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Jim Leff's Slog
Totally Overthinking It
Another Year in Paradise
I like to observe that we are experiencing the worst case scenario feared by the smartest authorities for decades. A century from now, we'll be remembered with pity. And yet....here we still are, same as ever, albeit masked. This is the low point? This? Seriously? We've been bowling in an alley with raised gutters!
Inevitably, someone hears this and grows indignant, informing me that it's easy for me to gloat. I don't have covid. I'm not a healthcare worker, etc etc. The curse for those holding unconventional perspectives is that people assume we're failing to "get" the obvious. So I find myself lectured a lot about basic issues of the human experience. COVID's bad, mmkay? My odd-seeming gratitude and satisfaction could - and absolutely should - be constrained if I'm properly educated about how people are having very real problems out there.
To them, I say this:
Has there been a year of human history - a day, an hour, a moment - where multitudes weren't enduring difficulty? Is that what you're waiting for? Would that be the condition where you'd tolerate expression of joy and satisfaction? If so, geez, Louise, the perspective you've framed for yourself dooms you to misery. You've sealed your fate. Enjoy unmitigated suckiness.
The people bitterly complaining about 2020 - who are the same people who whined about 2019, 2018, 2017, etc. (an unbroken chain of unsatisfactory suboptimality) - are not the ones in ICUs with tubes down their throats, nor are they the health care workers bravely attending to them. Those folks are all busy. They have no time for whining on Facebook. People confronting actual problems don't reflect over their disappointment. Whining's the exclusive domain of the comfortable.
The aggrieved express their aggrievement on gleaming super-computers while ensconsed comfortably in comfortable homes, warm and well-fed, enjoying vastly more security, comfort, entertainment, and interconnectivity than their ancestors could have imagined. Those who are anxious to kick awful, awful 2020 in its ass live as aristocrats while framing themselves as oppressed and persecuted. Like princes and princesses for time immemorial, they are increasingly vexed by ever-diminishing mattress peas. And they sneer at those with the temerity to propose they be grateful and happy when it's not all precisely the way they like it.
In 2020 the worst thing (short of war) happened and here we are; with goofy masks, sure, but otherwise still us, still here, still doing our thing. Trump's circling the drain and we enjoy all human knowledge, entertainment, art, and communications on slabs of glass in our pockets. No lions or warlords have poised themselves for imminent attack. No death from infections from papercuts. We're free to lounge back in comfort and complain about our immense disappointment. It's fucking fantastic!
Here's how we expel ourselves from Paradise.
Posted by James Leff at 12:28 PM No comments:
Viruses (e.g. COVID-19) and Sleep
I've had a long-time health trick. Whenever I have a lingering cold, virus, or bug of some sort that just won't go away, I cancel everything and plunge into what I call "malarial sleep mode", and I don't emerge until I'm absolutely 100%. I guess this is what parents of previous generations were trying to encourage when they made kids stay in bed. Of course, we'd only watch TV and play with toys and read. Nowadays, with our devices, no one sleeps, really, ever. We just mainline coffee.
Turns out we're starting to understand the connection between sleep and illness, and it's all about melatonin (note: don't just take melatonin pills, for reasons aluded to in the article). Sleep may affect how susceptible you are to COVID, how bad your symptoms get, how long they persist, and even how well the vaccine works for you. Read "The Mysterious Link Between COVID-19 and Sleep" in the new issue of The Atlantic.
I've tried to be diligent about sleep all along through this crisis. I've ratcheted up the priority of a full night's sleep; I won't blithely shrug it off and figure I'll catch up the next night. I've broken appointments (via email) at 3 am during insomnia periods. I've also worked on my falling-asleep skills.
Labels: health/diet/fitness, science
Solid Clear Examples
...of perceptual framing.
Some readers complain that I keep touting the benefits of reframing without ever pinning down the actual phenomenon. But I've offered hundreds of examples. In fact, this entire Slog is nothing but reframings (that's my secret crappy little trick for coughing up fresh "takes" and surprising conclusions. I'm not particularly smart, but I reframe like a mo-fo). But, happy new year, I'll offer some rock solid examples of everyday reframing that anyone can relate to.
Bathroom Floor
I tore a ligament in my foot in June and, over these months, have had more ice on my foot than a glacier-preserved woolly mammoth. At first, I used a dish towel to separate my delicate flesh from the frigid ice, and would count the seconds. By September, I was slapping the ice bag directly over my foot and drowsing comfortably until the timer rang. And now, in December, when I venture barefoot into the perilous downstairs bathroom with the unbearably cold tiled floor, I stride in like it's absolutely nothing. It feels like strolling the beach on Maui. I can't imagine how it ever tormented me; I giggle at the memory of my suffering. My foot's the same foot, and the floor's just as cold, but, mentally, I have reframed.
Thing is, I could have done so without months of ice. All that's required is an imperceptible mental shift...and an infinity of shifts is available in every situation at any moment. We falsely assume the world forces our reactions, so our habitual responses feel predetermined. They're not. They're volitional. We're free.
Similarly, years ago when I'd get a parking ticket, I'd curse, have my day ruined, and send a check. Now that I'm no longer scraping pennies as a freelance musician, when I get parking tickets, I don't curse, I don't have my day ruined, and I send a check. Same outcome, less histrionic suffering...which, I now see, was always optional. My bank balance didn't relieve the suffering, my reframing did, and framing can shift in any direction at any time. The world can't trigger you. You're free. To recognize this is to experience the liberation folks used to whisper about in awestruck reverence.
In the great basketball documentary "The Last Dance" (watch on Netflix here), Michael Jordan is seen doing the same mental maneuver again and again. The film doesn't analyze it, but it's a constant throughout his extraordinary career. And one would be foolish to ignore it, as it's clearly Jordan's secret sauce:
Whenever an opposing player says something negative, or cocky, Jordan marinates in it. Stews in it. And draws from that gurgling pot whenever he finds himself up against that opponent.
You might say he "holds a grudge", but that's not quite it. It's not about the other guy, or the thing the other guy said. This is entirely propogated inside of Jordan's head. A shift of perspective. In fact, when Jordan didn't have anything to latch on to, he'd make up a story, and suck on that fiction like a nourishing lozenge.
There are many words one could assign to this maneuver. "Emotionality". "Psyching up". "Grudging". But no. What it is is reframing. Every other player would come to work and try to sink baskets. That's the universe they're in. Jordan is in another universe entirely; fighting holy wars and smiting evil. That explains how he played like someone in another universe Reframing unlocks extraordinary results.
You needn't wait for the world to present an excuse. You can shift perspective at will, by simply remembering that you can. And once you do, you'll find yourself in a different universe, as Jordan did.
Most of us have shifted into a universe of grim wearisome flatness. That's where we stew and marinate; that's the lozenge we suck. It's clearly not productive, but we assume the world has forced this perspective upon us. Uh-uh. That's backwards. By relinquishing our shift-ability, we allow perspective to freeze - and a monochromatic world of drudging boredom ensues. This is especially common in a wealthy, comfortable, non-perilous society, where shifts are rarely compelled by existential threats. Here in paradise, we must reclaim our natural shifting litheness or else be lost to depression.
Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes
There was a great (but inconsistent) TV series a couple of years ago on Comedy Central called "Review". The show's host, Forrest MacNeil, (played by comedian Andy Daly) would review "real life experiences" - whatever the audience threw at him. Problem: his quietly sadistic producer (played, naturally, by James Urbaniak) used the opportunity to torture MacNeil.
And Forrest MacNeil was really really really committed to earnestly going through with each and every challenge. In fact, the show was a satire about the perils of over-commitment.
Yes, one of the prime tenets of this Slog is that loopy mega-commitment is responsible for all transcendence. It's the thing that separates us from livestock. But, duh, you mustn't commit mindlessly. Capriciously, yes. Playfully, sure. But never mindlessly. Mindless commitment is what makes people count every Toyota they ever pass, which isn't actually good for anything.
Anyhoo...
The third show of season one was "Pancakes, Divorce, Pancakes", and it's a great work of art (watch for free here if you subscribe to AppleTV, or scroll down this page and buy the episode from Amazon for $1.99, or watch for free online by signing in with your cable provider). It clearly and persuasively illustrates the power of shifted perspective (i.e. reframing).
In the show's first segment, MacNeil is asked to review the experience of eating 15 pancakes. He groans and whines and slogs through the task and vomits in the parking lot. It's an ordeal.
In the second segment, MacNeil is asked to review the experience of divorce. With great trepidation, he goes home and informs his beloved wife that her services are no longer required. It doesn't go well.
The third segment starts with MacNeil prone on the studio floor, cursing himself for actually consenting to divorce his wife just for a stupid TV show. Then, for his third challenge, MacNeil is asked (because his producer is a dick) to review the experience of eating 30 pancakes.
MacNeil heads back to the diner under this voiceover:
"It would be challenging to find meaning in any life experience, now that my life had no meaning. The idea of eating twice the number of pancakes that laid me so low last time should have filled me with a sense of dread or fear. But I felt nothing. I greeted the prospect of all this pan-fried dough with only a vast empty numbness."
He sits down in the diner booth, and, with nothing left to live for, numbly and mechanically rams down all 30 without pausing.
Framing!
The Astronaut
I linked to this excerpt from a not-great movie a bunch of times before I went on my tear about perceptual framing. I didn't have words at the time to explain the move being described, but it was a sort of mental judo I'd been using all my life in order to cope, to advance, to conjure creativity and epiphany, and to escape from sticky wickets of every type. And more!
People hate this damned video. The woman's sappy and annoying, and the vibe is a nauseating amalgam of smugness and potpourri. Yet what she's saying is the key to life. It's Truth. And I'm not surprised it irritates people, because if humans were attracted to Truth (or even just slightly less repulsed by it), this would be a very different world. So try to overcome your aversion and check it out.
It describes the only bona fide magic trick in this world, and nearly everyone's missed it in plain sight. Reframing cures depression, unfickles the muses of inspiration, and helps you recognize you're residing in Heaven.
When I was a freshman in college, I discovered (via the metaphor of ironing) that dicking around with the universe isn't worth much, but full-out flips can transform. You can't do much to change the world, but you can always shift your perspective. And from reclaiming that pliancy, anything's possible. It's backwards to wait for the world to coax a shift. You're the shifter. You frame the world, not the other way around, though few of us ever notice (even the incomparable Michael Jordan needlessly rooted around for external snippets to prompt internal shifts of framing).
Jordan was "something else". An astronaut could go from torture chamber to bliss in the blink of an eye. A cold tile floor feels like a tropical beach. And Forrest MacNeil effortlessly gobbles up 30 pancakes. It's all about how you frame things.
Posted by James Leff at 1:00 PM No comments:
Labels: perceptual framing, television
When Monsters Flee
What is different is these are NOT the Never Trumper types. These are people who have fully thrown their lot in with Trump but are legitimately worried about his receptivity to Flynn and Powell's ideas and conspiracy theories. One month seems like an eternity in this context. https://t.co/7t5oWkg1ht
— Jonathan Swan (@jonathanvswan) December 19, 2020
As a leader sinks deeper and deeper into tyranny, fantasy, and fuckery, the "opposition" comes to include an increasing number of bona fide extremists who won't go THAT extreme.
Michael Cohen is not a great guy. John Bolton is not a great guy. Georgia governor Kemp is as Trumpy as Desantis. I welcome them all to the fight without reservation (we've begged insiders to "speak up" for years, so we mustn't rebuff those who do), but it's a fantastic study in relativism.
We talk about the "lobster boil" effect: if you raise water temperature gradually enough, lobsters never realize they're being cooked. We are adaptable creatures, which is a blessing and a curse. It can be hard to gauge where we're at.
But here's the yardstick: gauge by the awfulness of the characters peeling off and saying "enough". When monsters flee in disgust - when even a Bill Barr gets fed up - that's a problem.
And, again, let's welcome the monsters back to civilization. Monster repatriation is a wonderful saving grace of this sort of crisis. Monsters gaining perspective is even better than monsters shunned and shamed.
Posted by Jim Leff at 8:01 PM No comments:
The Pitfall of Arrogance
The worst downside of arrogance is that it compels a person to sneer at that which they can't comprehend. This compulsion fortifies comfort zones, constraining growth, learning, and the ability to shift perspective. And those constrains, in turn, lead to depression. Depression's a punishment for arrogance.
Those who eagerly learn, grow, and shift don't get stuck. But the arrogant, steeply invested in their current position, are cursed to remain entrenched in their status quo, however miserable and unsatisfactory.
Not quite the same point, but the main cause for serious depression is the world's knack for offering an increasing load of evidence that you are not the hero you'd immaturely imagined yourself to be. Depression is all about over-rumination, and that is the most common rumination ("If I can't be the hero of this story, then screw it, I'm out").
Labels: depression, perceptual framing
The Murky Distinction between OCD and Giving a Crap
Egg white omelet with sliced grape tomatoes. Sautéed baby asparagus. Reheated garlic knot.
This was one of the easiest "9"s (re: my surprisingly non-ditzy system for rating foods from one to ten) ever evoked. And, as any chef will tell you, it's devilishly hard to deliver impressive results with unadorned simple fixings (much less LEFFtovers).
Let's focus on the reheating of that garlic knot.
We use awfully sappy language to account for the conjuring of quality. With food, the cliché is to say it's "cooked with love", evoking Valentine cards and wooly sweater cat lady hugs. Let's expunge the corny language and examine how I crushed the garlic knot reheat.
I thought about how I'd go about this, off and on, all morning. Finally, I had a clear picture in my head. And once a clear picture has appeared - which means all obstructions have been worked out - there's an insatiable drive to proceed. So I strode into my kitchen with the studly brio of a pole vaulter stepping up to the medalist's podium.
Here was the plan. I'd pop it in a toaster oven, with a square of foil perched precariously atop to protect it from burning, but leaving the sides fully exposed so they'd heat thoroughly. I also needed the heat to dry it out after 24 hours spent sliming in its oily juices in the fridge. The moment the knot looked non-slimy (and not a moment later, because it would need more oven time and I didn't want it to dry out; I needed to preserve the chewy/fluffy/crusty), I'd snatch away the foil, turn down the heat a bit, and watch like a hawk for the moment when the knot browned into exactly the Object of My Deepest Desires (the harnessing of minute care with visceral desire stokes deep creative powers). As with my bagel toasting manifesto, I'd watch like a scientist observes a crucial experiment. Mere seconds matter.
I'd prioritized my two main concerns: heat and moisture, and in a very particular manner. Cooking teachers don't frame it this way, but I bear in mind that I'm always working on a continuum, rather than toward some finish line. The garlic knot shouldn't be cold, nor nuclear hot. I didn't want it slimy, but I didn't want to dry it out.
Cooking is a matter of midpoints, not endpoints. There's no endpoint in cooking, only a "click" of the camera - i.e. plating/serving at a certain point in an unending procession of possibilities. It's like writing - one could keep editing forever, but the supposed final version is just the capture of a certain arbitrary moment. "Process", not "arrival points". Always!
If you're absorbed in nano-moments, you can choose between billions of them, each conveying a different slant of deliciousness. There is vanishingly scant middle ground between under and over, or between slimy and dry, but if you're slicing finely enough (i.e. paying extremely close attention), you have myriad choices in choosing a particular slice to capture. The choosing is an exercise of playful caprice amid deadly seriousness - an amalgamation few people can manage, which explains why food (even from highly-trained chefs) is so seldom delicious.
I've just devoted 500 words to reheating a garlic knot...after spending my entire morning thinking through the process. To most people, this would seem stark raving bonkers. I could, however, justify it by calling it an expression of love. Hey, that garlic knot was for my beloved. Nothing's too good for my darling Linda. Or Vanessa. Or whomever. Swap in a random name, and you're good to go. Suddenly, the caring seems more beautiful than bonkers. Love justifies the caring.
At least it did until a generation ago. Yesterday's "love" is today's "OCD", and I'm not being cute; it's true. "OCD" is now applied, willy-nilly, to any instance of deep caring. Einstein working on Relativity? Beethoven composing in a diaper? Ugh. OCD, man. Take a chill pill. Find yourself some life/work balance.
OCD is a mental health problem where care is lavished where it doesn't matter. Cooking and other matters of actual utility and/or creativity do matter, always. "Obsessing" over your work - whether you're a choreographer, a barrista, or a mechanic - is what elevates us from livestock. It's sacred.
Martin Luther King skewed it as more of an ego appeal, but conveyed the basic gist:
"If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as a Michaelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, 'Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well."
Obsessing over your stuff is a lesser mission. Obsessing over Linda or Vanessa used to be beautiful, though it lately seems "unbalanced". But obsessing about counting every single Toyota you ever pass makes you OCD. No bueno.
Lavishing your deepest attention on your garlic knot - or whatever else you're productively working on - is the opposite of OCD, which is the trivialization of one's limited time on Earth. It's true that a garlic knot - which pops in your mouth and is gone moments later - sits on the very brink of triviality. But the garlic knot in the photo, above, was as good as it looked. Two hours later, I'm still aglow. That's proof that it wasn't trivial; that it deserved my attention; that this was no kooky waste of Earth time, but more of a legit holy mission (even if it's not as "serious" seeming a pursuit as selling your car or endlessly mentally replaying the hurtful thing your old boss said).
People with OCD needn't change their drives; just channel those drives to something productive. As with depression, OCD's a dead end where, as perspective constricts and freezes, wheels spin impotently. A depressive spins creative wheels, over-building pointless internal towers of brooding discontent. An obsessive-compulsive spins activity wheels, pointlessly over-processing some constricted slice of the world.
Those who build useful towers or execute useful actions - who power their wheels with verve, transforming solid traction into bona fide landspeed - are using those faculties in their intended manner.
I'm describing, fwiw, karma yoga. Anyone great at anything - whether they realize it or not - is a karma yogi.
