About the Universe and its "conspiracies"

Sorry folks, but the Universe does not conspire for or against you when you really want something. So resist the (understandable) temptation to think so, when things are going well or badly. It's too convenient, among other things.

Reminds me of a scene in "The Day After" when a woman who sees the nuke mushroom says something like (was ages ago, in the 80s when I watched this TV movie): Does that mean my appointment with my hair dresser for tomorrow is off?

I could reply to tweeps I often unfollow or block

Philosophise on this:

I could reply to tweeps I often unfollow or block. But that would mean my mutation into something I have the skill to be but I am not. Why let myself be mutated by a stranger's tweet? No point. Not even an employer, client or friend. Think of what I am saying here in terms of life management

My cost of doing nothing on Nov 19

Tomorrow, after quite some time, I can afford to do nothing and have it cost me only 13 euros (my all inclusive rent divided by 30), 13 instead of 60, 82, 70, and especially 80 or 100 or in some cases 150! Oh yes, hotel rooms cost, around Europe. That will contribute to my rest - peace of mind while doing nothing. Dolce far niente, right?

What did Alexander the Great and Diogenis of Sinope have in common?

Philosophise on this (re ways of life, life missions, quests, etc):

Why did Alexander the Great, when he met Diogenis of Sinope (see Wikipedia), say that if he wasn't Alexander he would wish to be Diogenis of Sinope?

In other words, what did Alexander the Great and Diogenis (or their missions in life or quests) have in common? Or what is not a common element but an alter element?

In any case, why did he say it?

The value of primary education in life and career

Newsweek recently had 2 very interesting articles on (the US) higher education.

1) "How the Economy is Killing the Liberal Arts"
2) College: Making The Case For Useless Degrees


IMO, when one analyses the value or usefulness of a college degree and a college" major"/content, one has to factor in the very high cost of 4 yrs college.

In addition, it is primary rather than higher education that makes the difference in career and life. IMO everyone needs quantitative & qualitative analysis tools and IME/IMO these tools are best taught at the primary education level.

when the "streets" have an "expiration date"

Take your life back, from the bad memories, from the scars, from the fears, from all the negativity and BS that surrounds us.

Learn when to stay and when to move on; when in doubt, move on, change is almost always a good thing, albeit scary.

a few thoughts on decisions and the governing dynamics

Can a company, government, even household or person afford to make decisions 2day leaving the dynamics (world, etc) out of the equation?

Do the complexity of the financial system and bad public policies dominate the rest of the dynamics (social, etc) in play nowadays?

Constraints? For whom? By whom?

It is not people and small companies that set most limits to themselves, as some claim; Over regulation and legal labyrinths create most constraints IMO.
Systemically speaking how can a person or organisation make rational decisions + operate within a system of thousands of laws - constraints??

No wonder entrepreneurship moved online to escape IRLife's regulatory and legal and red tape labyrinths!! But these are catching up, steadily!

Smarts or Wisdom?

Is a) smarts or b) wisdom the more crucial "skill" or asset for personal - professional success in our era?

I define success as happiness and go for wisdom over smarts.

Why?

Because if information is power, then awareness is super-power. But of course, awareness is much more than mere accumulation of info.

Thus, IMO, the power to collect, have even process information may be a useful tool nowadays, and that applies to the ability to analyse it as well.

But it is in my opinion wisdom that is the "tool" that best makes use of all that in making decisions, be they corporate or personal, for profit, success or, what is most for persons, happiness.

US: Living on food stamps and 2010 socio-economic dynamics

About 6 million of the 300 million Americans (2%), report they have no other income other than the food stamps they receive, according to an analysis of state data collected by The New York Times. One in eight Americans now receives food stamps, including one in four children, reports the NYT!

That, plus the existing healthcare systemics in the US, IMO make one think of the faults in the American socio-economic model.

On the other hand, one might consider that the US model was one of a "make or break" (succeed big or fail big) systemics, with minimum safety net, as opposed to most socio-economic models in Europe. Was the American Dream that was a secure employee or that of an entrepreneur? IMO, the latter. Like the difference in expected return and risk and risk profile between a stock and a bond.

To what extent does the US public opinion wish to move to a more "European" or "bond" model?

"Vagabonding" or "Fortress Building"?

Vagabonding/roaming - being mobile vs. building a "fortress":

What is the best way for a person or family or company to deal with the challenges and parameters of what people like to refer to as "globalization"?

Both options seem to have pros and cons! Capital's main reputed advantage is that it is very mobile! Can humans compete with capital in that "game"? Go where the proper work is to be found?

Or merely "hitchhike" around, experiencing the beauties of this Earth?

Can they do both?

Simplify, rationalise, economise?

Simplify, rationalise, economise is probably my main axiom on the topic of survival and prosperity in these global times (for companies, families, people, etc) .

A few other "axioms" I find relevant include:

1) Do not try to "protect" what you cannot "protect"
2) If you try to "protect" too much, then you wind up "protecting" nothing

A third one is:

3) Do not own what you cannot protect or can have no control over!

In these weird times, I personally think it is best to travel light, in light "armour". Simplicity, logic and rationalisation of problems which occur in daily life, taking "time outs" (as in basket ball), are useful to stay in some % of control over one's own life.

Of course 100% control over one's own life is not possible. But zero or near zero % situations are to be avoided either, I propose.

Does wealth "buy" Freedom?

Is Freedom a privilege reserved for the wealthy?

IMO, it is the opposite.

Most wealthy are not free because what they own winds up owning them.

Freedom is neither free or expensive.

Freedom requires wisdom. Whether wisdom is free or not that is another issue. But Wisdom is not that correlated with wealth, IMO!

And freedom is not correlated with greed, especially for material goods.

