Thursday, June 12, 2003

Via Slate, Lucky came across the description of the psychological condition termed Narcissistic Personality Disorder.  Lucky read the description, and is now a bit frightened, as every single one of his classmates is afflicted.  In fact, he thinks this is a precondition to going to business school. From Psychologynet.org: Overview A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following: has a grandiose sense of self-importance (e.g., exaggerates achievements and talents, expects to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements) is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love believes that he or she is "special" and unique and can only be understood by, or should associate with other special or high-status people (or institutions) requires excessive admiration has a sense of entitlement, i.e., unreasonable expectations of especially favorable treatment or automatic compliance with his or her expectations is interpersonally exploitative, i.e., takes advantage of others to achieve his or her own ends lacks empathy: is unwilling to recognize or identify with the feelings and needs of others is often envious of others or believes that others are envious of him or her shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes He thinks #10 should be "Consistently writes about self in the third person."   10:21:54 PM    comment []

A Day In The Life 0700 Alarm rings.  Get up, faintly surprised that five hours didn't leave me refreshed.  Get ready. 0830 Negotiation Analysis - Today's class was a classic; quotes will follow. Our professor spent 80 minutes on a monologue about the Prisoner's Dilemma, and how its basic structure is applicable to politics, governance, management, society, delinquent children, ethics, police, and brainwashing. He then spent 10 minutes discussing the results of the last negotiation. It's easy to know which is more important. 1000 Break.  Tea. 1015 Head to library.  Check email.  Prepare for Gulfwing negotiation. 1200 Begin Gulfwing negotiation.  This is a three-party affair, and I know both; one is a friend, the other an acquaintance.  After 90 frustrating minutes, we ended the session miles apart on our positions.  We agree to continue on Saturday afternoon. 1330 Lunch.  Sautéed fish, yellow rice, tomatoes.  Apricot yoghurt for dessert. 1400 Consumer Behavior.  We discussed the Principle of Automaticity and the Principle of Pavlovian Conditioning. 1530 Break.  Tea. 1545 Dynamic Pricing and Revenue Management.  We were treated to a guest speaker, whose name I never caught, from Manugistics.  Manugistics is a high-tech pricing and supply chain management software solutions provider (this is their description, not mine).  He gave a good presentation, short at 40 minutes, and spent the balance of class answering questions.  The speaker was unusually personable, and took lots of time in dialogue with students.  I can imagine he was just a killer business development and sales professional; ex-Andersen, from Kellogg.  As a side note, I must remark that this is the first person I have ever met from Kellogg with whom I was not unimpressed, and I've met plenty.  We'll chalk it up to luck. 1730 Gym. I went with a friend, which was great fun, and we egged each other on to lift bigger and bigger weights. It felt like high school. 1900 Tombola. As part of the Italian Week festivities, the Italians organized a pizza break on campus. In the space outside Freddy's Bar, there were one hundred boxes of pizza and what appeared to be an infinite supply of Moretti beer. They played Tombola, which appeared to be a precursor of bingo. 2000 Library.  Study.  Update blog. (estimated) 2200 Go home.  Eat dinner.  Sleep. 9:02:20 PM    comment []