Links for Thought -- April 27, 2012

Pixar Story Rules (The Pixar Touch, h/t to Ritholtz) -- This is a great list of the "rules" that shape Pixar's stories.  No matter what our age, we all know (and I'm sure love) the great stories from Steve Job's computer animation studio.  While these rules are about how to structure a great animated film, they are deeper life lessons with broader implications.  Definitely worth a read.

Logical Fallacies Poster (Boing Boing) -- Ah remember the good 'ole days as a philosophy major in college memorizing the long list of all the fallacies.  Each day as I peruse the financial news, I'm pretty sure I encounter at least a handful.  Slippery slopes, strawmans and appeals to emotion are RAMPANT throughout today's 24-hour news cycle.  Which others do you see regularly?

Lonesome Dove (Free Exchange) -- The Economist's economics blog looks at Ben Bernanke's maneuvering and posturing through the financial crisis.  In particular, this post looks at how Bernanke has positioned himself between those like Paul Krugman saying the academic Bernanke would do more to fend off deflation, and the inflationistas who at every step of the way insist that hyperinflation is right around the corner.  This is a must read for those interested in macroeconomics.

Don't Cripple Innovation for the Sake of this Quarter's Numbers (Harvard Business Review) -- This article touches on a point I will get back to time and again.  Companies need to manage their business to maximize the long-term value, and not for meeting quarterly numbers.  Too often we see companies doing precisely the wrong thing.  Many of today's managerial challenges on this end are driven by increasingly fickle shareholders looking to make a quick buck on a trade, rather than building wealth through long-term investment.  The tide does seem to be shifting though.

Bullish Sentiment At Lowest Level Since Last September (Pragmatic Capitalism) -- I usually try to focus on pieces that are not pegged in time, but this I just found so damn interesting.  Right now as the market sits within spitting distance of multi-year highs, investor sentiment is much nearer levels consistent with a bottom.  This is a pretty consistent contrarian indicator, where the preponderance of market participants tend to be wrong.  It's also a great counterpoint to those talking heads who keep speaking of excessive bullishness.

People are Figuring Out Austerity is Stupid (Ritholtz) -- It's about freaking time! Austerity has never worked throughout history and it sure as hell won't work now.  Don't be fooled by all the appeals to emotion and slippery slopes (go check out those logical fallacies from above).  The austerity argument is stooped in moralism far more than sound economics, and in reality the morality is all wrong anyway.  There is a sound empirical explanation for why austerity not only doesn't work, but is also in fact counterproductive and a force which increases (not decreases) an aggregate debt burden.  It's all about thinking of things in terms of their relative levels (i.e. debt to GDP) instead of gross levels.

David Wright: Greatest Met Ever? (Fangraphs) -- Well just 3 years ago I think every Mets fan would've agreed Wright had a clear shot at being the greatest Met ever.  Today many would beg to differ.  Reality, as it often does, lies somewhere in the middle.  He had some all-time great Mets years, with a couple of injury riddled ones we'd rather forget.  Looks like things are getting back to normal though for D. Wright.  The most shocking surprise from the Fangraphs analysis is that Edgardo Alfonzo is way higher than I thought he'd be statistically speaking.  I was a HUGE fan back in the day.

Typically I leave off with a great nature shot, but today I will again diverge and end with the 3 best photos I took at today's flyby from the Enterprise Space Shuttle.  What a cool site that was flying first up the Hudson from downtown, and then back towards the city, past the Hudson cliffs and over the George Washington Bridge.  While the space shuttle is old and headed for retirement, I still couldn't help but laugh at the contrast with my recent post on New York City pre-concrete junge.  Just an awesome site to see! 

New York Pre-Concrete Jungle

As I've mentioned several times already, I am thoroughly addicted to TED Talks. I just watched a particularly cool one by Eric Sanderson, where he goes back and reconstructs a visual model of what the island of Manhattan looked like when Henry Hudson first sailed into New York Harbor and the river that bares his name, including an analysis into the topography, geography and robust ecosystems of the island.  

Often I find myself in awe of the natural element to New York, these days even far more so than the gigantic buildings that make up the city's renowned skyline.  Yes the big buildings are impressive, but to me, they have become so natural that there is a deep internal apathy to its effect.  As time evolves, I have started to marvel more at the actual topography of the lands around me, from the Harbor down by the Battery, to the cliffs opposite Washington Heights, to that large still seemingly natural swath of land we call Central Park in the middle.  The Hudson River itself is so large and powerful that it has crafted one of the most unique systems of tidal pools, straights, estuaries and meadows in the world.

I can't help but wonder when on a boat with the following view, what would this look like sans concrete, steel and people? 

Or when on a rooftop looking West over New Jersey, what the river, transitioning to meadows, growing into forests and ultimately mountains would look like compared to what is there today:

It's always fascinated me how the geography of Manhattan specifically allowed for the city that is today New York.  Eric Sanderson gives an amazing glimpse into the original nature behind the island itself, beyond just the geographical location, which enabled New York to become the city that it is today: