“The 48 Laws of Power” by Robert Greene and Joost Elffers
Law 1 Never Outshine the Master Always make those above you feel comfortably superior. In your desire to please or impress them, do not go too far in displaying your talents or you might accomplish the opposite – inspire fear and insecurity. Make your masters appear more brilliant than they are and you will attain the heights of power.
Law 2 Never put too Much Trust in Friends, Learn how to use Enemies Be wary of friends-they will betray you more quickly, for they are easily aroused to envy. They also become spoiled and tyrannical. But hire a former enemy and he will be more loyal than a friend, because he has more to prove. In fact, you have more to fear from friends than from enemies. If you have no enemies, find a way to make them.
Law 3 Conceal your Intentions Keep people off-balance and in the dark by never revealing the purpose behind your actions. If they have no clue what you are up to, they cannot prepare a defense. Guide them far enough down the wrong path, envelope them in enough smoke, and by the time they realize your intentions, it will be too late.
Law 4 Always Say Less than Necessary When you are trying to impress people with words, the more you say, the more common you appear, and the less in control. Even if you are saying something banal, it will seem original if you make it vague, open-ended, and sphinxlike. Powerful people impress and intimidate by saying less. The more you say, the more likely you are to say something foolish.
Law 5 So Much Depends on Reputation – Guard it with your Life Reputation is the cornerstone of power. Through reputation alone you can intimidate and win; once you slip, however, you are vulnerable, and will be attacked on all sides. Make your reputation unassailable. Always be alert to potential attacks and thwart them before they happen. Meanwhile, learn to destroy your enemies by opening holes in their own reputations. Then stand aside and let public opinion hang them.
Law 6 Court Attention at all Cost Everything is judged by its appearance; what is unseen counts for nothing. Never let yourself get lost in the crowd, then, or buried in oblivion. Stand out. Be conspicuous, at all cost. Make yourself a magnet of attention by appearing larger, more colorful, more mysterious, than the bland and timid masses.
Law 7 Get others to do the Work for you, but Always Take the Credit Use the wisdom, knowledge, and legwork of other people to further your own cause. Not only will such assistance save you valuable time and energy, it will give you a godlike aura of efficiency and speed. In the end your helpers will be forgotten and you will be remembered. Never do yourself what others can do for you.
Law 8 Make other People come to you – use Bait if Necessary When you force the other person to act, you are the one in control. It is always better to make your opponent come to you, abandoning his own plans in the process. Lure him with fabulous gains – then attack. You hold the cards.
Law 9 Win through your Actions, Never through Argument Any momentary triumph you think gained through argument is really a Pyrrhic victory: The resentment and ill will you stir up is stronger and lasts longer than any momentary change of opinion. It is much more powerful to get others to agree with you through your actions, without saying a word. Demonstrate, do not explicate.
Law 10 Infection: Avoid the Unhappy and Unlucky You can die from someone else’s misery – emotional states are as infectious as disease. You may feel you are helping the drowning man but you are only precipitating your own disaster. The unfortunate sometimes draw misfortune on themselves; they will also draw it on you. Associate with the happy and fortunate instead.
Law 11 Learn to Keep People Dependent on You To maintain your independence you must always be needed and wanted. The more you are relied on, the more freedom you have. Make people depend on you for their happiness and prosperity and you have nothing to fear. Never teach them enough so that they can do without you.
Law 12 Use Selective Honesty and Generosity to Disarm your Victim One sincere and honest move will cover over dozens of dishonest ones. Open-hearted gestures of honesty and generosity bring down the guard of even the most suspicious people. Once your selective honesty opens a hole in their armor, you can deceive and manipulate them at will. A timely gift – a Trojan horse – will serve the same purpose.
Law 13 When Asking for Help, Appeal to People’s Self-Interest, Never to their Mercy or Gratitude If you need to turn to an ally for help, do not bother to remind him of your past assistance and good deeds. He will find a way to ignore you. Instead, uncover something in your request, or in your alliance with him, that will benefit him, and emphasize it out of all proportion. He will respond enthusiastically when he sees something to be gained for himself.
