For, in truth, custom is a violent and treacherous schoolmistress. She establishes, little by little, slyly and unperceived, a foothold for her authority, but, having by this gentle and humble beginning, with the benefit of time, fixed and established it, she then unmasks a furious and tyrannical countenance, against which we have no courage or power to raise our eyes to. We see her, at every turn, forcing and violating the rules of nature:

[Custom is the most effective teacher of all things (Pliny)]

- Michel de Montaigne, Of Custom, and That We Should Not Easily Change a Law Received

Digital computers have 3 layers:

1. Hardware
2. Firmware
3. Software

Hardware and software are well known: the physical infrastructure of a computer and its easily reprogrammable instructions. Firmware, on the other hand, is overlooked. Like software, firmware is reprogrammable; however, it's intimately tied to hardware, it's rarely modified, and reprogramming it is non-trivial. Blowing a firmware upgrade will leave hardware a useless mass of metal and silicon, making software unusable. If hardware is solid and software rubber, firmware is plastic, rigid but flexible.

Humans have 3 basic levels too:

1. Meat
2. Culture
3. Thought

These are adaptation cycles of ever tightening timescales consisting of a constantly repeating sequence of:

1. Observe (discover causes in the world)
2. Orient (infer causes of novel input)
3. Decide (make predictions)
4. Act (directed behavior)

Meat pursues 3 goals as it cycles:

1. Somatic satisfaction (eating and drinking)
2. Reproduction
3. Surviving to do 1 and 2

Thoughts pursue the same goals as meat but they are abstracted behind an interface. Thoughts run in two types of OODA loops running in paralled, labeled, as pointed out by Taleb in The Black Swan, as System 1 and System 2 or, as usefully relabeled by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein in Nudge, the Automatic and Reflective Systems:

The Automatic System is rapid and is or feels instinctive, and it does not involve what we usually associate with the word thinking. When you duck because a ball is thrown at you unexpectedly, or get nervous when your airplane hits turbulence, or smile when you see a cute puppy, you are using your Automatic System. Brain scientists are able to say that the activities of the Automatic System are associated with the oldest parts of the brain, the parts we share with lizards (as well as puppies).

The Reflective System is more deliberate and self-conscious. We use the Reflective System when we are asked, "How much is 411 times 37?" Most people are also likely to use the Reflective System when deciding which route to take for a trip and whether to go to law school or business school. When we are writing this book we are (mostly) using our Reflective Systems, but sometimes ideas pop into our heads when we are in the shower or taking a walk and not thinking at all about the book, and these probably are coming from our Automatic Systems. (Voters, by the way, seem to rely primarily on their Automatic System. A candidate who makes a bad first impression, or who tries to win votes by complex arguments and statistical demonstrations, may well run into trouble.)

If my favorite 5 tier OODA model is mixed with the 3 layer model we get:

1. Meat - hardwired adaption for resource consumption, reproduction, and survival
2. Cultural - adaption through the prioritization of goals.
3. Political (Thought) - adaption through the division of power between goals.
4. Strategic (Thought) - adaption through the integration of goals and power.
5. Operational (Thought) - adaption through the arrangement of goals and power in time and space.
6. Tactical (Thought) - adaptation through the direct interaction of goals and power with the external environment consisting of friction (anything non-living that obstructs adaption) and The Other (anything living that obstructs adaptation).

Political, Strategic, and Operational levels tend to be Reflective OODA systems and Tactical tends to be Automatic, though there is intermixing. Meat tends to be physically evolutionary. Culture, the art of the unspoken assumption is physically evolutionary to a slight degree, mostly Reflective, and a touch Automatic. Cultural adaptation occurs by shifting priority between values, giving one greater priority at one time and lower priority at another. It's tied closely to meat so it adapts very slowly, it's rarely fundamentally changed, and reprogramming it is non-trivial, especially in a linear fashion. It's firmware.

As the loop that Nations operate on, Nation builders tend to be quirky, automatic, non-linear. State builders tend to be the rational materialists, interested in the art of the possible, focused as they are on the division and allocation of power:

Nation builders tend to be quirkier, parents of a spiritual body:

Sometimes a figure will straddle both categories:

Culture is a strange trip. From Dawn to Decadence, by Jacques Barzun, is a good guide to the viccitudes of Western culture.

