Book on Basil Labib

Thoughts: The Psychology of Money (Book)

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 08:58:30 +0530

Abstract

Morgan Housel’s “The Psychology of Money” is less of a technical book and more of a collection of wisdom and wishful advices. It is N. Taleb’s “Bed of Procrustes” augmented with real life anecdotes, morsels of history, and a lot of quotations. Although Housel professes a very conservative and frugal approach to managing money, his advice cannot be disputed without a very good counter argument. The cautious models, frameworks, and signposts laid out in the book would prevent an investor from being foolish and that Housel says is too easy to be in the modern financial system.

“A genius is the man who can do the average thing when everyone else around him is losing his mind.”

— Napoleon

The psychology of money

This book is unique with respect to contemporary finance books because it assumes a psychological approach to finance, rather than a quantitative analytical one. The reason being this: Humans are inherently emotional and irrational creatures. Most of our decisions are instinctive and impulsive. Then how can we assume an individual to behave like a well-tuned machine making decisions based on “rational” and precise mathematical formulae? For example: If you were an investor in 2008, it would have been very difficult to hold on to your assets when everybody was selling, or moreover, to dare to buy in the market crash because as Warren Buffett quipped, “Everything got cheaper”. Unless you have the discipline and patience of Warren Buffett, such decisions are hard to even comprehend. And that is essentially what this book is about. It talks about few fundamental basic, even mundane nature of human and how we tend to act upon them, how it all applies to finance and how we can leverage this knowledge to become more disciplined and patient.

“To grasp why people bury themselves in debt you don’t need to study interest rates; you need to study the history of greed, insecurity, and optimism…”

— Introduction, The Psychology of Money

The idea that gives rise to such reasoning is quite potent and an ironically overlooked one in the money business.

My favourite Housel quote would be the following:

“Your personal experiences with money make up maybe 0.00000001% of what’s happened in the world, but maybe 80% of how you think the world works.”

— Morgan Housel

Most people don’t realise it but this is a very powerful idea. It can explain why we don’t usually get the result we think we ought to get. It can point to how we ought to react and improvise under dire as well as lucrative circumstances. Not just in finance but in other aspects of life too. Cultures and systems have grown to be complex and varied. Wisdom has become more diverse and specialized which is exactly what wisdom is not.

I strongly hold the belief that all complex systems and the world in general, is simple. To clarify, this “simple” does not mean “simple to understand”, it means “simple to navigate and emerge successful however one chooses to define the word for themselves”. Because ultimately, all effort of man and woman is to find utility in life.

Things that worked for me:

It’s not a long book which is a boon for me really. It makes its points concise and clear and that’s good.
In the edition which I have, there is a postscript section which chronicles the economic history of the US from 1945 to the present day and that is very cool. In fact, I was looking for something exactly the same but for India. I want to understand how we got were we are.
Entire book summary tacked at the end. It’s a conglomeration of the most important ideas all in one place, kind of like what I do here with my notes. Now, I can refer to that chapter.

Postscript

I’m aware that its been quite a long time since I wrote one of this. I miss those days when I could be more myself. I have been quite busy lately with college admission processes as you have no doubt noticed with a decline in my rate of publication and engagement on the blog. I would like to clarify that this is NOT a book review. This is a preservation of my thoughts that were kindled by this book so I can refer back to them later.

Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar and feminism

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Mon, 27 Sep 2021 11:27:04 +0530

"What I hate is the thought of being under a man’s thumb", Sylvia fearlessly thundered in her only published novel “The Bell Jar”. Published in 1963, Jar is one of the prominent texts on feminism and the vocalisation of a woman’s apprehensions, rights and freedom. Sylvia’s words, like brazen dagger, are used today in protest marches as well as analysed in literary circles.

Sylvia Plath

Jar stands as testimony to the ephemeral skills of Sylvia as a writer. She took everyday objects and turned them into metaphors and similes that resonated with the soul. Her poetry is acclaimed for this and even in Jar, it can be noticed.

I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig-tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.

The metaphor of the fig tree represents her apprehension of being a failure in life inspite of all wonderful possibilities within her arms reach, due to doubt or uncertainty on her part. Most of us have felt this way atleast once in our lives and it is the spontaneity and common grounds of consolation that we find ourselves on with Sylvia that lends this metaphor its potency.

