A goal / A great day / Ford is beating GM / Modesty vs accomplishments / Charismatic…

There is a computer disease that anybody who works with computers knows about. It's a very serious disease and it interferes completely with the work. The trouble with computers is that you 'play' with them! Richard P. Feynman

A goal

I was reading a chapter of the Engineering Systems Monograph on sustainability for my PhD-preparations and came across this paragraph:

As we face an increasingly global economy, fundamental organizational and political changes, and the advent of ever more advanced technologies, the development of methodologies that allow us to understand and manage complex engineering systems becomes increasingly critical. One of our core objectives will be to perform research at the interface of technology and institutions, with the ultimate objective of developing a new cadre of professionals capable of addressing the most pressing socio-technical challenges society has to face.

It summarizes very nicely the reasons, why I want to pursue a PhD here in ESD in MIT. I thought someone might like to know.

A great day

What a great day I had. Got up at 9am, rushed to MIT with S for the "Charismatic speaker"-lecture, read a bit Philip Roth's new book "The plot against America", had lunch with S watching the Feynman-movie, canceled my fixed phone&furniture&electricity&NY times and bought flight ticket to Finland (leaving Boston on the 20th of Fenruary), met with professor Crawley (who asked me to add some explanations to my thesis, agreed to be on my PhD-committee, and gave me good advice on whom to talk to about my PhD-research), updated my PhD-application, had dinner with S, worked on the pre-assignment of the "Living an extraordinary life, submitted it, and then read the novel for a while. I am so exalted that not even slushy snowing could bring my mood down a smallest bit. One lucky and happy nerd I am!

Ford is beating GM

It seems that Ford is beating GM in the race to non-existense. Today, Ford announced cutting up to 30000 jobs and closing down 14 plants in the next 6 years. I think that the US government should protect the automotive jobs as strongly as it protects the farmers. It would be just fair for the US taxpayer to cover the losses of Ford and GM. Anyway, automotive workers are as valuable citizens as farmers.
Well, seriously, the situation of both Ford and GM does look very grim. It is very hard to save a company by such dramatic down-sizing. The only way it would succeed would be to fire the extra workers as soon as possible, close the factories, and then tell that nobody else will be fired. And then concentrate all efforts in innovative products, which the customers are likely to want in 5 years or so. Otherwise downsizing is just delayed way of committing corporate suicide.

Modesty vs accomplishments

It may well be almost a truism, that only really accomplished persons can be modest. I was reminded of this, when I read Tom Speller's CV. My already great respect for Tom got even deeper. What a honor it was to have a person of Tom's stature helping us with our systems architecting class.

Charismatic speakers

Vikas Jhingran gave a lecture on charismatic speakers. Such speakers give memorable speeches and have influence on their audience. Vikas gave three simple pieces of advice on how to become more charismatic. First, do not serve your meat without sauce; always tell a story, deliver the facts/message/ideas as parts of the story. Second, give an unexpected punch line. Surprise the audience, do not let them guess what you are up to before hitting them with the bunch line. Third, remember that the words (the actual wording) delivers only 10% of the message. Practice enough to know the topic well enough, then concentrate on vocal variety and gestures. In short, people love stories, love humor, love being surprised, and the livelier, the better.

Feynman-movie

Every year, MIT presents a series of Feynman-movies. So far, I have missed them all, even though he definitely is one of my idols (the others being at least Feyerabend, Russell, Gandhi). This movie was called Take the World from Another Point of View and in it Feyman told how he works. In short: being curious and working hard are the keys. Thinking things through oneself, not worrying about names of things.

Alun perin julkaistu kuukausikoosteessa "Blogs January to February 2006".