“While other approaches involve managing your emotions and being aware of your impact on people, says Steven M. Swavely, Ph.D., senior consultant and psychologist with Farr Associates, Conscious Leadership takes it a step further in assessing leadership effectiveness beyond just emotions that may be driving automatic or reflex behaviors but also examines an individuals’ belief systems and how those beliefs drive behaviors”....

Conscious Leadership requires an individual to acknowledge their beliefs and biases and how they influence his or her situational awareness, to understand other people’s points of view, and to discern, for example, when to be assertive and when to allow others to take the lead.

All good stuff, though I'm not sure why we have to come up with a New Phrase to describe what sounds a lot like mindfulness.

Republicans have championed deregulation for companies. Our Jobs have gone over seas where companies pay oversees workers much less than American workers.

Republican deregulation has led to the biggest tax payer bail out in the history of America; over $700,000 Trillion dollars. All of this is happening and Barack Obama is only up on McCain by a mere 5 percentage points. Why? A CBS article says it can be attributed to racial prejudice. It seems that race, particularly against Barack Obama, is causing Obama not to pull away from John McCain.

I don't know about you, but I thought our country was better than that. I thought we had made many strides in this country, but It appears that many still hold a negative view of Blacks, so much so that they can't bring themselves to vote for an African American, who is truly exempliary. Someone who worked his way through the American system the right way. Someone who touched all the basis, played by the rules that were not made up by him; but dictated by our society. Someone who cares deeply about this country. Someone who have demonstrated his service to his community, his state and the nation.

Yet we are in the worst economic depression we've ever had. No African American has ever ran this country as President, yet some can't bring themselves to vote for an African American, even though it is apparent that he is qualified to lead this country. I choose to believe that we have gotten through our prejudices. I choose to believe that we will not judge Obama, by his race. I choose to believe that we will not Judge Obama by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character. I choose to believe that we will not view him as someone different from ourselves. I choose to believe that we are Americans and that we are better than that. Yes, we are bigger than that, and that if you do not vote for Obama, then let it be based on something concrete. But please don't let it be based on prejudices, or biases. Here the link to the CBS article.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/09/20/politics/main4462623.shtml

Ironically, I began reading the book on the very same day that one of the eleven “good to great” companies, Fannie Mae, made the headlines of the business pages. It looks like Fannie Mae is going to need to be bailed out by the federal government. If you had bought Fannie Mae stock around the time Good to Great was published, you would have lost over 80 percent of your initial investment.

Another one of the “good to great” companies is Circuit City. You would have lost your shirt investing in Circuit City as well, which is also down 80 percent or more. Best Buy has cleaned Circuit City’s clock for the last seven or eight years.

Hmmm. While it's true that you can learn from the mistakes and successes of those that came before us, what the salient lesson is (presuming there is one), the role of causality and luck or how to generalize to new situations make it a fool's errand. Good to Great and other successmanship manuals pick and choose winners to fit the evidence and ignore the losers.

Much of the focus of on boarding is on essential resources, critical networking, and a creating a vision and strategy which aligns with the vision, mission and goals of the company. To "on board" successfully a leader must be able to "read the landscape" (Madeline Homan and Linda Miller).

This would mean identifying who can help them succeed, who are the people that they can trust, who are the key influencers, and who can guide them through the key processes.Getting to know these people and developing strong working relationships with them is crucial in the effective and smooth movement of leaders within the organisation.

Understandably On Boarding is a major focus area in executive coaching. Leaders work with their coaches to first identify and then assess the needed networks, and then to evaluate their own impressions.

On boarding also means "finding the landmines" (Homan and Miller), that is figuring out what is in danger of blowing up and preventing that from happening.

Here the coach works with the leader to identify the `red-flag` issues (without causing controversy) ,gaining some early and noticable successes and possibly delaying the decisions around issues that don`t have easy answers or that require deeper investigation.

By working with a coach during on boarding process leaders can more quickly:

1. identify strengths and skills they will need

2. determine how to employ or accquire those skills

3. understand the culture and corporate values from a fresh perspective

4. learn to work strategically

5. develop keen observation skills

6. evaluate assumptions

7. identify who to trust

8. and become aware of their own biases particularly identifying WHEN they come into play

Making smooth transitions not only helps the leaders but the organisations as well.

