Success requires hard work (but not all in one day)

This is a nice blog post that elaborates on many of the themes we've talked about before.

Success Requires Hard Work (But Not All in One Day)


Why not start writing a book?

While success may require a lot of hard work, that doesn’t necessarily mean that work is hard to do. A book may contain 80,000 words of carefully edited content, that’s a lot of hard work. But writing 800 words almost every day for four months isn’t hard to do.

What's it like to win the nobel prize?

Carol Greider, winner of the 2009 Nobel prize for discovering discovering telomeres bits of seemingly useless DNA on the end of each of your chromosomes that progressively get shorter as you age and your cells reproduce. As it turns out, these bits of DNA are deeply linked to the aging process.

Anay, Dr. Greider has a fantastic interview with the NYT in today's paper, and one quote is absolutely worth reading and pondering.

Q. DID YOU ALWAYS WANT TO BE A BIOLOGIST?

A. My parents were scientists. But I wasn’t the sort of child who did science fairs. One of the things I was thinking about today is that as a kid I had dyslexia. I had a lot of trouble in school and was put into remedial classes. I thought that I was stupid.

I hope you'll take away the knowledge that if you struggle in science, or any subject, it is no measure of your ability to succeed in that field or your intelligence. Truly, hard work and persistence are the key to success at any level—even winning a Nobel prize.

A great quote you might have missed

If you didn't have a chance to read the great article in the NYT on Carolyn Porco, who heads the Casssini space probe studying saturn, I thought I'd highlight one quote from the article, which ties in nicely to what we talked about today:

To my mind, most people go through live recoiling from its best parts," Porco told The New York Times. "They miss the enrichment that just a basic knowledge of the physical world can bring to the most ordinary experiences. It's like there's a pulsating, hidden world, governed by ancient laws and principles, underlying everything around us -- from the movements of electrical charges to the motions of planets -- and most people are completely unaware of it. To me that's a shame." A shame, indeed.

Also, you might be interested in knowing a bit more about this amazing photo I linked to. Here's a description from BadAstronomy.com. Saturn-shine is a amazing concept...


That, duh, is Saturn, taken by the ever-amazing Cassini spacecraft. It’s actually 75 different exposures stitched together, and was taken on August 12, just a little over a day after Saturnian equinox, when the Sun shines straight along the rings. The illumination from the Sun is about the same everywhere, but on the left the rings are illuminated by Saturn-shine glowing down on them, making them a bit brighter.

Humorous idea for the day

Luckily, in this class pain doesn't have to be your teacher.

Are you living well or preparing to live well?

Another great post from study hacks. Here's a quote:

The happiest students are those who try to shape their life into something that’s meaningful, quality, and enjoyable right now; the type who get excited about the philosophy seminar they got into, and then spend an early Fall day outside getting acquainted with the reading. These students aren’t afraid of hard work, but they keep it carefully contained, because they know there’s a lifetime more where that came from, and if they can’t handle it well now, when will they ever?



If you’re not trying to live well now, what are you waiting for?

Remember, I'm always free during backwork (or just about any other time) to talk to you about how to put these ideas into action.

Definitely worth 20 minutes of your time

No matter what your politics are, you should take 20 minutes to watch this speech by the president today about how hard work and goal setting can help you to achieve your dreams, and solve the world's problems. It's wonderful speech worth serious thought.

Idea for the day

How is this an appropriate metaphor for our (mine and your) relationship in this class? Comments welcome.

HT (hat tip)-Dan Meyer, teacher extraordinaire.