The silence depressed me, It wasn’t the silence of silence. It was my own silence.

Depression, self-doubt and mental illness forms recurrent and central themes in the novel. It reveals a vulnerable and wounded side of a woman. Sylvia openly writes about judging other women, an encounter with a misogynist that almost ended in rape, a subtle rejection, being embarrassed, wardrobe negotiations, mischiefs, and other “vulgarities” and trivialities of life with such eloquence, it is impressive.

My mind slipped from the noose of the thought and swung, like a bird, in the centre of empty air.

Jar is brimming with such wonderful similes and analogies.

Yet, what shines through in these lyrical sentences is the experiences that gave rise to them. Plath, known for a class of poetry called confessional poetry, struggled with clinical depression and turbulence in her life. Sample this:

“I felt it was very important not to be recognized.”

It is not difficult to picture Slyvia in place of Miss Esther Greenwood, the protagonist in Jar. Sylvia’s handful but potent poetry is still considered first class material in English literature and speaks against women oppression, freedom, rights, marriage, sexuality, child rearing and so forth. “Ariel” is considered the best among her collection which shot her into the limelight. Published in 1965 posthumously.

ON CHILDREN

Children made me sick.

Despite this, she bore two of them. What was it? The overpowering of her rebellious spirit by the craving of motherly love or the overpowering of her rebellious spirit by the current of societal norms?

If I had to wait on a baby all day, I would go mad.

A man doesn’t have a worry in the world, while I’ve got a baby hanging over my head like a big stick, to keep me in line.

I have noticed that men have a general desperation in speaking on these matters as if in a vain attempt to get rid of the guilt of not being the one who bears the child. Now, men are not at fault of being selected by natural selection to be the sperm donor. But the point is, this doesn’t give men a right to speak on matters that they cannot really experience. The best way to behave for a man, IMHO, would be to be respectful and kind towards the other, even if it is not justified. That is chivalry, isn’t it?

ON MEN

With Ted Hughes

The trouble was, I hated the idea of serving men in any way.

I felt the first man I slept with must be intelligent, so I would respect him.

I like this woman.

ON HERSELF, BEING A WOMAN AND FIGHTING MENTAL DEPRESSION

The silence between us was so profound I thought part of it was my fault.

While walking with a girl who, like her, had won a month long scholarship to New York. They were on uneasy terms. A passing note, men are different from women in this regard. Even if two are arch nemesis of one another, they’ll still receive each other with open arms and whole hearts. Disdain and competition is, and should be, confined to the profession.

What did I think was wrong?
That made it sound as if nothing was really wrong, I only thought it was wrong.

Wow.

On receiving electrotherapy at a mental asylum.

I wondered what terrible thing it was that I had done.

Multiple suicide attempts (tried to drown, swallowed pills, slit her veins) and descend into mental deterioration.

“I knew when I was beaten.”

“I wanted to be where nobody I knew could ever come.”

“I am, I am, I am.”

DISAGREEMENTS

What does a woman see in a woman that she can’t see in a man?
Doctor Nolan paused. Then she said, “Tenderness”.

Ugh. Men can be tender too. I know it.

And I knew that in spite of all the roses and kisses and restaurant dinners a man showered on a woman before he married her, what he secretly wanted when the wedding service ended was for her to flatten out underneath his feet like Mrs Willard’s kitchen mat.

What sort of men were you hanging out with, dear?

THE CHARACTER OF MISS ESTHER GREENWOOD

Bell Jar was received with mixed acclaims and disdain by critiques. Perhaps, because of the explicit description in the second half of the book inspired by Plath’s own multiple suicide attempts and experiences of treatment at a mental institution. The first half is commendable and novel in its own right as she draws a picture of her protagonist as an independent, hopeful young woman. She is loud and vocal and indifferent to societal norms pertaining to female etiquette.

I hate handing over money to people for doing what I could just as easily do myself, it makes me nervous.

Sylvia constructs her character not as a woman a man would be pleased to read about but as a woman as she really is.

There is something demoralizing about watching two people get more and more crazy about each other, especially when you are the only extra person in the room.

She shamelessly admits her craving for jewellery and clothes and food. How she plots and strategises on the dinner table to have all of the caviar without sharing with her friends.

RELEVANCE OF ‘THE BELL JAR’

I see Jar as a touchbearer for a different interpretation of life, society and the status quo. Feminists, especially young ones, express their pleas in a manner that subtly blames man for all the trouble and misery and so forth. I think that is wrong and malformed. Man never asked for any of his roles in the natural order of things. If the woman think they are ill-treated (and I acknowledge that) then so is man. It certainly offends me the way some think of feminism as a “Us versus them” debate. The real monster is the set of ideas that dictate disparity and discrimination based on gender. It must be noted, and this is important, that such ideas can flourish in any human’s mind, irrespective of gender. I think texts like Jar empowers people, especially men to introspect and correct themselves. As Plath knew, nobody is perfect. This is why I think Jar should be read by more men than women today.

THE SYLVIA PLATH SYNDROME & ARTISTIC EXPRESSION

“The Sylvia Plath Syndrome” is a condition of severe mental illness that plagues an artist and threatens their life. Her explicit suicide, at the tender age of 30, by shoving her head in an oven while her two children were in another room, is evidence of the untold difficulties that woman had to go through, that is, until Sylvia stood up and chose to protest them. The thorny questions it raises even today is: Where do we go wrong? To coerce a young soul into such pain that the only escape they see befitting is taking their own lives? Are we any different today? How are we safeguarding artistic creativity and freedom today?

CONCLUSION

“The Bell Jar” is a text repeatedly held to light and examined from different prisms. It is a text debunking the ideal woman figure and casting her in a new light, as a real woman with her flaws and strengths. Together with pioneers like Simone de Beauvoir (“The Second Sex”) and Virginia Woolf (“A Room of One’s Own”), young Sylvia Plath stands in great company and continues to inspire both young men and women alike.

Love As An Illegitimate Byproduct

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Fri, 03 Sep 2021 10:18:22 +0530

Evolutionary biology has always fascinated me. I have marveled at the ingenuity of evolutionists drawing up elegant theories, piecing together the most bizarre of observations with a string of sound reasoning. I guess the quality of making logical sense of the alien world we find ourselves in makes evolution appeal to me.

Recently, I read Jared Diamond’s “Why Sex is Fun?”, a short book (a series of essays really) about human sexuality and how it differs so radically from every other species we know of. His words and reasoning reminded me of Dawkins’ “The Selfish Gene” – particularly nostalgic where the spermatozoa and oocyte structural discrepency and Zahavis’ principle of handicap signals; however, the prose was much easier to read than Selfish. Evolution is much like astronomy / cosmology in a certain way – both instills humility in a manner no other subject can.

A word of caution: Please don’t read this book if you have a certain preconceived notion of reality and would feel enraged if someone dared question it.

As I was reading through the text, I couldn’t help but confront an inescapable truth: love is an unnecessary aberration. Outrageous and scandalous as it might seem, it is an inevitable fact that follows naturally from our physiology, behavior, and of course natural selection. What makes natural selection so damn powerful is the fact that it is a single idea grounded in the most mathematical sense and yet can virtually explain every weirdness in the animal kingdom. If you have many different colored balls in a basket and you specifically took out certain colored ones, then over time, those other colored balls will increase in number. Natural selection is not a philosophers’ imagination or a physicists’ hypothesis, it is a certainty so undeniably when one sees it.

What’s funny is the fact that selection happens at the genetic level, not at the organism level. We are mere containers of convenience for those innocuous dictators who have controlled us since before we were even us.

Monogamous matrimony

Why did monogamous matrimony evolved in human societies when it is virtually non-existent in other mammal species? It is “obvious” that post-copulation male desertion of the female and successive search for other females for impregnation must be the optimal behavior for the male to ensure maximum propagation of his genes and hence, natural selection must favour it. And indeed, that is observed in the majority of mammal species. Then, what about us? It turns out, things are more involved than they seem at first glance. The human child is a relatively weak and helpless creature unable to sustain itself on its own. Further, the energy demands, food, protection from predators makes it a taxing situation for the single mother and often, they fail to raise the child. The male, thus, faced a dilemma whether to leave the mother and go on his philandering adventures regardless of the fact that his child dies (which is not favored since making those sperms and the act of copulating takes time and energy) or stay with the mother, ensure nourishment and protection but foreclose his other opportunities to spread his genes. It turns out that in humans, natural selection favored monogamy. Note that I have simplified the discussion here. There are other factors and more nuances to be considered and so on.

