How Skilled is Your Thinking (Right Now)?

There is nothing more practical than sound thinking. No matter what your circumstance or goals, no matter where you are, or what problems you face, you are better off if your thinking is skilled. As a professional梥hopper, employee, citizen, lover, friend, parent梚n every realm and situation of your life, good thinking pays off. Poor thinking, in turn, inevitably causes problems, wastes time and energy, engenders frustration and pain.

Critical thinking is the disciplined art of ensuring that you use the best thinking you are capable of in any set of circumstances. The general goal of thinking is to "figure out the lay of the land." We all have multiple choices to make. We need the best information to make the best choices.

What is really going on in this or that situation? Are they trying to take advantage of me? Does so-and-so really care about me? Am I deceiving myself when I believe that…? What are the likely consequences of failing to…? If I want to do…, what is the best way to prepare for it? How can I be more successful in doing…? Is this my biggest problem, or do I need to focus my attention on something else? Responding to such questions successfully is the daily work of thinking. That's why we are THINKERS.

Nothing you can do, of course, guarantees that you will discover the complete truth about anything, but there is a way to get better at it. Excellence of thought and skill in thinking are real possibilities. However, to maximize the quality of your thinking, you must learn how to become an effective "critic" of your thinking. And to become an effective critic of your thinking, you have to make learning about thinking a priority.

Ask yourself these梤ather unusual梣uestions: What have you learned about how you think? Did you ever study your thinking? What information do you have, for example, about how the intellectual processes that occur as your mind thinks? More to the point, perhaps, what do you really know about how to analyze, evaluate, or reconstruct your thinking? Where does your thinking come from? How much of it is of "good" quality? How much of it is of "poor" quality? How much of your thinking is vague, muddled, inconsistent, inaccurate, illogical, or superficial? Are you, in any real sense, in control of your thinking? Do you know how to test it? Do you have any conscious standards for determining when you are thinking well and when you are thinking poorly? Have you ever discovered a significant problem in your thinking and then changed it by a conscious act of will? If anyone asked you to teach them what you have learned, thus far in your life, about thinking, would you really have any idea what that was or how you learned it?

If you are like most, the only honest answers to these questions run along the lines of: "Well, I suppose I really don't know much about my thinking or about thinking in general. I suppose in my life I have more or less taken my thinking for granted. I don't really know how it works. I have never really studied it. I don't know how I test it, or even if I do test it. It just happens in my mind automatically." In other words, serious study of thinking, serious thinking about thinking, is rare. It is not a subject in most schools. It is not a subject taught at home. But if you focus your attention for a moment on the role that thinking is playing in your life, you may come to recognize that, in fact, everything you do, want, or feel is influenced by your thinking. And if you become persuaded of that, you will be surprised that humans show so little interest in thinking. We are like monkeys uninterested in what goes on when we "monkey around." What is more, if you start, then, to pay attention to thinking in a manner analogous to the way a botanist observes plants, you will be on your way to becoming a truly exceptional person. You will begin to notice what few others notice. You will be the rare monkey who knows what monkeying around is all about. You will be the rare monkey who knows how and why he is monkeying around, the rare monkey skilled in assessing and improving his monkeying. Here are some things you will eventually discover: that all of us have, somewhere along the way, picked up bad habits of thinking. All of us, for example, make generalizations when we don't have the evidence to back them up, allow stereotypes to influence our thinking, form some false beliefs, tend to look at the world from one fixed point of view, ignore or attack points of view that conflict with our own, fabricate illusions and myths that we subconsciously confuse with what is true and real, and think deceptively about many aspects of our experience. As you discover these problems, we hope you will begin to ask yourself some key questions: "Is it possible for me to learn to avoid bad habits of thought? Is it possible for me to develop good habits of thought? Is it possible for me to think at a high, or at least, higher, level?" These are problems and questions that few discover or ask. Nevertheless, every major insight you gain into good or bad thinking can significantly enhance your life. You can begin to make higher quality decisions. You can gain power, very important power, you presently lack. You can open up new doors for yourself, see new options, minimize significant mistakes, and maximize potential understandings.

Test the Idea Beginning to Think about your Thinking To begin to think about your thinking, make a list of any problems you believe currently exist with your thinking. Try to be as explicit as possible. The more problems you can identify the better. For each problem you identify, complete the following statements: One problem with my thinking is… This is a problem because…

List of Scoville ratings

Naga Jolokia pepper
Fresh Naga Jolokia Peppers (whole and cut)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae (unranked): Angiosperms (unranked): Eudicots (unranked): Asterids Order: Solanales Family: Solanaceae Genus: Capsicum Species: C. chinense / C. frutescens Subspecies: C. c. cultivar Naga Jolokia
Trinomial name
Capsicum chinense 'Naga Jolokia'

Heat: Peak (SR: 1,041,427)

Pungency values for any pepper, stated in Scoville units, are imprecise, due to expected variation within a species—easily by a factor of 10 or more—depending on seed lineage, climate (humidity is a big factor for the Naga as the Dorset Naga and the original Naga have quite different ratings), and even soil (this is especially true of habaneros). The inaccuracies described in the measurement methods above also contribute to the imprecision of these values. When interpreting Scoville ratings, this should be kept in mind.
Scoville scale Scoville rating Type of pepper

Scoville scale

Scoville rating	Type of pepper
15,000,000-16,000,000	Pure capsaicin
8,600,000-9,100,000	Various capsaicinoids (e.g. homocapsaicin, homodihydrocapsaicin, nordihydrocapsaicin)
2,000,000-5,300,000	Standard U.S. Grade pepper spray[5], FN 303 irritant ammunition
855,000-1,050,000	Naga Jolokia
350,000-580,000	Red Savina Habanero
100,000-350,000	Habanero chili, Scotch Bonnet Pepper, Datil pepper, Rocoto, Jamaican Hot Pepper , African Birdseye, Madame Jeanette
50,000-100,000	Thai Pepper, Malagueta Pepper, Chiltepin Pepper, Pequin Pepper
30,000-50,000	Cayenne Pepper, Ají pepper , Tabasco pepper, some Chipotle peppers
10,000-23,000	Serrano Pepper, some Chipotle peppers
2,500-8,000	Jalapeño Pepper, Guajillo pepper, New Mexican varieties of Anaheim pepper, Paprika (hungarian wax pepper)
500-2,500	Anaheim pepper , Poblano Pepper, Rocotillo Pepper
100-500	Pimento, Pepperoncini
0	No heat, Bell pepper

China Battles Worsening Drought

BEIJING -- China's leaders ordered emergency measures to battle one of the country's worst droughts in decades, which is threatening to damage nearly a fifth of China's wheat harvest and millions of livestock.

Underscoring the government's concern, Chinese President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao ordered the State Council, China's equivalent of a cabinet, to make "all-out efforts to combat the severe drought," the official Xinhua news agency reported Thursday.

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Reuters

A farmer carries pails to transport water from a partially dried-up pond at the outskirts of Yingtan in Jiangxi province. China is taking emergency action to limit the impact of a drought in the country's breadbasket that is hurting crops and livestock, and threatens to push up food prices.

Dry Spells Trouble for China's Wheat Crops

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China has been experiencing a drought since November, having not seen snow or rain, putting China's wheat crops in jeopardy from lack of rain to irrigate crops, threatening farmers' incomes. Video courtesy of Reuters.

The central government allocated $44 million in emergency funds to help fight the water shortage, in addition to $14 million already earmarked.

China often battles droughts in its parched north, but meteorologists say the current one is, in some areas, the worst since 1951. It has left 3.7 million people across eight provinces facing water shortages and has damaged 9.3 million hectares of farmland, according to the Ministry of Agriculture, cited by state-run media.

In some provinces, as much as a fifth of the wheat harvest could be destroyed, and nationwide as much as 5% of this year's wheat crop could be lost if conditions continue to worsen, the state-run China Daily reported.

The emergency measures to fight the drought include subsidizing irrigation projects, giving financial help to the poorest farmers and sending experts out to help limit damage to the summer harvest, state media said.

A poor harvest could mean higher food prices at a time when rising unemployment has been especially acute among migrant factory workers, many of whom are returning to the countryside after layoffs from city jobs. The government, however, says it isn't yet worried about the effect of the drought on food supplies because of current stockpiles and because it could further subsidize the rural poor if conditions worsen.

