We should teach the students, as well as executives, how to conduct experiments, how to examine data, and how to use these tools to make better decisions.

But because human being tend to focus on short-term benefits and our own immediate needs, such tragedies of the commons occur frequently .

There's something about [cyclically] doing something over and over and over that seems to be particularly demotivating.

Ownership is not limited to material things. It can also apply to points of view. Once we take ownership of an idea - whether it’s about politics or sports - what do we do? We love it perhaps more than we should. We prize it more than it is worth. And most frequently, we have trouble letting go of it because we can’t stand the idea of its loss. What are we left with then? An ideology - rigid and unyielding.

If you ever go bar hopping, who do you want to take with you? You want a slightly uglier version of yourself. Similar ... but slightly uglier.

The problem is that people basically dangle debt in front of us. And the cost for the poor of course is much higher than for the wealthy.

Scaling down individually is very hard. Imagine that if you go to a place where everybody is dressed nicely, and you are the only one who doesn't dress nicely. Everybody goes on vacations to a great place and you go to the Jersey shore. It's very hard to do these things without an organized mechanism, but it looks to me like there might be some organized mechanisms.