Four Great Intellectual Conversations

The following 4 conversations are all excellent. In each case, the person being interviewed has an extremely accurate worldview which they are able to articulate well to others. Thus it’s no surprise that two of them are billionaires and a third works as the manager of another billionaire’s investment fund. The more accurate your model of the world, the more successfully you can operate within it.

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How to Be a 3 Percent Man / Corey Wayne

3 Percent Man

The book’s title How to Be a 3 Percent Man comes from the author’s claim that only 3% of men truly understand women. While this is an impossible proportion to actually quantify, my own personal life experience tends to back this estimation.

The book in extremely anecdotal, with almost all examples and stories coming from the author Corey’s own life. While many readers will be able to directly identify with being in similar situations, some may wish that the book’s core points were more directly summarized. Continue reading

The Rational Male / Rollo Tomassi

Rational Male

The book The Rational Male discusses the hidden forces behind inter-gender relations. The book is the aggregation of multiple blog posts that the author had previously written over the course of many years, and thus the work reads like a collection of short essays. I believe The Rational Male to be one of the first attempts to actually explain the reasons behind successful inter-gender social dynamics, at a time when other sources were only telling men how to act and not addressing the reasoning behind the actions. Continue reading

Never Split The Difference / Chris Voss

The book Never Split the Difference is written by former FBI hostage negotiator Chris Voss and describes different strategies that you can use during negotiations. Thus as one would expect, it is filled with many nail biting true stories which are used to illustrate its points. I personally standby the methods in the book, having been able to successfully apply them to the effect of saving thousands of dollars. Continue reading

Are you a Fundamentalist Without Knowing It?

Fundamentalism: a movement or attitude stressing strict and literal adherence to a set of basic principles.

When we think of fundamentalists, our minds most often jump to pictures of zealous religious followers who are willing to denounce both logic and reason to protect their beliefs. However, fundamentalism can exist in many different forms. Even scientists can become fundamentalists within their own disciplines and refuse to accept evidence that may contradict with their beliefs. We even now have atheists who ironically promote atheism as fervently as many missionaries promote their own religions. Continue reading

Why We Fear Failure

Whenever we imagine pursuing a new endeavor, we all have that small voice inside of us which warns that we are not good enough. Not good enough to work a particular job. Not good enough to put our own needs before others. Not good enough that another person would want to have a relationship with us. We fear that if we try to achieve something and fail, that it will only serve as proof that the little voice inside our head is right.

So to prevent this, we come up with countless excuses and rationalize away reasons to even begin trying. We tell ourselves that we are either too stupid, poor, boring, ugly or low class. Instead of recognizing our common humanity in others, and realizing that what is possible for one person is also possible for another, we instead separate out ourselves into the “not good enough” category. While our immediate intention is to project ourselves from potential pain, with every deference to fear, we forfeit our personal integrity and slowly chip away at our own souls. Continue reading

Causation vs. Correlation: Where Classic “Pick-Up” Advice Went Wrong.

The publication of the book The Game by Neil Strauss, over a decade ago, marked the birth of the modern “pick-up” industry, whose intent is to teach men how to become more successful in meeting and attracting women. Many men started religiously following the advice that they got from such books, lectures and online forums, because when applied, it did indeed appear to lead to better results.

However, almost all these men, including the very authors of the advice, often misattributed the reasons behind why their techniques were successful. They believed that the specific actions that they were taking were directly causing their success, when in reality their success was primarily the result of separate factors which were only correlated with their actions.
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Prevalence of Group Think in Modern Society

We all benefit from the advantages of group think. No single person has the time to base every decision upon only the information which they have alone amassed. As the speed of everyday life and the volume of information we are exposed to rapidly grows, so does the pressure to make rapid decisions. Thus people are inclined now more than ever before to tap into a group consciousness for answers to their quandaries. Continue reading