See also "Explaining Steve Jobs", "Unhinged" and "Cousin Libby's Yellow Rice".
Vaccination Roll-Out
If this country had any remaining creativity, boldness, vision, and/or leadership, we'd gather all living presidents, Rush Limbaugh, Bernie Sanders, LeBron James, Fauci, Captain Sullenberger, and all the pharma CEOs onstage (or, at least, a Zoom chat), and vaccinate them all at the same time. Then have Beyonce sing a tune, for max attention.
This is how 1940s America or 1960s America and probably even 1990s America would have done it.
In case you missed it, I published, yesterday, "The Expert Skinny on COVID Vaccine"
Posted by Jim Leff at 12:12 PM No comments:
Empathy Framed as Concession
This nugget got buried in a posting from last weekend.
The single most dangerous psychological tendency of our era is the deep-seated feeling that empathy implies sympathy and support. These days, to say "I understand..." absolutely conveys, to the listener, some degree of approval. Understanding is a gift one grants on the merits. It's a concession. A kiss.
This represents the very seed of evil and brutality (though it has not yet fully germinated), and I'd gladly use up a genie wish to see it go away.
Really, I believe this will be our undoing. Aliens observing from Rigel-32n will point to this subtle shift of language. It may appear to be a quirky little linguistical thing, but it's really not. This is a ticking bomb; as insidious and alarming as a whiff of gas in one's kitchen.
When did this happen? You can't deny that it has; roll the phrase "I understand him" (or "I understand where he's coming from") around in your mouth and see. How did understanding become approval? How can we possibly live on a planet like that?
Update: I just got off the phone with a 92 year old friend. I asked him "If someone during the time of the McCarthy hearings were to say 'I understand McCarthy', would that have made people assume he was sympathetic?" He answered, with great agitation, "Absolutely! Why would you want to understand somebody like that?"
So this correlation is not, as I suspected, something new. It is, however, horrendously awful (no offense to my friend, of course).
Posted by Jim Leff at 11:30 AM 4 comments:
Labels: conciliation
Tearing Down
If you're determined to seem great at all costs, but are unsuited to creating or fixing, you have only one possible course of action: tear stuff down.
The Expert Skinny on COVID Vaccine
Here's a free-wheeling vaccine discussion with the Slog's longtime technical advisor, who prefers not to attach his name, because, I suspect, he was writing off the cuff (as a scientist, he feels obliged to be more rigorous publicly than in informal conversations with friends).
His words weren't chosen with weighty care, and his conclusions were cheekily stated, so this might not pass muster for publication by a scientific journal. But in terms of useful savvy - a well-informed expert laying out what's really going on, in (more or less) plain language - you couldn't ask for better. It's a great read.
Me: Would you chance an airline flight post-vaccination? Or does 90% effectiveness plus undetermined length of immunity leave too much uncertainty?
Technical Advisor: Of course. Apart from the fact that I hate flying, of course.
90% efficiency is the lowball number for the leading candidates. It means that some people will still get infected, but so far none of the tens of thousands in the trials developed a serious (ICU-grade) disease. In fact one of the vaccines (don't remember which) shows so far a 100% efficiency against even moderate infection. There will be a few cases that slip through, eventually, but the probability will be far lower than slipping in the bathtub.
Length of immunity looks good so far, and will likely get better with later versions. In any case, booster shots can always be given regularly, and they use lower doses, thus minimizing side effects even further. If the virus continues to circulate, boosters may not even be necessary, as asymptomatic re-infection would self-boost the system.
Me: How does noncompliance affect this? I know we expect a certain amount, and there's slack (especially given the surprisingly high effectiveness). But what if compliance is surprisingly low?
Technical Advisor: What kind of noncompliance, though?
Not getting the vaccine is, well, not getting the vaccine. Lots of people choose to smoke, and they die.
Not getting the second shot could be deleterious for the two US ones (so they claim, but perhaps they are just covering their asses), but it appears that the Oxford one may be able to provide most of the immunity with just the first dose (although perhaps not as robust, so more -- albeit less severe -- infections would be expected.) It's all conjectural at this point, naturally, only time will tell.
Not getting later boosters (if recommended) may vary enormously depending on the type of vaccine; long-term immunity has nothing to do with antibody persistence (which is easy to measure), it's all about memory cells (and that's rather hard to measure since it requires lengthy cell cultures, at best).
A memory cells is like a stem cell specific for one antibody; if it encounters the antigen (bug or vaccine) for which it carries the antibody instruction, it is stimulated to start dividing and differentiating into all the different types of antibody-producing cells (IgG, IgM, IgA mostly) as well as some ancillary ones, all directed against that particular antigen. In Theory, as long as there is just one memory cell left over from the vaccination, challenge with the antigen will produce a rapid response.
Boosters are more often effective than re-infection, because the adjuvants cause a non-specific stimulation of the immune system, so the vaccine is more effective than the virus (alive or dead). Still, re-tickling once in a while the memory cells by the virus will wake them up and revive that cell line.
The response speed that the memory cells afford is important, because it shortens the non-specific (interferon) immunity, which can degenerate into a massive cytokin storm, which appears to be a major morbidity factor. The faster antibodies are produced, the faster the cytokin response shuts down. Let go of the chainsaw once you've found your nail clipper.
Me: I'll try to clarify my question. If a large segment of population doesn't vaccinate at all, how would that affect the situation? Is vaccine-immunized herd immunity in jeopardy if compliance is even more disappointing than expected by authorities?
Technical Advisor: Oh, that. Vaccinated people are protected, unvaccinated ones take their chances. In the US, people are allowed to make their own decisions and take their lumps. We still get cases of polio, measles, etc; their choices, their lumps. And if the children die, jail the parents. (This is not specifically an American problem, BTW, over 50% of the French say they will refuse the vaccine, and nearly as many of the Swedes.) Once the vaccine is here, it's back to a matter of choice; you choose protection or you don't. If you don't, it's like smoking or not using your seat belt.
Herd immunity is a lagniappe once vaccination is available; I firmly believe that it cannot and should not be made into a major player the way it would be without a vaccine. Encourage people to vaccinate, muzzle RFK Jr and Gwynneth Paltrow, by all means, but as long as YOU get your vaccine, you're OK, and let the others deal with their choices, however stupid they are. Even Socialstyrelsen, which delights in telling Swedes how many slices of bread they must eat, is shying away from compulsory vaccination.
Note that Technical Advisor knows this because he, naturally, follows the Swedish press. In Swedish. When not translating novels into Esperanto.
Me: Going back to fundamentals, what's the difference between Covid vaccine and polio, measles, etc, where the unvaccinated DO imperil the rest of us?
Technical Advisor: No difference. The unvaccinated polio or measles carriers do not imperil the vaccinated, they only imperil the other unvaccinated. Once you're vaccinated (and get boosters wherever appropriate) you are taken out of the pool of potential victims. It's them but not us.
Depending on the exact circumstances, there may be a small amount of (usually benign) leakage, since immunity persistence is not a precisely determined effect, but by and large, that's it. Measles epidemics happen among the unvaccinated only, which does include a lot of small children, but this virus is fortunately not targeting the very young, so that's out of the way.
Me: Huh. So the non-civic-mindedness angle on anti-Vaxxers is misplaced. I'd bet 90% believe they're endangering the public.
Though on second thought, I suppose it's right because they're essentially creating safe harbors for pathogens that otherwise might be eliminated.
Technical Advisor:
I'd bet 90% believe they're endangering the public.
They are endangering the unvaccinated public, which does include a small number who aren't unvaccinated by choice but by necessity: people with severe immune deficiencies or on immunosuppressants in particular.
However in this particular case the two traditional major classes of undervaccinations are not relevant: the elderly, because it seems that the vaccines do work on even the very old (Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip are scheduled to be among the first to set the example in Britain), and the babies are anyway not a target for the virus.
The only really problematic cohort is the transplant recipients, who already know they must be extra careful in any case, because any infection will be more severe for them no matter what. Even then, it's quite possible that some vaccines may work on them, depending on their profile of action (and here I'm totally in the dark, the intricacies of immune response are way beyond my ken).
They're essentially creating safe harbors for pathogens that otherwise might be eliminated.
Yes, but only for those pathogens without non-human hosts. Smallpox could be wiped out, polio should be soon, but influenza and corona viruses have huge wild animal reservoir hosts, so they will never be eliminated.
Great short explanation by a doctor of how the vaccine works
Same doctor explains why the vaccine will work even with mutated version of COVID virus
Posted by James Leff at 10:00 AM No comments:
Intuition and Lindsay Graham
I have good intuition. I usually pretty much know what a person's thinking (no need for concern; the Invisible Man watches everyone pee). It's nothing mysterious or "woo-woo". If I were Gifted With Telepathy, I'd be able to say your dog's name, and what color socks you're wearing. I'd know which number from 1 to 100 you're thinking of. But I can't do anything like that because there's no such thing as telepathy. My cheesey little trick is a higher-level feeling for patterns of attention (aka framing), and there are fewer of them in operation out there than people realize.
My musicianship took a big leap as a teenager when I realized, at a gut level, that there are only twelve notes, not a jillion. I intellectually knew this long before, of course, but hadn't fully framed it as such. All musical complexity comes down to twelve notes, combined in myriad ways.
And while twelve's a lot, it's not unconquerable. You might easily have twelve friends, and remember their respective names, histories and phone numbers. You could learn to recognize their voices, and to anticipate their reactions. So I spent a couple years making myself intimately familiar with these twelve notes - making friends with them - and then I "owned" music, in the way that only musicians do.
My standard explanation for my intuition, before I figured out a way to talk about framing, was that "people really aren't that complicated". And that's both true and false. In our thoughts, we're infinitely complicated, just like music is infinitely complicated. But in our perspective (underpinning our thoughts), we're profoundly simple. If you can glean someone's framing, you'll have a good idea of what their mind is doing.
People often make it easy by announcing their perspective from the get-go. Most people, in case you haven't noticed, belong to one of a few dozen clone lines, in terms of personality. They're playing a character they saw once in movies or on TV, or are imitating family members or friends who themselves are copying.
Just don't take the shtick at face value. Look one level beneath. A "Super Nice Guy", for example, is motivated by deep vanity and unquenchable need for admiration (which is why you can't count on such people; it's gruffly un-smiling types like me who'll actually come get you when your car breaks down. Being legitimately kind, I have no impulse to stoke an image of Super Niceness).
For more on Super Nice Guys, see my posting on autism (scroll down to the section titled "Eschewing Froth").
So, often, there's little work involved in gleaning a person's perspective. And their actual thoughts are irrelevent. With an empathic feeling for underlying perspective - and for their momentary pattern of engagement (from body english, speech patterns, etc.) - you have quite enough data. Probably too much. As I've warned before, intuition's not fun. People generally put their best foot forward; they're rarely hiding lovely awesomeness. Intuition's like sniffing someone's dirty hamper.
If you pay attention to people's tilt of perspective, intuition follows naturally. Not re: sock colors or numerals, but you can glean trajectory, if not individual nuggets.
I've just deconstructed empathy. This is what empathy is; this is how it's done. Empathy and intuition are pretty much the same function. One can't intuit without empathizing, nor empathize without intuiting. And you can't do any of this unless you're lithely free in your capacity to reframe.
So here's what I glean from Lindsay Graham, widely considered one of the most enigmatic figures in American political history. I'll encapsulate his perspective via words, but the words themselves are, obviously, mine, not his. This is my rendition of the unverbalized inclinations and trajectories I see operating behind his veneer.
Why's everybody making such a big deal? I haven't "lost my compass". I'm doing my job. I'm supporting my president, pushing for my side, and giving no quarter to my opponents. Sure, I made cutting remarks about Trump during the primaries, but that's what one does in primaries. And, yes, I pivoted to support him after he won, but that, too, is what we politicians do, whether we like the guy or not.
I'm doing the same thing I've done for my entire career. It's what every politician does. Aside from errant murmurs of disapproval, one tows the party line and keeps one's head down, whether one likes it or not. My constituents love Trump, and I represent them, so, if I don't stand up for him, they'll simply replace me. That's the proposition, as laid down by the country's founders, so why's everyone so confused and appalled?
I'm certainly not saying he's right. I don't agree that following Trump has been "just politics". I think this time's different. A line has been crossed. Politics shouldn't be about stirring up yahoos to the brink of civil war or dismantling democratic institutions and norms or abandoning every core party belief to kowtow to a personality cult. This has been an unprecedentedly deep descent into the American political abyss, but the abyss itself is not unfamiliar. Republicans have engaged in a pattern of descent behind various Dark Lords - from Gingrich to Limbaugh to Cheney to Palin. They had no choice, if they wanted careers in politics. So while I'm neither defending nor forgiving Graham, I do understand his perspective.
And, in this moment, whenever you find yourself understanding someone's perspective, angels swoon. This is why I go on and on about framing, which is the underpinning of empathy. You can't empathize if you're too frozen in your own perspective to inhabit someone else's. A frozen perspective produces contention and depression. A lithe perspective produces empathy and happiness. This is why I've been on this tear about framing. We need to understand it now like never before.
Posted by James Leff at 3:57 PM 2 comments:
Labels: music, perceptual framing, politics
Plumbing Banality
This Slog is me working stuff out...and sharing my observations with eavesdroppers. But that's not to say I'm entirely unselfconscious about doing this publicly.
My greatest fear isn't being wrong or looking dumb. It's banality. I worry incessantly about stating the obvious in a needlessly convoluted manner. Just consider this Slog's subtitle!
I once wrote a posting essentially reestablishing the purpose of glue. I left it up for amusement value - it was posted with a winking grin - but I tremble to recall it, because I'm well aware that some of my more tortured conclusions can seem like some prettttty basic common sense. I'm never unaware of this.
For example, consider my recent posting "Reframing vs Posing". I propose that a person can actually do a thing...or else just pose at having done it. Whup dee doo. For that, 1600 words? Really?
Yes really.
We wave away our meatiest realms. "Imagination" is juvenile Disney fluff. "Posing" is what pretentious people do. "Perspective" is your opinions or whatever. Boom, done. Onward. None of this affects me.
I'll phrase this Yogi Berra style: we don't pay nearly enough attention to the stuff we overlook. Framing/perspective is so intimately familiar that we go our entire lives without considering it. But, having immersed in it extensively for a couple of years, I've been able to shed fresh light on autism, addiction, depression (here and here), and creativity. It helped me, some shmucky trombonist, to construct an original and credible theology, cosmology and quick-start guide for would-be messiahs. Framing might be banal, but plumbing it has produced a gusher of answers to eternal mysterious. Don't write off banalities!
"Being" versus "seeming" - the Authenticity question - is likewise both banal and deeply productive. It's an everyday matter seldom explored. No one imagines they'd need to struggle to distinguish actuality from posing, yet the world is plagued by massive delusion, everyone oppressed by sad movies playing in their heads. We recently added the phrase "First World/Rich People Problems" to our vocabulary (a promising sign!) but we don't yet see the full extent of it...because we're not paying enough attention there.
Sooooo.....while my recent posting "Reframing vs Posing" seemed to laboriously fixate on familiar terrain, it's truly worth peering behind the veil. The distinction I'm drawing is not intellectual. It's practical. It's about the tone of our lives and our happiness, both of which are - surprise! - completely under our own volition.
Where do you draw the line between forgiveness and just telling yourself you forgave? The thing versus the story? It's not a pedantic distinction, though I realize it smells like philosophy:
Philosophy is abstract conceptual masturbation, usually irrelevant for everyday people. This material is anything but. All things mind-bending and assumption-challenging are not philosophy! Every "long view" is not philosophy! It's a lazy term. Like "ethnic food", it's a planet-sized drawer where we toss anything not brutally familiar. This material is too singular to sort, so into the drawer it goes. "Smells like philosophy" justifies one's retreat back to a more comfortable diet.
If we were as clear about seeming-vs-being as we think we are, this would be a very different world. We wouldn't wonder why our declarative New Year's resolutions fizzle. We wouldn't feel angry and depressed when the universe presents evidence to suggest we're not the heroes we presume ourselves to be.
Practical benefits can be gleaned from exploring these questions. Much of our misery and bewilderment stems from our habit of confusing the two faculties of consciousness. "Thinking" is not "framing", and "framing" is not "thinking". We use cognition to fake/pose/simulate/charade. It's insubstantial commentary; a perpetual tickertape of noisy mental flotsam. But with our framing, which is way deeper than thinking, we can shift everything fundamentally. Real forgiveness, for example, isn't some dramatic interlude - a scene to play out; a string of thoughts and words. Like all reframings, it's a foundational pivot that can be executed in the bat of an eyelash with zero effort. This banal faculty we perennially overlook turns out to be frigging incredible.
If we can untangle our assumptions about consciousness, we can wield it more productively, rather than use it to make ourselves needlessly miserable amid Utopia. I'm explaining how to regain control of innate faculties, which has nothing to do with pointy-headed philosophy. Banality is juicy!
If you've recognized the breadth of creativity and insight compiled here over the past twelve years, take note that I'm freely spilling my secrets of how I did it as I go. Bear in mind that I'm not super smart. I'm nowhere near as smart as this Slog. I'm the hapless little dude behind the curtain. But reframing's my cheap magic trick, and I've been framing the framing for you.
Yes, it gets wordy. Conventional perspectives must be examined and overturned before you can be coaxed into considering the unfamiliar underpinnings of the commonplace. It's nothing scary/trippy. It feels like home, where you've been all along. Banal! What's weird and creepy and stilted is the movie you've been pretending to star in. That's why we all feel so ill at ease!
