Riki Tiki Tavi Returns

The next door neighbor boy just came over and asked if he could play with the rubber snake on my front walk way. When I looked out the door, I realized that he was referring to a baby copper head. Since I appreciated the boy’s courtesy, I said, “Sure, go ahead. But let me know when you’re done.”

If you ever want to catch a copper head, just gently stroke it behind its head. This places the snake in a near trance-like state. Then, when it gently attaches itself to your finger with its mouth hooks, you can, with reciprocal gentility, transfer it to a bottle like the one pictured here. Under no circumstances should you try to sprinkle salt on its tail. This only makes it angry, and it might slither away. No fun with that.

Here are some pictures of me having fun with the snake.




If you can’t make out the details of the snake in my pictures, here is a link to a picture of a juvenile copper head with its tell-tale yellow tail.

PS. If anyone has a home remedy for the spontaneous swelling of one’s hand, please let me know. Mine is bigger than a softball and turning blue. Hmmm.

When Green Means "What does that mean?"

My friend George P. Burdell, a man of profound insight, recently pointed me to Dr. Bissantz's article, "Can we steer banks like cars?", at Bissantz's blog: Me, myself, and BI.

After reading the article, I called my friend, George, and exclaimed, "Wow! I didn't even know banks had to obey traffic signals."

There was a long pause, and then a sigh.

George said, "Here's what I thought was the key take away: 'People who deliver green lights instead of the underlying numbers have made a decision instead of supporting the decision-making process.' You ought to think about that. That's worth generalizing into a decision support visualization principle, something like: 'Your data visualization should inform and support the decision process; it should not make the decision.'"

So I thought about it for a awhile. I called George back the next day.

"It seems to me that the problem decision support systems are trying to solve is this: How do you support a decision without forcing the decision maker to understand too deeply the model used to support the decision making? 'Green light' is obviously too high level… at the same time, we can’t expect someone to be an expert in quantitative analysis to use the models we develop for them, or our services won’t be useful in the first place. So, I’m curious, how do we decide where to draw the line between providing raw data and digesting it for the user?"

George responded, "Actually, green light/red light dash boards simply communicate a state of affairs against a predetermined preferential threshold. They are not just data digestions but interpretations as well. Unfortunately, the way most of them work, a system could run just under the line of a threshold and indicate 'good' when it is actually very close to a 'bad' situation. This is why Dr. Bissantz says the machine is doing the deciding. You might could argue that another light could be added (i.e., yellow) that suggested that one was approaching the threshold. However, I would say that the machine is still being given the role of human interpreter against a predetermined bias."

"So what should we do?" I asked George. "Don't managers want simple, quick answers so they can run their business on autopilot and go play golf?"

"Oh heavens! I hope not. The way around this is to provide analyses that do digest the raw data without imposing judgments through such icons such as green light or red light, go or no go, good or bad. We should simply report the digested form in such a way that quick, yet deep, insight can be gained and lead one to more questions. An example of such data digestion might be a risk profile or a tornado plot. They don’t make judgments about the state of things, they merely inform with data digested from the models."

And that seems smart to me.

The next time your dashboards indicate "green," you might want to ask what that really means.

I can vouch for that

When I mentioned my failing approbation for a school voucher system, my friendly free market pedagogue, George P. Burdell, said, "Have you gone all commie on me? I thought the voucher system was free market?" Unfortunately, I think it still lets Uncle Karl in the back door.

Now, lest anyone doubt it, I am all for free market education and an end to the government monopoly of our educational system. So, in general, I agree with the author's contention for less government intrusion in the lives of parents and their children. But before you get all supercilious on me, too, read this article: Are you smarter than a homeschooler?

Then read the linked article again: School voucher system has its benefits

I found this comment in the second article a little troubling: "Home-schoolers may not receive full funding, but instead a tax credit. Still, with more choice, there may be less need for home-schooling."

The assumption seems to be that parents chose home-schooling simply because of lack of quality and choice in government schools. But the mounting evidence is that home-schooling actually provides a superior education, not to mention the many other familial benefits. Why would anyone want to curtail the obvious successes of that? A voucher system may actually contribute more to the disintegration of the family by promoting less time with one's children.

Furthermore, if a voucher system went into place, and home-schoolers received a tax credit within that system, who's to say that the credit wouldn't be dependent on the home-schooling family conforming to the imposed government standards of education? The standards still represent the imposition of government regulation and the attendant propaganda, which will be present in any voucher supported school system. The voucher system simply makes the transmission of government propaganda more efficient.

Finally, until the financing of a voucher system is based entirely on the level of consumption of educational resources used by each family (i.e., each family pays for each of it's children and only its children) instead of the current method of taxing wealth, the voucher system will still represent a wealth redistribution program. Free education for all regulated by the government is still the 10th Plank of Communism [II -- PROLETARIANS AND COMMUNISTS].

Let's just get government out of education all together. Now I can vouch for that.

Machismo when the party gets loud

Now this was fascinating: "Subjects who made incorrect decisions under "noisy" conditions tended to have extremely high confidence that their decisions were right. They were far more confident than the subjects dealing with a noncluttered image."

Hmmm...so, the "louder" and more confusing it gets, visually speaking, the more machismo shows up at the party.

The original article, "Visual Clutter Causes High-Magnitude Errors," can be found here.

Why I am a Libertarian

Admittedly, I am borrowing someone else's words here, but this idea captured so succinctly why I am a libertarian: I am just naïve enough to believe that the Constitution of the United States was supposed to guarantee and secure the rights of the individual endowed by the Creator, rather than beat into submission any individual who disagrees with the democratic will of the majority.

George P. Burdell's Recommended Reading List

Here’s a short excerpt of my recommended reading list that I frequently suggest to clients and other professionals. Some of the texts don’t necessarily speak directly to day-to-day business, but the applications of them to business are profound in many ways. This list represents some of the most helpful books to my own professional growth as well as the most enjoyable to read. An asterisk marks those I regard most remarkable. I will update this list from time to time.

Biographies
By far, some of the best business books are biographies about the successes and failures of people in diverse arenas.

