Why Most Of Us Can’t Think Once upon a time a very timid fellow decides to take an ocean cruise. He was very worried, as he’d never been out on the ocean. After the first couple days, he felt brave enough to venture out on the deck. But as luck would have it, as soon […]
Equilibrium Paradox
How Much Do You Need? Most of us have a curious belief about some big thing that we want. This can either be a thing, a certain amount of money, or even a long range goal. The belief that we hold about this is that once we get that “thing,” whatever it happens to be, […]
Collapse
Success Rate Of Zero Humans have gone through two types of societal organization. One has been stable, the other has not. In this post, we will endeavor to explain precisely why this second type of society always ends in collapse. It is far beyond the scope to come up with any large scale remedies to […]
Unintended Consequences
The Unpredictable Future The human brain is extremely limited in how we perceive things. Our sensory organs can only discern a very tiny window within the data that is hitting them. Even the idea of our conscious minds is not something we fully understand. Some studies indicate that up to 95% of our behaviors are […]
Supply and Demand
Secrets Of The Global Brain These two words, supply and demand, seem very simple. They are known and supposedly understood by virtually anybody. They are ubiquitous, and if you know the words, but are a bit sketchy on the concepts, then you will fully understand them by the end of this post. Despite their simplicity, […]
Tragedy Of The Commons
Why Are The Freeways So Crowded? This is a simple idea from economics that has far reaching ramifications. You’ll find it among roommates, farmers and even in the ocean. It’s called the “tragedy” of the commons because that’s how it always ends. Opposite of how everybody thinks it will end. Set Up Imagine you’ve […]
Time Preference Destruction
The Death Of Every Society In a recent post, we talked about the idea of time-preference. How it is the meta skill that is behind every other skill. How the lower your time-preference is, the more easily you can delay gratification. The more you can plan your future instead of living day to day. In […]