Category Archives: culture

266. Pity your neighbour’s cat

Posted on June 10, 2013 by Thor

The most cer­tain qual­ity of power is that those who seek it will mis­use it. A sec­ond cer­tainty is that an army of zom­bies will eagerly imi­tate their lead­ers. And so it is with “cyber war­fare”. Gov­ern­ment lead­ers rou­tinely spy … Con­tinue read­ing →

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265. The Limits of Education

Posted on May 20, 2013 by Thor

“Edu­ca­tion does not make us edu­ca­ble. It is our aware­ness of being unfin­ished that makes us edu­ca­ble.” ~ Paulo Freire, Ped­a­gogy of Free­dom. How much time have you invested in edu­ca­tion? How much value has your edu­ca­tion given you? How … Con­tinue read­ing →

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264. Evidence – The Alchemy of the Ages

Posted on May 13, 2013 by Thor

What do politi­cians, vot­ers, the cap­tains of indus­try, drug com­pa­nies, priests and door-to-door sales­men all have in com­mon? Not much. How­ever, every one of them has an addic­tion to evi­dence. Not any evi­dence. The evi­dence they crave (and will pay … Con­tinue read­ing →

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262. The Factory Makes Six Million Left-Footed Shoes

Posted on April 19, 2013 by Thor

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 ?

Posted on April 10, 2013 by Thor

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

Posted on April 2, 2013 by Thor

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?

Posted on March 25, 2013 by Thor

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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