Three Wise Men

Gaspar, Balthasar, and Melchior, the three Wise Men or Magi, visited the Christ child in Bethlehem bearing gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.  The three gifts had a spiritual meaning: gold as a symbol of kingship on earth, frankincense as a symbol of priestship, and myrrh (an embalming oil) as a symbol of death.  Sometimes this is described more generally as gold symbolizing virtue, frankincense symbolizing prayer, and myrrh symbolizing suffering.  All three are ordinary offerings given to a king.  It has been suggested also by scholars that the "gifts" were medicinal rather than precious material for tribute.  The three wise men were probably priests from Persia who traveled a long distance, perhaps 1,000 miles, on their pilgrimage to Bethlehem.      

 

from Threes, Chapter 4, “Threes in Religion and Mythology”

The Big Three in World War II

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin—the leaders of the three major Allied powers—were known during World War II as The Big Three. The Big Three and their military advisors planned and executed the strategy that defeated the Axis. 

The Axis powers included Germany, Italy and Japan. World War II began on September 1, 1939 when Germany invaded Poland. Great Britain and France were drawn into the war quickly as Nazi Germany moved its mighty army west through Europe. The United States entered the war two years later after Japan bombed naval forces at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. Churchill and Roosevelt conferred frequently on overall strategy.  Stalin directed the Soviet war effort against the Germans who pushed east, but he rarely consulted his allies.  

Nazism was the German political movement initiated in 1920 that culminated in the establishment of the Third Reich and the totalitarian German state led by the dictator Adolf Hitler from 1933 to 1945. Probably no regime in the 20th century or any other has been so closely identified with institutionalized terror and evil as that of the Third Reich under the control of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis. Its rise and fall had worldwide consequences, and its legacy continued to shape the identity of Germans long afterward. Hitler believed he was creating a third German empire, a successor to the Holy Roman Empire and the German empire formed by Chancellor Bismarck in the nineteenth century.  

The main disagreement among The Big Three concerned an Allied invasion of western Europe. Churchill argued for the immediate invasion of Italy. Roosevelt and Churchill discussed plans for a joint British and American invasion of France in the spring of 1944, but they needed time to prepare. President Roosevelt relied heavily on his military advisors, principally Army Chief of Staff Gen. George C. Marshall, whose strategy for prosecuting the war ultimately prevailed and led to the Allied victory.

From Threes, Chapter 7, “Threes in Government and Politics”

Watch These Three Countries as the Price of Oil Falls

“The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 had many causes. None was as basic as the fall in the price of oil, its main export, by two-thirds in real terms between 1980 and 1986.  By the same token, the 14-year rule of Vladimir Putin, heir to what remained, has been bolstered by a threefold rise in the oil price.”

Oil is falling again, and this week’s drop in price was severe.  Some countries that depend on the sale of oil they produce will be squeezed on profits.  “For those governments that have used the windfall revenues from higher prices to run aggressive foreign policies, things could get uncomfortable. The most vulnerable are Venezuela, Iran and Russia.”

From The Economist, page 16, “Many winners, a few bad losers,” October 25, 2014

A Time to be Grateful

Grace fascinates for its many dimensions.  It goes well beyond the spiritual meanings.  You can think of physical grace or gracefulness, which is an ability to move around effortlessly.  You can think of social grace.  In Greek mythology the Charites, known as The Three Graces, were the goddesses of joy, charm and beauty.  They were named Aglaia (Splendor), Euphrosyne (Mirth), and Thalia (Good Cheer).  The Graces presided over banquets, dances, and all other pleasurable social events, and brought joy and goodwill to both gods and mortals.   In Roman mythology they were known as the Gratiae, which connotes gratitude. 

With grace and gratitude derived from the Latin gratus, the meaning of grace can be extended to mean a sense of gratitude or gratefulness.  “Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life.  It turns what we have into enough, and more.  It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity.  It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events.  Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow,” writes Melodie Beattie.               

from Threes, Chapter 4, “Threes in Religion and Mythology” 

Three Things Distinguish Interstellar

“No one willingly attends a space science fiction movie with a space history curator. The audible eye rolling, heavy sighing and groans of protest when the laws of physics are violated through the magic of CGI can ruin even the most entertaining and fast-paced science fiction movie for others. Even tightly written movies that cause the most skeptical to suspend disbelief for the duration of the film later generate days of recrimination over historical, logical, mechanical and physical flaws. The flaws can range from meaningless ones to grand leaps of faith; all of which can unravel the entire fabric of the story. Interstellar is not one of these movies.  

“Three things distinguish the film from recent space-themed movies: it is grounded in the current concerns of our world; its plot is rich in the technically accurate science and technology of spaceflight and the movie pays homage to the best of the spaceflight cinema genre. All three themes transport the viewer and leave few concerns for what might be missing, rather than what the film got wrong.”  

Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/why-interstellar-belongs-pantheon-best-realistic-science-fiction-films-

China Is Number One Again

When the International Monetary Fund released its ranking of the largest economies last month, China returned to top spot for the first time in two centuries.  Measured in purchasing power parity, China moved ahead of the United States, which had been number one since 1820.  India is number three.

 

One hundred years ago the three top economies were United States, Japan and Britain.  Economists think China will continue to grow for a long time, and better wages will continue to lift a large poor segment of its society into the middle class where they can become consumers.

 

Read more in Threes, Chapter 6 “Threes in Economics and Finance”

Halloween and Threes

Halloween or Hallowe'en is a contraction of All Hallows' Evening, which is also known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve and All Saints' Eve.  The yearly celebration is observed in a number of countries on October 31, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Hallows' Day. It initiates the triduum of Allhallowtide, the time in the liturgical year dedicated to remembering the dead, including saints (hallows), martyrs, and all the faithful departed believers. Within Allhallowtide, the traditional focus of All Hallows' Eve revolves around the theme of using "humor and ridicule to confront the power of death."


According to many scholars, All Hallows' Eve is a Christianized feast initially influenced by Celtic harvest festivals with possible pagan roots, particularly the Gaelic Samhain. Other scholars maintain that it originated separate from Samhain and has solely Christian roots.
 

And this from the “Jack is Back” lyrics:

“So be careful when out on this all hallows eve,

Stay away from the dark, travel in threes.

Jack might pick you for his dinner tonight,

If he sees you alone, in the dark, he just might.”

Three Elements in a Perfect Storm

Threes are popularized by events and episodes as well.  The idea of a perfect storm is a recurring theme that today helps to explain the combination of three elements that create a result far greater than each one has the potential to produce by itself or even when two are combined.  The Perfect Storm started as a depiction of a meteorological oddity.

As we await the arrival of the “Frankenstorm” that is about to pummel the Mid-Atlantic states, we can recall another similar scenario.  The powerful nor’easter of October 1991 that formed off the coast of Massachusetts became the antecedent for the currently popular term.  Eventually to be described in a best-selling book by journalist Sebastian Junger and then depicted in a movie, the storm perfected itself as warm air from a low-pressure system arriving from the southwest met cool, dry air generated by high-pressure to the north and tropical moisture provided by Hurricane Grace, which was dying out off the East Coast of the United States as it moved into the colder waters of the north Atlantic.  The three ingredients produced rain, strong winds and 100 foot waves in the ocean.  

Now we use “Perfect Storm” as a metaphor to describe situations that result from a combination of three ingredients in a potent mix.  We see the reference often.

From Threes, Chapter One, “The Wonder of Threes”

Happiness

“We’re happy when we have a rosy view of the future, but we’re also happy that the present exceeds what our expectations were,” [Researcher George] Loewenstein said. Also, quite unsurprisingly, past rewards had less of an impact on contentment as time passed. 

Using MRI data, researchers determined that signals from a region of the brain called the striatum could be used to predict how happy people would be at any given time during the experiment. They then created a smartphone app to test their model on a much wider audience–a total of 18,420 online participants. 

The app featured the same decision-making game as the MRI experiment. Although the subjects were remote and anonymous, the results were still consistent with the model.  “All models are simplifications of reality,” said Loewenstein. “But their central insight that happiness depends on how reality pans out relative to expectation is a correct one, in my view.” 

