The search for 'meaning' at work

By Kate Morgan

Ask workers what the most important thing is to them in a job, and first on the list generally is pay cheque - perhaps obviously. But in a very close second, as data is beginning to show, people want their work to have meaning. A 2020 McKinsey & Company surveyed showed 82% of employees believe it' s important their company has a purpose; ideally, one that contributes to society and creates meaningful work. And when a company has purpose, its people do, too. Separate McKinsey research from 2022 showed 70% of employees say their personal sense of purpose is defined by their work, and when that work feels meaningful, they perform better, are much more committed and are about half as likely to go looking for a new job.

The search for meaning at work is a relatively new idea, says Aaron De Smet, a senior partner at McKinsey. The Industrial Revolution, he says, made work very "transactional": people worked and got paid money to live, with no greater purpose required or expected. But over time, as decent working conditions and a pay cheque became simple fundamentals, workers began to want more. ln 2018, a survey of American professionals showed nine out of 10 workers would trade a percentage of their eamings for work that felt more meaningful. This drive for meaning is especially true of the newest generation to enter the workforce; in a survey of Gen Z workers from jobs site Monster, 70% of respondents ranked purpose as more important than pay.

As people's jobs have become a significant part of their identities - and the way they spend most of their time - occupations have also become the place where they hope to derive at least some of their life's meaning. People might define meaning in many ways, whether that's working in a glossy 'dream job' or using particular skills to perfonn a necessary role. But however people frame meaning, experts say that in the workplace of the future, making people feel that what they're doing matters, matters more than ever.

The modern search for meaning at work

The desire for meaningful work has been a slow and steady evolution that's happened as society has_ become, on the whole, wealthier. As people's basic needs for food and shelter were met, and the nature of work changed, people began to want more from their daily grinds. ln many industries, the more rote, repetitive jobs have disappeared. "Automation is happening pretty quickly, which is why I think things are now coming to this tipping point where meaning matters a lot," says De Smet.

Stephanie Bot, a clinicai psychologist and co-founder of Workright, a Toronto-based workplace mental-health consultancy, notes that for a lot of people, identity has become closely tied to work. What we do, in many ways, defines who we are. "As the type of jobs we're in have evolved, people are now looking for a greater sense of self," she says. It makes people feel like their lives have meaning, she adds, when their work does.

People also spend most of their time at work - it's the activity that takes up the biggest chunk of waking hours - and even when they're not actively working, many people are still thinking about work. The majority of younger people, in particular, report that it's difficult to disengage. It becomes even more important, then, that this place people spend most of their time and mental energy mean something. "lf people don't have outside time to get those needs met elsewhere," says Bot, "they need to get more out of work."

ln the wake of the pandernic, meaningful work has become more important to people than ever before. It was a catalyst that realigned many people's priorities. "Two-thirds of US employees said Covid caused them to reflect on their purpose in life," says De Smet, of 2021 McKinsey research. "Everybody took this moment to step back and reassess. People were taking stock of their lives, and asking, 'Does what I do matter? I should really spend my time on things that matter.'"

People's search for meaning in their work contributed to the Great Resignation - a phenomenon that's seen workers leave their jobs in droves throughout the past two years. "Some people said, Tm not getting enough meaning from work, I want to work somewhere my purpose is more fulfilled by the work I do'," says De Smet. "Or, they said, 'I don't feel the work I do is important to anyone. I want to go somewhere it feels like my work is valued by my organisation' ."

(Adapted from: https://www.bbc.com/)

The universe is not locally real

By Daniel Garisto

One of the most unsettling discoveries in the past half a century is that the universe is not locally real. ln this context, "real" means that objects have definite properties independent of observation - an apple can be red even when no one is looking. "Local" means that objects can be influenced only by their surroundings and that any influence cannot travei faster than the light. Investigations at the frontier of quantum physics have found that these things cannot both be true. Instead the evidence shows that objects are not influenced solely by their surroundings, and they may also lack definite properties prior to measurement.

