In the Japanese summer, minor cockroach infestations are common. Every pharmacy makes a fortune selling a wide variety of cockroach repellents, traps and poisons.
Cockroaches are interesting from an evolutionary point of view. They are inherently passive and defensive in their approach to life. When danger threatens, they run to the darkest possible place. They seem to  eat whatever is left over by larger animals. It is sometimes said that they would be the only species to survive nuclear fallout. But it turns out other insects, like the fruit fly, have a much higher radiation resistance.
Maybe cockroaches have some similarities with mold, then. Possessing minimal initiative, they are like a chemical reaction of nature that sets in wherever there is some energy gain to be had by consuming and breaking down some leftovers. Their boundary can be pushed away, but banishing them from the surface of the earth would be an impossible feat (and probably undesirable).
Sometimes it is suggested that these days, there is an ecosystem of ideas – “memetics”. Surely, in this ecosystem too, there are large and small “animals”. Animals that feed selectively, and animals that eat just about anything (that is, ideas that can take root in just about any sort of mind). Animals that take initiative and seek to change their environment, and animals that only react, only defend, only hide in the dark.
In daily life, we must be careful so as to not fall prey to the small ideas that hide in the dark. Seek out the large beasts, and hunt them in the light of day.
Or, perhaps one should seek to shed light on the little ideas that hide in the dark.
Posted by shirasurice on October 5th, 2009.
What are you saying Johan? We shouldn’t chase after smaller problems and only focus on the great, unsolved problems of our time? This is probably the anti-statement to every bit of advice given to beginning Ph. D. students
Posted by Richard Hayden on October 28th, 2009.
I’m not talking about academic problems necessarily, just silly ideas in general. Simple ideas without much substance, such as “foreigners are dangerous”.
My final sentence was a bit wide of the mark perhaps.
When PhD students chase after small problems, I think they eventually manage to evolve those small problems into large and complicated things. They don’t chase things that lack this evolutionary potential.
So what I should perhaps have said was, “seek out the ideas that carry potential in their DNA”.
Posted by johan on October 28th, 2009.