I'll keep explaining how you can have your output (in whatever realm) vastly exceed your ability...and be happy...and evade depression...and be free. Just grant me slack on the banality thing, ok? I promise I won't waste your time with needless convolution. If I appear to be convoluting, there's something there. So convolute with me! Let's have ourselves a Convolution!
Labels: Meta Slog, perceptual framing
Leaning Away From the Crack Buzz
Back in November, I posted Maybe Don't Lock Him Up
I agree with this outspokenly anti-Trump and anti-corruption former federal prosecutor that as much as we'd all thirst to investigate the Trump administration - and as convincing as some of the arguments to do so might be - in the end, not investigating would better serve the greater public good. He makes a well-rounded case for it, so please check out the op-ed (it's a very quick read) before you read my uptake (which doesn't restate all his points).
1. The very worst aspect of these past four years, psychologically, has been the fulfillment of Trump's fondest wish: an entire nation (supporters and opponents, both) entirely obsessed with Donald Trump. We ate Trump for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The next four years can't continue to be all about Donald Trump. We must not extend the lease on a madman's inhabitation of our psychic space.
(That said, we'll see whether mainstream news can resist the ratings candy of his tweets and utterances as a private citizen - which they'll no longer have a duty to report. If they do remain locked on to that stuff, we'll see whether weary viewers can create pressure on them not to. It's not a necessity. Alex Jones, for example, has been saying horrific crap all day every day with very little of it reamplified by mainstream media. Trump could and should be relegated to similar irrelevance, though it will likely require viewer/reader/reporter boycotts to convince networks and publishers to do so.)
2. "Lock him/her up" can't become our new normal refrain. Defeat and disgrace must be sufficient (plus less publicly spectacular legal proceedings in, for example, New York State - if litigation and punishment are what you wish for this guy, fear not). As I wrote in "Some Real Talk About Face-Eating Hyenas":
Here's a simple adjustment to avoid getting your face eaten: satisfy yourself with milder punishment for your perceived opponents and oppressors."
I may have also offered this observation a time or two:
History always unfolds via a succession of immoderately reactive pendulum swings. Will we human beings ever learn to react to extremism with enlightened moderation rather than with reciprocal extremism?
A week later, I turned around and posted Maybe We Should Investigate Trump
The great Rick Wilson dissents convincingly:
"Some people believe we should enter a new era of comity and goodwill... We should offer a soft landing and a gentle exit from the Trump cult, right? To this, I must issue a hearty 'fuck no'.
Only exposure, pain, humiliation, and (inshallah) incarceration will lead to a moment of reckoning for the GOP. It should start at the top and work down from there. ...."
I can't escape the foggy impression that there's a means for Trump and his enablers to have due comeuppance without extending his chokehold on our national attention. But I'm foggily unsure how that would happen. Like all of us, I'm numb and exhausted. I'm pretty sure Rick's right, and I'm pretty sure I'm right, and perhaps there's a way to thread the needle. Don't ask me how, but I'll let you know if anything pops up.
I'm hardly the only one stewing on this question. The Lincoln Project last night conducted a video interview with two august legal scholars, Jack Goldsmith (illustrious Harvard Law prof) and Bob Bauer (Obama's White House Council), who've written a book ("After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency") on what we need to do after Trump's gone to (among other things) enshrine into law the norms we just realized can be shit upon by presidents lacking a scruple. And they were asked this same question: "Punish the guilty?" or "Avoid the Trap of Endless Reciprocal Punishment of Ex-Presidents on the Other Side?" Their replies broke no new ground, but it's good to hear their thoughts. I've cued it right up to that point, below:
Burying my lede as usual, I'd like to share an essential thing I realized while mulling this all over.
Nearly everything broken about America is epitomized by this mode of responding:
"It's perfectly obvious: He broke laws and was corrupt. So he must be punished. Presidents are not above the law. If we don't investigate and punish now, anyone will freely do these things - and more! - in the future. It's simple!"
This sort of glib, cocksure, you're an-asshole-if-you-miss-the-sheer-simplicity mindset (framing!) is like pure crack for Americans on both sides of the political divide.
Abortion's murder and murder's wrong, period. Simple!
It's a woman's body, she decides, period. Simple!
It's my child, I'll decide whether he gets vaccinated, period. Simple!
People kill people, not guns, period. Simple!
Illegal immigrants broke the law to get in, period. Simple!
A population conditioned by 10 gajillion lifetime advertisements is easily enticed by the reduction of difficult, multifaceted issues into sanctimonious axioms. It even works when the axioms are so reductive as to mean nothing at all. Millions were stirred by Trump's "Make America Great" and Obama's "Change We Need", though both were vacant (albeit stirring) pablum.
In effect, this is worse than mindless simplification. It's deeply anti-intellectual. It communicates to those trying to work through factors and subtleties, "You're allowing yourself to be distracted from the essential moral simplicity. My good old-fashioned common sense (the Right's frame) or my woke clarity and insight (the Left's) empowers me to transcend the tangly thicket you're needlessly fussing through. Shut up and go away and let my greater, cleaner, bolder sanity prevail.
"My tribally-instilled mindframe is always the higher one....self-evidently because it's mine and I'm me." This is the essence of narcissism, and, as I've said before, I've met very few non-narcissists.
"My simplistic gut instinct trumps your nuanced thoughtfulness" explains why we're anti-science. It explains why we're anti-expertise. It explains why everyone shouts each other down rather than carefully listening (I lose readers whenever I attempt to "right whisper" - to explain the Right to the Left). It explains why the Left wants everyone eschewing their views and their language to crawl up and die. It explains the Right's embrace of MAGA. Channeling gut instincts into viscerally reductive slogans smothers thought, engorges spleens, and makes everyone louder and dumber. Over time, it inevitably radicalizes people into extremism.
"We must not extend the lease on a madman's inhabitation of our psychic space" might be pithy, but it doesn't offer a sanctimonious jolt to my bone marrow, like "Presidents are not above the law!" So, for now, I'll stubbornly stick with the former.
"Presidents are not above the law" is an invitation to put away the argument and stop thinking. It's cocksure and resolute, and it brusquely side-steps all the important issues. How many consequences are we willing to suffer in hewing to a simplistic axiom (if you're on the Left, consider "Abortion is Murder!")? Do we truly want every new administration occupied for four base-stoking years with "Locking Up!" the previous one? Do we really want to enshrine Trump's politicization of the Justice Department? Is it really a great idea to stoke prospects for Civil War? All so you can cling to your marrow-jolting axiom? The human race has had a poor track record with that move.
"We must not extend the lease on a madman's inhabitation of our psychic space" doesn't make me stop thinking; it's a starter, not a closer. It side-steps nothing. Most important: it offers no crack buzz. So I'll keep leaning that way. I lean away from the crack buzz. Consider leaning away from the crack buzz! I realize this assertion is, itself, reductive and glib, but I really think we're way too hooked on the crack buzz. Sometimes it's best to just say no.
This is nothing less than a struggle toward sanity in an insane world. It reminds me of the quintessential Slog posting, "The Deeper Implications of Holiday Blues", recalling a time when I kept ping-ponging between actuality - a lovely evening spent in deep comfort and pleasure - and misery-stoking indulgent dramatic mental chatter - canned, contrived notions of what I was missing out on. It should not have been tough to distinguish the sane perspective. But sometimes one fights a headwind. Sometimes one fights a headwind.
Posted by James Leff at 11:50 AM 2 comments:
Labels: marketing/advertising, politics
Reframing vs Posing
I've written a lot about reframing. I've also written a lot about "being" versus "seeming" - aka posing, aka authenticity (which, btw, I believe accounts for autism). None of my writings has summed that up as crisply as my oft-repeated observation that most singers become singers because they want to be singers, not because they want to sing.
I haven't properly joined the two (reframing and being/seeming) together until now.
We can simulate reframing without ever budging our point of view. It's childishly simple: you just claim to have reframed. You say the words, think the thoughts, and call it an accomplishment. You can easily make yourself believe it. You believe lots of hollow things you tell yourself!
Let's take forgiveness as an example. As I wrote in "Liberation and Addiction" (as a recent addition you might not have seen upon first reading; I often post-polish my more ambitious posts):
A really useful testing ground for reframing is the application of Forgiveness. Not big showy huggy dramatic gestures; I mean the internal process. Shift from seeing it this way to seeing it that way. That's what reframing is, and it's stupendously, maddeningly easy (don't tell yourself a story about having done it. Don't just pose. Really actually do it!).
"Don't just pose. Really do it." One can easily say "I forgive you" without meaning it. The same pose can just as easily happen internally: "I forgive him". And the charade might be ongoing ("I forgave him"). We can carry a pose, a charade, forever ("I'm a wonderfully forgiving person").
But there is, of course, an enormous difference between rotely saying/thinking the words and actuality. That's an awfully sucky term - "actuality" - but human language doesn't offer a rich palette in this realm. Genuineness is not an issue humans consider much, so our language is parched for terms. Much as eskimos have an abundance of words for snow, humans have many terms for artifice, charade, and empty drama, but what shall we call the real thing? "The Real Thing" is an empty placeholder, an expedient means of pointing to something unnameable. "Actuality" sounds crisply scientific, but it's as vacant as a variable...and truth should be more than a variable.
This distinction is more fundamental than you'd imagine, because consciousness is bifurcated along precisely these lines:
There are two aspects to consciousness: cognition and perceptual framing. We know an enormous amount about cognition, but few of us spend even a moment considering perceptual framing. It is assumed that external factors frame our perspective for us; that it's not under our own volition.
We'd freely acknowledge that a given city block is experienced through completely different eyes, depending on, for example, whether we've just been kissed by a new loved one or been ditched by a previous one. But we assume we must wait for external circumstances to provoke emotions for perceptual shift to occur. There is no reason for this assumption. All frames are available in any moment. We just get lazy, and forget that we can actively choose.
We are wrong about both, assuming that we own our thought stream - though we obviously do not (just try to not think about the thing you're currently worried about) - while we assume our perceptual framing is imposed from without - though it patently isn't (you can't make me angry, only I can make myself angry). Our confusion about the operation of our own minds is a central problem.
I can muster the thought "I forgive you" regardless of my actual view. Genuine forgiveness is a separate action, and it's not verbal. Neither a thought nor an utterance, it's a doing. It's pure reframing. It's hard to talk about. It's just a faculty we have, though we often forget we have it.
There's another pesky factor. We confuse the action of actual forgiveness - the reframing - with anticipated associated emotion. There's a bag we carry around with us; a burdensome dramatic obligation. We can't simply forgive; first we must perform a movie scene. You know the one, where a grave-looking person stares with gloomy concern out of a rainy window while cellos moan. How can I possibly forgive him?
Poignant! But let's give that cinematic layer the easy dismissal it deserves, being nothing but indulgent bullshit. You're not in a movie. You can forgive someone as effortlessly as you can manufacture the empty thought "I forgive him"....but it involves a separate faculty. It's a shift rather than a thought.
Try it! Pick someone easily forgiven. Not your ex who said that horrible thing, or that old boss who fired you. Don't get ambitious! Think of someone more readily forgivable, and do it. I'll wait!
Don't just say the words. Feel the shift. Experience the minuscule sensation of blissful unwinding, like a knot being untied. Our bodies are programmed to reward certain choices - sleeping, eating, procreation....and forgiveness is an oft-forgotten item on that list. Why is it forgotten? Because we assume we must play out a movie scene, and it likely doesn't jibe with our current plot arc at any given moment. The fake, ridiculous, self-indulgent cinematic experience - me up there on that screen! - is, for most people, unquestionably primary. So if one fancies oneself to be in a movie, forgiveness requires a laborious rewrite.
Real forgiveness is simple and instantaneous, but it's nothing like blandly uttering the words. It's a foundational shift, easy though it is. If you want to play with this function, and explore reframing, check out the previously linked post about forgiveness.
But let's go beyond forgiveness to a real world framing example that involves interacting with another person rather than silent machinations in the corridors of your private mind.
You run a business with a critical, terrifying problem. Your tech guy crashes on the problem tirelessly, finally coming to you, eyes ablaze, with an impossibly brilliant solution. He needs to share the details, because it could only be properly appreciated if you really understoodd what he did.
That's him. Now let's swing the focus over to you. You're not a tech person. You barely understand what he's saying. Every cell in your body wants to tell him to shut up, go away, and just hook it up, now.
Let's call that management choice #1: The Imperious Asshole.
There's a second management choice: The Patronizing Asshole. You recognize that he's bursting at the seams, viscerally needing to spike the football by explaining what he did. He will resent you if you dismiss him. It will harm your relationship and deflate his morale. So you steady your gaze at him, restraining your eye roll, and nod your head engagingly as he recounts his actions, punctuating the tech lecture with eager "uh-huhs!" When he's done, you express your astonishment re: his brilliant genius, wait a couple beats, then rub your hands eagerly together saying "Well, let's hook it up, then, shall we?", patting him on the shoulders as you retreat to your office to let this annoying, overheated little geek do his thing.
There's also a third choice, which would never occur to most managers. Actually listen to the guy. Try to understand, and genuinely share his enthusiasm - not just for the fact that a solution was reached, but for what he actually accomplished in solving it. Make an effort to get a genuine sense of what he did and share his moment. This involves shifting your attention momentarily away from the big problem stewing in the gurgling acid pit of your managerial stomach. Shift to his view and be an engineer for a sec, not a manager, even if this is a realm where you're tenuous and thus vulnerable, and must allow yourself to be lectured to by your institutional inferior. You'd feel much more comfortable; more secure; more yourself by interrupting him to tell him (more or less bluntly) to shut up and just go hook up the fucking thing. But you don't. You shift over to his world, his framing. You roll with it.
#1, The Imperious Asshole, maintains his perspective tenaciously, and would snarl at the suggestion that he do otherwise. As Manager, he occupies the center of the circle. Other people must shift to share his perspective, not vice versa. This, sadly, feels to him like privilege.
#2, The Patronizing Asshole, is just as tenacious in his frozen perspective, but goes through the motions. He follows a flowchart any dumb computer could obey:
EMPLOYEE HAS NEED
EMPLOYEE IS INDISPENSABLE
POSTPONE OPTIMAL ACTION
INITIATE RESOLUTION PROTOCOL
EMULATE ENTHUSIASM AND OUTPUT SUPERLATIVE PRAISE
MONITOR FOR ACCEPTANCE
TRANSITION TO OPTIMAL ACTION WITH REITERATION OF PRAISE
#3 doesn't have a name. "The Real Thing"? "Actuality"? "Humanity"? The manager reframed - amid a crisis, too, which is extra hard given that humans abandon their values under duress. You can't name what he did. It's not something taught in business school. You can't devise a procedure to accomplish this. It's the thing computers (or people who act like computers) can't do.
Reframing is the thing computers can't do.
There's a new wrinkle these days. Managers try to add genuineness into the mix. Like a powder. They recognize (blurrily) the shortfall I'm describing, and try to fix it via extra conscientious patronization. Let's call it meta-patronization. "PLEASE DON'T THINK I'M PATRONIZING YOU," the manager pleaded, patronizingly. It's just a minor subroutine to add to the flowchart - Patronization_Erasure.
This sort of thing is a natural outgrowth of the thinking that makes corporations design products to power up saying "Hello, Jim, how are you today?" It's a way of having computers - and people who act like computers - simulate better, to hastily patch over the sticky wicket of authenticity. Authentic authenticity is scarily unthinkable, whereas contrived Authenticity-Seeming is more viable. You can develop and procedurize and test it.
Labels: Management, perceptual framing
Jim Leff
Writer, jazz trombonist, and
co-founder of Chowhound.com
Web Site: JimLeff.info
Read them all...or else click individually:
Bubbles, Slogs, and Selling Out (series)
- the tale of Chowhound's sale to CNET)
Ballasting Happiness
The Monks and the Coffee
Uncommon Terseness (pithy quotes)
A Unique Perspective on Depression
The Times Everything Worked Out
Grief Survival Kit
Why "God" Lets Bad Things Happen
The Deeper Implications of Holiday Blues
Resilience Means Giving Serendipity a Chance
The Evolution of a Perspective
Our Albatrosses are Red Herrings
Angel on a Bike
The Crux of Creativity
Waiting for David Copperfield
The Non-Linearity of Deliciousness
You Are Absolutely Right!
Why People Don't Learn
Should You Go to Cooking School?
Billions, Millions, Thousands
A Surprisingly Uplifting Examination of Suicide
You Can Be The Messiah
The Most Helpful Insight About Creativity
The Greatest Lesson Ever Taught
The Center is a Super Tribe...but Doesn't Know it Yet!
Empathizing With Pro-Gun People
Explaining Salinger
Jnani Train
How I Outgrew Libertarianism
An Adult View on Preference
The Visualization Fallacy (series)
THE FRAMER
Truth and Curiosity
Racist Racist Racist Racist Racist!!
Flipping Your Street Smarts
Giving Misanthropy Its Due
Always Talk to the Mask
The Precedent of Muffin Refusal
Decision Factors
Discomfort is Not Poverty
Did You Miss the Part About How We're in Utopia?
The Inside Story on Asceticism
The Route of Escalating Conciliation
Milton Resnick: Ecstasy Made Visible
We've Gone Completely Jungian
Consistency, Niche, and the Art/Biz Dichotomy
A Muslim Writer's "Open Letter to Obama"
Ad Blocker Exceptions Are the New Online Tip Jar
How to pick out shill-reviewed places on Trip Advisor
God As Dude
Eating by the Numbers
Going All the Way in One's Shmuckery
Ten Terrific Films You've Never Heard Of
Why Things Suck
Transcending Tom & Jerry
Brazilian Bus Driver Syndrome
Climbing Ladders
A Public Declaration
anecdote (168)
aphorism (9)
autonomous cars (5)
bag of hurt (9)
chowhound (91)
chowhound sale (27)
clutter (3)
cochlear implants (12)
conciliation (54)
cornered rat (29)
ethics/morality (10)
find-my-resume-on-linkedin (1)
health/diet/fitness (78)
human behavior (205)
killer asteroid (2)
Leff's Laws (14)
Meta Slog (106)
NOLA Trip (11)
oaxaca (7)
Paul Trapani (5)
perceptual framing (114)
phil (1)
priscilla (12)
right whispering (34)
saccharine self-help (3)
sensation/perception (7)
SIGA (41)
survival kit (3)
team donnie (1)
the Curse (15)
the media (42)
TMDTIATW (12)
Trademark Infringement (1)
Trump/Russia (5)


