Erich Fromm

Link to Fromm on Wikipedia


Bibliography(Source: Wikipedia)

• 1941 - Escape from Freedom (US), The Fear of Freedom (UK)
• 1947 - Man for himself, an inquiry into the psychology of ethics
• 1950 - Psychoanalysis and Religion
• 1951 - The Forgotten Language; an introduction to the understanding of dreams, fairy tales, and myths
• 1955 - The Sane Society
• 1956 - The Art of Loving
• 1959 - Sigmund Freud's mission; an analysis of his personality and influence
• 1960 - Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis
• 1961 - May Man Prevail? An inquiry into the facts and fictions of foreign policy
• 1961 - Marx's Concept of Man
• 1962 - Beyond the Chains of Illusion: my encounter with Marx and Freud
• 1963 - The Dogma of Christ and Other Essays on Religion, Psychology and Culture
• 1964 - The Heart of Man, its genius for good and evil
• 1965 - Socialist Humanism
• 1966 - You Shall Be as Gods: a radical interpretation of the Old Testament and its tradition
• 1968 - The Revolution of Hope, toward a humanized technology
• 1968 - The Nature of Man
• 1970 - The Crisis of Psychoanalysis
• 1970 - Social character in a Mexican village; a sociopsychoanalytic study (Fromm & Maccoby)
• 1973 - The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness
• 1976 - To Have or to Be?
• 1979 - Greatness and Limitation of Freud's Thought
• 1981 - On Disobedience and other essays
• 1993 - The Art of Being
• 1994 - The Art of Listening
• 1997 - On Being Human

Too much anonymity

I think there's too much anonymity on the Internet at the moment. That's why I've decide to stop using a pseudonym (Delusional) on this blog. That's not to say that anonymity isnt' needed or useful - it is! But there is a time and place for it, and that time and place is not this blog.

(Anyway, I'm sure most people could have found it out with a little digging)

Life at a Low Ebb (Erich Fromm)

Today, our love of life has sunk to a low ebb. Any behaviour that does not serve a person's growth, his progress towards complete self realisation, takes it's toll. The exploiter fears the exploited. The murderer fears the isolation his deeds condemns him to. The destroyer fears his conscience. The joyless consumer fears living without being truely alive.

Erich Fromm

On Faith in Oneself (Erich Fromm)

You have to have faith in yourself, to be able to think critically, to be an independant human being, a human being and not a sheep. To achieve that, to learn "the art of living and of dying" takes a lot of effort, practise and patience. Like any other skill, it has to be learned. Anyone whose growth takes this direction will also develop the ability to know what is good - or bad - for himself and others, good or bad for him as a human being, not good or bad for his success, his acquisition of power or of goods.

Erich Fromm

On Talking (Erich Fromm)

If two people talk together and both of them remain the same people they were before, then they haven't really talked at all. They have simply engaged in an exchange of words.

Erich Fromm

The Art and Joy of Conversation (Erich Fromm)

...these things [the art and joy of conversation] will become possible again only if we can rid ourselves of our monomaniacal, goal-oriented way of life. We need to cultivate attitudes that recognise the expression and full realisation of human potential [his emphasis] as the only worthwhile goals in life. To put it in the simplest possible terms: What matters is being as opposed to having; to just using and consuming and getting ahead.

Erich Fromm

Forgetting the Self (Erich Fromm)

Once we can forget the self as the prime focus of our interest and once we experience ourselves as acting, feeling, non-alienated human beings, then the world becomes the prime focus of our interest, our concern, our creative energies.

...We can best practise self-analysis the first thing each morning, combining it with the kind of breathing and concentration exercises used in Buddhist meditation. The important thing is to step back from the bustle of life, to come to ourselves, to stop reacting constantly to stimuli, to make ourselves "empty" so that we can become active within ourselves.

Anyone who attempts this will, I think, experience a deepening of his capacity to feel; he will experience "healing", a recovery of health, not in the medical sense but in a profound human sense. But this process requires patience, and patience is certainly not a commodity we have in great abundance. To any and all who want to make the attempt, though, I wish the best of luck.

Erich Fromm

On Effort (Erich Fromm)

Anyone who fears effort, anyone who backs off from frustration and possibly even pain will never get anywhere.

Erich Fromm

On Evil (Erich Fromm)

Evil is a human thing. Arising from intelligence, greed and a lack of empathy.

Erich Fromm, For The Love of Life

Monotonous and Boring Work (Erich Fromm)

...That is why work has to stop being monotonous and boring. And the central problem we face in organising our work: How can we make work interesting, exciting, lively?

...The whole point of life is to become increasingly vital, more full of life

...I agree with thinkers like Marx and Disraeli, who were convinced that luxury is no less an evil than poverty.