This is, of course, deeply contrary to our everyday experiences. As Albert Einstein once bemoaned to a friend, "Do you really believe the moon is not there when you are not looking at it?" To adapt a phrase from author Douglas Adams, the demise of local realism has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.

Blame for this achievement has now been laid squarely on the shoulders of three physicists: John Clauser, Alain Aspect and Anton Zeilinger. They equally split the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics "for experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science ("Bell inequalities" refers to the pioneering work of Northern Ireland physicist John Stewart Bell, who laid the foundations for the 2022 Physics Nobel in the early 1960s ). Colleagues agreed that the trio had it coming, deserving this reckoning for overthrowing reality as we know it. "lt was long overdue," says Sandu Popescu, a quantum physicist at the University of Bristol in England. "Without any doubt, the prize is well deserved."

"The experiments beginning with the earliest one of Clauser and continuing along show that this stuff isn't just philosophical, it's real - and like other real things, potentially useful," says Charles H. Bennett, and eminent quantum researcher at IBM. "Each Year I thought, 'Oh, maybe this is the year,"' says David Kaiser, a physicist and historian at the Massachusetts lnstitute of Technology. ln 2022 "it really was. It was very emotional- and very thrilling."

The journey from fringe to favor was a long one. From about 1940 until as late as 1990, studies of so-called quantum foundations were often treated as philosophy at best and crackpottery at worst. Many scientific journals refused to publish papers on the topic, and academic positions indulging such investigations were nearly impossible to come by. ln 1985 Popescu's adviser warned him against a Ph.D. in the subject. "He said, 'Look, if you do that, you will have fun for five years, and then you will be jobless,"' Popescu says. Today quantum information science is among the most vibrant subfields in all of physics.

(Adapted from: Scientific American, 2023)

The universe is not locally real

By Daniel Garisto

One of the most unsettling discoveries in the past half a century is that the universe is not locally real. ln this context, "real" means that objects have definite properties independent of observation - an apple can be red even when no one is looking. "Local" means that objects can be influenced only by their surroundings and that any influence cannot travei faster than the light. Investigations at the frontier of quantum physics have found that these things cannot both be true. Instead the evidence shows that objects are not influenced solely by their surroundings, and they may also lack definite properties prior to measurement.

This is, of course, deeply contrary to our everyday experiences. As Albert Einstein once bemoaned to a friend, "Do you really believe the moon is not there when you are not looking at it?" To adapt a phrase from author Douglas Adams, the demise of local realism has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.

Blame for this achievement has now been laid squarely on the shoulders of three physicists: John Clauser, Alain Aspect and Anton Zeilinger. They equally split the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics "for experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science ("Bell inequalities" refers to the pioneering work of Northern Ireland physicist John Stewart Bell, who laid the foundations for the 2022 Physics Nobel in the early 1960s ). Colleagues agreed that the trio had it coming, deserving this reckoning for overthrowing reality as we know it. "lt was long overdue," says Sandu Popescu, a quantum physicist at the University of Bristol in England. "Without any doubt, the prize is well deserved."

"The experiments beginning with the earliest one of Clauser and continuing along show that this stuff isn't just philosophical, it's real - and like other real things, potentially useful," says Charles H. Bennett, and eminent quantum researcher at IBM. "Each Year I thought, 'Oh, maybe this is the year,"' says David Kaiser, a physicist and historian at the Massachusetts lnstitute of Technology. ln 2022 "it really was. It was very emotional- and very thrilling."

The journey from fringe to favor was a long one. From about 1940 until as late as 1990, studies of so-called quantum foundations were often treated as philosophy at best and crackpottery at worst. Many scientific journals refused to publish papers on the topic, and academic positions indulging such investigations were nearly impossible to come by. ln 1985 Popescu's adviser warned him against a Ph.D. in the subject. "He said, 'Look, if you do that, you will have fun for five years, and then you will be jobless,"' Popescu says. Today quantum information science is among the most vibrant subfields in all of physics.

