Demographics Demographics are important. John the 35-year-old Computer Engineer, who doesn’t work out and writes poetry in his spare time, shouldn’t go to loud parties to attract a girl like Jenna, who is in college. But demographics are not fixed. If two years prior, John the Engineer joined the gym, buffed up, wore contact lenses … Read more
Receptivity Rejection is painful, but it’s good. It keeps people who are not good for each other apart. Guys don’t understand that if a woman rejects him for his hair or personality, then he wouldn’t have wanted a relationship with her anyway. Don’t approach a woman you don’t find attractive. It’s not practice, it’s desperation. … Read more
“The only thing that’s Capital-T True is that you get to decide how you see things.” – David Foster Wallace Chapter 1: What Attracts Women What do women want? No one knows for sure, not even Sigmund Freud, who spent decades trying to figure it out. Manson points out that for men, the ideal woman … Read more
Bigger Leaner Stronger by Michael Mathews was rated one of the top books in the fitness genre, so I decided to give it a go. There are some faults with the book, especially with organization, but overall, the author was knowledgeable about nutrition and training, and cites enough research to back his claims. I think … Read more
Summary How Not to Die by Dr. Michael Greger is about the health benefits of eating your fruits, vegetables, nuts, and spices and the dangers of eating too much meat, or any meat at all. In the same way that smoking was ignored as a health hazard for so long, many people today are ignoring … Read more
In the spirit of The Checklist Manifesto, I will keep this summary short. High stakes mean that margin of error is low. Surgeons and pilots must minimize error because of high stakes. They love checklists. If your work doesn’t save lives, it’s okay. You can still improve the quality of what you produce. Use checklists … Read more
In Thoughts Without a Thinker, Mark Epstein makes the case that what is missing from psychoanalysis is Buddhism, that the two are complementary. Psychoanalysis is a reversion to the past, but a study of the past, while necessary, can be infinite and ineffective. There must be a focus on the present, this is the idea … Read more
Improvement of the Mind by Isaac Watts is an early text about how to learn, and it was recommended by Faraday, who claimed that it had provided him with the framework and tools he needed for his eventual discoveries. No one can learn everything, it is neither possible nor desirable, but everyone should try to … Read more
Television and radio do not stimulate your mind or force you to think. They provide you with pre-packaged opinions that give you the illusion that you are thinking. How to Read a Book argues for switching to the written word, and to doing it right. You are enlightened, not when you know what the author … Read more
In ancient Chinese rituals, straw dogs were used as sacrifices to the gods. ‘Gaia’ is the name of a goddess in Greek mythology, and the Gaia principle, by Lovelock, suggests that the earth is a self-regulating, complex system that is influenced by its habitants. And that human beings, are merely organisms in this system, that … Read more