Junk thoughts of Curious Idiot

http://timeman.com/time-management-tips/time-management-tips-for-getting-results *) Many people concentrate on what I call “ant stomping” when they should concentrate on “elephant hunting.” When you focus on stomping ants you confuse activity with accomplishment. *) You’re going for the small insignificant tasks that are easy to do. They can be done quickly, so you give yourself the illusion that you’re really accomplishing a lot, when in actuality you’re getting further and further behind because you’re overlooking the elephant hunting. *) Elephant hunting means to pursue significant projects that have long-term payoffs for you. If you’re busy stomping ants all day long, you might not even be aware that you’re totally ignoring some of your elephants. *) Solving problems is “fire fighting.” You’d be better off in the long run figuring out how to prevent fires in the first place instead of constantly reacting to problems. Preventing fires puts us ahead of the game–and saves ...

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/08/20/genius-across-cultures-and-the-google-brain/?WT_mc_id=SA_CAT_MB_20110824

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/14/opinion/sunday/the-elusive-big-idea.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all Excerpts: *) Ideas just aren’t what they used to be. Once upon a time, they could ignite fires of debate, stimulate other thoughts, incite revolutions and fundamentally change the ways we look at and think about the world. *) If our ideas seem smaller nowadays, it’s not because we are dumber than our forebears but because we just don’t care as much about ideas as they did. *) In effect, we are living in an increasingly post-idea world — a world in which big, thought-provoking ideas that can’t instantly be monetized. *) There is the retreat in universities from the real world, and an encouragement of and reward for the narrowest specialization rather than for daring — for tending potted plants rather than planting forests. *) Courtesy of the Internet, we seem to have immediate access to anything that anyone could ever want to know. We are certainly the most informed generation in h...

Galactic-Scale Energy - http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/ Can Economic Growth Last? (Based on physical growth) http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/can-economic-growth-last/

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/white-noise/2011/08/02/addiction-a-fault-of-chemistry/

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-does-time-fly The more energy it takes to process a stimulus the longer it appears as a subjective experience of time.  Something moving toward you has more relevance than the same stimulus moving away from you:  You may need to prepare somehow; time seems to move more slowly. When we experience something as “taking a long time” it is really the result of three inter-twined processes: the actual duration of the event, how we feel about the event, and whether we think the event is approaching us.  There is little we can do about the first factor but there are obvious ways of modulating how we feel about an event and how we think about an event approaching us.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-neurobiology-of-bliss-sacred-and-profane&WT.mc_id=SA_WR_20110714