, according to the company.

SO the trick, Dr. Curtis and her colleagues realized, was to create a habit wherein people felt a sense of disgust that was cued by the toilet. That queasiness, in turn, could become a cue for soap.

Their solution was ads showing mothers and children walking out of bathrooms with a glowing purple pigment on their hands that contaminated everything they touched.

The commercials, which began running in 2003, didn’t really sell soap use. Rather, they sold disgust. Soap was almost an afterthought — in one 55-second television commercial, actual soapy hand washing was shown only for 4 seconds. But the message was clear: The toilet cues worries of contamination, and that disgust, in turn, cues soap.

“This was radically different from most public health campaigns,” said Beth Scott, an infectious-disease specialist who worked with Dr. Curtis on the Ghana campaign. “There was no mention of sickness. It just mentions the yuck factor. We learned how to do that from the marketing companies.”

The ads had their intended effect. By last year, Ghanaians surveyed by members of Dr. Curtis’s team reported a 13 percent increase in the use of soap after the toilet. Another measure showed even greater impact: reported soap use before eating went up 41 percent.

... oh just read the article, it is awesome. 4 pages of awesomeness

Oddly, Hypocrisy Rooted in High Morals

http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/071114-cheating-basics.html

Maybe this explains religion

Morally upstanding people are the do-gooders of society, right? Actually, a new study finds that a sense of moral superiority can lead to unethical acts, such as cheating. In fact, some of the best do-gooders can become the worst cheats.

"Cheating is a way to get ahead in a competitive environment where there are rewards for winning or getting ahead of others," said Daniel Kruger, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of Michigan, who was not involved in the current study. "It seems like there is an increasing desire and expectation in our society to 'be the best.'"

Even if a person doesn't justify his unethical behaviors, "cheating can save lots of time and energy and take advantage of the knowledge and reasoning of others who are more adept, but could be disastrous if one is caught," Kruger said. He added, "I am not surprised that some of the extreme examples of cheating—ripping the relevant pages out of library books so other students cannot see them—happen in intensely competitive environments, law school in this example [of ripping out book pages]."

Maybe this is why the nature of business is to cheat & ethics must be pushed at it again & again.

Why We're All Moral Hypocrites

http://www.livescience.com/strangenews/080707-moral-hypocrites.html
Why We're All Moral Hypocrites

Mounting evidence suggests moral decisions result from the jousting between our knee-jerk responses (think "survival instinct") and our slower, but more collected evaluations. Which is more responsible for our self-leniency?

To find out, a recent study presented people with two tasks. One was described as tedious and time-consuming; the other, easy and brief. The subjects were asked to assign each task to either themselves or the next participant. They could do this independently or defer to a computer, which would assign the tasks randomly.

Eighty-five percent of 42 subjects passed up the computer’s objectivity and assigned themselves the short task – leaving the laborious one to someone else. Furthermore, they thought their decision was fair. However, when 43 other subjects watched strangers make the same decision, they thought it unjust.

Time to think

The researchers then "constrained cognition" by asking subjects to memorize long strings of numbers. In this greatly distracted state, subjects became impartial. They thought their own transgressions were just as terrible as those of others.

This suggests that we are intuitively moral beings, but "when we are given time to think about it, we construct arguments about why what we did wasn’t that bad," said lead researcher Piercarlo Valdesolo, who conducted this study at Northeastern University and is now a professor at Amherst College.

The study, funded by the university, will be detailed in an upcoming issue of the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

The researchers speculate that instinctive morality results from evolutionary selection for team players. Being fair, they point out, strengthens mutually beneficial relationships and improves our chances for survival.

Loathe to admit

So why do we choose to judge ourselves so leniently?

We have a lot wrapped up in preserving a positive self-image, said Valdesolo, and thus are loathe to admit, even to ourselves, that we sometimes behave immorally.

A flattering self-image is correlated with rewards, such as emotional stability, increased motivation and perseverance. "It is a very functional part of our psychology ... but it is not always a desirable one," explained Valdesolo.

Affliction July 19th.

I am not sure why the Affliction fight was brought up on this article.. but I dont see how any hard core fan is going to miss that fight.
When was the last time you saw more than 3 fighters with previous UFC or Pride title holders in one night?

Affliction has ---> 6 previous title holders!! six!
Fedor "Cyborg" Emelianenko
Tim Sylvia
Victor Belfort
Andrei Arlovski
Josh Barnett (he beat Randy Couture to get it.. though it was stripped later)
honorable title: Matt "the LAW" Lindland (he has a freaking Olympic silver medal)
(and none of them are washed up over 40 guys, like Ken Shamrock... he needs to retire)

PLUS, it has these other names that everyone knows.
Antônio Rogério Nogueira (only 1 loss to knockout, the guy is a machine)
Aleksander Emelianenko (I love when he KO'd Josh "idiot" Thompson)
Renato "Babalu" Sobral
Pedro Rizzo

ANYONE calling themselves fans.. who has watched mma on youtube, online, and old Pride FC videos... would know all those guys. If you like the fighters is personal, but you would have to respect their skills.

Even the less popular fighters on the card are known. Vernon White (lost to many good fighters), Matt Whitehead, and Paul Buentello.

It is just crazy talk to say you are going to miss it. CRAZY I say.

NOTE: Newbies excluded from all logic, I dont see how they can appreciate this card.

brain lies, how they are invented

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/27/opinion/27aamodt.html?em&ex=1214884800&en=9b34d24b60bc382e&ei=5087%0A

This phenomenon, known as source amnesia, can also lead people to forget whether a statement is true. Even when a lie is presented with a disclaimer, people often later remember it as true.

