Popular sciences

I must admit that I love it when complex & dry topics are ‘simplified’ & jazzed up to cater to an audience of laypersons such as myself. From psychology, to economics, to science, subjects that seem distant from our daily lives displayed and explained in such a way they make you realise that they do play a big part of your lives and conscience. A few years back, I was following Robert Winston’s The Human Mind which was really a series of documentary on the human mind & personality presented in an interesting way. Having seen the ‘movie’(series) first, and thereafter feeling intrigued & wanting more, it was only natural, whilst waiting for my plane at the airport sometime ago, that I picked up his book on the same subject, The Human Mind. The good thing is, the book has more depth than the series, with more scientific explanations that if you had at least  taken a subject in the human brain at school or college, you would be able to follow his writing fluently. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t take up the sciences beyond my high school since I was told I didn’t need to study those subjects for my business degree. Instead, as I was reading this book, I had to flip back and forth reminding myself, taking notes on what I had just read. Robert Winston, is not a psychologist by profession, although if you watch his shows, you might mistake him for one. He is a professor of fertility studies at the prestigious Imperial College, University of London and his book read more like a biology book than a psychology book.

So how did this particular science made itself relevant to me? One such example is that on every visit to my dentist, my dentist would always be amazed at the amount of saliva she had to suck out of my mouth using her ‘saliva vacuum cleaner’ (sorry – i don’t know the technical term for that tool). Maybe I should have quoted this explanation to her:

” For the BBC tv series of the Human Mind, we undertook a little test in London’s main fruit market, Spitalfields. After getting our victims to fill in a simple personality questionnaire, we asked 2 groups of people – a platoon of student physicist at Imperial College and a troupe of Butlin’s hospitality staff – to compete in licking yards of 2″ wide gummed tape. This was the competition between the White Coats and the Red Coats. You will not be surprised to learn that Imperial College physicists tend to be serious introverts. They spent most of the time in the market looking as if they would rather be in a darkened room. The Butlin’s Redcoats, on the other hand, looked as if they had momentarily come in off the beach, and were clearly extremely extroverted…The physicists found it well-nigh impossible even to smile at their predicament, while the Redcoats were grinning ear to ear and competing with each other to get on camera. Various psychological studies under controlled conditions have shown that introverts produce much more saliva than extroverts. So after a quick splash of lemon juice on each contestant’s tongue, we expected our physics students to be able to lick far more packing tape to encircle boxes full of oranges than the lively Butlin’s group – even though being extrovert, the Redcoats were certainly trying and competing much harder.”

Does beauty make you smarter?

There’s an article in Slate entitled, Does beauty make you smarter? It’s written by Tim Harford, the author of The Undercover Economist which is a book I’m reading now. He has quoted a few researches on the subject of beauty, and how beauty is not just rewarded in Hollywood & the entertainment industry, and as some would expect, the sales profession, but being beautiful or better looking pays even in industries and professions where looks aren’t supposed to count.

Apparently, those who are better looking have better electoral successes, as shown by one study of the 2004 Australian electoral candidates. A study by Hamermash, an economist found that the better-looking people are remunerated more than their average-looking peers, and less attractive people are paid less than their average looking peers.

In Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink, the good looking electoral candidate is also discussed, a chapter dedicated to the “Warren Harding Error” whereby Harding ran for office in 1920 & finally became President. “To whom else could they turn in that desperate moment, if not to the man who radiated common sense and dignity and all that was presidential? In the early morning hours, as they gathered in the smoke filled back rooms of the Blackstone Hotel in Chicago, the Republican Party bosses threw up their hands and asked, wasn’t there a candidate they could all agree on? And one name came immediately to mind: Harding! Didn’t he look just like a presidential candidate?….. Harding served two years before dying unexpectedly of a stroke. He was, most historians agree, one of the worst presidents in American history”. Good looks, or height, can also improve the chances of making it to the top of the corporate ladder. Gladwell polled half of Fortune 500 companies and found that the average height of the CEOs of those companies were just under 6 feet, versus the male population average of 5 foot 9. His book has also cited many other studies on this. Gladwell’s explanation for the obvious advantages of being beautiful is due to our reliance on ‘thin slicing”, where we rely on making decisions based on intuitions and other non-conscious level. Sorry that I’ve summarised his book on thin slicing into one sentence, which is not my intention in the least, but I hate being too verbose in one post. I’ll save some for future posts.