Theodore Rex
by Edmund Morris

John Adams *
by David McCullough

The Education of Henry Adams *
By Henry Addams

MY BRAIN IS OPEN: The Mathematical Journeys of Paul Erdos
by Bruce Schechter

A Beautiful Mind
By Sylvia Nasar

Incompleteness: The Proof and Paradox of Kurt Godel*
by Rebecca Goldstein

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin *
by Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin: An American Life
by Walter Isaacson

Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War *
by Robert Coram

Decisionmaking
Few people understand that there is a well understood science behind effective decision making. If you learn this methodology, you will always make a good decision. Over time you will increase the likelihood of experiencing desirable outcomes, too.

Decision Traps *
by Dr. J. Edward Russo and Dr. Paul J. H. Schoemaker
Few people have the training they need to make good decisions consistently. Becoming a good decision-maker is like training to be a top athlete: Just as the best coaches use training methods to help athletes develop proper techniques and avoid mistakes, Dr. J. Edward Russo and Dr. Paul J. H. Schoemaker have developed a program that can help you avoid "decision traps" -- the ten common decision-making errors that most people make over and over again. It is extremely well written and simple, yet it is very powerful. The basic concept of the book is: if you want to mess things up, then think this way.

Smart Choices : A Practical Guide to Making Better Decisions*
by John S. Hammond, Ralph L. Keeney, Howard Raiffa
Combining solid research with common sense and practical experience, this user-friendly guide shows readers how to assess deep-seated objectives, create a comprehensive set of alternatives, determine likely consequences, make tradeoffs, and grapple with uncertainty. Not only will readers learn how to make decisions, they will learn how to make the smartest decisions. For anyone caught at a confusing crossroad–whether you’re choosing between mutual funds or deciding where to retire–the Smart Choices program will improve your decision-making abilities immediately, and make your life more rewarding and fulfilling. Look for other works by the authors. They are some of the thought leaders in DA. This book is DA 101, but I use it as a reference all the time. I also use it as a primer with people making personal decisions. Introduces a little math, but nothing complex.

Value-Focused Thinking: A Path to Creative Decisionmaking*
by Ralph L. Keeney
This book is a little more in-depth than Smart Choices. It’s basic idea is that every decision should be framed in part by goals and values of the stakeholders involved. Everything by this guy is worth reading. The material is important and profound, but his writing is clear, lucid, and free of jargon. Keeney gets into some mathematics that may scare some people off, but it is no more than algebra. For the most part, you can even skip the chapters that deal with math.

Making Hard Decisions: An Introduction to Decision Analysis (2nd Ed.)
by Robert T. Clemen
This best-selling and up-to-date survey of decision analysis concepts and techniques is accessible to a wide range of backgrounds. This is the Pentateuch of decision analysis. You must read this before you can enter the Temple.

Introduction to Decision Analysis (2nd Edition)
by David C. Skinner
David Skinner shares the wealth of his experience and expertise about decision making in a clear, practical way. This book is an excellent resource for managers, technical professionals, and decision analysts, regardless of your experience level with decision analysis. It tells you how you make the theory practical in collaborative decision-making environments.

Why Can't You Just Give Me The Number? An Executive's Guide to Using Probabilistic Thinking to Manage Risk and to Make Better Decisions
by Patrick Leach
An excellent book to give to your boss to explain why probabilistic reasoning is so important and powerful for generating deep insights and creative solutions.

Organizational Learning and Management
How to learn and lead within any organization is one of the keys to personal and professional success.

Overcoming Organizational Defenses: Facilitating Organizational Learning
by Chris Argyris

Flawed Advice and the Management Trap: How Managers Can Know When They're Getting Good Advice and When They're Not
by Chris Argyris

Reasons and Rationalizations: The Limits to Organizational Knowledge
by Chris Argyris

The Trusted Advisor
By David Maister

Economics & Economic History
We live in an economic universe: unlimited demands on limited supply. It’s good to think about how best to allocate resources to achieve one’s goals. It’s also good to know how people can destroy good economic practice, especially through good intentions.

The Wealth of Nations
Adam Smith

Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy
by Joseph A. Schumpeter

The Road to Serfdom (Fiftieth Anniversary Edition) *
by F. A. Hayek and Milton Friedman

Free to Choose *
by Milton Friedman and Rose Friedman

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything
by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, New Edition
by Jared Diamond

Against the Gods: The Remarkable Story of Risk
by Peter L. Bernstein

Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets *
by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Armchair Economist: Economics And Everyday Experience
by Steven E. Landsburg

Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life
by David D. Friedman

Basic Economics: A Citizens Guide to the Economy, Revised and Expanded *
by Thomas Sowell

Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One *
by Thomas Sowell

The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism *
By Michael Novak

The Long Tail
by Chris Anderson

Analysis for Financial Management
by Robert C. Higgins

Strategy Theory
If you don’t know where you want to go, how, and why, you probably won’t get there.

Competitive Strategy
by Michael E. Porter
THE Bible on strategy. No other substitute.

Certain To Win: The Strategy Of John Boyd, Applied To Business
by Chet Richards

Ender’s Game *
By Orson Scott Card
This is a science fiction novel, but Card accurately demonstrates in a compelling narrative how maneuver theory works.

Psychology
Understanding how people think and perceive their environment and how this differs among individuals (even in abnormal and pathological ways) is critical to understanding how to work with people in organizations.

An Anthropologist On Mars: Seven Paradoxical Tales
by Oliver Sacks

The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat: And Other Clinical Tales
by Oliver Sacks

Thinking In Pictures: and Other Reports from My Life with Autism
by Temple Grandin

Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode Animal Behavior
by Temple Grandin, Catherine Johnson

The Boids and the Bees

I really thought this was an interesting article.

One thing that struck me about swarm theory is the lack of management hierarchy as an element of the system. That's probably the point. But why have humans derived management by command-and-control and management hierarchy rather than swarm approaches? Conversely, why doesn't a swarm include such a method? What are the benefits of either? The risks and costs? Could it be that dumb humans aren't as smart as ants, bees, and wildebeasts? Are there good reasons that we have developed command hierarchies in our organizations? Or does such a practice represent foolish consistency and social inertia? Might there be some conditions where one approach is more beneficial than the other, but we've failed to be flexible enough to recognize the differences in conditions that would prescribe one approach to prevail over another?

