A few years ago a friend and I drove up to our former college campus, located about two hours north of the Maine-New Hampshire line. It was a beautiful day at the end of May. We went to a local bar that night. After a couple of drinks, we started talking with the man to our left, a professor. He explained that he spent his summers building an entirely self-sufficient home on a property a few hours north of town. He was either in the process of wiring the house for electricity or putting in a plumbing system for water; if I recall correctly, both would draw from renewable sources.
A few days ago, I was walking through the Public Garden. An unmasked man sat on a bench with a woman and a young girl - likely his wife and daughter. I caught the tail end of an exchange with a masked couple walking by - you don't like freedom? I'm only guessing here, but I assumed this comment was related to the masks. I couldn't help but think back to that short conversation in the bar.
There is a difference between freedom and being free to do whatever you like. They are very much the same thing most of the time; the exceptions are delineated by effort. I bet the unmasked man on the bench wasn't aware of the distinction. He probably lived in a home where if the water stopped running or the electricity cut out, he fixed it by calling someone. I'm sure he valued his freedom and meant no harm with his decisions, but there's a certain price to pay when you replace your toolbox with a cell phone, and I'm not just talking about the electric bill.
I wonder how the professor would have answered that question - you don't like freedom? I can imagine what might have gone through his head - in a city, I don't have freedom, and neither do you - that's why he was spending his summer solving 'problems' like how to attach a pipe to a toilet. I don't mind trading some of my freedom in exchange for enjoying certain sanitary advancements, which is why when we started driving back to Boston the next morning, the professor was probably on his way north, to the edge of the grid and beyond.
We drove steadily, listening to The Bones of What You Believe - twice, at my insistence - and pulled over to stock up at the New Hampshire liquor outlet. We crossed the state line into Massachusetts, but the bottles remained closed while I kept the car between the lines; we were enjoying the freedom of the road, but we were only free to do so much.
Friday, July 31, 2020
Thursday, July 30, 2020
reading review - seeking wisdom, riff-off
Let's have a second look at Peter Bevelin's Seeking Wisdom, focusing on specific ideas from his work.
1a) Praise changes behavior, criticism does not - emphasize what is going well.
1b) Appealing to interest almost always works - for example, why do something unethical, since it exposes you to blackmail?
1c) Paying people for a shift and sending them home when the work is done is the best incentive for prompt and accurate work.
Psychology is always lurking in this book and one of its main applications is to motivation. I don't believe in the partnership of carrots and sticks (most carrots are basically sticks anyway) so the above thought helpfully clarifies the orange approach. However, from my experience many people simply don't respond to feedback, preferring instead to make inevitable errors, then 'learning from mistakes'. Why is this such a popular method? Do sailors learn by sinking their own battleships? Self-interest and clear incentives are buoyant tools when directing a deluded skipper.
The third quote was based on a particularly memorable anecdote about shift workers - no matter what the boss did, the work always expanded to fill the allotted time. One day, the boss declared - the shift ends when the work is done. Again, motivation using self-interest, delivered via the clearest of incentives, and in this case enough to ensure an efficient shift.
2a) Humans excel at interpreting new information such that all prior interpretations remain intact.
2b) A good place to put armor is where the bullets did not hit - everyone else hit by those bullets likely didn’t make it back.
The subtlety in the above pair is that when the vehicle returns to the base, the temptation is feel good about the success - they made it home because the armor protected them. The failure to consider those who perished means more of the same, ensuring that the next round of casualties will have been entirely preventable.
3) A great lesson in education is knowing how to do something when it needs to be done, whether you like to do it or not.
This type of 'insight' is a possible way to measure privilege; someone whose life is defined by want and necessity will not derive this great lesson from having to complete a problem set in the wee hours of the morning.
4a) Never ignore a subset of information just because it’s not easily or clearly counted as the rest. Try to be roughly right, not precisely wrong.
4b) An inferior option makes a relatable but superior option more attractive. For example, most people choose money over a fancy pen, but some switch to a fancy pen if a bland pen is added to the original choices.
This picks up on a point I made in the original reading review. The specific example builds on a finding that people overvalue options if it wins in a direct comparison to a similar choice. If you offer someone a fancy pen or money, they choose differently than if the choices included a third option, the bland pen. If you want to be roughly right when choosing among many options, perhaps one way is to narrow the decision to two options, and then proceed as if those earlier options were never part of the equation.
5a) EBITDA is odd because it suggests depreciation is not an expense, that it is a non-cash charge. It’s merely unattractive because you pay before the return, and therefore the returns in the future represent accounting gymnastics.
5b) Cost reductions alone aren’t important, it’s also a question of whether you recognize the benefits of those cost reductions.
Frankly, I only barely understand topics like EBITDA from reading about the balance sheets of soccer clubs, a topic thoroughly covered by The Swiss Ramble (who is now exclusively on Twitter - here's a not very illuminating example that mentions EBITDA). The larger point is good enough for now - the accounting maneuvers are always fun so long as you can support the business with cash flow. Otherwise, it quickly becomes like a river just gone dry; you suddenly see all the crap that inflated the water level.
The cost reductions get to the same idea. Again, on the surface it's always a great idea to reduce costs, but a reduced cost is in itself no automatic benefit. If the immediate benefit isn't obvious, the money is either going into an investment (which will take time to pay off) or to the profit margin (which means it might disappear into ownership's personal bank accounts).
6a) One way to evaluate a stock is to consider the whole thing, then translate the overall business into a pretax revenue amount that equates to your desired rate of return. OK, you value it at $500B, and you want a 10% return… if you must wait a year, that means $80B a year pretax… how many such businesses exist?
6b) Stocks have value because of dividends, not earnings. Earnings are a means to the end, either paid out in dividends or reinvested to produce dividends later. To justify putting down cash now, an asset must return cash later.
I think people create a great deal of confusion for themselves when they think of stocks as something resembling ownership in a company. Sure, there are enough parallels to make it true, but the bottom line is that unless you buy a majority of the shares stock ownership is little more than a right to future earnings. So instead of asking whether you want to 'own' part of the company, ask - can I get a dividend out of this stock asset?
7) Economists do well to ask ‘then what?’ If we trade away future claims on our output, then others have to invest in us.
I was trying to think up a colorful analogy for international trade, and this is what I got: it's like two guys standing face-to-face, each with a handful of the other guy's you-know-whats. They have two options: (1) twist or (2) let go. But here's the catch, or twist - if one guy lets go, the other guy will immediately twist. So what do you think will happen? At the very least, they'll invest enough into the situation so that no one suddenly becomes interested twisting, or letting go.
I've otherwise written enough about this topic - I mean both 'then what', and also Seeking Wisdom. Not sure if I've written enough about My Analogy for #7, but let's say it's enough for now, so I'll, er... let you go. Anyway, we'll finish up with part two next week.
1a) Praise changes behavior, criticism does not - emphasize what is going well.
1b) Appealing to interest almost always works - for example, why do something unethical, since it exposes you to blackmail?
1c) Paying people for a shift and sending them home when the work is done is the best incentive for prompt and accurate work.
Psychology is always lurking in this book and one of its main applications is to motivation. I don't believe in the partnership of carrots and sticks (most carrots are basically sticks anyway) so the above thought helpfully clarifies the orange approach. However, from my experience many people simply don't respond to feedback, preferring instead to make inevitable errors, then 'learning from mistakes'. Why is this such a popular method? Do sailors learn by sinking their own battleships? Self-interest and clear incentives are buoyant tools when directing a deluded skipper.
The third quote was based on a particularly memorable anecdote about shift workers - no matter what the boss did, the work always expanded to fill the allotted time. One day, the boss declared - the shift ends when the work is done. Again, motivation using self-interest, delivered via the clearest of incentives, and in this case enough to ensure an efficient shift.
2a) Humans excel at interpreting new information such that all prior interpretations remain intact.
2b) A good place to put armor is where the bullets did not hit - everyone else hit by those bullets likely didn’t make it back.
The subtlety in the above pair is that when the vehicle returns to the base, the temptation is feel good about the success - they made it home because the armor protected them. The failure to consider those who perished means more of the same, ensuring that the next round of casualties will have been entirely preventable.
3) A great lesson in education is knowing how to do something when it needs to be done, whether you like to do it or not.
This type of 'insight' is a possible way to measure privilege; someone whose life is defined by want and necessity will not derive this great lesson from having to complete a problem set in the wee hours of the morning.
4a) Never ignore a subset of information just because it’s not easily or clearly counted as the rest. Try to be roughly right, not precisely wrong.
4b) An inferior option makes a relatable but superior option more attractive. For example, most people choose money over a fancy pen, but some switch to a fancy pen if a bland pen is added to the original choices.
This picks up on a point I made in the original reading review. The specific example builds on a finding that people overvalue options if it wins in a direct comparison to a similar choice. If you offer someone a fancy pen or money, they choose differently than if the choices included a third option, the bland pen. If you want to be roughly right when choosing among many options, perhaps one way is to narrow the decision to two options, and then proceed as if those earlier options were never part of the equation.
5a) EBITDA is odd because it suggests depreciation is not an expense, that it is a non-cash charge. It’s merely unattractive because you pay before the return, and therefore the returns in the future represent accounting gymnastics.
5b) Cost reductions alone aren’t important, it’s also a question of whether you recognize the benefits of those cost reductions.
Frankly, I only barely understand topics like EBITDA from reading about the balance sheets of soccer clubs, a topic thoroughly covered by The Swiss Ramble (who is now exclusively on Twitter - here's a not very illuminating example that mentions EBITDA). The larger point is good enough for now - the accounting maneuvers are always fun so long as you can support the business with cash flow. Otherwise, it quickly becomes like a river just gone dry; you suddenly see all the crap that inflated the water level.
The cost reductions get to the same idea. Again, on the surface it's always a great idea to reduce costs, but a reduced cost is in itself no automatic benefit. If the immediate benefit isn't obvious, the money is either going into an investment (which will take time to pay off) or to the profit margin (which means it might disappear into ownership's personal bank accounts).
6a) One way to evaluate a stock is to consider the whole thing, then translate the overall business into a pretax revenue amount that equates to your desired rate of return. OK, you value it at $500B, and you want a 10% return… if you must wait a year, that means $80B a year pretax… how many such businesses exist?
6b) Stocks have value because of dividends, not earnings. Earnings are a means to the end, either paid out in dividends or reinvested to produce dividends later. To justify putting down cash now, an asset must return cash later.
I think people create a great deal of confusion for themselves when they think of stocks as something resembling ownership in a company. Sure, there are enough parallels to make it true, but the bottom line is that unless you buy a majority of the shares stock ownership is little more than a right to future earnings. So instead of asking whether you want to 'own' part of the company, ask - can I get a dividend out of this stock asset?
7) Economists do well to ask ‘then what?’ If we trade away future claims on our output, then others have to invest in us.
I was trying to think up a colorful analogy for international trade, and this is what I got: it's like two guys standing face-to-face, each with a handful of the other guy's you-know-whats. They have two options: (1) twist or (2) let go. But here's the catch, or twist - if one guy lets go, the other guy will immediately twist. So what do you think will happen? At the very least, they'll invest enough into the situation so that no one suddenly becomes interested twisting, or letting go.
I've otherwise written enough about this topic - I mean both 'then what', and also Seeking Wisdom. Not sure if I've written enough about My Analogy for #7, but let's say it's enough for now, so I'll, er... let you go. Anyway, we'll finish up with part two next week.
Wednesday, July 29, 2020
lefftovers #6 - proper corona admin, vol lxiii - i'll get corona (cambridgeside door handles)
I'll get corona... from the self-cleaning door handle.
CambridgeSide has debuted the future - door handles, perfectly safe to the touch. I don't have the details so until I learn more, I'll remain skeptical.
Honestly, it reminds me of the old joke - if all they ever recover from the crash is the black box, why not make the whole plane out of the black box? I estimate 0.000001% of the mall's surface is covered by this 'safe to touch' miracle. Here's my guess - if this stuff was So Great, we'd see it everywhere, but of course, we don't. I suspect the best place to get corona is from these handles, which surely have the highest concentration of COVID germs in all the northeast thanks to everyone going out of their way to touch them.
CambridgeSide has debuted the future - door handles, perfectly safe to the touch. I don't have the details so until I learn more, I'll remain skeptical.