 

Very often an emergency is not obviously an emergency. Is the man lying in the alley a heart-attack victim or a drunk sleeping one off? ... In times of such uncertainty, the natural tendency is to look around at the actions of others for clues. We can learn from the way the other witnesses are reacting whether the event is or is not an emergency. What is easy to forget, though, is that everybody else observing the event is likely to be looking for social evidence, too. Because we all prefer to appear poised and unflustered among others, we are likely to search for that evidence placidly, with brief, camouflaged glances at those around us. Therefore everyone is likely to see everyone else looking unruffled and failing to act.
Cialdini, R. B. 2001. Influence: Science and Practice

While I always steer clear of gender wars no matter how funny, and religious debates no matter how provocative, I find myself again and again, arguing with knucles heads arguing about how people can be judged and bunched for their choices. While it does piss me off, I've kinda perfected the art of the big ignore.

Save for one exception.

College in Manipal was a very cosmopolitan experience. I had friends from all over. Most of my closest friends were of Nepalese origin. And thats when I started to realise the reeking prejudices people have about people with oriental features.

I only realised how strong the opinions were once I moved to Bangalore. Not only are my friends perceived to be of a lesser moral benchmark, they are constantly subjected to the 'hello darlings' and 'how much's?' One of my friends even said how 'slow' the 'chinkis' are!!!! Since when did IQ depend on the slant of your eyes or the colour of your skin?? Some of the smartest women I knew in college were Nepalese and also some of the most feisty! I wish I had Pragya Koirala (the superhero) with me everytime someone made a wise crack about Nepali girls.

Any ideas on how to stop this rubbish??

In college, I challenged the notion of true objectivity then because I didn't believe it was humanly possible. And I still hold to that belief today years after working as a reporter and publisher. It can be almost impossible to recognize our own biases.

I believe people can be somewhat fair. And that requires hard work because it is difficult to truly listen when we disagree with what someone is saying. I think listening is the most important skill a journalist needs to develop. I am always suspicious of people who claim to have held their biases in check. Can we really ever know how much our biases are impacting our thoughts and actions in our subconscious mind?

News reports love to paint one group as biased while other people have pure motives. One of the more recent examples involves news coverage of environmental issues, especially global warming. I don't know what I think yet about that issue. But I do know that those who question the science behind it are vilified and lampooned. It seems that the eco groups can do no wrong. But are their motives completely pure?

Don't scientists have egos? Don't researchers need a crisis to ensure funding? Don't eco groups need an enemy to convince people to give them money? I believe that all sides to the climate debate have financial and personal reasons to fight for their beliefs. Some may also have noble, ideological reasons as well. It just bothers me when reporters contrast two sides and portray one as completely pure when that is far from accurate.

For those who are willing to listen to a different view than Al Gore's documentary on global warming, consider the following film. I don't know which one to believe. They both make good points.

Your thoughts...

 http://www.rightalk.com/asx/ggws.asx

Slate's headline story today is the Hillary supporters that may or may not jump ship to McCain. John Dickerson, the political director, is especially concentrating on the female Clinton supporters who feel wronged by the system, and are cutting off their reproductive rights and self respect despite their faces to vote for a man that dumped his first wife after she became a cripple and called his second wife a "cunt" in front of reporters. Of course, instead of writing about the maddening fallacies of the arguments of such people, Dickerson embraces them because it gives him more to write about.

I checked in with Irma [a Clinton supporter] recently. I'd started to hear a second wave of anecdotes about women who first claimed they'd vote for McCain but then switched back after giving Obama a second look. Irma was not one of them. She was even more opposed to Obama after hearing about his stimulus plan and what she saw as his wishy-washy position on Jerusalem. She thinks he's an inexperienced empty suit.

Those of us who cover the presidential race love women like Irma. She has a strong point of view, and she allows us to write about conflict. This is not only entertaining, it's where you usually find the important fights that influence electoral contests.

Dickerson suggests that the press has put the narrative in front of the issues, and that he "loves this."

This statement is completely infuriating, and should be for everyone, not just Obama supporters. We are allowing the press to give voice to illogical whack-jobs for the sake of a story, not our democracy.

We allowed the narrative after the nomination to be one which Clinton dictated, that her loss was due to sexism, not that she had run a poor campaign. In his description of Irma's views, Dickerson paraphrases her views, not bothering to refute them, finding her harboring of misinformation and malcontent somehow amusing. For Dickerson, this is, after all, a racial battle, a gender battle, a generational battle, and not one of differences on policy, of which little could be made of discussing the advantages and disadvantages of a health care mandate or Pakistan's military sovereignty.

The danger innate in making this race a narrative is that narratives are fictional, and often are not contigent upon any truth. Examples in this campaign are already plentiful--the press runs with story that rumors persist Obama may be a Muslim (noting parenthetically that they are false), and all of sudden someone like Irma thinks he is weak on support for Israel, and is almost certainly ignorant on Obama's unusually aggressive view of going after terrorists in Pakistan without regard for Pakistan's sovereignty, if Pakistan refuses to act. 

Then we have the infamous one that took a major misstep from Clinton to expose. Clinton's claim of "experience" always just seemed to sound right to most people--her name was easily recognizable, especially for older voters, and thus playing this angle seemed to work. She was so gung-ho about the concept that her, Penn, and McAuliffe decided that she should talk about the time she faced sniper fire in Bosnia, after corkscrewing her way into a landing, with her then teenaged daughter at her side. She liked the story so much, she told it a couple of times afterwards, and it wasn't until a nearly exiled member of the press and a totally disregarded comedian exposed the story as a fabrication. When their narrative had been impaired, the press simply laughed it off for the most part, and started pushing Clinton's next claim that she was the hero of the white working class, all while being part of a $109 million dollar family.

It may not be worth it to beat a dead campaign, but lessons should be taken from what Clinton was allowed to pull off, and why the press loved it. We will, no doubt, continue to hear about McCain's "maverick" brand while he changes his position to the absolutely Wrong party line. There is such a desire to see an equal fight in this campaign; the coverage has been more fitting to the NBA finals rather than a presidential campaign.

One has to ask of the media, just when will they stand up and just say a candidate or party is flatly, patently wrong on the issues. If the Nazi party gained traction in America, would they repeat their party line? Are we that complacent to just let this go on? And is the press that complicit?

Economists at Duke found that compared to pessimists, optimists work more hours per week, save more money, are more likely to own stock, and are more likely to say that they're never going to retire..."The moderate optimists are prudent people," said David Robinson, who conducted the Duke study. "They pay their credit cards on time. They tell you that they save because saving is a good thing to do. . . . Extreme optimists are just the opposite. They have short planning horizons, they don't pay their credit cards off on time. As you get extremely optimistic, the good behaviors drop off."

And this nugget about when optimism is beneficial and harmful.

The importance of positivity can vary by profession. University of Pennsylvania psychologist Martin Seligman, a leading researcher on optimism, has found that pessimistic law students are the most successful. Optimistic sales agents, on the other hand, significantly outsell pessimistic ones.

Are you an optimist? Take this quiz to find out.

Looking at the other entries, it hasn't a snowball's chance... but it's literally the taking part that counts; lots of fun and new ideas.

I didn't come here to bore everyone senseless (oh, well maybe I did, but not deliberately). I was thinking about how people make certain decisions that X is OK but Y is not... for instance, traditional photography versus digital photography. All kinds of photography versus manipulation or 'tweaking'. Those are very broad examples; the individual permutations of biases and prejudices are endless. "I despise the brushed metal effect," is one phrase I came across a while ago. Nobody bothered to reply. What he really meant that he thought it was overused by uncool people. On a Come Dine with Me show, someone said "you used one of those two-handled things to open the wine. The RIGHT way to open wine is..." and my mother and I looked at each other.

X is cool, the right kind, the right way, used by the right people. Y is not.

These biases start young. I was rambling round one of the arty sites and came across a conversation where someone was required to describe the process of photomanipulation. Despite the friendly reply from the photomanipulator, the enquirer dismissed it as 'simply cutting and pasting the images of other users'. That's not necessarily true; photomanipulators aren't barred from using their own images. And if they just cut and pasted things, they would probably not look good... there is much more to it than that.

If you think about painting a picture (traditional media), you might have a still life specially set up in the studio (various items taken out of their own environments and placed together in an attractive way). If you think about photography, there are portraits of people perched against backgrounds, graduates wearing cheesy grins and clutching false rolled-up certificates (slightly battered round the edges), models wearing evening gear and make-up. When you took a photo of wild nature on holiday, you waited for a break in the crowds of other tourists and angled the shot to avoid the telephone pole and picnic signs. Then, people enjoy movies and fiction, but they've never been real.

