Even science needs its beauty to attract the scientist

From Henri Poincare:

Le savant n'étudie pas la nature parce que cela est utile; il l'étudie parce qu'il y prend plaisir et il y prend plaisir parce qu'elle est BELLE.

The scientist does not study nature because it is useful to do so. He studies it because he takes pleasure in it, and he takes pleasure in it because it is BEAUTIFUL.

C'est par la logique qu'on démontre, c'est par l'intuition qu'on invente.
It is by logic that we prove, but by intuition that we discover.
To know how to criticize is good, to know how to create is better.

--drawin,invitingandmaketheywantmore--

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

By Rusty Lindquist

Note: I’m going to be referring to Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs in a number of upcoming posts about goal-setting, education, career advancement, as well as business and marketing, and wanted to first lay the groundwork by a post dedicated to simply understanding this motivational framework.

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It’s 1943, and Dr. Abraham Maslow just wrote an article entitled “A Theory of Human Motivation”. It would become one of the pivotal frameworks for understanding individual motivation and happiness.

The article appeared in Psychological Review. It was an expanse of his book “Toward a Psychology of Being”, and later culminated in his book “Motivation and Personality”, in which it became known formally as “Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs”.

Maslow’s motivation theory was that we are motivated by a series of needs, which can be segmented into the following categories.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Layer 1: Physiological Needs

These are the literal requirements for survival. The basest and most fundamental of needs, without which, the body itself begins to fail to function.

These consist of things like breathing, food, water, sleep, homeostasis, and excretion.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Layer 2: Safety Needs

If these needs are unmet, they tend to be the primary motivations for our behavior. We have a strong desire to feel security, balance, and equilibrium in our environment, often as measured by things like security of body, of employment, of resources, or morality, of family, of health, and of property.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Layer 3: Love and Belonging

For the first time the needs extend beyond the individual to encompass their social network. We have a strong urge to be connected, to belong, to socialize, and to feel wanted and loved. These needs consist primarily of friendship, intimacy, and love.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Layer 4: Esteem

Stemming from our need to associate with others, rises the need to feel accepted, appreciated, and respected. If we get this kind of feedback, it fulfills our need for a positive self-esteem, develops confidence, and respect of self.

We want to feel valued, self valued and valued by others. If we don’t, we tend to develop an inferiority complex, we doubt ourselves, lose faith and confidence, which can have a dramatically negative effect on our ability to accomplish things that are meaningful.

Maslow actually separated esteem needs into two sub-groups. The first, lower consisted of the need for attention, recognition, status, fame, and prestige. The higher sub-group is the need for self-respect, strength, competence, mastery, self-confidence, independence, and freedom.

He distinguishes between these two sub-groups, because often individuals may end up receiving attention, recognition, prestige, etc., but until their internal view of themselves changes, the higher-subset of needs remains unchanged and unmet.

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Layer 5: Self-Actualization

Self-Actualization refers to the ability of a person to reach their full potential. Interestingly, your vision of your potential changes as you move through this level. The more you do, the more you reinforce your appreciation of your capabilities, leading you to reach ever higher, setting larger and larger goals, and accomplishing more and more. This state of being is where the highest levels of fulfillment and individual happiness are achieved.

While there are some critics of this model, it seems to have largely withstood the test of time. Much of the criticism is focused around Maslow’s suggested hierarchy, with others claiming that these needs exist and operate independently of each other, rather than being associated hierarchically as suggested.

Regardless, Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs provides an interest foundation and intellectual framework we can use to discuss development, not only of the individual, but of teams, families, and whole companies as well.

life-engineering.com

“I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.” —Mark Twain

UnCollege is a social movement changing the notion that going to college is the only path to success.

Are you a swashbuckler, autodidact, creator, entrepreneur, sojourner, or polymath? You should join the UnCollege movement!

Fifty percent of the world’s population is under thirty: you must differentiate yourself to succeed. With 70.1% of high school graduates going to college, a college degree no longer guarantees success.

College shouldn’t be the only path to success — you can create your education by leveraging the resources of the world around you.

Why should you join the UnCollege movement?

• College lacks academic rigor.
• 22% of college grads under 25 are working jobs that do not require a degree
• A college degree ≠ success.
• Creativity is the No. 1 “leadership competency.”
• Self-directed learners outperform traditional students (86th percentile to 50th).

You should join the UnCollege movement if you

• Hope to hack your education;
• Will be enrolling in college;
• Want to complement your college experience;
• Are past your college years but want to give higher education a second chance;
• Want to be an educational deviant.

