Outlook – Page 2 – On The 8 Spot

December 3, 2009

UCLA Loneliness Scale

Take the loneliness test here: UCLA Loneliness Scale.
UCLA Loneliness Scale
Indicate how often each of the statements below is descriptive of you. Circle one letter for each statement:
via UCLA Loneliness Scale.

If I interpret this correctly I have low loneliness, but this is because I don’t feel lonely doing things alone (I love how this sentence rolls of the mouth). I searched for the UCLA Loneliness Scale after reading this post by Gretchen of The Happiness Project. Loneliness was on my mind because of the study this article was based on. (Pointer From Jayson F.).
Hope we can all self-evaluate and if we feel lonely then connect with people. Loneliness can be debilitating.

December 1, 2009

Repost::Open as in water, the fluid necessary for life

Most of our happiness and productivity comes from the everyday details of our lives: the people we live and work with, the books we read, the hikes we take, the parties we attend, etc. But how do we choose these things? How do we know what to do, and how do know if we’ll like it? The obvious answer is that we do and like whatever the TV tells us to do and like. I’m not certain that's the best answer though.
By sharing more of our own thoughts and lives with the world, we contribute to the global pool of “how to live”, and over time we also get contributions back from the world. Think of it as “open source living”. This has certainly been my experience with my blog and FriendFeed. Not only do people occasionally say that it has helped them, but I’ve also met interesting new people and gotten a lot of good leads on new ideas. These are typically small things, but our lives are woven from the small details of everyday living. For example, I saw a good TED talk on “The science of motivation”, shared it on FriendFeed, and in the comments Laura Norvig suggested a book called Unconditional Parenting, which turns out to be very good.
via Paul Buchheit: Open as in water, the fluid necessary for life.

July 16, 2009

Knowledge Seeks To Be Free::Walking Randomly » The ridiculous high prices of online journal articles.

One of the many things that I miss in being a student is the access all the IEEE journals through UP’s academic access. Nothing seems more against the principle of the academe than the way that research isn’t propagated because of cost. See I am interested in alot of things , this is because of an intense curiosity that tries to seek out as much knowledge as my little brain can grok. One of the themes that continously arises is how much progress made in the sciences are due to lateral or expansive grasp of present knowledge.
I use lateral in the way that alot of progress is due to connecting various seemingly independet events into a theory that explains both. I put Einstein’s theories in this category.
The expansive grasp means knowing all the pertinent techniques with respect to your problem. If you read Feynman‘s Nobel Lecture you see whaI mean here. He had a claim that(probably true) that he knew everything about the problem he was trying to solve, which help him connect the dots on the different approaches to the same problem.
Both of these are negatively impacted by the high cost of journals. The amateur/hobbyist is doubly affected , and what are most of us in fields that we are not actively trying to research further are we? Most of us are not experts in everything and some of us (including me) are not even expert in anything. How much progress is not being made because information is not readily available?
If this is a simple case of “It’s always been done like this!”, then I think we need to rethink this. In a way science has progressed. During the time of newton or darwin they rarely collaborated with fellows, but we have progressed far faster because of openly available information. The thing is we are moving ever faster towrds an age where science would either stagnate or reach a point that people call a singularity. Stagnation means that there would be a return to malthus and that is something we cannot let happen, this for me means that we have a duty to ourselves and those that come after us to make sure that the future is aor near the singularity. This calls for cheaper if not free flow of information!

The ridiculous high prices of online journal articles.
I’m a lucky guy! I work for a major UK University and one of the perks of the job is that I (along with every other member of the University) get access to a massive array of academic journals and this is close to priceless as far as I am concerned. I’d rather take a salary cut than lose that particular perk (shhhh, don’t mention this to my bosses) and I don’t even do any formal research!
I have been blogging for almost two years now and one thing I have learned from the whole experience is that the world contains legions of amateur scholars – people who do research for personal rather than professional reasons. These scholars (and I like to think I am one of them) don’t want to publish papers or get qualifications, they simply want to learn about and discuss whatever subject takes their fancy. In my case I focus on subjects such as mathematics and physics since they are (and always have been) the subjects that float my boat and they are also the subjects I studied both at school and at University.
via Walking Randomly » The ridiculous high prices of online journal articles..

May 8, 2009

Best Read:If You Have 3 Or More Priorities You've Got To Read This:Mud Rooms, Red Letters, and Real Priorities | 43 Folders

Even though their influence informs every decision we make on the most tactical level, thinking about priorities happens at a strategic, “why am I here?” level. Right? Maybe? Disagree? Pretty sure you can make priorities like biscuits or shuffle them around like Monopoly pieces?
Got news for you, Jack: if it moves, it’s not a priority. It’s just a thing you haven’t done yet.
Making something a BIG RED TOP TOP BIG HIGHEST #1 PRIORITY changes nothing but text styling. If it were really important, it’d already be done. Period. Think about it.
Example. When my daughter falls down and screams, I don’t ask her to wait while I grab a list to determine which of seven notional levels of “priority” I should assign to her need for instantaneous care and affection. Everything stops, and she gets taken care of. Conversely — and this is really the important part — everything else in the universe can wait.
via Mud Rooms, Red Letters, and Real Priorities | 43 Folders.