...I think that the changes can be effected only if people feel a deep need for more life and less routine, only if they reject boredom and respond to needs that make them more vital and spontaneous, freer and happier.

Erich Fromm, For The Love of Life

The Delight of Function (Erich Fromm)

The German psychologist Karl Buehler has coined the very apt phrase "The delight of function" to suggest the joy that activity can bring with it.

I believe a human being is fully himself only when he expresses himself, when he makes use of the powers within him. If he cannot do that, if his life consists only of possessing and using rather than being, then he degenerates; he becomes a thing; his life becomes pointless. It becomes a form of suffering.

Erich Fromm, For The Love of Life

Time (Erich Fromm)

Another remarkable thing about our culture is that we will go to any lengths to save time, but once we have saved it we kill it because we can't think of anything better to do with it.

Erich Fromm, For The Love of Life

Humility (Erich Fromm)

The faculty to think objectively is [called] reason; the emotional attitude behind reason is that of humility.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Live Fully (Erich Fromm)

• Art
• Discipline
• Concentration
• Patience
• Supreme Concern

Learn and practice these things in all areas and aspects of life. To be concentrated, to apply oneself fully to each and every thing one does. To live fully in the present.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Proof of Love (Erich Fromm)

There is only one proof for the presence of love: the depth of the relationship, and the aliveness and strength in each person concerned; this is the fruit by which love is recognised.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

To Love Somebody (Erich Fromm)

To love somebody is not just a strong feeling - it is a decision, it is a judgement, it is a promise.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Conditional Fatherly Love (Erich Fromm)

In conditional fatherly love, we find, as with conditional motherly love, a negative and a positive aspect. The negative aspect is the very fact that fatherly love has to be deserved, that it can be lost if one does not do what is expected. In the nature of fatherly love lies the fact that obedience becomes the main virtue, that disobedience is the main sin - and it's punishment the withdrawal of fatherly love. The positive side is equally important. Since his love is conditional, I can do something to acquire it, I can work for it; his love is not outside of my control as motherly love is.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Love's Levels (Erich Fromm)

Infantile love follows the principle: "I love because I am loved"
Mature love follows the principle: "I am loved because I love"

Immature love says: "I love you because I need you"
Mature love says: "I need you because I love you".

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

The Essense of Love (Erich Fromm)

The essence of love is to labour for something and to make something grow, that love and labour are inseparable. One loves that for which one labours, and one labours for that which one loves.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Love (Erich Fromm)

The basic elements common to all forms of love:

• Care
• Responsibility
• Respect
• Knowledge

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Material Things (Erich Fromm)

In the sphere of material things giving means being rich. Not he who has much is rich, but he who gives much. The hoarder who is anxiously worried about losing something is, psychologically speaking, the poor impoverished man, regardless of how much he has.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Giving (Erich Fromm)

Giving is more joyous than receiving, not because it is a deprevation, but because in the act of giving is the expression of my aliveness.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Spinoza (Erich Fromm)

Thus Spinoza arrives at the statement that virtue and power are one in the same.

Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

Antibacterial Soap More Trouble than Bubble?

With this article: Freaky Clean: Chemical in Antibacterial Soap Weakens Muscle Function I will be rethinking what soaps will find residence in our house.

A common chemical in antibacterial products, triclosan — which can be found soaps, toothpastes and mouthwashes — was found to impair muscle function in lab and animal tests.

...effects of triclosan may not be entirely beneficial

The FDA notes further that there’s no evidence suggesting that antibacterial soaps containing triclosan offer any additional health benefits over regular soap.

Can Overuse of Antibacterial Soap Promote Allergies in Kids?

This is backed up again here: The Dirt on Anti-Bacterial Soaps and here: Ingredient Widely Used in Antibacterial Soap May Impair Muscle Function

It's a message that is repeated as far as the google can see: lmgtfy: antibacterial soaps are bad

The Eternal Quest for Productivity

I thought this article (What's the big deal about being productive) was a good read. Which finished on two interesting points:

• Productive people simply love the thought of being productive
• “If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don’t have integrity, nothing else matters…”

Plenty of interesting articles where that came from.

Another site I stumbled upon in my never ending quest to find the truth about productivy and motivation: Mind Tools

Some interesting stuff there on topics such as:

• Leadership Skills
• Team Management
• Time Management

Though I did find it all a bit generic, it seemed nevertheless quite thorough and professional. And some of their skill assessment quizzes were fun.

