LESSON FIVE: The Ancient Chinese Secret

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HAVE A COOKIE: Someone else wants to protect the memory of Master Kong and it is the guy who writes the fortunes you read after polishing off your General Tso’s chicken and cracking into the cookie. “Confucius is the best-known philosopher, respected, a good person. Making a joke of him is not right,” he says. Read Why Confucius Quit the Cookie Business at: 

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The last word: Why Confucius quit the cookie business

Wonton Food, of Brooklyn, N.Y., is the largest fortune cookie manufacturer in the United States, at least twice as big as its nearest competitor. It churns out more than 4 million cookies a day-more than a billion cookies a year. All of which have fortunes inside them.

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PLAY THE GAME: Confucius (2008) is a sort of combination of Monopoly, Clue, and Axis and Allies. The focus seems to be on developing relationships to build power and influence in the government. Play it more for the period design than to learn much about Confucian philosophy. It gets a 6.9 out of 10 from Board Game Geek but is out of stock on Amazon so you’ll probably have to go garage sale hunting for this one. 

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BE A LOSER: Buy a lottery ticket. There is no better way to participate directly in an activity where the small number of winners are hyped endlessly so you remember them and ignore the astronomical odds. Call me if you win and there is anything left to invest after taxes and that fleet of sport cars you’ve always wanted. 

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THE CHINESE CLASSICS with a translation, critical and exegetical notes, prolegomena, and copious indexes by James Legge IN FIVE VOLUMES CONFUCIAN ANALECTS THE GREAT LEARNING THE DOCTRINE OF THE MEAN 論語 CONFUCIAN ANALECTS. 學而第一 BOOK I. HSIO R. 【第一章】 【一節】子曰、 學而時習之、不亦說乎。【二節】有朋自遠方來、不亦樂 乎。【三節】人不知而不慍、不亦君子乎。 CHAPTER I. 1.

GET SOME SHI TO READ: A five volume translation of The Analects and other Confucian works is available here. Order Chinese take- out and settle in if you intend to read the whole thing. 

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THINK FAST: Author Daniel Kahneman, whose research work we introduced earlier, wrote a book called Thinking Fast and Slow (2011). Reading it tends to be the latter, but you can get the abridged version by watching part of a series on books with big ideas by FightMediocrity.

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GET BACK IN THE WATER: Don’t worry, it is safe despite the simple ostinato of two bass notes, F to F Sharp echoing in your ears. Watch the movie Jaws (1975). One of the most chilling moments in Spielberg’s film comes when Quint, captain of the Orca, relates to his new shipmates the horrors he experienced during the sinking of the USS Indianapolis during WWII. “Over 1,000 men went into the water, 316 survivors came out, and the sharks got the rest”. Terrifying? Yes. Historically accurate? Not so much. Indianapolis was indeed sunk by the Japanese in the summer of 1945 (Quint incorrectly says it was June 29th, it was July 29th). But, it is believed that a few hundred of the casualties died in the initial torpedo attack and that many more perished due to dehydration after five days floating at sea without fresh water. This didn’t stop the incident from being dubbed “the biggest shark attack in history.” Hollywood rule #1: never let the facts get in the way of a good story. Investing rule #1: always let the facts get in the way of a good story.