[FRIAM] /Topic Latent in: Latent Topics was: enough sleep?

[Marcus Daniels]

Steve writes:

 < What little Buddhist/Meditation affinity/practice I have suggests that
    it is an illusion which on a good day is fully ignored ("but by whom?"
    the paradox asks).   To the extent that *most* everyone I know presents
    to me (or I apprehend them as such) as an ego-centric individual, I
    don't know what it means exactly to annihilate our identities.  Perhaps
    you are speaking more of the social norms of crafting or projecting a
    pseudo-identity from a buffet of "reserved identities" and building a
    meta-game around them of "how one should (inter)act" with that milieu
    looking a lot like the "games" you notice you don't enjoy playing. >

Among engineers, especially young ones, one way the ego-centric individual presents herself is via Not Invented Here (NIH).  She simply cannot imagine studying and using another work.    The tribe permits it so long as the tribe can be impermeable to criticism and that they can get her to associate the work with the group.   It doesn't matter if it is grossly wasteful of time or money.   Also NIH superficially makes the engineer appear more instrumental because she is solving a simpler problem than if she rationalized the state-of-the-art before beginning her venture.

Marcus