Honestly, it reminds me of the old joke - if all they ever recover from the crash is the black box, why not make the whole plane out of the black box? I estimate 0.000001% of the mall's surface is covered by this 'safe to touch' miracle. Here's my guess - if this stuff was So Great, we'd see it everywhere, but of course, we don't. I suspect the best place to get corona is from these handles, which surely have the highest concentration of COVID germs in all the northeast thanks to everyone going out of their way to touch them.
Tuesday, July 28, 2020
leftovers - tall tails
I'm sure some readers are in serious disagreement. I concede that there are some obvious problems with my adjustments to the original idea. I know some people really don't change all that much; I have a friend from my college class that I used to joke was "nineteen going on forty-five". And for the most part, he's been going on forty-five for these past twelve or so years (I guess you'll have to ask me what I think when we turn forty-six).
This friend isn't unique, at least in that respect. 'The Tail End' probably applies better to him than do my above speculations, and on a planet of seven billion I'm sure this is true for many others. Still, I feel people like this are a minority, and that most of us are undergoing some kind of relevant transformation at all times.
This friend isn't unique, at least in that respect. 'The Tail End' probably applies better to him than do my above speculations, and on a planet of seven billion I'm sure this is true for many others. Still, I feel people like this are a minority, and that most of us are undergoing some kind of relevant transformation at all times.
Monday, July 27, 2020
leftovers: reading review - 100 essays i don't have time to write
I tip my cap to whoever courageously titled this collection. I think a healthy strategy for naming books should mirror that for naming children - don't give the bullies anything. I'm sure some brilliant genius, fully realizing the potential suggested when he coined nicknames like 'Smelly Shelly' on the schoolyard, has reviewed this book by calling it "100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Read". Like all forms of bullying, such a comment says far more about the speaker than it does the intended victim; I recommend making good use of the moral high ground, and cutting off the foreseen threat at the pass.
Sunday, July 26, 2020
tall tails
I read this pretty interesting post, 'The Tail End', at the start of the pandemic. For those who don't have the three minutes to spare (it's mostly full of long graphics), here's the quote that best summarizes the main idea:
"It turns out that when I graduated from high school, I had already used up 93% of my in-person parent time. I’m now enjoying the last 5% of that time. We’re in the tail end."
It's a clever idea, and an important insight. A little earlier in the post is another quote that explains the overall point:
"When you look at that reality, you realize that despite not being at the end of your life, you may very well be nearing the end of your time with some of the most important people in your life."
At the start of the pandemic, perhaps I didn't have the energy to muster up my usual skepticism. Things were changing; I was adjusting. If you had asked me then, I wouldn't have just agreed, I would have added - we are running out of time, so savor every moment, live with zest! I was like a fish swimming around the internet, mouth agape as I gobbled up lines from every angler. A few months of almost total alone time ensued, and I think my feet are finally back on familiar ground. What I realize now is that although these ideas about how we spend time with others always looked good at first sight, there are a couple of problems with that post's basic assumptions.
The first is a belief that I see as a dangerous trap - any and all time spent with a person should count as quality time. You might sit alongside a classmate all semester or greet the same colleague every morning for month after month, but you wouldn't reminisce on those moments as 'quality time'; a shared space is no guarantee of forward movement. This problem, easily acknowledged (and dismissed) among casual acquaintances, is more urgent when it goes ignored in how we spend time with friends and family. Many may disagree that their closest relationships are on the pause button, but I fear their protest is only a question of degree. Every once in a while, the effort of forward movement becomes too much and we deal with each other like the head of HR is peering in on the interaction; this is a teetering moment because it won't take much more to fall into a rut.
This bring me to my second problem with an assumption underlying 'The Tail End' - people more or less remain as they are throughout the course of a relationship. It's right there in that first quote - 93% of the time is gone, and now 5% remains (the math adds up if you read the post). It suggests that past and future are part of the same unbroken sequence, like the way you can put a slice of takeout pizza into a container so you can finish the pie tomorrow. But I don't think it's quite accurate in terms of relationships with people. If you assume the person you saw yesterday will still exist when you reconvene next week, you might be surprised to discover that someone went into the refrigerator and changed all the toppings while you were away.
This isn't meant to lead into one of those big and bold, bulletin-board, fortune cookie ideas that remind us how death lurks in the little tick-ticks of each second. I'm not here to talk about the sudden tragedy of an unexpected death - that's a completely different thing. But 'The Tail End' isn't about that, either - it's a wise, measured look at the time we have and what we should do with it. What I'm thinking about is a little different because my belief is that most of us suffer through small deaths each and every day; it doesn't take much to ensure the person that existed yesterday will never see tomorrow. Of course, each death is accompanied by a birth, a new idea that whisks away the bones of a discarded belief, revised ideology, or forgotten commitment. The overall effect is barely noticeable, I hardly recognize it even in myself and I'm pretty much in my own head all the time; I suspect I miss almost every instance of these changes among my closest contacts.
I'm thinking now that considering these two small objections, I can say that although the formula above looks good, the numbers both within and outside the equation are probably wrong. I would first suggest that for the most part we've used up around 99.9% of our time with anyone given how people are always in the midst of some kind of change. We're all well past the tail end, we're standing precariously on the tip. The second aspect, the numbers outside the equation, are equally driven by this reality of constant change; rather than one finite set of interactions with each person, we have an essentially infinite set of opportunities to interact with each iteration. But if you don't catch me the way I am today, you probably have very little opportunity to do so again; the urgency suggests we should give up our tall tales and focus on the reality of the moment, while there is still time.
"It turns out that when I graduated from high school, I had already used up 93% of my in-person parent time. I’m now enjoying the last 5% of that time. We’re in the tail end."
It's a clever idea, and an important insight. A little earlier in the post is another quote that explains the overall point:
"When you look at that reality, you realize that despite not being at the end of your life, you may very well be nearing the end of your time with some of the most important people in your life."
At the start of the pandemic, perhaps I didn't have the energy to muster up my usual skepticism. Things were changing; I was adjusting. If you had asked me then, I wouldn't have just agreed, I would have added - we are running out of time, so savor every moment, live with zest! I was like a fish swimming around the internet, mouth agape as I gobbled up lines from every angler. A few months of almost total alone time ensued, and I think my feet are finally back on familiar ground. What I realize now is that although these ideas about how we spend time with others always looked good at first sight, there are a couple of problems with that post's basic assumptions.
The first is a belief that I see as a dangerous trap - any and all time spent with a person should count as quality time. You might sit alongside a classmate all semester or greet the same colleague every morning for month after month, but you wouldn't reminisce on those moments as 'quality time'; a shared space is no guarantee of forward movement. This problem, easily acknowledged (and dismissed) among casual acquaintances, is more urgent when it goes ignored in how we spend time with friends and family. Many may disagree that their closest relationships are on the pause button, but I fear their protest is only a question of degree. Every once in a while, the effort of forward movement becomes too much and we deal with each other like the head of HR is peering in on the interaction; this is a teetering moment because it won't take much more to fall into a rut.
This bring me to my second problem with an assumption underlying 'The Tail End' - people more or less remain as they are throughout the course of a relationship. It's right there in that first quote - 93% of the time is gone, and now 5% remains (the math adds up if you read the post). It suggests that past and future are part of the same unbroken sequence, like the way you can put a slice of takeout pizza into a container so you can finish the pie tomorrow. But I don't think it's quite accurate in terms of relationships with people. If you assume the person you saw yesterday will still exist when you reconvene next week, you might be surprised to discover that someone went into the refrigerator and changed all the toppings while you were away.
This isn't meant to lead into one of those big and bold, bulletin-board, fortune cookie ideas that remind us how death lurks in the little tick-ticks of each second. I'm not here to talk about the sudden tragedy of an unexpected death - that's a completely different thing. But 'The Tail End' isn't about that, either - it's a wise, measured look at the time we have and what we should do with it. What I'm thinking about is a little different because my belief is that most of us suffer through small deaths each and every day; it doesn't take much to ensure the person that existed yesterday will never see tomorrow. Of course, each death is accompanied by a birth, a new idea that whisks away the bones of a discarded belief, revised ideology, or forgotten commitment. The overall effect is barely noticeable, I hardly recognize it even in myself and I'm pretty much in my own head all the time; I suspect I miss almost every instance of these changes among my closest contacts.
I'm thinking now that considering these two small objections, I can say that although the formula above looks good, the numbers both within and outside the equation are probably wrong. I would first suggest that for the most part we've used up around 99.9% of our time with anyone given how people are always in the midst of some kind of change. We're all well past the tail end, we're standing precariously on the tip. The second aspect, the numbers outside the equation, are equally driven by this reality of constant change; rather than one finite set of interactions with each person, we have an essentially infinite set of opportunities to interact with each iteration. But if you don't catch me the way I am today, you probably have very little opportunity to do so again; the urgency suggests we should give up our tall tales and focus on the reality of the moment, while there is still time.
Saturday, July 25, 2020
biden my time
I was thinking over why I'm so annoyed about Joe Biden - not with, about. It's a general feeling I've conveyed once, or twice, maybe even three times in this space. About is the key word because he would represent an upgrade in the office, and that's kind of the bottom line at the moment. Still, I wanted to make one last quip before I shut my mouth and got back in line; I want to clarify my annoyance.
Imagine if your company hired a new CEO, let's call him... Joe. Joe was in retirement for the past four years but he was coaxed back to duty in a time of great need. Joe was a fringe candidate the last time the role was filled, four years ago, but apparently stepped back because his boss (and CEO at the time) pointed out the obvious - there was already a candidate more qualified for the role than any man or woman in history. For some reason, she didn't get the job, but that's all in the past, just like Joe's retirement, because now he is the CEO. And what has this new hire, Joe, what has Joe done the past four years to become better prepared for the job? I looked and looked and looked - it seems like he's said a few things, some in public, which is great, but nothing that makes a list of 55 important 'Joe' facts. I guess the answer to the question is, during these past four years, he's done nothing to improve his qualifications for the job, a job he wasn't the most qualified for last time.
Would I continue working in this hypothetical company?
That's why I'm annoyed.
Imagine if your company hired a new CEO, let's call him... Joe. Joe was in retirement for the past four years but he was coaxed back to duty in a time of great need. Joe was a fringe candidate the last time the role was filled, four years ago, but apparently stepped back because his boss (and CEO at the time) pointed out the obvious - there was already a candidate more qualified for the role than any man or woman in history. For some reason, she didn't get the job, but that's all in the past, just like Joe's retirement, because now he is the CEO. And what has this new hire, Joe, what has Joe done the past four years to become better prepared for the job? I looked and looked and looked - it seems like he's said a few things, some in public, which is great, but nothing that makes a list of 55 important 'Joe' facts. I guess the answer to the question is, during these past four years, he's done nothing to improve his qualifications for the job, a job he wasn't the most qualified for last time.
Would I continue working in this hypothetical company?
That's why I'm annoyed.
Friday, July 24, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 74 - then what?
I've always described economics - somewhat knowingly, somewhat dismissively - as the discipline of asking "then what?": tax rates go up... then what? A store reduces its hours... then what? The world needs a vaccine for COVID-19... then what? Then what?!? Then you make a vaccine!
A flaw of economics is that most of its topics can be reduced to sound bites such that the clueless masses can delude themselves into a sense of convinced mastery; these people often go on to win elections. But to a question like a vaccine, where the goal is unanimous and the outcome crystal clear, the details matter more than the rah-rah answer. And this is where my long-standing support for using prize incentives rather than the free market comes into the picture; my hunch is that a prize awarded to whoever invents the vaccine will do much more good than relying on patents. This might not necessarily change the speed of research, trials, or outcomes; I only see benefits in the aftermath of the success, in the answer to 'then what?'.
A prize, once-awarded, frees governments to leverage the idea as a true public good; a patent forces the inventor to clutch desperately to the innovation until every available dollar is squeezed from the market. It's not uncommon to vilify companies that set obscene prices for life saving products, but we average citizens don't make innovation very easy for inventors when we refuse to lift a finger in protest until the very last step of the process. Sadly, I have little to offer in terms of exactly how to lodge this complaint, that we should offer prizes instead of patents. Is it possible to politicize the patent office? Economics is about how the world revolves, not revolutions; I have much to learn about spin.
In these dizzying days, the timing feels right. The pandemic seems to have amplified calls for The End of Capitalism, and although I've defended capitalism in some respects I'm sympathetic to those who prefer a new direction; I'll lead the charge if the vision promises to eradicate poverty. But in the meantime, we remain stuck with a certain version of the status quo, so to me rewarding crucial inventions with prizes rather than patents seems like an obvious and necessary compromise. Otherwise, I fear the answer to the critical question - we have the vaccine... then what?
A flaw of economics is that most of its topics can be reduced to sound bites such that the clueless masses can delude themselves into a sense of convinced mastery; these people often go on to win elections. But to a question like a vaccine, where the goal is unanimous and the outcome crystal clear, the details matter more than the rah-rah answer. And this is where my long-standing support for using prize incentives rather than the free market comes into the picture; my hunch is that a prize awarded to whoever invents the vaccine will do much more good than relying on patents. This might not necessarily change the speed of research, trials, or outcomes; I only see benefits in the aftermath of the success, in the answer to 'then what?'.
A prize, once-awarded, frees governments to leverage the idea as a true public good; a patent forces the inventor to clutch desperately to the innovation until every available dollar is squeezed from the market. It's not uncommon to vilify companies that set obscene prices for life saving products, but we average citizens don't make innovation very easy for inventors when we refuse to lift a finger in protest until the very last step of the process. Sadly, I have little to offer in terms of exactly how to lodge this complaint, that we should offer prizes instead of patents. Is it possible to politicize the patent office? Economics is about how the world revolves, not revolutions; I have much to learn about spin.
In these dizzying days, the timing feels right. The pandemic seems to have amplified calls for The End of Capitalism, and although I've defended capitalism in some respects I'm sympathetic to those who prefer a new direction; I'll lead the charge if the vision promises to eradicate poverty. But in the meantime, we remain stuck with a certain version of the status quo, so to me rewarding crucial inventions with prizes rather than patents seems like an obvious and necessary compromise. Otherwise, I fear the answer to the critical question - we have the vaccine... then what?
Thursday, July 23, 2020
reading review - seeking wisdom
Bevelin's incredible work, a compilation of seemingly every piece of wisdom he's ever come across, would have changed my life if I had read it a few years ago; I'm on nodding terms with such books these days. This book is remarkable just for its density. I suppose an easy criticism is to suggest that reading the original sources of these insights might prove more beneficial, but such a dismissal ignores that ingesting Seeking Wisdom instead saves hundreds of hours.
Seeking Wisdom by Peter Bevelin (May 2020)
To expand on the above point, it's an example of opportunity cost, the idea that the best way to value a decision is to compare it against the next best alternative. These sorts of intellectual, academic ideas are covered in exhausting detail over just three hundred pages - applications of the prisoner's dilemma, why relative frequencies influence better than probabilities, or the importance of base rates. Those who want the ten minute version can follow this link to my notes.
The book presents an early insight that serves almost as its mission statement - the best way to achieve wisdom is to master what other people have already figured out. I don't like this thought much - as longtime readers may recall, I have my own definition for wisdom: wisdom is knowing when your experience is relevant. Bevelin is fully in charge of the intellectual relevance of his experiences, as demonstrated by this book, a collection rather than invention; the critical next step is recognizing in his own life those moments where by standing on the shoulders of Munger and Darwin, he has seen beyond where their eyes only saw horizons.
There is so much in this book that I fear going on and on would merely restate the work; my notes above might prove a decent compromise, as could be this extended review and analysis of the book. I am even considering an old-school TOA riff-off, and I do not make that threat lightly. For now, let's close with a thought that has lingered with me over the past couple of months - better roughly right than precisely wrong. Seeking Wisdom explores many ways to apply the idea - for example, increase system efficiency by employing trustworthy people instead of worrying about every little mechanical detail. Bevelin also explores a mathematical angle to the idea, noting that analysis carried out to a third decimal place - often with the help of lawyers, accountants, and consultants - suggest a complexity that should make anyone wary about reaching a clear conclusion. Another way to think of this is that it's easier to multiply by 3 rather than by Pi - not only does it simplify the math, it also forces us to admit that we merely estimating.
Seeking Wisdom by Peter Bevelin (May 2020)
To expand on the above point, it's an example of opportunity cost, the idea that the best way to value a decision is to compare it against the next best alternative. These sorts of intellectual, academic ideas are covered in exhausting detail over just three hundred pages - applications of the prisoner's dilemma, why relative frequencies influence better than probabilities, or the importance of base rates. Those who want the ten minute version can follow this link to my notes.
The book presents an early insight that serves almost as its mission statement - the best way to achieve wisdom is to master what other people have already figured out. I don't like this thought much - as longtime readers may recall, I have my own definition for wisdom: wisdom is knowing when your experience is relevant. Bevelin is fully in charge of the intellectual relevance of his experiences, as demonstrated by this book, a collection rather than invention; the critical next step is recognizing in his own life those moments where by standing on the shoulders of Munger and Darwin, he has seen beyond where their eyes only saw horizons.
There is so much in this book that I fear going on and on would merely restate the work; my notes above might prove a decent compromise, as could be this extended review and analysis of the book. I am even considering an old-school TOA riff-off, and I do not make that threat lightly. For now, let's close with a thought that has lingered with me over the past couple of months - better roughly right than precisely wrong. Seeking Wisdom explores many ways to apply the idea - for example, increase system efficiency by employing trustworthy people instead of worrying about every little mechanical detail. Bevelin also explores a mathematical angle to the idea, noting that analysis carried out to a third decimal place - often with the help of lawyers, accountants, and consultants - suggest a complexity that should make anyone wary about reaching a clear conclusion. Another way to think of this is that it's easier to multiply by 3 rather than by Pi - not only does it simplify the math, it also forces us to admit that we merely estimating.
Wednesday, July 22, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 73 - is that mortimer?
I've written plenty about The Sims; it once seemed on the verge of becoming a monthly feature. The similarity of pandemic life to the gameplay made me wonder recently - what from the game is helping me today?
The key insight is to take every opportunity to meet the social need. This is among eight equally important basic needs in the game, but the only one that cannot be met alone. If the social need is neglected for too long, the end result is personal ruin. I always managed a low social rating by stringing together every small moment - a hello to a passing neighbor, a quick word with a roommate, a short phone call. It never made for a healthy social life, but it was enough to keep me healthy, and enabled me to get on with the other relevant concerns in my isolation.
The key insight is to take every opportunity to meet the social need. This is among eight equally important basic needs in the game, but the only one that cannot be met alone. If the social need is neglected for too long, the end result is personal ruin. I always managed a low social rating by stringing together every small moment - a hello to a passing neighbor, a quick word with a roommate, a short phone call. It never made for a healthy social life, but it was enough to keep me healthy, and enabled me to get on with the other relevant concerns in my isolation.
Tuesday, July 21, 2020
reading review - 100 essays i don't have time to write
This collection from playwright Sarah Ruhl might remind loyal readers of TOA (though of course, I'm unlikely to ever write about theater). Interestingly, the title seems slightly off; of the six essays I marked for a second read, I believe half were of 'essay length'; I say Ms. Ruhl finding the time to 'finish' writing some of these pieces would be a very positive development.
100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Write by Sarah Ruhl (July 2020)
My experience with the theater is limited to a handful of Almost Exposures - a number of improv performances in New York, a Celtic Social Club concert on the stage of the Norwood Theater, and an English class my junior year that ended with a classmate saying 'exeunt class' (this ticked me off because people laughed like it was funny). Despite my glittering history, the most enjoyable parts of this collection were about the theater. I appreciated the observation that rhyme is a tool used by actors to help remember their lines and enjoyed the essay that pointed out how the the main difference of theater and film is the door - in film, the camera is the door, and strips away the power of entering and exiting a stage. For other scattered observations, you can refer to my book notes.
The most important insight in the book describes how casting uses names as hints for ethnicity; I imagine a play about the life of Tim Concannon might find an actor as Asian as Emma Stone. The theatrical implication of this is seen in the challenge of writing a play about a nonwhite character that isn't about race. In the outside world, I might suggest a connection to studies implying that some hiring managers may benefit if names were removed from resumes.
Of the essays I reread, I thought essay #27 ('The four humors: an essay in four parts') was the jewel in this particular crown, and essay #59 ("It's beautiful, but I don't like it") also stood out from the rest ('On interruptions', 'Conflict is drama?', 'The age of commentary', and 'Writing and waiting'). Despite my admiration, I disagree slightly with the key idea from essay #59, which suggests that we lack the ability to separate beauty from our preferences; the skill that seems lacking from the perspective of a playwright is to me one in overabundance elsewhere, perhaps based on my experiences in competitive collegiate athletics, or various corporate work assessments.
Another of my minor challenges grew from a passage that mused on the lack of stories written from a mother's perspective toward her child. Ruhl points out that although some have wondered about the ability of phallocentric language to tell these stories, she feels it's likely these stories simply aren't being told, or told often enough; I worry that it might be just another manifestation of publishing bias, which I learned about while researching my first 'Hello Ladies' post.
One thought I'll carry with me in the coming months is based on Ruhl's insights into the development process. In short, she claims that a poor process strips writers of solitude in the early days while failing to bring in enough outside perspectives during the final stages. I think it's important to remember that we often jog when we should walk or sprint; the middle path sometimes means appropriately balancing one extreme with its opposite.
100 Essays I Don't Have Time to Write by Sarah Ruhl (July 2020)
My experience with the theater is limited to a handful of Almost Exposures - a number of improv performances in New York, a Celtic Social Club concert on the stage of the Norwood Theater, and an English class my junior year that ended with a classmate saying 'exeunt class' (this ticked me off because people laughed like it was funny). Despite my glittering history, the most enjoyable parts of this collection were about the theater. I appreciated the observation that rhyme is a tool used by actors to help remember their lines and enjoyed the essay that pointed out how the the main difference of theater and film is the door - in film, the camera is the door, and strips away the power of entering and exiting a stage. For other scattered observations, you can refer to my book notes.
The most important insight in the book describes how casting uses names as hints for ethnicity; I imagine a play about the life of Tim Concannon might find an actor as Asian as Emma Stone. The theatrical implication of this is seen in the challenge of writing a play about a nonwhite character that isn't about race. In the outside world, I might suggest a connection to studies implying that some hiring managers may benefit if names were removed from resumes.
Of the essays I reread, I thought essay #27 ('The four humors: an essay in four parts') was the jewel in this particular crown, and essay #59 ("It's beautiful, but I don't like it") also stood out from the rest ('On interruptions', 'Conflict is drama?', 'The age of commentary', and 'Writing and waiting'). Despite my admiration, I disagree slightly with the key idea from essay #59, which suggests that we lack the ability to separate beauty from our preferences; the skill that seems lacking from the perspective of a playwright is to me one in overabundance elsewhere, perhaps based on my experiences in competitive collegiate athletics, or various corporate work assessments.
Another of my minor challenges grew from a passage that mused on the lack of stories written from a mother's perspective toward her child. Ruhl points out that although some have wondered about the ability of phallocentric language to tell these stories, she feels it's likely these stories simply aren't being told, or told often enough; I worry that it might be just another manifestation of publishing bias, which I learned about while researching my first 'Hello Ladies' post.
One thought I'll carry with me in the coming months is based on Ruhl's insights into the development process. In short, she claims that a poor process strips writers of solitude in the early days while failing to bring in enough outside perspectives during the final stages. I think it's important to remember that we often jog when we should walk or sprint; the middle path sometimes means appropriately balancing one extreme with its opposite.
Monday, July 20, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 72 - just the numbers
Today's post is dedicated to everybody who asks questions just to fill time.
All numbers below are thirty-day averages unless indicated otherwise. Figures are as of the tenth of each month, starting in February ('pre-covid') and moving steadily up to July ('the present').
Reading (books finished since previous 10th of month)
Feb - 9
Mar - 5
Apr - 2
May - 3
June - 4
July - 2
Running (miles / week)
Feb - 17.98
Mar - 13.48
Apr - 23.10
May - 24.42
June - 27.64
July - 26.93
Weight (pounds)
Feb - 176.57
Mar - 176.33
Apr - 173.77
May - 172.97
June - 173.17
July - 169.63
Writing (minutes / day)
Feb - 67.50
Mar - 63.50
Apr - 73.50
May - 117.00
June - 112.00
July - 107.00
Alcohol (drinks / day)
Feb - 3
Mar - 2
Apr - 2
May - 3
June - 3
July - 2
Laundry (weeks between trips)
Feb - 2
Mar - 2
Apr - 2
May - 2.5
June - 2.5
July - 2.5
Desire to get a smart phone (scale of 1-100)
Feb - 0
Mar - 0
Apr - 0
May - 0
June - 0
July - 0
It's worth noting that those last three stats are 'approximations', in the sense that I can't pull open a spreadsheet and point to those numbers. It's also worth noting that those numbers are correct; I'd rather be dead with my flip phone than alive with a smart phone.