UnCollege is founded on three principles:

1. Introspection is essential. It is vitally important that you know yourself before you pursue higher education.

2. Passionate action outweighs school. Real-world success proves more than homework.

3. Self-motivation is requisite for success. Taking initiative is more valuable than completing assignments.

source: uncollege.com

“Nature is my mentor. In my garden, quietly watching with a childlike sense of fantasy, has helped to instill in me a sense of balance and a constant search for perfection, proportion, harmony.” Capucci

Why be normal?

Where cool girls aim for either cuteness or sophistication in their personal style, nerd girls aim for silliness. Cool girls play soccer or basketball; nerd girls play badminton. Cool girls read fashion magazines; nerd girls read novels. Cool girls wear tight T-shirts, and either very tight or very baggy jeans; nerd girls wear shirts and jeans that are neither tight nor extremely baggy. Cool girls wear pastels or dark tones; nerd girls wear bright primary colors. But these practices are specific to individuals; they are engaged in by particular nerd girls, not all of them.

source

Color of Life

Some friends gave special colors, strange colors, normal colors, harsh colors, bright colors, warm colors, ... Daily, weekly, monthly, yearly collecting them in the album called life.

The Meaning Of The Natural World?

The definition of the natural world is, everything that exists on the earth, and in our universe, that is not manufactured or man made. This includes plant life, animal and insect life, soil, rock sand deserts. The mountain ranges and all the different habitats that exist on the earth, and the universe.The seas and the life in them, including all the processes carried out by each species each day to survive and produce the next generation and continue their line.Naturalists, ecologists, marine biologists and others, study these phenomena, daily ,weekly and yearly, to tell us how the environment is evolving, and which species are under threat and should be protected.

The Beat That My Heart Skipped (De battre mon cœur s'est arrêté)

THERE is a good reason that learning to play the piano is generally considered child's play. Not because it is easy but because, on the contrary, it requires years of patient practicing that few adults have time for.

The fingers must be strengthened by hours and hours of exercises - scales, chord progressions and the ubiquitous drills designed by the French composer Charles-Louis Hanon, whose 1873 book, "The Virtuoso Pianist in 60 Exercises," is still the most widely used hand workout in print. There are fingering patterns to memorize, sounds to recognize, motor skills linking the brain and the body that can be refined only by continuous repetition. Right?

Right - unless you are a movie star, in which case a combination of camera tricks and extraordinary training techniques can take you from "Chopsticks" to Chopin over the course of a few weeks. Like gaining 80 pounds for a role, feigning piano virtuosity is one of those transformations that consistently wins Oscars. From F. Murray Abraham's portrayal of Mozart's sidekick Salieri in "Amadeus" to Geoffrey Rush's of the pianist David Helfgott in "Shine"; from Adrien Brody as Wladyslaw Szpilman in "The Pianist," and Jamie Foxx as Ray Charles in "Ray": the pianist role, when skillfully executed, leaves audiences mesmerized and full of questions.

Is the actor faking it? Are those hand-doubles? Did he really learn how to play? And if he learned, could I learn?

Would-be pianists may find hope - if false hope - in the new French film "The Beat That My Heart Skipped," Jacques Audiard's adaptation of the 1978 James Toback movie, "Fingers," in which Harvey Keitel played a debt collector torn between a life of crime and classical music. In the updated story, Romain Duris plays Thomas Seyr, a 28-year-old Parisian who makes his living running seedy real estate transactions and collecting debts - violently - on behalf of his washed-up dad.

But Thomas, whose dead mother was a famous concert pianist, had shown great promise on the piano as a child. Now, fed up with his brutal life, he schedules an audition with his mother's former agent and hires a Vietnamese immigrant, Miao Lin (played by Linh Dan Pham) to help him relearn the instrument, which he hasn't touched for 10 years.

In real life, meanwhile, Mr. Duris, 31, had a much bigger challenge: to learn an instrument he had never played at all. He followed a well-worn path for film actors: learn to play the piano - actually play, not just pretend to play - even though the audience will hear a professional performance while the actor strikes the right keys on a mute instrument.

Margie Balter, a Los Angeles-based pianist who has been the crash-course coach behind many famous on-screen pianists, explains that this approach is much more popular than using hand-doubles. "The actor needs to feel like a musician," she said. "They need to be able to read some music and understand the mind-set of a musician in order to look realistic."

Ms. Balter, who has been an actor herself, had her first major film-coaching gig with Holly Hunter, for her Academy Award-winning role in "The Piano." (Ms. Hunter was already a skilled pianist but needed brushing up.) Ms. Balter has also worked with Tom Cruise for "Interview With a Vampire," Scarlett Johansson for "The Man Who Wasn't There," Sandra Bullock for "The Net," Barbara Hershey for "The Portrait of a Lady" and, most recently, Paige Hurd and Djimon Honsou for "Beauty Shop."

