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2332-30
Robert Blattberg and Steven Hoch noted that, in a changing environment, it is not clear that consistency is always a virtue and that one of the advantages of human judgment is the ability to detect change. Thus, in changing environments, it might be advantageous to combine human judgment and statistical models. Blattberg and Hoch examined this possibility by having supermarket managers forecast demand for certain products and then creating a composite forecast by averaging these judgments with the forecasts of statistical models based on past data. The logic was that statistical models assume stable conditions and therefore cannot account for the effects on demand of novel events such as actions taken by competitors or the introduction of new products. Humans, however, can incorporate these novel factors in their judgments. The composite ─ or average of human judgments and statistical models ─ proved to be more accurate than either the statistical models or the managers working alone.

2332-31
Free play is nature's means of teaching children that they are not helpless. In play, away from adults, children really do have control and can practice asserting it. In free play, children learn to make their own decisions, solve their own problems, create and follow rules, and get along with others as equals rather than as obedient or rebellious subordinates. In active outdoor play, children deliberately dose themselves with moderate amounts of fear and they thereby learn how to control not only their bodies, but also their fear. In social play children learn how to negotiate with others, how to please others, and how to manage and overcome the anger that can arise from conflicts. None of these lessons can be taught through verbal means; they can be learned only through experience, which free play provides.

2332-32
Many early dot‑com investors focused almost entirely on revenue growth instead of net income. Many early dot‑com companies earned most of their revenue from selling advertising space on their Web sites. To boost reported revenue, some sites began exchanging ad space. Company A would put an ad for its Web site on company B's Web site, and company B would put an ad for its Web site on company A's Web site. No money ever changed hands, but each company recorded revenue (for the value of the space that it gave up on its site) and expense (for the value of its ad that it placed on the other company's site). This practice did little to boost net income and resulted in no additional cash inflow ─ but it did boost reported revenue. This practice was quickly put to an end because accountants felt that it did not meet the criteria of the revenue recognition principle.

2332-33
Scholars of myth have long argued that myth gives structure and meaning to human life; that meaning is amplified when a myth evolves into a world. A virtual world's ability to fulfill needs grows when lots and lots of people believe in the world. Conversely, a virtual world cannot be long sustained by a mere handful of adherents. Consider the difference between a global sport and a game I invent with my nine friends and play regularly. My game might be a great game, one that is completely immersive, one that consumes all of my group's time and attention. If its reach is limited to the ten of us, though, then it's ultimately just a weird hobby, and it has limited social function. For a virtual world to provide lasting, wide‑ranging value, its participants must be a large enough group to be considered a society. When that threshold is reached, psychological value can turn into wide‑ranging social value.

2332-34
It seems natural to describe certain environmental conditions as 'extreme', 'harsh', 'benign' or 'stressful'. It may seem obvious when conditions are 'extreme': the midday heat of a desert, the cold of an Antarctic winter, the salinity of the Great Salt Lake. But this only means that these conditions are extreme for us, given our particular physiological characteristics and tolerances. To a cactus there is nothing extreme about the desert conditions in which cacti have evolved; nor are the icy lands of Antarctica an extreme environment for penguins. It is lazy and dangerous for the ecologist to assume that all other organisms sense the environment in the way we do. Rather, the ecologist should try to gain a worm's‑eye or plant's‑eye view of the environment: to see the world as others see it. Emotive words like harsh and benign, even relativities such as hot and cold, should be used by ecologists only with care.