Law 14 Pose as a Friend, Work as a Spy Knowing about your rival is critical. Use spies to gather valuable information that will keep you a step ahead. Better still: Play the spy yourself. In polite social encounters, learn to probe. Ask indirect questions to get people to reveal their weaknesses and intentions. There is no occasion that is not an opportunity for artful spying.
Law 15 Crush your Enemy Totally All great leaders since Moses have known that a feared enemy must be crushed completely. (Sometimes they have learned this the hard way.) If one ember is left alight, no matter how dimly it smolders, a fire will eventually break out. More is lost through stopping halfway than through total annihilation: The enemy will recover, and will seek revenge. Crush him, not only in body but in spirit.
Law 16 Use Absence to Increase Respect and Honor Too much circulation makes the price go down: The more you are seen and heard from, the more common you appear. If you are already established in a group, temporary withdrawal from it will make you more talked about, even more admired. You must learn when to leave. Create value through scarcity.
Law 17 Keep Others in Suspended Terror: Cultivate an Air of Unpredictability Humans are creatures of habit with an insatiable need to see familiarity in other people’s actions. Your predictability gives them a sense of control. Turn the tables: Be deliberately unpredictable. Behavior that seems to have no consistency or purpose will keep them offbalance, and they will wear themselves out trying to explain your moves. Taken to an extreme, this strategy can intimidate and terrorize.
Law 18 Do Not Build Fortresses to Protect Yourself – Isolation is Dangerous The world is dangerous and enemies are everywhere – everyone has to protect themselves. A fortress seems the safest. But isolation exposes you to more dangers than it protects you from – it cuts you off from valuable information, it makes you conspicuous and an easy target. Better to circulate among people find allies, mingle. You are shielded from your enemies by the crowd.
Law 19 Know Who You’re Dealing with – Do Not Offend the Wrong Person There are many different kinds of people in the world, and you can never assume that everyone will react to your strategies in the same way. Deceive or outmaneuver some people and they will spend the rest of their lives seeking revenge. They are wolves in lambs’ clothing. Choose your victims and opponents carefully, then – never offend or deceive the wrong person.
Law 20 Do Not Commit to Anyone It is the fool who always rushes to take sides. Do not commit to any side or cause but yourself. By maintaining your independence, you become the master of others – playing people against one another, making them pursue you.
Law 21 Play a Sucker to Catch a Sucker – Seem Dumber than your Mark No one likes feeling stupider than the next persons. The trick, is to make your victims feel smart – and not just smart, but smarter than you are. Once convinced of this, they will never suspect that you may have ulterior motives.
Law 22 Use the Surrender Tactic: Transform Weakness into Power When you are weaker, never fight for honor’s sake; choose surrender instead. Surrender gives you time to recover, time to torment and irritate your conqueror, time to wait for his power to wane. Do not give him the satisfaction of fighting and defeating you – surrender first. By turning the other check you infuriate and unsettle him. Make surrender a tool of power.
Law 23 Concentrate Your Forces Conserve your forces and energies by keeping them concentrated at their strongest point. You gain more by finding a rich mine and mining it deeper, than by flitting from one shallow mine to another – intensity defeats extensity every time. When looking for sources of power to elevate you, find the one key patron, the fat cow who will give you milk for a long time to come.
Law 24 Play the Perfect Courtier The perfect courtier thrives in a world where everything revolves around power and political dexterity. He has mastered the art of indirection; he flatters, yields to superiors, and asserts power over others in the mot oblique and graceful manner. Learn and apply the laws of courtiership and there will be no limit to how far you can rise in the court.
