Practical learnings from business and life
Rupert Murdoch, illegal activity, and responsibility
With the current furore about crimes committed – at the time of writing, phone tapping and paying police for information have come to light – by media in Rupert Murdoch’s ownership (and James’ Murdoch’s management), there appears to be something important missing in people’s consideration. The revelations about phone tapping at the News of the World that are now showing that illegal practices were both widespread and long in duration are raising serious questions about how much the senior management actually knew. Rupert Murdoch has merely apologised for not investigating it in more depth. In essence his defence before the select committee was essentially that he didn’t know what the underlings at the bottom layer of his organisation had been doing and had thought what was initially discovered was an isolated event. Does that claim withstand scrutiny?Note: Article now updated with developments
The Mystery of Flight AF447 - Deliberately avoiding the inconveniently obviousI'm beginning to suspect that in yet another disaster where the true facts would be 'inconvenient', an effort is being made to find both technical and human scapegoats.
On 1st June 2009 Air France flight AF447 disappeared over the Atlantic on a flight from Brazil to France. There was no mayday call and initially it seemed to have just disappeared without any trace, until it was revealed that an on-board automatic system had been sending computer-generated technical messages describing a sequence of problems occurring on the flight and revealing its last known location. Eventually of course, a considerable amount of debris was recovered indicating the flight had at the very least crashed into the sea. But the flight data and cockpit recorders were still missing, presumed to be at the bottom of the Atlantic, along with most of the wreckage.
Astra G 8-valve Thermostat problem
If your thermostat has failed open, in which case the engine never seems to warm up and will use more fuel, the most common solution is to get a hot thermostat from a Renault 5 - 89 degrees c is the hottest I've seen - like the one in the picture and insert it into the top hose. It is helpful to drill a small hole (1 - 1.5mm diameter) at the point where I'm pointing my knife, in order to allow both air bubbles and a small amount of water through to ensure that the wax bit of the thermostat (the pointy bit) gets up to the temperature reasonably promptly. It should be installed with the small hole at the top (the thermostat goes in the top hose horizontally with the pointy bit closest to the engine. This is almost as good as replacing the original Vauxhall thermostat, and will cost about £6 instead of £200+. For all you could ever possibly want to know about this, go to this thread at the vauxahll Owners Network. Sir Paul Nurse Abandons Scientific Principles on becoming President of Royal Society
Goal-Finding questionsMost goal-setting systems presume you already know broadly speaking what your goals are, or that professionally and personally at least, you already have a pretty good idea what they are. That’s not always the case – sometimes we are completely on the wrong track and we haven’t realised it, or else we just aren’t sure really what we want to achieve. As your goals determine your whole direction, it makes sense to take extra care to make sure you have ones that really motivate and will fulfil you.
Here are some questions I originally developed for a workshop on a more left-brain / unconscious mind approach to help you find out what goals you want to achieve. ie, not based on intellectual stuff, but more taking a peek into your soul.
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For those with a Vauxhall Astra G (that's the version that went from late 1990's to mid 2000's - can't be bothered to look up exact year range - if you have an 8-valve version you'll be likely to have experienced engine thermostat failure by now. You'll also have been stunned to have been quoted a couple of hundred quid to have it replaced, because in their infinite wisdom, Vauxhall have built this engine around one of the cheapest and most unreliable components - the thermostat. It's buried so deep that the whole timing belt has to be removed in order to get to it, if you follow the official procedures, although a friend of mine with one did manage to wiggle his out by bending a few things back in order to avoid having to do that.
In his new position as president of The Royal Society, Nobel Laureate Sir Paul Nurse took the opportunity to present an episode of Horizon on the BBC, titled “Science under Attack” (BBC, 9pm, 24th Jan 2011). Now, you might expect that the president of The Royal Society would be someone who upholds scientific principles above everything. But no. Right from the very beginning in his opening comments he commented on the archives of the Royal Society as ‘bearing witness to over 350 years of scientific achievement’. I don’t think anyone is disputing that enormous gains in scientific knowledge have been made, as well as the scientific knowledge leading to technological progress. But there was no mention of 350 years of scientific blunders, fraud and unethical behaviour that inevitably accompanies any field of human endeavour - No, just the progress. Neither was there any mention of the fact that scientific consensus has been wrong on many occasions, repeatedly, and a prolonged refusal to acknowledge evidence contrary to ideas held by the majority of established experts in the relevant fields. With his reverential tones when describing scientists and scientific institutions, from the start this programme made it clear it was a hagiography of the orthodox establishment. And not surprisingly, scientific bandwagons he presented as being unfairly ‘under attack’ from naïve groups of people being misled by wayward ‘experts’ were Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) – now re-branded ‘climate change’ due to evidence of global cooling – vaccines, GM foods, and HIV/AIDS.
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