seths.blog

"Why are you taking this class?" That seems like a fair question. After tenth grade or so, it's a choice, after all. One honest answer is, "I have to get a good grade to get ...

Apophenia is the uniquely human tendency to perceive meaningful patterns or connections in random or unrelated data, events, or objects. Humans are story telling machines. And one thing we do is tu ...

Frederick Taylor taught Henry Ford how to do mass production. Deming brought quality, systems understanding and respect for the worker. And operations research brought insight. If you have a repeat ...

The first day of classes, some students slouch in the back row, unprepared and uninterested. Some are up front, eager and ready. But it's only the morning of the first day-these attitud ...

Snap, crackle and pop. A set of German-made socket wrenches can turn a bolt in a similar way to a cheaper alternative, but it feels far more rewarding. More than forty years ago, I started using a ...

For fifteen or twenty years, this question is relentlessly answered, whether or not we ask it. After we learn fractions, the teacher moves on to decimals. After we read O'Connor, we're ...

It's not up to us to fix the world all by ourselves. But we vote with our attention and our dollars. If we're attracted to the wrong stuff like moths to a flame, don't be surprise ...

It might be at school, at work or at home. Hunkering down, hoping we won't get noticed. A safe spot, worth concealing. The problem with hiding out from responsibility or change is that weR ...

Three paths are now available: Race through this last part. Deal with your fear of the threshold by shipping the work as soon as you possibly can. Stall and avoid. Fear is at its peak, and your per ...

That's pretty new. Letters sent by Thomas Jefferson from France often took months to get a response. No points for shaving a day off a 90-day correspondence lag. The 800 toll-free number shif ...