I'm referring to the expectation that photos etc are worth nothing if they are not a real, true representation of the subject. If the sunset is peachy pink and there's a boat on the water, it should remain peachy pink with a boat on the water. I don't understand that, as there's nothing 100 percent natural or 'true' about any of it. That same stretch of sky could be glorious blue and gold tomorrow. What we see out of our own eyes or perceive with our own minds is never the full, eternal truth; still less committing it to a piece of paper and saying "this is last night's sunset." It's not a sunset... it's a piece of paper.

There's nothing 'true' about painting, photography, sculpture, drawing.... none of it.

As for the 'using other people's stuff' thing, well... provided you make a good image and credit the original photographers / artists (who gave permission in the first place), or avoid all of that and use your own stock anyway, then I don't see a problem. It's still work: searching out the images you want; using tools, skills, the mind's eye... trying to achieve a particular result. Sometimes the 'cheat' is much harder to pull off than the real thing.

In the conversation I mentioned, the photomanipulator asked if the other person would like to try that genre. No, said the other person – she would never do it... she preferred to stick with the usual kind of art.

I went to see who this philistine was, and what sort of art she went for, and I didn't find much there to support. It was all one kind of thing (not terribly adventurous) and not particularly well done. But before I got too sneery in the privacy of my own room, I checked her profile... and she was only 14.

Ah. She's got time yet. I'm sure I was dismissive of things (and stuck in an artistic rut) when I was 14, but in time I learned life is never black and white. Rather to my dismay. Then again, what would art be if we didn't have other shades to play with?

�There�s a clique in my daughter�s grade that�s making her life miserable. She doesn�t want to go to school anymore. Her own supposed friends are turning on her, and she�s too afraid to do anything. What can I do?�

Welcome to the wonderful world of your daughter�s adolescence. A world in which she comes to school one day to find that her friends have suddenly decided that she no longer belongs. Or she�s teased mercilessly for wearing the wrong outfit or having the wrong friend. Or branded with a reputation she can�t shake. Or pressured into conforming so she won�t be kicked out of the group. For better or worse, your daughter�s friendships are the key to enduring adolescence�as well as the biggest threat to her well-being.

In her groundbreaking book, Queen Bees and Wannabes, Empower cofounder Rosalind Wiseman takes you inside the secret world of girls� friendships. Wiseman has spent more than a decade listening to thousands of girls talk about the powerful role cliques play in shaping what they wear and say, how they respond to boys, and how they feel about themselves. In this candid, insightful book, she dissects each role in the clique: Queen Bees, Wannabes, Messengers, Bankers, Targets, Torn Bystanders, and more. She discusses girls� power plays, from birthday invitations to cafeteria seating arrangements and illicit parties. She takes readers into �Girl World� to analyze teasing, gossip, and reputations; beauty and fashion; alcohol and drugs; boys and sex; and more, and how cliques play a role in every situation.

Each chapter includes �Check Your Baggage� sections to help you identify how your own background and biases affect how you see your daughter. �What You Can Do to Help� sections offer extensive sample scripts, bulleted lists, and other easy-to-use advice to get you inside your daughter�s world and help you
help her.

It�s not just about helping your daughter make it alive out of junior high. This book will help you understand how your daughter�s relationship with friends and cliques sets the stage for other intimate relationships as she grows and guides her when she has tougher choices to make about intimacy, drinking and drugs, and other hazards. With its revealing look into the secret world of teenage girls and cliques, enlivened with the voices of dozens of girls and a much-needed sense of humor, Queen Bees and Wannabes will equip you with all the tools you need to build the right foundation to help your daughter make smarter choices and empower her during this baffling, tumultuous time of life.

From the Hardcover edition.

