Tag Archives: Diversity

Three Tales from Amtrak

Posted on April 14, 2021 by N.S. Palmer

In the early 2000s, I worked for a year as an IT contractor at Amtrak’s headquarters in Washington DC. My experience there showed one of America’s greatest problems, as well as its solution. The U.S. federal government created Amtrak in … Continue reading →

Posted in Psychology, Society | Tagged Affirmative Action, Amtrak, Communication, Cultural difference, Diversity, H1-Bs, India, Merit, Productivity, Quota hiring, Replacement, Unemployment | 2 Comments

Democracy for Dinner

Posted on April 2, 2019 by N.S. Palmer

“Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried.” — Winston Churchill It’s dinner time. You and your spouse decide to vote on dinner. Happily, you both love pizza with anchovies. The vote … Continue reading →

Posted in Human Relations, Life, Political Science, Society | Tagged Consensus, Democracy, Democratic decision, Diversity, Forms of government, Majority rule, Minoritarianism, Multiculturalism | Leave a comment

Can You Feel the Love?

Posted on January 30, 2019 by N.S. Palmer

Can you feel the love? It’s kind of a cliché, sometimes said as a joke. But it points to a real problem. For any society to survive, its people need to cooperate. That requires at least a minimum level of … Continue reading →

Posted in Human Relations, Life, Political Science, Psychology, Society | Tagged Diversity, Empathy, Homogeneous societies, Kipling, love, Mutual understanding, Social Conflict, Social harmony, The Stranger, Tolerance | Leave a comment

Our Own Personal Iagos

Posted on January 29, 2019 by N.S. Palmer

In high school, I had a friend who tipped me off that someone secretly hated me. Pretty soon, however, I noticed that he told me the same thing about a lot of other people. So either I was most hated … Continue reading →

Posted in Human Relations, Life, Psychology | Tagged Alexander Pope, Diversity, Essay on Man, Grievance Industry, Iago, Napoleon, Othello, Positive attitude, Self-reliance, Shakespeare, Taking responsibility | Leave a comment

Remain Calm, Even If All Isn’t Well

Posted on January 8, 2019 by N.S. Palmer

It’s easy to remain calm when everything is going well. But it’s more important to remain calm when everything isn’t going so well. One way I’m lucky is that I have friends and family members who disagree with me about … Continue reading →

Posted in Human Relations, Judaism, Life, Political Science, Psychology, Society | Tagged Animal House, Calmness, Communication, Communication Problems, Debate, Disagreement, Diversity, Miscommunication, Misunderstanding, Rational, Rationality, Reasonable Debate, Serenity | 2 Comments

Job and Culture

Posted on November 1, 2018 by N.S. Palmer

In yesterday’s blog post, I referred to “automatic pilot.” And as often happens when I write, I wondered if I needed to explain what it was. Any readers who didn’t understand “automatic pilot” would have missed my point. Suppose that … Continue reading →