Concealed Ovulation

Another curious development is concealed ovulation in females. Consider female baboon who visually advertise their estrus with reddened and swelled vaginal region. But apparently, human females themselves are in the dark about their fertile phase. Why did we differ? The argument is the book is involved but equally enthralling. Actually, concealed ovulation evolved as a way to deter murderous, competitive males from killing her offsprings (who represent half of her genetic material) if they know when females are fertile in a society that was predominantly promiscous or harem-based. But when concealed, a male has to make love to her often in hopes of actually mating with her when it matters. This prevents them to be hostile to her and her kids (who an outside male sees as competition to his genes and resources) in her “dispensable” days. But afterwards when societies developed monogamy, she began using her new feature as a mean of securing a “good caveman” – monogamous, loyal, responsible who brought resources and protection for the child because he must be invested in her if he ever hopes to have a child with her.

Recreational Sex

We can comfortable chip in the bizarre practise of recreational sex here too. Other species have a narrow time to mate, not so with us. Females are sexually receptive almost through the cycle. Why? At first glance, it seems counter-productive that selection will favour an activity that is clearly a huge investment of time and energy and leaves parties vulnerable to enemies threat or starvation. But it’s the females being diplomatic. Wouldn’t it do the female good if she could ensured her husband had an incentive to stay at home and not go on his adulterous misgivings? Of course, she can keep him satisfied by offering him free sex!

This is, in fact, a normal situation in the circus of natural selection. A feature developed for one purpose might reverse, restructure even reinvent itself to some other purpose in time. Sexual strategies, like any other, evolve in response to ecological parameters and conditions. The only guiding principle for these genes is the question: How does an organism maximize its representation in the gene pool? Everything else is just details. Pretty cool way to empower females, eh?

We sit down to watch National Geographic and scowl at behaviors of other species completely oblivious to the fact that it is us who are an anomaly to them.

Where is the need for love?

The foregoing discussions were to give you a glimpse of the ruthless reasoning evolutionists employ. So, the question is: where is love in all this? Honestly, it was never meant to be. But the fact that we developed love, intimacy and a thousand more complex emotions is testimony to our superior cranial capaity. In the grand scheme of things as laid out by science (of which I have attempted to present a slice), there is no need for love songs, heartbreaks, ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and poetry.

Now, before you begin to believe your author is a hard-core nihilist, let me tell you that we did find a need. Take the fact that you are reading this: probably on a webpage which was served to you via a web server. That sentence right there is remarkable in itself. We developed language, reading and writing. Arbitrary symbols scratched on paper can invoke emotions and thoughts. We ask questions. We developed science and learned how to apply it, giving birth to technology. We are powerful enough today to change our own genetic constitution (let that sink in) and have been changing the course of our planet for centuries since the Industrial Revolution. True, a couple hundred years of advances cannot rival the millions of years of instincts engrained in our genes. But we can afford to be counter-evolutionary. No other species can do that. We can love if we choose to.

Freakonomics: Should you read it?

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Sun, 25 Jul 2021 11:14:14 +0530

“Why do drug-dealers still live with their mothers?”
“Are Sumo wrestlers corrupt?”
“Legalized abortion led to decreasing crime rates”
“Are real-estate agents really acting in your best interest?”
“Does a child’s name have any effect on their lives?”
“Do parents really matter?”
“Are swimming pools more dangerous for kids than guns?”
“Why should teachers cheat?”

Freakonomics is a study of bizarre, mundane and exceedingly interesting questions. It employs the arsenal of mathematical sophistication to unearth truths and secrets that are hidden from plain sight. Written by an uncanny duo, Steven D. Levitt (the economist) and Stephen J. Dubner (the journalist) as part of an unexpected collaboration.

Our world is so bafflingly connected and complex, it takes sheer effort to identify correlation ( When two variables are connected), indicators (When one variable indicate an information about another) and causality (When one is really the cause of another).

The book warns that if morality dictates what people should do, then economics tells us what they really do. And no wonder, Levitt, a co-author, is a curious economist – a breed of closed-society intellegentsia who are trained to worship rationality over morality, prudence over emotions and numbers over talks because people may lie, numbers don’t.

