Author Archives: donturn

About donturn

Don Turnbull, Ph.D. is a consultant specializing in software research and development focusing on search systems, information analytics, user experience design, semantic and knowledge management technologies as well as intellectual property analysis.

Behavioral Finance 101

Great, short article on Slate by Henry Blodget about the mistakes we make when investing – which really applies to many other areas of life: Born Suckers – The greatest Wall Street danger of all: you. By Henry Blodget

Most interestingly, the Prospect Theory concept applies to many other aspects of behavior, including foraging theory and when mixed with the Confirmatory Bias, can lead to numerous costly mistakes.

Much of this work reflects recent Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman’s work (along with Amos Tversky, but Nobels aren’t awarded posthumously) .

Other notable, perhaps more readable interpretations are in Thomas Gilovich’s excellent books Why Smart People Make Big Money Mistakes And How To Correct Them: Lessons From The New Science Of Behavioral Economics and How We Know What Isn’t So.

Texas Book Festival

Of course, tomorrow is the beginning of the Texas Book Festival, if anything else – to prove that some of us here in Texas do in fact read.

Here’s what events look good to me:

  • Saturday
    1. 11:45 – 12:30: H.W. Brands, Lone Star Nation
      Reading and Q&A introduced by Greg Curtis
      Location: Auditorium

    2. 12:30 – 1:30:
      James Ellroy: Destination: Morgue!
      Jessee Sublett: Never the Same Again
      Reading and Q&A introduced by Kip Stratton
      Location: Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum Main Hall

    3. 12:45 – 1:30: Dayton Duncan, Lewis and Clark
      Reading and Q&A introduced by Regan Gammon
      Location: Capitol Extension Room E2.028

    4. 2:00 – 3:00: What’s So Funny About Politics?
      Jim Hightower, Let’s Stop Beating Around the Bush
      Andy Borowitz, The Borowitz Report
      Panel discussion by Evan Smith
      Location: House Chamber

    5. 2:15 – 3:00: Men Behaving Badly:
      Adam Johnson, Parasites Like Us
      Kyle Smith, Love Monkey
      Jonathan Ames, Wake Up, Sir
      Reading and panel discussion moderated by Neal Pollack
      Location: Capitol Extension Room E2.010

    6. 7:00 – 9:45: Texas Book Festival After Hours: Movies
      Location: Alamo Drafthouse–Downtown
      Oscar-winner Peter Bogdanovich will introduce two of his favorite films: 7 p.m.: Targets & 9:45 p.m.: Saint Jack.
  • Sunday
    1. What’s Cooking in Texas
      John DeMers, Houston: Culinary Capital
      Fernando Saralegui, Our Latin Table
      Linda Bauer, Historic Recipes from Texas and American Sampler Cookbook
      Panel discussion moderated by Virginia Wood
      Location: Capitol Extension Room E2.014

    2. 12:30 – 1:15: Meghan Daum, The Quality of Life Report
      Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, Queen of Dreams
      Reading and Q&A introduced by Mary Margaret Farabee
      Location: Senate Chamber

    3. 2:00 – 2:45: Mind of a Killer
      Michael McGarrity, Slow Kill
      David Lindsey, The Face of the Assassin
      Reading and panel discussion moderated by Gary Lavergne
      Location: House Chamber

Podcasting?

Am I the only one who doesn’t care about podcasting?

Why would I want to HEAR posts from someone when I can skim them in seconds in my RSS reader? There are so many other interesting things to listen to and it’s not like most of our voices are sonorous enough for lengthy attention.