The goal of the project is to significantly increase cooperation in habitat management and water protection in the Central Baltic operating area.
The project implements interdisciplinary coastal planning in accordance with sustainable development and aims at finding the best cost-efficient methods for promoting water protection and biodiversity and rating ecosystem services in cooperation with all the partners. Ecosystem services mean benefits obtained from nature. They include the supply of nutrition and other renewable natural resources as well as undisturbed operation of the ecosystems, which e.g. maintains the water management and circulation of nutrients in our environment. Ecosystem services also include recreational use of nature and the experiences obtained there. Usually the value of ecosystem services is not noticed until they are weakened or lost. The project aims at finding win-win solutions that benefit all: nature, water protection, local farmers and entrepreneurs, as well as inhabitants. Special emphasis is placed on Natura 2000 areas. The project also cooperates with existing projects and provides them with information about the Central Baltic area.
The principal product of the project is "Habitat Management Library" that consists of 6 publications. The project performs innovative tests and exchanges information within the operations of the working groups and introduces tried and tested good experiences and practices from different countries in the publications.
The duration of the project is approximately 3 years, from October 2009 to January 2013.
The operating area is the whole Central Baltic area, with focus on habitat management and water protection in catchment basins in coastal areas.


Here we have it: a strong early contender for 2015's guiltiest pleasure. Jackie Chan, John Cusack, Adrien Brody and Peng Lin star in Dragon Blade, an alt-history in which Rome fights Han Dynasty China for control over the Silk Road. You've never seen Brody chewing scenery like this before.
According to Slashfilm, this is the most expensive Chinese-language movie of all time — although it looks as though Cusack and Brody will be spitting out their insane dialogue in English, judging from the trailer. What crime did he commit? I'll tell you what crime! He stole the place in your heart that belongs to me!!!!
Dragon Blade comes out in February 2015 in China, but sadly has no U.S. release date yet.


