I just finished reading Gesundheit! by Patch Adams, and it’s left me totally high. I saw the movie Patch Adams starring Robin Williams a while ago, but I never realized that there was a real doctor by that name, striving to create a totally revolutionary hospital – the Gesundheit Institute. Patch Adams is mostly known for introducing humour in the treatment of his patients, but this book reveals that his philosophy goes way beyond that. It is about the whole person. This is hardly a new notion, but it is certainly waaaay different from how medicine is practiced in most …
Dr. Felton Earls has done research on the roots of crime, and has arrived at the following insight, quoted in this NY Times article: Dr. Earls and his colleagues argue that the most important influence on a neighborhood’s crime rate is neighbors’ willingness to act, when needed, for one another’s benefit, and particularly for the benefit of one another’s children. And they present compelling evidence to back up their argument. Well, duh! It seems obvious to me, that a neighbourhood in which people are actively engaged would be a better place to live and show lower crime rates, and it’s …
Richard Feynman was a very clever guy. Apart from his work in physics (specifically quantum electrodynamics which got him a nobel prize in 1956), he was also an accomplished safe cracker, samba drummer and all-round liver of life as described in the wonderful biography “Surely you’re joking, Mr. Feynman“. In april 1963 he gave a set of lectures on the role of science in the world, adressing questions like “what is science”, “what is the value of science” and “can a scientist believe in god”. These lectures have been collected in the book “The meaning of it all“, from which …
Thanks Chris for the wonderful welcome. I’ve been following the discussions here on jazz and improvisation in project management and it reminds me of one of my favourite tools these days: eXtreme Programming. The thing that really makes XP interesting is, that it’s been designed for a changing world. Remember tat big project you’d been working on for months, really giving it your best with your team mates, when suddenly the requirements changed, or the customer changed his mind or your boss got a new idea or… In many projects this would mean that a lot of work will be …
My friend Alex Kjerulf is a wonderful guy. I say my friend, like I know him really well, but the truth is that I met him online in the summer, linked to his blog, Positive Sharing and then carried on a bit of an exchange with him. Turns out that he and I have a lot of similar interests, including Open Space Technology, a simultaneous reading of Crptonomicon and a love of fun. In fact, he does a lot of work with laughter and is currently writing a book about happiness at work. It’s in Danish, so I have no …