Part of the reason for such a lack of management hierarchy may be that the swarm focuses on relatively few well-defined activities: gathering food, securing and maintaining shelter, protecting the hive, and reproducing. So it’s not that hard to insure that each individual “knows” exactly what its task is. Secondly, the task assignments are probably hardwired in some way (whether determined by genetics or assigned during the development phases of the young. Alligators predetermine the gender of their offspring by controlling the temperature of their eggs, so it wouldn’t surprise me that bees and ants can determine the task assignment of their offspring by controlling temp, food content, etc.), so there is very little ambiguity about the nature and purpose of each task and the vital reason it needs to be done. Since humans largely join companies primarily to earn a living, the goals of their organization are largely secondary to them. Most people aren’t genetically predisposed to work in a given company. They may even switch frequently among employers. In the minds of the individuals, the survival of the firm or human species isn’t dependent on the actions of the individual, and individuals often overlay their agenda with the agenda of their employing organization, confusing the two. Hardwiring the agenda goes a long way to avoid this ambiguity of purpose.

My initial reaction to the truck-to-ant analogy was that such an analogy is a false one. It seemed to me that the trucking company really just identified the right objective function (minimize cost, not minimize distance traveled) and acted accordingly. Maybe there is more to the swarm theory employed by the trucking company than revealed (or even understood) by the writer. In more general terms, an ant is an unsophisticated automaton, following a simple rule. The cases described in this article are frequently cases where the simple heuristic of following local price signals works well. This has nothing to do with pheromones, and it is nothing new. It is free (rational) enterprise, and its philosophical basis and empirical success are well established in the literature. I'm more inclined to see the telecommunications analogy.

It was the bees’ heuristics I more thought about as related to my own work in decision analysis. In fact, I wrote back to the friend of mine who alerted me to the article and noted that the odd thing about the bees was that they weren’t simple automatons, that they formed an “opinion.” What I found analogous to decision analysis in the example given by the bees was that the bees seek a diversity of options, allow the options to compete against some objective function, and then use some mechanism to narrow the choices. I don't think that the history of decision analysis includes consideration of swarm behavior as its inspiration. Rather, I think rational human intelligence discovered a means for solving uncertain, resource constrained problems through rational thought and experimentation, and nature converged on a similar solution through evolutionary means.

Of course, what is missing from the swarm approach is the means by which the diverse options are "considered." Unless bees are more sentient than I think they are (...which very well may be the case, but no bees have disclosed the level of their sentience to me yet. Many have indicated that I should leave their nest alone.), it seems that bees find their candidate solutions via trial and error, stimulus and response. But it seems to me that human creativity is a special kind of intelligence that may obviate swarm intelligence. Human creativity seems to be driven in virtual reality; that is, humans seem to create alternate realities for consideration. We can visualize a desired or undesired future, and then derive the mechanisms that facilitate or mitigate that conceived future state, and we can hybridize our original set of considered alternatives. In other words, human intelligence and creativity seem suited for strategic thinking. Swarm "thinking", on the other hand, seems to be the biological analogue to such mathematical processes as Metropolis and genetic algorithms, a means to solve well-defined yet mathematically intractable and computationally huge problems. If the situation is more ambiguous, such an approach may be quite brittle.

The closest example I know of a company that implements a hybrid of both approaches to solving problems is Oticon, a Danish company that makes hearing aids. The management team takes pride in its minimal interference with the actions of the work force. Teams are self-forming and self-dissolving. If a technical employee has an idea that he thinks is worth pursuing, it’s up to him to convince his co-workers to join the effort. If he can, the team is formed. If he can’t, then the consensus is that the idea isn’t currently a good one. At any given moment, a typical employee will be on several different teams, each at a different stage of the overall development process. The management team also takes pride in maintaining a certain level of chaos in the office. No one has an assigned office, employees keep nearly all of their information electronically on laptops, and most furniture is on wheels – all to encourage dynamic grouping and re-grouping. Getting back to my original questions, this is more than slightly different from the typical command-and-control attitude of many American management teams. The real questions in my mind are:

• does such a "swarm" approach to management actually provide higher returns than the alternatives


• under which conditions does one approach work better than others?


• in what ways might aspects of command-and-control hybridize with "swarm" approaches to produce even better results?
  

It looks like I have more reading to do here

Oticon: unorthodox project-based management and careers in a "spaghetti organization"

and here

Swarm Intelligence: A Whole New Way to Think About Business.

The one last thing that I thought was interesting about the article was that the author tried to attach swarm theory to altruism in the end rather than the obvious: free market capitalism. I wonder why? The Wealth of Nations describes how capitalism benefits everyone in almost the same language as that used to describe swarm theory many years before swarm theory was ever conceived; i.e., individuals acting in their own local self-interests ultimately provide what the global market wants, increasing the value experienced by everyone.

The Necessity of the Electoral College

In preparation for the celebration of Independence Day, in which Americans (should) recall the sacrifices endured to create a homeland free from tyranny, I thought I would share a short meditation by George P. Burdell, visiting Constitutional Law Scholar, on the nature of the Electoral College and how it was designed to guard against political tyranny.

I recently overheard a frustrated and disappointed pundit cry in the wake of post 2004 election blues: "If the guy who got the most votes doesn't win, then IT ISN'T DEMOCRACY!"

How perspicacious of him. America never was, nor should it ever be, a democracy. America is a Federal Republic (US Constitution, ARTICLE IV, Section 4), a hybrid of democracy and monarchy, but not a strict representation of either. A Federal Republic retains the best elements of democracy and monarchy while disposing of their respective worst elements. Since a discussion of monarchy is not in context here, it will be pointed out exclusively that democracy itself is not so desirable. In fact, a strict democracy would never be palliative even for those who feel like their vote was cancelled by an electoral college counter swing for this simple reason: at some point, a popular vote may take place that by a simple majority installs a president with legislative intentions that is "harmful" to the desires of those who would now eradicate the electoral college. The electoral college was put into place to limit the power of simple majorities with minority concerns; i.e. special interest agendas. Special interest agendas, by definition, never accurately reflect the will of the people with such consensus that stability and order is maintained.

