And this would work because there are a lot of excess nutrients in human waste?

Well, to be fair, it doesn't really apply to novelty books and coffee-table books. Uncle John's Bathroom readers or the Extreme Case Scenario Survival handbook are generally a few minute micro-read.

I listen to some music my dad listened to but for different reasons. I would consider myself rebellious and I like Amadeus. I listen to Muse and Radiohead and I don't drink alcohol, especially not beer. The main criteria for what I listen to is the meaning of the song, if it means nothing to me, I don't listen to it. If my father happened to listen to it, makes little difference. I also enjoy some of the music my mother and even my grand-mother listened to. My grand-mother loved Roger Whittaker and I only had to hear him a few times to fall in love too. "Will the sea fill up with sand, and the fire burn out the land, will the last word ever spoken be 'Why?'" and "Oh I don't believe in IF anymore, IF is for children, building daydreams."

There will be unforseen consequences, or possibly obvious consequences that people will ignore in place of vanity. Same old story.

I really don't care what I look like or what anyone else looks like. You think you are beautiful; clean the inside.

Just my opinion, but any book I could casually read for five minutes at night before bed is not worth reading.

Sure, I can't think of any harmful consequences, so why not? And don't say because an argument from ignorance is not a good argument, I have no idea what that means.

Spoofing? Never heard of it.

Me (at age 12): "Dad, I really don't understand what I'm supposed to do. It doesn't matter how hard I try its never good enough for anyone."

Dad: "Some day you will figure it out."

Me (at age 21): "Dad, I figured it out, I know why I'm never good enough..."

Dad: "Can we talk about something more my level, like cell-phones or something?"

His advice was always "Someday you will figure it out." Clearly indicating that he himself had never figured it out. He is also one of these people who thinks the world is too confusing to make sense of, so he isn't interested in hearing any theories.

First thing I remember was askin' papa, "Why?",
For there were many things I didn't know.
And Daddy always smiled; took me by the hand,
Sayin', "Someday you'll understand."

Well, I'm here to tell you now each and ev'ry mother's son
You better learn it fast; you better learn it young,
'Cause, "Someday" Never Comes." - Someday Never Comes, Creedance Clearwater Revival

On second thought, I shouldn't be so desirous of having others feel my pain. Then we'd all suffer. Rather, I will suffer quietly and in so doing minimize the amount of suffering wholescale. Because if I complain about it you are going to wonder "What can I do about it?" and then I'm going to say "You can be a lot more considerate." It's painful just thinking about it. I'd rather be served up chewy steak and suffer for it than say "How could you be so inconsiderate, you know I can't eat this!"

We shouldn't be surprised at this result, we torched the old Gods, we toppled their temples and destroyed their wisdom. Be prepared to be made obsolete by myriad inventions. If the culture does not value you for something over and above your assets, then you are a mere product to be outdone by something synthetical.

These days everyone is pro. I was hired as a general assistant to the Technology Operations department of my work. I worked with them temporarily off and on for a year while we rolled out new hosting environments in Toronto, Chicago and Los Angeles. During that time I was asked to work on the VPs desktop. I was told that it had a memory error and I should try replacing the physical memory (RAM). The person giving the instruction was the full-time desktop support technician. I formatted and re-installed windows several times, tried different RAM slots and expansion cards, I even performed a full test of the physical memory using Hiren's Boot CD. Still, not working; Blue-Screen of Death error 0x0000020. I pull this little slip of paper out of a box of cds that came with the PC and one reads "Virtual Memory Error". Out of curiosity I pull up error 0x00000020 online and find it relates to swap file. So I run scandisk to check for bad sectors, found a few and the computer worked perfectly. However, the Tech wasn't happy with me, it took me a few hours and when I told him "That's because you said it was a physical memory problem, not virtual memory, and you told me to troubleshoot the RAM" he got really upset. I got let go a few days after I fixed a brand new monitor he was prepared to toss out. I fixed it by draining the capacitors - a relatively simple fix any tech should know about. I was "let go" due to incompetence. It is ironic that 3 months later they launched an internal investigation to see if I had hacked the Linux servers. Still, rumor is that I was let go for incompetence and the Tech who jerked me over is still here. I don't say anything, it's their company, their loss. But none of it will change the fact that I can fix monitors he can't and that I know the difference between physical and virtual memory. He may have won his career from me, but he's still ignorant, self-centered and deluded. Where is teh handbook on that?

"All in the world know the beauty of the beautiful, and in doing
this they have (the idea of) what ugliness is; they all know the skill
of the skilful, and in doing this they have (the idea of) what the
want of skill is." - Tao Te Ching

At least they are upfront and honest about their discrimination. Most of us aren't that honest with ourselves. We descriminate between beautiful and ugly and pretend like we don't. Remember that research that found that attractive women are less likely to be convicted of a crime than unattractive women. Even in the epicenter of our presumed "Justice" we cannot account for such discrimination.

Lao Tzu, however, made it explicit, if you look and say "Lo, there is beauty" then by your very looking you create ugliness. Because both are in the eye of the beholder. YOU discriminate between beautiful and ugly. YOU make them a reality, otherwise they have no reality.

I would call that article an op-ed piece, not a lesson. Books and lectures on this subject from the researchers who uncover it are much better at reserving judgement and casting it in a proper light. For example; Jean Twenge in the Narcissism Epidemic argues we should put an end to thinking either optimistically or pessimistically, but we should think realistically and we should be raising kids to think realistically.

"The enormous value of the concept of free will in relieving parental shame and guilt is the only and overriding reason, in our opinion, that the lie of free will is well nigh universally taught to all children. If and when we can convince parents of total determinism, so they are freed from their own shame and guilt, they will no longer need to teach the vicious lie of free will to the world's children. A new world will be born."
- Peter Gill, Developmental Psychologist and Founder of Determinism.com

Sloppy. While stereotype threat and fear of failure might sound like good reasons to be unrelenting optimists, it isn't true. Biasing oneself in favor of positivity can make people anxious about negatives. There is all kinds of research on this; check out "Smile or Die" from the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) and "The Narcissism Epidemic"

My father was a manager and a professional liar. He spent his days drinking coffee at the deli next door while his lackeys did all the work. He didn't teach me anything except how to manipulate people to get what you want. He taught me that everyone has an unconscious emotional bank-account, an idea he got from Dale Carnegies' How To Make Friends and Influence People. He said if I did nice things for people, they would then feel obligated to do what I want. He was very good at persuasion and is the reason he is now alienated from his own family. Happy Father's Day.