All numbers below are thirty-day averages unless indicated otherwise. Figures are as of the tenth of each month, starting in February ('pre-covid') and moving steadily up to July ('the present').
Reading (books finished since previous 10th of month)
Feb - 9
Mar - 5
Apr - 2
May - 3
June - 4
July - 2
Running (miles / week)
Feb - 17.98
Mar - 13.48
Apr - 23.10
May - 24.42
June - 27.64
July - 26.93
Weight (pounds)
Feb - 176.57
Mar - 176.33
Apr - 173.77
May - 172.97
June - 173.17
July - 169.63
Writing (minutes / day)
Feb - 67.50
Mar - 63.50
Apr - 73.50
May - 117.00
June - 112.00
July - 107.00
Alcohol (drinks / day)
Mar - 2
Apr - 2
May - 3
June - 3
July - 2
Laundry (weeks between trips)
Feb - 2
Mar - 2
Apr - 2
May - 2.5
June - 2.5
July - 2.5
Desire to get a smart phone (scale of 1-100)
Feb - 0
Mar - 0
Apr - 0
May - 0
June - 0
July - 0
It's worth noting that those last three stats are 'approximations', in the sense that I can't pull open a spreadsheet and point to those numbers. It's also worth noting that those numbers are correct; I'd rather be dead with my flip phone than alive with a smart phone.
Sunday, July 19, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 71 - sixes and sevens, part two
I'm back today to add some extra thoughts to my original post, which went up at the end of June.
Let's start with my annual rant about car culture; it's long overdue. Since I was born in 1987, over 1.2 million people have died on America's roads. Again - one point two million people. Using recent statistical trends and ruling out major culture changes, I'm comfortable estimating an additional 1-2 million people will die on America's roads during the remainder of my lifetime. Imagine visiting me on my deathbed and hearing my last words - three million road fatalities in my lifetime...
As noted above, I've ruled out culture as a way to change the future. Our driving culture is corrosive, but we seem happy with it. Quite frankly, it's almost impressive how consistently people have died on our roads despite all the advancements of the past three decades - we're committed, or should be. I'll concede that the trend is generally downward, but progress has been slow; we've moved from an annual death toll of around 45K to 35K over my lifetime. The reduction is nothing to sneeze at (not that we should be sneezing at anything these days) but in my mind I aim a little higher, I aim for zero, so if we continue at this rate I will need to live another one hundred years or so if I want to see the day.
One reason I'm skeptical of culture change is that when I think back to all the drivers I've sat with, I can only recall one person who drove safely during 100% of my passenger time (and I'm sure the realities of old age will soon ruin her perfect record). It's not a massive surprise that drivers pile up minor infractions like they are on some kind of misdemeanor scavenger hunt - speeding a little bit here, not checking every blind spot there, all while rolling a stop sign after that first third drink of the night; my driving instructor bragged that she had successfully argued her way out of twenty-five tickets in traffic court. A revolver with 10,000 chambers isn't banned from Russian Roulette.
I've never understood why so many people die in this country every single year without noticeable public outcry about the tragedies. But perhaps my longtime confusion has clarified my understanding of America's bumbling COVID-19 response. Some people are finding great meaning in life at the moment by waking up every morning, donning their mask, and scolding others for strutting about uncovered, all in The Name of Science. I feel bad for these science evangelists because they've forgotten about those annual automobile fatality rates; they've forgotten the base rate. Getting people to wear masks by explaining the life-saving science is like trying to sell umbrellas to swimmers by extolling the virtues of dryness. When history looks back on this moment, they won't say we were unprepared because we ignored the warnings, acted slowly, or elected clueless leaders - they will say a country that never cared about preventable deaths simply didn't stand a chance.
Let's start with my annual rant about car culture; it's long overdue. Since I was born in 1987, over 1.2 million people have died on America's roads. Again - one point two million people. Using recent statistical trends and ruling out major culture changes, I'm comfortable estimating an additional 1-2 million people will die on America's roads during the remainder of my lifetime. Imagine visiting me on my deathbed and hearing my last words - three million road fatalities in my lifetime...
As noted above, I've ruled out culture as a way to change the future. Our driving culture is corrosive, but we seem happy with it. Quite frankly, it's almost impressive how consistently people have died on our roads despite all the advancements of the past three decades - we're committed, or should be. I'll concede that the trend is generally downward, but progress has been slow; we've moved from an annual death toll of around 45K to 35K over my lifetime. The reduction is nothing to sneeze at (not that we should be sneezing at anything these days) but in my mind I aim a little higher, I aim for zero, so if we continue at this rate I will need to live another one hundred years or so if I want to see the day.
One reason I'm skeptical of culture change is that when I think back to all the drivers I've sat with, I can only recall one person who drove safely during 100% of my passenger time (and I'm sure the realities of old age will soon ruin her perfect record). It's not a massive surprise that drivers pile up minor infractions like they are on some kind of misdemeanor scavenger hunt - speeding a little bit here, not checking every blind spot there, all while rolling a stop sign after that first third drink of the night; my driving instructor bragged that she had successfully argued her way out of twenty-five tickets in traffic court. A revolver with 10,000 chambers isn't banned from Russian Roulette.
I've never understood why so many people die in this country every single year without noticeable public outcry about the tragedies. But perhaps my longtime confusion has clarified my understanding of America's bumbling COVID-19 response. Some people are finding great meaning in life at the moment by waking up every morning, donning their mask, and scolding others for strutting about uncovered, all in The Name of Science. I feel bad for these science evangelists because they've forgotten about those annual automobile fatality rates; they've forgotten the base rate. Getting people to wear masks by explaining the life-saving science is like trying to sell umbrellas to swimmers by extolling the virtues of dryness. When history looks back on this moment, they won't say we were unprepared because we ignored the warnings, acted slowly, or elected clueless leaders - they will say a country that never cared about preventable deaths simply didn't stand a chance.
Saturday, July 18, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 70 - the evaporating covid
My friend learned about evaporation when he was five or six. A few weeks later, he was on a long family car ride. He had to pee; he remembered evaporation. Little squirts, strategically placed, were the hypothesis, but his pants became wetter and wetter. He stuck to his strategy.
This is the best analogy I could come up with for America's coronavirus response. And I'm not trying to say we are collectively pissing our pants (though feel free to say whatever you want, reader). What I'm trying to say is that we learned a little bit of science, and then applied our knowledge. Great idea, but we forgot the most important thing - when the evidence starts coming in, you have to respond, you have to adjust, or you aren't being scientific at all.
This is the best analogy I could come up with for America's coronavirus response. And I'm not trying to say we are collectively pissing our pants (though feel free to say whatever you want, reader). What I'm trying to say is that we learned a little bit of science, and then applied our knowledge. Great idea, but we forgot the most important thing - when the evidence starts coming in, you have to respond, you have to adjust, or you aren't being scientific at all.
Friday, July 17, 2020
reading review - the empathy exams
The Empathy Exams is a wide-ranging collection, each essay exploring Jamison's definition for empathy - a fine line between gift and invasion.
The Empathy Exams by Leslie Jamison (April 2020)
I liked an idea Jamison returns to in various ways - empathy is more inquiry than imagination. It's echoed in another sentiment, that we should say - I can't even imagine - rather than a more common - that must be hard. At the core, I suspect the critical component of empathy is maintaining an open space, and nothing does more to accomplish this goal than a question asked out of genuine curiosity, consideration, and humility.
She adds elsewhere that empathy is in some ways the opposite of impulse, a choice made from attention to extend ourselves past a basic set of instincts. This additional layer helped me understand her point that social confidence is critical to developing and exercising empathy because in many ways our social norms are designed around a faster pace than is healthy for demonstrating empathy. A person who wishes to exercise empathy needs a certain level of confidence, even if it's to just slow the pace, so that important moments of vulnerability are not trampled by a set of conditioned beliefs about the speed with which to interact.
I was very impressed by the insight that offering someone a solution can be seen in a negative light if it replaces another person's ongoing effort. I think this speaks to a broader challenge of empathy in the way that there is always something else happening below the surface which we can only intuit by moving with great care and consideration. We shouldn't mistake people drawing strength from their pain as a signal that they are happy with it, and never wish things were different.
I think one specific idea in the book I didn't have much time for was a notion that one comment is rarely enough to repair years of a destructive refrain. I feel I understand where the idea is coming from but fear its discouraging effect on someone pondering whether to make a comment. If the words we use aren't enough to complete the job, that's OK, but we can still make a small contribution and build toward an eventual outcome. As Mos Def rapped in 'Mathematics':
Why did one straw break the camel's back?
Here's the secret:
The million other straws underneath it
It's all mathematics
Footnotes / endnotes
0. Who knows?
For some reason, this book prompted me to scribble a poem onto my bookmark:
It’s OK
I’m OK
I feel sad
I guess
I think it could survive as a review of this collection. One thing Jamison points out is that sometimes a wound can seem so obvious we forget that it's still our job to point it out, to say "look right here, that's what hurts". The poem is kind of like a progression, the first line a polite response to the innocent "everything OK?" because it seems rude to suggest someone asked a dumb question, and the remaining lines the process of understanding, accepting, and finally articulating the many realities of one moment.
0a. Admin...
Book notes are here, if you need them.
In terms of the 4-1-1, the "what I'm doing next" with this book, it's in the above endnote - remembering that for now victims still need to point to their pain, and that there is a cruel injustice in the fact.
The Empathy Exams by Leslie Jamison (April 2020)
I liked an idea Jamison returns to in various ways - empathy is more inquiry than imagination. It's echoed in another sentiment, that we should say - I can't even imagine - rather than a more common - that must be hard. At the core, I suspect the critical component of empathy is maintaining an open space, and nothing does more to accomplish this goal than a question asked out of genuine curiosity, consideration, and humility.
She adds elsewhere that empathy is in some ways the opposite of impulse, a choice made from attention to extend ourselves past a basic set of instincts. This additional layer helped me understand her point that social confidence is critical to developing and exercising empathy because in many ways our social norms are designed around a faster pace than is healthy for demonstrating empathy. A person who wishes to exercise empathy needs a certain level of confidence, even if it's to just slow the pace, so that important moments of vulnerability are not trampled by a set of conditioned beliefs about the speed with which to interact.
I was very impressed by the insight that offering someone a solution can be seen in a negative light if it replaces another person's ongoing effort. I think this speaks to a broader challenge of empathy in the way that there is always something else happening below the surface which we can only intuit by moving with great care and consideration. We shouldn't mistake people drawing strength from their pain as a signal that they are happy with it, and never wish things were different.
I think one specific idea in the book I didn't have much time for was a notion that one comment is rarely enough to repair years of a destructive refrain. I feel I understand where the idea is coming from but fear its discouraging effect on someone pondering whether to make a comment. If the words we use aren't enough to complete the job, that's OK, but we can still make a small contribution and build toward an eventual outcome. As Mos Def rapped in 'Mathematics':
Why did one straw break the camel's back?
Here's the secret:
The million other straws underneath it
It's all mathematics
Footnotes / endnotes
0. Who knows?
For some reason, this book prompted me to scribble a poem onto my bookmark:
It’s OK
I’m OK
I feel sad
I guess
I think it could survive as a review of this collection. One thing Jamison points out is that sometimes a wound can seem so obvious we forget that it's still our job to point it out, to say "look right here, that's what hurts". The poem is kind of like a progression, the first line a polite response to the innocent "everything OK?" because it seems rude to suggest someone asked a dumb question, and the remaining lines the process of understanding, accepting, and finally articulating the many realities of one moment.
0a. Admin...
Book notes are here, if you need them.
In terms of the 4-1-1, the "what I'm doing next" with this book, it's in the above endnote - remembering that for now victims still need to point to their pain, and that there is a cruel injustice in the fact.
Thursday, July 16, 2020
toa rewind - kyoto caviar (march 2018)
Hi all,
No post today, but I figured that's no reason to do nothing. Since I have some new readers these days, I figured on these 'off days' I can go back and pull a winner (or a loser) from the TOA archives.
Here's today's throwback, 'Kyoto Caviar', when I wondered how the process of translating food words affects the willingness of folks to try a bite or two.
Back tomorrow, thanks for reading.
No post today, but I figured that's no reason to do nothing. Since I have some new readers these days, I figured on these 'off days' I can go back and pull a winner (or a loser) from the TOA archives.
