increasing my surface area
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increasing my surface area
Large quantities of something can transform the nature of those somethings. More is different. Computer scientist J. Storrs Hall writes: “If there is enough of something, it is possible, indeed not unusual, for it to have properties not exhibited at all in small, isolated examples.
Kevin Kelly • The Inevitable: Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape Our Future
I think another driver of this sentiment and behavior is that chasing scale strips you of some humanity. It puts your head too high up in the clouds. It removes you from what happens in the real world with real people. Pursuing something that can’t scale does the exact opposite: it grounds you. It’s a comforting and healing next act.
Anu Atluru • Pursuits That Can’t Scale
we cannot assume that everything interesting is at the same scale as ourselves.
John Brockman • This Will Make You Smarter: 150 New Scientific Concepts to Improve Your Thinking (Edge Question Series)
Satisfaction comes not from chasing bigger and bigger things, but paying attention to smaller and smaller things.
Arthur C. Brooks • From Strength to Strength
I think the frogs have something to teach us about living in the world today. There are risks and rewards to baring your soul to the jungle. Still, I worry about disappearing altogether. By keeping things too close, do I risk becoming invisible? If I show too much of myself, if I let the wrong light in, do I risk having my contours become... See more
Show Me Your Guts
release. The trick is to figure out ways to explore the edges of possibility that surround you. This can be as simple as changing the physical environment you work in, or cultivating a specific kind of social network, or maintaining certain habits in the way you seek out and store information.
Steven Johnson • Where Good Ideas Come From
as far as you can manage it, you should make sure your psychological centre of gravity is in your real and immediate world – the world of your family and friends and neighborhood, your work and your creative projects, as opposed to the world of presidencies and governments, social forces and global emergencies.
This will make you happier. It will
... See more“Dunbar’s number” is a theoretical cognitive limit on the number of stable social relationships humans can maintain at one time. According to Robin Dunbar, a British anthropologist, humans have the cognitive capacity to keep track of somewhere around 150 close personal connections. Beyond this limited circle, we start treating people less like
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