With time, this misremembering only gets worse.
....
In the same study, however, when subjects were asked to imagine their reaction if the evidence had pointed to the opposite conclusion, they were more open-minded to information that contradicted their beliefs. Apparently, it pays for consumers of controversial news to take a moment and consider that the opposite interpretation may be true.

Would you hire your husband?

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/29/business/29hubby.html?em&ex=1214884800&en=99ff2eb4546d9fd3&ei=5087%0A

cool husband wife combo!

6 Supposed Action Heroes You Could Probably Take In A Fight

6 Supposed Action Heroes You Could Probably Take In A Fight
http://www.cracked.com/article_16433_6-supposed-action-heroes-you-could-probably-take-in-fight.html

It is gloriously well written. The videos I skipped, as they are too long.

It is worth glancing at the "Strengths" "Weaknesses".. those are the funniest.

nudge, nudge, grin grin.

What is a nudge:
http://www.nudges.org/thebook.cfm

nudge blog:
http://nudges.wordpress.com/

21 nudges they started
http://nudges.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/our-dozen-nudges1.pdf


gives credit to incentive systems, and the idea that minor incentives can enable much bigger action. snowball effect, etc.

some other interesting pages:
http://leduc998.wordpress.com/2008/05/31/why-trade-1-stock/

rich vs poor, leisure time

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/22/AR2008062201859.html

interesting on rich vs poor in regards to leisure time. very short "article" it is borderline worthy of mentioning, but it is a topic that is interesting.

People who make less than $20,000 a year, for example, told Kahneman and his colleagues that they spend more than a third of their time in passive leisure -- watching television, for example. Those making more than $100,000 spent less than one-fifth of their time in this way -- putting their legs up and relaxing. Rich people spent much more time commuting and engaging in activities that were required as opposed to optional. The richest people spent nearly twice as much time as the poorest people in leisure activities that were active, structured and often stressful -- shopping, child care and exercise.
.....
Kahneman and his colleagues argued that many people mistakenly allocate enormous amounts of their time and psychological focus to getting rich because of a mental illusion: When they think about what it would mean to be wealthy, they think about how enjoyable it would be to watch a flat-screen TV set, play lots of sports or get a lot of pampering -- our stereotypical beliefs of how the rich spend their time.

"In reality," Kahneman and his colleagues wrote in a paper they published in the journal Science, "they should think of spending a lot more time working and commuting and a lot less time engaged in passive leisure."

Sarcasm. Umm yeah

http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20080620/sc_livescience/sarcasmseenasevolutionarysurvivalskill

Evolutionary biologists claim that sociality is what has made humans such a successful species. We are masters at what anthropologists and others call "social intelligence." We recognize and keep track of hundreds of relationships, and we easily distinguish between enemies and friends.

More important, we run our lives by social calculation. A favor is mentally recorded and paid back, sometimes many years later. Likewise, insults are marked down on the mental score card in indelible ink. And we are constantly bickering and making up, even with people we love.

Fast forward a few million years and the network of human relationships is wider and more complex, and just as important to survival. The corporate chairman throws out a sarcastic remark and those who "get" it laugh, smile, and gain favor. In the same way, if the chair never makes a remark, sarcastic people are making them behind his or her back, forming a clique by their mutually negative, but funny, comments. Either way, sarcasm plays a role in making and breaking alliances and friendship.

Thanks goodness, because life without out sarcasm would be a dull and way too nice place to be, if you ask me.

Meredith F. Small is an anthropologist at Cornell University. She is also the author of "Our Babies, Ourselves; How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent" (link) and "The Culture of Our Discontent; Beyond the Medical Model of Mental Illness" (link).

Fedor Emelianenko, Stephen Colbert's new bodyguard

http://www.flickr.com/photos/15895460@N07/2585784539/

Chuck Norris's Reign Of Terror Is Over & Fedor's Has Begun

FEDOR FACTS!!!

1 --- Some kids piss their name in the snow. Fedor can piss his name into concrete
2 --- Leading hand sanitizers claim they can kill 99.9 percent of germs. Fedor can kill 100 percent of whatever the hell he wants
3 --- Fedor counted to infinity - twice
4 --- Fedor once visited the Virgin Islands. They are now The Islands
5 --- Fedor's calendar goes straight from March 31st to April 2nd; no one fools Fedor
6 --- Fedor can speak braille
7 --- Fedor's tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried
8 --- Fedor was originally cast as the main character in 24, but was replaced by the producers when he managed to kill every terrorist and save the day in 12 minutes and 37 seconds
9 --- Fedor died ten years ago, but the Grim Reaper can't get up the courage to tell him
10 --- Fedor puts the "laughter" in "manslaughter"
11 --- Superman owns a pair of Fedor pajamas
12 --- Fedor can slam revolving doors
13 --- Fedor sleeps with a night light. Not because Fedor is afraid of the dark, but the dark is afraid of Fedor
14 --- Once a cobra bit Fedor' leg. After five days of excruciating pain, the cobra died
15 --- Fedor was once on Celebrity Wheel of Fortune and was the first to spin. The next 29 minutes of the show consisted of everyone standing around awkwardly, waiting for the wheel to stop.
16 --- Fedor does not hunt because the word hunting implies the possibility of failure. Fedor goes killing
17 --- Fedor divides by zero
18 --- Fedor's wristwatch has no numbers on it. It just says, "Time to kick ass."
19 --- When Fedor gives you the finger, he's telling you how many seconds you have left to live
20 --- Fedor is not hung like a horse... horses are hung like Fedor
21 --- Giraffes were created when Fedor uppercutted a horse
22 --- When the Boogeyman goes to sleep every night he checks his closet for Fedor
23 --- Fedor' dog is trained to pick up his own poop because Fedor will not take crap from anyone
24 --- Fedor has to maintain a concealed weapon license in all 50 states in order to legally wear pants
25 --- Fedor is the only person on the planet that can kick you in the back of the face
26 --- When Fedor exercises, the machine gets stronger
27 --- Fedor doesn't use pickup lines, he simply says, "Now."
28 --- Fedor can build a snowman out of rain
29 --- Fedor once had a heart attack; his heart lost
30 --- Fedor plays russian roulette with a fully loded revolver... and wins
31 --- Fedor can kill two stones with one bird
32 --- M.C. Hammer learned the hard way that Fedor can touch this
33 --- Fedor once killed a bird by throwing it off a cliff
34 --- The best part of waking up is not Folgers in your cup, but knowing that Fedor didn't kill you in your sleep
35 --- Fedor once punched a man in the soul
36 --- Fedor did that to Michael Jackson's face
37 --- The chief export of Fedor is pain
38 --- The most honorable way of dying is taking a bullet for Fedor. This amuses Fedor because he is bulletproof
39 --- Fedor can tie his shoes with his feet
40 --- Fedor once finished "The Song that Never Ends"
41 --- The quickest way to a man's heart is with Fedor's fist
42 --- It is considered a great accomplishment to go down Niagara Falls in a wooden barrel. Fedor can go up Niagara Falls in a cardboard box
43 --- The saddest moment for a child is not when he learns Santa Claus isn't real, it's when he learns Fedor is
44 --- We all know the magic word is please. As in the sentence, "Please don't kill me." Too bad Fedor doesn't believe in magic
45 --- Fedor can drown a fish
46 --- When Fedor enters a room, he doesn't turn the lights on, he turns the dark off
47 --- Fedor can create a rock so heavy that even he can't lift it. And then he lifts it anyways, just to show you who Fedor is
48 --- The reason newborn babies cry is because they know they have just entered a world with Fedor
49 --- The grass is always greener on the other side, unless Fedor has been there. In that case the grass is most likely soaked in blood and tears
50 --- Fedor was once the F.B.I's chief negotiator. His job involved calling up criminals and saying, "This is Fedor."
51 --- Fedor used to beat the crap out of his shadow because it was following to close. It now stands a safe 30 feet behind him
52 --- The only time Fedor was wrong was when he thought he had made a mistake
53 --- The last digit of pi is Fedor. He is the end of all things
54 --- On Neil Armstrong's second step on the moon, he found a note that said, "Fedor was here."
55 --- When Fedor breaks the law, the law doesn't heal
56 --- A unicorn once kicked Fedor. That is why they no longer exist
57 --- Bullets dodge Fedor
58 --- Fedor once partook in a pissing contest outside of a bar. His opponent drowned.

articles interesting

http://www.thestandard.com/news/2008/05/29/where-are-they-now
http://news.slashdot.org/news/08/05/30/1435256.shtml
10 companies from dot com boom & their CEOs

Top 10 most important technologies, by Garner
http://businessofit.blogspot.com/2008/05/gartner-reveals-top-10-technologies.html

http://www.ehomeupgrade.com/2008/05/28/gartner-identifies-top-ten-disruptive-technologies-for-2008-to-2012/

* Multicore and hybrid processors
* Virtualisation and fabric computing
* Social networks and social software
* Cloud computing and cloud/Web platforms
* Web mashups
* User Interface
* Ubiquitous computing
* Contextual computing
* Augmented reality
* Semantics

That's all

$1.45 a week, and I love it.

http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2006/07/24/turks/index.html
"I make $1.45 a week and I love it"
On Amazon Mechanical Turk, thousands of people are happily being paid pennies to do mind-numbing work. Is it a boon for the bored or a virtual sweatshop?

>>> this is what I need to make the point system into, EXACTLY the same thing

http://www.thesheepmarket.com

NYT article on MMA

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/30/sports/othersports/30fight.html?hp

Thanks Cale!

Wanderlei Silva

Wandy is back

I cant find entrance music / video of him, but it is a site to see

-------------------------- fav comments:
Mr. Joshua
May 26, 2008 at 9:42 am
Bad stoppage. Jardine was so stunned about the early stoppage that he just layed there in shock and thought about the early stoppage.

Morgan
May 26, 2008 at 1:42 pm
I was at the fights live…
The entire arena errupted into pandamonium. Everyone was jumping out of their seats, screaming. I nearly fell over the guy in front of me.

Personally? I thought Wand fricking killed him. It doesn’t show it so well on camera, but like the last punch that Wand landed on Jardine, jolted Jardine’s legs out like he had been hit with a pair of shock paddles. Jardine’s legs were quivering…

Ivan Bueno
May 27, 2008 at 1:52 pm

Wand’s initial punch that put Jardine down didn’t look impressive, but the barrage of punches that follow afterward are relentless. Wand’s killer instinct is off the chart.

Some say the fight is boring because it finished early, and less techniques were displayed. I say bullshit. Win or lose, Wand is always exciting to watch.

Morgan
May 27, 2008 at 1:58 pm
Anyone who was in the arena that night would say that fight was awsome.

The electricity in the air at the ending of that fight, was rediculous, I don’t think it was even surpassed by when BJ knocked out Sherk, and there were SO MANY people there rooting for BJ it was sick.

Even with all of BJ’s fans there, the reaction to Wand’s knock out of Jardine was absolutely the “moment” of the night.

----------------- double knockouts:
http://blog.ronin5.com/

Maslow's hierarchy of needs

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs

basic > complex
Life needs (Physiological)
Safety needs
Social needs (Love and Belonging)
Esteem needs
Growth needs (Self-actualization)

Physiological needs
These are the basic human needs for such things as food, warmth, water, and other body needs.
In opposite order of importance:
* Excretion
* Eating
* Drinking
* Breathing
If some needs are not fulfilled, a human's physiological needs take the highest priority. Physiological needs can control thoughts and behaviors, and can cause people to feel sickness, pain, and discomfort.

Safety needs
Primarily concerned with survival:
Safety needs include:
Basic Safety:
* obtaining adequate food, clothing, shelter
* seeking justice from the dominant societal groups

High level Safety:
* Personal security from crime
* Financial security
* Health and well-being
* Safety net against accidents/illness and the adverse impacts

Once physical needs are relatively satisfied, the individual's safety needs take over and dominate his behavior. These needs have to do with man's yearning for a predictable, orderly world in which injustice and inconsistency are under control, the familiar frequent, and the unfamiliar rare. In the world of work, these safety needs manifest themselves in such things as a preference for job security, grievance procedures for protecting the individual from unilateral authority, savings accounts, insurance policies, and the like.

For the most part physiological and safety needs are reasonably well satisfied in the first world. The obvious exceptions, are the poor and the disadvantaged. If frustration has not led to apathy and weakness, such people still struggle to satisfy the basic physiological and safety needs.


Social needs
After physiological and safety needs are fulfilled, the third layer of human needs is social. This psychological aspect of Maslow's hierarchy involves emotionally-based relationships in general, such as:
* friendship
* intimacy
* having a supportive and communicative family

Humans need to feel a sense of belonging and acceptance, whether it comes from a large social group (such as clubs, office culture, religious groups, professional organizations, sports teams, gangs) or small social connections (family members, intimate partners, mentors, close colleagues, confidants). They need to love and be loved (sexually and non-sexually) by others. In the absence of these elements, many people become susceptible to loneliness, social anxiety, and depression. This need for belonging can often overcome the physiological and security needs, depending on the strength of the peer pressure. e.g. an anorexic ignores the need to eat and the security of health for a feeling of control and belonging.

Esteem needs

All humans have a need to be respected, to have self-esteem, self-respect, and to respect others. People need to engage themselves to gain recognition and have an activity or activities that give the person a sense of contribution, to feel accepted and self-valued, be it in a profession or hobby. Imbalances at this level can result in low self-esteem, inferiority complexes. People with low self-esteem need respect from others. They may seek fame or glory, which again depends on others. However confidence, competence and achievement only need one person and everyone else is inconsequential to one's own success. It may be noted, however, that many people with low self-esteem will not be able to improve their view of themselves simply by receiving fame, respect, and glory externally, but must first accept themselves internally. Psychological imbalances such as depression can also prevent one from obtaining self-esteem on both levels.

Self-actualization
Self-actualization — a concept Maslow attributed to Kurt Goldstein, one of his mentors — is the instinctual need of humans to make the most of their abilities and to strive to be the best they can. Working toward fulfilling our potential, toward becoming all that we are capable of becoming.

In Maslow's scheme, the final stage of psychological development comes when the individual feels assured that his physiological, security, affiliation and affection, self-respect, and recognition needs have been satisfied. As these become dormant, he becomes filled with a desire to realize all of his potential for being an effective, creative, mature human being. "What a man can be, he must be"[1], is the way Maslow expresses it.

Maslow's need hierarchy is set forth as a general proposition and does not imply that everyone's needs follow the same rigid pattern. For some people, self-esteem seems to be a stronger motivation than love. Mussolini, for example, alienated his closest friends by undertaking reckless military adventures to achieve status as a conqueror. (This example can also be used to illustrate the means-to-an-end dilemma of human motivation. That is, Mussolini may have reached for status as a means to gaining the affection of Adolf Hitler. More will be said about this problem later.) For some people, the need to create is often a stronger motivation than the need for food and safety. Thus, the artist living in poverty is a classic example of reversing the standard hierarchy of needs. Similarly, persons who have suffered hunger or some other deprivation for protracted periods may live happily for the rest of their lives if only they can get enough of what they lacked. In this case, the level of aspiration may have become permanently lowered and the higher-order, less prepotent needs may never become active. There are also cases of people's martyring themselves for causes and suffering all kinds of deprivations, particularly in the physiological, safety, and sometimes social categories, to achieve their goals.

Maslow writes the following of self-actualizing people:

* They embrace the facts and realities of the world (including themselves) rather than denying or avoiding them.
* They are spontaneous in their ideas and actions.
* They are creative.
* They are interested in solving problems; this often includes the problems of others. Solving these problems is often a key focus in their lives.
* They feel a closeness to other people, and generally appreciate life.
* They have a system of morality that is fully internalized and independent of external authority.
* They have discernment and are able to view all things in an objective manner.

To further confound the problem of understanding motivation, Maslow points out that motives are not always conscious.[1] In the average person, he believes, they are more often unconscious than conscious — showing the influence on his thinking of Freudian psychologists who have long been concerned with the hidden causes of human behavior.

In Maslow's theory, then, human needs are arranged in a hierarchy of importance. Needs emerge only when higher-priority needs have been satisfied. By the same token, satisfied needs no longer influence behavior. This point seems worth stressing to managers and administrators, who often mistakenly assume that money and other tangible incentives are the only cures for morale and productivity problems. It may be, however, that the need to participate, to be recognized, to be creative, and to experience a sense of worth are better motivators in an affluent society, where many have already achieved an acceptable measure of freedom from hunger and threats to security and personal safety, and are now driven by higher-order psychological needs.

