I came across a new word recently in a New York Times article entitled "A Public Exit from Goldman Sachs Hits at a Wounded Wall Street." You may have heard of it, but I certainly had not. The word is: shibboleth. The word has several shades of meaning, but the one I find most intriguing …
Tag: new york times
The Truth is True
I stumbled upon an excellent article yesterday in The New York Times Sunday Review entitled "Biased but Brilliant." The author, Cordelia Fine, a senior research associate at the Melbourne Business School, points to research showing that confirmation bias - the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions, leading …
Five Habits
The powerful recession that swept the globe over the last few years was a game-changer for businesses everywhere. Lulled into a false sense of security by the the many years of plenty, companies operating with bloated payrolls, lavish spending on nonessentials and lax management practices suddenly found themselves confronted with a new reality. Corporate leaders …
Is Charity a Moral Failure?
I read a fascinating article in the New York Times yesterday titled "Kindness of a Stranger that Still Resonates." The article described the kind and selfless acts of a successful businessman in the depths of the Great Depression during an era where charity was seen as a moral failure. The secret philanthropist, Samuel J. Stone, …
Altruism is Possible and Altruism is Real
I read a fascinating article in the New York Times called "Is Pure Altruism Possible?" The article's author, Judith Lichtenberg, is a professor of philosophy at Georgetown University who is writing a book on charity and her interest seems to be in part to discover ways to increase altruism in the world today. While much …
The “Inner Go”
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman used an interesting quote yesterday from Lewis Mumford's book "The Condition of Man," about the development of civilization. Reflecting on the American nation in 1944, Mumford drew a chilling parallel to the decline of the mighty Roman Empire: Everyone aimed at security: no one accepted responsibility. What was plainly …
Technology, the Medusa of our Day?
I came across unrelated but commonly themed articles today that contained ideas worth spreading. The technological advances of our current era are transforming the way people interact. Some argue for the changes, others argue against them, but as with all human developments it behooves us to ask whether we are managing the change or if …
A Nation of Nitwits? I think not!
Bob Herbert's recent column in the New York Times, "Putting our Brains on Hold," is a real wake-up call. In a nutshell, Herbert described the precipitous drop in quality of a U.S. education versus that of other developed nations over the last few decades. As a father of two young boys, I must say that …
My Evolving Thoughts on Gnosis
"We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy is when men are afraid of the light." ~ Plato There was an interesting article in the New York Times 'Opinionator' yesterday that compared the views of optimistic Darwinians and pessimistic Darwinians on the concept of morality ("Moral Camouflage or …
Smile! (You are getting old)
A recently published Gallup poll of 340,000 people between the ages of 18 and 85 indicates that the happiness waxes, wanes then waxes again in the life cycle of the average American. Late teens note a high sense of satisfaction with life as do people over the age of fifty. What happens in between is …
Gregory Hake 