Straw that broke the camel's back

The idiom the straw that broke the camel's back is from an Arabic proverb about how a camel is loaded beyond its capacity to move or stand.^[1] This is a reference to any process by which cataclysmic failure (a broken back) is achieved by a seemingly inconsequential addition, a single straw. This also gives rise to thephrase "the last/final straw", used when something is deemed to be the last in a line of unacceptable occurrences. Variations include "the straw that broke thedonkey's back", the "melon that broke the monkey's back", the "feather that broke the camel's back", and the "straw that broke the horse's back".

One of the earliest published usages of this phrase was in Charles Dickens's Dombey and Son (1848), where he says "As the last straw breaks the laden camel's back", meaning that there is a limit to everyone's endurance, or everyone has his breaking-point. Dickens was writing in the nineteenth century and he may have received his inspiration from an earlier proverb, recorded by Thomas Fuller in hisGnomologia: Adages and Proverbs as "'Tis the last feather that breaks the horse's back". Mark Twain also used a variation of this phrase in his book The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), "this final feather broke the camel's back" 

Camel's nose

The camel's nose is a metaphor for a situation where the permitting of a small, seemingly innocuous act will open the door for larger, clearly undesirable actions.

A typical usage is this, from U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater in 1958:

This bill and the foregoing remarks of the majority remind me of an old Arabian proverb: "If the camel once gets his nose in the tent, his body will soon follow." If adopted, the legislation will mark the inception of aid, supervision, and ultimately control of education in this country by the federal authorities.^[1]

According to Geoffrey Nunberg, the image entered the English language in the middle of the 19th century.^[2] An early example is a fable printed in 1858 in which an Arab miller allows a camel to stick its nose into his bedroom, then other parts of its body, until the camel is entirely inside and refuses to leave.^[3] Lydia Sigourney wrote another version, a widely reprinted poem for children, in which the camel enters a shop because the workman does not forbid it at any stage.^[4]

The 1858 example above says, "The Arabs repeat a fable", and Sigourney says in a footnote, "To illustrate the danger of the first approach of evil habit, the Arabs have a proverb, 'Beware of the camel's nose.'" However, Nunberg could not find an Arab source for the saying and suspected it was a Victorian invention.^[2]

An early citation with a tent is "The camel in the Arabian tale begged and received permission to insert his nose into the desert tent."^[5] By 1878, the expression was familiar enough that part of the story could be left unstated. "It is the humble petition of the camel, who only asks that he may put his nose into the traveler's tent. It is so pitiful, so modest, that we must needs relent and grant it."^[6]

In a 1915 book of fables by Horace Scudder, the story, titled The Arab and His Camel, ends with the moral: "It is a wise rule to resist the beginnings of evil."^[7]

The phrase was used in Reed v. King (193 CA Rptr. 130 - 1983): "The paramount argument against an affirmative conclusion is it permits the camel's nose of unrestrained irrationality admission to the tent. If such an 'irrational' consideration is permitted as a basis of rescission the stability of all conveyances will be seriously undermined." The case in question involved a plaintiff suing because the defendant sold a house without telling them that the house's previous inhabitants had been brutally murdered 10 years earlier.

There are a number of other metaphors and expressions which refer to small changes leading to chains of events with undesirable or unexpected consequences, differing in nuances.

The usage:

The Bible says: Ephesians 4:27 NIV

and do not give the devil a foothold.

God knows that giving a slightest of detail to devil will take control of the whole person. 

Matthew 12:43-45

New King James Version (NKJV)

An Unclean Spirit Returns

43 “When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. 44 Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. 45 Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation.”

Time Management

Time Management

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

So the professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with an unanimous “yes.”

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filing the space between the grains of sand.

The professor then started talking to the students. “My dear students, the jar is now full, but what is the message.” One student stood raised his hand and said, “However busy we might be, there is always time for some more work.” Good, said the professor, but I would like to add some more.

The students look curiously at the professor as he continued. However busy we may be, we can always find time for more work is right, but what if the sequence in which the items were placed in the jar was reversed.

Would there still be enough space for all things to be placed in the jar. So, my friends, the important thing in life is to understand your priorities. What things must go in first and which ones later. Once you have it right, it will all fit in well.

10/12/10

The Glad Game... Pollyanna principle

The Pollyanna principle (also called Pollyannaism or positivity bias) is the tendency for people to remember pleasant items more accurately than unpleasant ones. Research indicates that, at the subconscious level, the mind has a tendency to focus on the optimistic while, at the conscious level, it has a tendency to focus on the negative. This subconscious bias towards the positive is often described as the Pollyanna principle.