Yes, Levitt is all that but more. He asks a lot of questions. His questions are a strange assortment of irrelevant (apparently) and outrageous. He had his share of unpleasantness and scorn because after all, even Levitt knows the bell curve of human intellectual distribution.

In a world dominated by people who loves to take sides, Levitt offers the rare third person perspective standing on a pedestal and presenting the true states of affairs. The book doesn’t build on any underlying theme – and perhaps that is the appeal. During an interview, someone asked Levitt “What is the unifying theme of your works?”. He was offered an answer by philosopher Robert Nozick,

“He’s twenty-six years old. Why does he need to have a unifying theme? Maybe he’s going to be one of those people who’s so talented he doesn’t need one. He’ll take a question and he’ll just answer it, and it’ll be fine.”

My thoughts on morality:

People tend to be good, generally. But only if their goodness is recognized and rewarded. If there is a bigger incentive for them to cheat or be bad and/or be assured they won’t be held accountable, they will become bad. There are always outliers, like in any discussion on economics. That is, people who are good just because that’s what they are.

In conclusion

Economics, at its barest, is understanding how people get what they want or need. Incentives strongly dictate human behavior (moral? eh, that’s debatable). Conventional wisdom is more often wrong than right. Measurement of data and its interpretation is essential.

I personally enjoyed reading this book.

Rereading 'A Thousand Splendid Suns'

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Sun, 18 Jul 2021 18:37:19 +0530

There are all these people constantly questioning me about my identity, my aspirations, my worth. What I want to do? What I want to be? So, I am forced to think about these questions. Indeed, what do I wanna do?

I reread the poignant “A Thousand Splendid Suns” by Khaled Hosseini. So, I have a habit, for better or worse, of poking around the central content to appreciate the big picture. I read a Wikipedia article on Afghanistan’s history. I found it interesting. And included 3 books on Afghan history in my library – looking forward to “A Brief History of Afghanistan” by Shaista Wahab et. al.

So here’s what I want: I want to go to Afghanistan. Stand and take a deep breath of Afghani air and remember the greatness and the massacre. Remember all the great leaders, the corrupt dictators, the murders, the rapes, the genocide, the bullets, the bombs, the cries, the anguish. I want to experience the sweetness of the land, the beautiful mountains, the pretty women, the hopeful youth. I want to savour the delicacies, the smells, the sounds. I want to go to these places I read about. The poorest, deprived of villages to the teeming metropolises.

I want to know how Herati accent is different from Kabuli. I want to see vineyards and orchards. Fields of them. I want to shake the hands of the Afghani women and tell them how brave they are. I want to sit down and listen to their tales of sacrifice and greatness. Such greatness that I can only imagine for myself.

And I want to learn, not only from books but from life itself. Yes, that is what I want to do.

I find life so worthy of living. Is there anyone out there who can hear my cry? Who knows exactly how I feel?

My Reading Portfolio

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Mon, 05 Jul 2021 12:00:15 +0530

I haven’t met anybody as devoutly fanatic about books as I am in real life. This love of mine can turn aggressive, even generously self-depreciative, which is a source of concern. I maintain a digital library simply because there won’t be enough room for all the books if I build for myself a physical library (Now you know how to impress me :winking_face:). I spend literally hours fretting about organization, intensely debating with myself what parameters to organize under, designing programs to maintain a catalog, devising makeshift ways to register progress and so on.

The most painful task for me, however, is choosing what book to read next. Bear with me if this sounds ridiculous. It is less ridiculous than what most people do these days. Hours of negotiation goes into deciding what to read next. To ensure I utilize my time optimally. This might seem trivial but it isn’t. Imagine picking up a book that required pre-requisite knowledge. Reading it is wasting time because nothing registers. So, it boils down to a dependency problem. But that can be solved with trees? One problem: Those trees can get very large. Pruning? No, what we need is prudent decision making.

Four parameters

Interest. I am human and a reckless reader. If I lose interest in a book, I’ll leave it right then, no questions asked. So, I have to make sure I pick up only those books that I want to read.

Utility. For eg, I love Harry Potter. Let me put away my current read and pour over the entire HP universe? No. The next question is: How much utility will I derive from the book I am about to read? Is it a good investment? Will it help me in acheiving my goals?

Experts. I believe we are the greatest fools if we can’t learn from the mistakes of those who already committed them. In terms of books, I look up to what others suggest. Mostly, the old and wise are eager to share their knowledge.

