Yennifer West

“The intolerance of uncertainty and ignorance flows not only from pridefulness, but from a universal human desire to find meanings and patterns everywhere. The mind abhors a vacuum.”
― Jon Elster, Explaining Social Behavior: More Nuts and Bolts for the Social Sciences

“Esperanza Impossible Sonnet 30

There is nothing free about your will,
All of it is conditioned to the hilt.
If you are to foster any original will,
A lot of soil you've got to till.
Perception is not observation,
Perception is prediction.
The brain doesn't care about observing,
It only puts forward a self-serving illusion.
Your will is but puppet to that illusion,
Which means you are but a puppet to evolution.
You do have the brain power to take control,
But it'll take a lot of inconvenient self-correction.
If you can do that, you shall rise as sapiens.
Or you'll just end up as compost in nature's garden.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Esperanza Impossible: 100 Sonnets of Ethics, Engineering & Existence

“Inaction driven by the belief that we have no control creates a breeding ground for unaccountability. Believing this can excuse us from making proactive decisions, we tend to shirk responsibilities, resulting in a dangerous cycle of unaccountability as we fail to take responsibility for the outcomes we can influence, thus we we attribute our inaction to external factors rather than our own choices. By not recognizing the control we do have, we passively allow life to happen to us rather than actively shaping our destinies.”
― Carson Anekeya

“A reality of personal productivity is that humans are not great at estimating the time required for cognitive endeavors. We’re wired to understand the demands of tangible efforts, like crafting a hand ax, or gathering edible plants. When it comes to planning pursuits for which we lack physical intuition, however, we’re guessing more than we realize, leading us to gravitate toward best-case scenarios for how long things might take. We seem to seek the thrill that comes from imagining a wildly ambitious timeline during our planning: “Wow, if I could finish four chapters this fall, I’d really be ahead of schedule!” It feels good in the moment but sets us up for scrambling and disappointment in the days that follow.

By deploying a blanket policy of doubling these initial estimates, you can counter this instinct toward unjustified optimism. The result: plans that can be completed at a more leisurely pace. The fear here, of course, is that by doubling these timelines, you’ll drastically reduce what you accomplish. But your original plans were never realistic or sustainable in the first place.”
― Cal Newport (Author)