On casting

The first contribution (rather too long) in the newly launched ‘On series’ will focus on intelligence and degrees of intelligence as I see it. It will briefly outline three casts of intelligence or stupidity as one might say (the one who sees glasses half empty rather than half full) – smart, average and stupid. Furthermore, we will explore their life prospects and coexistence with other casts. Of course, theory is far from complete or perfect and as such it does not encompass all aspects of life or outliers (e.g. professor of physics from former Soviet Union country who cleans toilettes in CALTECH, or Will Hunting who is social outcast and ignored by the system). Anyway, if you find it boring please skip it and wait for more interesting travel topics :)

The whole theory is based on axiom of motivation to work. This axiom (invented during some excessive drinking sessions and following deliriums in December 2009 and January 2010) states that all of us are motivated to work only by two things – remuneration (or money) and self-realisation. Please note that this is in line with basic assumptions of classical economics* :) We try to maximize our utility and this can be done either by buying things (for money) or by creating something lasting / useful (sort of self-realisation).

The world as I see it, is a home to three distinct casts of people: a) those who are smart enough to establish their own companies, posses unique brain power to invent and come up with world altering solutions, b) average or not-so-smart people who are smart enough not to work manually and use (sort of) their brain to earn their living, and last but not least c) stupid. Third cast’s name is not meant in derogative form and I would personally refer to it as rather imprecise but all encompassing and generalising. It is used only due to fact that cast includes also people of wrong character who do not deserve any other title. Besides criminals it complies of all manual workers who live by their hands and administration employees (e.g. state and government bureaucracy).

As already mentioned first cast is of Brims and Gates who establish their companies and boldly explore opportunities market economy offers**. Alongside entrepreneurs we should put scientists who have gift of superior intelligence and decide to use it in research rather than commercial way. To those individuals belongs my biggest admiration (also I am compensating for my lack of intelligence as I do not see myself anywhere in their company :) ). Unlike entrepreneurs, scientists never become ultrarich but are happiest folks of them all anyway. Commercially successful inventors become rich beyond any measure but need extensive network of ‘mediocre’ protectors – more on that in a moment. Only certain individuals of ultrarich ‘businessmen’ who exploited lawlessness following fall of communism are included in this cast. 99% of them are criminals but that one percent is smart enough to keep their riches together and increase their wealth even after law and order was brought to town.

Second cast, the cast where I humbly position myself, people of mediocre intelligence who are not capable of great things but are good enough for middle management. They are employees of private sector working on management positions and creating standards and templates to facilitate understanding of processes and tasks. Second cast is the buffer cast separating the bright from the stupid. Included in this cast are all the advisory firms which feed of potential and ideas of the smart ones. Any accounting, financial advisory and services firm is basically creating buffer between inventors and consumers and criminals. Basically we can say that finance industry is run by average for protection of smart from stupid. While smart invent, average play with numbers so the stupid buy the ideas of smart and / or do not steal from smart. This was handily summarised by prof. K. J. Arrow in his lecture given at Fudan University in Shanghai, China on 30 October 2008: ‘Economists are the guardians of possibilities of civilisation’ (I am 99% sure he meant something different but anyway...).

Third and the last cast is the cast of those who mindlessly consume products invented by smart and sold by average. Of course, same stupid need to manually produce these products in a first place :) In order to avoid manual work they cheat or try to get into one of the previously mentioned classes. This attempt is encouraged by government (usually by attempting to increase percentage of college educated population) which itself comprises of stupid.

We assume that no smart man will waste his time and energy on politics (fairly obvious observation) as he will find better remuneration or self-realisation in research or business. Assumption was violated in 19th century when institutional environment and blending of public and private institutions (e.g. East India Company) enabled satisfactory self-realisation for young men in service of her majesty.

Mingling of the categories is possible as some of the average end up in first class - by exploiting certain circumstances specific for time and place (e.g. Central and Eastern Europe in 1990’s and China today, offering opportunities for eager and bold students to study in the US); some of the stupid end up in second cast (mostly criminals who in attempt to disguise their lack of brain or ability, cover their tracks in illegal manner – e.g. cases of Nick Leeson and Jerome Kerviel) and vice versa (for both examples listed). Although jumping two classes above or below your abilities is extremely difficult it is possible in certain extraordinary circumstances (e.g. revolutions, dictatorship, military junta or anarchy).

This mingling of the casts is main facilitator of economic crisis as in time of plenty we (especially average – charged with protection of smart) let our guard down and allow sufficiently high number of stupid to enter our ranks and to wreak havoc in the system. Imagine giving control panel (managed by average) of nuclear arsenal (assembled by smart ones) to a toddler (guess who). Same goes with mingling of first and second cast as system encourages sufficiently high number of average to enter the cast of smart and dilute the invention process (some degenerate rip off of Schumpeter’s business cycle theory).

Anyway, as you can see although broadly outlined this theory still does not cover all aspects of life. Additional angles can be revealed later in other posts or in comments section. This post’s aim was to sketch ideas I was playing with in past few months and propose simple explanation of some aspects of our lives. If you find it interesting please do not hesitate to post your comments below (usual decency rules apply).

Notes: * JFGI; ** Cases of other regimes will be discussed in following posts.