Content. This is me getting judgemental. If I have a chose between a finely written old masterpiece and a lousily written contemporary masterpiece, I’ll probably go with the old one. I can’t stand poor writing. I want to derive more than just the concepts. But what if the new book has more relevant ideas? As I said, it isn’t always easy.

My portfolio

I read multiple books together. So, I devised a so-called “reader’s portfolio” – a term borrowed from investing. It is a bunch of categories and I actively endeavor to maintain that proportion in my current readings.

Non-fiction
- History
- Finances
  - Economics
- Psychology
- Philosophy
- Culture & Geography
Revisits
Tech
Science
- Mathematics
- Engineering
- Fundamental Sciences
Literature
- Poetry
- Contemporary
- Classics

In conclusion

All these elaborate schemes are far from perfect and I know it. But at least, it’s a start. These crude ideas give me a basic idea of where I should be headed so that I don’t go crazy.

Notes: The Millionaire Fastlane by MJ DeMarco

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Sat, 03 Jul 2021 21:02:21 +0530

Are you able to successfully leverage the opportunities at your disposal? That is the question that this book tries to answer and provides advice backed by the author’s own experiences. The book is written in a comfortable conversational style, including way too many metaphors and analogies.

The author, himself, has a remarkable lifestyle: starting a tech company during the dot-com bubble, growing it, selling it and so on. Below I have aggregated few core ideas from the book. Enjoy!

My highlights

Beliefs

Beliefs are powerful mechanisms that drive action, whether true or not.

What is wealth?

“Wealth is the ability to fully experience life” — Henry David Thoreau
Wealth is the state when each unit of money that you own earns more than its worth without you doing anything. (mine)
Wealth is composed of fitness (health), family (relationships) and, freedom (choice).

Luck on demand & Accountability

Luck is the residue of process.
“Responsibility is the price of greatness” - Winston Churchill
Responsibility is acknowledging your flaws. Accountability is modifying your ways to eliminate them.

Skills & Education

To trade time is to trade life.
Confined set of skills makes you expendable if demands for them becomes obsolete.
“The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education” — A. Einstein

build a machine for yourself.
Impact millions
Maximum control and leverage.
Wealth = Units sold * Unit profit + Asset value
Appreciable assets - businesses, brands, cashflows, notes, IPs, licenses, patents, inventions and real estates.
Passive income - earning income while not working
Start with $5m at 25, and let it compound. Wanna skip the first 30 years.
Become a producer first and a consumer second.
Business structures - C corp, S corp, LLC (Limited Liability Corporation)

Life choices

Poor choices are the leading cause of poverty.
Decisions made early in life are most impactful and irreversible.
Be willingly to accept your flaws.
“Ridicule is the tribute paid to the genius by the mediocrities” — Oscar Wilde
Create “free time” - time not spend working or recharging from work.
Pledge to never stop learning. Not from books but by engagement.
The acquisition and application of knowledge will make you rich.
Are you interested or committed?
Take intelligent risks.
Big dreams, materialistic or altrusic non-profit foundations, cost money.

Rules of thumb for business

- Need - “What’s in it for me?”
- Control - Over the variables
- Entry - barrier for competition, monopoly, license etc
- Scale - Units sold and Unit profit
- Time - business detached from your time
Live below your means with the intent to expand your means
Financial literacy - I mean, obviously

Entrepreneurship 101

The owner of an idea is not he who imagines it, but he who executes it.
Listen to people’s complains. Customers are foremost.
Look big to impress customers and intimidate competitors.
When supply exceeds demand, prices must drop, suddenly, the product becomes commoditized. Avoid such industries entirely.
Differentiation. Force innovation.
Be copied, never copy. (mine)

Partners:

Accountants and attorneys (among others) must be top-notch
Verify first, trust later
Spectacular product features cannot overcome poor services.

Branding

Build a brand. Rise above the noise.

Discipline & Focus

“…No life grows great until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined.” — Harry E. Fosdick
When you segregate your effort among assets, you build weak assets.

Think, Wait and Fast

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Sun, 06 Jun 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In the book “Siddhartha” by Herman Hesse – the protagonist, who is a Samana (a homeless hermit), is enchanted by the beauty of a woman named Kamala. On their first discourse, Kamala asks him what is he capable of doing that he can trade for money, pretty clothes, shoes, sweet perfumes and gifts for her. To which Siddhartha replies,

“I can think. I can wait. I can fast.”

