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Conversation with house mate SouJun on Northern and Southern Chinese eating habits

The emphasis is on salt and sauce in the north versus spice and soup in the south.

Salt reduces overall level of perspiration, retaining higher levels of fluid in the blood vessels, leading to higher blood pressure. At the experiential level, it translates to more physical power available for utilization when the weather is cold as is typical in northernChinese territories.

Spice promotes sweating and discharge of toxic accumulated within the system. Some variants of spice also includes a strong dose of vitamin C (chilli and ginger). Soup replenishes the lost fluid in the body through sweat.  The belief is that this keeps the effects of high humidity, such as cold and arthritis, in the environment at bay, as is typical of souther Chinese territories.

Food is seen not just as a source of energy but as a way of alter the chemical processes within the body to suit environment circumstances.

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On similarities between organizations and organisms

An individual in an organization is similar to a cell in an organism.

The earlier the stage in the life cycle, the more generic and diverse the basic unit is. Founders and stem cells.

As maturity occurs, the basic unit becomes more specialized and in some cases loses ability that units in earlier stages had but is more adapted to performing its tasks. Stem cells can become bone cells but bone cells cannot become stem cells.

It is important to keep in mind that every organization and organism has a inherent DNA that will inevitably express itself.

Micheal Porter states an organization should not measure its success by its size but by how fit it’s configuration is in terms of serving its purpose. Charles Darwin’s survival of the fittest posits that the organism most suited for its environment will be the one that flourishes in that environment. In none of these two statements were there mention of size as an advantage.

Regarding cells and individuals, there comes a time in the life cycle of the organism/organization when the cell dies off and the individual departs.

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Insights from lunch with Jamie

On Apple

Steve Jobs was working at an apple orchard for a period of time and her resolved to just eating apples for two whole weeks

At the end of the two weeks, as a by product of his diet he was able to achieve an extremely heightened level of awareness. He had been pursuing the altering of his biology through food intake ever since,

He would conduct food experiments on himself as well as his staff at Apple by ordering only specific items to be made available in the Apple canteen. Once he ordered only vegetarian food to be made available. There were huge protest and he thus back down by allowing grass fed beef.

His cancer was initially curable but delay through experiments with attempting cure via various diets led him to the eventual terminal stage of cancer before he finally seemed actual treatment.

On being a teacher

Being part of the journey towards a learner’s moment of epiphany bring a tremendous amount of satisfaction.

Unlike US, teachers in Korea is revered

On being of mixed descent in an American society

Struggles with resolving cognitive dissonance associated with identity has consumed the major bulk of attention and energy.

Koreans back in Korea does not consider her one of theirs. White amongsts Americans considered her an outsider. A second class citizen in your own country.

Realized the importance of not having to accept what does not need to be accepted. Instead of accepting what society prescibes, define your own identity based on your own core values.

In times of hardship Mexican and Asian families come together and are able to pull through tough times. This is not the case with African blacks. Generations of slavery has served to dilute family ties amongst this racial group.

 

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Reflection this morning on profiles

A profile is essentially a bio-chemical based system. When gearing for a specific outcome, it is important to examine its configuration at all levels to remove redundant attributes to free up CPU cycles for performance effectiveness. 

The goal of a practitioner is thus to consistently work on the discipline of self-mastery.

Levels of available profile configuration

  • Behavior
  • routines
  • Habit
  • Personality
  • Identity
  • Worldview
  • Beliefs

 

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Reflections for the evening

Balancing the acoustics of a social venue to ensure its lively is very hard. A lively venue is constantly titillating between the extreme ends of dead and overly rowdy. Control of the balance are via indirect means like choice material use for walls, ceiling and floor, height of ceiling, seating space between groups and sound system bass and tremble.

Given two possible scenarios, the first being winning a lottery on day one and then losing the entire amount of money the very next day, the second being nothing happened on day one and day two. Suppose the subject chooses to experience scenario one instead of two, the only possible explanation for his behavior would be that he is a drug addict.

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Friday morning coincidence

I was driving to Edmodo this morning when SIRI recited to me  the section of the book on the Muses and the higher spiritual planes. I was stopped at the intersection just shortly after SIRI mentioned the vision the author had of becoming one with an eagle during his meditation when I saw this giant bird with a great wing span landing to perch on lamppost that I was about to drive under.

I was the very first time I saw such a bird in this parts of town. Must be a coincidence.