Here's today's throwback, 'Kyoto Caviar', when I wondered how the process of translating food words affects the willingness of folks to try a bite or two.
Back tomorrow, thanks for reading.
Wednesday, July 15, 2020
reading review - strangers in their own land
I recommend this book to anyone interesting in learning about different perspectives, whether it be that of the author or those of her subjects, but I suggest looking elsewhere if you are seeking additional building blocks to reinforce your political views. Hochschild's project, based on her experiences as a liberal sociologist getting to know Louisiana Tea Party supporters over a five-year period, fascinated me simply because she used a tool viewed with great disdain these days - listening - but it offers no sweeping explanations or interpretations of national politics.
Strangers In Their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild (April 2020)
I was chatting about something unrelated to this book a few days ago when I stumbled into an amusing observation - when policy goes wrong, some people will blame the elected politician of the moment while others will blame the very idea of government. There are plenty of colorful analogies - is the bad diagnosis the fault of one doctor, or the hospital? When your medium-rare steak is indistinguishable from a hockey puck, is that the cook's fault, or should you blame the entire restaurant? At some point I'll write more about the larger idea here of how we apportion blame to either a culpable individual or the larger system that enabled the individual.
In the context of this book, the question that kept coming back to me was jobs. What is the effect on people when they constantly see companies create jobs in a community while governments lurk on the city limits with a tax bill in hand? I think this is a massive factor in the way people come to form their views on government. My personal experience is that my employment prospects don't change due to size or influence of government, but I've never seen a large chunk of my city's jobs go away thanks to an international deal, a national policy, or a local regulation. If the government creates a problem for me, I'm much more likely to blame someone in charge and look to some policy action (including voting) as a way to do it right next time. On the other hand, if I saw the world differently, it probably would make no difference to me who was in office because the office itself was the issue. There's a similar but less formed thought in my head regarding vaccines and the way some people are inexplicably against the very idea. This is impossible to relate to using my life experiences, but I might feel differently if I were accustomed to being lied to by governments.
Another aspect of the book that caught my attention was Hochschild's reference to class conflict. My hunch is that American society has blurred its class lines to the point that conflicts go unseen by most eyes, and perhaps in a sense this makes them effectively nonexistent (certainly so if you compare it to the prominence of conflicts along racial, economic, or religious lines). But when I think in the context of how policies are created and enacted, it clarifies the way class battles play out through political ideology. The specific note I wrote down stated that when government takes money from working people and redistributes it to the idle, it creates a battleground for conflict between the blue-collar and the poor. The thought leaves little room for acknowledging more complex viewpoints, such as when a government uses redistribution as a way to accept culpability for keeping people in poverty, or whether those being taxed desperately need the money being taken out of their paychecks or communities. In a country where some estimate half the tax benefits go to the 20% of richest Americans, we need to do better than using policy to force our hardest working groups to support others who are in a crisis moment.
There were a couple of ideas in this book that have lingered in my mind. First, I'm curious about the way Hochschild frames a certain premise of the book as a 'paradox' - that although red states would likely benefit from more government assistance, they tend to vote against it. It's clearly a paradox... if you believe people should vote entirely based on some academic model of economic self-interest. So why not write a book about all the rich liberals who voted against Trump, even though it probably would have been to their economic self-interest? It's a paradox if you don't agree? It's always problematic to start on a premise that describes everyone yet applies to no one (or is it the reverse?) so although I liked the end result of this project, I'm not going to give extra credit for the starting premise.
The second thought was about bullying in general, a consideration sparked by a comment that blue states sometimes mock, belittle, or insult red states. It reminded me of my own discomfort with a certain style of comedy, one that mocks the victim rather than the con artist, because the third rail of such jokes is always a power discrepancy. Hochschild notes that she didn't meet anyone who used the same inflammatory language associated with Fox News, so why are its viewers apparently subject to criticism from those who assume the news outlet is a mouthpiece? It just comes back to power and the logic of the bully, who will always do the easy thing; it's far easier to make fun of someone for watching a TV show than it is to attack the presenting network.
One of my final notes would fascinate me as its own book - what do left and right have in common? I wrote down getting big money out of politics and the need to reduce the prison population; Hochschild also added that among younger generations there is consensus about the environment. I'll add my own editorial that infrastructure seems to be a shared priority. It would be a fascinating experiment to see what would happen over a few years if the focus turned to investing in areas of joint agreement rather than the current tug-of-war over perpetually competing priorities. For now, I think my personal next step from this book is to continue looking for additional consensus issues.
Footnotes / endnote / book notes
Here's the link to my reading notes from this book, mostly a collection of insights or opinions related to the subject matter. I must say, this was a classic TOA book, in the sense that I could take down comments even from parts of the book I found uninteresting, or disconnected from the larger themes.
Strangers In Their Own Land by Arlie Russell Hochschild (April 2020)
I was chatting about something unrelated to this book a few days ago when I stumbled into an amusing observation - when policy goes wrong, some people will blame the elected politician of the moment while others will blame the very idea of government. There are plenty of colorful analogies - is the bad diagnosis the fault of one doctor, or the hospital? When your medium-rare steak is indistinguishable from a hockey puck, is that the cook's fault, or should you blame the entire restaurant? At some point I'll write more about the larger idea here of how we apportion blame to either a culpable individual or the larger system that enabled the individual.
In the context of this book, the question that kept coming back to me was jobs. What is the effect on people when they constantly see companies create jobs in a community while governments lurk on the city limits with a tax bill in hand? I think this is a massive factor in the way people come to form their views on government. My personal experience is that my employment prospects don't change due to size or influence of government, but I've never seen a large chunk of my city's jobs go away thanks to an international deal, a national policy, or a local regulation. If the government creates a problem for me, I'm much more likely to blame someone in charge and look to some policy action (including voting) as a way to do it right next time. On the other hand, if I saw the world differently, it probably would make no difference to me who was in office because the office itself was the issue. There's a similar but less formed thought in my head regarding vaccines and the way some people are inexplicably against the very idea. This is impossible to relate to using my life experiences, but I might feel differently if I were accustomed to being lied to by governments.
Another aspect of the book that caught my attention was Hochschild's reference to class conflict. My hunch is that American society has blurred its class lines to the point that conflicts go unseen by most eyes, and perhaps in a sense this makes them effectively nonexistent (certainly so if you compare it to the prominence of conflicts along racial, economic, or religious lines). But when I think in the context of how policies are created and enacted, it clarifies the way class battles play out through political ideology. The specific note I wrote down stated that when government takes money from working people and redistributes it to the idle, it creates a battleground for conflict between the blue-collar and the poor. The thought leaves little room for acknowledging more complex viewpoints, such as when a government uses redistribution as a way to accept culpability for keeping people in poverty, or whether those being taxed desperately need the money being taken out of their paychecks or communities. In a country where some estimate half the tax benefits go to the 20% of richest Americans, we need to do better than using policy to force our hardest working groups to support others who are in a crisis moment.
There were a couple of ideas in this book that have lingered in my mind. First, I'm curious about the way Hochschild frames a certain premise of the book as a 'paradox' - that although red states would likely benefit from more government assistance, they tend to vote against it. It's clearly a paradox... if you believe people should vote entirely based on some academic model of economic self-interest. So why not write a book about all the rich liberals who voted against Trump, even though it probably would have been to their economic self-interest? It's a paradox if you don't agree? It's always problematic to start on a premise that describes everyone yet applies to no one (or is it the reverse?) so although I liked the end result of this project, I'm not going to give extra credit for the starting premise.
The second thought was about bullying in general, a consideration sparked by a comment that blue states sometimes mock, belittle, or insult red states. It reminded me of my own discomfort with a certain style of comedy, one that mocks the victim rather than the con artist, because the third rail of such jokes is always a power discrepancy. Hochschild notes that she didn't meet anyone who used the same inflammatory language associated with Fox News, so why are its viewers apparently subject to criticism from those who assume the news outlet is a mouthpiece? It just comes back to power and the logic of the bully, who will always do the easy thing; it's far easier to make fun of someone for watching a TV show than it is to attack the presenting network.
One of my final notes would fascinate me as its own book - what do left and right have in common? I wrote down getting big money out of politics and the need to reduce the prison population; Hochschild also added that among younger generations there is consensus about the environment. I'll add my own editorial that infrastructure seems to be a shared priority. It would be a fascinating experiment to see what would happen over a few years if the focus turned to investing in areas of joint agreement rather than the current tug-of-war over perpetually competing priorities. For now, I think my personal next step from this book is to continue looking for additional consensus issues.
Footnotes / endnote / book notes
Here's the link to my reading notes from this book, mostly a collection of insights or opinions related to the subject matter. I must say, this was a classic TOA book, in the sense that I could take down comments even from parts of the book I found uninteresting, or disconnected from the larger themes.
Tuesday, July 14, 2020
all the news that fits your budget
I just reread my post from two weeks ago. It's vaguely about The Onion but peel back the layers and you'll find a little jab at paywalls: ...while our so-called great media institutions hide behind paywalls...
Back in my day, you couldn't charge for an hours-old paper, but thankfully paywalls remedied this issue. You can now pay full price to read something written three weeks ago about something that happened three months ago. Of course, the paywall has created its own strange conundrum - it means we're charged equally regardless of the news being old or, well, news. Dystopian, right?
Charging for old news is a magazine's job, since old news isn't news. So what's behind the paywall, a newspaper or a magazine? It feels like an important distinction; something just doesn't sit right with me about a world that charges for news. It's a little like being lied to by omission - instead of being told fake things, you just aren't told anything, at least until you open your wallet; for a low monthly fee, all the world becomes a stage again, and we are merely payers.
Back in my day, you couldn't charge for an hours-old paper, but thankfully paywalls remedied this issue. You can now pay full price to read something written three weeks ago about something that happened three months ago. Of course, the paywall has created its own strange conundrum - it means we're charged equally regardless of the news being old or, well, news. Dystopian, right?
Charging for old news is a magazine's job, since old news isn't news. So what's behind the paywall, a newspaper or a magazine? It feels like an important distinction; something just doesn't sit right with me about a world that charges for news. It's a little like being lied to by omission - instead of being told fake things, you just aren't told anything, at least until you open your wallet; for a low monthly fee, all the world becomes a stage again, and we are merely payers.
Monday, July 13, 2020
quota proofreading
I heard once that a quota is a great tool for removing the most undeserving of a disproportionately represented group. This idea makes sense to me. If I go from eating a different takeout pizza every night to eating just one per month, the pizzas I stop eating will be the worst pies of the bunch.
I wonder if a beginning writer needs form in the same way a lazy decision maker needs quotas. If you are new to the craft, an essay like "Ten Ways Coronavirus Changed My Life" means the eleventh idea gets scrapped - the structure forces a choice. But if you have no idea what you are doing and fail to work within some kind of structure, you might just end up listing all the ways life changed, and forget to consider whether there is a threshold that no longer interests the reader.
I wonder if a beginning writer needs form in the same way a lazy decision maker needs quotas. If you are new to the craft, an essay like "Ten Ways Coronavirus Changed My Life" means the eleventh idea gets scrapped - the structure forces a choice. But if you have no idea what you are doing and fail to work within some kind of structure, you might just end up listing all the ways life changed, and forget to consider whether there is a threshold that no longer interests the reader.
Sunday, July 12, 2020
lost
My mom died five years ago today. In the past, I've indirectly referenced the occasion on TOA, usually sneaking an acknowledgement of the day into a seemingly unrelated post. I started working on something similar earlier this week but it wasn't really clicking, so I gave up and decided on a more direct approach. I guess I envisioned something like a tribute, a process of fully explaining what I heard when people told me: sorry for your loss.
Unfortunately, I don't think this is going to work, either. I've lost something, but I don't know what. Or maybe I should say, I don't know who I've lost; I'm lost. It's like I've finally envisioned someone asking me - can you describe your loss? - and in the process of writing down my answer, I've realized I can't do it.
That's not to say I have no sense of who she was, or that I sleepwalked through twenty-seven and a half years. I have a great memory, and many great memories. Minutes before my last high school basketball game, the seniors exchanged warm hugs and kisses with their mothers and gave them flowers as part of a long 'Senior Day' tradition; mine punched me in the shoulder, and brandished her bouquet in my direction like a samurai warlord threatening to attack - I scored twenty points in the first half. What I've retained about her mannerisms speaks to my retention; the rare impressions I do of her have been described as 'spot on', and this feedback validates both my exhilaration and exhaustion from the exertion of resurrection. It's my inheritance, this wealth of recognition, a priceless treasure that winks without warning from the burial ground within me. I often suspect her ghost is in the vicinity whenever I see her living on in the way I do things - how I run two miles more than I should, or express my aversion to categorization, or derive great pleasure from teaching. There is music living in me, and I know why. I still have so much that I feel weird wondering about what I've lost.
