So the train broke down in Philadelphia today, but that allowed seating arrangements to be reshuffled by the delay -- and I ended up across the cafe car table from a guy who knows a lot about cognitive science. 

Who's going to do best in difficult situations, like, say, a war?  Well, someone whose neurological attributes allow him to become very anxious (and very alert) very quickly but then to return to baseline swiftly -- and whose baseline is higher in the first place.  Phlegmatic people may not do well, and always-anxious people won't either.  Someone who has been through trauma before and has thrived.  Someone who is able to reframe things and move on.  Someone with a good support network.

How do we learn best?  By challenging ourselves -- not through repetition, but through trying to remember something under different circumstances and forcing ourselves to rebuild the thought-scaffolding.  Not by getting into a rut, either physically or mentally.  Visual learning helps too (he had never seen MindManager before and thought it was very cognitively appropriate).

Ah, but then we got to net neutrality.  I asked him what he thought.  He said, "Well, I don't like regulation."  We then went through a little visual mind map of net neutrality, and he had to agree (or perhaps he was just being polite) that for this moment in time, because we don't have adequate broadband competition we need to avoid privileging gatekeepers for internet access.  ("I can't stand cable prices," he said, encouragingly).  This moment in time will end when there's more competition -- hey, there's a spectrum auction coming up on August 9!  Wouldn't it be great if some large online companies joined in?

Anyway, it was a fine mind-map-meld as the train edged its way towards New York. 

(Most confusing announcement:  "We are encountering trespassers and must move slowly through this area.")