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(Monthly Archives) August 2008

Big Thoughts from Small Minds

Here is a guy who’s (in his own words) “supposed to be thinking ‘big thoughts’ all day as part of a fellowship program that recruits PhD-level scientists into public service with the federal government.”

And here is one big thought he produced:

“But at a fundamental level, studying complex behavioral and genetic networks in animals is not so different from understanding human social networks.”

Oh yeah… on a fundamental level… we’re all animals. So heartbreakingly true.

But here is the scary part:

“So to some extent, when it comes to explaining social software to military policymakers – I’m the perfect guy for the job.”

Read more… 

Alexander Solzhenitsyn Dies

Never read “The Gulag Archipelago“… but loved “One Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovich“… always remember his advice from “One Day…” about how to survive in tough conditions – do everything slowly.

There was a joke back then… in the Soviet times… about a Russian boy… from the 21st century… asking his father: “Dad… who’s Brejnev?”… and the father: “Hmmm… I think he was a politician from Solzhenitsyn’s time.” Not a joke anymore.

Hope Obama Doesn’t Become an “Engineer” Once (if) Elected

In a recent (really interesting) NYT article, Jodi Kantor tells us how Obama’s students (at the University of Chicago Law School) call him “a contextualist, willing to look past legal niceties to get results.”

This reminds me of two older NYT articles (both by David Brooks) which I commented in two older posts – one about “Relationship Blend” vs. “Productive, Rational Behavior” and another about Progressive Realism.

Politically, I identify with the “ecologists” (contextualists) and Robert Wright’s “progressive realism”…

Now, here is the thing (by David Brooks) I am referring to in the title of this post:

“Most politicians are ecologists who turn into engineers once in office.”