"I have always thought that one man of tolerable abilities may work great changes, and accomplish great affairs among mankind if he first forms a good plan and, cutting off all amusements or other employments that would divert his attention, makes the execution of that same plan his sole study and business." - Ben Franklin
A Conversation with David Swensen [H/T @jasonzweigwsj] (LINK)
Related article: Yale's Swensen Sees Low Volatility as `Profoundly Troubling'Lessons Learned from The Outsiders & How Intelligent Fanatics are Different (LINK)
Pension Actuaries: The Joke is On Us - by Rick Bookstaber (LINK)
Is the Business Cycle Dead, Or Just Hibernating? - by Frank Martin (LINK)
Why Sales Quotas Ruined Wells Fargo (LINK)
Will Amazon disrupt healthcare? (LINK)
Sebastian Junger: "Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging" | Talks at Google (LINK)
Long-lost da Vinci painting fetches $450.3 million, an auction record for art (LINK)
How the Zombie Fungus Takes Over Ants’ Bodies to Control Their Minds - by Ed Yong (LINK)
Life Without Guts - by Ed Yong (LINK)
Book of the day [H/T @jasonzweigwsj]: The Quotable Darwin
"I have steadily endeavoured to keep my mind free so to give up any hypothesis, however much beloved (and I cannot resist forming one on every subject), as soon as facts are shown to be opposed to it. Indeed, I have had no choice but to act in this manner, for with the exception of the Coral Reefs, I cannot remember a single first-formed hypothesis which had not after a time to be given up or greatly modified. This has naturally led me to distrust greatly deductive reasoning in the mixed sciences. On the other hand, I am not very sceptical,–a frame of mind which I believe to be injurious to the progress of science. A good deal of scepticism in a scientific man is advisable to avoid much loss of time, but I have met with not a few men, who, I feel sure, have often thus been deterred from experiment or observations, which would have proved directly or indirectly serviceable." - Charles Darwin