The US is a confederation of states, not a homogenous political body. These states are held together by a federal constitution "...to establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense (i.e., the general defense), promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity..." However, each state has different resources (or lack of them), different populations, different economic concerns, and different social values. Yes, we are unified, but as a federal integration of differential units. I don't care that the president ever visit my state in a campaign bid. But I do care that the president accurately represents my constitutional rights to the benefit of everyone. Currently, the best expression of the popular intent is at the state level. Here the popular will of the people is appropriately heard, addressed, and reflected by the peculiar concerns of the people in their respective states. In presidential elections, this occurs with the electoral college "all or nothing" format. If it occurs that the will of Californians is commensurate with the will of Georgians, then that will is best known by the electoral college. Otherwise, why would Georgians (or even smaller states) desire to relinquish their concerns to the will of a body politic 2500 miles away with a different economy and differnet values? When each state has equal populations with equivalent economies and social values then an aggregate popular vote will begin to make sense. Otherwise, the only rational place for the national aggregate will of the people to be expressed is in the market place. It is here that all people can act in a self-determined manner to establish the prices for goods and services, respond to supply and demand, and achieve personal wealth.

The President is elected to represent the rights of ALL Americans (not simple majorities of them), to promote legislation to the Congress to further the general welfare of our country, to endorse or veto congressional legislation, and to be the Commander in Chief of our military that provides for the common defense. The electoral college ensures that the president who is elected most likely represents and understands the largest concerns of the country as opposed to the specialized and local concerns of a simple majority contained in only the most populated centers of our country. In other words, the electoral college actually ensures that, more often than not, the elected president fulfills the requirements of our constitution more generally than a president who wins 51% of the popular vote. Consequently, the president is not elected to represent the aggregate will of the people, but the will of the people in their respective differential states. In this line of reasoning, it is Bush who won the largest number of states, and thus represents the broader will of the people. In actuality, neither candidate won a simple majority since by now, the actual popular vote is split approximately 49% to 49%. Hardly an aggregate popular mandate for either candidate. In fact, Bill Clinton won even less popular vote, and he was elected into office by 42% of the popular vote cast. Again, hardly an aggregate popular mandate for him as president, but a decisive mandate from the electoral college.

From James Madison in the Federalist Paper No. 10: "Measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority." The constitutional framers were astute students of political power. Consequently, they wrote the constitution with the idea that legislative deadlock should be the norm more often than swift legislative action. To accurately represent the real needs, concerns, and trade-offs of a large population of people requires ponderous rationality and discretion. The electoral college is part of this system of graded powers that prevents majority whim to enact changes that affect significant populations with less than majority influence. Our republic has lasted as long as it has, in part, precisely due to the annealing effect of the balance of graded powers. To change this now, particularly as information and MISINFORMATION are transmitted so effortlessly now, would be national suicide. Instability would become the norm rather than the stability that has been our nation's halmark. In other words, we need the electoral college and representative government now more than ever, not the opposite.

But let the exponents of the eradication of the electoral college be consistent in their desire for a pure democracy, if such a will truly exists. If they are going to decry the electoral college as anti-democratic, why don't they go the full measure and denounce the executive and representative legislative branches as being undemocratic also? Afterall, the various bills placed before both houses of Congress are never assessed and approved by the direct will of the people but by representative proxy. And what about Constitutional interpretation? Why have a judicial branch at all? After all, in a pure democracy, the will of the people should directly determine the appropriateness of legislation and the meaning of laws. Maybe the guilt or innocence of alleged criminals should be determined by national will as well. We could eradicate all branches of government and replace them with daily referendums. But we can see where this goes. One day, one law would be passed, and shortly thereafter another law would overturn it. All it would take is a simple majority in a pure democracy to introduce a yearly (if not monthly) switching dominance of one whim over another. This is the tyranny and quagmire of simple majorities that pure democracies introduce and that our founding fathers so rightly avoided by establishing a federal republic that includes the electoral college.

Jonah's whale of an idea

Jonah Goldberg gets it quite right.

And don't forget JFK assassins!

The fact of the matter is, this cartoon applies not only to conspiratorialists, but also to anyone who selectively applies data to suport a pet theory, not just young earth creationists, but atheist secularists, anthropogenic global warming-ists, etc.

We all have pet theories or mental models about the world in which causation is often ambiguous. I wonder, though -- is the goal for a good thinker to be right as much as being open to understanding why one might be wrong? I don't think the two have to be mutually exclusive, but an attitude of humility would seem to dictate that the latter rather than the former takes a higher precedence. It would seem, at least, that the two should exist in some tension.

Rodan the Destroyer and Getting Things Right

The other evening, my friend, George P. Burdell (a man known for his sense of nostalgia), and I were sitting around reminiscing and remiserating our days at Ma Tech. Suddenly, George slapped his knee and whooped.

“Do you remember when you got that B in your aerospace design class for turning in a paper airplane? That took Big Kahunas!”

George just had to bring this up. I turned away, crestfallen, to the setting sun. Nineteen years later, I am still mad about the B.

I began my enginerding career as an Aerospace major (I transferred to Mechanical in my junior year). In the spring quarter or 1987, I took “Introduction to Aerospace” from Rodan the Destroyer.

He was known to fly at supersonic speeds, even at low altitudes.

For the final class project, Prof. Rodan assigned a design project in which we were to use the principles we had learned in his class to develop an airplane that could perform three flight functions:

• fly “straight” across the length of the classroom


• turn a vertical loop in flight


• turn a horizontal loop in flight

The only restriction placed on the design parameters was that to perform the maneuvers, we could only add/remove mass or change the control surfaces of the plane. Those were the only instructions he gave us.

Since this was an introductory class, I didn't know much yet about airplane design. I thought the best way to proceed was to copy the designs of aerobatic planes and scale them to a hand-held size. I used balsa wood and card board. Nothing worked. I considered stealing the Tech Tower “T” just to vent my frustration.



Then I remembered a delta wing paper airplane I was fond of making as a kid. It would do all kinds of aerobatics just by modifying the wing surface with flaps cut into the trailing edge of the wings. If the flaps were both turned up, the plane would do a vertical loop. If the flaps were turned in opposite directions, it would turn in a horizontal loop when thrust with a quick flick to the left. I was just about there. All I needed was to get the plane to fly straight for about 50 feet. But the plane was too unstable. It seemed unwilling to respond to any control surface modifications I made to achieve the final requirement.



