- What’s lost as cursive handwriting goes away? Intelligence … memory … turns out handwriting isn’t just some bugaboo in stuffy, old-fashioned teachers’ minds.
- In Thailand, protestors salute with the touching gesture borrowed from The Hunger Games. The junta doesn’t like it.
- Hm. I dunno. I guess if you’re too busy, have the bux, and don’t mind your dog pigging out on treats, this could assuage your guilt. Frankly, though, if I had the money and no time, I’d go with an automated fetch machine, instead. Keep ’em lean and well-exercised. (H/T ML)
- Whotta place to be caught: between secrecy and censorship
- Haha! Those noxious patent trolls are getting what they deserve.
- Six subtle things that highly productive people do every day.
Don’t check email in the morning, ehhh? OK, I’ll try it… Just kidding. I’m doomed to be uninsanely productive.
Those suggestions from productive people are quite sensible ― better than a lot of things I’ve read. Especially # 3. “Doing something well does not make it important.”
I’m convinced that people are not geared to multitasking and speed, that we do it because, as humans, we can… and because, since the Industrial Revolution, businesses have dictated our schedules for their benefit. The “let’s get it done and go on to bigger, better, brighter things” attitude of a company’s production is actually hostile to individual productivity.
~~~
On handwriting: the subject of penmanship wasn’t addressed, but it does force a sort of organization of the mind. Do ― or can ― we focus better when we take the time to write better?
Interesting about the handwriting. I used to at least outline anything I planned to write, and often wrote out the rough draft by hand even after using a typewriter for many years. In 1986, I got my first word processor and never looked back, really, but still keep a notebook and pens by my bed. Some of my best ideas come in the late evening, or even the middle of the night, and if I don’t make some notes at least, it’s apt to be completely gone by morning.
I will try going back to hand written outlines before I compose something. It will be interesting to see how that works, and if my writing improves. I had a long, hard struggle before I was able to compose anything at the keyboard… and I may just have outsmarted myself rather badly!
Writing down the names of people I meet seriously helps me to remember them, while a trip to the grocery store without making a list is apt to be unproductive. But if I do write the list, I usually can remember what I need even if the list itself winds up being left on the refrigerator.
I have to yawn at Bovard’s article about press freedom. Whenever I start worrying about such things I recall that the press was at the forefront of the campaign to pass McCain-Feingold, the law that made it illegal to try to report on elections without conforming to campaign finance laws – with exceptions wrote into it for “official” news organizations. Those bastards have about as much commitment to liberty as Lenin did. That’s why I call them the Ministry of Propaganda.
I realize Bovard is talking about individual reporters rather than institutions, but those reporters still work for those institutions. They are inside the system, and they serve the ruling class when you come down to it. Reading his article with all the blather about the courts and subpoenas and so forth just makes my eyes roll. The reporters are just more “good Germans”:
http://strike-the-root.com/compromise
A reporter I respect is Neema Vedadi (Freedom Feens) who walked away from the system because he couldn’t stomach the lies.
Thanks for that article about productive people. I have the email thing down at least – I check it about once a week.
Hightly productive people probably don’t read to many blogs.
I am not convinced about the handwriting thing. Yes, I can accept the mental benefits, but not that handwriting is the only way to get those benefits. Plus, it mentioned that students who “took notes” retained the information better than those who typed notes, but I know I retained information best when I doodled as I listened. Perhaps handwriting is just filling that niche in those students tested.
The biggest benefit to handwriting that I see is that technology fails, and it’s good to have a backup.
I like the idea of the Hunger Games sign being used against tyrants in the real world.
The “6 things” was apparently written by a “morning person” (fire and brimstone, and spiders, upon his head). He assumes that morning is “your best hours”. Ha. I check my email in the morning, because otherwise I would be sitting staring into space at that time of day. I was never one for doing much in the morning. At least now I use that time- maybe not in a way he would consider “productive”. I do what I consider my “best” writing late at night. That’s when I am energized and feel creative. Morning is best for zombie-like going through the motions- like checking email.
I was using the “Hunger Games sign” back in the 1950s, as a Boy Scout. It dates back to 1910.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scout_sign_and_salute
Not that I begrudge freedom-minded folks co-opting it.