Month: March 2009

Immediacy, choice and free will

I’ve been thinking.

Consider this:

“What if culture is not the liberator of individual free will, but another jailer?” [Jamie Tehrani & Robert Layton]

Photo by Fernando Silveria

Photo by Fernando Silveria

Consider this:

“…people actually put a disproportionately high value on things they can have right now, and if they cannot have them now the length of the delay matters relatively little.  If something is delayed by a few minutes we might devalue it by perhaps 10 per cent, while if it is delayed by two years we devalue it by 12 per cent.” [Daniel Read]

Photo by Xindaan

Photo by Xindaan

Consider this:

“The most decisive actions of our life…are most often unconsidered actions.” [André Gide]

Photo by frankh

Photo by frankh

Has immediacy and never-ending choice taken away some of our freedom?

The Wonder of the Weekend

Why would you want to treat the weekend as the weekend?  Saturday and Sunday are boons for productivity.

photo by mcleod

The week is a great time for fun at uni and things often slow down at the weekend.  It’s not always the case, but you’re likely to find precious little happening over large chunks of that time, so it’s perfect to get on with your work and catch up on the stuff you don’t want to think about when everything else is vying for your attention during the week.

Look at Saturday and Sunday as a two-day week.  Let Monday to Friday be the weekend instead!  Okay, so there are lectures and it won’t be work-free.  But how often do you manage an entire day where it was exclusively fun, laughter, decadence and delight from start to finish?  Exactly!

Normally, the weekend is an excuse to chill, or a time to go back to the family home, or catch up on sleep and washing (if you parents have stopped letting you bring your dirty stuff home…).  However, you have the prospect of achieving a whole lot more if you’re proactive on campus.  While others go home and Saturdays are naturally quieter, you can focus on more important matters.  And for those who stay on campus at the weekend, you can get up early on a Sunday while everyone else stays in bed catching up on lost sleep or nursing hangovers.

I recently saw this quotation from ‘How to be Idle‘, by Tom Hodgkinson:

“To be truly idle, you also have to be efficient.”

The weekend is the perfect time to do most of the work you’d expect others to do in the week.  Then, when the normally busy weekdays come along, you can spend a lot more time idling and a lot less time worrying about your workload.  Good times, here we come!

Even if you have sporting events at the weekend, meet up for a weekend activity, or go to church on a Sunday morning, there should be no trouble incorporating it into a packed routine.  There should still be plenty of weekend ‘dead time’ to be proactive in.

I’m not the only one who made the most of this valuable time.  Cal Newport has long been an advocate of a ‘Sunday Ritual’.  It’s great to get up as early as possible on a Sunday (even if it had been an eventful Saturday night…) and enjoy the peace.  For me, early mornings were spent walking around the quiet campus, catching up on reading, getting a few boring chores out of the way, writing drafts of essays, going to a practically empty library and making the most of the facilities, and all sorts of other things.

photo by patkisha

While everyone else slept, I worked with ease and without distraction.  Once friends started to emerge from their beds, I’d been up and about for hours.  It was bliss.  Seriously.

Some people thought my workload was nothing compared to my friends.  It looked like I was doing much less than anyone else.  And at that precise moment in time, it was probably true.  But if they’d noticed how much I’d achieved while they weren’t looking, all would make sense and it would be clear how much effort I’d really put in.  I only made it look easy.  Doesn’t mean it was a breeze.  A relaxed effort, yes.  A half-hearted effort, no.

What does the weekend mean for you?  And how much is that time worth?

Back Away From Pointless Plagiarism

Plagiarism doesn’t always have to be intentional.  It’s unlikely, but certainly possible if you’re not careful.

Seeing double? (photo by bananabren)

Seeing double? (photo by bananabren)

Get your wits about you and give credit where it’s due.  Here are a few ways you can stay on the right side of things:

  1. Don’t take another person’s unique idea and use it unless you reference that  person’s work.
  2. Cite the source of facts, statistics, and quotations.
  3. Don’t copy from elsewhere without properly referencing and attributing, no matter how obscure it is.
  4. If it’s a close call and you feel a reference may be needed to cover all ground,  do put the reference. Don’t second guess yourself and decide against putting a  footnote.  Citing it means that you’ve done your research and it means you won’t  get into unnecessary trouble later down the line.
  5. Quote and reference in advance. When you copy quotations, photocopy pages, or  do anything with another person’s work, make sure to note down the reference, so  you can add it easily to an essay later.  A major time-waster for many students can be the bibliography and references at the end.  Even if you don’t use half the information you’ve gathered, you’ll still save time having noted the proper referencing notes in the first place, rather than working it out at the time.  I found this out pretty quickly…A quotation without a reference can be hell!
  6. Don’t blindly rely on what classmates have to say on a subject. If you take  down someone’s opinion on an essay topic, how do you know it’s an original thought?   You may find that the idea is a very specific one  that’s held by an important  academic in the field.  From taking a friend’s idea and thinking you’re onto a good  thing, you may find difficulty when you’re being asked how you came across this  information.  Stick to your own ideas and back them up.

It isn’t always as simple as copying someone else’s writing or idea word for word.  There are many different ways to get caught in the trap.  Here are some more helpful links to help you understand what plagiarism can be:

Photo by mollyjolly

Photo by mollyjolly