First Blog

  As social people, we love to give advice. “You should do this.” “You shouldn’t do that.” “The prof’s an easy grader. Just study the worksheet.” “You should buy that car.” But do you ever know all the facts? Do you see only a simplified situation with essential facts removed? Is your friend asking for advice or asking for hope? There’s a difference.   Hope is the meta-fuel of well-being, giving comfort and peace in times of distress. Is your friend asking for the advice they want to hear? For something they’ve considered but needs confirmation? For a go-sign? We, the advice-givers, all too often venture into homespun psychology. Not good, mostly because we don’t know any. Among the biggest advice-givers are friends, parents, pastors, and teachers. For younger persons, parental advice is often rejected, but the other three are on the spot.   Because, if they give advice, they must accept some responsibility if it is accepted. The pastor hopefully limits advice to simple homilies o

 Your diet works even when it doesn't. How can that be? In fact, if you're on a diet, you do limit your intake, but alas it seems not to be working. No weight loss. Dang!   Take heart. You're diet is working, for if you quit dieting, your intake would go way up without restriction, and you would definitely gain weight.  To actually lose those kilos will take a greater effort. But your effort does indeed help. Keep it up! Don't quit.

Often I get questions about math. Some tell me they like math but just can't solve the problems. What I always say is this. Life is solving problems. If you can’t solve problems, your life will be one speed bump after another, one crisis after another, one brick wall after another. Learn how to solve problems. First you learn at home from toys and your parents. However, school is the first place you learn this formally. Others are experience, reading, management, parenting, teaching, hunting, sports, carpentry, and many more. All teach applicable lessons for life's problem solving. As John Daly on What's My Line , would say about everyone. "My line is problem solving." Now a word about math... All that said, you may like math, but you cannot say you’ve learned it unless you can solve related problems. Otherwise, it would be self-deception.

 Of course, you've seen these headsets with visual viewers where the player can see virtual worlds.  It is the latest construct of the Metaverse. It is beyond experience toward a meta-reality.  It is the ultimate of cool. It is perfect and can be used for teaching, for learning, for understanding, and for enhancing your life.  But, it can also be used for subliminal training, subliminal suggesting, and subliminal testing.  The user is completely captivated by the device with no outside influence whatever. Their brains are isolated and  fully open to whatever is transmitted. Nefarious programmers, corporations, and even governments can use these devices to control their customers and populations.  It is time to consider the dark side of these new technologies.  When power and money lay in the balance, it will happen.  Is it already happening? If you're alerted, frightened, and even scared stiff, you should be. There are governments and corporations that see us not as citizens or

The  late, great mathematician George Polya has advises all (math) problem solvers to begin with a guess. What the? Really? This question was recently posted on quora.com.  Here is the response I gave. For any and every problem you face, if you haven’t experience with the problem, you first think about and then guess how to solve it. Based on this guess, you try to solve it. If it fails, you use this information and guess again. Life doesn’t usually give you a road map. Well, not quite. The chef has a recipe. The judge has procedures. The accountant has principles. Hence, the consultant.  However, the hunter, the parent, the student, the president, the citizen, and most others do not. They guess, at first. You must start somewhere. Hence, the guess, hopefully the educated or experiential guess. You begin life with no methods; your journey through life adds experience which helps. Polya’s guessing mandate is little more than common sense.

  ‘Twas the week before Christmas, and all through the nation, Not a creature was taking their next vaccination. The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, Hoping that Santa would still come there. Up on the roof top were heard hooves of eight, And down came ‘ole Biden with another mandate.

  A number of studies suggest that aspirin may prevent both the development and spread of colorectal cancer (cancer of the colon and/or rectum) and that it lowers the risk of dying from colorectal cancer. There is also some evidence that aspirin may protect against other types of cancer. (But, you need to take it for a number of years for the effect.) There is also evidence it slows the advance of cognitive decline in patients with Alzheimer's disease.

 Did you know that in a recent study of 7.2 million patients, the Cleveland Clinic (top-notch) established that taking Viagra (   sildenafil ) leads to a 70% lower risk of Alzheimer's disease.   This study was done through insurance claim forms data of 7.2 million people.  For details, see https://www.sciencealert.com/giant-study-finds-viagra-is-linked-to-almost-70-lower-risk-of-alzheimer-s  Thus, a healthy sex life leads to better health. :)

 As is well-known, the great Poobahs of Californian have chosen a course in managing their woodlands to allow naturally fallen trees to rot in place, thereby allowing them to become fertilizer for succeeding generations of forests.  Sounds great.  I like the idea.   BUT, these fallen and rotting trees then became kindling for any random lightening strike, thereby setting fires and destroying many healthy trees. This is what's happened in California.   This was Mother Nature's  original solution to forest management for all of time.  It is conjectured that prior to man, forest fires were most frequent, and the people living in them were under constant threat. Modern forest management seeks to clear undergrowth, thereby making forests less vulnerable to fires.  California says no to this.  Go figure.  Pristine nature creates forests. Forests burn all the time. Man learns to clear forests. Man unlearns forest clearing. Forests burn all the time. Return to pristine nature.

 You live within many groups.  Who's on top of each?  Difficult. But how many are on top? That is the subject of this essay. It turns out not a simple percentage will work.  We need to use the square root of the population and more.  Many examples are given. The following article was recently published to LinkIn. Example. The US Congress is about 500 strong.  Of those our model reveals that only about 6 are the truly top dogs while an additional 18 (e.g. committee chairs) others have serious power.  https://www.linkedin.com/posts/g-donald-allen-420b0315_compute-estimate-the-most-important-people-activity-6872539096368201728-Q8_3

  Field of Dreams We know it well. Picture this field as a vast plane, stretching to infinity. In it is contained all your hopes, ideas, wishes, aspirations, yearnings, and desires. Even faith has a presence. Many visit often. Some live there. Only a few have forgotten where it is. This field is special, part fantasy, part spiritual, part a plan, and part the solution. It is the place where dreams meet reality. Each of us sees this field stretching before our present and future. For each, there are hopes, even prayers for those dreams to come true.   Your field of dreams is a fertile plain, lush with flowers and grasses, but also with spines and thorns. because not everything growing there is what you want.   To be avoided are those most tempting, the dreams of excess. We should thus call this short essay Your Field of Dreams Parents often say, “Sweet dreams” to their children on tucking them in. Before that, you dreamt of having children, healthy and able, good and happy. Befo

Some of us live by maxims of the famous luminaries, past and present. Yet, it is upon us to understand just what is correct, actionable, and sensible. Let’s consider the lie from the inside and out. For us grown-ups Let’s begin with the maxim from Fyodor Dostoevsky , “Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love.” This lofty admonition sounds almost Utopian, with dire consequences for violation. The self-lie is wrong.   For the kids. We have “The Little Engine that Could,” a story used to teach children the value of optimism and hard work. This means to try hard regardless of doubt, also to be viewed as a possible self-lie. Dostoevsky instructs us not to, but most of us do try. Does this mean we lie to ourselves?   Yet, from another past luminary Thoma