I’ve probably read this 5 times at least some parts probably more than 10. I am trying to live. I am trying to find the/my priority. I am incomplete, I am confused, I am human.

March 12, 2009

Had To Share:Nice Story On Injustice:Guilt and forgiveness – Part II at Paulo Coelho’s Blog

: Image via Wikipedia

Nice story read the whole thing!
Guilt and forgiveness – Part II
Published by Paulo Coelho on March 6, 2009 in Stories

Here is a beautiful story that illustrates precisely what I mean:
When he was small, Cosroes had a teacher who helped him to become an outstanding student in all his subjects. One afternoon, the teacher punished him severely, apparently for no reason.
Years later, Cosroes acceded to the throne. One of his first actions was to summon his former schoolmaster and demand an explanation for the injustice he had committed.
‘Why did you punish me when I had done nothing wrong?’ he asked.
‘When I saw how intelligent you were, I knew at once that you would inherit the throne from your father,’ replied his teacher. ‘And so I decided to show you how injustice can mark a man for life. Now that you know that,’ the teacher went on, ‘I hope you will never punish another person without good reason.’
Guilt and forgiveness – Part II at Paulo Coelho’s Blog.

March 8, 2009

rePost:Finding Happiness:Stumbling and Mumbling: Money, reputation and happiness

: Image via Wikipedia

I suspect there might not be. One reason why I think I’m happier now than when I was younger (despite the U-shape in happiness over the life cycle) is precisely that I’ve stopped giving a damn what anyone thinks about me. If you care about your reputation, you end up worrying about things you can’t easily control. You become like Heather Mills, ranting hysterically about the press.
This is pretty much the exact opposite of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s recipe for happiness – flow. He says we maximize happiness when we lose ourselves in an activity – playing music or sport say – when we are in control, and yet oblivious to our own ego.
Stumbling and Mumbling: Money, reputation and happiness.

Happiness is that thing that I yearn for and actually try to find. I haven’t but all good things take time. What am I trying to do to find happiness? Here are some:
-Trying out new thing. This includes hobbies etc. I am trying to skew towards activities that do.
-Connecting with people. Trying to interact with people and increase my circle of friends. This also include improving connections with my friends now.
-Connecting with your family. We tend to take our parent and siblings for granted. I try to smooth things over and try to maximize my time spent with my parents.
-Self Improvement. A most overused word but its overused for a reason you are never perfect. What you can be is a person that is totally comfortable with yourself! The best way (for me) to be comfortable with yourself is to face the harsh realities of life and your rough edges head on. This means being honest to yourself with the things taht are painful for you, the things that irk you, things that give you joy, the activities that gives you a lasting joy. The good thing about being honest to yourself is that when you do it often enough it becomes a habit thatbrings you closer

March 6, 2009

rePost: Learning to Be Forgiving:Guilt and forgiveness – Part 1 at Paulo Coelho’s Blog

: Image by peterjaena via Flickr

Let’s just say I am not the ost forgiving person in the planet. I remember slights as far back as the second grade, but I remember because I believe I have something that could be called emotional memory. I tend to remember events, facts etc related to intense emotions that I feel. This means both extremes, happiness and sadness makes a mark on me that is hard to erase and so easy to recall and even easier to reinforce.
Forgiveness I think is a function of acceptance. Read the story accompanying the excerpted news. it’s quite good.

The story clearly illustrates our own problems with guilt and forgiveness. When we were children, we would often overhear our mother saying: ‘My child only behaved foolishly because he got into bad company. He’s a very good boy really.’
And so we never took responsibility for our actions, never asked for forgiveness and ended up forgetting that we must also be generous with those who offend us. The act of forgiveness has nothing to do with feelings of guilt or cowardice: we all make mistakes and it is only by occasionally stumbling that we can improve and progress. On the other hand, if we are too tolerant of our own behaviour – especially when this hurts other people – we become isolated and incapable of correcting our path.
Guilt and forgiveness – Part 1 at Paulo Coelho’s Blog.

