2006
371 posts under this date.
The above is a map of world happiness—the redder, the happier—Adrian White, Analytic Social Psychologist, University of Leicester, made in a meta-study that aggregated the results of over a 100 independent studies and surveys on subjective wellbeing from around the world. The study itself isn’t yet available, but there’s an intereresting (though hideous) press release were you can quote your country’s rank (the US is #23, Denmark #1, Switzerland #2, Austria #3 (cheers to Alexis!), and Mexico #51).
As I said, the source itself isn’t yet available, but Eurekalert—a science news service of sorts—provides some quotes on White’s meta-study.
My favorite one—because it confirms my individualistic prejudices of course:
We were surprised to see countries in Asia scoring so low, with China 82nd, Japan 90th and India 125th. These are countries that are thought as having a strong sense of collective identity which other researchers have associated with well-being.
It was also interesting to find out that health was the most closely correlated variable to happiness (I would have expected wealth to have that place):
Further analysis showed that a nation’s level of happiness was most closely associated with health levels (correlation of .62), followed by wealth (.52), and then provision of education (.51).
But there are several quotes that hint at the study’s agenda—and it sends a chill through my spine:
There is increasing political interest in using measures of happiness as a national indicator in conjunction with measures of wealth. A recent BBC survey found that 81% of the population think the Government should focus on making us happier rather than wealthier.
If government has proved itself so egregiously lousy and so disturbingly meddling when it started working under the banner of improving our welfare through last century, I can only shudder when imagining what a brand new world awaits us when it pursues “our” happiness.
Now, this is getting interesting. Too many books but too many commitments.
Take the day off, my sister’s back from California!
Mi storyteller hermana Shmito nos narra su mas reciente patoaventuraWP:
Manoloooooo!!!
I am in pain!!!
Tengo una lesion abrasiva en la parte inferior de mi gluteo derechoooo!!!!
Deje le hago la cronica de lo sucedido:
 Pues mire, sucede que aqui en Guadalajara los domingos de 8 a 2 de la tarde cierran varias calles por el centro de la ciudad y le llaman Via Recreactiva. Va mucha gente a andar en bici, caminar, correr, on en patines. Yo opte por la ultima, los patines, porque me los compre alla en Houston y los queria estrenar. Pues fuimos mi familia y yo a la mentada via recreactiva. Todo iba bien—shhht-shhht—deslizandome por las calles de cemento, hasta que llegamos a un paso a desnivel (de los que son por arriba, no los subterraneos) y pues con todo mi esfuerzo subi, y a la bajada dije ”uju! Voy a agarrar un impulsito super cool!!”. Fui estupida, lo se—inocencia quiero llamarlo. Total que iba hecha la madreeee!! Manolo, agarre muchisisisisimo impulsooo!! no me podia frenar!! Temi horrible por mi vida! Mis opciones eran, estamparme intencionalmente contra el camellon o el como barandalito de los lados (lo que era un madrazazazo seguro y una probable muerte en el intento), o seguir bajando e intentar lograrlo.  Asi que segui bajando, agarrando cada vez mas y mas velocidad, temiendo cada vez mas y mas por mi vida, tratando de esquivar toda imperfeccion de la calle que pudiera causar mi caida. Todo iba bien, casi lo logro Manolo!! Cuando inesperadamente me di cuenta que justo cuando se termina la bajada, se termina tambien el cementito bonito y empieza un asfalto horrible lleno de pequeñas y letales piedritas e inumerables baches (imperceptibles a los carros y bicicletas, pero la pesadilla de cualquier patinador). Pero a esas alturas era muy tarde para intentar hacer algo. Asi que iba yo con todo el impulso de la bajada… llegue al asfalto… y sucedio lo inevitable… cai Manoloooo!!! Fue horribleeeeeeeeeeeee!! Me fui como de lado, raro… porque cai con mi mano derecha apoyada (ahora raspada) y con mi trasero-pierna derechos (raspadisimos). No me podia levantar Manolooo!!!  Mi piernita temblabaaaaa! Pero unas señoras se apiadaron de mi y me ayudaron a levantarme, y como no habia desayunado nada, como que del susto y todo me empeze a marear. Pero bueno, me recupere y segui patinando, ya no me quedaba de otra. Me dolia mi pierna en el lugar del golpe, pero no habia baños ni nada donde me pudiera ver. Asi que segui como por una hora y media mas, hasta que terminamos nuestro recorrido en un restaurante para desayunar. Para esto ya traia super super hinchada mi piernita en esa areaaa!! Cuando entre al baño a verme… Santa madree Manoloo!! Me asuste!! Se ve horriblee, es como una gran quemada, mezclada con raspada, mezclada con el aporreamiento del sentonazo!! Se ve super super feo, y duele aun peor!!!
Llegando a mi casa me iba a bañar, pero me quede dormida y despues de como 8 horas me desperte. me lave y #$$%&x%x madre, me dolio hasta el alma, pero bueno, ya esta limpito ahi.
Ahora solo tendre que esperar como 1 año de aqui a que sane esa horrible herida.
Bueno, esa es mi historia. Se la platico esperando que se divierta un rato a expensas de mi sufrimiento.
 There’s something deep about Riya, the new image search engine, that bugs me. It reminds me a lot of a group in my university that was developing a digital whiteboard back in 2002. It was a fascinating technology, and, these being the days of Minority ReportWP, IMDB, I was infatuated with the possibilities. The thing was expensive and bulky, but allowed for some really sweet, unprecedented interaction with the computer not that far from those of said movie.
