Food For Thought 10
This is a lovely essay on a cute little creature called the lemur (remember King Julien XIII of the movie Madagascar?). Read it and gain some knowledge while having fun! Consider the Lemur Katherine Rundell It is probably best not to take advice direct and unfiltered from the animal kingdom – but lemurs are, I think, an exception. They live in matriarchal troops, with an alpha female at their head. When ring-tailed lemurs are cold or frightened, or when they want to bond, they group together in a furry mass known as a lemur ball, forming a black and white sphere that ranges in size from a football to a bicycle wheel. They intertwine their tails and paws, and press against one another’s walnut-sized swiftly beating hearts. To see it feels like an injunction of sorts: to find a lemur ball of one’s own. The first lemur I ever met was a [...]
Confusables 3
climactic, climatic, climacteric. Climactic means appearing at a climax (“the climactic scene in a movie”); climatic means having to do with climate and weather (“the climatic conditions of Southern India”); climacteric is a noun signifying a time of important change and is most commonly applied to menopause.
Vocab 4
This is an extract from lovely book called Siddhartha by the German writer Herman Hesse. Give it around 40 pages to get into the groove. It’s freely available here. Love touched the hearts of the Brahmans' young daughters when Siddhartha walked through the lanes of the town with the luminous forehead, with the eye of a king, with his slim hips. But more than all the others he was loved by Govinda, his friend, the son of a Brahman. He loved Siddhartha's eye and sweet voice, he loved his walk and the perfect decency of his movements, he loved everything Siddhartha did and said and what he loved most was his spirit, his transcendent, fiery thoughts, his ardent will, his high calling. Govinda knew: he would not become a common Brahman, not a lazy official in charge of offerings; not a greedy merchant with magic spells; not a vain, vacuous speaker; not a mean, deceitful priest; and also not a decent, stupid [...]
Vocab 3
Let Sherlock help you build a little vocab!
Food For Thought 9
Warren Buffett beat the hedge funds. Here's how One decade ago, Warren Buffett took a $1 million wager that stashing money in an index fund would make you richer than if you entrusted it with hedge fund managers. He won -- big time -- and in his annual letter on Saturday, the billionaire Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway (BRKA) Inc. outlined the final tally. He also took a jab at the hedge fund folks at the losing end. His pick, the S&P 500 (OEX), gained 125.8% over ten years. The five hedge funds, picked by a firm called Protégé Partners, added an average of about 36%. The names of the funds were not disclosed. (Read on)
Vocab 2
Try to see how the words are used. Then use them on your own. If you use a word around 10 - 15 times, that word will become a part of your permanent vocabulary.
Food For Thought 8
How to become a millionaire June 12, 2018 by MIKE COLAGROSSI The millionaire grid shows when you can become a millionaire based on annual savings and the age you start to save. (Credit: Four Pillar Freedom) One million dollars has always been a mark of monetary success and, despite inflation, it remains the magic number of wealth. It’s a goal that many people have, and although only some will get there, becoming a millionaire is not out of grasp for the ordinary person. The steps to getting there take hard work, investing and time—a whole lot of it for people who make an average salary. (Carry on here)
Vocab 1
Recently, there was a review of two books related to science in the American political and literary magazine Boston Review. The 1stparagraph of that piece has the maximum density of difficult – or uncommon – words that I’ve ever seen. Here’s that paragraph: People are gullible. Humans can be duped by liars and conned by frauds; manipulated by rhetoric and beguiled by self-regard; browbeaten, cajoled, seduced, intimidated, flattered, wheedled, inveigled, and ensnared. In this respect, humans are unique in the animal kingdom. Isn’t it amazing? Anyway if you want to read it further, here’s the link. But beware: it’s not easy, and it's very long.
Food For Thought 7
I always knew it at the gut level, and in a debate I could give very good reasons for thinking so, but there was no way I could prove it comprehensively. And anyway people don't listen to reasons. They believe whatever they want to. But seems like someone was working on it! So here is proof, if ever it was needed, that the belief that success is largely because of merit is mostly based on, well, nothing. If you’re so smart, why aren’t you rich? Turns out it’s just chance. The most successful people are not the most talented, just the luckiest, a new computer model of wealth creation confirms. Taking that into account can maximize return on many kinds of investment. by Emerging Technology from the arXiv March 1, 2018 The distribution of wealth follows a well-known pattern sometimes called an 80:20 rule: 80 percent of the wealth is [...]
Confusables: Can vs. May
This is another thorn in the flesh of a lot of my students. Let’s bury it once and for all: Can applies to what is possible and may to what is permissible. You can drive your car the wrong way down a one-way street, but you may not. Whenever someone says to you that You can’t talk to me like that. You should reply: But I can, and quite easily. What was meant, though, was that you may not or should not or ought not.