BIZ
Peter Thiel on What Makes A Great Technology
Company & Other Thoughts – Can
Turtles Fly
No Death, No Taxes (Nov 2011) – The
New Yorker
No more inhibition – Emanuel
Derman / Reuters
It could be like a distributed
denial-of-service attack that brings down the banking system. Probably I
shouldn’t be allowed to publish this idea.
Derivatives: The Unregulated Global Casino for
Banks – Demonocracy
Banks’
derivatives exposures visualized. Sure, this is BS, but at least the pics are
impressive.
WORLD
Whether ruled by shah or ayatollah, Iran's strategy remained
the same: deter by geography, protect with defensive forces, and engage in
complex diplomatic maneuvers. But underneath this reality, another vision of Iran's role always lurked.
The gross abuses of human rights in North Korea shame the whole world
In France, the story that keeps
coming back is about Freemasons. It’s everywhere. Most big French magazines run
at least one big Freemason cover a year. Books dissect the “state within a
state,” to borrow from a recent title. Blogs abound.
TECH
The
best-selling author Neal Stephenson talked about the obstacles faced by real
emerging technologies.
An inside look at how killing by remote control
has changed the way we fight.
The Laziest Scams in Internet History – Businessweek
PSYCHOLOGY
To Boldly Go: Risk and the Prime Directive – The
Psy-Fi Blog
If you prime people by exposing them to
information that advocates taking risks it causes them to boldly go out and
start taking more risks with their investments. This is no real surprise. Of course, if they’re a professional their
behavior is different. They’re more likely to take risks.
Can we talk about your anger at the banks? – The
Guardian
Join me and psychoanalyst Leslie Chapman in the
comments thread below to discuss your anger at the financial sector
Can You Make Yourself Smarter? – The
New York Times
Feast – BPS Research
Digest
Tuck into our latest round-up of the best psych
and neuro links:
How I Stay Productive and Get Massive Amounts
of Shit Done – Illuminated
Mind
The battle
for focus is one that I wage daily. And the fight never ends… So, what follows
is every tip, trick, and hack that I use to stay prolific, get shit done and
win the battle for focus.
FUN
Facts, 360 B.C.-A.D. 2012 – The
Chicago Tribune
In memoriam: After years of health problems,
Facts has finally died.
If Darth Vader Actually Raised Luke Skywalker – brain
pickings
Jeffrey Brown’s Darth Vader and Son — a sweet,
funny, charmingly illustrated story that imagines an alternate universe in
which the Dark Lord of the Sith actually raises his son.
OTHER
Up for Bids: Classic Soviet Space Propaganda
Posters – Wired
How Grand Theft Auto changed video games (and
the world) – CNET
With "Jacked," veteran video games
journalist David Kushner explains how the Grand Theft Auto franchise helped
usher in a new generation of games and set the tone for a decade.
Will it be possible to live forever? Is there
such a thing as the soul, or immortality in one’s legacy? The author of a new
book on immortality explores the eternal questions, from elixirs of life to
modern-day cryonics