CDOQ

Everyone looks more attractive with the sunglasses on. 

The ability of humans to entertain themselves without technology is on decline and will continue to do so. 

What you think is your problem and it is probably the biggest problem you have. 

I often think about how to create new things and why and how people adopt new things. The core of why people acquire new things can be narrowed down to four basic human attributes (to see how adoption occurs click  here ). These attributes have been with us for centuries. And, if we really understand these attributes well then not only we can position products well in the market but also design products which have better chance of being adopted. The four attributes are:  1.  S ex (evolution)  2.  A ttachment  3.  I dentity  4.  L aziness  Let's call it the SAIL model and let's dig deeper into each SAIL attribute.  1. Sex:  Most people are genetically programed to be attracted to the opposite sex. Evolutionarily speaking, reproduction is one of the main  purposes  of life. We see how the dynamics of sex-appeal work in advertising and movies. Just think why do we have supermodels? Why...

I buy fresh flowers every week. I see them blossom and die. They change form, smell, and the environment they are part of. Flowers remind me of beauty and temporariness of life. 

I must lie down where all the ladders start in the foul rag and bone shop of the heart. - Yeats  

Behaviors which maybe natural in one culture are artificial in another. What is natural behavior? Should a behavior repeated over a few thousand years be considered natural? 

Never wrestle with a pig because if you do you'll both get dirty, but the pig will enjoy it. - Charlie Munger 

The rabbit runs faster than the fox, because the rabbit is running for his life while the fox is only running for his dinner. - Richard Dawkins  

What moves the world forward is a man's passion for his idea and his ability to ignore all sound advice. 

Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything. - George Bernard Shaw

Happiness is short-lived and sadness lives a long time. 

People want to fit into the society and at the same time they want to be perceived different from others. This costs money and mental peace. 

Words don't lose their meaning if you use them often. Words lose their meaning if your actions vary from your words. 

People gossip and chit-chat about useless things and it is considered normal. People do the same thing on Facebook and my intellectual friends find this appalling. Does the medium (Internet, phone, face to face, etc.) decide what is appropriate? The intellectuals also take pride in their non-activity on Facebook. However, they do have Facebook accounts. At cafes, people read newspapers and magazines when they are with their friends/spouses and nobody notices. If people read/interact on their iPads or iPhones when they are with other people at cafes, the intellectuals see this as the society going downhill. Does the medium (paper, touch screen) decide what is appropriate? People do make-up. It is second nature to most people, they don't think about it. However, some intellectuals don't like when other people get plastic surgery done. So, application of a substance is fine if it is on the skin and insertion of a substance/chemical inside the body to look better is frowned upon. ...

Why do we like to be entertained? 

Thought, after all, is only a result and not the source. - Krishnamurti 

Watch The Artist to see what it means to love and to learn how words can be futile. 

I see beautiful palaces and castles and I see years of oppression.  

The world is facing a crisis of integrity. - Sylvia Edwards Davis 

Who I am is not written in stone. Who I am today is different from who I was yesterday and who I will be tomorrow. 

Increasing literacy did not only mean the production of philosophical works. In 1130-36  Geoffrey of Monmouth assembled his History of the Kings of Britain , containing stories of King Arthur based on Celtic legend. A few decades later Chretien de Troyes used the same material to tell the story of Perceval , which linked the Arthurian romances to the search of Holy Grail. These stories captured and helped to create the culture of chivalry, of courtly love and Christian romance that became the ideal self-image of European nobility and gentry for centuries to come. The key elements of this literature were bravery as an ideal end in itself (the knights were not fighting to defend heir homeland but were going out to seek adventure), and the idealization of love between a man and a woman. In a clear urban alternative to boorishness of rural warrior barons, the restrictions of church literature, love became exquisitely refined, and was often adulterous- Lancelot , the principal hero o...

Manon offers good insights into human nature - desire, moral indecisiveness, and lack of self-awareness.

Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your own unguarded thoughts. - Buddha  

Yesterday, I went to a writing workshop at the  Shakespeare and Company . Just being there feels like being in the company of great minds of the last century. It was cool! The workshop was given by Fred Leebron  who was very patient with me:-). Following are my random notes:  1. Most dramas follow the  Freytag's Pyramid structure. According to Freytag, drama is divided into five parts:  i) Exposition  ii) Rising Action iii) Climax  iv) Falling Action  v) Denouncement  2. A good drama always has conflict. There are four types of conflicts:  i) Character vs Self (internal conflict)  ii) Character vs Others  iii) Character vs Nature  iv) Character vs World  3. A good drama always has something at stake. That something could be:  i) Birth  ii) Love iii) Death  iv) Friendship v) Family  vi) Money vii) Liberty  viii) Spiritualit...

The search for happiness is causing a lot of pain and misery in the world. A mind that is not seeking anything is very happy. 

I am amazed how 5,000+ year old ideas still influence my thinking. Do ideas become part of DNA and are passed on to the next generation? Is it related to my survival? Or, is it just the current society, which itself is influenced from the past, affecting my thinking? Or, is it what I want that creates a thinking bias that serves me?  Well, then why do I want what I want? If there is no past and no influence from the society, would I want the same things? And, why do I want anything? 

The world exists in my head. 

Human communication is still not evolved enough to accurately articulate emotions. 

What is the goal of civilization? Does it have one? If it does, who decides what the goal is? 

Why do humans look for meaning in randomness of life? Does the fragrance of a flower have meaning? There is no meaning. It just is. 