The Science Behind What Motivates Us

An excellent follow up on what next after this

The Science Behind What Motivates Us To Get Up For Work Every Day

The main takeaway probably summed best with this extract about ... three main actions [which] have proven the best results for keeping our emotions and positive thinking the highest

1. Exercise: We’ve discussed before in detail how exercise makes us happier. Any work-out will automatically release mood-enhancing chemicals and endorphin into your blood. This can immediately lift your mood and lowering stress. Exercise and maintenance of our physical health boosts our emotional health. The hard part here is of course how to get started with an exercise habit. Whatever it is you want to get into, the key is to start with easier task than you could actually do. Yes, that’s right. If you feel comfortable lifting 10kg, make it five. The art is in the start.

2. Set yourself up for success: Amabile and Kramer’s most important finding is that making progress at work is the main way to fuel positive inner work life. Making progress is easier said than done but breaking it down to ask what will facilitate progress can be helpful. Identify barriers and remove them, whether it’s too many meetings or micromanagement. Identify facilitators and implement or improve them, such as better communication or increased autonomy. The feeling of progress triggers the emotions and brain activity that result in creativity and your best work.

3. Reflect and review: Pay careful attention to your inner work life by writing down thoughts and feelings about your workday in a work diary by yourself or with your team using a tool like iDoneThis. A regular practice of reflection helps you recognise patterns, gain insight about your work and work relationships, celebrate and appreciate achievements and gestures, and puzzle out what helps and hinders progress. Journaling itself will improve your inner work life, lifting your emotions and aiding cognitive processing and adaptation. Take 10 minutes out of your day to reflect, vent and celebrate.

Programming is like...

Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning. ~Rich Cook

Plenty more where that came from

[Update 24/9/2012]

More quotegarden quotes that we at FOE liked:

• Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand. ~Martin Fowler
• What I mean is that if you really want to understand something, the best way is to try and explain it to someone else. That forces you to sort it out in your own mind. And the more slow and dim-witted your pupil, the more you have to break things down into more and more simple ideas. And that's really the essence of programming. By the time you've sorted out a complicated idea into little steps that even a stupid machine can deal with, you've certainly learned something about it yourself. ~Douglas Adams
• Good code is its own best documentation. As you're about to add a comment, ask yourself, "How can I improve the code so that this comment isn't needed?" ~Steve McConnell
• It should be noted that no ethically-trained software engineer would ever consent to write a DestroyBaghdad procedure. Basic professional ethics would instead require him to write a DestroyCity procedure, to which Baghdad could be given as a parameter. ~Nathaniel S. Borenstein

10-minute break

Personally, I have always had the habit of taking a short break whenever I've been presented with something new, especially something challenging, such as when a colleague gives me 20-minute mind dump on some new topic.

I can usually tell when I need to do so, because my brain will reach a saturation point and demand a cessation to the input! I never thought about it very much. It just seemed like the right thing to do, even if I did feel a little lazy doing it.

PsyBlog to the rescue:

They found that even after 7 days people's memory was enhanced when they took a 10-minute break after reading the story. In fact, 7 days later people who'd taken a break were as good as those trying to recall the story just 15-30 minutes later, but without the break.

RSA Animate - Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us

I think The video speaks for itself! ;)

Nevertheless, here's a quick summary for those who don't have a spare 10 minutes.


When a task gets more complicated. eg requires some conceptual creative thinking, more money does not lead to better performance. In fact, the opposite occurs: performances deteriorates.

The best use of money as a motivator is to pay people *enough* to take the issue of money off the table.

3 Factors lead to better performance and personal satisfaction

• Autonomy
• Mastery 
• Purpose

Autonomy - desire to be self-directed (often contrary to management directives/controls).
Master - the urge to get better at stuff
Purpose - the desire to be involved with something we think can make a difference in the world

Challenge, Mastery & Making a contribution

The big takeaway: If we start treating people like people, and not assuming that they are just smaller, cleaner smelling horses (tools), we can actually build organisations and work lives that not only make us better off, but also have the promise to make the world a better place.

Capitalism (Erich Fromm)

Capitalism ... permits the making of profits without personal effort and productive function.

Capitalism ... is the conflict between two principles on value: that between

the world of things and their amassment

and

the world of life and it's productivity.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

Walk (Erich Fromm)

A man taking a walk every morning tends to look on it as a good investment for his health, rather than a pleasurable activity which does not need any justification.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

Outgoing (Erich Fromm)

The word which is used for alienated conformity and sociability is of course one which expresses the phenomenon in terms of a very positive value. Indiscriminating sociability and lack of individuality is called being outgoing.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

The Aim of Life (revisited) (Erich Fromm)

..the aim of life is to unfold man's love and reason and that every other human activity has to subordinate to this aim.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

Work (Erich Fromm)

Work, instead of being an activity satisfying in itself and pleasurable, became a duty and an obsession.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

Aspirations v. Reality (Erich Fromm)

Since we are living beings, we must be sadly aware of the necessary gap between our aspirations and what can be achieved in our short and troubled life.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

Political Liberty (Erich Fromm)

Political liberty by itself is, in fact, always illusory. A man who lives in economic subjection six days, if not seven, a week, does not become free merely by making a cross on a ballot-paper once every five years.

Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

Man-made Realms (Erich Fromm)

Man hardly ever gets out of the realm of man-made conventions and things, and hardly ever breaks through the surface of his routine, aside from grotesque attempts to satisfy the need for a ritual as we see it practiced in lodges and fraternities. The only phenomenon approaching the meaning of a ritual, is the participation of the spectator in competitive sports; here at least, one fundamental problem of human existence is dealt with: the fight between men and the vicarious experience of victory and defeat. But what a primitive and restricted aspect of human existence, reducing the richness of human life to one partial aspect!

Erich Fromm - The Sane Society

Design Talent

I have always admired the creative arts. Movie making, Painting and drawing, Photography, Artistic design, etc. These images by Jazzia tickled me:

Source: jazzia.

Erich Fromm Appreciation Month

In this coming month, I plan to post all my backlogged notes and quotes from my reading of Erich Fromm.

The two-books I have read and will be quoting from are:

The Art of Loving (1956)

Review:

The renowned psychoanalyst Erich Fromm has helped millions of men and women achieve rich, productive lives by developing their hidden capacities for love. In this astonishly frank and candid book, he explores the ways in which this extraordinary emotion can alter the whole course of your life.
Most of us are unable to develop our capacities for love on the only level that really counts––a love that is compounded of maturity, self–knowledge, and courage. Learning to love, like other arts, demands practice and concentration. Even more than any other art it demands genuine insight and understanding. In this startling book, Fromm discusses love in all its aspects; not only romantic love, so surrounded by conceptions, but also love of parents for children, brotherly love, erotic love, self–love, and love of God

Source: Source.

The Sane Society

Review:

First published in 1955, "The Sane Society" is widely recognized as being one of the most powerful and eloquent explorations of the human condition in modern society. Fromm argues that modern society subjects humans to continuous disenchantment from the world which they created. People in modern society are estranged from other people, from the objects which they produce and consume, from their government and from themselves. Capitalism has produced "the manipulated personality". To allow present trends to continue unchecked will result, Fromm contends, in an insane society in which alienation is the order of the day. Rejecting the options of both capitalism and communism, Fromm discusses a third way of exploring things. He writes of a form of organization in which no individual is a means towards another's ends, where the well-being of individuals is the focus of society, and where personal growth complements economic growth. Fromm presents a complete outline of the concept of humanistic psychoanalysis, and charts the paths which can divert us from the tendency to robotism. He looks forward to "the sane society" in which individuals are productive, healthy and responsible. This book should be of interest to students of sociology and psychology.

Source: Source.

Discipline

I've been having a long hard think about discipline vs procrastination, and after much reading and soul-searching, I've come up with this quote that I want to put out there and see what people think:

Discipline: Feeling uncomfortable for a limited time to achieve a desired outcome

Pablo Picasso

"Without great solitude no serious work is possible."

– Pablo Picasso

I take it ole Pablo wasn't a fan of the open plan office!?

focus : a simplicity manifesto in the age of distraction (free ebook)

Focus is about finding simplicity in this Age of Distraction.

It's about finding the focus you need to create, to work on what's important, to reflect, to find peace.

Go here (http://focusmanifesto.com/) for a free ebook (PDF format)

The Science of Spoon-Bending

What does science (or in this case, The Laws of Physics) have to say about people who claim to be able to bend spoons with only the power of their mind: 

Short answer: No way, Jose:

That’s it. We are done. The deep lesson is that, although science doesn’t know everything, it’s not “anything goes,” either. There are well-defined regimes of physical phenomena where we do know how things work, full stop. The place to look for new and surprising phenomena is outside those regimes. You don’t need to set up elaborate double-blind protocols to pass judgment on the abilities of purported psychics. Our knowledge of the laws of physics rules them out. Speculations to the contrary are not the provenance of bold visionaries, they are the dreams of crackpots.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2008/02/18/telekinesis-and-quantum-field-theory/

The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

http://www.lifehacker.com.au/2012/08/the-disciplined-pursuit-of-less

   Quote:

Why don't successful people and organisations automatically become very successful? One important explanation is due to what I call "the clarity paradox," which can be summed up in four predictable phases:

Phase 1: When we really have clarity of purpose, it leads to success.
Phase 2: When we have success, it leads to more options and opportunities.
Phase 3: When we have increased options and opportunities, it leads to diffused efforts.
Phase 4: Diffused efforts undermine the very clarity that led to our success in the first place.