George P. Burdell, a man known for his flights of fancy, offered brilliant advice. “Why don't you add mass to it. Maybe the added momentum will overcome the slight pressure changes that force the light plane to turn.” By taping a penny in the forward section of the airplane, the plane flew with stability in a straight path of just about the length I needed. A little practice got this right. Now all design criteria were met. The plane that did exactly what Prof. Rodan had ordered.



The due date of the project finally arrived. Everyone else showed up in class with the kind of things you would expect NASA engineers to design. Balsa wood monstrosities. Gleaming shellac. Rubber band powered motors. I swear, one student's plane had jet engines made from small aerosol cans. I felt like the one Cub Scout at the Pinewood Derby whose dad didn't make his car. Did these kids' parents work for JPL?

But then the test came. No one's plane could perform according to the design criteria. They were just too big and too bulky to fly within the confines of the Guggenheim classroom on Cherry Street. No one's plane, except mine, that is, would perform as specified. I felt victorious. My little paper airplane ruled the roost.

But then a cry went up from the masses. “We have to fly our planes outside!” The class teetered on the verge of mutiny. Rodan gave in. We went outside. Paper airplanes don't fly well in the brisk spring winds of Georgia.

When I received my grade for the project, Prof. Rodan had assigned me a D.

A D! I went to argue my case. “You said our airplanes had to perform the three flight function in the classroom. My airplane was the only one that would do that.”

“Yes, but I wanted something more substantial than a paper airplane.” Prof. Rodan expelled his uranium ignited nuclear breath.

“But you didn't say that. Your only criteria was that the plane fly the three functions in the classroom. My airplane alone did that. Everyone else deserves a D.”

My atomic shield had worked. Rodan again gave in and moved my grade to a B. I was nonplussed, though, because I believed then, as I do now, that I deserved an A.

Now, I don't usually assume to know people's motivations, but the cynical side of me suggests that Prof. Rodan wanted his students to reflect his brilliance as a teacher. When I'm less cynical, I think he just wanted to see something snazzy. But he certainly couldn't state either preference, likely for several reasons.

“It sounds like you learned a valuable lesson about design, especially design for clients,” quipped George.

By now you have probably guessed the problem: Prof. Rodan had a hidden, unstated preference. Simple requirements analysis won't uncover those. Often times, clients haven't even considered what is motivating them to seek a solution or satisfy a desire in the first place. They are simply responding to a burr in their saddle or a bee in their bonnet with a limited set of easily accessible alternatives. Such ambiguity is the bugaboo of planning, design, or problem solving opportunities. Even if one satisfies every client-specified design criteria, the client may still express disappointment and frustration that the real problem hasn't been addressed according to the underlying preferences. And if you have ever been the consultant or engineer trying to help in such a situation, you were likely completely caught off guard. After all, you did exactly what the client asked. The problem is, you brilliantly solved precisely the wrong problem. [Editor's note: In a recent client engagement, I was told that another consultant was released, in part, because he provided what the client asked for, just not what the client wanted. I felt very bad for this fellow.]

And things were likely worse if you went beyond the client's expectations by providing more bells and whistles. Design scope creep simply solves the wrong problem with greater flourish.

What do you do? Shouldn't you solve the problem as the client asks? Shouldn't you always do more than the client expects?

The answer requires two things from you. First, you have to give up any notion that you are the expert. You may be the expert in your design field, but you are not the expert in your clients' preferences. Only the client has such expertise, but it may take some clever facilitation to draw it out. Second, you must help transform your client into a values-based decision making organization. What this entails is digging and prodding to find out what really matters most, to uncover the primary objective and all its supporting means objectives. Once this hierarchy of values has been resolved, you can work with your client to be much more creative about the alternatives that can be exercised to achieve the real goal.

A few other benefits arise as well from this process. Once the primary objective has been clarified, you can know exactly how to measure success with little or no ambiguity. Also, once you understand how the means objectives relate to support the primary objective, you can begin to gain insights into how trade-offs may have to be managed. But most importantly, your client will begin to see you as a trusted advisor who does much more than simply react to requests for proposals. You will be seen as a person who has a vested interest in the client's success. And that makes everyone happy in the end.

I eventually left aerospace engineering for the highly lucrative career of secondary education (which I eventually left for med school, then engineering again, and finally the exciting field of hot dog sales). But Prof. Rodan taught me a valuable lesson about serving my clients even if I learned nothing about airplane design. Today, my clients are happier for it, especially when they fly.

Editor's Note: to learn more about values-focused thinking, read Ralph Keeney's book,

Value-Focused Thinking: A Path to Creative Decisionmaking.

I highly recommend it.

Why we home-school FAQ

Not long after the birth of our first child, some good friends of ours began home-schooling their oldest school-aged child. Before long, the results were obvious. Their child began to excel at a rate beyond her peers. Some of it was due to here innate abilities, but we just could help but believe how much of it was due to the focused and customized attention her parents were able to focus on their child based on the child's abilities and interests. Based on my own experience as a student in the government school system and as a teacher in a private school, I knew that home-schooling was the most natural solution to the problems I had observed and pondered over the last 20 years of my life.

When we considered the nation-wide failure to deliver quality education represented by the massive social works programs of government school systems in our country, and that government-hampered competition has not yet produced many private systems that are both affordable and provide remarkable quality (although this is now rapidly changing with the emergence of University Model Schools), home-schooling became the apparent practical and economic solution to our desires and needs for our children.

Essentially, we home-school our children because we believe that no one else other than the parents of our children (that's us) comprehensively know what our children need and respond to best.

The following represent a few questions we have received over the years and how we respond to them.

How will your children learn socialization if they aren't around other children?
First of all, you are assuming that we have isolated our children from other children. That is not the case. Our children participate in church activities, local sports, and scouts. In addition, we have next-door neighbors who have children, and they play with them regularly. Childhood is a beautiful time of life, and we believe that children should play often with other children.

However, we do not believe that children should learn their life skills nearly exclusively and largely from other children. Traditionally educated children do learn their life skills by being associated with other children for the largest part of their waking day. Rather we believe that the purpose of childhood is to learn to be a successful and contributing adult. The best place to learn the skills required to be such an adult is in the presence of successful and contributing adults. In other words, we believe that children should learn their socialization skills from adults first and from children second. The best way for them to do this is to spend the largest part of their time with the adults who have a vested interest in their personal well-being and development. Children are not concerned about the development of other children nor do they have the life skills to know what are ultimately in the long term interests of other children. Only adults have such experience and skill.