I suspect I'm in a pretty common conundrum, one that's almost inevitable whenever someone dies before old age; what I've lost is hard to explain because I never had it. Finishing school, finding work, moving out and starting my adult life - when I completed the process of growing up, always under my mom's watchful eye, I could finally get to know her as a person outside the identity of 'my mom'. I remember meeting my parents a few months after I moved out for a drink in The Prudential Tower. We were three adults on top of the world with no clue how to speak to each other, but willing to learn, looking forward to learning, and looking forward to the future - that's what I lost.
Unfortunately, I don't think this is going to work, either. I've lost something, but I don't know what. Or maybe I should say, I don't know who I've lost; I'm lost. It's like I've finally envisioned someone asking me - can you describe your loss? - and in the process of writing down my answer, I've realized I can't do it.
That's not to say I have no sense of who she was, or that I sleepwalked through twenty-seven and a half years. I have a great memory, and many great memories. Minutes before my last high school basketball game, the seniors exchanged warm hugs and kisses with their mothers and gave them flowers as part of a long 'Senior Day' tradition; mine punched me in the shoulder, and brandished her bouquet in my direction like a samurai warlord threatening to attack - I scored twenty points in the first half. What I've retained about her mannerisms speaks to my retention; the rare impressions I do of her have been described as 'spot on', and this feedback validates both my exhilaration and exhaustion from the exertion of resurrection. It's my inheritance, this wealth of recognition, a priceless treasure that winks without warning from the burial ground within me. I often suspect her ghost is in the vicinity whenever I see her living on in the way I do things - how I run two miles more than I should, or express my aversion to categorization, or derive great pleasure from teaching. There is music living in me, and I know why. I still have so much that I feel weird wondering about what I've lost.
I suspect I'm in a pretty common conundrum, one that's almost inevitable whenever someone dies before old age; what I've lost is hard to explain because I never had it. Finishing school, finding work, moving out and starting my adult life - when I completed the process of growing up, always under my mom's watchful eye, I could finally get to know her as a person outside the identity of 'my mom'. I remember meeting my parents a few months after I moved out for a drink in The Prudential Tower. We were three adults on top of the world with no clue how to speak to each other, but willing to learn, looking forward to learning, and looking forward to the future - that's what I lost.
Saturday, July 11, 2020
leftovers #5: proper corona admin, vol lxiii - i'll get corona (business bros)
It's been about four months since the start of the initial lockdown. What have we learned?
I'll get corona... from a business bro.
In some cases, not much. At this point, most organizations should know the impact of a full work from home arrangement on their teams. There should be no surprises for those being called back into the office - if the work was done just fine over these past four months, it will likely remain fine until we all have our vaccinations, so no need to come back.
Right?
So what words of comfort can I offer to those being unreasonably asked to report back to a central location, and rejoin the rat race of becoming the next epicenter of COVID-19? A business bro talks knowledgeably about what they know not; if your boss is a business bro, what were you expecting?
I'll get corona... from a business bro.
In some cases, not much. At this point, most organizations should know the impact of a full work from home arrangement on their teams. There should be no surprises for those being called back into the office - if the work was done just fine over these past four months, it will likely remain fine until we all have our vaccinations, so no need to come back.
Right?
So what words of comfort can I offer to those being unreasonably asked to report back to a central location, and rejoin the rat race of becoming the next epicenter of COVID-19? A business bro talks knowledgeably about what they know not; if your boss is a business bro, what were you expecting?
Friday, July 10, 2020
the business bro gives steph curry feedback
Most aspiring leaders know the importance of feedback. Indeed, giving feedback might be the most important leadership skill because it's tied so closely to growth, and without growth you have stagnation. You don't need a leader for something going nowhere.
Giving feedback is certainly the most unnatural leadership skill. Most people don't really give feedback unless they are in a specific kind of situation - offices, classrooms, workshops. This means that unlike most other skills, leaders don't have a wealth of life experience to supplement their learned abilities. Perhaps this explains why most people give terrible feedback.
The best recommendation I have for giving good feedback is to avoid dwelling on irrelevant weaknesses. This doesn't mean ignore all weaknesses, it just means focus on the small handful that might prove lethal to goals, aspirations, or growth. Everything else, just ignore it.
Imagine if a basketball coach tried to teach Steph Curry how to shoot with his left hand! You could say that this coach identified Curry's the biggest skill deficit while managing to prove a complete lack of coaching credentials. The best feedback would help Curry apply his transcendent right-handed shooting to a greater range of situations. It works the same way for anyone else - the best feedback acknowledges someone's strengths by pointing out one or two ways to apply that strength across an even wider range of opportunities.
Giving feedback is certainly the most unnatural leadership skill. Most people don't really give feedback unless they are in a specific kind of situation - offices, classrooms, workshops. This means that unlike most other skills, leaders don't have a wealth of life experience to supplement their learned abilities. Perhaps this explains why most people give terrible feedback.
The best recommendation I have for giving good feedback is to avoid dwelling on irrelevant weaknesses. This doesn't mean ignore all weaknesses, it just means focus on the small handful that might prove lethal to goals, aspirations, or growth. Everything else, just ignore it.
Imagine if a basketball coach tried to teach Steph Curry how to shoot with his left hand! You could say that this coach identified Curry's the biggest skill deficit while managing to prove a complete lack of coaching credentials. The best feedback would help Curry apply his transcendent right-handed shooting to a greater range of situations. It works the same way for anyone else - the best feedback acknowledges someone's strengths by pointing out one or two ways to apply that strength across an even wider range of opportunities.
Thursday, July 9, 2020
mercy
I can't quite pin down my thoughts on the song 'Mercy'. The second single from the 2015 album Drones, it's been a surprise highlight of my two Muse concerts. I'm tempted to write it off with something ambitiously smarmy - 'Mercy' is my fourth-favorite track from my fourth-favorite album by my fourth-favorite band - but it wouldn't feel right to dismiss a song where we fans clap along as if it's part two of 'Starlight', or we're part, too, of the rhythm secction. My lasting memory of 'Mercy' is the feeling of joining into a group celebration - we're all Muse fans! But shouldn't a song with such a lofty distinction sound more... like Muse? Maybe in the mold of 'Time Is Running Out'?
Regardless, I've been trying to figure out why this song seems to have such a great effect on the concert crowd. The first lyrics in the song might be a hint - help me, I've fallen on the inside. I think as the average Muse crowd gets a little older, the song makes more sense to us. At some point, we've all felt something fall away from us, within us, like it's gone forever to the inside. It's an intensely personal sensation, but the song drowns out the darkness, and for a few minutes we forget our decision to suffer alone.
Those first words always remind me of the Japanese phrase ochikomu, meaning 'be depressed'. It's really two words working together, 'to fall' (ochiru) and 'be crowded' (komu), and I think it does much more to capture the feeling than any equivalent English expression. It's one thing to feel completely defeated by a powerful opponent or a uniquely tragic situation, but when the darkness is borne out of an everyday setback we sometimes can't help but become our own harshest critic. And what is a better word than crowded for feeling unable to get away from our own critics? And of course, there is nowhere to stand up in a crowd that won't allow it.
Lyrically, Muse has steadily drifted from introspective beginnings to broader commentaries on the larger forces shaping daily life. Drones is often described as a concept album, using the idea of an autonomous machine as a starting point for many of its songs. Matt Bellamy himself has said Drones charts a journey that ends in a human drone rebelling against an oppressor. But in 'Mercy', I've always felt that subtle reference to individual complicity, mind over what matters, eroding our individuality with every little self-flagellation. The song is the awakening before forgiveness, before we ask those around us, because we must forgive ourselves first, and allow ourselves to stand up on the inside. If we have no mercy for ourselves, who will show it to us? Given how I've seen others around me respond to the song, maybe some, maybe many, of my fellow Muse fans wonder the same thing, just briefly, before they make room so their seatmate can stand up.
Regardless, I've been trying to figure out why this song seems to have such a great effect on the concert crowd. The first lyrics in the song might be a hint - help me, I've fallen on the inside. I think as the average Muse crowd gets a little older, the song makes more sense to us. At some point, we've all felt something fall away from us, within us, like it's gone forever to the inside. It's an intensely personal sensation, but the song drowns out the darkness, and for a few minutes we forget our decision to suffer alone.
Those first words always remind me of the Japanese phrase ochikomu, meaning 'be depressed'. It's really two words working together, 'to fall' (ochiru) and 'be crowded' (komu), and I think it does much more to capture the feeling than any equivalent English expression. It's one thing to feel completely defeated by a powerful opponent or a uniquely tragic situation, but when the darkness is borne out of an everyday setback we sometimes can't help but become our own harshest critic. And what is a better word than crowded for feeling unable to get away from our own critics? And of course, there is nowhere to stand up in a crowd that won't allow it.
Lyrically, Muse has steadily drifted from introspective beginnings to broader commentaries on the larger forces shaping daily life. Drones is often described as a concept album, using the idea of an autonomous machine as a starting point for many of its songs. Matt Bellamy himself has said Drones charts a journey that ends in a human drone rebelling against an oppressor. But in 'Mercy', I've always felt that subtle reference to individual complicity, mind over what matters, eroding our individuality with every little self-flagellation. The song is the awakening before forgiveness, before we ask those around us, because we must forgive ourselves first, and allow ourselves to stand up on the inside. If we have no mercy for ourselves, who will show it to us? Given how I've seen others around me respond to the song, maybe some, maybe many, of my fellow Muse fans wonder the same thing, just briefly, before they make room so their seatmate can stand up.
Wednesday, July 8, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 69 - phase four is phase one
The saddest routine news story during the pandemic was about every sick person who died alone. It reflected a necessary containment measure, but unlike the other strategies this asked the most vulnerable among us to sever the final rope that tethered them to the living world. In those dark moments, I reflected on my past four years of hospice volunteer work. Even in the best of times, it seemed someone was always about to die alone, so each week was an appeal against destiny. When the pandemic ends people will still die alone, and I'll be ready to get back to work.
I think many have felt something these past few months, perhaps manifesting as outrage, despair, or helplessness. Some tragedy hits us at the very core and we can do nothing more than shudder in the silent air of home. Hang onto that feeling, and remember it. When things return to a New Normal, the outrage, despair, or helplessness may pass, but most of the underlying problems will remain. Take advantage of a second chance, and follow the feeling until someone gladly welcomes your helping hand.
I think many have felt something these past few months, perhaps manifesting as outrage, despair, or helplessness. Some tragedy hits us at the very core and we can do nothing more than shudder in the silent air of home. Hang onto that feeling, and remember it. When things return to a New Normal, the outrage, despair, or helplessness may pass, but most of the underlying problems will remain. Take advantage of a second chance, and follow the feeling until someone gladly welcomes your helping hand.
Tuesday, July 7, 2020
proper corona admin, vol 68 - see you in phase four
I suspect peer pressure is a big problem at the moment. Not all of us religiously imitate somebody else, but I know most prefer solidarity to solitude. I feel for the odd ducks who can't dive into reopening even while their closest friends are partying like it's 1975 - or even 2019 - particularly if they've always defined individuality as 'freely choosing to be a follower', and have no experience being alone on the docks.
I've had no problem saying - get back to me in Phase 4. Lucky me, my imitation skills are completely atrophied. What's it like to finally hear the beat of your own drummer? Let me know. I think some are about to discover the first step to becoming peerless is to be without peers, to peer less at others, because when it comes to healthy creativity, herd immunity is the fastest way to become sick.
I've had no problem saying - get back to me in Phase 4. Lucky me, my imitation skills are completely atrophied. What's it like to finally hear the beat of your own drummer? Let me know. I think some are about to discover the first step to becoming peerless is to be without peers, to peer less at others, because when it comes to healthy creativity, herd immunity is the fastest way to become sick.
Monday, July 6, 2020
leftovers #4: proper corona admin, vol lxiii - i'll get corona (bubbles)
Hey look folks, just because I wasted your time on Father's Day doesn't mean I listed every possible way to become sick. Here's another to start your week.
I'll get corona... from a bubble.