Order Queen Bees and Wannabes from Amazon for $7.96

Don't have Amazon Kindle? You can always purchase it from here
Or if you prefer to read the Print editions instead, you can get it from here

Other Kindle Books of Interest
Queen Bee Moms & Kingpin Dads: Coping with the Parents, Teachers, Coaches, and Counselors Who Can Rule--or Ruin --Your Child's Life
The Price of Privilege
Cliques: Eight Steps to Help Your Child Survive the Social Jungle
Best Friends, Worst Enemies
Staying Connected to Your Teenager: How to Keep Them Talking to You and How to Hear What They're Really Saying

Project Implicit

Project Implicit provides a short online test that provides the opportunity to assess your conscious and unconscious preferences for over 90 different topics ranging from "pets to political issues, ethnic groups to sports teams, and entertainers to styles of music." By taking this test, you'll be assisting psychological research on thoughts and feelings.

The individual sessions take 10-15 minutes. At the end of the session, you will get some information about the study and a summary of your results. Interesting and informative!

About the project

Project Implicit blends basic research and educational outreach in a virtual laboratory at which visitors can examine their own hidden biases. Project Implicit is the product of research by three scientists whose work produced a new approach to understanding of attitudes, biases, and stereotypes.

The Project Implicit site (implicit.harvard.edu) has been functioning as a hands-on science museum exhibit, allowing web visitors to experience the manner in which human minds display the effects of stereotypic and prejudicial associations acquired from their socio-cultural environment.

Take me to Project Implicit!

Here's the scoop on the test behind the project:

It is well known that people don't always 'speak their minds', and it is suspected that people don't always 'know their minds'. Understanding such divergences is important to scientific psychology.

The Implicit Association Test (IAT) shows us that we learn to quickly link or associate sets of ideas in our brains. We might tend to associate the words "sunny" with "good" and "overcast" with "bad". Besides linking the words, we are linking the concepts and feelings that go with those words and we act on those feelings. The IAT is a way to see how closely our brains have linked certain concepts. The strength of the links is hard wired in our brains.

Note that the IAT has not gone without controversy (see Wall Street Journal; Science News Article).

Your turn

So, now that your interest is piqued...

How can we incorporate what we know abotu implicit assumptions into our learning and development practices?  Let's discuss ways to uncover hidden biases and optimize the training experience!

More information:

1. Dr. Anthony Greenwald/IAT Materials
2. http://faculty.washington.edu/agg/IATmaterials/PDFs/R&W.JEPG(2004).pdf

Many groups make their decisions through some process of deliberation, usually with the belief that deliberation will improve judgments and predictions. But deliberating groups often fail, in the sense that they make judgments that are false or that fail to take advantage of the information that their members have. There are four such failures.

(1) Sometimes the predeliberation errors of group members are amplified, not merely propagated, as a result of deliberation.

(2) Groups may fall victim to cascade effects, as the judgments of initial speakers or actors are followed by their successors, who do not disclose what they know. Nondisclosure, on the part of those successors, may be a product of either informational or reputational cascades.

(3) As a result of group polarization, groups often end up in a more extreme position in line with their predeliberation tendencies. Sometimes group polarization leads in desirable directions, but there is no assurance to this effect.

(4) In deliberating groups, shared information often dominates or crowds out unshared information, ensuring that groups do not learn what their members know.

All four errors can be explained by reference to informational signals, reputational pressure, or both. A disturbing result is that many deliberating groups do not improve on, and sometimes do worse than, the predeliberation judgments of their average or median member.

Below is my blog entry to his site.

*************************************

Just like life of a not-so Princess by Baikong Mamid

Baikong is my name. You haven’t heard it right? It sounds like Chinese? Or Thai? But no, no, no. It is a local dialect combined from the words “bai” meaning princess, and “ko” as “my.” When added with “-ng” it is an endearment, my princess.

But my life is a not-so Princess tale.

Because a princess lives in a beautiful place, and an exalted palace. But I live in place where chronic and protracted armed conflict is a part of daily life. My homeland Mindanao is a very lovely place despite the conflict. That is why I keep on sheltering myself in a humble house with a lovely family that I call home.

A princess is a daughter of a king. But I am not a king’s daughter. I am a daughter to a land aggressed by conflict, racial discrimination, prejudices, and misunderstanding. I am a daughter of history. I was born in the times when a ceasefire between the conflicting troops of government and revolutionary groups were enforced, and Philippines was set to liberty from dictatorship. 

That is why I was born and raised in an urban place, tasting and smelling Peace – reduced military presence, but still fear resides in each heart and mind. Just like a princess. She can have almost all the things money can buy. But could hardly touch what’s the real essence of life and happiness. Just like me, I am having a difficult time to touch and hug the real essence of peace in my land. 

