What We’re Reading
A few good articles the Collab team came across this week …
Progress
Bill Gates on the reduction in violence:
What indicator improves even faster than reduction in violence? Our distaste for violence. We’re more upset about it today. If I see someone spanking a kid — I’m stealing from Steven’s book — I might get up and say: “Hey, wait a minute!” Forty years ago, it might have been more like: “Do you want to borrow my belt?”
Intelligence
“To gain success a person will need high EQ; if you don’t want to lose quickly you will need a high IQ, and if you want to be respected you need high LQ - the IQ of love.”
Time
The un-ownability of time is a little more obvious when it comes to life expectancy. I have to occasionally remind myself I don’t have another 40 or 50 years to live. I often expect it, but I never have it. It’s not mine. I don’t even “have” one year. I do have this moment, but all the time stretching forward from it is just speculation. We can have intentions, but never time.
Context
More Gates on progress, from his new favorite book:
The global average IQ score is rising by about 3 IQ points every decade. Kids’ brains are developing more fully thanks to improved nutrition and a cleaner environment. Pinker also credits more analytical thinking in and out of the classroom. Think about how many symbols you interpret every time you check your phone’s home screen or look at a subway map. Our world today encourages abstract thought from a young age, and it’s making us smarter.
Prescience
One of the (many) reasons I stopped heeding the macro forecasts of others and quit trying to come up with my own is that even if you knew what the future data would be, you’d still not be able to predict how people would react to it. You could certainly try, but markets are set up to confound us, not confirm our hypotheses.
Have a nice weekend.