He noted that, while the idea behind the happiness equation isn’t new, the study is a “strong and interesting” piece of supportive evidence. But can we use this knowledge to boost our own well-being? Lowering expectations as a tactic has already been ruled out, but the study does hint at why you might not feel as elated after reaching an expected goal as you might think. “People are always pursuing goals, and when they reach the goal, they don’t end up being as satisfied as they perceive they’d be–as if happiness is held out in front of us, and we never quite achieve it,” Loewenstein said. 

On the other hand, he suggests that there might be some consolation in realizing that we are all hard-wired this way in order to keep us moving forward.  

From “On the road to happiness, a pleasant surprise beats a sure thing,” Washington Post by Meeri Kim, August 8  

Storytelling and Threes

Have you ever wondered

 

• What the three little pigs, the three blind mice, Goldilocks and the three bears, the Three Musketeers, the three wise men and the Three Stooges have in common?

 

• Why the three-act structure is the dominant approach to screenwriting in Hollywood?

 

• Why three bullet points are more effective than two or four?

 

The Rule of Three works in stories due to the presence of the concise, memorable patterns that I mentioned above.  But even if that wasn’t the case, the number three has been used so widely throughout some of the most memorable works from our childhood, it’s likely that we are preconditioned to respond favorably to elements grouped in threes.

 

From Brian Clark, How to Use the “Rule of Three” to
Create Engaging Content at http://www.copyblogger.com/rule-of-three/

Julie Knows Threes

See Julie Paschkis’ blog of  August 15, 2014.  She writes about threes in storytelling, which is one of my themes in Chapter 9, “Threes in Art and Popular Culture.”

There's Wisdom in Threes

New and ancient philosophers have presented many of their best ideas in threes. Benjamin Franklin said, “There are three faithful friends: an old wife, an old dog, and ready money.” And this: “There are three things extremely hard: steel, a diamond, and to know one's self.” Buddha said, “Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.” Contemporary author and philosopher the late Stephen Covey said, “There are three constants in life...change, choice and principles.”  

“The principles of living greatly include the capacity to face trouble with courage, disappointment with cheerfulness, and trial with humility,” said Thomas S. Monson, a religious leader. Ancient Druidic wisdom contained in Celtic Triads includes, “The three foundations of learning: seeing much; studying much; and suffering much.” Confucius said, “Wisdom, compassion, and courage are the three universally recognized moral qualities of men. There are three methods to gaining wisdom. The first is reflection, which is the highest. The second is limitation, which is the easiest. The third is experience, which is the bitterest.” From a Chinese proverb, we learn: “Tell me, I will forget. Show me, I will remember. Involve me, I will understand.” 

Plato noted that “Human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and knowledge.” Franklin and others divided humankind into three groups. Franklin said, “All mankind is divided into three classes: those that are immovable, those that are movable, and those that move.” Plato came at it from a different point of view when he said, “There are three classes of men; lovers of wisdom, lovers of honor, and lovers of gain.” Leonardo da Vinci saw a world where there are “three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see.” Similarly, Niccolo Machiavelli writes in The Prince, “There are three classes of intellects: one which comprehends by itself; another which appreciates what others comprehend; and a third which neither comprehends by itself nor by the showing of others; the first is the most excellent, the second is good, and the third is useless.” 

From Threes, Chapter One, “The Wonder of Threes”

An Economist's Big Three

Here we are at the beginning of another school year.  What an appropriate time, then, to share the opening of economist and CATO Institute scholar Arnold Kling’s essay published in 2007.   

“Education is an example of an issue where free-market proponents were betrayed by the Republicans during the Bush Administration. In fact, on the domestic issues that I consider important, my take on the Republican Party in the 2006 elections was, “With friends like you, who needs enemies?” This essay lays out what I would like to see on the agenda, and how I will be keeping score.

“I start by taking seriously the forecast of economic historian Robert Fogel, which is that our economy will be increasingly dominated by education, health care and leisure. Therefore, the focus of the free-market agenda should be on limiting government’s encroachments into those areas. The encroachment comes from public education, government spending on health care, and government management of retirement savings.

“The goals of the free-market agenda should be:

1. Increase the proportion of children who are schooled outside of the public school system.
2. Increase the proportion of health care spending that is paid for directly by consumers.
3. Limit the fraction of people’s lives where they collect Social Security.”

A Holiday from Labor

Matthew Maguire, a machinist, first proposed the Labor Day holiday in 1882 while serving as secretary of the CLU (Central Labor Union) of New York. Others argue that Peter J. McGuire of the AFL (American Federation of Labor) proposed a Labor Day in May 1882, after witnessing the annual labor festival in Toronto, Canada. Oregon was the first state to make Labor Day a holiday in 1887. By the time it became a federal holiday in 1894, 30 U.S. states officially celebrated Labor Day. Following the deaths of a number of workers at the hands of the U.S. military and U.S. marshals during the Pullman Strike, President Grover Cleveland reconciled with the labor movement. Fearing further conflict, Congress made Labor Day a national holiday in just six days after the end of the strike. 

The September date originally chosen by the CLU of New York was preferred over the more widespread International Workers' Day (May Day or May 1 in more than 80 countries) because President Cleveland was concerned an observance on the latter date would be associated with the nascent Communist, Syndicalist and Anarchist movements that, though distinct from one another, had rallied to commemorate the Haymarket Affair on International Workers' Day.  John L. Lewis started the CIO (Congress of Industrial Organizations) trade union, in 1932. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders, including leaders of the CIO, to swear they were not Communists. That provision in the act was later found to be unconstitutional. The CIO merged with the AFL to become the AFL-CIO in 1955. 

See Threes, Chapter Eight, “Threes in Business and Technology” for more.

 

Three Types of Attitude

Anything, we are taught, can be accomplished with the right attitude.  Attitudes, though, come in varying degrees, particularly when they are part of a relationship with another person. 

 

There are three categories of human attitude, writes Meera Seshadri.  The first category includes those who have a ''You're right, I'm wrong'' attitude.  The second category has an ''I'm right, you're wrong'' attitude.  The third group believes in ''You're right, so am I.''

 

Those under "You're right, I'm wrong" category are generally subservient and agree easily with views of other people.  Those who belong to "I'm right, you're wrong" category are often vocal and vehement.  They often embark on 'sparring sessions' with everyone just to prove what they believe is universally true.   

 

Those who believe "You're right and so am I" are the most prudent, pragmatic and wise.  Though they are prepared to assimilate good points from other people (and even acknowledge another’s good qualities), they live life on self-dictated terms.  Being good listeners, they respect other viewpoints but finally do what they deem to be right.  They never take devious routes to attain success, nor do they pull someone down so they to climb the ladder.  They are so confident of themselves that they don't bother proving their skills and intelligence before others.   

 

From Threes, Chapter Five, “Threes in Psychology and Sociology”

Lucy Time and Hawking Time

In Luc Besson’s movie, Lucy, starring Scarlett Johannson, Lucy delivers a soliloquy on the meaning of time. 

She explains, in part, “Humans consider themselves unique, so they've rooted their whole theory of existence on their uniqueness. ‘One’ is their unit of ‘measure’—but it’s not. All social systems we've put into place are a mere sketch: ‘one plus one equals two,’ that's all we've learned, but one plus one has never equaled two— there are in fact no numbers and no letters….Time is the only true unit of measure, it gives proof to the existence of matter, without time, we don’t exist.”  Others have glimpsed time.

Stephen Hawking (1942—) is one of the world's renowned theoretical physicists.  His view of time relies on earlier thinking by Newton and Einstein. Hawking visualizes time as three arrows: the thermodynamic arrow, the cosmological arrow, and the psychological arrow. The concept of these arrows helps explain why we see time as moving forward and what this flow of time actually is in terms of the expansion and contraction of the universe. These arrows help distinguish the past from the future, and they give time a direction. 

“In our current state of the universe, all these arrows are pointing in the same direction, however, this will not always be the case, according to Hawking. The thermodynamic arrow is derived from the second law of thermodynamics, which states that in any closed system, disorder (entropy) always increases with time. Take an example of a glass falling from a table. The glass begins in a state of heightened order; it is all in one piece. As time passes, the glass hits the floor, and shatters into many pieces, increasing the disorder, or entropy, tremendously.