Honestly, this one is like a 'Choose Your Own Adventure', almost any definition of a bubble works. But my thought was specific to the bubbles you blow out of a stick, which then creates a natural floating container of The Novel Coronavirus.
Right?
I'm trying to walk home and some eight-year old is firing bubbles at me like he's Luke Skywalker getting after the Death Star... probably a West Ham fan, hang in there little fella.
I'll get corona... from a bubble.
Honestly, this one is like a 'Choose Your Own Adventure', almost any definition of a bubble works. But my thought was specific to the bubbles you blow out of a stick, which then creates a natural floating container of The Novel Coronavirus.
Right?
I'm trying to walk home and some eight-year old is firing bubbles at me like he's Luke Skywalker getting after the Death Star... probably a West Ham fan, hang in there little fella.
Sunday, July 5, 2020
changing our stripes
Let's start with a confession about the past couple of days.
My original thought on July 3 was that when I went back and looked through my TOA archives, I would find a July 4 post referencing an idea that's been on my mind these past few weeks. I'll paraphrase what I expected to see - our flag is stars and stripes, the stars a reminder of our capacity for change, the stripes our insistence on building around a shared foundation. To my surprise, I saw nothing in those July 4 posts referencing anything resembling this idea. But, I admitted that there was some decent material that I could highlight while poking fun at myself. So, I continued my stroll down memory lane as planned, even if I had set out with different expectations.
After I finalized yesterday's post, I had an odd realization - surely, I did write about the changing stars, the foundational stripes? The advantage of having TOA stretch back into the Obama administration is that pretty much all my recent thinking is posted somewhere. I decided to look again, this time searching through posts from other holidays. And sure enough, Labor Day 2016 (but a day late!) - 'Finding Meaning in Work'. It meanders about for a bit, referencing the history of Labor Day and all that, but I must say it really takes off from the line "I used to play sports all the time."
The section I was looking for comes a few sentences later:
"When we add states, the stripes remain fixed. To me, this represents the worst part of America- its capacity to cling to the past and to outdated ideas and to worry about exactly where certain colors are supposed to go."
So where do I stand regarding that thought four years later, and just one day after the most unusual circumstances surrounding a July 4 of my lifetime? In terms of the spirit of the idea, I think what I've posted the past couple of days demonstrates my general optimism in both the potential and the likelihood of meaningful change. But I must acknowledge that in this moment Massachusetts feels like a foreign country compared to the other states. There's been some truth to this fact all throughout my life, but the feeling is stronger right now than it's ever been in the past. Knowing that much of my experience is based on what I'm seeing here in Massachusetts, I understand it's possible I've misread the reaction elsewhere, and it makes me cautious about extending my conclusions into other parts of the country.
Literally speaking, I predict America will change its stripes at some point. Simply put, the stripes represent a different time, when Massachusetts was in fact a lot like the rest of America simply for having slaves. It feels inevitable that America will reach a point where we are no longer interested in preserving our oldest symbol of those times. That's not to say I expect this to happen tomorrow, next year, or even during my lifetime. I'm merely confident that before America goes extinct, we'll salute a flag everyone can be proud of, and it will require a very different look to the one we fly today.
My original thought on July 3 was that when I went back and looked through my TOA archives, I would find a July 4 post referencing an idea that's been on my mind these past few weeks. I'll paraphrase what I expected to see - our flag is stars and stripes, the stars a reminder of our capacity for change, the stripes our insistence on building around a shared foundation. To my surprise, I saw nothing in those July 4 posts referencing anything resembling this idea. But, I admitted that there was some decent material that I could highlight while poking fun at myself. So, I continued my stroll down memory lane as planned, even if I had set out with different expectations.
After I finalized yesterday's post, I had an odd realization - surely, I did write about the changing stars, the foundational stripes? The advantage of having TOA stretch back into the Obama administration is that pretty much all my recent thinking is posted somewhere. I decided to look again, this time searching through posts from other holidays. And sure enough, Labor Day 2016 (but a day late!) - 'Finding Meaning in Work'. It meanders about for a bit, referencing the history of Labor Day and all that, but I must say it really takes off from the line "I used to play sports all the time."
The section I was looking for comes a few sentences later:
"When we add states, the stripes remain fixed. To me, this represents the worst part of America- its capacity to cling to the past and to outdated ideas and to worry about exactly where certain colors are supposed to go."
So where do I stand regarding that thought four years later, and just one day after the most unusual circumstances surrounding a July 4 of my lifetime? In terms of the spirit of the idea, I think what I've posted the past couple of days demonstrates my general optimism in both the potential and the likelihood of meaningful change. But I must acknowledge that in this moment Massachusetts feels like a foreign country compared to the other states. There's been some truth to this fact all throughout my life, but the feeling is stronger right now than it's ever been in the past. Knowing that much of my experience is based on what I'm seeing here in Massachusetts, I understand it's possible I've misread the reaction elsewhere, and it makes me cautious about extending my conclusions into other parts of the country.
Literally speaking, I predict America will change its stripes at some point. Simply put, the stripes represent a different time, when Massachusetts was in fact a lot like the rest of America simply for having slaves. It feels inevitable that America will reach a point where we are no longer interested in preserving our oldest symbol of those times. That's not to say I expect this to happen tomorrow, next year, or even during my lifetime. I'm merely confident that before America goes extinct, we'll salute a flag everyone can be proud of, and it will require a very different look to the one we fly today.
Saturday, July 4, 2020
the elephant in the changing room
Ireland changed its constitution on May 22, 2015, after 62% of its electorate voted in favor of legalizing same-sex marriage. For what it's worth, I only remember the exact date because of this clip, where U2's performance of 'Desire' was prefaced by a reference to the constitutional referendum. The most remarkable part of that exchange is this analysis of the voting result - "Ireland didn't change [because of the vote]... but we did confirm a change that had already happened."
Is this what we mean when we talk about change? Just someone making a historian's job a little easier? I bring this up today because in the spirit of yesterday's post I went all the way back to 1776 and reviewed the most famous non-TOA piece of writing in July 4 history. As I read, I couldn't help but think back to this same idea, that the Declaration of Independence was hardly a revelation, or a transformation; it only confirmed a change that had already happened.
I don't mean to suggest such moments have no catalytic power. In fact, they are almost always a necessary step in the long process of change, either to lock in earlier gains or inspire a new group to join the movement. These moments are not limited to votes or written declarations, they also include forms such as protests, admissions, public reckonings, and more. Each manifestation is a little different, but at their cores they share an important quality - all point to the elephant in the room. And until someone points, people are pretty good at living their own lives without noticing what seems so obvious to everyone else.
Over these past few months, there has been a palpable sense of change. Moment after moment has strung together, each reinforcing a sensation that yesterday is being firmly locked into the past. But as I noted above, in these moments it's almost always a confirmation of something that has already changed. The elephant has been in the room, I suppose, and I think by now everyone has at least a sense of its form. But what exactly is everyone pointing at?
I think I finally figured it out, or at least figured out the best way to explain it, when I was reading the above declaration. Here's the relevant snippet:
"WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal..."
I think what's happened in 2020 is that people are looking at those words, taking a very serious moment to think about their meaning, and concluding in their own way that the elephant in the room is America's failure to live up to this promise, its own promise. Is everyone here equal? Is the truth of that self-evident? And when you consider those additional layers, the specific reference to men ('Men') or the fact that certain authors of the declaration were slaveholders, you start to get a sense that in some ways it was a false promise, a dream house built on a rotting foundation.
The uplifting aspect of rereading the declaration is the knowledge that we can always start afresh, using new words that suit our times and directing our energies to building a stronger society and a better future. It's never too late to fulfill a promise. We can take some hints from 1776, perhaps using its general spirit to point the way. But it's clear to me now that if we are going to ever live up to the idea of equality, we'll have to chart a different path, starting with our own declaration of independence from the loyalties and tyrannies of yesterday so that we can continue building a better tomorrow, today.
Is this what we mean when we talk about change? Just someone making a historian's job a little easier? I bring this up today because in the spirit of yesterday's post I went all the way back to 1776 and reviewed the most famous non-TOA piece of writing in July 4 history. As I read, I couldn't help but think back to this same idea, that the Declaration of Independence was hardly a revelation, or a transformation; it only confirmed a change that had already happened.
I don't mean to suggest such moments have no catalytic power. In fact, they are almost always a necessary step in the long process of change, either to lock in earlier gains or inspire a new group to join the movement. These moments are not limited to votes or written declarations, they also include forms such as protests, admissions, public reckonings, and more. Each manifestation is a little different, but at their cores they share an important quality - all point to the elephant in the room. And until someone points, people are pretty good at living their own lives without noticing what seems so obvious to everyone else.
Over these past few months, there has been a palpable sense of change. Moment after moment has strung together, each reinforcing a sensation that yesterday is being firmly locked into the past. But as I noted above, in these moments it's almost always a confirmation of something that has already changed. The elephant has been in the room, I suppose, and I think by now everyone has at least a sense of its form. But what exactly is everyone pointing at?
I think I finally figured it out, or at least figured out the best way to explain it, when I was reading the above declaration. Here's the relevant snippet:
"WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal..."
I think what's happened in 2020 is that people are looking at those words, taking a very serious moment to think about their meaning, and concluding in their own way that the elephant in the room is America's failure to live up to this promise, its own promise. Is everyone here equal? Is the truth of that self-evident? And when you consider those additional layers, the specific reference to men ('Men') or the fact that certain authors of the declaration were slaveholders, you start to get a sense that in some ways it was a false promise, a dream house built on a rotting foundation.
The uplifting aspect of rereading the declaration is the knowledge that we can always start afresh, using new words that suit our times and directing our energies to building a stronger society and a better future. It's never too late to fulfill a promise. We can take some hints from 1776, perhaps using its general spirit to point the way. But it's clear to me now that if we are going to ever live up to the idea of equality, we'll have to chart a different path, starting with our own declaration of independence from the loyalties and tyrannies of yesterday so that we can continue building a better tomorrow, today.
Friday, July 3, 2020
back and fourth
Longtime TOA readers will recall that in my early days I often 'wrote to the occasion' and used the date of the post to determine my topic. The first time I recall doing it was on Memorial Day 2016 (sort of) and I kept up the pace for a few additional holidays. But I also know at some point I stopped (thank God).
As tomorrow's holiday approaches, I decided it was an appropriate moment to go back and fact-check myself. What TOA fireworks have I lit off on past Independence Days?
Here are the results.
July 4, 2016 - 'Birthdays'
Honestly, a post called 'Birthdays' on July 4? It gets better from there, though. Overall, this post was surprisingly Not Bad. I don't usually enjoy rereading my own stuff (and I don't recommend others reread this one) but I managed just fine getting through 'Birthdays'. It's definitely an extinct style of TOA (and again, thank God) - it's the essay equivalent of examining each strand of hair when just a little more work could bring it all together into a coherent hairstyle. These days, I'm more willing and capable of doing that styling work. (But to be fair, back then my hair often was every loose strand flying about in all directions.)
Here's something I wrote in 'Birthdays' that I'm happy to have on the record:
"On my first July 4, a few months after moving here from Japan, we went to see the town's annual 5K road race. The start line was right in front of us and the finish line was there, too, so we waited for the winners of the race to return.
The man who returned first was a little early, suspiciously so. It turned out that he took a shortcut and as a result came in ahead of his competition. The race he ran was not a real race. His race was an easier race and his race made it a forgone conclusion that he would come out ahead of those running a different race. He worked hard, no doubt, but his idea about the race was why he 'won'. His race was a fabrication."
July 4, 2017 - no post
So much for the myth of TOA history...
The next day I posted an extended thought about job interviews, a post I find far more readable though not quite as insightful as 'Birthdays'. The summary - giving advice is for people who fail to lead by example.
July 4, 2018 - 'Happy Fourth'
I'm back to my supposed roots in 2018 with some reflections on the national anthem. The writing is better, but the post is useless. No courage, no risks, no point. I hate to put it this way but I need to be my own harshest critic. 'Happy Fourth' is the kind of writing you'd expect from someone with a corporate job.
The opening sentence sums it up - 'Not much to go with today...' - yes indeed, how appropriate. The best reason to abandon traditions like 'write a July 4 post related to July 4' is that you inevitably force yourself to speak when you have nothing to say, and the end result is that you end up saying nothing, or worse.
July 4, 2019 - 'Economic Democracy'
Kind of a classic TOA post where I try to explain something I barely understand, yet I go for it because I sense I understand it better than everyone else. To put it another way, I had something to say, but I didn't know how to say it.
The crux of the post is that in an era where everyone has their own definition of socialism, the one I think works best says 'socialism = economic democracy'. It's nice that I wrote this a year ago because in this moment, July 2020, I don't think it would be an appropriate topic. But the truth remains that in order for all people in America to exercise the fullest extent of their rights, for America to live up to its mission statement of equality for all within a democratic system, we have to put everyone's feet on the same basic economic foundation. We have to acknowledge that democracy means something different than it did in 1776. It's a massive job ahead of us, so let's get to work.
From last year -
"One thing a free market and a democracy have in common is that both systems function best when every individual is free to make informed decisions. Poverty prevents these systems from functioning at their best which means poverty is an anti-democratic disease that must be cured."
July 4, 2020...
This look like a time machine to you? Enjoy your day off, see you tomorrow.
As tomorrow's holiday approaches, I decided it was an appropriate moment to go back and fact-check myself. What TOA fireworks have I lit off on past Independence Days?
Here are the results.
July 4, 2016 - 'Birthdays'
Honestly, a post called 'Birthdays' on July 4? It gets better from there, though. Overall, this post was surprisingly Not Bad. I don't usually enjoy rereading my own stuff (and I don't recommend others reread this one) but I managed just fine getting through 'Birthdays'. It's definitely an extinct style of TOA (and again, thank God) - it's the essay equivalent of examining each strand of hair when just a little more work could bring it all together into a coherent hairstyle. These days, I'm more willing and capable of doing that styling work. (But to be fair, back then my hair often was every loose strand flying about in all directions.)
Here's something I wrote in 'Birthdays' that I'm happy to have on the record:
"On my first July 4, a few months after moving here from Japan, we went to see the town's annual 5K road race. The start line was right in front of us and the finish line was there, too, so we waited for the winners of the race to return.
The man who returned first was a little early, suspiciously so. It turned out that he took a shortcut and as a result came in ahead of his competition. The race he ran was not a real race. His race was an easier race and his race made it a forgone conclusion that he would come out ahead of those running a different race. He worked hard, no doubt, but his idea about the race was why he 'won'. His race was a fabrication."
July 4, 2017 - no post
So much for the myth of TOA history...
The next day I posted an extended thought about job interviews, a post I find far more readable though not quite as insightful as 'Birthdays'. The summary - giving advice is for people who fail to lead by example.
July 4, 2018 - 'Happy Fourth'
I'm back to my supposed roots in 2018 with some reflections on the national anthem. The writing is better, but the post is useless. No courage, no risks, no point. I hate to put it this way but I need to be my own harshest critic. 'Happy Fourth' is the kind of writing you'd expect from someone with a corporate job.
The opening sentence sums it up - 'Not much to go with today...' - yes indeed, how appropriate. The best reason to abandon traditions like 'write a July 4 post related to July 4' is that you inevitably force yourself to speak when you have nothing to say, and the end result is that you end up saying nothing, or worse.
July 4, 2019 - 'Economic Democracy'
Kind of a classic TOA post where I try to explain something I barely understand, yet I go for it because I sense I understand it better than everyone else. To put it another way, I had something to say, but I didn't know how to say it.
The crux of the post is that in an era where everyone has their own definition of socialism, the one I think works best says 'socialism = economic democracy'. It's nice that I wrote this a year ago because in this moment, July 2020, I don't think it would be an appropriate topic. But the truth remains that in order for all people in America to exercise the fullest extent of their rights, for America to live up to its mission statement of equality for all within a democratic system, we have to put everyone's feet on the same basic economic foundation. We have to acknowledge that democracy means something different than it did in 1776. It's a massive job ahead of us, so let's get to work.
From last year -
"One thing a free market and a democracy have in common is that both systems function best when every individual is free to make informed decisions. Poverty prevents these systems from functioning at their best which means poverty is an anti-democratic disease that must be cured."
July 4, 2020...
This look like a time machine to you? Enjoy your day off, see you tomorrow.
Thursday, July 2, 2020
leftovers #3: proper corona admin, vol lxiii - i'll get corona (racist)
The list of threats continues to grow...
I'll get corona... from a racist.
People have wondered recently what 'systemic racism' means, so I checked Wikipedia:
"Institutional racism (also known as systemic racism) is a form of racism that is embedded as normal practice within society or an organisation."
Does wearing a mask to slow the spread of COVID-19 have anything to do with the above definition? Not at first glance. But given how minorities are suffering disproportionately from this disease, I'll at least argue that refusing to make every reasonable personal sacrifice to slow the spread is racist.
And if the justification for doing otherwise invokes imitation - well, other people are walking around without masks, it's normal practice within society - then I refer you to the above definition.
I'll get corona... from a racist.
People have wondered recently what 'systemic racism' means, so I checked Wikipedia:
"Institutional racism (also known as systemic racism) is a form of racism that is embedded as normal practice within society or an organisation."
Does wearing a mask to slow the spread of COVID-19 have anything to do with the above definition? Not at first glance. But given how minorities are suffering disproportionately from this disease, I'll at least argue that refusing to make every reasonable personal sacrifice to slow the spread is racist.
And if the justification for doing otherwise invokes imitation - well, other people are walking around without masks, it's normal practice within society - then I refer you to the above definition.
Wednesday, July 1, 2020
the toa newsletter - july 2020
Hi,
Another month of TOA in the books! And what a weird month it was, almost historic for this humble space. I highlighted a few weeks ago that moving to a REAL URL had the predictable positive effect on my search ranking, but as I write a mere two weeks later I'm stunned to see TOA lurking just outside the top ten. We're like Everton Football Club... honestly reader, I was expecting the ascent to be more linear, but isn't that one of my common mistakes? Life moves quick, y'all, sometimes exponentially.
That said, the newsletter is a great time to slow down and think about the important(ish) things we often take for granted in everyday life. I noticed my recent posts have focused on The Big Wide World and My Wee Little Place in it, so let's take a break. (But no worries, we'll get right back to The Big Stuff almost immediately - hint, tomorrow's post has the word 'racist' in the title!)
For today, let's have a classic Proper Admin style recap about what's changed in my life since the lockdown started in March.
Pizza Friday
Speaks for itself, right? And this after almost a decade of making fun of any 'pizza Friday' routine - I was wrong, I was wrong!
I started this new tradition at The Hill Tavern near the end of April, their BBQ Pork pizza is on my list of annual Michelin Star Snubs. And don't forget the tots! But weeks later, The Upper Crust countered with 'buy one, get one', so in early June I had no choice but to make a change.
But if I don't write it, how can I read it?
Amusingly, last week I forgot my own rule and created chaos for those crusty folks down the street - I'm sure anyone named 'Tim' is now banned for life, sorry. Hopefully I can rehabilitate my image as 'Timothy' in July.
The lesson - I should read (and reread) my own crap.
So now I just turn on my three computers when I wake up
I wrote (pompously) during the early lockdown days about taking early morning strolls through Beacon Hill, but once the mask order came down I stopped these walks. Turns out, 'drinking coffee while walking' actually meant 'walking while drinking coffee' and the mask made it impossible for me to continue my primary activity.
Back to my roots
Guests to my apartment will recall my preference for sitting on the floor, an effective method for creating extra space in my one hundred and twenty square feet of open floor. But whenever I was alone, I generally sat on the couch. This changed after a few weeks of quarantine when hip and hamstring tightness forced me to reevaluate every aspect of my solitary days. I finally tried sitting on the floor during the day - or I should say, I returned, for this is a true callback to a distinct feature of Japanese culture, and one that I was very familiar with from my childhood.
It's hard to imagine going back to old (couched) ways, and not just because my work from home arrangement was extended through the remainder of 2020. Sitting on the floor has massive benefits that deal specifically with some of my nagging physical problems (flexibility in my lower half, core strength). It's no longer a solution to my aforementioned apartment space constraints, it's a vital part of my overall fitness.
Of course, one possible factor I'm underrating here is the process of standing up from the floor. If I wore goofy tight clothes and paid $200 a month to do this in a glittering gym, it would be called a 'squat workout'. It may be that I'm simply 'working out' every day because of my seating arrangement. If I'm ever forced back to loftier heights, I may try to make do for a short time by incorporating regular full squats throughout the day.
Anything else?
No.
Really?
Nope.
Nothing else?
Well...
Well?
Championes! CHAMPIONES!
There it is...
Ole, ole, ole!
Who taught Klopp how to dance?
Let's say the footage is here if anyone needs it.
OK, anything else?
Sure, one problem this year was how pathetic some of the other teams were this season, particularly Manchester United. It's almost no fun when you win with twenty percent of the season still to go.
Anyway, to increase competitive balance I've done some advance scouting, she seems a good prospect, and unlike some of United's recent forwards appears capable of scoring at Anfield.
Liverpool have not won the league in a week! The drought continues!
In the next month... of True On Average:
1. Never mind this, I need to make sure Jamie Carragher gets home safely.
Another month of TOA in the books! And what a weird month it was, almost historic for this humble space. I highlighted a few weeks ago that moving to a REAL URL had the predictable positive effect on my search ranking, but as I write a mere two weeks later I'm stunned to see TOA lurking just outside the top ten. We're like Everton Football Club... honestly reader, I was expecting the ascent to be more linear, but isn't that one of my common mistakes? Life moves quick, y'all, sometimes exponentially.
That said, the newsletter is a great time to slow down and think about the important(ish) things we often take for granted in everyday life. I noticed my recent posts have focused on The Big Wide World and My Wee Little Place in it, so let's take a break. (But no worries, we'll get right back to The Big Stuff almost immediately - hint, tomorrow's post has the word 'racist' in the title!)
For today, let's have a classic Proper Admin style recap about what's changed in my life since the lockdown started in March.
Pizza Friday
Speaks for itself, right? And this after almost a decade of making fun of any 'pizza Friday' routine - I was wrong, I was wrong!
I started this new tradition at The Hill Tavern near the end of April, their BBQ Pork pizza is on my list of annual Michelin Star Snubs. And don't forget the tots! But weeks later, The Upper Crust countered with 'buy one, get one', so in early June I had no choice but to make a change.
But if I don't write it, how can I read it?
Amusingly, last week I forgot my own rule and created chaos for those crusty folks down the street - I'm sure anyone named 'Tim' is now banned for life, sorry. Hopefully I can rehabilitate my image as 'Timothy' in July.
The lesson - I should read (and reread) my own crap.
So now I just turn on my three computers when I wake up
I wrote (pompously) during the early lockdown days about taking early morning strolls through Beacon Hill, but once the mask order came down I stopped these walks. Turns out, 'drinking coffee while walking' actually meant 'walking while drinking coffee' and the mask made it impossible for me to continue my primary activity.
Back to my roots
Guests to my apartment will recall my preference for sitting on the floor, an effective method for creating extra space in my one hundred and twenty square feet of open floor. But whenever I was alone, I generally sat on the couch. This changed after a few weeks of quarantine when hip and hamstring tightness forced me to reevaluate every aspect of my solitary days. I finally tried sitting on the floor during the day - or I should say, I returned, for this is a true callback to a distinct feature of Japanese culture, and one that I was very familiar with from my childhood.
It's hard to imagine going back to old (couched) ways, and not just because my work from home arrangement was extended through the remainder of 2020. Sitting on the floor has massive benefits that deal specifically with some of my nagging physical problems (flexibility in my lower half, core strength). It's no longer a solution to my aforementioned apartment space constraints, it's a vital part of my overall fitness.
Of course, one possible factor I'm underrating here is the process of standing up from the floor. If I wore goofy tight clothes and paid $200 a month to do this in a glittering gym, it would be called a 'squat workout'. It may be that I'm simply 'working out' every day because of my seating arrangement. If I'm ever forced back to loftier heights, I may try to make do for a short time by incorporating regular full squats throughout the day.
Anything else?
No.
Really?
Nope.
Nothing else?
Well...
Well?
Championes! CHAMPIONES!
There it is...
Ole, ole, ole!
Who taught Klopp how to dance?
Let's say the footage is here if anyone needs it.
OK, anything else?
Sure, one problem this year was how pathetic some of the other teams were this season, particularly Manchester United. It's almost no fun when you win with twenty percent of the season still to go.
Anyway, to increase competitive balance I've done some advance scouting, she seems a good prospect, and unlike some of United's recent forwards appears capable of scoring at Anfield.
Liverpool have not won the league in a week! The drought continues!
In the next month... of True On Average:
1. Never mind this, I need to make sure Jamie Carragher gets home safely.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)