I am a part of a family who has experienced so much suffering of the past – injustices, discrimination because of our identity, and severe conflict. It has rotten the good relationship of Muslims and non-Muslims in the place. That makes the colonizers laughed out loud seeing us fighting from each other, falling from the trap of divide and rule tactics. This made social harmony a ruined past. This past is hunting my life now.

Whenever I sit over my prayer mat after performing prayer inside my small bedroom, my heart begins to beat faster, I breathe deeply, and my tears falling rush. I close my eyes and start wishing that Allah would give me enough courage to surpass obstacles coming in my way for the fight of my people, for the fight of my future, my love, my happiness. 

My society that I grew up with has great teachings with my thinking and perspective now. My goal is to be able to help others realize to abide from justice. That justice is not elusive. That even a not-so princess like me can grasp and feel it. I see people as equal breathing creature; men or women, poor or rich, tall or short, white or black. 

I want to correct things and put them in the right place. I want to see that discrimination will soon be over. Those women will not be perceived and judged as weak; men will not be perceived the greatest; that children will be perceived as an important role player in the society; and, finally, persons will not be judged according to his/her religion and race, ethnicity and gender.

I am just one out of many who is suffering from the impact of the past. I was perceived weak, but I have proven them I am not. And the battle is not yet over. Mindanao is a hopeful land – strong, loving, sensitive, and optimistic – despite it’s past. 

It is not a land of terror, just like what others think. It is a rich land. But, inequalities have derailed its growth. I still see practices where voices of the poor and underprivileged are unheard. I still mingle with women who are really empowered, but don’t have venue to exercise their rights. Aside from armed conflict, food shortage, poor health, lack of access in quality education, and poor governance are included in the list to combat. 

What gladdens my heart is seeing my people driving change for the better, even without others to help them. And a woman like me who can’t give and buy any solutions to fight all the problems, will continue to be inspired to support them to achieve their dream of justice and to claim their rights. My dream, too, is to grasp justice in Mindanao, and see people especially the poor claiming their rights. Just like a life of a not-so princess.

: : : : : : : : : : :

"No one believes the original assumptions anymore," says John Seo, who co-manages Fermat Capital, a $2 billion-plus hedge fund that invests in catastrophe bonds—essentially bonds with put options that are triggered by such natural catastrophes as hurricanes and earthquakes. "It's hard to believe that anyone—yes, including me—ever believed it. It's like trying to replicate a fire-insurance policy by dynamically increasing or decreasing your coverage as fire conditions wax and wane. One day, bam, your house is on fire, and you call for more coverage?"

Does this mean they have to give back the Nobel prize? I would have thought Black-Scholes was pretty universally questioned after the whole LTCM fiasco...

Being a history lover, particularly of the American Revolution, I always love to see what kinds of thoughts and words propelled so many people to throw away every last bit of "status quo," and "security" to wage war against the 18th century superpower so as to right injustice.

I used to go to the racetrack in Saratoga, New York, every summer with my family. We'd have our $10 or $12 to spend on bets and knew that once that was gone, that was it. So we chose wisely. Even as kids, we knew that yeah, you could walk away with many months of allowance money if you won on the 100:1 shot. We also knew we'd actually go home broke from the racetrack that day because the 100:1 shot never came in. So we passed on it. Given the power of the British in the 1700s, colonial America would have been doing great to even be considered a 100:1 shot. So for that many people to still roll the dice on themselves and go for a dream, you just know there had to be powerful motivators. I look at Thomas Paine's words and rank his as one of those motivating forces to fight injustice.

I also realize they have a timeless quality. Yes, they applied to the circumstances that let to the Revolution. They also could be a rallying flag for battles against other injustices such as those against race, religion, sexual orientation. Many thought slavery was right. For centuries many just accepted that a long-standing institution was not wrong. These days people make derogatory jokes, or poke fun at certain religious or ethnic or sexual groups, and because "it's always been that way" it's assumed it's okay. I realize Paine's words do have a rallying quality to fight those battles, no matter the century.

It occurred to me, though, when I posted them, that most people read those words and perceive that the battle, the threat, the enemy is "out there." The British, or the Jews, or the gays, or the Irish or the Muslims or whatever group is currently the problem. I wondered though if even Thomas Paine knew that his words were really a call to a larger battle.