The affected area is primarily in central and eastern China, covering the country's breadbasket where much of the winter wheat crop is raised. The area also includes the region surrounding Beijing, the capital, which hasn't had precipitation in more than 100 days. In all, 1.85 million livestock are short of water.

Global warming, urbanization, pollution and wasteful irrigation have been blamed for depleting already scarce water resources in northern China. With rivers and lakes drying up, farmers are tapping groundwater reserves, and are forced to drill deeper each year as water tables fall. Droughts have increased in frequency, though authorities said this year the affected area is about 100 times as large as last year.

Beijing has been working on constructing a series of canals to divert water from southern China to the north to improve long-term supply. That project, which will be even more costly than the giant Three Gorges Dam, has come under attack by critics who say that water conservation could achieve similar gains, and who worry that the water diversions will hurt the environment.

AME-105 spy camera finds its way into ID badge for nefarious ends

from Engadget by Joseph L. Flatley

In the past we've noted (guessed) that as the economy continues its slippery-slide to Thunderdome, incidents of corporate espionage will continue to rise. And you know what that means: more cool spy gadgets! For instance, check out this 60 Minutes-esque hidden camera from Japan. Housed inside a phony smart card / ID badge (you can see the lens in the "d" on the word "card") the AME-105 is a 1.3 megapixel video camera that records using the AVI H.263 format at 352 x 288 resolution and 15 fps. This guy has 4GB memory, so it should let you do plenty of peeping, and when you're done with your Big Brother act, the footage can be offloaded to your computer via USB. Perfect for the little whistleblower in your life, right? All this can be yours for a mere ¥13,800 (about $155).

The most expensive potatoes in the world

It would seem that even simply potatoes can cost thousands. Resourcefulness citizents who lives on island Nurmuate annually harvest no more than 100 tons of class "La Bonnotte" per year.
As that piece of potato (on a legend, this sort developed by supreme god of Incas) exclusively soft, it harvested only manually.
The most expensive potatoes in the world cost about 500 euros per kilogram.

NEW YORK'S MOST EXPENSIVE BAKED POTATO

NEW YORK'S MOST EXPENSIVE BAKED POTATO

What: Baked Potato with white truffles
Where: The Four Seasons Restaurant
Price: $200

No, this meal does not come with a payment plan.

Tell the truth fellas... Say you were on a first date with a young lady and she happens to have a sudden urge for a loaded baked potato... Even if you were ballin would you or would you not look at your girl side ways for ordering this one? ***Remember this 200 bucks only covers the potato and truffles... No meat...No dessert.. No drinks have been tabulated yet...Ponder the thought and let us know...

Surrounded by friends? It's all in your genes

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Are you a social butterfly, or do you prefer being at the edge of a group of friends? Either way, your genes and evolution may play a major role, U.S. researchers reported on Monday.

While it may come as no surprise that genes may help explain why some people have many friends and others have few, the researchers said, their findings go just a little farther than that.

"Some of the things we find are frankly bizarre," said Nicholas Christakis of Harvard University in Massachusetts, who helped conduct the study.

"We find that how interconnected your friends are depends on your genes. Some people have four friends who know each other and some people have four friends who don't know each other. Whether Dick and Harry know each other depends on Tom's genes," Christakis said in a telephone interview.

Christakis and colleague James Fowler of the University of California San Diego are best known for their studies that show obesity, smoking and happiness spread in networks.

For this study, they and Christopher Dawes of UCSD used national data that compared more than 1,000 identical and fraternal twins. Because twins share an environment, these studies are good for showing the impact that genes have on various things, because identical twins share all their genes while fraternal twine share just half.

"We found there appears to be a genetic tendency to introduce your friends to each other," Christakis said.

There could be good, evolutionary reasons for this. People in the middle of a social network could be privy to useful gossip, such as the location of food or good investment choices.

But they would also be at risk of catching germs from all sides -- in which case the advantage would lie in more cautious social behavior, they wrote in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"It may be that natural selection is acting on not just things like whether or not we can resist the common cold, but also who it is that we are going to come into contact with," Fowler said in a statement.