My professional blog has just been posted and linked in the New York Times. We’ve been running stories from our translators around the world about how the economic crisis looks to them. It was picked up by the Freakonomics column, run by Steve Levitt, the U of Chicago economist who first established the link between the legalization of abortions by Roe vs. Wade to the spectacular fall in crime in the 1990′s.
Their column quoting our people is here.
I’ve been getting Playboy for three years now – part of my middle age crisis, fully approved by my spouse. And, unfortunately, I think it is about to end. Not only was my April issue three weeks late and very thin, but one of the prime Playboy real estate properties in LA is up for sale. I think it may be the end of this venerable magazine.
There is a social component to human intelligence. A great deal of what we consider to be intelligent, thinking activity is actually memory masquerading as intelligence. We can all see the results of it: towering skyscrapers, sleek airliners, glitzy smartphones. But, how did they get here? Where does it come from? How does one define the intelligence that created it?
While society has had IQ tests, college placement exams and the like for more than a century, no one seriously thinks that these are true tests of native intelligence. Too much of the tests require a particular social understanding, such that a teenager from Ghana is almost immediately at a disadvantage to a teenager from the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Why have no universal tests been created?
The answer comes from the nature of intelligence – intelligence is social and highly dependent on the network of memories and experiences that are built up in an individual. Those memories and experiences are highly personal, and quite different from one society to the next. The human brain is a living filter for those memories and experiences, judging them on their suitability and choosing to keep and pass on some of these individual memories and experiences or not others. This is the basis of most of mankind’s intellectual accomplishments. This form of intelligence has been most elegantly described in the discussion of memes.
First things first. I have not read a good primer on memes – most of them seem to count on smart people to grasp on the idea intuitively. It took me awhile, so I think a better explanation is called for.
COMING NEXT: Primer on Memes, The Current State of Evolution.
After over a year of dragging my feet, I’ve finally launched my professional blog. Go here to see the official Apogee Communications blog.
91.9 from dustin hostetler on Vimeo.
I’ve driven through Northern Indiana before and, yes, the radio stations are bad. But not this bad! Something was truly broken here. I love the driver’s eyebrows.
Gabi went to get an ultrasound yesterday. This was the major exam—and everything turned out just fine.
And we now have further proof that she is a girl. Just wanted you to know …
Last night was great fun. It was Alex’s 21st birthday (that’s Alex Steussy-Williams in full). We started at Lola’s on Fairfax, home of the Apple Martini.
We ended up at Yamashiro’s in Hollywood. There were six of us. From left to right, Anita Ruprecht, me, Alex Steussy-Williams, Daniel Thomas, Andrew Kalman and Gabi.
Every wonder what route Pappy and I take on our jogs? Here it is … just amazing what you can do when you carry a GPS connected cellphone with you and there are some bright people programming for it. 2.59 miles, speed 5.2 mph, total rise in hills 291 feet, calories burned 271. Find the application here.
There is another report of similar shaking on the Central Coast in the Santa Cruz newspaper.
Add that to our reports in Orange County and Temecula.
March Field, CA