An enormous amoeba-like structure 200 million light-years wide and made up of galaxies and large bubbles of gas is the largest known object in the universe, scientists say.
How can you not love such news? (via KurzweilAI.net)
The universe is not only queerer than we suppose, it’s queerer than we can suppose.
J.B.S. Haldane WP (attributed)
Ese fue un subtitulo de la portada del Publico de hoy. Para ser honestos, no suelo tener el menor interes por los deportes pero lo lei de rapido solo por aquello de enterarme de lo mas relevante del dia. Lo curioso fue lo primero que pense al leerlo:
...interesante, “festejo ganandole”, mmm, “festejo ganandole”, interesante, no es una forma que uno ve muy a menudo, por que la habran escogido? “festejo ganandole”, como mas podrian haberlo escrito? a ver, a ver, mmm, a ver, “festejo…”, “festejo ganarle al..”!, muy bien, ah!, “festejo al ganarle..”, muy bien, ya son 2 formas alternas, cual es la diferencia entre ellas y la forma original, en verdad difieren en significado? bueno, pues, si, creo que si, con “Atlas festejo ganarle al Boca Juniors” estableces claramente que el Atlas festejo por haberle ganado al Boca Juniors, con “Atlas festejo al ganarle al Boca Juniors” tambien dices que festejo por haber ganado pero insinuas que tambien tenia otro motivo de festejo, finalmente, con “Atlas festejo ganandole al Boca Juniors” no dejas duda de que aparte de festejar por ganar, el Atlas definitivamente tenia otro motivo para festejar de antemano…
Estoy enfermo?
...que hasta yo lo tengo!”
Vicente FernandezWP dixit (supuestamente).
Es increible pero el articulo de la Wikipedia en ingles sobre Vicente Fernandez esta mucho, mucho mas completo que el de la Wikipedia en español. Nuestra lengua materna esta devaluada en internet mucho mas alla de lo que nadie se atreve a decir en voz alta (o en letra grande).
I begin to think that I have a genius for working like an ox over totally irrelevant subjects… I am filled with an excruciating sense of never having gotten anywhere—but when I sit down and try to discover where it is I want to get, I’m at a loss… The thought of growing into a professor gives me the creeps. A lifetime to be spent trying to kid myself and my pupils into believing that the thing that we are looking for is in books! I don’t know where it is—but I feel just now pretty sure that it isn’t in books. —It isn’t in travel. —It isn’t in California. —It isn’t in New York… Where is it? And what is it, after all?
Thus one real result of my Los Angeles stay was the elimination of Anthropology from the running. I suddenly realized that all of my primitive and American Indian excitement might easily be incorporated in a literary career. —I am convinced now that no field but that of English literature would have permitted me the almost unlimited roaming about from this to that which I have been enjoying. A science would buckle me down—and would probably yield no more important fruit than literature may yield me!— If I want to justify my existence, and continue to be obsessed with the notion that I’ve got to do something for humanity—well, teaching ought to quell that obsession—and if I can ever get around to an intelligent view of matters, intelligent criticism of contemporary values ought to be useful to the world. This gets back again to Krishna’s dictum: The best way to help mankind is through the perfection of yourself.
Joseph Campbell in a January 1932 journal entry, as quoted in Joseph Cambpell Foundation’s About Joseph Campbell (emphases added)
Oh boy, I am Joseph Campell (toda proporcion guardada).
Marketing MyopiaWP, from the recently deceased economist Theodore LevittWP is a fascinating article from 1960. Despite its now quaint and outdated examples, despite being wrong in several of its predictions, this is one of the classic articles of marketing and deservedly so. Perhaps the biggest surpise for me was to reread a sense of marvel and respect at business, a lucid and bracing criticism of capitalism, that I hadn’t seen since I read some Peter DruckerWP last year. The “intellectual” community, specially in Mexico, has so often made deriding business and its babbits its raison d’etre, that I find such cogent analysis incredibly refreshing.
Here two fragments:
The difference between marketing and selling is more than semantic.
Selling focuses on the needs of the seller, marketing on the needs of the
buyer. Selling is preoccupied with the seller’s need to convert his product
into cash; marketing with the idea of satisfying the needs of the customer by
means of the product and the whole cluster of things associated with creating,
delivering, and finally consuming it.
In a sense Ford was both the most brilliant and the most senseless marketer in American history. He was senseless
because he refused to give the customer anything but a black car. He was
brilliant because he fashioned a production system designed to fit market
needs. We habitually celebrate him for the wrong reason, his production genius.
His real genius was marketing. We think he was able to cut his selling price
and therefore sell millions of $500 cars because his invention of the assembly
line had reduced the costs. Actually he invented the assembly line because he
had concluded that at $500 he could sell millions of cars. Mass production was
the result, not the cause, of his low prices.
At the end of the article, there’s an equally engaging retrospective commentary fifteen years after. Levitt could write.
Of course, I’d do it again and in the same way, given
my purposes, even with what more I now know—the
good and the bad, the power of facts, and the limits
of rhetoric. If your mission is the moon, you don’t use
a car. Don Marquis’s cockroach, Archy, provides some
final consolation: “An idea is not responsible for who
believes in it.”
As a sidenote, this was an article originally published in the Harvard Business Review, which I’ve always dismissed on the base of its exorbitating price. I’ve been reading through online article abstracts from the current edition and I’m most impressed. I’ll be sure to buy it next time.
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