Continue reading “The 48 Laws of Power” by Robert Greene and Joost Elffers
“Effortless Attention: A New Perspective in the Cognitive Science of Attention and Action” by Brian Bruya
This is the first book to explore the cognitive science of effortless attention andaction. Attention and action are generally understood to require effort, and the expectation is thatunder normal circumstances effort increases to meet rising demand. Sometimes, however, attention andaction seem to flow effortlessly despite high demand. Effortless attention and action have beendocumented across a range of normal activities — ranging from rock climbing to chess playing — andyet fundamental questions about the cognitive science of effortlessness have gone largely unasked.This book draws from the disciplines of cognitive psychology, neurophysiology, behavioralpsychology, genetics, philosophy, and cross-cultural studies. Starting from the premise that thephenomena of effortless attention and action provide an opportunity to test current models ofattention and action, leading researchers from around the world examine topics including effort as acognitive resource, the role of effort in decision-making, the neurophysiology of effortlessattention and action, the role of automaticity in effortless action, expert performance ineffortless action, and the neurophysiology and benefits of attentionaltraining.
Contributors: Joshua M. Ackerman, James H. Austin, John A. Bargh Roy F.Baumeister, Sian L. Beilock, Chris Blais, Matthew M. Botvinick, Brian Bruya, MihalyCsikszentmihalyi, Marci S. DeCaro, Arne Dietrich, Yuri Dormashev, László Harmat, Bernhard Hommel,Rebecca Lewthwaite, Örjan de Manzano, Joseph T. McGuire, Brian P. Meier, Arlen C. Moller, JeanneNakamura, Michael I. Posner, Mary K. Rothbart, M.R. Rueda, Brandon J. Schmeichel, EdwardSlingerland, Oliver Stoll, Yiyuan Tang, Töres Theorell, Fredrik Ullén, GabrieleWulf
(Contributed by Michael Kelly.)
Lo And Behold: Reveries of the Connected World – Official Trailer
Like on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LoandBeholdFilm
Legendary master filmmaker Werner Herzog (Grizzly Man, Cave of Forgotten Dreams) examines the past, present and constantly evolving future of the Internet in Lo and Behold: Reveries of the Connected World. Working with NETSCOUT, a world leader in-real time service assurance and cybersecurity, which came aboard as a producer and led him into a new world, Herzog conducted original interviews with cyberspace pioneers and prophets such as PayPal and Tesla co-founder Elon Musk, Internet protocol inventor Bob Kahn, and famed hacker Kevin Mitnick.
These provocative conversations reveal the ways in which the online world has transformed how virtually everything in the real world works, from business to education, space travel to healthcare, and the very heart of how we conduct our personal relationships. In the words of executive producer Jim McNiel, “It’s a journey even Werner, with his immense imagination and inquisitive mind, didn’t expect. Unless you have lived in the technology space, you don’t yet fully appreciate what dwells there.” Herzog adds: “It is one of the biggest revolutions we as humans are experiencing.”
See it in theatres, On Demand, Amazon Video and iTunes August 19th
http://www.loandbeholdfilm.com
Cream: Tales of Brave Ulysses
If I had to pick a favorite from among Cream‘s many excellent songs, this would probably be it. There are a couple of “live” versions of it posted on YouTube, but the sound is far from the best, here is the “studio” version.
Maybe with a bit more research I can find something that shows what these guys were really capable of in the heat of improvisation. Jack Bruce once remarked that he and Ginger Baker were “refugees from Ornette Coleman” (or something along those lines – at any rate, basically free-jazzers at heart). What that makes Eric Clapton in this context, I’m far from sure.
And I seem to recall that Mike’s favorite café in Paris was called “Cream”, too. One wonders, did they have the complete works of this band playing on an endless loop inside?
Also, last but far from least, many thanks to Richard Branam for posting “White Room”, reminding me of this music…
ADDENDUM: I find Jack Bruce’s singing here to be pretty clear, but just in case, one can find the lyrics to this song here.
Gabriel Marcel on what it really means when you tell someone “I love you”
“To tell someone, with fullness of heart, ‘I love you,’ is virtually the same as saying, ‘You shall never die.'”
–Gabriel Honoré Marcel (December 7, 1889 – October 8, 1973) was a French philosopher, playwright, music critic and leading Christian existentialist. Wikipedia
Some Jungian insights about excrement and politics
“In each of us there is a rejected part which can become the cornerstone like it’s written in the Bible, and we have to be aware of the stinking side, of the bad smelling side, as Jung says, about the urine, about the excrement and all that in our lives and this is the beginning of the way of God. This is the beginning of the transformation.”
–Dr. Lilliane Frey-Rohn
“The psychology of individuation has nothing to do with politics at all because it deals with the ultimate values, but yes, it has shattering political implications. We cannot behave as if this journey into the collective unconscious hasn’t happened, because it has happened. We can’t plead ignorance any more. It has happened and because it’s happened, because we are facing an objective universe within as great as the universe without, we can never be the same again. We cannot ignore it and it has enormous political consequences for us. And the kind of society, the kind of politics that will save us will have to be aware, more important than any other quality in our politicians. We must demand psychological illumination, psychological awareness, because otherwise we get people sparring with their own shadows. Otherwise, you’ll get nations, as we had in 1939, by the Germans projecting their shadows onto the Jews, and then when they’d eliminated the Jews, onto the Poles and God knows whatnot. Jung often said to me, the human being who starts by withdrawing his own shadow from his neighbor is doing work of immense immediate social and political importance.”
–Sir Laurens van der Post
Cream – “White Room”
Check out The Jonestown Revolt! http://www.youtube.com/thejonestownre…
Cream – White Room, studio version.
Lyrics:
In the white room with black curtains near the station
Black roof country, no gold pavements, tired starlings
Silver horses ran down moonbeams in your dark eyes
Dawn light smiles on you leaving, my contentment
I’ll wait in this place where the sun never shines
Wait in this place where the shadows run from themselves
You said no strings could secure you at the station
Platform ticket, restless diesels, goodbye windows
I walked into such a sad time at the station
As I walked out, felt my own need just beginning
I’ll wait in the queue when the trains come back
Lie with you where the shadows run from themselves
At the party she was kindness in the hard crowd
Consolation for the old wound now forgotten
Yellow tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes
She’s just dressing, goodbye windows, tired starlings
I’ll sleep in this place with the lonely crowd
Lie in the dark where the shadows run from themselves
Written by Jack Bruce, Pete Brown • Copyright © Warner/Chappell Music, Inc
(Courtesy of Richard Branam.)
Rare Earth – “Get Ready”
Get Ready – Rare Earth
I never met a girl could make me feel the way that you do
(You’re all right)
Whenever I’m asked what makes a my dreams real
I tell ’em you do
(You’re outta sight)
Well tweedle dee, tweedle dum
Look out baby now here I come
I’m bringin’ you a love that’s true yeah, get ready (get ready, get ready)
I’ll stop makin’ love to you, get ready (get ready, get ready)
Get ready, ’cause here I come (I said I’m on my way)
Get ready, ’cause here I come
If you wanna play hide and seek with love, let me remind ya
(You’re all right)
The lovin’ you’re gonna miss, and the time it takes to find ya
(You’re outta sight)
Well tweedle dee, tweedle dum
Look out baby now here I come
I’m bringin’ you a love that’s true yeah, get ready (get ready, get ready)
I’ll stop…
(Courtesy of Richard Branam.)
Jordan Peterson on a difficult and profound life
“If you’re aiming at something difficult and profound [say, the actualization of your own divinity] and you’re really working at it, then your life is going to become perhaps more difficult and profound.”
–Jordan Bernt Peterson (born June 12, 1962) is a Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology at the University of Toronto. Wikipedia
In communicating the progress of scientific theories and tests, experimental results are often presented to the public as concrete and indisputable, therefore proving this-or-that idea. This leads to the common misconception that scientific models can in fact become proven, instead of the more nuanced reality that they are only the most precise (sometimes extremely precise) and accurate models approximating what we can discern, and the very notion of evidence always suggest a degree of interpretation.
