Giovanni Piantoni

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Great Ideas

Laziness and cowardice are the reasons why so great a proportion of men, long after nature has released them from alien guidance, nonetheless gladly remain in lifelong immaturity, and why it is so easy for others to establish themselves as their guardians. It is so easy to be immature. If I have a book to serve as my understanding, a pastor to serve as my conscience, a physician to determine my diet for me, and so on, I need not exert myself at all. I need not think, if only I can pay: others will readily undertake the irksome work for me.

Nothing is required for enlightenment, however, except freedom; and the freedom in question is the least harmful of all, namely, the freedom to use reason publicly in all matters. But on all sides I hear: "Do not argue!" The officer says, "Do not argue, drill!" The tax man says, "Do not argue, pay!" The pastor says, "Do not argue, believe!" In this we have examples of pervasive restrictions on freedom.

TED: Ideas worth spreading

• Barry Schwartz on the paradox of choice.
• Hans Rosling reveals new insights on poverty.
• Brian Cox presents some question that the CERN's LHC might answer.

Physics

• EPR paradox.
• Sticky tape can produce x-rays.

Mathematics

• MIT video lectures on Linear Algebra.
• A well-thought tutorial on Bayesian Reasoning.
• A quick review on calculus and friends.

Computer stuff

• Introduction to Digital Signal Processing, including fourier transform and filtering.
• All the time wasted reading CAPTCHA can be used to read old books.

Psychology

• Heuristics and Biases^[1]: the biases in our reasoning are the results of our reasoning itself.

Game Theory

• The Jevons paradox (or rebound effect).
• Game theory, including the prisoner's dilemma and the Nash equilibrium.
• Evolutionarily stable strategy^[1], i.e. which strategy a minority should adopt to win the strategy of the majority.