Author: adamf

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Lifetimes

Created 6 December 2017 / Updated 9 December 2017 by adamf

I was at my Buddhist center tonight and a friend asked me, “Adam, how are you doing?” And genuinely wanted an answer. I found myself saying, I am feeling grief. It comes in waves. Often I don’t even know what I’m crying about now – often there’s no story anymore. It is contact with sorrow […]

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What’s a Mathematician To Do?

Created 31 October 2017 / Updated 29 October 2017 by adamf

Great answer on Math Overflow by mathematician Bill Thurston (1946-2012) to the question, “What’s a mathematician to do?”: It’s not mathematics that you need to contribute to. It’s deeper than that: how might you contribute to humanity, and even deeper, to the well-being of the world, by pursuing mathematics? Such a question is not possible […]

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Recipe For a Good Human Society

Created 28 October 2017 / Updated 28 October 2017 by adamf

My friend JoAnn gave me this recipe card today: Recipe For a Good Human Society Start with one View of basic self-worth — apply liberally and marinate continuously. Add high quality principles. Cook’s note: I suggest generosity, patience, compassion, kindness, and intelligence. Be careful not to cross-contaminate ingredients with doubt. Stir well, then let rest […]

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Running Through the Grief

Created 24 October 2017 / Updated 27 October 2017 by adamf

Even though I know things must be as they are, I am still struggling. The grief is coming in waves now, occasionally incapacitating me. That’s better than before, when I was overwhelmed for weeks on end. It’s still hard to surrender and accept that sometimes I am helpless because of it. Yesterday was a hard […]

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The Wisdom in Dark Emotions

Created 10 October 2017 / Updated 10 October 2017 by adamf

Great article in The Lion’s Roar on the Wisdom of Dark Emotions: Knowing how our grief, fear and despair may be connected to larger emotional currents and social conditions de-pathologizes these emotions, allowing us to accept and tolerate them more fruitfully, and with more compassion for ourselves and others. We begin to see the dark […]

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Learned Optimism

Created 8 October 2017 / Updated 7 March 2021 by adamf

In a previous post I mentioned that science didn’t know much about how to teach or grow optimism. I was wrong about that – quite a bit is known, actually. After I wrote that post I became more interested in how to learn optimism, and came across Martin Seligman’s great book on the subject, Learned […]

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I’m Hiring

Created 30 September 2017 / Updated 7 March 2021 by adamf

I’m hiring for two software developer positions: Senior Software Developer Software Developer We’re a fast-growing, fun, high-performance team working on some interesting large-scale machine learning applications. We use Scrum and Extreme Programming methodologies, Linux and Open Source software (and we contribute back also), and know that it’s creativity that matters, not the number of lines […]

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You Are Living in a Poem

Created 24 September 2017 / Updated 28 October 2017 by adamf

“You are living in a poem,” says poet Naomi Shihab Nye. “What do you mean, we’re living in a poem?” Or, “When? All the time, or just when someone talks about poetry?” And I’d say, “No, when you think, when you’re in a very quiet place, when you’re remembering, when you’re savoring an image, when […]

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Kindness

Created 23 September 2017 / Updated 28 October 2017 by adamf

Before you know what kindness really is you must lose things, feel the future dissolve in a moment like salt in a weakened broth. What you held in your hand, what you counted and carefully saved, all this must go so you know how desolate the landscape can be between the regions of kindness. How […]

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Change Backtick to Escape Key for MacBook Pro with Touchbar

Created 18 September 2017 / Updated 19 June 2018 by adamf

My work computer is a new MacBook Pro. It’s great except one thing – it has a Touchbar, and that means there’s no physical Escape key. I’m a vim user and so have been feeling pain about that, since the Escape key is essential to using vim. Then I discovered Karabiner Elements. It allows you […]

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