Chemistry Consulting is currently partnering with our clients for the following searches.
The Investment Adviser/Porfolio Manager will serve and support the existing clients in the Victoria region as well as grow the private client business throughout southern Vancouver Island.
Reporting to the CEO, the Human Resources Coordinator provides advisory services in all human resources functions including recruitment, employee relations, health and safety, compensation and benefits, performance development, training and development, and policy development.
Reporting to the General Manager, the successful candidate will be a strong leader with the ability to perform administrative, financial and people management responsibilities in accordance with the established operating plan.
The successful candidate will be responsible for coordinating serving staff in both the restaurant and pub. In addition, the Food and Beverage Manager will book all conferences, meetings and special events at the hotel.
The position will focus on fostering optimal customer and employee satisfaction along with the continued growth of the business; maximizing operational efficiencies and profitability.
The successful incumbent will be professional, eager to continue to develop and grow, have the desire and ability to take on new and exciting tasks and bring balance to a demanding and fast paced environment.
The Major Gifts Specialist (MGS) will be responsible for leading a variety of activities to engage donors and grow fundraising revenue. Reporting to the Chief Executive Officer, the MGS will collaborate with management and the workplace fundraising staff and volunteers to continue to make the UWGV the charity of choice in the Victoria community.
This key individual will be part of a small, yet dynamic team that is focused on providing excellent service both internally and externally.
This role will assist with the coordination and management of projects, liaise with clients as required and provide day-to-day support to one of the Founders of the company, and the VP of Operations.
GT Hiring Solutions is seeking to fill the position of Employment Services Administrator under the WorkBC Employment Services Program in our Greater Victoria catchment. Please view job details below to submit your resume.
GT Hiring Solutions is seeking to fill the position of Job Search and Retention Specialist under the WorkBC Employment Services Program in our Greater Victoria catchment. Please view job details below to submit your resume.
GT Hiring Solutions is seeking to fill the position of WorkBC Services Specialist under the WorkBC Employment Services Program in our Greater Victoria catchment. Please view job details below to submit your resume.
GT Hiring Solutions is seeking to fill the position of Labour Market Resource Specialist under the WorkBC Employment Services Program in our Greater Victoria catchment. Please view job details below to submit your resume.


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u2.com limited editions
When Love Comes To Town
When Love Comes To TownLyrics
Dancing BarefootLyrics
God Part IILyrics
The song appears on the Rattle and Hum album and video. During the November 24, 1987 concert in Fort Worth, Texas, B.B. King and his band joined U2 on stage to perform When Love Comes To Town, a song written for B.B. by Bono and rehearsed earlier in the day. The studio version of the song was recorded at Sun Studios in Memphis. During the Smile Jamaica concert on October 16, 1988 in London, U2 were joined by Rolling Stone Keith Richards on guitar.
B.B. King performed the song several times including a performance called Live At The Apollo on November 10, 1990 in New York and a duet with Melissa Etheridge on VH-1's Concert of the Century in 1999.
The following artists are among those who have covered the song: the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra on Pride: The RPO Plays U2; Studio 99 on The Best of U2 - A Tribute and Bryan Sutton's Ready To Go; the Paul Woodcock Band on Fat White Weirdo In A Cadillac. It can also be found on the compilation Blues Experience, Lucille and Friends, and King Of The Blues - all by B. B. King.
The song was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal.
Released Date:
Jimmy Iovine
Dave Ferguson and Cowboy Jack Clements
Recorded At:
'Bono and I met BB King in Dublin and he said, Hey, you guys should write me a song. We said, Ah, yeah. I thought it was unlikely but a while later Bono said, Remember BB King? Well I've done this song and it's pretty good. We liked it so much we decided to use it on Rattle and Hum and asked B.B. if he'd join us.'
Edge speaking to Q Magazine, December 1998

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


The winner for our November Blog Love Week Three Giveaway is Sandra Schroeder!
Sandra, contact me at stampin365@gmail.com and I'll send you your prize right away!
A huge thank you to everyone who left a comment- you all mean so much to me. Come back again- I'll announce the week four giveaway sometime on Saturday.
You are so welcome, Cobs! I got the idea from one of my favorite bloggers- she calls it "blog candy" and I thought I wanted to do that, too. It's so fun to mail off the prizes, I wish I could send something to all of you! thank you for you support and happy crafting.


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Telegram Clone
An Interactive Messaging App Embedded With Appealing Features
Who would not love to receive instant messages from their friends and families? An app like Telegram has profoundly gained the attention of enterprises and has made a huge hit in the messenger app market. If you are interested in venturing instantly, our Telegram clone script is here.
sApp Shape Created with Sketch
Stay connected with our Telegram Clone App solution
We are a species living as a community conversing with each other and expressing our love for one another by communication. Staying idle without conversing with our fellow people is still a penance we all undergo. Today connecting and conversing with our friends and family has sneaked its way into the online world with instant messaging app solutions. It has served as an intermediary connecting people from far away lands. Our Telegram clone script is one such instant messaging app solution with enticing features capable of attracting users.
Request Demo Let's Get Started!
The Mandatory Features Embedded in Our Telegram Clone
Building an app with essential features will fulfill the user's basic requirements and also a seamless flow in the app's functionality. Our Telegram clone is also embedded with extensive features.
Contact Synchronization
Once the user signs up in the app, they are available with the contacts in their phone, so they can start chatting with no further delay. This is executed by the automatic contact synchronization feature.
Multiple Log-ins
Being stuck with work and unable to chat with friends? The multiple log-in features is integrated with our Telegram clone, providing easy scanning of QR codes for your users to chat and work simultaneously.
Status is one of the most engaging and entertaining features in instant messaging apps today. The users share photos and videos on their status to be viewed by other users.
Planning a trip with friends, organizing a meeting, managing a team are all made effortless with the group chat feature in the chat app solutions.
Location Sharing
This is a breakthrough feature in a chat app. The user can share their location with their friends or family to assist them in reaching them effortlessly.
Multimedia Sharing
The users are offered a chance to share their photos, videos, audio, and other multimedia content with their friends and family and cherish the happiness altogether.
Turnkeytown's instant messaging app solutions
With our white-label solution you can swiftly mark an entry into the messenger app market and also we offer white-label solutions for numerous messaging app scripts.
Whatsapp is a renowned messaging app that is playing a vital role in each and every one's life. It is gradually turning into our prime source of communication. To develop an app similar to WhatsApp to connect with us.
WeChat Clone
WeChat, an app that began its walk into the digital world as a chat app, is now one of the leading super apps. If you have a thought of integrating your chat app with multiple businesses then it is the perfect time to join with us and launch your WeChat clone swiftly. Join us and launch your WeChat clone.
Signal Clone
The new hero in town for an instant messaging app is Signal. It has taken its side with privacy lovers. If you believe privacy is a preeminent feature for instant messaging and dream of building one, joining us.
Navigating through the workflow of our white-label Telegram Clone
Unblemished workflow of our Telegram clone app
Our user interface solution offers users to efficiently sign-up into your app by providing their mobile number. Once they have successfully updated their profile details they are ready to chat with friends and families.
Creating a Dynamic Profile
The profile of a user is the first impression of them to their contacts. So, the user is provided with a space to upload their photo and an interesting bio of themself.
Auto-synchronization of Contacts
The next minute a user is onboarded, they are asked permission to allow the app to access their contacts with a yes from the user. All the contacts of the user are synchronized in the app.
Unlimited Chat with Friends
After the synchronization of the contacts, the user can start chatting with their friends instantly without any delay. There is no limit on the number of texts making the user comfortable.
Face-to-Face live Interaction
Video calls can make the term long-distance relationship one screen away relationship, as this feature helps in connecting people from far away lands face-to-face. The user can also make audio calls.
We work to provide our clients with all possible solutions to launch message app like Telegram. With Telegram clone package, you will get,
User Android App
User iOS App
Start An Enthused Chat App Like Telegram With Exciting Features
User App
Signing up is the feature that gets a user onboard in the app. The user provides their contact number and gets onboard.
Maintaining a Lively Profile
The profile of the user is displayed to the contacts of the user. The user can set a stunning profile picture and an interesting bio for their contacts to get flattered.
Notifications are the feature that keeps a user coming back to the app often. The user is notified of any new texts, group chats, calls, and updates in the app.
Chat Themes
The chat themes are an interesting feature that allows a user to set different chat themes for different contacts. This lets them set exclusive chat themes for their special ones.
No more confusion if a message has been delivered or not. The text is marked with a tick mark notifying it has been sent and received on the other end.
Video calls are a necessity for the users as part of globalization. People travel to different countries for work and other purposes and are still connected with their friends and family by the video calling feature.
Privacy is an integral attribute for any chat app solutions. The user can hide their profile picture from some of the contacts for their privacy.
Every chat made by the user is encrypted from the sender's end to the receiver's end, allowing the user to share personal messages with their friends or family that they don't want any others to know about.
Every business needs an admin panel to have control over the app.
Every profile signed up in the app is overlooked and managed by the admin. Suppose any profile seems to be fake. The admin can delete the profile from the app.
The groups in the app are also overlooked by the admin, like the individual profiles. If any group spreads hatred messages or false information, the admin deletes the group.
Admin Status
The admin has an allotted space in the app to share any common news they want to present to the users.
Analytics Board
The analytics board presents graphical data of the user behavior pattern, the number of messages exchanged in a certain period of time, the number of dormant accounts, and more.
The user is notified with notifications on the updates in the app by the admin. The admin can either force update the app instantly or let the user update the app anytime.
Elective Features For Your Business Needs
Every business requires certain features that other businesses may not require. Keeping this in mind, we have come up with certain elective features.
Ethnic Languages
Some businesses may be confined to certain ethnic groups or languages. Thus they may require translation in their ethnic language.
Multiple Profile Pictures
The user can upload more than one profile picture and also decide which one should be displayed to which contact.
Back-up Messages
This feature helps the user to save all of their chats. This helps them to recover the data when they switch devices.
GIFS and Stickers
GIFs and stickers are required for instant messaging apps that are used for personal chats. It is mostly used to make fun. So, this feature has made it elective.
Top-end Features For An Instant Messaging App Solution
Secret Chats
Secret chats can be created by the user with specific contacts alone. These chats cannot be viewed by anyone other than the user.
App Lock
We integrate your app like Telegram with a security lock feature. Any person other than the user cannot use the app without entering the security pin. Any person other than the user cannot use the app without entering the security pin.
Destructive Chat
The conversation between two users can be diminished automatically in a certain span of time. This feature helps users to have confidential chats.
The group video calls are similar to the conference calls in audio calls, but here, the users can see each other's faces live.
Share Live Location
The user can share their live location with their friends or family. This helps their friends to keep track of the user's location.
Message Deletion
Any message sent to contact can be deleted by the user. This means the receiver of the message cannot view the message.
Build Your Wealth With Our White-label Telegram Clone
Every app has its own ways to generate revenue and boost up the business in the online marketplace. The simple ways to monetize your Telegram clone app are as follows:
The app can have its own products like GIFs, stickers, and more. These exciting products can be sold to the user for a small fee.
Premium Add-on Features
Premium features like secret chat, destructive chat, specific privacy settings, and more can be charged a price for the user to have their hands on them.
The most common way to generate revenue from an app is by placing ads in the app. This is a promising method to add some money to your pockets.
Build your dream app with us
Developing and launching an app is a step-by-step process.
Once a client approaches us with an idea to build an app. We research and analyze the market for the business, the target audience, the potential of the business, and more.
After a thorough study of the market, the competitors for the business are analyzed, and their app and the features in it are studied.
Requirement Analysis
A discussion is conducted between the client and us to understand their business requirements and the features to be embedded in the app.
Now that the analysis part is completed, we head to planning to begin the Telegram clone app development. The work is organized and assigned to different teams.
Designing a Stunning UI
The highly creative design team works vigorously to design the app with the logo of your business and the color palettes of your choice and make it pleasing to the user's eye.
The experienced team of developers adds all the customized features to the ready-to-launch script of the app.
The app is now tested for bugs. Several tests are undergone to make sure the app is bug-free and is all set for the launch.
Launching your App
The fully-functional app is now launched in the Android and iOS store, considering the client's request.
Why Is Turnkeytown Your First Choice
To Build An App Similar To Telegram?
Choosing a partner to develop your business idea into an app needs a lot of thinking and understanding. To know why Turnkeytown should always be your first choice, check on our reasons.
When it comes to security, we never compromise. We provide high security in addition to the best quality chat apps we develop for Android and iOS apps.
Customization at its Peak
We deliver what our client dreams to build. Any customizations can be made in the app. The final product always looks like an app built from scratch.
Round the Clock Support
Our support team is always active and happy to listen to your queries and resolve them for you. Our support has no time constraints.
We are a team with a plan. We stick to it and make sure there is no delay in the delivery of your app.
Hire Your Instant Messaging App Developer
TurnkeyTown is an app development company that strives to provide entrepreneurs with the perfect cutting-edge package to make you prominent among the other competitors. We have a troop of dedicated app developers to offer you "Turnkey" solutions and are also experienced in integrating with fascinating UI/UX designs. Our app development firm provides numerous solutions, the latest tools, and tech stacks for developing robust applications. We go one step higher in creating a Telegram clone app keenly and furbishing in such a way that it grabs the attention of a large audience. Connect with esteemed app developers to be flourishing in the online marketplace globally.
We work on the most durable and robust technologies to develop our Telegram clone app.
How to Develop Messaging Apps Like Telegram?
It can be as complex as building it from scratch or as simple as customizing the readymade clone scripts. Our reputed app development company provides scripts that can be bent as per your business needs and requirements.
How much does it cost to develop a Telegram Like App Development?
There are several factors that determine the numbers of Telegram like app development costs. A few factors that have a greater impact on price are feature set, tech stack, level of customization, efforts of developers, etc.
Top Reasons to choose Telegram Clone App
Telegram's popularity is spreading at an unimaginable pace, say the stats, which gives a good reason why you should go for Telegram clone.
- Telegram has more than 500 monthly active users currently, which is a 150% increase from 2018.
- As of Jan 2021, Telegram is the most downloaded app with over 55.2 million daily active users.
- The user base of Telegram has been consistently growing at a rate of 40% each year since its launch in the year 2013.
How does Telegram clone help my business?
It opens up wide revenue streams for businesses to make multi folds revenue. The application offers four most commonly applied ways to make money. They are Advertising, In-App purchases, In-App money transfer, and Gaming, etc.
How Secure is white Label Telegram Clone Script?
Our white-label Telegram clone script is fully gorged with security features satisfying the security needs by encrypting the data, protecting messages, and so on. Additionally, our white-label solution lets you do brand customization with ease.