See Threes, Chapter Four, “Threes and Science” for more.

We Like the Thought of Threes

In the final analysis, though, it’s the idea of a pattern that makes threes such a popular mechanism. Even though patterns can vary, appearing as sequences, chronologies, lists, definitions, classifications or series, for instance, they create frameworks that become memorable and contain transitions that tie three words, phrases or ideas together. Even our brains are wired for threes. “Stunning new visuals of the brain reveal a deceptively simple pattern of organization in the wiring of this complex organ. Instead of nerve fibers travelling willy-nilly through the brain like spaghetti, as some imaging has suggested, the new portraits reveal two-dimensional sheets of parallel fibers crisscrossing other sheets at right angles in a gridlike structure that folds and contorts with the convolutions of the brain. This same pattern appeared in the brains of humans, rhesus monkeys, owl monkeys, marmosets and galagos, researchers report Thursday in the journal Science. ‘The upshot is the fibers of the brain form a 3-D grid and are organized in this exceptionally simple way,’ study leader Van Wedeen, a neuroscientist at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, told LiveScience. ‘This motif of crossing in three axes is the basic motif of brain tissue,’" reports Stephanie Pappas at LiveScience. Perhaps we are hard wired for threes, making them natural, abundant and recurring. Beyond the science, though, threes have a rhythm and flow that are comfortable to the mind, the eye and the ear. Threes are social and timeless and inescapable. We embrace ideas given to us in threes.  Lewis Carroll said, “What I tell you in threes is true.” We like the thought of it. 

From Threes, Chapter Eleven, “Threes Forever” 

The Tipping Point Has Threes

Malcolm Gladwell, author of the best-selling The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference contends the Tipping Point is determined by three factors. 


The first, the Law of the Few, identifies three agents of change who are responsible for moving to and across The Tipping Point.  These change agents are connectors or those individuals who are skilled at networking; mavens or those to whom others go for information, and salesmen or those with charisma and personality to persuade others.  The second is the Stickiness Factor, which is determined by the content of the message and how it resonates in a society.  Gladwell’s third factor in reaching the Tipping Point is the Power of Context.  Context is a critical part of any communication that seeks to educate or persuade.  It relies on local conditions and circumstances for its power. 


There’s more in the book.     

The Perfect Wave

A prescient and popular Alvin Toffler (1928—) talks about waves in his book The Third Wave, published in 1980, that describes the transition in developed countries from industrial societies, which he calls the "Second Wave," to information age "Third Wave" societies. Toffler is a social scientist, futurist, author and lecturer. He has been called the third most influential voice in business after Bill Gates and Peter Drucker.    

Toffler describes three types of societies based on the concept of waves. Each wave pushes older societies and cultures aside. The First Wave is the settled agricultural society that replaced nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyles. The Second Wave began in western Europe with the Industrial Revolution and spread quickly across much of the world. A Second Wave society includes the nuclear family, a factory-type education system and the corporation.

“In short one could move systematically through the entire code book of Second Wave civilization—from standardization to synchronization right on down to centralization, maximization, specialization, and concentration—and show, item by item, how the old ground rules that governed our daily lives and our social decision-making are in the process of being revolutionized as Third Wave civilization sweeps in.”

from Threes, Chapter 1, “The Wonder of Threes”

Three Treatises for the New Revolution

Thomas Paine’s Common Sense argued openly for American colonies’ independence from Great Britain, an aristocracy. Born in England in 1737, Paine came to the colonies in 1774 to participate in the American Revolution. Common Sense “appeared in January 1776, after the Revolution had started. It was passed around and often read aloud in taverns, contributing significantly to spreading the idea of republicanism, building enthusiasm for separation from Britain, and encouraging recruitment for the Continental Army. Paine provided a new and convincing argument for independence by advocating a complete break with history. Common Sense is oriented to the future in a way that compels the reader to make an immediate choice. It offers a solution for Americans disgusted and alarmed at the threat of tyranny.” 

Later in 1776, Paine wrote and published The Crisis, another pamphlet that was read widely, including to an audience of colonial soldiers at General George Washington’s request. “These are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman,” he wrote. “Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives everything its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated.”

