Just saw this on Gizmodo. It is simply awesome!
Outliers
Currently about 1/3 of the way through Malcolm Gladwell’s “Outliers – The story of success”. For those who may be unfamiliar with this name, he is also the author of the highly successful “Tipping Point” and “Blink”, both dealing with insights into the causes for success.
Up to this point, the central thesis of the book seems to be that while some people are undoubtedly born with some innate talent
- the “innate”-ness or being “gifted” is more often too over-hyped;
- the home and social environments play a large role – in fact, his data seems to show that it can make or break a genius!
As it turns out, I started reading the book – bought at the airport bookshop – after listening on discussions between my sister and my parents regarding parenting. Surprisingly, this book is rapidly becoming a fairly good book for parenting, provided you are willing to unleash the true potential of your kids!
Big sorrows
My heart is so small
it’s almost invisible.
How can You place such big sorrows in it?
“Look,” He answered,
“your eyes are even smaller,
yet they behold the world.”
Jalal ad-Din Rumi, 1207-1273
Beloved Persian Poet
Another gloomy day
Another gloomy day in the western part of the island, but at least no rain for the time being. Very conducive for afternoon naps…
Build your wings
This sounds vaguely similar to the definition of faith I once heard, see On faith and More on faith. I guess, from time to time, it is “healthy” to push yourself off the edge and fall head-first into the unknown…
If we listened to our intellect, we’d never have a love affair. We’d never have a friendship. We’d never go into business, because we’d be cynical. Well, that’s nonsense. You’ve got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down.
Ray Bradbury
American Author
Greatest geeks
According to this article, the following are the greatest geeks of all time. Well, circa 2008 at the very least…
- Linux Torvalds
- Steve Wozniak
- Sir Tim Berners-Lee
- Seymour Cray
- Marc Andreessen
- Rear Admiral Grace Hopper
- Jack Kilby and Robert Noyce
- Alan Turing
- Richard Stallman
- Paul Allen
Have to admit, while the top 5 are familiar names to me, 6 & 7 are the “who??” choices, while 9 & 10 are not what I’d expected…
Man behind his language
A bit geeky, I know, but it’s good to get back to your roots sometimes, no? After all, wouldn’t you like to know what the twisted mind behind…., say, PERL, looks like?? 🙂
Check out the creators of PERL and other well known computer programming languages in Faces behind popular languages.
Death
Over dinner a couple of weeks ago, a friend shared with me some recent and unfortunate happenings involving his friend. As the result of a freak accident and a very probable case of medical incompetence, his friend was left with a severely damaged brain. A very likely outcome of this sad sequence of events is the loss of a husband for a newly wed couple, and the loss of a son to a mother.
We also briefly discussed about other aspects of death, like the well-known “last lecture” I mentioned before. I am truly full of admiration for people who can overcome their frustrations and live positively, right to the end.
Somehow this really put things into perspective. I mean, even when considering the recent world-wide financial turmoils – in fact, yesterday in the news, there was a Californian man who killed his 2 children, wife and mother-in-law before committing suicide because of his financial woes – what can be worse than losing your life/loved one at the prime of one’s life? What can be more courageous than to fight on and achieve your goals as best as you can?
Treasure what you have now for it may be your last chance.
Evil over good
Some thoughts from close to a year ago.
An oft-used theme in Chinese TV serials and movies is that of a bunch of bad guys trumping all over the good guys. In fact, come to think of it, this is a common theme in many forms of media and entertainment regardless of cultures. However, after all the teeth-gnashing, the good guys always triumph: good triumphant over evil, game over.
However, this only seems to happen in the movies.
Recent events have led me to believe things in real life don’t always go according to such scripts. In real life, the hypocrites among us can get away with murder and yet nothing can be done about it.