Bob gets up every morning in pain. He stumbles through his morning rituals and goes outside in nice weather to work in the yard. He knows that doing yard work results in more wear on joints already worn down. He knows that more wear means more pain. He works in his yard anyway.
His neighbor talks about Bob’s courage. “Look at Bob! He is so brave, out there in pain and doing what needs to be done.” Probably many of us would say the same thing.
How do we relate courage and clear thinking? What are Bob’s alternatives? Doing nothing would lead to atrophied muscles and about the same amount of pain, probably. What other activities could he engage in that might keep his muscles toned and cause him less pain?
Does Bob even think about it any more? Has habit replaced fresh questioning for Bob?
How do you relate courage, however misplaced, and clear thinking?
Al Lustie
Thinking with Al
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Preferring Superstition
At coffee this morning one of the guys remembered the scene in Caddy Shack where the old preacher is on the 18th hole of the best golf game in his life. He putts, misses and says something bad about God. Lightning strikes. He dies.
I’ve been wondering about people (including myself) who prefer superstition to clear thinking. The idea that God might care about the outcome of a golf game, and not care about the deaths and disaster in Japan during and following the tsunami is exaggerated superstition. Granted, such warped thinking is promoted and pandered to by hundreds of TV “christian” speakers, but what makes it easy to sell is the way you and I fail to think about big issues.
I don‘t mean our failure to factor in victims of the earthquake, tsunami and subsequent events. I mean our failure to factor in the ways greedy manipulators screw over the world economy, the ways natural disasters destroy villages, cities and populations with no tears shed that we can see by any god. I meaan our usual gratitude that we escaped a disaster again when others were crushed. Our kids are doing well while other kids are shot in drive-by violence, an so forth.
We know that the planet earth is not the center of our solar system, but continue to believe that we are the center of the universe.
When I think of our superstitions, I don’t just mean the teachings of all major religions. I mean the insanities we try to rationalize nearly every day no different than being careful not to step on a crack for fear of breaking our mother’s back.
What do you think? Share your thoughts with us.
I’ve been wondering about people (including myself) who prefer superstition to clear thinking. The idea that God might care about the outcome of a golf game, and not care about the deaths and disaster in Japan during and following the tsunami is exaggerated superstition. Granted, such warped thinking is promoted and pandered to by hundreds of TV “christian” speakers, but what makes it easy to sell is the way you and I fail to think about big issues.
I don‘t mean our failure to factor in victims of the earthquake, tsunami and subsequent events. I mean our failure to factor in the ways greedy manipulators screw over the world economy, the ways natural disasters destroy villages, cities and populations with no tears shed that we can see by any god. I meaan our usual gratitude that we escaped a disaster again when others were crushed. Our kids are doing well while other kids are shot in drive-by violence, an so forth.
We know that the planet earth is not the center of our solar system, but continue to believe that we are the center of the universe.
When I think of our superstitions, I don’t just mean the teachings of all major religions. I mean the insanities we try to rationalize nearly every day no different than being careful not to step on a crack for fear of breaking our mother’s back.
What do you think? Share your thoughts with us.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Thinking About Wasted Taxes - 2
Trotsky, Lenin and Stalin (as well as Hitler) all had the prescription for the well-run society. Their plans should have worked. They failed, however, to take people into account. People in general. People the various ways they are, not people as cogs in a machine. (Remember, however: even cogs show wear after awhile.)
Your tax dollars at work are managed by people. Forget, for the moment, the people you have seen standing around. Think with me, instead, about the empire builder. She or he wants to manage people, manage projects, manage paper -- whatever combination of stuff she or he wants to manage, the end goal is seldom an efficient operation. It is personal power, personal space, personal popularity or personal comfort. Maybe even being perceived as indispensable. It's about the "ME" in the equation, not about the efficiency and quality of the service to the taxpayer.
I speak of well meaning , even necessary, legislation that helps children stay safe, guards you in your car as you drive or keeps roaches out of your ragout. But someone is hired to "make it so" and that someone has a personal power agenda. At first, maybe, she or he does well. But the purpose of the bureau, committee, commission or council seems to fade into the historical background only to be trotted out when there is a threat to the empire. Your money at work making him a comfy next seems to be more and more the problem.
But we want to get rid of people like that, don't we? So we invent an investigating group, which (more often than not) seeks to maintain itself in comfort and the "you scratch my back and I'll scratch your back" transactions begin. The ideal falls prey to the human.
This is only one issue, of course. What do you think?
Your tax dollars at work are managed by people. Forget, for the moment, the people you have seen standing around. Think with me, instead, about the empire builder. She or he wants to manage people, manage projects, manage paper -- whatever combination of stuff she or he wants to manage, the end goal is seldom an efficient operation. It is personal power, personal space, personal popularity or personal comfort. Maybe even being perceived as indispensable. It's about the "ME" in the equation, not about the efficiency and quality of the service to the taxpayer.
I speak of well meaning , even necessary, legislation that helps children stay safe, guards you in your car as you drive or keeps roaches out of your ragout. But someone is hired to "make it so" and that someone has a personal power agenda. At first, maybe, she or he does well. But the purpose of the bureau, committee, commission or council seems to fade into the historical background only to be trotted out when there is a threat to the empire. Your money at work making him a comfy next seems to be more and more the problem.
But we want to get rid of people like that, don't we? So we invent an investigating group, which (more often than not) seeks to maintain itself in comfort and the "you scratch my back and I'll scratch your back" transactions begin. The ideal falls prey to the human.
This is only one issue, of course. What do you think?