In short, self-actualization is reaching one's fullest potential. However, to further clarify “There are certain conditions which are immediate prerequisites for the basic need satisfactions.” “Such conditions as freedom to speak, freedom to do what one wishes so long as no harm is done to others, freedom to express one's self, freedom to investigate and seek for information, freedom to defend one's self, justice, fairness, honesty, orderliness in the group are examples of such preconditions for basic need satisfactions.” [1]

According to Maslow, the tendencies of self-actualizing people are as follows:

1. Awareness
* efficient perception of reality
* freshness of appreciation
* peak experiences
* ethical awareness

2. Honesty
* philosophical sense of humour
* social interest
* deep interpersonal relationships
* democratic character structure

3. Freedom
* need for solitude
* autonomous, independent
* creativity, originality
* spontaneous

4. Trust
* problem centered
* acceptance of self, others, nature
* resistance to enculturation - identity with humanity

Maslow discovered that healthy individuals are motivated toward what he termed self-actualization, and noted that Self-actualizing people had strikingly similar characteristics. He described self-actualization as:

“an episode or spurt in which the powers of the person come together in a particularly and intensely enjoyable way, and in which he is more integrated and less split, more open for experience, more idiosyncratic, more perfectly expressive or spontaneous, or fully functioning, more creative, more humorous, more ego-transcending, more independent of his lower needs, etc. He becomes in these episodes more truly himself, more perfectly actualising his potentialities, closer to the core of his being, more fully human. Not only are these his happiest and most thrilling moments, but they are also moments of greatest maturity, individuation, fulfilment - in a word, his healthiest moments.

Self-actualising people, those who have come to a high level of maturation, health and self-fulfilment, have so much to teach us that sometimes they seem almost like a different breed of human beings.”

The following descriptions have been compiled from the writings of Maslow and others.

1. Clearer perception of reality. Self-actualizing people perceive reality more effectively than others and are more comfortable with it. They have an accurate perception of what exists rather than a distortion of perception by one's needs, and possess an ability to be objective about their own strengths, possibilities and limitations. They judge experiences, people and things correctly and efficiently, and have an unusual ability to detect the spurious, the fake, and the dishonest. They are not afraid of the unknown and can tolerate the doubt, uncertainty, and tentativeness accompanying the perception of the new and unfamiliar.

2. Acceptance of self, others, and nature. Self-actualizing persons are not ashamed or guilty about their human nature, with its shortcoming, imperfections, frailties, and weaknesses. They can accept their own human shortcomings, without condemnation. Nor are they critical of these aspects of other people. They respect and esteem themselves and others. Moreover, they are honest, open, genuine, without pose or facade. They are not, however, self-satisfied but are concerned about discrepancies between what is and what might be or should be in themselves, others, and society.

3. Spontaneity. Self-actualizing people are relatively spontaneous in their behaviour, and far more spontaneous than that in their inner life, thoughts and impulses. Self-actualising persons are not hampered by convention, but they do not flout it. They are not conformists, but neither are they anti-conformist for the sake of being so. They might act conventionally, but they seldom allow convention to keep them from doing anything they consider important or basic. They are not externally motivated or even goal-directed; rather their motivation is the internal one of growth and development, the actualization of themselves and their potentialities.

4. Problem-centering. Self-actualizing people have a problem-solving orientation towards life instead of an orientation centered on self. They are interested in solving problems; this often includes the problems of others. Solving these problems is often a key focus in their lives. They commonly have a mission in life, some problem outside themselves that enlists much of their energies. In general this mission is unselfish and is involved with the philosophical and the ethical.

5. Detachment and the need for solitude. Self-actualizing people enjoy solitude and privacy. It is often possible for them to remain above the battle, unruffled and undisturbed by that which upsets others. They may even appear to be asocial. It is perhaps, related to an abiding sense of security and self-sufficiency.

6. Autonomy, independent of culture and environment. Self-actualizing persons are not dependent for their main satisfactions on other people or culture or means-to-ends, or in general, on extrinsic satisfactions. Rather they are dependent for their own development and continued growth upon their own potentialities and latent resources. The meaning of their life is self-decision, self-governing and being an active, responsible, self-disciplined deciding person rather than a pawn or a person helplessly ruled by others.

7. Continued freshness of appreciation. Self-actualizing people have a wonderful capacity to appreciate again and again the basic pleasures of life. They experience awe, pleasure, and wonder in their everyday world, such as nature, children, music and sexual experience. They approach these basic experiences with awe, pleasure, wonder and even ecstasy.

8. The mystic experience, the oceanic feeling. Self-actualizing people commonly have mystic or `peak' experiences or times of intense emotions in which they transcend self. During a peak experience, they experience feelings of ecstasy, awe, and wonder with feelings of limitless horizons opening up, feelings of unlimited power and at the same time feelings of being more helpless than ever before. The experience ends with the conviction that something extremely important and valuable has happened so that the person is to some extent transformed and strengthened by the experience that has a carry-over into everyday life.

9. Oneness with humanity. Self-actualizing people have deep feelings of identification, sympathy and affection for other people, and a deep feeling of empathy and compassion for human beings in general. This feeling is, in a sense, unconditional in that it exists along with the recognition of the existence in others of negative qualities that may provoke occasional anger, impatience, and disgust.

10. Deep interpersonal relations. Self-actualizing people have deeper and more profound inter-personal relationships than most adults, but not necessarily deeper than children. They are capable of more closeness, greater love, more perfect identification, more erasing of ego boundaries than other people would consider possible. One consequence is that self-actualised people have especially deep ties with rather few individuals and their circle of friends is small. They tend to be kind or at least patient to almost everyone, yet they do speak realistically and harshly of those whom they feel deserve it — especially the hypocritical, pretentious, pompous, or the self-inflated individual.

11. Democratic character structure. Self-actualizing people are democratic in the deepest possible sense. They are friendly towards everyone regardless of class, education, political beliefs, race, or colour. They believe it is possible to learn something from everyone. They are humble in the sense of being aware of how little they know in comparison with what could be known and what is known by others. They are ready and willing to learn from anyone. They respect everyone as a potential contributor to their knowledge, merely because everyone is a human being.

12. Ethical means towards moral ends. Self-actualizing persons are highly ethical. They clearly distinguish between means and ends and subordinate means to ends. Their notions of right and wrong and of good and evil are often not conventional ones.

13. Philosophical, unhostile sense of humor. Self-actualizing people have a keen, unhostile sense of humour. They don't laugh at jokes that hurt other people or are aimed at others' inferiority — unless it is a convention that for some reason they happen to decide to follow in that situation. They can make fun of others in general — or of themselves — especially when they are foolish or try to be big when they are small. They are inclined towards thoughtful humour that elicits a smile, is intrinsic to the situation, and spontaneous.

14. Creativity. Self-actualizing people are highly imaginative and creative. The creativity involved here is not special-talent creativity. It is a creativity potentially inherent in everyone but usually suffocated by acculturation. It is a fresh, naive, direct way of looking at things, rather similar to the naive and universal creativity of unspoiled children.

Quote

"It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories instead of theories to suit facts."
- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

NYT: Wall Street Exodus: Fear, Panic and Anger

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/25/business/25pain.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5087&em&en=17f372cdec3fcbb2&ex=1211860800

The “High Roller” lives on the edge financially and becomes addicted to the thrill of earning large sums of money. But when things go bad, “they feel the greatest frustration both financially and psychologically,” she said in an e-mail message. The most common profile is what she calls the “Entrepreneur,” thriving on ambition but not taking as many risks as the High Roller.

“Denial is a wonderful defense mechanism as it eases the pain,” she said, “but it also delays the day of reckoning.”

A third type is what she calls the “Money Master.” People who fit this profile typically earn less than and take far fewer risks than the other two types and are better prepared to handle market swings and even layoffs, she said.

“They can come out of it feeling even more confident than before if they use their flexibility and figure out a new game plan,” she said.

“I’m in financial planning,” he said. “Isn’t it a sin not to do so for yourself?”

“Since they are expected to be experts, job loss and financial strain can trigger shame and embarrassment,” said Bradley Klontz, a psychologist who specializes in financial matters. “The shame can be similar to a cop who gets mugged.”

“When I got laid off, I felt a sense of panic — what am I going to do next?” she said. But after that initial shock, she grew calm. “I don’t have to get up anymore and go and pretend things are fine when they’re not.”

She spoke on condition of anonymity because she said she feared retribution. She has been looking for jobs, but, as many recruiters say, it is an employers’ market.

She has had trouble sleeping; she has lost weight. She started therapy but wonders whether it is helping. Not having a schedule is disorienting. She was accustomed to leaving the house even before her child woke up and getting home after dark.

“The first thing people ask you is what you do,” she said. “If you don’t do anything anymore, then how do you feel about your- self?”

Food Prices soar. Vegtables? not on the list

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7412817.stm

Interestingly, the most important food, VEGTABLES, is not on the list.

coming soon to a toilet near you

Google's version
http://www.google.com/tisp/install.html


England's version:
H2o-networks.uk.net

H2O Networks is revolutionising the deployment and build of fibre optic links. We have created the FS Focus System (Fibre Optical Cable Underground Sewer System) to meet the demands of 21st Century communications.

Fibrecity deployments are far kinder to the environment than traditional methods of fibre deployment, as the sewer is a ready-made duct which means the expensive and environmentally unfriendly method of digging up the roads is unnecessary and disruption to the road infrastructure is kept to a minimum. In addition, the system is at least 80 per cent faster than traditional methods.

We build bespoke fibre links, utilising the waste water networks, which allows us to be faster and more cost effective than the traditional methods. Not only that, but by using independent ducting, our network is secure and underpins business continuity.

Our methodologies allow us to pass on the benefits to our customers and offer long term (up to 10 years) fixed prices and unrestricted bandwidth.

H2O Networks - using the past to connect the future.

SATs are getting more difficult

Scientific words and names can become extremely long very easily, but here is an example of the longest name for an enzyme which has been cited in multiple scientific journals and recently on the SAT exam:

methionylglutaminylarginyltyrosylglutamylserylleucylphenylal
anylalanylglutaminylleucyllysylglutamylarginyllysylglutamylg
lycylalanylphenylalanylvalylprolylphenylalanylvalylthreonyll
eucylglycylaspartylprolylglycylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylse
rylleucyllysylisoleucylaspartylthreonylleucylisoleucylglutam
ylalanylglycylalanylaspartylalanylleucylglutamylleucylglycyl
isoleucylprolylphenylalanylserylaspartylprolylleucylalanylas
partylglycylprolylthreonylisoleucylglutaminylasparaginylalan
ylthreonylleucylarginylalanylphenylalanylalanylalanylglycylv
alylthreonylprolylalanylglutaminylcysteinylphenylalanylgluta
mylmethionylleucylalanylleucylisoleucylarginylglutaminyllysy
lhistidylprolylthreonylisoleucylprolylisoleucylglycylleucyll
eucylmethionyltyrosylalanylasparaginylleucylvalylphenylalany
lasparaginyllysylglycylisoleucylaspartylglutamylphenylalanyl
tyrosylalanylglutaminylcysteinylglutamyllysylvalylglycylvaly
laspartylserylvalylleucylvalylalanylaspartylvalylprolylvalyl
glutaminylglutamylserylalanylprolylphenylalanylarginylglutam
inylalanylalanylleucylarginylhistidylasparaginylvalylalanylp
rolylisoleucylphenylalanylisoleucylcysteinylprolylprolylaspa
rtylalanylaspartylaspartylaspartylleucylleucylarginylglutami
nylisoleucylalanylseryltyrosylglycylarginylglycyltyrosylthre
onyltyrosylleucylleucylserylarginylalanylglycylvalylthreonyl
glycylalanylglutamylasparaginylarginylalanylalanylleucylprol
ylleucylasparaginylhistidylleucylvalylalanyllysylleucyllysyl
glutamyltyrosylasparaginylalanylalanylprolylprolylleucylglut
aminylglycylphenylalanylglycylisoleucylserylalanylprolylaspa
rtylglutaminylvalyllysylalanylalanylisoleucylaspartylalanylg
lycylalanylalanylglycylalanylisoleucylserylglycylserylalanyl
isoleucylvalyllysylisoleucylisoleucylglutamylglutaminylhisti
dylasparaginylisoleucylglutamylprolylglutamyllysylmethionyll
eucylalanylalanylleucyllysylvalylphenylalanylvalylglutaminyl
prolylmethionyllysylalanylalanylthreonylarginylserine

Profit

From Russia with Hate

http://current.com/items/84906361_from_russia_with_hate

insanity. They say only 70k people, but these guys are certifiably insane.

13% difference isnt bad though

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601124&sid=aqfhvj9Grgfg&refer=home

Sleep Deficit Linked to Smoking, Drinking, Inactivity (Update1)

By Tom Randall

May 7 (Bloomberg) -- People who slept less than six hours a night were more likely than well-rested people to smoke, drink heavily and avoid exercise, a U.S. government study found.

About 31 percent of adults who got that little sleep smoked cigarettes, compared with 18 percent who slept seven to eight hours, according to the survey by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

politics video

nothing earth shattering. just another video with facts about what fake president bush says.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/30/gotcha-olbermann-rips-apa_n_99461.html

Personal Religion

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/06/the-meaning-of-life-intro/

Story on growing up Christian/Catholic and why he changed his mind. Anything that requires throwing away all logic and believing something based on "faith" is going to be personal.

If I was so motivated to write something on how/why I converted away from Chrisitanity, it would have been like this. The logic & focus aspects of his personality are very much like mine.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My overall religion has effectively become a religion of personal growth. Every year I continue to tweak my beliefs to try to bring them into closer alignment with my best understanding of how reality actually works.

The only reliable means I’ve found for discovering what beliefs are empowering is to test them and compare them to other beliefs.

Yet choosing my beliefs consciously has allowed me access to parts of my potential that I’d never have been able to tap with other belief systems. In most cases I’d have been stuck being way too passive and would have failed to push myself. I’d have been more inclined to accept my given lot in life instead of consciously co-creating it. Because my religion is based on working actively on my personal growth and helping others to do the same, I am driven to take action. Good thoughts or intentions aren’t enough.


Another part of my religion is to strive to become the best me I can become, not a copy of Jesus or Buddha or anyone else. This means spending a lot of time learning about my own strengths and weaknesses and figuring out where I can grow and what I may have to simply accept.


By their words I hear that most Americans are Christian. By their actions I see that most aren’t.
...
If you really believe something, you will act in accordance with that belief — always. If you believe in gravity, you will never attempt to defy it.

..

/. does it again. great article on open source

http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/08/04/21/1534222.shtml

"Meaning of life"

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/06/the-meaning-of-life-intro/

Interesting article on a guy going from Catholicism to Atheist. I can relate to much of the "Intro" part of the story. I didnt read further.

It is a very good articulation of frustration with the Christian Religions. Emotionally, I'd be proud to write it. I am not motivated enough to write something like this.

ask a ninja, grandpa.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1sm4jtoB44&NR=1

finally, some good healthy advice.
---------------------------------------------------------
http://bash.org/?572066
rofl. hilarious.
--------------------------------------------------------
http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/08/04/17/1210250.shtml
---------------
No, I'm not a republican OR a democrat because I enjoy the process of THINKING too much to give it up.
---------------
Real issues: economy, environment, crime, international relations
Distraction issues: file sharing, gay marriage, abortion, drugs, bosnian snipers
---------------

Iron man fights open source? What?

http://entertainment.slashdot.org/entertainment/08/04/15/0037211.shtml

Overview:
Tony Stark = Iron man = good usually.
Zeke Stane = "bad" guy.

From the article:

But Zeke Stane is a very different sort of enemy than what Stark is used to. “Zeke is a post-national business man and kind of an open source ideological terrorist,” explained Fraction, appropriately putting the contrast into software terms. “He has absolutely no loyalty to any sort of law, creed, or credo. He doesn’t want to beat Tony Stark, he wants to make him obsolete. Windows wants to be on every computer desktop in the world, but Linux and Stane want to destroy the desktop. He’s the open source to Stark’s closed source oppressiveness. He has no headquarters, no base, and no bank account. He’s a true ghost in the machine; completely off the grid, flexible, and mobile. That absolutely flies in the face of Tony’s received business wisdom and in the way business is done.

This makes no sense. Why? Because open source is a volunteer activity for the good of the people. It is the ultimate "helping the Grandmother cross the road" by giving her a robot that takes her across when she wants. It is absurd in other words.
This is the equivalent of taking all the people that volunteer for the Red Cross & calling them into terrorists for destroying the business model of the hospital.

Slashdot is the most intellectual nerd site I've ever seen. This is from a comment on an article on the Iron Man movie that is "Anti-Open source":

Yesterday's communist is today's terrorist. Anti Flag said it well in Anatomy of your enemy:

10 easy steps to create an enemy and start a war: Listen closely because we will all see this weapon used in our lives. It can be used on a society of the most ignorant to the most highly educated. We need to see their tactics as a weapon against humanity and not as truth.

First step: create the enemy. Sometimes this will be done for you.

Second step: be sure the enemy you have chosen is nothing like you. Find obvious differences like race, language, religion, dietary habits fashion. Emphasize that their soldiers are not doing a job, they are heartless murderers who enjoy killing!