Seek wisdom and enlightenment, and life is a journey, and the ticket is affordable for most.

Absolute freedom of a human from other humans does not exist in societies, even the most "libertarian" ones.

Only alone on a island, "free" from the interaction with other humans and their social rules and policies/laws, but not so free when it comes to "co-habitation" with wild animals and nature and its laws!

Carpe Diem

Today is another day!
Another day, a new day, the first one of the rest of our lives.

We enter in it carrying over with us obligations to fulfill, commitments we have made, hopes we have, dreams we have formed, mortgages and/or student loans to pay, rent payments to meet, electricity, water, heating and phone bills to cover, red tape and bureaucratic records of our past, a CV, an album of pains, joys, experiences of all kinds.

How wise or aware are we in this journey into the rest of our lives? Have our days, nights, months and years so far taught us anything? Are we any wiser than we were 1 month, 1 year, 1 decade ago?

Are we living our lives or are they "living" us?

Are we living our lives? What is a "life" (as in "get a life")?

What are we waiting for? The right cloud, the next train, the next subway train, the next promotion, the next vacation/holiday, the next X-mas , the next Spring, the next Summer?

Many of us subscribe to a Carpe Diem philosophy. But there seem to be so many versions of it, as many as the versions of the English language, for example!

Where do we plan to be 1 semester, 1 year from now? Do we have a plan, or even a clue?

To be continued (life goes on, until it does not).

Life is like a hotel room. Everyday someone checks out and someone else checks-in.

Where will you be 100, 1000, 10,000 years from now? You, not humankind, or the offsprings of your offsprings etc etc etc, you. Where were you in 1962, in 1968, in 1984, in 1992, on 31/12/1999, when the New Economy bubble was growing or when it burst, when the first subprime loans were being given or taken, when the last world trade agreement was made, when the last vote was cast? When man stepped on the Moon? When www made its entry into the world?

When Leonidas decided to stay behind with his 300 Spartans (and 1000 Thespians) to delay the invaders, when Alexander the Great decided to campaign East, after he died and the first globalisation occurred? When millions were dying in the trenches of WWI, from bullets or the Spanish flu, when Leonardo was painting or designing new war machines, when Mona Lisa first smiled?

When JFK was assassinated, when MLK said "I had a dream", when the Bolsheviks were seizing power in Russia (November 1917), when Miltiades and his Athenians won the battle in Marathon (November 490 BC)?

Where will you be on January 1, 2011? Where are you, today?

Do you know where you really are, today? Have a nice one! Seize it. Carpe diem or ... something!

Homelessness, Vagabonding and Capitalism

In principle, I see no conflict between homelessness or vagabonding and Capitalism. What we have today is "homeless" and "vagabonding" capital, products, services as well as companies and jobs (or at best migrating). These are more of a problem than a person not having a fixed home, because to cope with globalization one has to become homeless and vagabonding as capital, products, companies, and jobs are, IMO. Home ownership or even rental accommodation carries with it a load of bureaucracy/red tape and various tax related burdens that the libertarian thing to do is not to have a fixed home.

After all, the "market", the real "market" was always in the streets with street vendors and open bazaars. That is where it all started and then bureaucracy etc etc "took over".

The value and appreciation of intelligence

In an era when so many people do not actually think before they speak, write, etc, intelligent people who use their minds pass by as "covertly" as a fly in a glass of milk.

They only thing they can actually do is stay at home (!!!) and do nothing so that their intelligence does not "provoke", especially people who use emotional manipulation and the logic of the intelligent people gets in their way.

Are intelligent people arrogant? IMO it is even more accurate to say that many people dislike the "arrogance" of logic in its capacity (as a thinking tool) to expose prejudice, stereotyping, hatred, emotional manipulation, myths, etc.

But I am not sure that it is intelligence per se that is a key survival skill or asset in these global times.

IMO it is not the IQ or degrees that one has. Many such people are "intellectually lazy", ie they may have a great basic education or a high IQ or advanced degrees, but have lost the appetite for thinking.

Thinking is IMO a competitive advantage and survival skill in these times.

Self and world "awareness and crisis management

One meets many people who are self aware but lack awareness of the world we live in. And some who do the opposite.

One very rarely meets people who have relatively high levels of self and world awareness. Both are needed in this volatile world. And many people with philosophies that have no relation to reality or which are "dogmas" rather than philosophies/strategies on how to live.

They live chaotic lives and worry about the after life, instead of putting their life on earth in some sort of "order".

And they always think they know best and that they are masters of "crisis management". And others are often called upon to clean up the messes they have created!

Make Love not CO2?

Philosophical (applied):

Make Love not CO2: I wonder what is the carbon footprint of each (safe) act of intercourse!

My actual point is that IMO too many people engage in personally and collectively "eco-damaging" activities, many times substitutes of the joy of sex (and the joy of thinking - conversation).

My point re sex is part of a philosophy against materialism and material capitalism and for intellectual and physical satisfaction/joys as opposed to the joys derived by status symbols and other materialist activities and ways of life. Against materialist capitalism and for "intellectual" capitalism (as in production and consumption of intellectual/non-tangible products as opposed to material ones, including many "eco-hostile" culinary pleasures).

And a radical rethink of the pros and cons of the 200 years of the industrial era.

Can the EU lead humankind in sustainability (eco etc)?

Prompted by global warming, humanity must, anyway, revise its ways of life towards simpler, healthier, less materialist, carbon and nuclear free ways of life - lifestyles.

The EU could lead the way in climate change by leaving the WTO + using its internal market to "convince" others to cut CO2 w/o nukes

Humankind's wisdom today

Philosophy

Is humankind today, Dec 29, 2009, wiser than on Jan 1, 2000?

Than Dec 29, 1909?