Such students usually come to Ms. Balter with what she calls "Chopsticks"-level skills, a month or two set aside for daily training, and the charge to master segments of well-known piano works - typically, Beethoven sonatas or Chopin nocturnes - that have been chosen by a film's director or music consultant.

The hardest pieces for nonpianists to learn, Ms. Balter says, are fast pieces with big hand stretches - by Schubert, say, or Liszt. Yet while a two-part invention by Bach may seem straightforward in comparison, it presents its own difficulties. Since the right and left hands move in counterpoint throughout, Ms. Balter says, "it's like splitting your body into two halves." (The alternative to this "split" would be something like a waltz, where the left hand maintains a consistent pattern while the right hand plays a melody.)

For his role in "The Beat That My Heart Skipped," Mr. Duris - like his character, Thomas - labored over Bach's Toccata in E minor (BWV 914), a technically demanding piece that leaves no room for error or approximation.

But Mr. Duris didn't need to look far for a coach. His sister, Caroline Duris, 36, is a professional pianist and piano teacher in Paris. He worried at first that working with his big sister would be too comfortable, that it wouldn't be intimidating enough to make him practice.

"But I love her perceptions about music so much," he said, "and I realized that being a good student with her would be a question of the family's honor."

Ms. Duris did more than teach her brother; she played the music heard throughout the film. And an accidental moment of frustration that was captured during one of her recording sessions, in which she complained that her heart was beating too fast, made its way into the movie, depicting the voice of Thomas's mother on an old tape he listens to again and again.

Mr. Duris worked with his sister for three hours a day over two months, usually at their parents' house or at a music shop in Paris, where they had a practice room.

Like his character, he stayed up late in his flat playing a rented digital piano with headphones. But training his fingers was only part of the learning process. Mr. Duris says he wanted to understand what kind of mental space a pianist inhabits.

"When they sit down to play, are they nervous?" he asked. "Are they inspired?"

To find out, he watched videos of famous pianists. He learned that there were few physical rules, that each pianist had distinctive gestures and a personal style. "They all fed me," he said.

In the film, Thomas repeatedly watches a black-and-white video clip showing the fingers of Vladimir Horowitz curling down the piano in a long run. This obsession with watching performance videos was just one detail from Mr. Duris's real-life study that inspired Mr. Audiard's piano scenes in the movie.

Another source of inspiration was the real-life rapport between teacher and student, which informed Thomas's scenes with Miao Lin. She speaks virtually no French in the film, so she and Thomas communicate through imitation, repetition and body language. Even this, Mr. Duris says, mirrored his lessons with his sister, though they had the luxury of speech communication.

"Speaking or not speaking, it's the same," he said. In any music lesson, the teacher models good technique, watches, listens, waits and says, "Again" (one of the few words Miao Lin speaks), many, many times.

The speech-free method also resonates with Ms. Balter's Hollywood approach. While she describes herself as "wild" and "willing to do anything" in a lesson, she feels she learned more about music instruction from a Chinese musician who taught her to play a zither, she says, than from any classical piano instructor she has had. (Ms. Balter's childhood teacher was Lincoln Maazel, the father of Lorin Maazel, the music director of the New York Philharmonic.)

For a year during her studies in ethnomusicology at the University of Washington, Ms. Balter entered the Chinese teacher's room each week, bowed, then imitated everything he played. "He'd shake his head, and I'd try it again," she said.

Another speech-free technique Ms. Balter uses is to play a piece directly on top of a student's hands. "The body has its own memory," she said, explaining that the repeated manipulation of posture (centered), elbows (slightly out) and wrists (flat, never bent) can go a long way toward making a rookie look like a professional. But the most telltale sign of a real pianist, she says, is that the fingers always stay on the keys.

Still, for all this intensive training, an actor-pianist is the master of only a few bars here, a fragment there: not bad for a couple months' effort but not the same as really knowing how to play. Mr. Duris admits that most of the Bach toccata would be impossible for him.

"They gave me the beginning of the fugue," he said. "But to play the part that comes 30 seconds later, I'd need 10 years of training."

Fortunately, the repetition of just a few well-chosen segments, artfully arranged with subtle cuts and fades throughout a film can give an audience a rich illusion that the actor is playing a lot of serious piano.

Mr. Duris's success in playing the role of late-blooming virtuoso has not led him to any major delusions about a real-life musical career. But he says he wouldn't mind having a piano around, just in case.

"How do you call the one that is grand but not very, very grand?" he asked, searching for an English translation. A baby grand?

"Yes," he says. "I want a baby grand. Steinway. Black, Maybe somebody in America will read this and be very, very nice."

"When one door closes another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us." This is exemplified by the contrast of dark and light—we cannot change the past but we can move forward and we can learn from our past mistakes to create a better future.

Courtesy: Nat.Geo