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June 28, 2006
Warren Buffett Withdraws His Children from The Lucky Sperm Club
Warren Buffett effectively told the world this past Sunday afternoon that he wants his children and their progeny to do anything they want, but they can't do nothing.
Mr. Buffet later appeared in an interview with Charlie Rose on Tuesday night alongside Bill and Melinda Gates. Charlie Rose said to Buffett: "You famously said ... you wanted to leave your children with enough money to do whatever they wanted to do, but not nothing."
"So [my children] can do anything but not nothing," Buffet responded. "I don't believe in dynastic wealth. It's nice to leave something to kids. I can understand how somebody would want to leave their farm or their small business or something that they built, all of that, to their children. But dynastic wealth, the idea that many generations should be able to go without doing a thing, if they wish, simply because they came from the right womb -- that really strikes me as flying in the face of what this country is about. I mean we believe in a meritocracy and equality of opportunity. And dynastic wealth flies in the face of that. So I really felt that if you had a choice between having a foundation like this, doing tremendous things for people all over the world, or having a bunch of people that, as they say, came from the lucky sperm club..." [laughter]
An interesting part of Buffett's move is what he calls the "debilitating effects" of wealth, something that Buffett has seen afflict the rich.
"I love it when I'm around the country club, and I hear people talking about the debilitating effects of a welfare society. At the same time, they leave their kids a lifetime and beyond of food stamps. Instead of having a welfare officer, they have a trust officer. And instead of food stamps, they have stocks and bonds." New York Times
How can such a rich, powerful, and skillful business man have this attitude upon wealth? What does this mean about his attitude toward ensuring that his children live satisfying lives? And what does it mean to leave a legacy for your children? For your society? I find it fascinating that such a person would intentionally remove from his children's grasp a vast sum of fantastic and unfathomable wealth. This, to me, is an incredible expression of what wealth can do to a person.
Buffet notes his displeasure with "dynasties". Why would he dislike them?
Does it make more sense to divert your wealth into philanthropic endeavors which bestow the world with the ability to stop easily-preventable deaths, than to allow your children and grandchildren to inherit all your wealth?
Gates also mentioned how he was influenced by Andrew Carnegie's "Gospel of Wealth" which helped him think about philanthropy and set very high goals. Gates said:
"The whole idea [that] leaving wealth to your children actually would not be the best idea for society or for them, that came out of things that Warren was talking about right around the time we met him. I was starting to thing think that, oh jeez, this is a problem I'll have to deal with. This is some very good advice about that."
Posted by Rob at 06:46 AM | Comments (0)
June 24, 2006
The Trickery within the Common Sense of Bio-Enhancement
Does it make good sense to use bio-enhancing tools to improve and extend human life? This question was asked by Graham Lawton in NewScientist Magazine’s 13 May 2006 edition.
“For many people that future [promising to extend human biology] cannot come soon enough, and no wonder: human enhancement promises to fulfill some of our deepest-held desires. Suppose you were offered an extra 50 years of life, endowed with what Schwartz calls “superheath”, physical and mental capabilities that exceed the ones you were born with, not to mention the prospect of an even better life for your children. Would you turn it down?” (p. 37)
My argument against a future of such seduction is: we’re tuning it down now—we’re turning it down already. One need only to look at the level of obesity in American society today, approaching 30% of the population according to American Sports Data, to see that Americans have a difficult time taking care of themselves despite the myriad of fantastic healing tools and life-improving techniques, tools and techniques that we have today. One might think that Americans were the victim of a gigantic lie, that we have no tools to bring ourselves the “superhealth” Lawton mentions. But I believe that we do: I believe that we have many, many tools to bring us superhealth today. But the question arises: If we have such tools today, why do so few Americans use them?
So, allow me to alter Lawton’s question one step further: If you were to have tools that could “fulfill some of [your] deepest-held desires”, why would you not take them, as many Americans fail to do? This seems to me the bigger, the more important, and the more problematic question.
Posted by Rob at 12:42 PM | Comments (0)
June 21, 2006
The Parable of The Measuring Sticks
One day a squirrel and a pond-beaver stood in a clearing in the forest, arguing about which one was stronger.
"I'm stronger!" said the squirrel.
"Hah!" laughed the beaver. "You are not stronger than I."
"Yes, I am. See me lift this acorn!" The squirrel put an acorn into the air. "I'm strong!"
The beaver watched this and said, "You can lift a tiny acorn, but look at me!" The beaver clamped his toothy jaw around a log of wood and pulled it atop his beaver dam.
The squirrel was impressed. "Mm! Amazing! You are strongest!"
And the beaver was happy. For a moment.
Watching the debate between these two animals was a donkey. The donkey said, "Squirrel, you can lift an acorn, and beaver, you might lift a log, but look what's atop my back."
The two animals looked at the donkey and saw on top of him giant mass of equipment, a heavy canvas pack and shovels and supplies.
"Oooh! You are the strongest," the squirrel and beaver cried. "You are!"
Then, from the nearby forest came loud crash, and an enormous animal burst through the trees. It was an elephant, and the three other animals were shocked. The elephant was a mountain of an animal, and it loomed over the donkey and his pack.
"You may be strong, donkey," the elephant said, "but look what I can do!"
And with that the elephant moved swiftly to a large tree that had fallen into the clearing. The elephant shoved its tusks beneath the tree, coiled its snake-like trunk around it, and with a very loud grunt hoisted the tree—branches, leaves, tree trunk, and all—high into the air.
"There! Do you see?" the elephant boomed.
The squirrel, the beaver, and the donkey stood there, underneath the tree, with their mouths agape, as leaves and sticks fell to the ground around them.
With a loud thump, the elephant dropped the great tree back where it had fallen and said, "Do you see how strong I am!"
"Yes!" the three other animals shouted, clapping wildly, "We see! We see! You are the strongest!"
Then the elephant replied, "No! I am not strong!"
"What? Not strong?" the three smaller animals said.
"No. I am not strong."
The elephant pointed his trunk to the ground. "There, do you see that ant hill?"
The squirrel, the beaver, and the donkey all looked down to the ground and saw where the elephant pointed. It was a little ant hill, where tiny black ants carried slivers of leaves into their hole.
"They are the strongest. The ants."
"What!" cried the other animals.
"Yes. You squirrel are much bigger than they, yet you can only carry an acorn, and you beaver, you are stronger still. Yet you can carry only a log of wood, and you donkey, even stronger still, you can carry great bags of material but are not strong."
The other animals were speechless.
"It is the ants who are strongest, for they can carry their own weight many times over. Let each animal be judged by different measuring sticks, for each animal is different and should not be compared to each other. And any competition between animals is therefore foolish, for who among you can lift your own weight the way ants do."
The other animals stood there amazed and nodded their heads in agreement.
Posted by Rob at 03:46 PM | Comments (0)