I think that is a very profound answer and it will do ignorant fools like us much good if we make an attempt to comprehend it.

“I can think”

What does Hesse mean by “think”? Here’s my two cents: “think” is a metaphor for everything we can affect. The universe may be unforgiving and wild but our minds do have a certain say in certain matters. It is our responsibility to seek education, contribute to the productivity of the community, demand reward in return of our efforts, tie in matrimony with suitable partners, rear children et cetera(The pedantics may take to the comment section to tell me how wrong I am. We can sort it out there). All these worldly responsibilities cannot be fulfilled if we are selfish. Running away from them, seeking happiness in isolation and frugality is a valid (and selfish) way of life but in my opinion, not a optimal one. Just because the world is dying of global warming and degradation doesn’t mean we use fancy terms to run away from our duties. If we turn something bad, it is our duty to mend it, not run away from it (Footnote 1).

Herein lies a caveat though, engaging in worldly activities invariably implies invitation to negative emotions like desire, greed, jealousy and so on. By clear and rational thinking, we can be sure to not pursue a path of unfairness and uphold our modesty, chivalry and conviction while being gentle, kind and honest to our immediate brethren. Thus, it is prudent and crucial that such capability of thought be actively cultivated in minds, young and experienced alike.

“I can wait”

Hmm, here we enter the territory of the spiritual. I hold that there is indeed a way of life that is meaningful, fulfilling and full of happiness (Footnote 2). It involves plucking many ideas from many different trees in the garden of the collective human thought and preparing a recipe (Your author here is still in pursuit of that recipe, however). One of these ideas is waiting. A metaphor, of course.

Waiting for what? Nothing. And everything. Lao tzu talks about it beautifully in “Tao Te Ching”. Frankly, the idea bears quite resemblance to Lao’s scheme. It is the realization that you are nothing but a fool in the grand scheme of things (Reading astronomy at a young age helps in this realization, I have found) and subsequent acceptance that you, as a spectator, can only watch as things unfold before you. The world composed of other ignorants like you can exercise such a effect on you yet individually, we end up being at their mercy. Don’t believe me? Then, why do people get late for office meetings? If they really are so powerful, why not stop all the traffic in the first place? Or why is it that most people fail miserably in relationships that they try to actively seek out? (Naive examples but I cannot think of better ones at the moment).

Most importantly, desperation is never an answer. And neither is shouting or rage or profanity or the myriad of others, all of them offsprings of desperation.

“I can fast”

“Fasting” is a metaphor for restrain and abstinence. It is indeed a simple idea. What will make you restless if you have nothing to be restless about? Isn’t that powerful?

There is a bit of a contradiction here, perhaps my pedantic readers will notice. Engaging in society means desiring materialistic wealth and chasing romantic oppurtunities. How can one fast then? That is the beauty of it. Tzu uses the phrase, “To stand at the center”. Yes, to experience everything, good, evil, pure, noble, unchaste, corrupt, sinful and yet, not be moved by anything at all.

Conclude

Most fundamental ideas are beautiful. And beautiful ideas are utterly simple. Is this the ultimate guide to life? Far from it. Learning is not the recitation of words written down or the memorization of facts but the courage to question them and find even simple answers. May this serve as an inspiration to those who listen and set them on their own journey of finding their answers.

To perpetual learning.

Footnote 1: The pace at which modern society has evolved is blistening. Since the Information Age, we have developed far faster than we are capable of comprehending. This blinding growth (both numerical and technological) is at its worse, a recipe for disaster. Ignorance is evil, it always has been. But today, how to make sense of the information explosion? So most people don’t. What hurts most is not the absence of knowledge but partial knowledge. That is indeed the case today. Access to information should be coupled with education in order to yield it effectively. Impulsive youth can easily be swayed by baseless arguments and stage upheaval. Prudent assessment of all facts is key to survival and flourishment of us. Today, it makes us both vulnerable and powerful than ever before.

Footnote 2: And today, more than ever in our history, it is possible to achieve that.

Thoughts: UNIX - History and Memoir (Book)

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Tue, 30 Mar 2021 00:00:00 +0000

It’s always good to know about the things you love the most. It somehow makes you love them even more. I am glad non-living things are not stupidly self-conscious and self-doubting like us and I can understand them more deeply than I can understand other humans.

