And so...the sales are upon us. The ritualised duping of millions of people, not necessarily by the sales themselves but as part of the pre-Xmas/ post-Xmas gullibility system as a whole. The Sales won't work without the pre-Xmas hype.

On the run-in we are subjected to the full raft of advertising techniques carefully designed to appeal to our core needs of food, happiness, safety, belonging and nooky. We are then given a fabricated deadline...the 25th December...miss this and you are simply uncaring, irresponsible, lacking in Xmas cheer, miserable, and mean. To avoid the stigma you will willingly pay the asking price of course.

Then we are then lured back into the shops by appealling to our sense of competition and advantage over others. On your marks, get set...sales!

To complete the trick, the money something costs us is conveniently presented to us a 'none money' - you know, 'this sofa is only five nine nine' and the discount of the decade is offered to you by the 'oh so generous retailers' as real money saving you an amazing 'three hundred pounds/ dollars'

What is astounding is that we are told that we can have these amazing discounts as 'savings'. No they aren't they are an invention! The price is the price regardless of the notional drop in price. You and I are buying products we need not 'savings'

Waky waky everybody!!

'Tis The Season To Be Gullible

Happy Gullibleness Everyone!

So Christmas is actually a the mirror of a pagan new year festival, created by the Romans to woo people to the new christian religion. Happy Mithras Tide folks!, Santa should be dressed in green and white not Coke's red and white, and Retailers and Manufacturers have colluded in exploiting the power of social influence through public commitment by creating Nintendo DS scarcity to smooth out retail sales knowing I'll have to fulfill the promise I made in January now.

Not only that I've just seen zeitgeist.com to learn that the 3 Kings were the stars in Orions Belt!!

The Global Resorts Network (GRN) Gullibility Report.

There never was such a thing as a 'free lunch' Some thoughts on SEO, building blog and site traffic, buying leads and using google ad words.

Gullible about Work / Blog Balance

Well, being late out of the starting blocks on this one just goes to show that I'm struggling to manage work/ blog balance. It was a few days ago that I got tagged by Saboma for this meme.

She'll be 'muffawwwwwing' loud and hearty at me scratting around getting my act together...

And so the deal is 8 random facts about yourself. Blimey it's a bit like exploring the Johari Window you can give it a go yourself with this onlineversion, and if you have the bottle you might even try the Nohari Window too...

Talk about self disclosure city! So here goes...

1. I was born in Carlisle in the UK at the opposite end of Hadrian's Wall to Newcastle. The Romans called it Lugavallum.

2. I won a piano competition when I was 9 years old

3. I didn't like lemon meringue pie when I was younger

4. I owned a rare Bridgestone 175 cc motorbike. The 350 cc was apparently banned in the USA because the dual mode gear box wasn't fool proof and in the 'rotary mode' you could down change from 4th to 1st in one press...at 70 mph that would = ouch!

5. I dated my first girlfriend for 11 years

6. I was in Prague in 1968 on a school trip the night the Russians invaded

7. I worked with a girl who knew one of the SAS men in the Iranian Embassy siege

8. I served Gary Glitter's Glitter Band petrol when I used to work in petrol station in the 1970s

9. I used to work in the gambling industry helping people let go of their money, I now work in academia helping people let go of their assumptions

10. I speak quite good German, a little French and just done 10 weeks learning some Mandarin - Ni Hao!


I'm going tag the following people and hope they play!

the rules are:

1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.
2. List EIGHT random facts about yourself.
3. Tag EIGHT people at the end of your post and list their names.
4. Let them know they’ve been tagged.


Simone at Outfit Inspirations

Luis at Elusa

Scott at McArthurs Rant

Daddy P at Daddy Papersurfer

Gurushabad at Gurushabad

Mike at The Absent Mind

Ilkeryodas at The Thinking Blog

Harleyblues at Sir Paul Mcartney

Was I Gullible Expecting Macbook to Work With Netgear?

Two very important aspects for the avoidance of Gullibility have just been brought home to me through the experience of buying a Macbook.

What a great piece of kit, good looking etc, 'it just works' was the claim to fame.

Well it didn't...or rather 'we' didn't. Firstly I didn't do the required amount of due diligence (i.e. establish the facts)because the mac discussion boards are full of how Air Port doesn't hook up to the Netgear DG834G, and lots of lively discussion about fixes and tricks to make it happen too, some do some don't. Secondly I reached the limits of my ability and got involved in something (wireless networking) that was more complicated than I could handle.

OK I understand WEP keys and all that, but when you've done the obvious and it 'just doesn't work' your left thinking the apple logo should be a wallet with a bite taken out of it!

So time to tap up some tekkie friends, you know, the cyber equivalent of plumbers. They 'll come in, take a look at the system, take in a sharp breath through the teeth and say something like 'Which amateur did this for you?, they should have disconglomerated your WPA and WEP enablement in order to co-transfix the authority status on the security modulations'It's looking like a complete system review and perhaps dobbing in for an Airport router too. Anyone know if PCs work with it though?

It's looking like I might be contender for the Gullibility Canoe Award 2007!

The Darwin's - Evolutionary Evidence for the Gullibility Gene

You will no doubt be familiar with this very evocative shot of gullible Ann, wife of gullible John the forgetful canoeist.

If ever an image summed up the essence of Gullibility then this must be it. The moment when any one of us is confronted with the realisation that whatever mental map we were carrying of the world suddenly no longer represents how we thought it was.

As with so many stories in our lives they give the chance to learn and understand more about facets of human nature, and in this case the nature of gullibility.

Parking the whole pile of ethical questions that we can ask. The question of gullibility can be looked at from two sides. Firstly the expectations that John and Anne Gullible had of the gullibility of others, and secondly their own gullibility.

They have given us all a wonderful example of a fully integrated 'system of gullibility' at work, in which their own beliefs of the gullibility of others are born out of the gullibility they have themselves. This propensity to double loop gullibility must surely be prima facae evidence of the gullibility gene at work!

A thread that runs through this whole saga seems to be a complete lack of Critical Thinking.

The plan wasn't thought through to search for unintended side effects such as the estate agents photo being taken and shows a complete underestimation of the inter-connected world we live in.

Gullible Anne didn't sanity check the idea when it was first suggested. Clearly she choose to omit, delete and distort factors that showed up flaws in the plan, which meant she was living in an impoverished version of reality. She now blames this on 'marrying the the wrong husband!' So it was his fault that she got into this mess she claims. Well Anne, we all have a part to play in our own gullibility.

This claim is utterly staggering, and evidence of a complete state of denial. Even in the midst of the realisation of her gullibility she is still able to perform an act of extrinsic motivation and still ultimately blame everything on the failings of her husband.

The Gullible Canoeist himself, must think that world and his dog are stupid. As if we were going to take on face value he'd forgotten everything! Which part of 'I wonder what scientific and clinical skills will be used to check my story' did he forget to check...oh I forgot...he's got amnesia, so he will have forgotten to check!