The results of quantum entanglement experiments are a case-in-point. The results of data from particle accelerators to optical Bell tests (experiments that test entanglement) are statistical, such that conclusions are drawn based on the probability of a series of measurements being random or “true signals”. This goes for detection of Higgs, W, and Z bosons as well as whether two particles are so strongly correlated that they violate local-realism. Because evidence regarding the latter example have serious implications for the underlying nature of reality (implying that “things” are either fundamentally nonlocal or a probabilistic superposition) the results are strongly questioned.
This stems from the fact that as fallible beings, our experiments are not perfect. There are always a certain degree of underlying assumptions and interpretations of the data. In the case of Bell tests, these are often referred to as “loopholes”. Therefore, while quantum experiments have all produced statistical results strongly supporting nonlocality, state-superposition, and other violations of classical physics (superluminal tunneling, teleportation, etc.) all such experiments have certain loopholes that may be giving false-positive results. Therefore, much work has been done in designing and performing “loophole-free Bell tests”.
Such loophole-free tests have become increasingly sophisticated and have produced strong indication that local-realist theories, also known as local hidden variable theories, are not supported by the evidence. Note that nonlocal-realist theories, like de Broglie-Bohm Pilot wave theory, are still valid interpretations of quantum results.
One significant loophole that appears frequently in critiques of quantum experiments regards the idea of free-will, another way in which consciousness becomes an important factor in quantum theory and the objective physical mechanisms of reality. One of those afore-mentioned assumptions in quantum experiments is that the researchers have free-will to decide which variables to test. This may sound strange, but there are several lines of reasoning in science that indicate free-will may be illusionary — that our thoughts and behaviors may be intrinsically deterministic. If this were the case, then experimenters may not be acting of their own stand-alone volition in deciding what variables to test, i.e. decisions are not “random”, and therefore some hidden variable may have been at play that makes a result appear quantum mechanical when it in fact was not.
To obviate this potential problem, physicists have tried to remove the “human element” by using random number generators to decide which property of a putatively entangled quantum particle-pair to measure. Essentially, two entangled particles travel to detectors where a random number generator decides at the last moment which property to measure. This introduced randomness should remove potential pre-determined settings. Yet still, skeptics suggest that perhaps random number generators are not truly random, and again the question of “free will” remains.
To address this, physicists recently used photons from stars 600 light years away, so that the starlight acted as the random number generator. This experimental design comes from the idea that it is unlikely that an experimenter’s choices are at all able to influence photon emission 600 years ago (but again, this is an assumption, and hence another loophole; for example see Wheeler’s delayed choice experiment).
Now, a researcher from the Perimeter Institute who has over 25 years experience working with ideas of human consciousness in quantum mechanics, Dr. Lucien Hardy, has proposed a variation of the freedom-of-choice loophole experiment that would use the gestalt signal from a hundred human minds to make the last-moment decision of which property to test of the entangled particle pairs.
While the primary purpose of such an experiment would be to test the “quantumness” of correlations, providing another test of whether the violation of local-realism is indeed an intrinsic property of quantum mechanics, the implications of the results would be far-reaching into the nature of human sentience and consciousness in the universe. If it were found that such an experiment does not uphold quantum nonlocality or state superposition, then not only are interpretations of quantum mechanics thrown into question, but it may suggest that human consciousness is something above and beyond the information processing technologies of computers, machines, and random number generators.
From RSF researchers’ work in holofractographic unified field theory, in studies such as the Unified Spacememory Network, we would predict that it is unlikely that such an experiment would in fact find a deviation from what is normally observed in quantum experimentation. The reason for this is two-fold: (1) our analysis of the mechanics underlying most phenomena strongly suggest nonlocality, both temporally and spatially; and (2) we disagree with the hypothesis of Cartesian-duality — that the mind is somehow beyond the physical world — and while having many transcendental properties is nevertheless an intrinsic and integral aspect of the natural operation of the physical world. Of course, the only way to see whether this prediction is supported or negated is to run the experiment, which we hope will be undertaken!
Article: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1705.04620.pdf
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