What I Am Reading:
How to Live an Asymmetric Life
Graham Weaver's narrative unfolds as a profound exploration of both investing and life, with a focus on the four essential principles that shape an asymmetric existence. Central to his message is the notion of writing one's own story – envisioning and pursuing dreams with unwavering determination. Living an asymmetric life, according to Weaver, means breaking free from fear and playing for the asymmetric upside in every aspect of existence
What I Am Watching:
The Most Misunderstood Concept in Physics
Entropy is the tendency of energy to disperse and create disorder, and is intricately linked to Earth's existence. This video vividly explains the vital role played by the sun, which provides Earth with an invaluable stream of high-quality low entropy energy that allows for structure and temperature variations, fostering the conditions for life to flourish. It's a captivating journey into the science behind our planet's sustainability.
What I Am Listening:
"The Formula" by Albert-László Barabási
Too often, accomplishment does not equal success. We did the work but didn't get the promotion; we played hard but weren't recognized; we had the idea but didn't get the credit. We convince ourselves that talent combined with a strong work ethic is the key to getting ahead, but also realize that combination often fails to yield results, without any deeper understanding as to why. Recognizing this striking disconnect, the author, along with a team of renowned researchers and some of the most advanced data-crunching systems on the planet, dedicated themselves to one goal: uncovering that ever-elusive link between performance and success.
A conversation with Renaissance Technologies CEO Peter Brown
In this special episode, Peter Brown, CEO of Renaissance Technologies, talks about his career and building the hedge fund company. He also recounts how the firm navigated market crises such as the “quant quake” and the Global Financial Crisis, and describes how computer models and algorithms have long played a role in Renaissance’s growth.
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What I Am Reading
Why the ‘paradox mindset’ is the key to success
Although paradoxes often trip us up, embracing contradictory ideas may actually be the secret to creativity and leadership.
Revealed: British accents are the world’s sexiest
Sorry, France: in our latest global survey, accents from the UK swept the world off their feet
Why Do We See Dead People?
Humans have always sensed the ghosts of loved ones. It’s only in the last century that we convinced ourselves this was a problem
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What I Am Reading
The Psychology of Money: Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness
Doing well with money isn’t necessarily about what you know. It’s about how you behave. And behavior is hard to teach, even to really smart people. Money―investing, personal finance, and business decisions―is typically taught as a math-based field, where data and formulas tell us exactly what to do. But in the real world people don’t make financial decisions on a spreadsheet. They make them at the dinner table, or in a meeting room, where personal history, your own unique view of the world, ego, pride, marketing, and odd incentives are scrambled together. In The Psychology of Money, award-winning author Morgan Housel shares 19 short stories exploring the strange ways people think about money and teaches you how to make better sense of one of life’s most important topics.
The Science of Wisdom
As it turns out, wisdom doesn’t vary only between people who read about hypothetical scenarios in a laboratory. Even the same person typically shows substantial variability over time. Several years back, researchers asked a group of Berliners to report their most challenging personal issue. Participants also reported how they reasoned about each challenge, including meta-cognitive strategies similar to those described above. When inspecting the results, scholars observed a peculiar pattern: for most characteristics, there was more variability within the same person over time than there was between people. In short, wisdom was highly variable from one situation to the next. The variability also followed systematic rules. It heightened when participants focused on close others and work colleagues, compared with cases when participants focused solely on themselves.
These studies reveal a certain irony: in those situations where we might care the most about behaving wisely, we’re least likely to do so. Is there a way to use evidence-based insights to counter this tendency?
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When most business owners hear “taxes” they either stop paying attention or only think about how much in taxes they’re going to owe. However, Research & Development (R&D) Tax Credits are something every entrepreneur & existing business owner MUST understand and utilize. Many expenses that qualify for R&D Tax Credits are expenditures that your business is already encountering which you may not be capitalizing on. Having a thorough understanding of the following rules & ideas can save your business a lot of money each year in taxes.
Let’s start by understanding the difference between a tax credit and a tax deduction. Tax credits are more valuable because they are a dollar for dollar offset of a tax liability. In contrast, a tax deduction simply reduces your taxable income before the tax rate is applied. A tax credit directly reduces your tax liability in the amount of the credit, whereas a tax deduction only reduces a portion (your tax rate) of your tax liability. Because certain R&D costs are treated as a tax credit rather than a tax deduction, the tax savings are much larger for your business.
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You’re more likely to be struck by lightning. You’re more likely to be eaten by sharks. You’re more likely to score a royal flush in your first hand of poker. And on and on it goes. Basically, it’s scientifically proven that playing the lottery is a waste of money. So... why do it?
Every week, I play the lottery, and I have for years. I don’t plan on breaking this habit, either, even though I know that it’s essentially statistically impossible for me to win, and so the $2 I spend is a loss from the get-go. I’ve gotten some strange looks from friends and others when they find out I play or notice the tickets in my wallet. People are often surprised, and in some cases, disapproving-- playing the lottery has something of a taboo about it!
But for me, it’s not about the odds that I might not win-- it’s about the fact that I definitely can’t win if I don’t play. Let me explain ….