The name derives from the 1913 novel Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter describing a girl who plays the "glad game"—trying to find something to be glad about in every situation. The novel has been adapted to film several times, most famously in 1920 and 1960. An early use of the name "Pollyanna" in psychological literature was in 1969 by Boucher and Osgood who described a Pollyanna hypothesis as a universal human tendency to use evaluatively positive words more frequently and diversly than evaluatively negative words in communicating.
The Pollyanna principle was described by Matlin and Stang in 1978 using the archetype of Pollyanna more specifically as a psychological principle which portrays the positive bias people have when thinking of the past. According to the Pollyanna Principle, the brain processes information that is pleasing and agreeable in a more precise and exact manner as compared to unpleasant information. We actually tend to remember past experiences as more rosy than they actually occurred.
The researchers Margaret Matlin and David Stang provided substantial evidence of the Pollyanna Principle. They found that people expose themselves to positive stimuli and avoid negative stimuli, they take longer to recognize what is unpleasant or threatening than what is pleasant and safe, and they report that they encounter positive stimuli more frequently than they actually do. Matlin and Stang also determined that selective recall was a more likely occurrence when recall was delayed: the longer the delay, the more selective recall that occurred.
However, the Pollyanna principle does not apply to individuals suffering from depression or anxiety, who tend to either have more depressive realism or a negative bias.

Ways to look at Failure...

Thomas Edison tried and failed nearly 2,000 times to develop the carbonized cotton-thread filament for the incandescent light bulb.

And when asked about it, he said "I didn't fail; I found out 2,000 ways how not to make a light bulb," but he only needed one way to make it work.

Looking for Dirt or Gold?

Andrew Carnegie, America's first great industrialist, nearly 100 years ago had 43 millionaires working for him - an unheard-of occurrence in those days.  A reporter asked him how he managed to hire 43 millionaires.  Carnegie responded that none of them were millionaires when he hired them but observed that, "You develop millionaires the way you mine gold.  You expect to move tons of dirt to find an ounce of gold, but you don't go into the mine looking for the dirt—you go in looking for the gold."

Motivating People - From the Book "The Leader In You"

Even as a boy Andrew Carnegie discovered the astonishing importance that people place on their names. When he was ten years old, he had a father rabbit and a mother rabbit. He awoke one morning to discover that he had a whole next full of little rabbits and nothing to feed them.
What do you suppose he did? Well, he had a brilliant idea. He told half a dozen boys in the neighborhood that if they would go out everyday and pull enough dandelions and grass and clover to feed the rabbits, he would name the rabbits in their honor. The plan worked like magic, and here is the point of the story.
Andrew Carnegie never forgot that incident. And years later, he made millions of dollars by using the same technique in business. He wanted to sell steel rails to the Pennsylvania Railroad. J. Edgar Thomson was president of the railroad then. So Andrew Carnegie, remembering the lesson he had learned from his rabbits, built a huge steel mill in Pittsburgh and called it the J. Edgar Thomson Steel works.
Now let me ask you a question. When the Pennsylvania Railroad needed steel rails after that, where do you suppose J. Edgar Thomson bought them?
                                                                -- Dale Carnegie

Carz Vs Computers

At a computer expo (COMDEX), Bill Gates reportedly compared the computer industry with the auto industry and stated: "If GM had kept up with the technology like the computer industry has, we would all be driving $25.00 cars that got 1,000 miles to the gallon." 

In response to Bill's comments, General Motors issued a press release (by Mr. Welch himself) stating: 
 

---

If GM had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving cars with the following characteristics: 

1. For no reason at all, your car would crash twice a day. 

2. Every time they repainted the lines on the road, you would have to buy a new car. 

3. Occasionally, executing a manoeuver such as a left-turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to restart, and you would have to reinstall the engine. 

4. When your car died on the freeway for no reason, you would just accept this, restart and drive on. 

5. Only one person at a time could use the car, unless you bought 'Car95' or 'CarNT', and then added more seats. 

6. Apple would make a car powered by the sun, reliable, five times as fast, and twice as easy to drive, but would run on only five per cent of the roads. 

7. Oil, water temperature and alternator warning lights would be replaced by a single 'general car default' warning light. 

8. New seats would force every-one to have the same size butt. 

9. The airbag would say 'Are you sure?' before going off. 

10. Occasionally, for no reason, your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key, and grabbed the radio antenna. 

11. GM would require all car buyers to also purchase a deluxe set of road maps from Rand-McNally (a subsidiary of GM), even though they neither need them nor want them. Trying to delete this option would immediately cause the car's performance to diminish by 50 per cent or more. Moreover, GM would become a target for investigation by the Justice Department. 

12. Every time GM introduced a new model, car buyers would have to learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would operate in the same manner as the old car. 

13. You would press the 'start' button to shut off the engine.
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/humor/jokes/autos.asp#eKie7TGxsFr0jDfg.99

“The Christian says, 'Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. Men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or to be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that country and to help others to do the same.”

― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity