8 Advisements vs. the 10 Commandments
On this week’s DishyMix I interview David Cowan, a Forbes magazine “Midas Touch” VC from Bessemer Ventures. I met him in line at TED waiting to see Bill Clinton speak. We were all in a crush, lined up outside the doors sweating in an overstuffed space for an hour and that’s when the magic happened.
I started talking to those around me and that’s how I connected with David. Standing their pressed together, sweating, anticipating the oratory skills of Bill Clinton I found one of the top 5 most interesting people at TED and that’s SAYING SOMETHING!
In my conversation with David I learned that he gave a talk earlier at the TED University called “Raising Your Children Without God.” It was standing-room only and I couldn’t get in. Just my luck, I met David randomly, as is often the best way to connect.
David gave me an overview of his beliefs about raising children as critical thinkers from an early age and told me he’d come up with an alternative to the 10 Commandments called “Advisements.” Here’s a link to the 8 Advisements site and an index:
- Introduction
- I. Love Your Neighbor
- II. Take the Long View
- III. Think For Yourself
- IV. Challenge and Improve Yourself
- V. Cherish Your Family
- VI. Seize the Day
- VII. Embrace Your Mistakes
- VIII. Forgive
Click the buttons to listen to this episode to remind yourself what it’s like to rap with a rational conversationalist. Go on an auditory ride covering subjects as diverse as “man purses” and Kurt Vonnegut to why people believe weird things.
David gives us his opinion on donuts and Richard Dawkins and tells us what it’s like to be on Forbes’ “Midas List” of Tech’s Best Venture Investors. From the “Sirens of Titan” and how complex systems can have emergent properties to succumbing (or not) to your own biology, David delivers a smorgasbord of food for thought.