Quote

   ...Instead, we can conduct an advanced search and ask three questions: "What am I deeply passionate about?" and "What taps my talent?" and "What meets a significant need in the world?" Naturally there won't be as many pages to view, but that is the point of the exercise. We aren't looking for a plethora of good things to do. We are looking for our absolute highest point of contribution.

http://abstrusegoose.com/479

Your rewards in life...

Your rewards in life are based on the problems you have chosen to solve, the speed and accuracy at which you solve them, and for whom you have decided to solve them for.

Src: http%3A%2F%2Fwatsoninc.blogspot.com%2Ffeeds%2Fposts%2Fdefault

Debonair

debonair, debonnaire [ˌdɛbəˈnɛə]
adj (esp of a man or his manner)

1. suave and refined
2. carefree; light-hearted
3. courteous and cheerful; affable
4. having a sophisticated charm; "a debonair gentleman"

Source: The Free Dictionary.

On Federer

One difference between the players is illustrated on their faces when they strike the ball. Nadal and Djokovic come to meet the wide ball with open mouths, frowning at it as if they have arrived to dispatch it in anger, wage war on it. Federer's face is entirely uncreased when he swings through the ball, as though, even in the fury of that moment as it unfolds in real time, he's engaged in a soft conversation with it. The beauty of artful Roger TIMOTHY BOYLE The Age online, 15/7/2011

Emulate Those Who Finish Second, Not First

For those who didn't catch this in Lifehacker or Time :

Over time, the most skilled players came to inhabit a second tier of reliable competence. Those who succeeded spectacularly – who took their places in the first tier – were often not the most skilled, but rather were those who got some lucky breaks early on or took big risks that happened to pay off. Emulating these top performers would probably lead to disappointment, since imitators would be unlikely to replicate their good fortune.

Self Belief

Sometimes, before you can have faith in yourself, someone else has to have faith in you.

- Delusional

Procrastination

Code and fix

Code and fix

"Code and fix" development is not so much a deliberate strategy as an artifact of naiveté and schedule pressure on software developers.^[4]Without much of a design in the way, programmersimmediately begin producing code. At some point,testing begins (often late in the development cycle), and the inevitable bugs must then be fixed before the product can be shipped. See also:Continuous integration and Cowboy coding.

Link: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_development_process

Independent Security - Deputy Agents

Deputy agents were described by Blatz as devices an individual uses to carry him over a period of insecurity until he is willing to accept the consequences of a genuine decision. They work by freeing him of his insecurity at least temporarily, but they lead to no adequate permanent solution. (Blatz, 1966, p.93).

In the later phase of his theory, he labeled them postponement, reinterpretation, re-direction, and denial. He considered them healthy problem-solving devices if they were used with insight and employed only as a temporary expedient, but they were seriously maladaptive in their extreme and solidified forms.

Postponement of a decision represented good judgement if more information was required, if more time to consider were needed, and if the individual could accept the insecurity resulting from the delay. However, postponement to avoid decision-making could become procrastination fraught with anxiety.

Reinterpretation in its healthy form could be reasoning about alternative solutions but, if no decisive action followed, the reasoning could turn into rationalization ora "fantasy of lies" and obliterate the reality of the situation.

Redirection was attributing the cause of one's insecurity to others or blaming someone else for one's predicament. It was, Blatz suggested, commonly used to avoid the consequences imposed by an unjust authority. Resentment was induced, and this justified the blaming. If carried to its extreme, resentment could become feelings of persecution.

Denial was maintaining that there was no problem to be solved and hence no decisions to be made. Being ill and forgetting were the two most common forms. In their extreme, they become hypochondria and amnesia.

- W.E. Blatz: The Person and His Work by Mary J. Wright
Source: The Security Child, editor Volpe:p.37

Blatz - Security

This discussion is an attempt to strike at the root of social living and to try to bring out its first principle - security .... Security is not safety, because as soon as we desire safety we thereby show that we have not achieved security ... security is something you cannot buy or borrow. It is something you must learn and earn. The secure individual is one who when presented with a problem chooses an alternative and then is willing to accept the consequences, whatever they may be.... The standard of security may be achieved in two ways. The first way is through the mechanism of dependence.... Individuals grow toward the goal of maturity ... being born dependent, we achieve independence.... Independence is the end result of emancipation from all those persons or things upon which we are dependent since birth.... How do we achieve this independence? The mechanism is that of learning.... As you know how to do something, you are increasingly secure ... every individual may be regarded as striving for security in four phases of his social milieu ... a purpose in life ... vocation ... avocation ... social intimacies.
- Blatz 1934a pp.3-4

Source: The Secure Child, Volpe:p.11

Fromm - Loss of Individual Identity

..., the role of the consumer is essentially a passive one. Nothing has value itself, but only as "a good buy" or "a sound investment". We think with increasing abstraction, so that nuclear war becomes representable by graphs and charts (see the "decontextualized discourse" of military planner analyzed by Wersche). The most central ailment of modern society is, alienation - or idolatry, as Fromm prefers to call it: "the fact that man does not experience himself as the active bearer of his own powers and richness, but as an impoverished 'thing', dependent on powers outside himself, unto whom he has projected his living substance" (p.124)
   As a result, we have lost a sense of self, of individual identity.