Paine ignited popular opinion in support of the Revolution and a war against the Crown that lasted about eight years (1775-1783). He was accompanied by others of equal voice, such as Sam Adams, who said, “Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.” Sam Adams became another popular propagandist. He emerged as an important figure in Boston soon after Great Britain passed a series of three tax acts to pay for its Seven Years’ War (1756-1763). The Sugar Act of 1764, the Stamp Act of 1765 and the Townshend Acts of 1767 caused Adams and others to seek reform that was not forthcoming. His Right of Revolution, a third pamphlet, was published in 1769. 

From Threes, Chapter Seven, “Threes in Government and Politics” 

Dante's Divine Comedy

A fascination with an afterlife has been entertained by theologians, philosophers, and artists since the beginning of humankind. Italian author Dante Alighieri, writing in the early 14th century, produced one of the greatest works of literature—the allegorical, almost epic, poem called the Divine Comedy in which he lays out three options after life: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. 

“On the surface, the poem describes Dante's travels through Hell, Purgatory, and Heaven; but at a deeper level, it represents allegorically the soul's journey towards God.  At this deeper level, Dante draws on medieval Christian theology and philosophy, especially Thomistic philosophy and the Summa Theologica of Thomas Aquinas. Consequently, the Divine Comedy has been called ‘the Summa in verse.’” Summa Theologica, containing three major parts, explains Christian principles and presents arguments for the existence of God, again as Aquinas sought to reconcile faith and reason.

The Divine Comedy is divided into three canticas or major parts—Inferno (Hell), Purgatorio (Purgatory), and Paradiso (Paradise)—each consisting of 33 cantos. An initial canto serves as an introduction to the poem and is generally considered to be part of the first cantica, bringing the total number of cantos to 100. The number three is prominent throughout the poem and is represented, in part, by the length of each canto, which is formed in tercets or three-line stanzas. 

His story encompasses the travels of three people through unknown territory. Dante writes in the first person about his journey through the three realms of the dead, lasting from the night before Good Friday to the Wednesday after Easter in the spring of 1300. The Roman poet Virgil guides him through Hell and Purgatory; Beatrice, Dante's ideal woman, guides him through Heaven. Beatrice, a Florentine woman whom he had met in childhood and later admired from afar, served as his muse. 

The structure of the three realms—Hell, Purgatory and Paradise—follows a numerical pattern of nine plus one for a total of 10. For instance, Dante and Virgil visit the nine circles of the Inferno, with Lucifer at the bottom. Nine rings of Mount Purgatory are topped with the Garden of Eden. Nine celestial bodies of Paradise are followed by the Empyrean (the firmament or highest heaven) that contains the very essence of God. The seven deadly sins in Purgatory “correspond to a threefold scheme of improper love: excessive love or love of the things that are secondary to divinity (Lust, Gluttony, Greed); deficient love or the lacking in a desire to achieve divinity (Sloth), and malicious love or love of malignant things that should grieve man and are contrary to divinity (Wrath, Envy, Pride). Leaving Purgatory and arriving in Paradise, Dante sees the Triune God. 

“The structure of the poem, likewise, is quite complex, with mathematical and numerological patterns arching throughout the work, particularly threes and nines, which are related to the Trinity. The poem is often lauded for its particularly human qualities: Dante's skillful delineation of the characters he encounters in Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise; his bitter denunciations of Florentine and Italian politics; and his powerful poetic imagination. Dante's use of real characters, according to Dorothy Sayers in her introduction to her translation of the Inferno, allows Dante the freedom of not having to involve the reader in description, and allows him to ‘[make] room in his poem for the discussion of a great many subjects of the utmost importance, thus widening its range and increasing its variety.’”

From Threes, Chapter Eleven, “Threes Forever” 

Father, Son and Holy Ghost

The symbol of the trinity representing the father, son and the holy ghost or holy spirit is a part of Christian doctrine that defines God as three divine persons. They exist as equals. According to this doctrine, God exists as three persons but is still one God, meaning that God the Son and God the Holy Spirit have exactly the same nature or being as God the Father in every way. Whatever attributes and power God the Father has, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit have as well. God the Son and God the Holy Spirit are also omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient, infinitely holy, infinitely loving, infinitely wise and eternal.

