Curt Doolittle

Theme: Productivity

  • The Spectrum of Criteria of Individual Fulfillment from the Possession of Works

    The Spectrum of Criteria of Individual Fulfillment from the Possession of Works of Art and Craft
    There are four dimensions of owning art relevant to this question: first is the experience of the beauty as decorating one’s environment; second is owning and apperciating the one-ness of the hand of man and his little insights and imperfections – love of the character of the artist; the third is possession of a scarcity that is a direct capture and personal association with an individual time, culture, civilization, and theme; fourth is the status with possessing that exclusivity as self validation of one’s achievements.

    Myself, I do not need external validation, nor do I want responsibilty for the safeguard of a cultural relic. So if I can have an accurate copy of any piece of art that’s good enough for me. Though while architecture is reproducible, scuplture is reproducible, and prints are reproducible, pottery is reproducible, and plays are reproducible, it remains quite another thing to duplicate the complexity of a painting consisting of layers of semi-transparent color through which light passes and reflects, and the brushstrokes that compose them producing the texture of the painting at close observation. Though in that sense I’m sure our technology will get there, and I can finally have my Rothko in the living room. 😉

    I do find pleasure like anyone else in owning little pieces of pottery that connect me with previous millennia tho, because it makes time and space ‘real’ and tangible.

    Reply addressees: @LinusEkenstam

    Source date (UTC): 2023-08-11 16:53:21 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1690043738926579712

    Replying to: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1689585394780708869

  • RT @curtdoolittle: @DK_Aggie_95 @SethDillon Quite the opposite. Since cooperatio

    RT @curtdoolittle: @DK_Aggie_95 @SethDillon Quite the opposite. Since cooperation is always disproportionately productive (Beneficial), and…

    Source date (UTC): 2023-08-07 19:17:22 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1688630431179042816

  • Most important video on economics of the year so far: Why we need to end globali

    Most important video on economics of the year so far:
    Why we need to end globalization and benefit the USA and particularly the middle class. Note that our recommended reforms include these reforms. And our solutions are a bit more aggressive.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWk-5TvzQSU

    Source date (UTC): 2023-08-06 14:22:00 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1688193712860336128

  • That’s a mistake. It’s the absence of prohibitons on labor arbitrage at the cost

    That’s a mistake. It’s the absence of prohibitons on labor arbitrage at the cost of employment causing internal asymmetry of rewards (which may require some explanation if you aren’t educated in economics.)

    Unions are one thing. Coercieve unions are yet another. Coercive unions that apply political pressure under democratic participation are even worse. Export of production means export of labor, means elimination of the power of unions, union corruption, and state use of coercion as a result.

    That’s a simple example of the absence or rule of law (of natural law) and what we call ‘full accounting’. The result of rule of law of natural law under full accounting is just ‘moral capitalism’.

    This is a relatively simple problem to fix. But creating ideological positions under democratic competition merely exacerbates the ignorance of the population by converting a practical institutional practice of maintaining rule of law of the natural law, as we do in many other aspects of life, to a moral, and then ideological and then divisive means of divide and conquer.

    Reply addressees: @liberaequa @EPoe187

    Source date (UTC): 2023-08-04 13:10:58 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1687451060833546240

    Replying to: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1687421400712110080

  • The military can’t take you with an IQ under 83. That’s because they are more ha

    The military can’t take you with an IQ under 83.
    That’s because they are more harmful than helpful, 1.5-3x more likely to fail training, and 3-9x remedial training, they die at 3x the rate of those with higher IQs.
    That 83IQ limit is about 17% of Americans. Just raising it to 85 takes it to 20% of Americans.
    The Military can’t tolerate more than 20% of recruits under 92. That’s around 36% of Americans.
    Every 15 points of additional IQ means you’re 27% more likely to be alive at age 76.
    — From Veritas’ recent video.

    Comments:
    The correlation between IQ and income is not high; it’s between the complexity of work and income. (AFAIK, conscientiousness correlates with income and net worth).

    Does IQ matter? Yes. A lot.

    But is the test always measuring the same thing? Well, in a western country, yes, because we’ve neutralized the flynn effect. In less developed countries? Well, we should expect average IQs to increase over time as they ‘catch up’. But will the differences remain? It seems so.

    Why? Because the principle difference between groups is class size, and class is a measure of genetic load. (yeah, get over it.) In other words, race and ethnic differences will persist to some degree once they’ve narrowed under the same knowledge base, education, and incentives.

    Source date (UTC): 2023-08-03 19:52:38 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1687189755451019264

  • Elon: We need a means to FIND creators

    Elon: We need a means to FIND creators.

    Source date (UTC): 2023-08-03 18:07:10 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1687163212028874752

    Reply addressees: @elonmusk

    Replying to: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1686828350289887232

  • (Hourly Rate? Usually around $700-800 per hour, but closer to $1000 with expense

    (Hourly Rate? Usually around $700-800 per hour, but closer to $1000 with expenses. Then from there to a daily rate, then to a fixed number on outcome. Always try to evolve from payment for time to payment for outcomes. Payment for time is usually just means of incremental billing for outcomes to preserve cash flow and reduce risk. But payment for outcomes (if you have the cash reserves) allows you to charge for value provided rather than time. I have a friend who names products. She charges about the same for every product name. It might take her three months. It might take her twenty minutes driving or taking a shower. The very best people solve problems and sell deals that their organizations then bill for by hourly rate. This results in indirect capture of profits on the entire billed effort. And for owner-executives indirect profits in appreciation of stock or export of dividends. Finance is simply the most elaborate and complex version of this method of revenue production.)

    Reply addressees: @themaxstoic

    Source date (UTC): 2023-07-30 14:49:54 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685664016947920896

    Replying to: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685653285007429632

  • (corrrect). Whether it is a currency or not is a technical question, but if it’s

    (corrrect). Whether it is a currency or not is a technical question, but if it’s a digital currency (quantifiable commodity) then clearing is frictionless. Solves the precious metal commodity problem.

    Source date (UTC): 2023-07-29 19:40:50 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685374846048329729

    Reply addressees: @VelenskiMeir @DwightExMachina

    Replying to: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685347818108534785

  • Why should money sit fallow instead of move? Isn’t that rent seeking? (trying to

    Why should money sit fallow instead of move? Isn’t that rent seeking? (trying to get you to think it thru)

    Source date (UTC): 2023-07-29 19:38:43 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685374313841524736

    Reply addressees: @Valkyrie_1_9

    Replying to: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685367093342912512

  • “Money shouldn’t be something that holds value over a long period of time. It sh

    –“Money shouldn’t be something that holds value over a long period of time. It should be something that loses value at a slow, predictable rate. Investable assets are what gain over time, and ideally those should be productive assets.

    If you can earn a positive return on money over time, society is literally just paying you to sit there and hoard cash and do nothing. Only investing in productive assets should give you a positive return in the long run.

    People who demand that society fork over an ever-increasing amount of its resources to people who sit on cash and do nothing with it are demanding INFINITE FREEBIES. Why should society give you infinite freebies?”–Noah Smith @Noahpinion

    My opinion’s the same on fiat vs private. That does not mean that there is no place for digital. Particularly in fiat – if only to solve the unbanked and unbanking problem, the rents that are collected by institutions for transaction processing, and the ability of the treasury to distribuite liquidity to counter decline in demand. But that digitia fiat must be so rigorously constitutionally defended that even proposing ‘policing by money’ is a crime against the people.

    Source date (UTC): 2023-07-29 13:32:23 UTC

    Original post: https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1685282122427150336