- Preface by David Ingleby
Source: The Sane Society, Fromm 1991:xxxii

Lyotard - Our role as thinkers

In the situation of postmodernity, "Our role as thinkers is to deepen what language there is, to critique the shallow notion of information, to reveal an irremediable opacity within language itself".

Source: Lyotard and Philosophy of Education, Lyotard, 1993d: 27

An Exceptional Journey is made with Exceptional People

Portmanteau

portmanteau - a new word formed by joining two others and combining their meanings; "`smog' is a blend of `smoke' and `fog'"; "`motel' is a portmanteau word made by combining `motor' and `hotel'"; "`brunch' is a well-known portmanteau"

False dichotomy

Cunningham & Cunningham, Inc

A dichotomy is a set of two mutually exclusive, jointly exhaustive alternatives. Dichotomies are typically expressed with the words "either" and "or", like this: "Either the test is wrong or the program is wrong."

A false dichotomy is a dichotomy that is not jointly exhaustive (there are other alternatives), or that is not mutually exclusive (the alternatives overlap), or that is possibly neither. Note that the example given above is not mutually exclusive, since the test and the program could both be wrong. It's not jointly exhaustive either, since they could both be correct, but it could be a hardware error, a compiler error and so on.

…

I think there is another name for the argument where somebody makes a list and tries to say that your answer "has to be on the list." I think the name of that fallacy would have nothing to do with the length of the list. A FalseDichotomy is an attempt to force a person into choosing one of two seeming opposite extremes, not just one of two arbitrary answers. That is why "If you're not with us, you're against us" is a FalseDichotomy -- because the two alternatives are presented as opposite extremes. But "He lives in either New York or Boston" is not.

---

Rational Wiki 

A false dilemma, or false dichotomy, is a logical fallacy which involves presenting two opposing views, options or outcomes in such a way that they seem to be the only possibilities: that is, if one is true, the other must be false, or, more typically, if you do not accept one then the other must be accepted. The reality in most cases is that there are many in-between or other alternative options, not just two mutually exclusive ones.
 
False dichotomies are commonly seen in arguments vis-a-vis religion vs. science, and woo vs. science.

Most people of the world

Most people in the world do not care much at all about science, as long as their TVs work...
- PZ Myers

Sturgeon's law

Sturgeon's revelation, commonly referred to as Sturgeon's law, is an adage commonly cited as "ninety percent of everything is crud" or "ninety percent of everything is crap". It is derived from quotations by Theodore Sturgeon, an American science fiction author: while Sturgeon coined another adage that he termed "Sturgeon's law", it is his "revelation" that is usually referred to by that term.

The phrase was derived from Sturgeon's observation that while science fiction was often derided for its low quality by critics, it could be noted that the majority of examples of works in other fields could equally be seen to be of low quality and that science fiction was thus no different in that regard to other art.

Your time is limited - Steve Jobs

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life and don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your inner voice. Most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become." - Steve Jobs (2005)

Dunning Kruger effect

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect

The Dunning-Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which unskilled individuals suffer from illusory superiority, whilst actual competent individuals may lack such self-confidence as they (competent individuals) may falsely assume that others have an equivalent understanding!

TEOTWAWKI

The world can be divided into two types of people. Those who have googled TEOTWAWKI and those who haven't!

Independent Security

In 1944, Blatz wrote about independent security as follows:

> Independent security can be attained only in one way, by the acquisition of a skill through learning. Whenever an individual is presented with a situation for which he is inadequately prepared or whenever he is striving for something and finds that his preparation is inadequate, he must make one of two choices, either to retreat or to attack. This situation is emotionally charged, but there is more than the emotional content in such situations. The individual must, if he is to attack, emerge from the security of a dependent sort and accept the state of insecurity. His attack, of course, will result in learning; the degree of skill which he acquires will depend on his persistence. But once having learned, he will meet this situation in the future with assurance, because now he possesses a behaviour pattern which makes it possible for him to adapt himself satisfactorily. Furthermore, he has become familiar with the consequences of his advance and is willing to face them. Such a skill, having been acquired through his own effort cannot be subject to the same kind of crisis as the other agents which have been described. (p. 167)

Blatz as quoted in The Secure Child, Richard Volpe (Editor)

若要人不知，除非己莫为

Pinyin: ruò yào rén bù zhī, chú fēi jǐ mò wéi

Meaning: If you don't want anyone to find out, don't do it.

