Archives for April 2022

I’m a big fan of Unnecessary Inventions.

Matty spends his days making exactly that: unnecessary inventions—tools and machines that you don’t need, but they’re hilarious and immensely creative.

With all the talk and concern around rising inflation rates, I took a leaf out of Matty’s book and created the ’Tooth Fairy Inflation Calculator’. Here’s my pitch!

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“Are you a parent? Are your kid’s teeth falling out? With inflation rates rising, how do you know what amount to put under their pillow?

Don’t let your kid fleece you! Get rid of the guess work, and use this Tooth Fairy Inflation Calculator today!

Simply pick your country, input the year you got money from the tooth fairy, and type in how much you received. The calculator will automatically tell you the inflation-adjusted amount you should be giving your kid.

Don’t spoil your kid. Instead, give them what you got, but adjust it.”

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It’s a very basic hack I threw together in 30 mins. But I had fun finding the data set and exploring the different variables and scenarios! Let me know your thoughts, and share it with others if you like it!

About 3 years ago I read a post from Seth Godin which set me off on this daily blogging journey. It was called ‘The first 1,000 are the most difficult’.

It was also Seth’s 2016 interview with Tim Ferris, where he calls his daily blog “one of the top five career investments he’s ever made,” that convinced me to start.

It’s a great listen; start at minute 33 if you want to skip to the section on blogging. And I’d recommend sticking around at least until the story about Stephen King’s pencil!

And so, after seeing Seth advocate so strongly for daily blogging, I decided to give it a go. And, you guessed it, today marks my 1,000th post!

There’s was no shiny revelation, or striking epiphany, today. I’ve been believer for a long while now.

But I’m more convinced than ever that there is magic in turning up every day, noticing what’s going on around you, and sharing it in the most thoughtful and generous way possible.

Thanks, Seth! And here’s to the next 1,000!

I enjoy getting James Clear’s 3-2-1 Newsletter each week. It’s pithy, and always helps me see a situation or topic in a new light.

Today I came across one of last year’s editions, and this ‘Three steps to exceptional results’ stood out to me:

1) Do less. Stop dividing your attention.

2) Do it right now. Once you have identified the essential, go fast. Maintain a bias toward action.

3) Do it the right way. Acting quickly doesn’t mean acting carelessly. Get to work right away, but keep working on it until it’s right.

I like how each point builds upon the last, and how the steps become more impactful when executed sequentially.

Fewer things. Start now. And take great care to do it right.

It happens every year shortly after the UK’s Daylight Savings Time kicks in.

I’ll be out on a walk after 6pm and realise it isn’t dark anymore. I’ll notice there are flowers in bloom among the trees. Spring is arriving!

I’ll then make a beeline to the pharmacy to pick up hay fever tablets.

I spent enough years thinking “I’ll wait until the allergies arrive” to know that my body and spring don’t get on. And with some simple preventative steps, I can avoid weeks of discomfort.

Although the example may feel trivial, the lesson is plain to see because of the direct cause and effect relationship between pollen and allergies.

Being a few steps ahead makes a big difference. Especially when the problem space is complex, nebulous, and where a direct relationship between variables hasn’t been established.

By proactively getting ahead of the problem, we can avoid headaches down the line.

Developer Simon Sarris asks a simple, but challenging, question:

“If you know what you want, why are you waiting?”

And if there are many reasons, what’s the simplest next step you can take?

Russell recommended I read Oliver Burkeman’s column ‘the eight secrets to a fairly fulfilled life’.

This was the final edition of Burkeman’s ‘This column will change your life’ that ran weekly from 2006 to 2020.

The purpose of this final column was to give the stage to the principles that came up over and over again during the column’s 14-year run.

I had heard of Burkeman, but I hadn’t read anything of his before. I connected immediately with his style: both tongue-in-cheek and earnest, but also piercing with clarity.

A few of the eight “secrets” resonated deeply.

There will always be too much to do – and this realisation is liberating.
My takeaway: Don’t beat yourself up for this one. Most of modern life feels like a constant learning, and relearning, of this lesson.

When stumped by a life choice, choose “enlargement” over happiness.
My takeaway: Us humans are bad at predicting what will make us happy. So we should choose that which will help us grow the most.

The capacity to tolerate minor discomfort is a superpower.
My takeaway: How many of life’s greatest ambitions are set aside due to the avoidance of “tolerable levels of unpleasantness?” Chilling.

The future will never provide the reassurance you seek from it.
My takeaway: Stop trying to control what you can’t.

I’m looking forward to poking through a few more of Burkeman’s columns. Thanks again for the recommendation, Russell!

I’m a big fan of consistency. A few examples of previous posts on the subject can be found here, here, here, here, and here.

To be clear, I’m talking about consistency in one’s level of effort and application (e.g., exercising daily), not rigidity in one’s thinking (e.g., an unwillingness to change opinion).

The problem with consistency is it’s hard to measure in any short term time horizon. This is because meaningful progress is often non-linear, where change happens slowly over many years.

So when I see an example of remarkable consistency, and it’s summarised in a bite-sized format, I feel compelled to share it.

Simone Mulas is a hyper-realistic portrait artist, and the 1-minute video below shows how he improved from the age of 9 through to 31. The fruits of his years of painstaking practise are summarised so well and is so inspiring, I don’t need to add anything else. Enjoy!

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A post shared by Simone Mulas (@slim_draw)

If there’s an issue with the video embed for those who subscribe by email, you can find the video here.

I was recently recommended this fascinating paper which outlines how the practice of deliberately disagreeing with yourself can lead to better decisions.