Why don't you trust the public school system?
If I sent my children to a parochial or other religiously affiliated school, I would expect that the world-view of the body that organized the school to inculcate their values in their students. Education naturally entails a transmission of values. It is not value neutral. We personally do not agree with the values (or lack of them) being transmitted in the schools organized by the government. We simply do not trust that people who do not have a personal, vested interest in our children, and yet would have the largest daily influence on their lives, will attempt to inculcate the values we believe are important for our children to understand.

Secondly, most government bureaucracies do not exhibit a high degree of efficiency or accomplishment in achieving the goals that our Constitution established as the appropriate purposes of government. When you consider the overall state of decay in the current government school systems, the question really is: "Why do YOU TRUST the public schools systems?"

Won't your children feel left out if they don't get to participate in a school setting like their friends?
Actually, our children feel a high degree of pride that their parents have made many sacrifices to home-school them and that they are getting probably the best form of education available from the people that love them most. More often than not, they feel sorry for children that go to traditional schools.

Secondly, as a parent, we have to discern what is best for our children regardless of our children's feelings about our decisions. There are many things we withhold from our children that they often want that we believe are not good for them.

I know a family who home-schools, and their children are behind academically. Aren't you afraid that your children will be behind as well?
Currently, our children are performing at or beyond grade levels beyond their peers, depending on the subject. Unless we quit what we're doing or decline in our commitment, it's not likely that they will slow down or get behind.

Also, it is not rational to extrapolate a singular experience to an entire population. This type of thinking is the basis for prejudice and bigotry. Most measurable outcomes, such as academic achievement, generate a distribution of possible outcomes. The family you know may for many reasons simply be falling out on the lower tail of the distribution. There are many reasons that the family you know may not be excelling, and not all families are characterized by such reasons.

Statistically, home-school children outperform their peers in private and public school, in that order. They score higher on standardized tests, perform at higher grade levels for their age, and excel in national contests such as the National Spelling Bee and National Geography Bee. Statistically speaking, then, the desired outcome is on our side.

How long will you home-school?
As long as we feel it is appropriate.

It is important to understand that home-schooling does not necessarily imply sitting around the kitchen table for all learning. Home-schooling simply means that the family is the controlling moral, legal, and economic authority with the responsibility for educating our children. As such, we may opt for tutors and other collaborative educational groups as the need arises.

In October 2007, I took my son, Forrest, on a sailiing trip with a friend down the Atlantic coast. While on our trip, Forrest learned to navigate, take soundings, establish his bearings, and learn to tie knots from Pop. We saw numerous examples of wildlife rarely seen in the north Georgia mountains such as dolphins, sharks, bald eagles, osprey, and alligators. We had some great meals and some that were quite Spartan. We learned to cope, adapt, and make rapid decisions in a quickly changing enviroment. We learned how to suppress the inclination to complain in the face of sea sickness, cold wind, and peanuts for dinner. We realized just how insignificant we were in the grand scale of the sea and sky, and that regardless of how resourceful we were, we were still at the mercy of forces beyond our control. We relied on God to protect us and secure our faith in His grace. Like Odysseus, we recalled how much we love home and looked forward to getting there, enjoyed the friendship of great comrades (Jeff, the captain, and Pop, the first mate), and learned to embrace adventure. This was not schooling in the home, but a life-time enduring education on the high seas. If my son had been in government school, I could have been fined for what would have been an unexcused absence.

Aren't home-schooling families right wing religious nuts?
Many home-schooling families are probably rightly characterized as being religiously and socially conservative. However, many families are socially liberal, atheist, "left wing religious nuts", etc. In short, there are many reasons parents choose to home-school, and the diversity of the social/political/religious make-up of these families is reflected in the diversity of the reasons they choose to home-school. Many of the early families in the home-schooling movement were probably best described as hippies - hardly right wing religious nuts!

How do home-schooled children compare academically to children who go to private school or public schools?
Statistically, they exceed the performance of private and government schooled children.

Can your children get into college? Will they be able to compete once they get there?
Recognizing the superior character and educational accomplishments of many home-school children, many colleges and universities are now actively recruiting home-schooled children to attend their schools. These include Ivy League schools as well. Also, as the prevalence of home-schooling is increasing, many colleges are being established now that recruit only home-schooled children.

All the evidence indicates that home-schooled children continue to excel both in and beyond their college experience.

You were educated in public school. It didn't seem to hurt you.
While I agree that the government schools I attended were not devastating, I do not agree that the experience did not harm me. In government schools, I was under the tutelage of many lackadaisical teachers and administrators, constantly exposed to the disruptive behavior of children who did not receive appropriate guidance from home, and drilled in an academic environment that is considered by most of the industrialized world standards as substandard. In the government schools I was exposed to drugs, violence and sex at age-inappropriate times. The level of involvement and discipline I received from teachers and administrators was minimal and commensurate not so much with people who don't care as much as people who are overwhelmed with an impossible task and did not have a parental level of vested interest in my development and growth.

Would you please buy wrapping paper, candy, etc. to supplement our child’s school’s educational budget?
In addition to the financial burden we have undertaken to personally educate our children, we still pay federal and state taxes to support your child’s school’s budget. We haven’t asked you for additional support. Please do not ask us.

What do you think is the solution to educational reform?
It’s really quite easy. Education should be opened up to the same forces that efficiently deliver housing, transportation, food, clothing, labor, etc. at affordable prices; that is, the free market. The current government monopoly on education effectively masks price transparency through the use of taxes that are not directly associated with the services purchased. Consequently, most people think of government education as essentially free. It isn’t. In order for free market education to produce the same gains we have experienced in practically all other sectors of the economy, we need to open education up to competition through transparent pricing and the profit motive. Let people choose what their children are taught and the manner in which it is delivered without undue meddling from inefficient bureaucracies.

Maybe it isn't your fault after all

My friend, George P. Burdell, a man known for his climatic warmth, suggested that I watch this video:

The Great Global Warming Swindle.

However, if you still need to alleviate your conscience, you can contribute $100 to my Paypal account, and I will contribute a portion to efforts that will offset your carbon footprint. I'm just that nice.