Some mind(ful|less) blabberings

With that said, I enjoyed this book. In Brian’s succint prose, he recollects the history of the mother of all operating systems: UNIX. And along the way, describes the sideways development that it encouraged such as the development of C (the “lingua franca of computing”), various timeless tools like grep, awk, sed, yacc, lex, make, document formatters and so on. He talks about what lead to the development of UNIX and ruminates on the kind of environment contagious to such breakthroughs. Unfettered management, fun atmosphere, great minds, stable funding and the freedom and willingness to solve real-world problems. He also points out and clear a lot of the admittedly confusing history that is the legacy of Unix as the (licensed) source code of Unix reached Berkeley. As he correctly pointed out, AT&T tried to “lock the barn door after the crown jewels had flown the coop”. And then we had BSD, Minix, Linux, Xenix and yada yada.

He talks about the revered “Unix philosophy” and spells it out in its entirety which is what I was looking for. He talks about the genius of Ken Thompson (May the Nerd God bless him), the technical eloquence of Dennis Ritchie, the management of Doug and so on. Who wouldn’t love to work at a place where people respect and rever things they loves?

He kind of skims very gently on the technical innovation that Unix brought to the table such as pipes, hierarchial file system, user-level shell programs along with the basic good design decisions and principles of system design.

He talks about pranks on other colleagues, defiance of the management and other geeky things that sound wholesome and naive (It makes me feel that Gods do sometimes play). He points out rather coyly the Unix system in use in the Jurassic Park which controlled the security locks and latches and how Lex navigated it and saved the day. He talks about the infamous comment in the Unix source code that apparently described code responsible for context-switching between processes and it went like:

/** You are not expected to understand this. **/

I think I can safely attribute the code it described to Ken :P.

And he did all that in his usual mix of humour and nostalgia which is heart-warming and I guess will be to anyone who had helped build something that has literally changed the world.

The masters have shown the way, it is time we lead.

Logs

This was a (relatively) short book and I think I completed it in three to four sittings. I finished it on Mar 30, 2021 though I’m sure to dig into the myriad of resources Brian has linked to. I also want to get my hands on the Unix src (6th edition) preferably with Lions’ commentary.

Thoughts: The Selfish Gene (Book)

gs454236@gmail.com (Basil Labib) — Wed, 30 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Abstract

My favourite non-fiction read of 2020.

Devil in the details

With natural selection manifesting itself in the most outspoken of ways this year, it was most apt that I stumbled upon this book. (A Twitter suggestion by PG) And I must say it’s quite a lovable book (for rational and open individuals, anyway).

It’s a book about evolution from the perspective of the gene; the so-called “selfish gene theory”. Dawkins asks the question, “What if evolution happens at the genetic level, individuals and species being mere vehicles (contrary to popular belief that Darwinism is focused on the organism level)?” The book is basically an answer to that question. And such a magnificent work, with Dawkins well-formed ideas coupled with intriguing (read: very bizarre) examples from the kingdom of life presented in his terse words. Perhaps never had a book been so opaque in nature yet so transparent at the same time.

I can safely say a part of me (my ideas) resides in the pages of this book. It is humbling to know what we truly are and even more terrifying to know that we can understand us ourselves. The book invites criticism for some of its “purple passages” but as it is said, truth is what it is. On the face of it, Dawkins may look like a vile antihumanist but on the contrary, he’s doing better than most humans in being outspoken and hence, helping in disrobing that fake robe of arrogance and pride some of us guise under for indeed misunderstanding must be nipped as soon as possible.

The programs fed by the genes are the default factory settings for organisms. But of course, at least we override it by conscious awareness, cultural influences, and the education that we receive.

It’s definitely not a book to be rushed through but devoured slowly. I’d say relish a chapter a day (with possibly a metaphorical lipsmack) and draw connections between the ideas presented. For it is in this diffused state that the mind can do magic.

If there is to be a list of books I’d like to revisit every year (and I’m actively working on making something akin to one), The Selfish Gene will undoubtedly be one of them. A book that will be as immemorial as the subject that it chooses to talk about.

Log

I started around Dec 17 and completed on Dec 28, so around 1.5 weeks.