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Thinking about Wasted Taxes
If I begin, "Don't you just hate having your tax dollars wasted", most people will jump for joy. They feel the hatred, the disgust, and the anger. But they are not thinkingĖ. I want to encourage us to think.
Given the old saw that whenever I point the finger at someone three fingers are pointing back at me, I want to think about this: "Do I ever work at less than 100% efficiency?" Ask yourself that question, especially if you work for private enterprise. If you EVER work at less than 100% efficiency you are wasting someone's money and time.
How about your spouse, if you are married? How about your good friends, the folks you work out with, or go to church with, or play a pickup game of basketball with? Do any of them ever work at less than 100% efficiency? (You can pause and curse them here, and then get back to thinking.)
"But the government is so crammed with waste!"
So is business. Any business that has more than forty or forty-one employees has one or more wasteful processes in place, well on the way to becoming hallowed "ways we have always done it." I watched several guys working for a private contractor standing around the other day. Wasteful! My buddy was riding with me and he immediately assumed they were city workers. No, they worked for a private contractor who has not gotten everything scheduled perfectly. They needed a truck that had not arrived before they could work the next piece of the project.
Think about it. Was the crew standing around being wasteful, or was the administrator who scheduled poorly, or was the problem heavy traffic that held up the truck for which they were waiting?
Think about it. Is less than 100% efficiency in everything even remotely possible in a complex world?
We will keep thinking together about this. Post a comment and let us know what you think.
Given the old saw that whenever I point the finger at someone three fingers are pointing back at me, I want to think about this: "Do I ever work at less than 100% efficiency?" Ask yourself that question, especially if you work for private enterprise. If you EVER work at less than 100% efficiency you are wasting someone's money and time.
How about your spouse, if you are married? How about your good friends, the folks you work out with, or go to church with, or play a pickup game of basketball with? Do any of them ever work at less than 100% efficiency? (You can pause and curse them here, and then get back to thinking.)
"But the government is so crammed with waste!"
So is business. Any business that has more than forty or forty-one employees has one or more wasteful processes in place, well on the way to becoming hallowed "ways we have always done it." I watched several guys working for a private contractor standing around the other day. Wasteful! My buddy was riding with me and he immediately assumed they were city workers. No, they worked for a private contractor who has not gotten everything scheduled perfectly. They needed a truck that had not arrived before they could work the next piece of the project.
Think about it. Was the crew standing around being wasteful, or was the administrator who scheduled poorly, or was the problem heavy traffic that held up the truck for which they were waiting?
Think about it. Is less than 100% efficiency in everything even remotely possible in a complex world?
We will keep thinking together about this. Post a comment and let us know what you think.
Thinking About Taxes
Emoting about taxes is in the wind. Few people want taxes, many people despise taxes, balancing the budget without more taxes feels right. Even people (like the governor of Wisconsin) who seem to think about taxes are mostly emoting about taxes and thinking about their ideological position and how to achieve it. Think a moment about taxes with me.
Let's try damping the emotions. Try substituting a word for "taxes" like "payment for services rendered".
We pay for police patrols, fire truck responses, road building and road maintaining. We pay for law enforcement (not just keeping bad guys from breaking into our homes, but closing restaurants which are vermin infected). We pay for food for hungry children, most of whom need help because one or more parents cannot get a job in this economy.
Oh, you say, there are deadbeats cheating on food stamps. So, we pay for investigators to catch them and courts (judges, jury pools, clerks, buildings, etc.) to punish them.
We pay to have parks open (and mowed and patrolled), we pay for snow removal so we can get to work and earn money during snowstorms (and just after). We pay for schools to educate our children not only in the three R's, but in social skills, in appropriate behavior, in music and drama, and in skills that make them employable in the coming years. Employable? Read "useful to our society" as well.
Payment for services rendered does not mean there are not places where money is wasted. Let's look at that next.
What do you think? Use the Comment link to share your thoughts with the rest of us.
Let's try damping the emotions. Try substituting a word for "taxes" like "payment for services rendered".
We pay for police patrols, fire truck responses, road building and road maintaining. We pay for law enforcement (not just keeping bad guys from breaking into our homes, but closing restaurants which are vermin infected). We pay for food for hungry children, most of whom need help because one or more parents cannot get a job in this economy.
Oh, you say, there are deadbeats cheating on food stamps. So, we pay for investigators to catch them and courts (judges, jury pools, clerks, buildings, etc.) to punish them.
We pay to have parks open (and mowed and patrolled), we pay for snow removal so we can get to work and earn money during snowstorms (and just after). We pay for schools to educate our children not only in the three R's, but in social skills, in appropriate behavior, in music and drama, and in skills that make them employable in the coming years. Employable? Read "useful to our society" as well.
Payment for services rendered does not mean there are not places where money is wasted. Let's look at that next.
What do you think? Use the Comment link to share your thoughts with the rest of us.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Commenting
Somewhere along the line my "comment" field disappeared. I don't know why, but I enabled a pop-up comment field this evening. Click the Comments link and a box will pop up for you to comment in.
I will be looking at, and responding to, all comments UNLESS they are clearly just obscene nonsense. Probably you would not do something like that, but I have had people try to advertise their wares, make sick jokes, and generally behave in an unthinking and inappropriate manner in the past.
Or it may show up like the image below (in both cases, minus the red arrow.
Looking forward to hearing your input and having useful discussion. Al
I will be looking at, and responding to, all comments UNLESS they are clearly just obscene nonsense. Probably you would not do something like that, but I have had people try to advertise their wares, make sick jokes, and generally behave in an unthinking and inappropriate manner in the past.
Or it may show up like the image below (in both cases, minus the red arrow.
Looking forward to hearing your input and having useful discussion. Al
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