Here are the core ideas behind the the study:

1. Making good decisions relies upon our ability to make sound estimates of unknown quantities
2. Typically, the aggregate estimates of a group outperform the estimate of an individual (e.g., diverse teams usually perform better than homogenous teams)
3. However, the same benefit can be seen when we aggregate multiple estimates from the same person
4. Here’s what the study recommends: “combine people’s first estimate with their second estimate made from the perspective of someone they often disagree with.”

So next time you’re making a decision, have a go at creating a second estimate from the perspective of someone you often disagree with. Then find the aggregate of those two estimates. It’ll likely outperform your first estimate. And for extra marks, sense check your aggregate estimate with others you trust.

Some of you will have already seen or read about DALL•E 2 in the past 24 hours, but I can’t resist sharing.

DALL•E 2 is an AI system from Open AI that creates realistic images and art from a text input. The model itself is trained against a vast database of text-image pairs.

Open AI’s CEO, Sam Altman, asked his Twitter followers to submit strings of text and he’d reply with the image generated by DALL•E. The results are nothing short of astounding.

In fact, the more words, the better!

I also found Sam’s reflections interesting to read.

He acknowledges the possibilities: this is perhaps the beginning of a new computer interface trend (i.e., you say something to a machine in natural language, and it does it).

He recognises the danger: the model is already powerful enough to imagine the downsides such as disinformation.

He also reminds us that AI predictions are so difficult to make: 10 years ago we believed AI would replace physical labour, cognitive labour, and only then tackle creative tasks. It seems now that the reverse could be true.

It’s tempting to start with an answer, an opinion, or a possible way forward.

But we risk speaking without the adequate level of context, information, or data.

It’s good to build a habit of leading with questions. Not just any questions though, but ones that get to the heart of the matter, the misalignment, or the motive.

Hold off on answering for a moment. Get curious. Ask better questions.

See what happens.

The Grammys are great for music discovery.

Scroll down the winners list, find a genre you like but maybe aren’t familiar with, pick a winner or nominee, and listen to the album they were nominated for.

It’s a lovely way to break out of the Spotify genre echo chamber.

I’m a big fan of listening to music when I’m working, especially music in languages other than English. I don’t get distracted by the lyrics and end up appreciating the vocal melodies and intonations in the same way I do with other instruments in the arrangement.

Today’s listen was the winner of the Best Regional Roots Music Album: “Kau Ka Pe’a” from Hawaiian artist Kalani Pe’a.

Felt like I was working from Maui.

Maru and I got back from Argentina this morning only to find ourselves locked out of our flat.

We forgot to tell the friend who was taking care our plants to only use the Yale lock rather than the deadbolt. They’d also just left town for a work trip, meaning we had no way to get in.

The locksmith arrived within the hour, got our front door open, but then had a look of concern on his face. He said our locks were non-compliant with fire safety regulations. He explained that in the event of an emergency, our current locks could enable someone to be trapped inside the flat, and because we’re on the 4th floor, that person would have no way of getting out of the building without risking serious injury.

Although it was a frustrating morning, we had deadbolt fortune today. We learnt something important that would help keep us safer in the long run.

When things don’t go to plan, there’s often a lesson or silver lining that can be found. Those moments should be celebrated too!

Cycling is good for the environment, right?

Yes, when looking at first-order effects. If you’re on a bike, rather than in a car, train, or bus, you’re emitting less carbon into the atmosphere.

But once second-order effects are taken into account, paradoxically we may emit more carbon in the long run by taking up cycling.

A 2009 study from Karl Ulrich at the Wharton School found, “The environmental benefits of human power are, however, strongly coupled to the environmental costs of increased population, due to increased longevity of those who engage in physical activity… Human-powered transportation is therefore less an environmental issue and more an issue of public health… The interplay between longevity and environmental impact is a central feature of the conflicting societal objectives of improving human health and increasing environmental sustainability.”

There are limitations with a studies like this though. For example, we don’t know what average emissions per person will be in the future. It may be worse than today, or technological advances may reduce our impact in the decades to come.

Regardless of its limitations, it’s a fascinating example of second-order effects, and how a perceived improvement in one area may lead to worse effects in the long run.

Our world, our actions, and the consequences of those actions are often much more complex and nuanced than what seems apparent at first glance.

Each week, the European Space Agency publishes a series of images. It’s like a weekly photo diary focused on the cosmos. It’s awesome.

In March they published the highest resolution photo of the sun ever taken. They also included in the top right corner a scale image of the Earth—you’ll need to zoom in to see it.

I love how images like this evoke a unique sense of perspective within each viewer. Some may feel lonely. Others may be in awe. And many are likely to feel gratitude for our little floating orb of life.

I’m a big fan of regular doses of cosmic perspective.

Bees pollinate about 30% of total global food supply, but they’ve come under threat in recent decades.

“The overall abundance of pollinators is thought to have declined in the UK since the 1970s. For example, managed honeybee hives in England declined by 50% between 1985 and 2005,” reports the UK’s Royal Society of Biology.

Which is why I loved discovering and reading about Beewise. They’ve produced the world’s first robotic, solar-powered, commercial-scale beehives. The device houses 24 bee colonies, and allows beekeepers to remotely manage and treat their hives. This leads to increased bee health, improved honey yields, and improved pollination.

I’ve always enjoyed watching beehives—either at the museum behind the glass perspex, or when visiting friends who have had them—but it’s always felt like a time intensive, dangerous, and very manual activity.

So what I love about this product is that the solution feels so obviously good.

Here’s hoping its unit economics per bee hive mean that large agricultural businesses, as well as governments, can one day adopt it at scale for the pollination of crops and other natural environments.