Whatever global warming's cause, If Kiesling's comment in the last post was accurate, Greek anarchy could spread all over an increasingly warm world. Do you comprehend the systematic linkages? Oh, what hath we wrought?

The Greeks Don't Want No Freaks?

This just says it all: "'I think it's easier to be an anarchist in a good climate,' Kiesling suggests."

Wasn't there a famous Greek philosopher who said: "The unexamined life is not worth protesting?"

Pigs in the Schoolhouse: Some are more equal than others

Did you see this article? Why We Banned Legos?

This reminds me of another favorite quote:

The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.
-President John Adams (1797-1801)

Wanting not that anarchy and tyranny should commence, but more importantly wanting not that a good time should not be had by all in an inequitably distributed way, I ventured to ask the authors of this article, Ann Pelo and Kendra Pelojoaquin, a few questions.

Hello Ann,

I read your article Why We Banned Legos? with interest, and I have a few questions for you.

1. Why is the Hilltop school mostly white in its demographic?


2. Should it not actively seek to provide equitable educational resources to other disenfranchised social and cultural groups that aren’t represented by the descendents of white European hegemony?


3. Does Hilltop provide a superior educational experience or is it equitable to the surrounding educational environment?


4. If Hilltop does provide for a superior educational experience, how do you ensure that such experience does not provide an undue privilege or inequitable power distribution to the white kids that get to experience it and consequently put lesser advantaged people to even greater disadvantage to the white Hilltop attendees?


5. If Hilltop does not provide an excellent educational experience beyond the norm, then why provide Hilltop at all except as a day care center, and at that only as a day care center free of charge to disadvantage people if you so believe that resources, such as the ability to provide after school care, should be equitably distributed?


6. Should Hilltop provide its resources free of charge to all who desire to learn from it? Can Hilltop afford to relinquish its tuition so that all can freely learn from it without overcoming the burden of inequitable power and financial resources?


7. Who should pay for Hilltop attendees to attend? Only the powerful, well heeled parents of students who can afford to pay the ~$14,000 annual tuition for preschool?


8. To be fair, I see that you provide assistance to the underprivileged children through subsidy provided by the tax paying citizens of Washington. However, since you obviously have limited resources, and the state only shares enough to pay for approximately half of the $14,000 annual tuition, you limit the number of such subsidized children. Why don’t you provide the other 50%-40% of the tuition so that all can have equitable access to the Hilltop experience? How and why do you prioritize who actually gets in?


9. Do you believe it should be the goal of the Hilltop school to ensure that all graduates of the Hilltop programs have an equitable distribution of talent, intelligence, motivation, and aptitude? How would you theoretically and practically correct the inequitable distribution of talent, intelligence, motivation, and aptitude in the broader community such that people aren’t burdened or threatened by the inequities that often result from the inequitable distribution of talent, intelligence, motivation, and aptitude?

Thank you in advance for your kind reply.

Best regards,
Rob Brown

No response yet. I'll let you know...

To me, this was one of the most telling statements of all: "...class-based, capitalist society — a society that we teachers believe to be unjust and oppressive."

Yet, at nearly $14,000 per year to attend pre-school, the Hilltop Children’s Center ensures that only a certain class of privileged students can attend. Their website clearly states that even with a state-funded subsidy of half the tuition, they are still going to turn away some applicants due to limited space. Hmmm. Price-prioritized application of limited resources. Sounds like capitalism to me. Class-based, capitalist, high society.

So I mentioned this breaking story to my friend, George P. Burdell, a man known for the equitable distribution of his talent, intelligence, motivation, and aptitude. I asked him what he thought. There was a long, thoughtful pause.

"Apparently, at the Hilltop Animal Farm, '...all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.'"

I wonder if Napoleon has been rooting around.

Favorite Quotes

Here are some of my favorite quotes about thinking.

But politics is not about facts. It is about what politicians can get people to believe.
--Thomas Sowell
[Editor's note: I love Thomas Sowell. I keep waiting for him to adopt me.]

It seemed like such a good idea at the time...I thought it would work. I planned everything down to the last detail...As God is my witness, I thought turkey's could fly.
--Mr. Carlson, Station owner, WKRP in Cincinnati, Thanksgiving Turkey Drop episode

Before you go to war, make sure you know how much the other side is willing to lose.
--George "SunTzu" P. Burdell

Every prudent man acts out of knowledge, but a fool exposes his folly.
--Proverbs 13:16

The wisdom of the prudent is to give thought to their ways, but the folly of fools is deception.
--Proverbs 14:8

He who answers before listening-that is his folly and his shame.
--Proverbs 18:13

What luck for rulers that men do not think.
-Adolf Hitler

Failing to think provides an opportunity for unfathomable evil.
--George "Bonhoeffer" P. Burdell

Make yourself sheep and the wolves will eat you.
--Benjamin Franklin

Many disastrous mistakes, in both public and private life, are not due to people thinking stupidly but to their not bothering to think at all. If you don't stop and think, then it doesn't matter whether you are a genius or a moron.
--Thomas Sowell
[Editor's note: Did I mention how much I love Thomas Sowell?]

Good sense is the most equitably distributed of all things because no matter how much or little a person has, everyone feels so abundantly provided with good sense that he feels no desire for more than he already possesses.
--Rene Descartes, Discourse on Method

What evidence would it take to prove your beliefs wrong?
--Steven Dutch, Natural and Applied Sciences, University of Wisconsin - Green Bay

If you're not actively seeking to determine whether or not your beliefs are valid, you can't really claim to be sincere, can you?
--Steven Dutch, Natural and Applied Sciences, University of Wisconsin - Green Bay

It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.
--Jonathan Swift

[what distinguishes a great leader from a regular politician?] ...to concentrate on objectives for long periods without tiring.
--Napoleon Bonaparte

The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.
-- Herbert Spencer

Madeleine Shrugged

Two weeks prior to the submission deadline for the order form, my 8 year old daughter, Madeleine, had not sold ANY Girl Scout Cookies. This was disturbing to me because in the prior two years Madeleine had been among her Brownie troop's top sellers. This year she was off.

Madeleine was ecstatic the first year she sold Girl Scout cookies. The night she received her order form, she ran home and begged me to go with her that very night "...to get a jump on the market." (I kid you not, she said these exact words.) As a dyed-in-the-wool capitalist, I beamed. That's my daughter!