When you dine out in the US, why are the waiters/busboys in a rush to take your plates? Is there a plate-shortage in casual restaurants?:-)

Not long ago, the big retailers were considered as the sharks eating the small independent retailers. Today, these sharks are getting eaten by the web savvy companies. Booksellers are good examples. Borders is bankrupt. Barnes and Noble is not doing so well. These are the same companies that were thought to drive independent booksellers out of business. Now they are going out of business. The Internet companies may the new Goliaths . However, the new Davids may be the ones who combine web savvy with mobility and social networks. I see business very similar to biology. The species (companies) that survive are the ones who are the most adaptable to the change in the environment [ Darwin ]. 

I wonder how the world would be like if people showed same affection to unknown people that they show to unknown dogs. 

Innovation is one of the latest buzz-words in the business world. And, there is a lot of debate in academia about what innovation is. Is it any invention ? Is it anything new? Do x number of people have to buy the new "thing" before it is considered innovation? Is a new feature added to an existing product an innovation? Is any new product or service innovation? And on and on...the debate continues. The problem is that the academics spend most of their time and energy on discussing what innovation is and not enough on how to innovate. And, the people who are innovating are not usually discussing it. Innovation is very contextual subject. In the business world, most of the times, innovation is related to revenue growth. For this article, innovation is new revenue creation with commercialization of new high-technologies  or finding applications of existing high-technologies. Furthermore, this article is based on a recent talk I gave at the Santa Fe Institute  busines...

It is $4.99 on Amazon.com!

The following article was published in the European edition of  The Wall Street Journal on October 28th, 2011 and provides a good example of what is wrong with our society today. The love of sensory pleasures has taken over the love for another human being. The 'I Don't' Honeymoon By JULIA REED The honeymoon was to begin in Paris because that was, more or less, where we began. When I met my fiancé, I was in my early 20s and living in Washington, D.C. He was almost twice my age and living in London, so Paris is where we got together—where he romanced me over the course of seven years.    Hadley Hooper for The Wall Street Journal   Sometimes our visits were fevered two-day jaunts; sometimes, when we had the use of his sister's sprawling apartment, they'd last for more than a week. ...

People usually get more pragmatic with age.

It is better to understand oneself vs trying to understand others. If one understands oneself well then the behavior of others makes sense.

How do you learn to love? Is it possible to love truly if you have never been loved? Can you sustain love if it is not reciprocated?

Sleep is a wonderful thing.

You say you love your wife. In that love is involved sexual pleasure, the pleasure of having someone in the house to look after your children, to cook. You depend on her; she has given you her body, her emotions, her encouragement, a certain feeling of security and well-being. Then she turns away from you; she gets bored or goes off with someone else, and your whole emotional balance is destroyed, and this disturbance, which you don't like, is called jealousy. There is pain in it, anxiety, hate and violence. So what you are really saying is , 'As long as you belong to me I love you but the moment you don't I begin to hate you. As long as I can rely on you to satisfy my demands, sexual or otherwise, I love you, but the moment you cease to supply what I want I don't like you.' So there is antagonism between you, there is separation, and when you feel separate from another there is no love. But if you can live with your wife without thought creating all these contrad...

We learn how things were and how they should be but rarely how things really are. This causes a lot of misery and pain because things are never how they should be. Now, where does "should be" come from? "Should be" is based on religious or some other ideals or on the memories of the past or on anticipation of better future. All of these "should be" concepts are never fully realized and hence we spend our lives in conflict with the present.

Is it possible to have thought without memory?

Why is people watching a popular time-pass around the world?

I often wonder what the best life strategy is. Complex Systems and experience taught me that tit for tat is the best survival strategy. However, it is in direct conflict with what I learned from Gandhi i.e. an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. Do I have to raise my consciousness to the level of Gandhi to live by "be the change you want to see in the world" (another lesson from Gandhi)? What do you think?  

An independent mind is a rare thing.

The basic human nature is same all over the world - reproduce, continuously satisfy senses, and pursue self-interest, all with the least amount of effort.

Smart people manage. Smarter people invest.

Context is not a well understood concept in context of decision-making:-) By context, I mean a set of conditions (mostly interconnected) under which something works or occurs.  We go to school (higher education) and learn theory which tells you how the world should work and not necessarily how it actually works. Subjects are taught in universal terms and not in relative (or context-specific) terms. How many classes have you seen on mastering context? So, how do you learn context? Mainly, by experience and thinking. However, most people are mentally lazy and they don't think about why something worked. One of my heroes, George Bernard Shaw , famously said, " Few people think more than two or three times a year . I have made an international reputation for myself by thinking once or twice a week."  We tend to think that success was because of our actions and failure was because of others' actions. We like simple rules of thumb which don't require us t...

My dear friend, Jens-Uffe Andersen, passed away on May 26th, 2011. Jens-Uffe was a great man and I admired him. He spent his life being a productive member of the society and made significant contributions to the success of SIEMENS in Denmark. Jens-Uffe taught me valuable lessons in business, specifically: In a big centralized corporation, when managing a big account, one has to spend more time within the organization aligning various entities than with the customer.    Internal alliances are necessary to get anything done in a big organization.  People like to do business with with people they like even if it costs a bit more.  I am sure that I am not doing justice to wisdom of the man by just listing three things I learned from him because the list is very long. May Jens-Uffe rest in peace. My condolences to his family.