I stood in front of the mirror and for a split second, caught a glimpse of the real enemy. The true battle, underlying all others, is within. Our beliefs. Biases. Our view that "I'm fine but it's them" - "those people" - "they're the problem." Even the most open-minded liberal who supposedly loves everyone might be surprised to look in their hearts and see the real answers to questions like: Who did I judge today? Who did I decide I was better than? Who did I proclaim a failure because they did something I didn't agree with so they must be worth less than me?

The reality is we all do it and we do it so often we don't even notice it. We do it because we always have, and because "a long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." But every once in a while, in the small second between thoughts of, "Well of course I'm better because I do this, and of course, they're worse because they didn't," there's that fleeting glimpse of the enemy. I see the enemy staring back at me in the mirror - the person whose heart is so sure it's right, it's hardened against anything else. The mind that is like a full glass of water - no room to add any more - so that no room exists to ask questions like, Am I really that good? Are "they" really that wrong? Or the most important question of all - "What if we're all really the same, no better or worse than the other?"

No answers this morning. Just questions. When Voltaire said "Judge a man by his questions not by his answers," maybe he was simply pointing out the importance of asking the questions. Questions can bring you to the mirror. The answers are perhaps less important. In fact, maybe the answers are the same for all of us. In the end, we all struggle with the same things because we're all human. So it's the questions, the stopping to ask, that matters. Deep down, we probably already know the answers, no matter who we are.

And by the way, don't assume because I asked these questions, I won't see that enemy staring back at me in the mirror tomorrow morning. I don't think it ever leaves. I think it's somebody that maybe just softens over time, and eventually might stare back at us and say "Yeah, I have been kind of a jerk, haven't I?"

On this day in 1973, David Rosenhan's article entitled, "On Being Sane in Insane Places" was published in the eminently well-respected scientific journal Science.  This was a highly provocative article summarizing the findings of a study that involved eight “pseudopatients” (one graduate student, three psychologists, a pediatrician, a psychiatrist, a painter, and a housewife) being admitted to twelve different hospitals in five different states on the East and West coasts.  Each of these pseudopatients was admitted after complaining about hearing voices saying relatively innocuous words such as, “empty,” “hollow,” and “thud.”  While the facts of these pseudopatients’ names, vocations, and employment were altered, no further alterations in life histories and circumstances were made.  All of these, debatably, “normal” individuals were admitted to the psychiatric ward.  All but one was admitted with a diagnosis of schizophrenia.

Following admission to the psychiatric ward, these pseudopatients ceased presentation of any symptoms of abnormality and began tracking their interactions in notebooks.  In the absence of “abnormal” symptoms, it was quite common for other patients on the ward to tell the pseudopatients that they did not belong there.  The psychiatric staff, however, did not surmise this.  In fact, the length of hospitalization for these pseudopatients lasted anywhere from seven to fifty-two days, with an average stay of about nineteen days.  During this time, these eight pseudopatients were given approximately 2,100 pills, including antidepressants and antipsychotics (none of which they ingested). 

Rosenhan noted that even the pseudopatients’ tracking of their experience was taken as evidence of psychological disturbance.  Rosenhan suggested that the reason for this misinterpretation is that the behaviors of these pseudopatients were interpreted with reference to symptoms of psychological disorder.  In other words, because these individuals were disordered, and because the location of the disorder, in atomistic fashion, continues to remain within the individual, the behaviors must be indicative of the disorder.  In the end, all of the pseudopatients were discharged with a diagnosis of schizophrenia “in remission,” an indication that the schizophrenia may merely be in hiding but remains within the individual just as a remitting form of cancer remains within a treated cancer patient.

There was much debate regarding this study subsequent to its publication.  Much of the debate focused on the methodological problems.  Still, it is difficult to doubt the role of biases in interpreting not only others’ behaviors but also the results of investigation.  In fact, our values and biases appear to have clear relevance to our clinical decisions in psychology as well as our interpretations of research data.  It is encouraging that such a well-respected journal as Science would publish such a thought-provoking and dialogue engaging article as this.

Fuel for thought, I guess… head to my website GivingPsychologyAway.net for more fuel for thought regarding psychology.