The next year was just as productive as the first, maybe better. In fact, Madeleine "employed" a younger next door neighbor boy to help her with sales. When I asked what that was about, she replied, "I'm not as cute as I was last year. Adam is so cute, people just can't help but buy cookies." I don't make this stuff up. Anyone with kids knows what I mean.

The first year, Madeleine was eager with enthusiasm. The second year, she was optimizing sales. What was wrong this year? Was she bored with commerce? Had she given up on the profit motive? I decided to explore further.

"Madeleine, why haven't you been selling your Girl Scout cookies?"

"Because I'm tired of selling for everyone else," she answered.

"What do you mean?" I pressed.

"Well, the first year we were told that if we sold the most cookies, we would win a prize, but in the end everyone got the same prize. The next year they told us the same thing, but we all got the same prize AGAIN! Even if you sold 1 box of cookies you got the same prize as the people who sold the most. I don't think that's fair."

Wow! From each Brownie according to her ability to every Brownie regardless of their contribution.

I called George P. Burdell, a man known widely for the efficient use of his invisible hand, and asked him what he thought. There was a long, thougtful pause.

"Apparently, incentives do matter. It sounds like Atlas shrugged to me."

Indeed...Madeleine shrugged.


Madeleine achieves economic enlightenment and levitates above the rest.

Are You Doing What They Want?

Before I get started, I'd like to relate to you that I recently asked my friend, George P. Burdell, a man known for holding deep sympathy for mankind in his bosom, if he would consider breast augmentation mamoplasty. Based on the consequential affect of his face, I'd say this question raised a whole series of questions and images in George's mind. Sheepishly he grinned. "Well, yes. I frequently consider breast augmentation. Why do you ask?" I'll explain presently.

Katherine Rosback's article "Crossing the Line: When has Team Building Gone Too Far?" really raises some interesting thoughts that are associated with some things I've been questioning lately, namely about the ethics of participation in culture in general. I'll wait while you read Katherine's article. Would you like another cup of tea?

I began thinking about this while I worked on a project in Japan. It appeared to me that some, maybe many, Japanese folk criticize others for not being Japanese enough. I think it's an example of what is often called "high shame culture." Think about that for a moment. If you have Japanese parents, how can you be any more Japanese? And what leverage could shame provide to further that end? Obviously, in the minds of many Japanese, being Japanese is about more than merely being Japanese. But who determines what being Japanese is all about? The Ministry of Japanese Cultural Conformity? What are the consequences for having your identity stolen in Japan? Is there of necessity and at a minimum a genetic component? Could I be Japanese? Would I want to? Could I choose to? And what if being born to "Japanese" parents, could I refuse to be Japanese? What should the consequences be, if any?

Ironically enough, as I have been thinking about this issue lately, a friend of mine, who is from mainland China, commented that I look Japanese. I told her that I think I am turning Japanese. Hmmm.

But what if we're not talking about the Japanese anymore but the Aztecs? At what point does a person really make a willing offering of themselves to Quetzalcoatl or Tlaloc? I'd be surprised to find out that you aren't as disgusted by ritual human sacrifice as I am. But in so many ways, we all sort of engage in these sacrifices. In some ways, we all place other people on the alters of our cultural identities, whether they asked for it or not. And yet I don't believe that culture is value neutral. I'll take the US over Aztec culture any day, and I'm suspicious of anyone who wouldn't.

Exposure to this made me begin to think that culture is very rarely a free transaction engaged by people who have given due consideration to the exchanges taking place. At some point some of us do grow up and say, "I can't abide by that" or "I willingly choose to participate in these mores" to the things we're aware of. But there are so many subtle requirements that go beyond our awareness oftentimes.

Of course, this makes me think about my own children and the cultural imposition we (my wife and I) make on them in our raising of them, such as the assumptions we make about truths, what's good and bad, what's noble and opprobrious, etc.

Translate this to business cultures. It doesn't take long to recognize that businesses possess a culture. Who determines how that culture is imposed? Is it transactional? Is it governed by the laws of contracts? Should it be?

I know I may be pushing the limits of propriety here, so please take my comments in the, ah, professional, academic vein in which they are being made. A friend's wife recently went through breast augmentation. She now, how shall I say, "sports" a 36DD. She's proud of that. Why? Two other friends have recently done the same thing, though not as extremely. In each case I attempted to ask a few tactful questions about motivation. I was surprised to find out that, at least consciously, the women were not being motivated by the desire to be attractive to other men (after all, they claim they are happily married and emphatically not seeking new significant others). In each case, I observed that the women in our circle of friends and other neighbors were the ones making comments and side commentary, not the men as I probably stereotypically expected.


This woman has had breast augmentation mamoplasty. Why would she do that? Are the results really as fun as they look? Do you feel motivated to get your breasts augmented with mamoplasty?

What I wonder is: do women more than men create the expectations of female culture and the more "outward" expressions of them? In other words, I think we superficially assume that gender roles are imposed by more across-gender dynamics than within-gender dynamics. I observe the same thing in regard to women and their clothing. I'm convinced that women dress for women more often than they do for men. So what's my point and how is it related to this issue of culture? Obviously, there seems to be some assessment of what it means to be a woman from within the ranks of women, and "womanness" seems to be imposed regardless of whether or not the participants in the larger culture signed up for the assessment.

In what ways do the various cultures we participate in motivate us to become what we are not, what we likely would not do otherwise? How does your business, church, garden club, etc., make you consider, metaphorically of course, breast augmentation mamoplasty?

"You are totally bonkers," said George.

Editor's note: After some parallel discussion on this theme some time later than the original post here, a friend of mine, The Damascene, penned the following little quatrain. He has allowed me to share it here.


I have noticed a swelling trend
Among my friends and acquaintances
To fit the part and look the role
Through quite unnatural maintenances

Needle in a Haystack

This reminded me of my earlier post about being a fixed resource. It looks like I'm a needle in my own haystack. Talk about the need to differentiate!

HowManyOfMe.com

There are: 29,348 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

The Definition of Stupid

John Stossel nails it.

Someone has said that CRAZY is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.

I suggest that STUPID is the government school system doing the same thing over and over again knowing that it's NOT going to get a different result.

No, wait.  That would be CORRUPT.