“David Sklansky and Mason Malmuth are a pair of authors whose poker books revolutionized the game. They are, far and away, the best theorists and writers about poker ever. Yet reading Sklansky and Malmuth will not make you a winning poker player in tougher games. Advertising books and seminars provide a framework for thinking about concepts. To become a great poker player, you must think about the game. To become a great Ad Man, you must think about advertising. In both arenas, very credible thinkers and writers–even you, my dear Wizard–will sometimes explore concepts that seem, on the face, to be inherently contradictory. The weak student picks one and discards the other. The strong student thinks about the contradiction and when and why each side of it might apply.” – Brett Feinstein, by email, Tuesday, July 9, 5:07AM
Feinstein's assertion about strong and weak students is extraordinarily insightful. Most of us, when faced with two truths that seem to be mutually exclusive, will simply pick the one we like and discard the other, utterly ignoring the admonition of Niels Bohr, the brilliant physicist and chemist who said, “The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.”
Have you never noticed that our universe is built on dualities? Nothing stands alone. The only way something can exist is if its opposite exists. There is no singular object, or quality, or trait, in this dualistic world. Everything comes in opposed pairs – male and female, multiplication and division, action and reaction, positive and negative, supply and demand, profit and loss, inhaling and exhaling, justice and mercy, chlorophyll and hemoglobin, conservatism and liberalism, the list is endless. Is it really wise to choose one and ignore the other?
John Young introduced me to the law of Intersecting Dualities the other day. Drawing a horizontal line on a sheet of paper, he wrote “takers” at the left extreme and “givers” at the right. Then he drew a vertical line bisecting the horizontal one, creating four equal quadrants. At the bottom of the vertical line John wrote “talkers,” and at its top, “doers.” In the bottom, left quadrant, (talkers – takers) John wrote “negotiators.” In the bottom, right quadrant, (talkers, givers) he wrote “motivators.” In the upper, left quadrant, (doers, takers) he wrote “thieves.” I'm not going to tell you what John wrote in the upper right quadrant, (doers, givers.) Instead, I want you to think of how many words might fit in that space and then write each of them down in an email to be sent to editor@wizardacademy.org before Tuesday, July 24, at noon. We'll publish your words, along with everyone else's, in a master list in the early August edition of the Beagle Bugle. (Aroooo!)
Lastly, consider – How many words on your list might your acquaintances use to describe you?
Roy H. Williams
PS – For those who have been wondering about whether Dave Nevland was successful in his attempt to digitally restore the long lost, 45 year-old taped interview with Joe Rosenthal, the photographer who snapped “Raising the Flag over Iwo Jima,” the answer is “Yes! Yes! Yes!” and it's fabulous. CDs of the interview will soon be made available.
Your FREE Subscription to the Beagle Bugle, a cooperative musepaper written by the readers of the Wizard's Monday Morning Memo, is available simply by emailing your address to tammy@wizardacademy.org or calling her at (800) 425-4769. Fax is (512) 295-5701. The musepaper will be mailed to your home monthly as a gift from the alumni of Wizard Academy.