Message of Optimism

I'm going to keep this research in mind going forward:

• Change by the Bundle: Study shows People are Capable of Multiple, Simultaneous Life Changes
• The Secret To Learning New Skills Twice As Fast

Samgyeopsal and the Martial Arts

I have this nice metaphor I've developed about the martial arts. See, if you go to multiple samgyeopsal places in South Korea you'll notice each one has a different interpretation of the food. Each place has its own set of side-dishes that accompany the meat; and they use different ingredients for a marinade, that is if they do use one.

There might be a recommended way to eat the meat after it's cooked...

The meat might be smoked first before being seared...

And the meat might be scored to increase the surface area and give a distinct texture.

Back in the day, practitioners were from every background you can imagine, and their experiences were just as varied. There were scholars, bandits, bodyguards, chefs, mercenaries, soldiers, opera actors, ordinary people, security guards, even gangsters. There were those who fought on the lei tai (maybe it wasn't called that, but the culture might have had something similar), others fought in the back-alleys or slums. Others didn't fight at all. All of them would have had different ideas on what was "sporting." Or they wouldn't have had any such term in their vocabulary.

My teacher told me this story. That his teacher's grand-teacher (four generations removed from me)  sold oranges on the sidewalk. And was still scarily good even in his old age. So you see, martial skill is grassroots; jealously guarded and lovingly honed over a person's life. It is an individualistic endeavor. Much like the mom-and-pop eateries of South Korea.

What to do in heaven

Unlearn to Escape

You must unlearn what you have learned
Refreshing / reloading of pages and delayed redirect using Meta tags in ASP.Net c#
How to design finger print/ scanner based project in C#

Cooking Philosophy

There's three recipes I want to do before I die. Actually there's a lot of dishes, but these are the main ones.

Buddha Jumps Over the Wall

True Magic

He was laboring under a burden we are only now starting to understand. It must have been excruciating to continue functioning, and yet for all that he found some measure of happiness. And he spent all of his money and so much time just so he can get a hit of that happiness again.

The psychics were only too happy to oblige him his fantasies. They gave him the feeling that he was doing things, that he was getting closer to his goal. That somehow things were finally going his way. That there was a point... Sadly that's how occultism generally goes -  a great big con job.

I've been there, same as him. But I never let it get to the point he's in now. I was lucky - if I had been born with an active gene for substance abuse or mental disability, I would probably be right up there. But who knows what the future holds? I might still get to experience things from his point of view.

Being Right isn't as Important

Be the big fish in the small pond.

I read about this feature, detailing what netizens in South Korea feel like about the college experience - basically, that it's better to be the dragon's tail, i.e. last among elites, than to be the head of a snake (first among inferiors).

I would say, basing from what I've read and from my own personal experience, that this is not so. Being last in an elite school means that after graduation the recruiters will just pick everyone else who ranked above you. You get to participate in a stressful rat race for position instead of getting the room to experiment and grow. 

And in the end all you would have achieved is a fancy piece of paper. Big deal, everyone has that piece of paper.

Being the head of a snake is fine, so long as you plan to turn into a dragon; but remaining a snake is fine too - because you'll end up happier in the long run.

Basically, think of college not as selection, but as training. I've been further informed about this with Robert Greene's "Mastery" book, it explains things a lot better.

Hacking Feature from Fusion

Nathan Matias: Developing Effective Citizen Responses to Discrimination and Harassment Online

I WANT TO BE A FECAL WIZARD

I never thought I'd ever say this.

An interesting thing happened on the way home from work.

The guy was walking near the parking lot outside the office. He was absorbed with his phone so he didn't see the car exiting the parking lot. Car's driver honked his horn and startled phone guy probably, because after the latter looked up and registered the car that almost hit him he proceeded to act all cocky by slowing down his walking pace. Driver got even more impatient and honked his horn, phone guy kept on taking his bloody time - blocking driver from getting off the parking lot.

Eventually there was enough room for the car to get out. Driver then pulled up to phone guy; driver kept the car going abreast of phone guy as he walked. I heard some words being exchanged, some manly staring. Then driver sped the car up and went on with his life.

Phone guy went back to his phone.

Tim Harford: How to See into the Future

Conformity

I read Tim Harford's article "The Truth About Our Norm Core" today. It had this interesting passage about Solomon Asch's obedience experiment:

...It is true that most experimental subjects were somewhat swayed by the group. Fewer than a quarter of experimental subjects resolutely chose the correct line every time. (In a control group, unaffected by social pressure, errors were rare.) However, the experiment found that total conformity was scarcer than total independence. Only six out of 123 subjects conformed on all 12 occasions. More than half of the experimental subjects defied the group and gave the correct answer at least nine times out of 12. A conformity effect certainly existed but it was partial.

...Conformity was already a well-established finding by 1951, and his experiments were designed to contrast with earlier research on social norms. This previous research showed that people conformed to social pressure in situations where there was no clear correct answer — for instance, when asked to identify which of two ungrammatical sentences was the most ungrammatical. But Asch wanted to know if peer pressure would also wield influence when the crowd was unambiguously wrong. His research provided an answer: social pressure is persuasive but, for most people, the facts are more persuasive still.

 So if total conformity is a rarity, then that means the Nazis and those who supported them can't use the "Everyone was doing it" excuse. When you are in an environment of corruption, joining in is ultimately your own choice; you chose to be the three out of 12 who were swayed by the group.

You got a lifetime. No more, no less.

The Internet of Garbage, by Sarah Jeong

I find stuff like this informative because the problems being discussed affect all of us. It's just that women are the biggest victim demographic right now; but any race or individual or age group or gender or whatever group rises in the future can be a target for harassment and worse.

Comics and Creativity

See, this is something I have a small problem with about Western comics. The major publishing houses that are DC and Marvel rely too much on the same stable of characters, in the same universe. There's variation by changing the people bearing the names of the characters (but usually this results in a return to the status quo), or by giving characters power upgrades (like the one in the video above).

In Japan, stories in comics have a start and an end. Authors can be expected to write about more than one universe, more than one setting, more than one set of characters. And more often than not you'll see characters using their powers in creative ways. Sometimes the characters don't have powers at all; they use their cognitive ability.

Becoming Diamonds

To the above I would add:

• Install software like Folding@Home or BOINC
• Keep a few car-lengths of space in front of you as you approach a traffic jam 
• Avoid left turns when driving  
• Learn disaster preparedness
• Learn first aid, beginner to advanced
• Vaccinate yourself and your pets
• Neuter your pets
• Be frugal
• Vote - with your ballot, with your feet, with your money; VOTE.

Multitasking

Tim Harford makes for some good reading. I particularly like this article of his about how multitasking isn't necessarily all bad. As with everything in life, there are nuances.

I'm having trouble with multitasking. Even when doing programming jobs at work I have to finish things one at a time, which is bad when one issue proves to be pretty ornery. Right now I can only put focus on two things; if I'm into programming and hand combat skills I can't focus on Go or Japanese. I blame not being organized when I was younger. If I'd gotten this down back in college I wouldn't be struggling so hard.

Private Spy Agency

This New Yorker article talks about Harvey Levin and his private CIA, TMZ. He changed the whole celebrity-chasing game by insisting on hard proof and compensating his sources. What I am also particularly impressed by is how a positive externality came out of his endeavors - exposing unethical behavior of marines in Afghanistan. 

Then again, he does take responsibility for launching Kim Kardashian...