How Do We Create Something Beautiful

There is a school of thought that holds that beauty is subjective and unreal; merely the expression of one person’s preference over another. Whilst fashionable, this is contradicted by philosophy, science, and more importantly by the experience and good sense of ordinary people.  Places, buildings, items, creatures; all of them are capable of holding this […]

Have you been taught the wrong way to think?

As some of you may have heard, humanities education is in something of a crisis. University enrolment in such subjects is in free fall, and many are now questioning what the point of studying literature, philosophy, history, etc. is, in comparison to practical STEM disciplines. This topic may seem outside of our purview here, but […]

The danger of knowing too much

Consider the following paradox: The more news you consume, the more ignorant you may become. How can this be true?  After all, clearly the person who reads the paper regularly, watches a 24 hour news channel, devours current affairs podcasts, and spends hours on Twitter will end up knowing an awful lot of stuff.  Certainly […]

How To Take Your Thinking To A New Level – Literally

The yin-yang symbol has become a bit of a cliche. These days it’s probably more likely to bring to mind a lower back tattoo than timeless wisdom, which is too bad, because its message is extremely relevant to our contemporary struggles. It also reveals a method of thinking which is central to strategic wisdom, and […]

How To Use Writing To Solve Problems

I have written before that if you want to have a successful newsletter, you’d better be happy with firing off 500 mails to absolutely nobody – because in order to get there, that’s exactly where you’ll have to start. Fortunately, things haven’t been quite that bad in my case; I’m a long way from 500 […]

Appreciating scale – what to do with things you can’t control

There is a quote you may have heard which goes something like: “I am a libertarian at the federal level, Republican at the state level, Democrat at the local level, a socialist with my friends and family, and a communist with my dog”. The idea is designed to reveal the fatuousness of political labels, but when […]

Be what your customers are not

Occasionally I’ve seen it noted that the more normal, safe, and suburban someone’s life, the more gruesome and unpleasant the novels they like to read. There’s a great line in the sitcom Peep Show where socially awkward Mark thinks to himself: “Look at me; I’ve got a girlfriend. A proper girlfriend reading a best-seller about […]

If in doubt just be weird

A rotting lion carcass, being devoured by bees. I was surprised to learn the other day that this is what is depicted on the logo of Lyle’s Golden Syrup.  Not exactly what most would consider appetising, but it does have a certain logic to it.  The origin lies in the Biblical tale of Samson, who […]

How to maximise success through asymmetric bets

We live under the illusion of control. We believe that we design our lives, we design our companies, we design culture, and we design human civilisation itself.  The way we do this, according to the belief, is that we analyse the situation, make a plan, and then execute it – and in doing so create […]

Originality Is Overrated

A couple of years ago I heard an executive from Quorn speak at a conference. Normally talks like these are just boring propaganda pieces, but his was usually thoughtful and candid.  One point he made that stuck with me was that whilst people, in general, are eating less meat, pure veganism isn’t actually growing.  Quite […]