Author Archives: Thor

263. When an Arm is not an Arm

An arm is not an arm until it attaches to a body and moves in cer­tain ways. It is the rela­tion­ship between the arm and the body which makes it an arm, not a cer­tain weight or shape of blood … Con­tinue read­ing

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262. The Factory Makes Six Million Left-Footed Shoes

From early in the Cold War era it became a habit to lam­poon the idio­cies of cen­tral­ized com­mu­nist plan­ning in the Soviet Union. There was plenty to lam­poon. George Orwell’s “Ani­mal Farm”, and later “1984” became eerily pre­dic­tive. What we … Con­tinue read­ing

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261. Boo! So What Are You Afraid Of ?

What are you afraid of? If you are under 30 you are prob­a­bly afraid of being laughed at by your friene­mies, but prob­a­bly not afraid of burn­ing half your brain cells and poi­son­ing your liver with booze, or get­ting an … Con­tinue read­ing

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260. Trust

Do you trust me?  That’s a hard call, isn’t it. With­out trust life is not easy. Oxy­tocin is the brain chem­i­cal  which gives the  feel­ing of trust. Some peo­ple, and maybe some cul­tures seem more hooked on it than oth­ers. … Con­tinue read­ing

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259. What is Your Greatest Weakness?

A favourite ques­tion in job inter­views is “what is your great­est weak­ness?” I always find the ques­tion puz­zling. It is puz­zling because nowa­days the per­son who inter­views you is rarely, say, a hard drink­ing build­ing super­vi­sor who wants to know … Con­tinue read­ing

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258. From Small Beginnings …

Habits are effi­cient (.. decide daily which side to part your hair on?). Habits are restrict­ing (.. do you really need to check Face Book every ten min­utes?). Har­vest­ing the ten­sion between effi­ciency and restric­tion gives life pur­pose and direc­tion … Con­tinue read­ing

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257. Feeding the Uninvited Guests – Why putting on weight is so damned unfair

This is com­pletely unsci­en­tific. I don’t know the vices of microbes. I am told that I have tens of tril­lions of the bug­gers in my gut, and through my body. “Accord­ing to a recent National Insti­tutes of Health (NIH) esti­mate, … Con­tinue read­ing

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