On series

As most of you already noticed I returned from China sometime in September 2009. Happily joining taxpaying workforce in Czech Republic I have realized that my China focused blog is not up to date (so to say). In view of this truly life changing realization i have decided to reload my blog and make it more ‘present’. Starting now, I am launching new series of so called 'On' articles.

Don’t be worried ya ole traveller! Besides the On series I will continue to provide you with description of my occasional adventures outside of comfort zone of my single bedroom apartment. Unfortunately due to sad reality that there is no chance to continue travelling as intensively as during my stay in China, I will use this blog to provide you with my opinions on everything and nothing.

This insights and opinion articles would cover wide range of topics from social issues (hopefully the very next post not including travellers notes), politics (yeah we will enter this filthy realm), economics (nothing but mere rip off of ideas of giants), international relations (just to make my brother angry) and hopefully many others.

Of course somebody would argue that I descent to the abyss of popular crap only in vane desire to increase my own popularity and readership base, but rest assured that I do not vie to enlist any new readers besides YOU my fateful five :) Enjoy!

(Almost not) skiing in Maribor

After much ado, huge snowfall and freezing weather which swept across European continent, I have decided to continue my tradition of skiing in Maribor, Slovenia. Although little off the map of usual ski loving population Mariborske Pohorje hosts FIS women slalom competition (‘Zlata Lisica’). The whole arrangement is very comfortable for me as I exploit good heartedness of my friends from Maribor, whom i met during my stay in Rotterdam, Netherlands as an exchange student.

Of course as usual with my travels complication caught up with me fairly soon. This time I hit the bump even before start of my journey. My perfect plan of 14 hours train ride (with four aimless wandering hours in Murzzuschlag incorporated) from Prague to Maribor fell apart as a house of cards. Of course, that also meant half a day less of skiing so instead of two full days I faced reality of mere 1.5 days of skiing. Anyway, thanks to train delay in Germany I would have missed my next connection in Vienna and as such I would have been forced either to spent a night in there or take a later train. Of course I choose the more comfortable way and enriched my brother's Friday evening by complaining about everything, eating all what was left in his fridge and forcing him to prepare crepes for us as a dinner of last resort.

This whole delay thing turned out to be sort of a blessing in disguise as 2 hours spent on Vienna Meidling train station (i.e. nine platforms without any station building or heated waiting room – in fact the least equipped train station I had pleasure to spent time on - including all those Chinese barnhouses) were maximum of what I could have taken in below zero weather. Vision of four hours of wandering around Murzzuschlag in case my original train would make it was pushed deeply in the dumpster of memories.

Making long story short – after my arrival to Maribor we went for afternoon skiing session. Heavy snowfall helped to provide us with the edge between lacklustre experience and memorable ski day. Shortly after dinner we gathered all who is important in Maribor and went for night of sports and hot wine. Plezka was word of the day as my hosts decided to introduce me to small wooden stool nailed to c. 60cm piece of old ski (meaning ski without any curvature) - home made skibobs we should say.

First ride was introductory (for me who was only one not familiar with this concept) with lights for night skiing on (yes we did ‘skate’ on the main slopes in between legs of skiers). Second ride was planned after some drinking session at skiing hut with the loudest music (not that we did not drink during first ride). At this hut we earned reverence of ‘Sef’ (a.k.a. the boss) to such an extent that he started giving us food for free. Of course our continuous ordering of 10 kuhano vino (hot vine) and liquer-weak colourful form of blue berry schnapps (Berentzen sort of mouth glue) greatly helped our cause.

We joined or better forced ourselves into attention of private party held at this hut. It turned out to be party of the most popular TV channel in Slovenia (POP TV). We danced shouted and drank till late late night and when all slope maintenance machines finished their work we tested our skating / sliding skills on newly woven manchester :)

Speeding downhill on wooden seat with no breaks (other than your feet and mouth), no steering mechanism (besides your feet and careful shifting of weight) and no lights (other than the stars and moon) turned out to be great fun. Of course prudent of you would argue that after litres of hot wine anything dangerous and crazy would look like great fun. Believe me, the sight of Maribor and its lights from the top of the slope was all worth it. With snow in any conceivable part of you clothing we went to bed happy and cold.

Next day few of us followed initial plan through and went for skiing as early as possible. We fully exploited fresh snow and newly built gondola (built only and exclusively because the old one literally fell down in fall last year - pun intended) as well as newly cut Pisker ski slope (one year old 40m wide ski slope with ultra quick chairlift and virtually no people). The monotonous up and down cycle was occasionally interrupted by hot tea breaks (somehow after excesses of previous night we could not muster any desire to drink hot wine). Monotonous because we literally had to hop on the chairlift as there were no people in line whenever we bothered to ski down :) We will see what will happen to this paradise when plan of prolonging Pisker ski slope to the bottom of Pohorje will be followed trough this summer. It will end its seclusion from main slopes of Pohorje (Stadion and Bellevue) by net of sophisticated connections. On the other hand lost gems of slopes between Areh and Bellevue will be even more forgotten (you can easily ski on perfectly maintained ski slopes by yourself) – which makes me giddy even thinking about it.

Anyway, after last ride down the icy trails we had our last dinner (best pizza since I came back) and I started my train journey to Prague. Besides one small feud with co-travellers about their need of keeping lights on after 2.00am journey was as boring as it can be :)