the.com/pessimism
the art of being pleasantly surprised by everything because you expected the worst
means The tendency to expect the worst outcome or to dwell on the negative side of things.
from From Latin 'pessimus,' meaning 'worst' — the superlative of 'malus,' 'bad.' It was deliberately coined as the dark twin of 'optimism' (from 'optimus,' 'best'), the two words entering European philosophy together in the 18th century as people argued over whether this was the best or worst of all possible worlds. So 'pessimism' is, quite literally, the doctrine of the worst.
- defensive math
- Lowered expectations make any outcome a small win
- old roots
- From Latin pessimus, meaning the worst
- survival edge
- Spotting threats first kept ancestors alive
- defensive pessimism
- A real strategy that anxious high performers use well
- weather forecast
- Pessimists are statistically more accurate about bad outcomes
schopenhauer's philosophy — german philosopher (1788-1860) who argued existence is suffering and the will to live is fundamentally tragic
thomas hobbes leviathan — 1651 treatise declaring life in nature is 'solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short'