However, Harford quoted the study by Marcus Mobius of Harvard and Tanya Rosenblat of Wesleyan University where they found that attractive people aren’t necessarily smarter than the others (surprise – not!), but that they were more confident that the others.

I guess, the beautiful people, after a life of being noticed and liked for their looks, would have more confidence than the average-lookers. Is it really doom and gloom for the ugly Betties out there? If Mobius and Rosenblat were to have us believe, the premium is placed on self-confidence. To me, that is good news – because you can nurture and grow confidence in the right environment – regardless of your physical attractiveness.

Remember though, when voting for an electoral candidate, or hiring a staff: Just because they appear more confident, does it really mean they can do their jobs better?

Metal Men- Marc Rich & the 10 billion dollar scam

A. Craig Copetas’s Metal Men is a biography of Marc Rich, who is literally rich, a billionaire who gained notoriety in the 1980s for white collar crimes. He became rich from trading commodities, who started out as an apprentice under Phillip Brothers and left after a fall out with its senior partner to form a billion dollar business out of Switzerland. His fortune was made out of trading any and all commodities, including oil which trading (during the 1970s) were confined to the oil producers. What is interesting is how he made his fortune from trading – trading that surpassed Philip Brothers and other reputable commodities trading houses.

In order for the author to obtain materials for this biography, A. Craig Copetas, a journalist by profession, had to assume a job as a trader, to get into & understand the world of Marc Rich, as the man shunned any contacts with people not related to his work. Thus began the story of uncontrollable wealth and ruthlessness, of corrupt deals to the highest degree with corrupt foreign governments around the world, Latin America, Africa, Middle East, Asia, Eastern Europe whereby some deals involved duping entire nations. It was due to his immense wealth, more money than many banks controlled, that motivated him to have a tax shelter in the early 1980s which led to finally to the US Department of Justice investigations on his business activities. The investigation began from the sale of domestic US oil where daisy chains of companies trading domestic controlled oil prices were creating chaotic paper trails, in order to manipulate the controlled oil prices. They uncovered more than just oil price scams, tax evasions worth a few hundred millions but also Marc Rich’s deals with certain foreign governments. It took more than 3 years to successfully indict Marc Rich’s company, March Rich AG, and after various tussles between the Swiss and US jurisdictions on corporate businesses of Rich when finally he paid $340 million – consisting of $150 million in government fines for a guilty plea, and other fees, seized assets, debt settlement and forfeitures.

Given that the copy of my book is a 1987 ed., the book ended with a quote from the federal prosecutor, “I’m not gonna tell ya what I said when we made a deal for money instead of Marc and Pinky. I wanted those boys in jail. But they can’t come back into the US as free men. Never. Those indictments are outstanding…no statute of limitations…and Marc and Pinky will try to come back. Bet on it.” But the saga did not end there. Towards the final days of his term as US President, former president Clinton gave him a pardon. Google him, and you’ll be surprised at how the story continues.

smelly books

When I ripped open the packaging of the second hand book I just bought of ebay, I was pretty excited, but I definitely wasn’t prepared for the odor!

I just purchased A beautiful mind by Sylvia Nasar and had the intention on putting that up in my inventory list of books to give away for free on bookmooch, as soon as I finish reading it. For a second hand book, I was ready for the smell of mildew, dust, smoke, but one thing I can’t stand is if the book smells of crap, as if the previous reader spent his time reading it in the toilet whilst on his ‘business’.

Still, I am undeterred from reading this, although I might have to limit to reading it in the park or some other open environment only. No more late nights with this book in my bed, and I will put this on my bookmooch inventory one day, except that I will be transparent and put a warning sign, “Beware: original owner read this in the loo, and now it smells of crap. Read with caution and in an open air environment only!”.

