Author: Роман Петров — 786
While the Task Is Young
A new task contains more information than it looks like it does. We still remember the conversation, we understand the context, we know where the materials are, and we can…
Insure the unbearable
Insurance is especially useful where an event is unlikely but its consequences cannot be paid for calmly. A house fire, heavy liability towards a third party or large medical bills…
The Information Diet
News, television and social networks do not contain “nothing important at all”. Through them people learn about wars, laws, epidemics, work, culture and the lives of their friends. The problem…
Do Not Educate Strangers
Everyday morality demands that you answer rudeness so that the offender does not “get used to it.” That turns a chance encounter into an educational project for which nobody issued…
The size of the container
Work knows how to fill the time allotted to it. Cyril Northcote Parkinson published his formula about work expanding to fill the time available for it in 1955 as a…
Fraud Without Shame
The public stereotype explains fraud by the victim’s greed and stupidity. In fact scammers use fear, love, urgency, authority and the wish to help — qualities that are not vices…
The Second Life of Things
A new thing is at its most expensive at the moment it stops being new. After the first unboxing, the first trip or the first scratch, a large part of…
People on Autopilot
Most everyday behaviour is automatic. People repeat familiar phrases, ask questions without being ready to hear the answer, and defend an opinion that formed before the arguments did. This does…
Sex and Mismatched Desire
Sex is the biggest nothing of all time. — Andy Warhol Long relationships rarely argue about whether sex is needed at all. The argument usually starts with the calendar. One…
Swimming in water
Educational culture sometimes behaves as if it were enough to read the right book and understand the right formula. Knowledge really can be got from a text; skill appears only…
The Invisible Shore
The hardest thing to take into account is not what we do not know but what we do not suspect exists. A person sees the boundary of his own knowledge…
Plan B does not invite disaster
Superstitious common sense sometimes treats preparing for a bad scenario as a sign of distrust or a way to “tempt fate”. A backup, a first aid kit and a second…
Money Between People
Money is good at turning vagueness into resentment. A borrowed sum means temporary help to one person, a gift to another and a test of friendship to a third. All…
Money and the Household Economy
Having money isn’t as good as not having it is bad. — A Jewish proverb At the start of living together, the money question is often settled with one nice…
Appearance Without a Verdict
Society is happy to make appearance both a personal duty and grounds for a verdict. A person is invited to “be themselves”, and then their clothes, body and grooming are…
Simple comes after complex
Society likes simple answers and particularly likes calling them a mark of genius. “Everything great is simple” sounds best once somebody else has done the difficult work. A good explanation…
Don’t Burn Bridges for Motivation
Irreversibility sometimes creates resolve. That is exactly why people quit before looking for a new job, put all their money into a project or publicly promise a result. Once the…
Debt Buys the Future
Debt lets you use tomorrow’s money today. That can be sensible. Education raises income. Equipment starts turning a profit. Housing gives stability. A short-term loan covers a cash gap. At…
Power and the Cost of Leaving
Whoever can do without the other is the stronger one. — Folk wisdom One partner says: “If you don’t like it, leave.” The line looks emotional, but its force is…
Your partner’s parents
Meeting your partner’s family isn’t a competition for approval. It is a mutual gathering of information. The family shows you: which ways of having a conflict count as normal, how…