I wonder if Seth Godin’s recommendation of this book was resultant of similar experience he had when reading this book

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Key takeaway from “Connected” by Nicholas A. Christakis

 

  • Our ties to others affect emotions, sex, health, politics, money, evolution and technology
  • Acts of aggression typical set off a cascade of killings
    • morality resides in groups instead of individuals

 Insights

  • the particular pattern of ties are more important than the individuals
  • different patterns facilitate the individuals in the groups
  • structures are more important than shared traits of individuals
  • we influence how densely connected we are
  • core discussions network decreases as we age
  • needs tending and should not be taken for granted
  • our mirror neurons gets affected by our network

Principles

  • emergent properties
    • inherent in the interactions and interconnection of the parts
  • Rule 5 – social proofing from 5 people is as effective as any number above that
  • 6 degree of connectedness
  • 3 degrees of influence
    • network instability inhibits 4th degrees
  • Situational inequality
    • where you are in the network matters
    • affects if you are healthier or richer than others
    • even if you have no control

On Mating

  • your network will find a mate for you
    • being in a network with more men than women makes it harder to find a partner and leads to a shorter life
  • Much easier to go for a guy that other women in your network are going for
    • assessment is already done by others
  • Men bring money and resources to the table
  • Women bring emotional/social support
  • friendship network and mating network are very different

On Friendship

  • Habits / behavior spread – culture
    • obesity
    • suicide
  • can be attributed to mirror neurons
  • behavior of female is more contagious than the behavior of male
  • people who have five friends who know one another has a different genetic makeup than a person with five friends who do not know one another
    • religion is the opiate of disconnected people

On Health

  • Targeting folks at the central of a network to treat an epidemic is more effective than treating those at the fringes in the case of aids

On Politics

  • Being in a politically active network makes you more likely to vote even in they support the opposing politician
  • peer pressure
  • voting makes no logical sense, since your impact is statistically insignificant

Mathematics

  • Contagion goes through a pattern called Levy Flight
    • imagine a seagull
    • Mathematicians
      • Pierre Levy
      • Benoit Mandelbrot
  • Weighted average of the crowd is not that inaccurate

Weak ties versus Strong ties

  • Strong ties help dissemination within networks
  • Weak ties act as bridge between different networks
    • useful for search large areas of networks
    • people with lots of weak ties get more frequently sought out for advice and given opportunities
    • they become central to the overall network
    • minority power effect – a small group of influentially positioned individuals can consistently get their way
  • it appears we often start our search for information two or three degrees away to make sure we learn something new

On language

  • makes it easier to interact with people as types rather than as individuals

Online networks

  • roles
    • Co-operators
    • free riders
    • punishers
      • manages public good versus private good
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Knowing what you want and optimizing for that

While chatting with Adi today, I realized two huge reason why people continue showing up for work is because of habit and fear.

I recalled this irony I read somewhere else where people started out wanting to change the world but ended up becoming really wealthy but never really achieving what they originally set out to do. Its a tragedy.

A few symptoms resulting from a lack of clarity in what you want are FOMO and the need of keep up with the Jones.

If you judiciously worked back from what you want to what you need to do, you will very quickly realize there are a lot of things you are doing now that might be totally redundant. Dropping of these redundant efforts will immediately increase you overall quality of life by freeing up more time while simultaneously getting you closer to what you want.

Related readings

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Key take aways from “Gut Feelings”

  • Gut feelings definition
    • appears quickly in consciousness
    • underlying reasons we are not fully aware of
    • strong enough to act upon
  • Laws in the real world are different from those in the logical idealized world
  • Benjamin Franklin’s Moral Algebra
    • when in doubt weigh out the pros and cons of each side by cancelling out the pros that might weigh the same
  • Our brain
    • adaptive forgetting: data is destroyed with the aggregation of information into actionable insights
    • We can only decipher the output generated by our brain (a neural network) but cannot decipher the series of logical steps taken to derive this output
    • Deliberate thinking about reasons seems to lead to decisions that make us less happy
    • Thinking too much can slow down and disrupt performance
      • The gaze heuristics for catching baseball
    • the more complex a species the longer the period of infancy
    • The short term memory rule of 7 +/- 2
    • Intelligence means making bets, taking risk seeing more than what the eye sees
  • Satisfisers versus Maximizers
    • former is reported to be more optimistic, higher self-esteem and life satisfaction
  • Rule: Create scarcity and develop systematically
    • is a viable alternative in human and organizational development
  • Less is more
    • Stock picking of familiar stocks (partial ignorance) still out perform complex analysis (extensive knowledge)
  • Man and his environment
    • Herbert Simon: A man, viewed as a behaving system, is quite simple. The apparent complexity of his behavior over time is largely a reflection of the complexity in the environment he finds himself
    •  Steve Jobs, structured work place to maximize chance conversations
    • In an uncertain environment good intuitions must ignore information
    • Quality heuristics: we equate recognition to quality – Goldstein and Gigerenzer, 2002
      • why marketing might work in short run despite shitting products
    • One-reason decision making – a short cut people use despite official guidelines
      • implies a fast and frugal decision tree

