09-22-2009, 10:44 PM
Okay, cool synchronicity to share which is in keeping with the theme of the power of doubling.
(I include the following incidentals because they explain how this, to me at least, is synchronicity.)
Over the weekend I attended a wedding in the Virginia mountains. While at the wedding site on the side of a mountain with nothing to do and not knowing anyone there because this was a friend of my girlfriend's who was marrying, I was outside finishing a great book, "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell. The homeowner and host of the wedding (who also owns a coffee shop stocked with used books) inquired into my reading material and upon learning it was Malcom Gladwell, gave me a spare copy of another Gladwell book, "The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference". I gratefully accepted his gift, uncertain of when I would ever get to the new book. This was three days ago.
Because of L/L's annual Homecoming hosted over Labor Day weekend, I've been behind in reading the Bring4th forums. In fact I think it's been a few weeks since I've read anything.
Today, I had only a moment to check in with the forums. In that moment, βαθμιαίος's "Ra's Calling" thread caught my eye and, upon reading, compelled a response from me. So I added my own post earlier this afternoon (even though I didn't really have the time).
This evening as I shoved a vegetable wrap into my mouth, I opened up my new book, "Tipping Point". Immediately within the first opening pages of the Introduction I saw a fantastic and synchronistic connection between the premise of the "Ra's Calling" thread and the book. Following I will share a section from page 10:
(Note: Gladwell does not use the word "epidemic" in the following section in a strictly biological sense. He purports that ideas, products, messages, and behaviors spread just like viruses do and are thus understandable as epidemics.)
"The second of the principles of epidemics - that little changes can somehow have big effects - is also a fairly radical notion. We are, as humans, heavily socialized to make a kind of rough approximation between cause and effect. We are trained to think that what goes into any transaction or relationship or system must be directly related, in intensity and dimension, to what comes out.
Consider, for example, the following puzzle. I give you a large piece of paper, and I ask you to fold it over once, and then take that folder paper and fold it over again, and then again, and again, until you have refolded the original paper 50 times. How tall do you think that final stack is going to be? In answer to that question, most people will fold the sheet in their mind's eye, and guess that the pile would be as thick as a phone book or, if they're really courageous, they'll say that it would be as tall as a refrigerator. But the real answer is that the heigh of the stack would approximate the distance to the sun. And if you folded it over on more time, the stack would be as high as the distance to the sun and back.
This is an example of what in mathematics is called a geometric progression: when a virus spreads through a population, it doubles and doubles again, until it has (figuratively) grown from a single sheet of paper all the way to the sun in fifty steps. As human beings we have a hard time with this kind of progression, because the end result - the effect - seems far out of proportion to the cause. To appreciate the power of epidemics, we have to abandon this expectation of proportionality. We need to prepare ourselves for the possibility that sometimes big changes follow from small events, and that sometimes these changes can happen very quickly."
After only barely beginning the book, I know it will be a classic in my own library and considering that I loved the author's previous book, I would high recommend this to you.
: ) GLB
(I include the following incidentals because they explain how this, to me at least, is synchronicity.)
Over the weekend I attended a wedding in the Virginia mountains. While at the wedding site on the side of a mountain with nothing to do and not knowing anyone there because this was a friend of my girlfriend's who was marrying, I was outside finishing a great book, "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell. The homeowner and host of the wedding (who also owns a coffee shop stocked with used books) inquired into my reading material and upon learning it was Malcom Gladwell, gave me a spare copy of another Gladwell book, "The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference". I gratefully accepted his gift, uncertain of when I would ever get to the new book. This was three days ago.
Because of L/L's annual Homecoming hosted over Labor Day weekend, I've been behind in reading the Bring4th forums. In fact I think it's been a few weeks since I've read anything.
Today, I had only a moment to check in with the forums. In that moment, βαθμιαίος's "Ra's Calling" thread caught my eye and, upon reading, compelled a response from me. So I added my own post earlier this afternoon (even though I didn't really have the time).
This evening as I shoved a vegetable wrap into my mouth, I opened up my new book, "Tipping Point". Immediately within the first opening pages of the Introduction I saw a fantastic and synchronistic connection between the premise of the "Ra's Calling" thread and the book. Following I will share a section from page 10:
(Note: Gladwell does not use the word "epidemic" in the following section in a strictly biological sense. He purports that ideas, products, messages, and behaviors spread just like viruses do and are thus understandable as epidemics.)
"The second of the principles of epidemics - that little changes can somehow have big effects - is also a fairly radical notion. We are, as humans, heavily socialized to make a kind of rough approximation between cause and effect. We are trained to think that what goes into any transaction or relationship or system must be directly related, in intensity and dimension, to what comes out.
Consider, for example, the following puzzle. I give you a large piece of paper, and I ask you to fold it over once, and then take that folder paper and fold it over again, and then again, and again, until you have refolded the original paper 50 times. How tall do you think that final stack is going to be? In answer to that question, most people will fold the sheet in their mind's eye, and guess that the pile would be as thick as a phone book or, if they're really courageous, they'll say that it would be as tall as a refrigerator. But the real answer is that the heigh of the stack would approximate the distance to the sun. And if you folded it over on more time, the stack would be as high as the distance to the sun and back.
This is an example of what in mathematics is called a geometric progression: when a virus spreads through a population, it doubles and doubles again, until it has (figuratively) grown from a single sheet of paper all the way to the sun in fifty steps. As human beings we have a hard time with this kind of progression, because the end result - the effect - seems far out of proportion to the cause. To appreciate the power of epidemics, we have to abandon this expectation of proportionality. We need to prepare ourselves for the possibility that sometimes big changes follow from small events, and that sometimes these changes can happen very quickly."
After only barely beginning the book, I know it will be a classic in my own library and considering that I loved the author's previous book, I would high recommend this to you.
: ) GLB
Explanation by the tongue makes most things clear, but love unexplained is clearer. - Rumi