Caesar is General Manager of Payments and Vice President leading the Next Billion Users (NBU) initiative at Google. As General Manager of Payments, Caesar runs both product and engineering teams for Google's payments solutions such as Google Pay and Tez, our India-first payments app. In his NBU role, Caesar is responsible for Google's product strategy for high user growth countries like India, Indonesia, Brazil and Nigeria. His team is not just building a set of new products for these countries, such as the high-quality WiFi solution, Google Station, and smartphone storage manager, Files Go, but also working with other teams at Google to improve existing products with features like low-bandwidth and offline modes. Previously at Google, Caesar helped start and led the ChromeOS team that launched Chromebooks which are now the #1 device used in schools in the US, UK & Nordics, and the #2 operating system in the US and UK. Caesar has more than 15 years of experience developing consumer and enterprise technology products. Before joining Google, he held engineering and research positions at Encentuate Inc. (a Singapore startup acquired by IBM) and Hewlett Packard Labs, Palo Alto. He holds 15 patents in Operating Systems design and Expert Finding Systems. Caesar has a master's in computer science with a distinction in research from Stanford University, where he was awarded the Christofer Stephenson Memorial Award for the best master's research. Caesar also has an MBA from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.


CLEVELAND, OH—Increased architectural paint sales has propelled Sherwin-Williams to a record first quarter, the company announced Thursday (April 16).
The Cleveland-based coatings maker reported consolidated net sales rose 3.5 percent, to $2.45 billion, in the first quarter of 2015 ended March 31.
However, unfavorable currency translation rate changes cut net sales by 3.1 percent in the quarter, according to Sherwin-Williams.
Sherwin-Williams' Paint Stores Group saw a 7.5 percent increase in net sales to $1.46 billion for the quarter.
Diluted net income per common share rose to $1.38 from $1.14 per share in 2014. The increase was driven by improved operating results of the company's Paint Stores and Consumer Groups, according to the company.
"It is gratifying to report another quarter of record sales and earnings per share," said Chairman and CEO Christopher M. Connor.
The Paint Stores segment led the company to ring up a record $11.13 billion in sales for 2014.
Connor said the company's Consumer Group had improved its operating results for the quarter through enhanced operating efficiencies.
He also noted that the company's HGTV HOME paint program at Lowe's had begun shipping late in the quarter. The product is expected to arrive in all Lowe's stores by May 1.
As for the Global Finishes and Latin American Coatings groups, they are "managing through the negative effects of currency devaluation and weak end market demand in some geographies," Connor reported.
The Paint Stores Group saw a 7.5 percent increase in net sales to $1.46 billion for the quarter, the company said.
Net sales from stores open for more than 12 calendar months increased by 6.4 percent in the quarter over last year's comparable period. Group segment profit increased by $30.3 million, to $176.6 million, in the quarter.
The company opened seven net new locations in the quarter.
Sherwin-Williams is the largest specialty retailer of paint and painting supplies in the U.S.
Net sales in the Consumer Group rose 8.1 percent to $351.7 million in the first quarter, due in part to the first shipments of HGTV HOME to Lowe's Home Improvement stores, the company said.
Consumer Group profit increased to $55.4 million in the quarter from $51.1 million last year, due to operating efficiencies.
The company's Global Finishes Group and its Latin American Coatings Group finished the quarter out of the growth spotlight.
Net sales for Global Finishes, which includes protective and marine coatings, decreased 5.6 percent to $469.6 million in the quarter. Unfavorable currency translations changes nipped net sales by 6.9 percent in the quarter.
The company's Global Finishes Group is "managing" despite negative effects of currency devaluation and weak end market demand in some regions, according to Connor.
Segment profit dropped to $38.9 million from $46.5 million a year earlier.
In the Latin American Coatings Group, net sales dropped 8.9 percent to $166.2 million in the quarter, due primarily to unfavorable currency translation rate changes partially offset by selling price increases.
The currency changes decreased net sales by 13.9 percent in the quarter, according to the company. Segment profit dropped to $9.5 million from $10.0 million posted the same period last year.
For the second quarter, the company anticipates a net sales increase of 6 to 8 percent compared to 2014.
That estimation would put diluted net income per common share in the range of $3.70 to $3.90, compared to $2.94 per share earned in the second quarter of 2014.
"For the full year 2015, we expect consolidated net sales to increase a high single-digit-percentage compared to full year 2014," Connor said.
Founded in 1866 by Henry Sherwin and Edward Williams, The Sherwin-Williams Company is one of the largest producers of paints and coatings in the world.
Wouldn't it be fitting if Sherwin-Williams used some of these profits to clean up the toxic lead paint and to pay for the special education and prison systems supporting children poisoned by the toxic lead paint they sold so well decades ago?


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Home / News / Dying breed: Aston Martin to offer manual transmission in new Vanquish
Dying breed: Aston Martin to offer manual transmission in new Vanquish
By Andrew Sluys • 02/07/2019
Search Driven for Aston Martin for sale
Photos / Supplied
Just like the C8 Corvette that's set to be debut later this month, the new Aston Martin Vanquish is going to be mid-engined.
Although the Vanquish is following in the footsteps of the Corvette with the engine placement, there's one aspect that the British-built supercar has over its American counterpart — the humble manual transmission.
When asked about the prospect of the manual transmission making an appearance in the Vanquish, Aston Martin CEO Andy Palmer didn't say yes, but basically confirmed it.
"I've already made a commitment that I want to be the last manufacturer in the world to offer manual sports cars and I want to honour that commitment," Palmer said.
In pursuit of quicker acceleration and lap times, high-performance manufacturers moved away from manual transmissions, but it seems that there is still a market for the old technology.
The last generation Aston Martin Vanquish was sold exclusively with a six-speed box for a few years after release, but it 2014, an eight-speed auto became the standard.
Introducing a manual option on a car that was previously exclusively auto might seem like a step backward in some eyes, but Aston Martin has made sure that everyone knows what the new Vanquish is. According to the British brand, it is going to be a lot faster and more driver-focused than previous generations, and will stand out against its competitors with its manual transmission.
When asked about the possibility of higher spec Aston Martin models featuring a manual transmission, Palmer quickly shut down any speculation by saying: "no, now that car will only come with a paddleshift transmission."
While no official power figures have been released, the hybrid twin-turbo V6 that powers the Vanquish has been said to produce something in the region of 800hp.
Aston Martin Vantage V8 Coupe
Aston Martin DB9 6.0 V12 Volante Convertible
Aston Martin Vantage Base grade
Aston's V12 Vantage S available to NZ, with a stick V12 Vantage S available with a stick
Aston Martin Vantage: Red Bull Racing Edition Aston Martin Vantage: Red Bull Racing Edition
Aston Martin Vanquishes demons Aston Martin Vanquishes demons
Aston Martin DB11 V8 4.0p/8at
Aston Martin DB9 Touchtronic
Aston Martin DB9 6.0 V12 Volante


We consider how to maintain the topological order of a directed acyclic graph (DAG) in the presence of edge insertions and deletions. We present a new algorithm and, although this has marginally inferior time complexity compared with the best previously known result, we find that its simplicity leads to better performance in practice. In addition, we provide an empirical comparison against three alternatives over a large number of random DAG's. The results show our algorithm is the best for sparse graphs and, surprisingly, that an alternative with poor theoretical complexity performs marginally better on dense graphs.


Vehicle activated sign finally installed at the entrance to Colyford – I almost missed it as I was doing under 30!
The Vehicle Activated Sign (VAS) on the A3052 near Gully Shoot – which I funded by my Locality Budget with support from the Colyford Burgesses – has finally been installed. At least it will be working through the rest of the summer.
This is the first of several long-awaited traffic-calming measures. A second VAS is planned for the other end of the village, which Colyton Parish Council and Colyford village organisations are expected to fund, and Devon County Council is currently doing design work for a zebra crossing near the Memorial Fund, due within this financial year.
This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged Colyford, Vehicle Activated Sign.
The Colyford Speedwatch Team, Colyton parish councillors and I have agreed in principle that it is desirable to erect a second VAS at the other end of Colyford. I am paying in full for the first VAS in order to make progress within the current financial year, on the understanding that funding for a second VAS will be a matter for Colyton Parish Council to consider in budgeting for the coming financial year.
I am working with the Speedwatch teams in Colyford and Seaton Down Hill as well as the A35 Action Group in Wilmington to mitigate speeding in the area. At an earlier meeting with Neil Parish MP and Councillor Stuart Hughes, Highways agreed to install a crossing in Colyford and a pedestrian refuge in Seaton Down Hill, as well as to look again at the speed limit on the hill (which we want reduced to 40).
This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged Colyford, speeding, Vehicle Activated Sign.


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Q: Why is VARCHAR slower than CHAR on updating rows? I was reading a book :

For example, when a column is defined as VARCHAR(25), the maximum number of characters supported is 25, but in practice, the actual number of characters in the string determines the amount of storage. Because storage consumption
  for these data types is less than that for fixed-length types, read operations are faster. However, updates might result in row expansion, which might result in data movement outside the current page. Therefore, updates of data having variable-length data types are less efficient than updates of data having fixed-length data types.

I can understand that storage consumption for varchar is less than that for char, but why is it slower than char when updating records? What does row expansion mean and what actually happen when row expanses?
Let's say we have a suburb table which has two columns, zipcode char(5) and name varchar, and let's say we need to update a row's record with zipcode to be 10005, and name to be 'NYC', we only set 3 characters for the name column, shouldn't it be more efficient than zipcode column which requires 5 characters?

A: Rows are laid out with the fixed size columns first, at fixed offsets from the start of the row. Then (after some important bytes in the middle) the variable sized data is placed at the end. Because it's variable sized, the actual offset to the data cannot be computed for the whole table (like the fixed data) but has to be computed on a row-by-row basis.
And if a varchar(5)1 is storing NYC and is then asked to store NYCX, it may find that there's not a spare byte at the end of NYC - it's being used for another column - so the row has to expand by moving everything after one byte further along to make space for the extra byte.

1I notice in one of your examples you failed to specify a length. Please drill into yourself that that's a bad habit

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