March 5, 2009

rePost:Finding Your Thing:Stumbling and Mumbling: Consumption deskilling & utility

: Image by madaboutasia via Flickr

I am proud to say that i see this in a few of my friends, where other people might ask why? they just do!
Why is this? Based on my all too biased personal experience I find that the majority of people I know are like this, consumption maximisers and probably all that I can blame is probably environment. TV is the national obssession.
I remember a local rock legend ranting about how the kids nowadays just buy off the rack punks wear, etc. Things like this are akin to exercise , you need to get to form a habit of doing, creating and when you are you probably just can’t stop.
But how?
-Find what you enjoy by doing a multitude of things and try to do it till you feel at least two levels of pay-offs, so you can evaluate if something is “your thing!” Why two levels? Well most experiences either have different pay-offs and different level of pay-off per skill level, you may not get to evaluate how much you would value something if you quit to quickly!
-Just like the previous post try to incorporate it to your life/habit. Remember how Randy Paush, when he is thinking always had a football in his hands, you could do this with guitar playing whilst watching tv play the guitar, or while walking think of poems if you’re into poetry, think of blogposts while waiting for your train, you have the time, you are just not using it wisely.
-Find a friend to help you with your hobbies. Remember its always fun to do something with someone.
-When something is beginning to define you step back and think if this is really something you want to be defined by.
-Evaluate the effort you put in to your thing. You must always strive to improve because you might end up just with another reflex action.
-Evaluate you thing. Sometimes doing your thing would hold you back on some important parts of life, Like how my Internet addiction is slowly making me more socially inept than I already am.
Read the whole post its packed with information.

I suspect something else is going on. That something is the spread of purely instrumental rationality – the idea that utility maximization consists solely in maximizing consumption for minimal expenditure of time and money. Many of us take it for granted that it’s rational to spend as little time cooking as possible, and that music should only be a consumption good.
What this ignores is that many things are worth doing for their own sake. I’ll never play the guitar as well as Martin Simpson, or cook as well as Gordon Ramsey, or grow enough vegetables to be self-sufficient. But I play the guitar, cook and grow my own because these things are worth doing for their own sake.
Labour is not just a cost, to minimized. It is – or can be – a form of satisfaction in itself – a way of asserting who we are.
Stumbling and Mumbling: Consumption deskilling & utility.

March 3, 2009

-No To Right Of Reply Bill-GMANews.TV – Media groups vow stiff defense against RORB – Nation – Official Website of GMA News and Public Affairs – Latest Philippine News – BETA

: Image by BlueJeff via Flickr

The right of reply bil would like to ensure that the party referred to by a media report has a law defined right to air his side. Its all fine and good in theory but let’s analyze this in its proper context and we would realize that like libel it is another tool that powerful people use to suppress the truth and/or bullying by the media. Ordinary people like me do not have the resources to hire lawyers to try to sue people for libel or if this becomes law try to force media organizations to air my side. Generalizing this, although I have been extremely critical of the Philippine media, the toolset of powerful people in the Philippines would be the only one that is helped by this bill.

Media groups vow stiff defense against RORB
03/04/2009 | 09:02 AM
MANILA, Philippines – After failing to come to terms with lawmakers, media groups vowed Wednesday to stage a “man-to-man” defense against the passage of the Right of Reply Bill in Congress.
National Press Club president Benny Antiporda said they will not allow the passage of the RORB, which he likened to a “beautiful woman with AIDS.”
GMANews.TV – Media groups vow stiff defense against RORB – Nation – Official Website of GMA News and Public Affairs – Latest Philippine News – BETA.

March 3, 2009

rePost: Excellent Ranty Advice from Paul Wilmott:Paul Wilmott's Blog: Copulas and Cults

: Image via Wikipedia

Can’t say I blame him. People generally hate being different in a real way. The way I observe things, it seems most people just want to stand-out in the center of attention kind of way and not in the different trailblazing kind of way that I admire!
What you think of as just you job consumes probably from 2-10 hours of a 24 hour day. If you add in all the stuff you do because of work like commuting/preparing reports outside office hours/even shopping for office clothes/stuff etc . You can’t deny that what you call as just your job consists of the majority of your usable waking hours.
We need to take charge of our lives and have pride in what we do, and as human beings we have the capacity to think and analyze complex stuff. Why are we not doing exactly that?
As for the picture, for somer strange reason Zemanta thinks it’s relevant!

But that’s only part of the problem. Far more serious, because it extends to all of finance not just to a single model, is the poor education that people get in university financial engineering programs and also the blind-following-the-blind behaviour that is so common throughout the industry.
The copula model is not robust to changes in model assumptions. Black-Scholes is. Did you know that? Or maybe I’m wrong. Would you like to know the truth?
Yes, I could tell you. I could spoonfeed you. You’ve got used to being spoonfed, haven’t you? But you’re passing the buck there, putting an awful lot of responsibility on my shoulders. I can cope, as I’m sure David Li can cope. But you’re a big boy/girl now, you should be able to think for yourself. Isn’t that part of your job description?
It’s getting quite tedious me telling people to get off their backsides and test the models for themselves. Don’t believe anything I say, don’t believe anything Nassim, also quoted in the Salmon article, says. Question everything. Switch your brains back on.
Paul Wilmott’s Blog: Copulas and Cults.