Illustration by Paul Tansley.
Illustration by Paul Tansley.
Companies may seek to dismantle prejudice among their employees â but psychologists question whether these courses effect lasting change
Sun 25 Apr 2021 06.00 EDT
Hereâs a fact that cannot be disputed: if your name is James or Emily, you will find it easier to get a job than someone called Tariq or Adeola. Between November 2016 and December 2017, researchers sent out fake CVs and cover letters for 3,200 positions. Despite demonstrating exactly the same qualifications and experience, the âapplicantsâ with common Pakistani or Nigerian names needed to send out 60% more applications to receive the same number of callbacks as applicants with more stereotypically British names.
If you drop a glass cup on the floor, it will smash, representing fragility.
If you drop a stone, despite the fall, it continues entire, firm, representing resilience.
And if you cut off a Hydra head, two are born in place, representing antifragility. With more adversity, the response is to become stronger.
The Antifragile concept explains that some form of randomness and variance make things less fragile.
Some stress is productive; some physical work is good for the bones; some fasting is good for the immune system etc.
On the information and knowledge level, we can apply the concept of antifragility by constantly exposing our ideas, beliefs, investment thesis to a certain level of contradictory information – in order to make them less fragile.
Why it s time to stop pursuing happiness David Robson
Like many teenagers, I was once plagued with angst and dissatisfaction – feelings that my parents often met with bemusement rather than sympathy. They were already in their 50s, and, having grown up in postwar Britain, they struggled to understand the sources of my discontentment at the turn of the 21st century.
“The problem with your generation is that you always expect to be happy,” my mother once said. I was baffled. Surely happiness was the purpose of living, and we should strive to achieve it at every opportunity? I simply wasn’t prepared to accept my melancholy as something that was beyond my control.