Translation & Pinyin

Post tenebras spero lucem

“After darkness, I hope for light”

文武双全

Pinyin: wén wǔ shuāng quán


Meaning: well versed in letters and military technology (idiom); fine scholar and soldier / master of pen and sword.


Dictionary

Chinese Nursery Rhymes/Songs

I've composed a small list of chinese nursery rhymes/songs.

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1BA4121D74866BA7

借刀杀人

Pinyin: jiè dāo shā rén


Meaning: kill somebody by another's hand; make use of a person to get rid of another.

Fake it till you make it

Fake it till you make it (also called "act as if") is a common catchphrase that means to imitate confidence so that as the confidence produces success, it will generate real confidence.

Human Stupidity: the need to resist

"... the country moving uphill also has an unusually high fraction of intelligent people who manage to keep the σ fraction at bay and at the same time produce enough gains for themselves and the other members of the community to make progress a certainty." (The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity, Cipolla: 17)

locum

n locum [ˈləukəm]

a person who takes the place of another (especially a doctor, dentist etc) for a time. 

Proclivity

pro·cliv·i·ty noun, natural or habitual inclination or tendency; propensity; predisposition: a proclivity to meticulousness. plural pro·cliv·i·ties.

expediency

expediency
n. pl. expediencies

1. Appropriateness to the purpose at hand; fitness.
2. Adherence to self-serving means: an ambitious politician, guided by expediency rather than principle.
3. A means; an expedient.
4. Obsolete Speed; haste.

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Gifted Children

Gifted children are not magically gifted with knowledge and expertise; they are gifted with the ability to learn! - Delusional, 27/4/2012

gird your loins

gird
v. gird·ed or girt (gûrt), gird·ing, girds
v.tr.

1. 1. To encircle with a belt or band.
   2. To fasten or secure (clothing, for example) with a belt or band.
   3. To surround. See Synonyms at surround.
2. To equip or endow.
3. To prepare (oneself) for action.

v.intr.

To prepare for action: "Men still spoke of peace but girded more sternly for war" (W. Bruce Lincoln).

Idiom: gird (up) (one's) loins

To summon up one's inner resources in preparation for action.

[Middle English girden, from Old English gyrdan; see gher-1 in Indo-European roots.]

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Brandon Lee - life philosophy

In August of 1992, Bruce Lee biographer John Little asked Brandon Lee what his philosophy in life was, and he replied, "Eat—or die!" Brandon later spoke of the martial arts and self-knowledge:

Well, I would say this: when you move down the road towards mastery of the martial arts—and you know, you are constantly moving down that road—you end up coming up against these barriers inside yourself that will attempt to stop you from continuing to pursue the mastery of the martial arts. And these barriers are such things as when you come up against your own limitations, when you come up against the limitations of your will, your ability, your natural ability, your courage, how you deal with success—and failure as well, for that matter. And as you overcome each one of these barriers, you end up learning something about yourself. And sometimes, the things you learn about yourself can, to the individual, seem to convey a certain spiritual sense along with them.

...It's funny, every time you come up against a true barrier to your progress, you are a child again. And it's a very interesting experience to be reduced, once again, to the level of knowing nothing about what you're doing. I think there's a lot of room for learning and growth when that happens—if you face it head on and don't choose to say, "Ah, screw that! I'm going to do something else!" We reduce ourselves at a certain point in our lives to kind of solely pursuing things that we already know how to do. You know, because you don't want to have that experience of not knowing what you're doing and being an amateur again. And I think that's rather unfortunate. It's so much more interesting and usually illuminating to put yourself in a situation where you don't know what's going to happen, than to do something again that you already know essentially what the outcome will be within three or four points either way.

source

Brandon Lee

In an interview just prior to his death, Lee quoted a passage from Paul Bowles' book The Sheltering Sky that he had chosen for his wedding invitations; it is now inscribed on his tombstone:

Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. And yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, or five times more? Perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless...

source

Interesting Words

sinophile
n.

One who admires China, its people, or its culture

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perspicacity
n.

Acuteness of perception, discernment, or understanding

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adversary
n. pl. ad·ver·sar·ies

1. An opponent; an enemy.
2. Adversary The Devil; Satan. Often used with the.

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protagonist
n.

The main character in a drama or other literary work

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iconoclast
n.

1. One who attacks and seeks to overthrow traditional or popular ideas or institutions
2. One who destroys sacred religious images

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affliction
n.