From Threes, Chapter Four, “Threes in Religion and Mythology” 

The Elusive Triple Crown

Yesterday’s Belmont Stakes calls attention to the Triple Crown in thoroughbred horse racing.  Winners of the Kentucky Derby, Preakness Stakes, and the Belmont Stakes in a single year are declared Triple Crown winners, a designation conceived by Charles Hatton writing in the Daily Racing Form in 1930.  Only eleven horses have won the Triple Crown, the last, Affirmed, in 1978.  

Professional surfing and baseball also award a triple crown.  That makes three triple crown awards.

The Triple Crown in baseball is awarded when one player in either the American League or the National League (or in some rare cases all of Major League Baseball) has the highest batting average, the most home runs and the most runs batted in during a single season. Before Miguel Cabrera won the Triple Crown in 2012, Carl Yastremski was the last player to do it 45 years earlier while playing for the Boston Red Sox. Only 14 players have achieved the feat. Pitchers also have a triple crown for most wins, best earned run average and most strikeouts in a single season. Winning the pitching Triple Crown has occurred more often. Grover Cleveland Alexander did it three times. 

From Threes, Chapter Ten, “Threes in Sports and Games” 

Three Major Periods of Upheaval

We like the stability of threes. The triangle provides stability even as the world is changing. Threes thinking gives us the base from which to make “a dent in the universe.” Threes come at us often during periods of upheaval and disruption, and threes have occurred in three big cycles already. The ancient Cambrian explosion of 500 million years ago started a biologic evolution that continues today. The religious explosion of the classical period from 800 BC produced religions and philosophic beliefs that are still relevant. The third disruption, the modern industrial era, started 200 years or so ago. That dramatic period contains within it three disruptive technology sub-periods—with the inventions of the steam engine and the railroad, the combustion engine and electricity, and computer technologies and modern communications. 

From Threes, Chapter Eleven, “Threes Forever” 

Three Keys to Happiness

Psychologists, theologians, self-help experts and many others who have studied happiness often mention strong relationships, namely family and friends, as keys to living a happy life. 

Yale University Professor Paul Bloom points out three keys to sustainable happiness. Even though people may become happier from a kind word, a new car, or good news, they are less likely to stay happy. Within six months of either good news or bad news, ups or downs, people tend to return to their original level of happiness, he says. In most cases, in fact, fleeting happiness or instant pleasure rarely lasts more than a few moments or days. “Sustainable happiness, happiness that is more permanent, unchangeable from external events, comes from three things: good friends, good family, and long-term projects. Knowing this framework simplifies the thing every human wants most: happiness,” he says.⁷  

From Threes, Chapter Five, “Threes in Psychology and Sociology” 

Three Mothers

Today we celebrate mothers.  Everyone has one mother.  Today we can celebrate the mother we have, not the mother we want or the mother we need.  Three mothers, just one Mothers Day.

The New Big Three Economies

Many news reports this week talked about China as the leading world economy.  It depends how you count.

"Until just a few years ago the largest national economies existed in the developed world.  United States, Japan and Germany (The Big Three) achieved the largest gross domestic product (GDP) in 2000.  'Ten years ago rich countries dominated the world economy, contributing around two-thirds of global GDP after allowing for differences in purchasing power.  Since then that share has fallen to just over half.  In another decade it could be down to 40%.  The bulk of global output will be produced in the emerging world,' wrote The Economist in 2010.  In the last 20 years or so the developed and developing worlds have undergone a re-positioning with the explosion of rapidly expanding, formerly developing economies in Brazil, Russia, India and China, which are known collectively by the acronym BRIC.  In fact, Goldman Sachs’ projections suggest China will jump into the number two position in the new Big Three list by 2020 and will become number one, surpassing the United States by 2050, and India will become the third largest economy as measured by GDP unless something cataclysmic derails its unprecedented growth, which by some measures approaches 10% annually.   

"Three forces will dictate China’s rise…demography, convergences and 'gravity.'" 

from Threes, Chapter 6, “Threes in Economics and Finance”