References

  • Simple rules for a complex world, Epstein
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Book Summary: The driver in the driverless car

Conditions the presage the leap into the future in any specific economic segment or type of service

  • Systemic requisite:
    • Widespread dissatisfaction – latent or overt with the status quo
  • Technology requisite:
    • Moore’s Law
      • Cheap computers
      • Cheap sensors – IOT
      • increase in Connection speed
      • Hand hosted AI
    • IOT
      • software
      • data connectivity
      • Handheld computing
    • Artificial Intelligence and Automation
      • Shift of discrete analog task into networked digital one

Five paradigms of computing

  • Electromechanical
  • Relay
  • Vaccuum tube
  • Discrete transistor
  • Integrated circuits – Moores’ Law

Current Concerns

  • Speed of technology evolution versus  speed of regulation – codified ethics
  • Equality, Risks and Dependency versus Autonomy
    • Does the technology have the potential to benefit everyone?
    • What are the risk and rewards?
    • Does the technology more strongly promote autonomy or dependence?
      • cheap software based technologies inexpensively scaled to reach millions-billions
      • the more revenue generated the more motivated developers would want to share it broadly

Future Concerns

  • Biometric theft
  • Merging of humans with computers
  • Extent of Gene alteration that is socially acceptable – new class of humans differentiated by genetic differences
    • mitigating health risk
    • higher intelligence
    • better looks
    • greater strength
  • Privacy will be a thing of the pass
  • Navigating technology trends as a navigator instead of a passenger
  • Large scale drone attacks

Artificial Intelligence

  • Definition: a cheap reliable industrial grade digital smartness running behind everything, Kevin Kelly, Editor of WIRED magazine
  •  Types
    • Narrow AI
    • Strong/General AI
      • Watson
  • Impact of existing human occupations
    • Doctors in health care
    • Lawyers

Education

  • Ancient Greece:
    • Socratic process whereby teacher guided students through the learning process by asking them questions
    • Education was privilege reserved for the elites
  • Middle Ages/Renaissance
    • Remained a priviledge
    • process of learning became more rote
    • more memorization
  • Online Education
    • Example: Khan academy
    • Researchers found people most likely to take advantage of online courses were those who need the least help
    • LA Unified: giving each student a tablet failed to move the needle
  • Minimally invasive Education, Mitra, New Delhi
    • NIIT building, Kalkaji slums
    • Key component of the learning process was the group dynamic
    • Self taught scholars learned as quick as school-bound peers
  • Self directed learning – flipped model of education
    • teacher no longer broadcast information, write lesson plans or stand in front of classes lecturing
    • teachers became coaches and guides to students needing additional help
    • students consumed recorded lectures or videos online at their own pace and in their own time
    • Teachers focus on judgment, nuances and emotional intelligence

Mores law and poverty

  • Comparatively poorer parts of the world will be able to leap frog into more modern and efficient era
    • wireless mobile phones
    • drones for deliver
    • Solar energy power plants
    • driver less cars
      • no need for traffic lights
      • freeways
      • Parking spaces
  • USA has no monopoly on innovation

Driver less Cars

  • Access versus ownership
  • Baidu, Google, Tesla
  • China
    • Bejing, Wuhu and Anhui
  • Singapore
  • city layouts become more flexible
  • commuting is less a hassle

Current trends

  • Plasma based water purification technology: kills 100% of bacteria and viruses
  • Energy

Further readings

  • How to create a mind: the secret of human thought revealed, Ray Krurzweil
  • The inevitable, Kevin Kelly
  • The internet of things: Mapping the value beyond Hype, McKinsey Global Institute
  • Infinite Resource: The Power of Ideas on Finite Planet
  • Abundance: The future is better than you think, Peter Diamandis