1. A condition of pain, suffering, or distress
2. A cause of pain, suffering, or distress

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plebiscite
n.

1. A direct vote in which the entire electorate is invited to accept or refuse a proposal
2. A vote in which a population exercises the right of national self-determination.

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skeptical
adj.

1. Marked by or given to doubt; questioning: a skeptical attitude; skeptical of political promises.
2. Relating to or characteristic of skeptics or skepticism.

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salacious
adj.

1. Appealing to or stimulating sexual desire; lascivious.
2. Lustful; bawdy.

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despot
n.

1. A ruler with absolute power.
2. A person who wields power oppressively; a tyrant.
3. 1. A Byzantine emperor or prince.
   2. An Eastern Orthodox bishop or patriarch.

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positivisms
n.

1. Philosophy
   1. A doctrine contending that sense perceptions are the only admissible basis of human knowledge and precise thought.
   2. The application of this doctrine in logic, epistemology, and ethics.
   3. The system of Auguste Comte designed to supersede theology and metaphysics and depending on a hierarchy of the sciences, beginning with mathematics and culminating in sociology.
   4. Any of several doctrines or viewpoints, often similar to Comte's, that stress attention to actual practice over consideration of what is ideal: "Positivism became the 'scientific' base for authoritarian politics, especially in Mexico and Brazil" (Raymond Carr).
2. The state or quality of being positive.

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locum
n.

Someone (physician or clergyman) who substitutes temporarily for another member of the same profession

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olympic
adj

1. (General Sporting Terms) of or relating to the Olympic Games
2. of or relating to ancient Olympia

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miasma
n. pl. mi·as·mas or mi·as·ma·ta

1. A noxious atmosphere or influence: "The family affection, the family expectations, seemed to permeate the atmosphere . . . like a coiling miasma" (Louis Auchincloss).
2. 1. A poisonous atmosphere formerly thought to rise from swamps and putrid matter and cause disease.
   2. A thick vaporous atmosphere or emanation: wreathed in a miasma of cigarette smoke.

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miasma
n pl -mata [-m?t?], -mas

1. an unwholesome or foreboding atmosphere
2. pollution in the atmosphere, esp noxious vapours from decomposing organic matter

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pediatrics
n. (used with a sing. verb)

The branch of medicine that deals with the care of infants and children and the treatment of their diseases.

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dire

1. j (usually prenominal)

1. Also direful disastrous; fearful
2. desperate; urgent a dire need
3. foreboding disaster; ominous a dire warning

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recalcitrant
adj.

Marked by stubborn resistance to and defiance of authority or guidance. See Synonyms at unruly.

n.

A recalcitrant person.

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edification
n.

Intellectual, moral, or spiritual improvement; enlightenment

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suffrage
n.

1. 1. The right or privilege of voting; franchise.
   2. The exercise of such a right.
2. A vote cast in deciding a disputed question or in electing a person to office.
3. A short intercessory prayer.

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cathartic
adj. n.

An agent for purging the bowels, especially a laxative.

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Wheat Belly, Davis: cha 2

"Plants such as wheat have the ability to retain the sum of the genes of their forebears. Imagine that, when your parents mated to create you, rather than mixing chromosomes and coming up with forty-six chromosomes to create their offspring, they combined forty-six chromosomes from Mom with forty-six chromosomes from Dad, totaling ninety-two chromosomes in you. This, of course, doesn’t happen in higher species. Such additive accumulation of chromosomes in plants is called polyploidy." (Wheat Belly, Davis: cha 2)

The Sane Society, Fromm 1991:203

The aim of life is to live intensely, to be fully born, to be fully awake. To emerge from the ideas of infantile grandiosity into the conviction of one's real though limited strength; to be able to accept the paradox that every one of us is the most important thing there is in the universe - and at the same time not more important than a fly or a blade of grass. To be able to love life, and yet accept death without terror; to tolerate uncertainty about the most important questions with which life confronts us - and yet to have faith in our thought and feeling, insomuch as they are truly ours. To be able to be alone, and at the same time one with a loved person, with every brother on this earth, with all that is alive; to follow the voice of our conscience, the voice that calls us to ourselves, yet not to indulge in self hate when the voice of conscience was not loud enough to be heard and followed. The mentally healthy person is the person who lives by love, reason and faith, who respects life, his own and that of his fellow man. (The Sane Society, Fromm 1991:203)

The Sane Society, Fromm 1991:xvii

"[...] the tendency of political parties to abandon ideological platforms for political packaging p, presentation and personalities. The party intellectuals have been put out to grass, and replaced by marketing consultants." (The Sane Society, Fromm 1991:xvii)