James Drogan

This Bill Taylor podcast (this is an iTunes URL) from Harvard Business IdeaCast looks at leadership from provocative point of view, asking uncommon questions as to what leadership means.

Nine minutes and 10 seconds that's worth a listen.

Surfing the Universe is a fascinating article from July 21, 2008 issue of The New Yorker.  Only the abstract of the article is, at the time of this posting, available online.

'Physicists have long looked to higher math for insights into the workings of the universe.  "If a figure is so beautiful and intricate and clear, you figure is must not exist for itself alone," John Baez, professor of mathematics at the University of California at Riverside, said.  "It must correspond to something in real world."  This instinct -- the assumption that beauty will stand for truth -- has become a habit.  Some physicists now worry that string theory's mathematics has grown permanently unmoored from the real world -- an exercise in its own complexity.  And so modern theoretical physics has become, in part, an argument about aesthetics.'

Hence, the fact versus fancy portion of the title of this post.

I'm reminded here of the words of Paul Samuelson.

“There is no substitute for paying attention to the empirical facts of life, and no substitute for systematic reasoning about them.”

I'm no physicist and am not taking stand against string theory, apparently the most widely (and wildly?) accepted approach to developing the Theory of Everything.  But I am taking a stand against becoming "...unmoored from the real world..." regardless of the subject under consideration.

The other thing that comes to me from the article is the close-mindedness of people.  There is progress to made on a number of fronts -- finding the Theory of Everything may not be amongst the most urgent issues that need to be tackled -- and that progress is likely not to be what is required if thinkers become insular.

"If stated reasons don't sit well with your conscience or stand the test of logic, look for deeper motivations."

Docent Glax Othn in Dune: The Butlerian Jihad.

From Boing Boing.

Sufficient reason to view technology and its shamans with some skepticism.

Your attention is called to "Unloading Information Overload" from the July 7 issue of the Wall Street Journal

Most telling to me is the following from Maggie Jackson:

"Relying on multitasking as a way of life, we chop up our opportunities and abilities to make big-picture sense of the world and pursue our long-term goals," she writes. "The way we live is eroding our capacity for deep, sustained, perceptive attention – the building block of intimacy, wisdom, and cultural progress."

The issues with which we need to contend are such that we need  "...deep, sustained, perceptive attention..." in order to resolve these matters.

From Yale Global Online comes

"The US, as the world’s largest economy, carries less influence over other economies of the world. Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC) have reported rapid growth in recent years, thanks to innovative firms that have become leading exporters, reports Robert Weisman for the Boston Globe. Business no longer flows from west to east but in multiple directions, argues a team with the Boston Consulting Group. Companies based in the developing world have achieved global scale, and Weisman notes that “Decision making has been decentralized and business models opened up, with companies outsourcing design and tailoring products to different countries.” Specialization has become a competitive advantage for new companies in emerging economies, some analysts suggest. Such specialization requires flexibility, but also encourages different countries to concentrate on and master a few select industries."

"You cannot solve a problem with the same type of thinking that is creating it." 

 

Albert Einstein

The Core Rules of Netiquette are excerpted from the book Netiquette by Virginia Shea.  They have been brought to my attention by my colleague, Dr. Mark Chadwin.  I, in turn, bring them your attention.

From time to time we need to be reminded of proper behavior.

Today, from Arts & Letters Daily comes an article by John Naughton from The Observer that adds to this string regarding the the changing of the mind.

As I read it, I turned to look behind me to see 12 inches of unread books, then to the right of me to see another 18 inches of unread books.  I don't think this would ever have happened pre-Internet and I believe it a phenomenon that has developed only in the last four to five years.

Evidence, I think, that the trend noted by Turkle, and underscored by Carr and Naughton is indeed, at least in my little world, true.

The fundamentals of communication and the SIDAL loop are radically changing.  Am I keeping up?  I'm not sure as I can't seem to take the time to think about it.

On Friday, June 13, from Smart Mobs, comes a post by Howard Reingold, "Attention, Multitasking, Learning," that fits quite well with Carr's piece quoted in The Mind Changes.  And it is disturbing.

"Over the course of a riveting 75-minute discussion of the birth of Gandhian non-violent activism, I found myself becoming increasingly distressed as I watched students cruising Facebook, checking out the NY Times, editing photo collections, texting, reading People Magazine, shopping for jeans, dresses, sweaters, and shoes on Ebay, Urban Outfitters and J. Crew, reorganizing their social calendars, emailing on Gmail and AOL, playing solitaire, doing homework for other classes, chatting on AIM, and buying tickets on Expedia (I made a list because of my disbelief). From my perspective in the back of the room, while Dalton vividly described desperate Indian mothers throwing their children into a deep well to escape the barrage of bullets, I noticed that a girl in front of me was putting her credit card information into Urban Outfitters.com. She had finally found her shoes!"

This cited a post by Josh Waitzkin referred to by Reingold; " this post on “Multitasking and the End of Learning,”

I find myself sketching the following in my diary.

The task teachers have always had is to capture the attention of the student.  Some do it better than other.  With all that is going on in the world, and with all that is available almost instantaneously and almost anywhere and at almost any time, this task of capturing attention has become more critical and more difficult.

I noted to one of my teaching colleagues:

"Bill, summer, in my experience, brings on increasing waves of ennui.  I'm noticing it in my graduate class.  It's hot.  The beach and the beer call.  The course is intense.  It takes the strong-minded to keep in step."

The World is Lumpy is from Paul Krugman and in regards to global transportation.  He also makes mention of a paper, "The Trade Reducing Effects of Market Power in International Shipping," that may also be of interest.

Krugman is a good addition to your news reader.

Given all the needs of the world and the present socio-economic-political situations is this really an appropriate thing to do?  Isn't there a better use for $700M?