Scott Adams's Blog, page 389

Bad Personality Traits

Think of the last person to whom you spoke and describe that person's most annoying personality trait. One of them might become a Dilbert comic.

Windows

I like looking out of windows. I like opening them to let in the fresh air. But windows are also a big bother. I need to close them when it rains, or when it is too hot or too cold, which is most of the time, or when the neighbors are noisy, which is all of the time. Windows get dirty. They cause glare on my computer screen. And if you have nearby neighbors, you end up keeping the shades down all the time anyway. And you might worry about bad people crawling in your windows.

Now suppose you had

Garbage City

I've blogged before about how great it would be to have a city with underground bike paths, replacing cars for most purposes. Almost everyone would ride a bike if they didn't need to worry about weather and traffic and hills. Even senior citizens would tool around in 3-wheelers with little effort.

It would also be great to have underground package delivery to your home via robots. Just order your groceries and whatnot via the Internet, then get an e-mail alert when the robot has delivered your go

Economics of Solar Power

Is it economical to install a solar power system (photovoltaic) for a new home?

Assume you will live in this home for the next 30 years, you're in California where the sunlight is plentiful, energy costs are high, and the government is offering rebates. You run the numbers, and as long as the cost of the system is wrapped into your mortgage, you are saving cash from day one. Ta-da! It's good economics, right?

Not so fast. Economists consider all alternatives, and one of the alternatives is to wai

Exercise is Useless for Weight Loss

There's an interesting article in TIME that says exercise doesn't do much for weight loss.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20090806/hl_time/08599191485700

I've been a member of the same health club for over 15 years, so I've observed lots of regulars and how their bodies change. One thing I rarely see is people losing weight, no matter how often they go to the gym. Personally, I've never heard of anyone losing significant weight by eating the same as they always did and exercising more. But I know pl

Patents

Recently I had an idea that seemed patentable. I've been through the patent process a few times, once successfully, but it has been a number of years. So I wondered what it would cost to run my new idea through the system.

What do you think it costs to use attorneys to work through the patent system and obtain patents for the U.S., Europe, and let's say 16 more of the bigger countries?

Answer: Over $100K.

Sure, I could do the work myself, but who has that kind of time? And what are the chances that

Visualizing the Entire Path

Let's say you have a goal in life, but you don't know what steps will be required to get there. The only step you are sure you can accomplish is the very first one. Maybe that first step involves quitting your job, or moving, or doing something else that is hard to reverse.

Do you take the first step and hope you can figure out the rest later? Or do you try to figure out all of the steps, at least in a general way, before you take the first step?

Every situation is different, so generalizing is r

Self Talk

I wonder if the words you use to speak about yourself actually cause you to become a different person. Research shows that the language you speak can change your abilities in some ways.

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/boroditsky09/boroditsky09_index.html

This might be a partial explanation for why affirmations appear to work for some people. Perhaps using language to tell yourself that you are a different person (happier, more successful, etc.) causes you to become more like the words.

We know tha

Thwarted by Idiots

Describe the idiot, excluding yourself, who is preventing you from accomplishing your biggest goal. Describe the goal in one sentence, but spend as much time as you like describing the idiot.

Themes

As regular readers know, I believe that the most likely explanation for our existence is that we're holographic computer simulations created by humans who came before us. And we don't appear to be randomized. It seems as if there are clear themes to every life, as if we are programmed that way.

For example, one of my themes is that most of my technology is defective. Here's a sample just from today:

Fax machine receives but doesn't send

DVD drive on computer doesn't recognize discs

DVD player puts w