If you’re a book lover and you don’t know what bookmooch is, you really need to check it out. Its a book membership site, where members can exchange books for free! Although I must admit, I have given away books (and received points) but have yet to successfully mooch off others

Salaam Brick Lane

Tarquin Hall’s memoir of his life in the poorer part of London, the East End during his down and out days, is reminiscent of George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris & London. I enjoyed reading both books, although I read the latter some ten or fifteen years earlier. His memoir can almost serve as a study of the structure of the social underclass in London.

Life for Hall was pretty hard, being penniless and jobless, having just returned to his homeland after years of living abroad as a journalist. With the rising property boom and high rental rates in London, he had little choice but to live in an almost-ghetto environment East End, especially since he came from a comfortable middle class life. His new environment gave him a fresh perspective of the poor and immigrant class, up close and personal. Hall life intertwined with his neighbours of the immigrant community, mainly those from South Asia, such as India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, served to tell their tales of surviving in their new land, of holding on to their cultures, and of assimilation. Nonetheless, his interesting historical commentaries on the East End, being the recipient of many immigrant communities going back a few centuries, and how each community manages to improve upon their economic and social status before finally assimilating into the mainstream, and by moving on to the next social & neighbourhood ladder leaving a vacuum for the next immigrant community to fill is insightful and thought provoking. Have I mentioned that Hall’s memoir is funny too?

Really, Salaam Brick Lane has plenty of wonderfully witty tales of various predicaments of the lives of people he ran into whilst living there. He has also captured the lyrics of the local dialect, the cockney, in the speeches of the locals which adds wonderful color and liveliness into his memoir. Although I must admit, if you’re not that familiar with the cockney accent, you have to recall the speeches of Eliza Doolittle in Dr. Doolittle, or a more contemporary example would be Guy Ritchie‘s Lock stock & 2 smokin’ barrels, or Snatch (starring Brad Pitt – although Pitt’s accent wasn’t cockney), and mix that with Missippi Masala and you’re halfway towards Salaam Brick Lane.

Rejection, then retreat

I don’t know about you, but I fall for this one without fail. Maybe I just have a kind heart

Sidetrack a little, just thought that I had to break up my write up about my all-time favourite book, as I won’t be able to do justice if I swept the entire book into a paragraph or two, and instead of being verbose all in one post, I thought I’d cover each chapter in different posts.

Rejection-then-retreat is a form of larger-then-smaller request where a person demands/sells the big item, then if the demand or sales is turned down, a counteroffer for smaller item is made. This technique is said to be pretty effective, although, again common sense would dictate that the ‘victim’ who falls into complying with this strategy might show resentment and not follow through with his agreement with the demander.

Once again, psychology trumps common sense. Cialdini cited an interesting study where college students were the subjects. The college students were asked to give a pint of blood as part of the annual campus blood drive. 1 group of students were first asked to give a pint of blood every 6 weeks (!) for a minimum of 3 years (!). The other were only asked to give a single pint of blood. Those of both groups who agreed to give a pint of blood and who later appeared at the blood center were then asked if they wuld be willing to give their phone numbers so they could be called upon to donate again in the future. The results were 84% of the students who received the rejection-then-retreat technique agreed to donate again later, while less than half of the other students who appeared at the blood center did so.

Looking at the bright side, I have never had to pay for this in blood…….

weapons of influence?

One of my all time favourites: Robert Cialdini, Influence, the psychology of persuasion

The book was written in the 1990s, but it’s still valid today as it was then. Cialdini, a social psychologist professor, wrote the various social situations and psychological factors that make up influence. Its really NOT a book about how to improve sales, etc, and instead its more towards the various factors and social situations that make us susceptible to be influenced – and if we recognise these factors, we’d be able to counter their effects. Although it can be said there are plenty of gems here for the sales & marketing oriented. His style of writing is casual, fluid and almost storytelling rather than academic.

In his first chapter, one of the weapons of influence is perception of contrast. Salespeople have this all figured out. He also points out interesting insights that may seem contary to popular beliefs. There are 3 components mentioned inChapter 1 on the mechanical process which, if triggered would result in our actions complying with the intended purpose. Anyway, let me mention the 3rd component: the principle in human perception, the contrast principle that affect the way we value things, if 1 is presented after another. For example, Cialdini quotes sales motivation analysts, Whitney, Hubin & Murphy, “The interesting thing is that even when a man enters a clothing store with the express purpose of purchasing a suit, he will almost always pay more for whatever accessories he buys if he buys them after the suite purchase than before”.   Simply put, after being exposed to a higher priced item, purchasing 2nd and lesser priced item may appear “smaller” by comparison, regardless of a comparable price of the 2nd item.

This I have never realised until I read this book.   Hmm, makes me want to plan my shopping trips carefully, buy the lower cost items first, before the big purchase, especially if there is a budget to keep to.

Do they call it a “relapse”?

Not that I’m an alcoholic or recovering addict (of any form), but my need to be a recluse overcame me again. It’s not that I haven’t been online, but the reality is that I have been too comfortable reading, observing, lurking around interesting sites online to leave my comfort zone of expressing myself.

Anyway, I found this interesting 3d video animation. The main character is a virtual girl recently created, and funny as it may be, I thought I could recognise that character as me. How she became comfortable in her own skin, and then something turned up to cause her to confront her fear. I don’t want to give the plot away, so best check the video out yourself.

Ok, before you think I’m talking too much nonsense, just cut me some slack will you? At least, I’m expressing myself again

p.s in case the video didn’t upload properly, go see it here:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x17v5a_esc

Shifting preferences

For the past five years or so, my preference have shifted over to reading non-fiction books. I had realised that reading fiction had become a chore for me, after it took me to finish reading Love in the times of cholera, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, of just under a year. I couldn’t believe it myself, after all, I absolutely loved Garcia Marquez’s One hundred years of solitude, where it had only taken me 3 days to devour that complicated book – after skipping lunch, dinner, television and sleep just because I was too engrossed in the story to put it down unless I had reached the last page.

So my shift in preferences for books have led me to have enjoyed reading these non-fiction books in the past few months:

1. Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell

2. Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, by John Perkins

3. Freakonomics, by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dunn

4. The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell

5. Salaam Brick Lane, by Tarquin Hall

6. Metal Men, by A. Craig Copetas

7. Retire Young, Retire Rich, by Robert Kiyosaki

During the same period, the other have-read category, although less enjoyable were:

8. The Human Mind, by Robert Winston

9. Bargaining for Advantage, by G. Richard Shell

My all time favourite has to be, where I have read, and re-read and re-read again:

9. Influence, the Psychology of Persuasion, by Robert B. Cialdini

Now, don’t get me wrong – just because my all time favourite book is about influence, the tricks of how-to, it really does not mean that I am of such character. To the contrary, I find that the book tells fascinating real life stories & anecdotes of how people persuade people, and if you realise that a persuasive trick is being played on you, you can escape being persuaded/goaded into doing something.

I’ll put up my take on “Influence” in my next post.

Out of my shell

I just have to…start blogging again. It has been 2 years since my last entry, elsewhere. This time, I’m hoping that blogging may, bring me out of my “shut down” phase, where I have been emotionally & verbally shut down, unable to express myself, unable to express my thoughts & feelings to others. Its not that I lack cohesive thoughts or that my thoughts were confined to frivolous matters. Somehow, somewhat my emotions were numbed, and any speech that I produce rarely, or at least for the past 2 years, result in me articulating my thoughts well.

Now this may not be a disaster if I were a mime artist. You may disagree with me that lacking that eloquence would not lead to a career catastrophe if the career were a finance personnel in a corporation. Well, maybe not, but being unable to sit through a meeting without sounding inept is hardly an experience worth repeating.

Right now, the cause of my emotional ‘shut down’ will not be discussed here. At least not right now.

So, lost in my own silence, I found solace in reading books. That is where this blog leads me to. I’m gonna discuss the books that I have read in the past few months as a way for me to crawl out of my shell.