Third step: Once these differences are established continue to reinforce them with all disseminated information.

Fourth step: Have the media broadcast only the ruling party's information

Iron Man anti-open source movie, anyone? Remember, this is an American movie, and the multinational corporations own and control the US government

this can be done through state run media. Remember, in times of conflict all for-profit media repeats the ruling party's information. Therefore all for-profit media becomes state-run.

Fifth step: show this enemy in actions that seem strange, militant, or different. Always portray the enemy as non-human, evil, a killing machine.

Sixth step: Eliminate opposition to the ruling party. Create an "Us versus Them" mentality. Leave no room for opinions in between. One that does not support all actions of the ruling party should be considered a traitor.

Seventh step: Use nationalistic and/or religious symbols and rhetoric to define all actions.
This can be achieved by slogans such as "freedom loving people versus those who hate freedom." This can also be achieved by the use of flags.

Eighth step: Align all actions with the dominant deity. It is very effective to use terms like, "It is god's will" or "god bless our nation."

Ninth step: Design propaganda to show that your soldiers have feelings, hopes, families, and loved ones. Make it clear that your soldiers are doing a duty; they do not want or like to kill.

Tenth step: Create and atmosphere of fear, and instability and then offer the ruling party as the only solutions to comfort the public's fears. Remembering the fear of the unknown is always the strongest fear.

I remember the "duck and cover" drills. The tactics would be competely useless if there was an atomic explosion, it had no purpose whatever except to create and maintain an atmosphere of fear.

Top 25 Linux Games

http://rangit.com/software/top-8-linux-games-of-2007/

awesome:
http://www.wesnoth.org/
http://www.vendetta-online.com/
http://savage2.s2games.com/

best backup ever: sugarsync

http://www.sugarsync.com/products/sync.html
it is awesome. autosync everything so cheap & easily.
$25/year for 10Gb
up to 250Gb options

Coke and Pepsi's New Marketing Strategy: Pull at Your Heart Strings

http://www.alternet.org/water/79741/
The big bottled water companies are trying to counter negative press by tying their products to charitable causes.

Money buys happiness -- if you spend on someone else

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Money can buy happiness, but only if you spend it on someone else, researchers reported on Thursday.

Spending as little as $5 a day on someone else could significantly boost happiness, the team at the University of British Columbia and Harvard Business School found.

Their experiments on more than 630 Americans showed they were measurably happier when they spent money on others -- even if they thought spending the money on themselves would make them happier.

"We wanted to test our theory that how people spend their money is at least as important as how much money they earn," said Elizabeth Dunn, a psychologist at the University of British Columbia.

They asked their 600 volunteers first to rate their general happiness, report their annual income and detail their monthly spending including bills, gifts for themselves, gifts for others and donations to charity.

"Regardless of how much income each person made, those who spent money on others reported greater happiness, while those who spent more on themselves did not," Dunn said in a statement.

Dunn's team also surveyed 16 employees at a company in Boston before and after they received an annual profit-sharing bonus of between $3,000 and $8,000.

"Employees who devoted more of their bonus to pro-social spending experienced greater happiness after receiving the bonus, and the manner in which they spent that bonus was a more important predictor of their happiness than the size of the bonus itself," they wrote in their report, published in the journal Science.

"Finally, participants who were randomly assigned to spend money on others experienced greater happiness than those assigned to spend money on themselves," they said.

They gave their volunteers $5 or $20 and half got clear instructions on how to spend it. Those who spent the money on someone or something else reported feeling happier about it.

"These findings suggest that very minor alterations in spending allocations -- as little as $5 -- may be enough to produce real gains in happiness on a given day," Dunn said.

This could also explain why people are no happier even though U.S. society is richer.

"Indeed, although real incomes have surged dramatically in recent decades, happiness levels have remained largely flat within developed countries across time," they wrote.

Dozens of children in U.S. face life in prison

http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSN1045443520080321

Dozens of children in U.S. face life in prison
Fri Mar 21, 2008

In all, 2,225 people are sentenced to die in U.S. prisons for crimes they committed as minors and 73 of them were aged 13 and 14 at the time of the crime

Human Rights Watch estimates that only 12 people outside the United States face such sentences.

Not all those serving life-means-life sentences for crimes committed as minors are convicted killers.

Antonio Nunez was convicted of multiple counts of attempted murder and also aggravated kidnapping and sentenced to life without parole for his role in a kidnap, police chase and shootout in April, 2001, in which nobody was injured.

Great Tips

http://www.examiner.com/a-335400~John_Mack__Chairman_and_CEO__Morgan_Stanley.html

My five tips for young people for success

1 Do what you love. Money isn’t everything. You need to find a job that you enjoy — that excites you.

2 Take risks and make mistakes. And learn from those mistakes. If you don’t do that, you won’t grow. Don’t go through life sitting back and not being a risk-taker.

3 Demand to be managed. Demand that your managers make you better. It’s their challenge to mentor you and teach you. It’s your responsibility to make sure they do that.

4 Tell people what you think. Don’t just sit back or be intimidated. You need to do it tactfully, but tell people what you think.

5 Maintain your reputation. Always do what’s right for your client and your company and your own reputation. Success is built on honesty and integrity. And you should do whatever it takes to maintain your reputation.
======================================================
Interesting thoughts! My reactions:
1) Not sure I agree – if you don’t have cash, you can’t do things that you enjoy.
2) Don’t agree either – all I do is get ire if I make mistakes and take risks
3) Doesn’t one just get more ire if one tries this? It’s a good theory, but does it work in practice? Managers don’t seem to have the time to mentor and teach you.
4) Agree to a degree, but not sure if it works in practice.
5) Agree