(Adapted from: Scientific American, 2023)

The universe is not locally real

By Daniel Garisto

One of the most unsettling discoveries in the past half a century is that the universe is not locally real. ln this context, "real" means that objects have definite properties independent of observation - an apple can be red even when no one is looking. "Local" means that objects can be influenced only by their surroundings and that any influence cannot travei faster than the light. Investigations at the frontier of quantum physics have found that these things cannot both be true. Instead the evidence shows that objects are not influenced solely by their surroundings, and they may also lack definite properties prior to measurement.

This is, of course, deeply contrary to our everyday experiences. As Albert Einstein once bemoaned to a friend, "Do you really believe the moon is not there when you are not looking at it?" To adapt a phrase from author Douglas Adams, the demise of local realism has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.

Blame for this achievement has now been laid squarely on the shoulders of three physicists: John Clauser, Alain Aspect and Anton Zeilinger. They equally split the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics "for experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science ("Bell inequalities" refers to the pioneering work of Northern Ireland physicist John Stewart Bell, who laid the foundations for the 2022 Physics Nobel in the early 1960s ). Colleagues agreed that the trio had it coming, deserving this reckoning for overthrowing reality as we know it. "lt was long overdue," says Sandu Popescu, a quantum physicist at the University of Bristol in England. "Without any doubt, the prize is well deserved."

"The experiments beginning with the earliest one of Clauser and continuing along show that this stuff isn't just philosophical, it's real - and like other real things, potentially useful," says Charles H. Bennett, and eminent quantum researcher at IBM. "Each Year I thought, 'Oh, maybe this is the year,"' says David Kaiser, a physicist and historian at the Massachusetts lnstitute of Technology. ln 2022 "it really was. It was very emotional- and very thrilling."

The journey from fringe to favor was a long one. From about 1940 until as late as 1990, studies of so-called quantum foundations were often treated as philosophy at best and crackpottery at worst. Many scientific journals refused to publish papers on the topic, and academic positions indulging such investigations were nearly impossible to come by. ln 1985 Popescu's adviser warned him against a Ph.D. in the subject. "He said, 'Look, if you do that, you will have fun for five years, and then you will be jobless,"' Popescu says. Today quantum information science is among the most vibrant subfields in all of physics.

(Adapted from: Scientific American, 2023)

Seafaring Language: The Jargon of Ships

How Illiteracy Shaped Seafaring Language

Anyone who has enjoyed literature and films portraying life at sea may have quickly noticed that the ship environment is alive with unfamiliar jargon. Words such as "bosun" and "stays'l" might feel the air, but upon looking in a dictionary, no such words seem to exist! The reason for many of the warped pronunciations (and spellings) of some sailing jargon comes down to the capabilities of the sailors themselves. For many, literacy was a boon available only to the privileged.

When a sailor didn't know how to read, it was likely that they didn't know how to spell, either. Thus, sailors needed to rely only on the pronunciation of a word as picked up from others. Because crews in the age of sail could be made of dozens of people from countries all around the world, these pronunciations were neither consistent nor always accurate to the words' original spelling. Thus, some terminology shifted away from a 1:1 spelling to pronunciation correlation. For instance: Bosun - an experienced sailor who is in charge of keeping the deck and exterior of a ship in good condition. The pronunciation "bosun" is a result of most crewmembers' inability to read the word "boatswain" and pronounce it as such. Consider also the origin of boatswain in British English, where it would have been frequently pronounced "boat-swayn." Coxin - the coxin is in charge of navigation on a ship. Like boatswain, the original term is  "coxswain," which was shortened due to crew illiteracy and a reliance on pronunciation across cultures with different accents.

(Adapted from: https://www.uslanguageservices.com/)