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Scientific Due Diligence

May 14, 2013Alvaro Cordova1 CommentPersonal Opinions

There is a funny thing going on in nutritional sciences that I find difficult to explain, but not completely unheard of. As opticians we are subscribers to the Wave Theory of light as developed by Christian Huygens. This wasn’t always the case. Early in optics history, Newton’s Corpuscular Theory of light was favored even though it wasn’t quite correct. It couldn’t fully explain certain experimental phenomena like diffraction and interference. The current theory of light is encompassed in Quantum Mechanics. Einstein, in describing the photoelectric effect, essentially combined both Newton’s (particle) and Huygen’s (wave) paradigms. As opticians, we stick to (more…)

Nutrition – (part II )

Jan 24, 2013Alvaro Cordova1 CommentPersonal Opinions

As some of you may know, I’ve taken on a lifestyle change that has altered my outlook on a few things. Food is medicine and medicine is food, in a way. How dietary recommendations have changed has confounded many and with each study a new piece of the puzzle seems to invalidate a previous study and make the puzzle harder to piece together. After reading several books on the subject I’m convinced that (more…)

Financial Advisors Dilemma

Jan 24, 2013Alvaro Cordova1 CommentPersonal Opinions

I get a lot of spam from online publications. One I got that had this headline caught my eye “Altruism: The real ethical dilemma faced by financial planners.” This seemed a little odd to me. I would have responded directly, but didn’t want to sign up for another account. So, where to begin. The article makes a philosophical argument against altruism (as defined by Auguste Comte) in the finance sector. I honestly didn’t know (more…)

Why I Stand in Solidarity with the Walmart Black Friday Strike

Nov 20, 2012Alvaro CordovaPersonal Opinions

Walmart is one of those companies that’s easy to hate. They almost make it too easy. As someone who has worked for them, I can’t help but agree with many assessments made by others. Walmart seems to engage in all sorts of crappy behavior; whether they get tax breaks from townships against the wishes of its citizens, their abysmal percentage of healthcare […]

Getting a loan

Oct 16, 2012Alvaro Cordova3 CommentsOptician's Friend Blog, Personal Opinions

While it is no secret that banks aren’t lending to small businesses, I was quite shocked to find that local credit unions are equally as absent from lending. This post goes out to the very wonderful people at Group Financial and Jodi Goldfarb-Sullivan in particular whose help has been valuable in securing capital and financing […]

60 Minutes Luxottica Segment

Oct 9, 2012Alvaro Cordova5 CommentsPersonal Opinions

For the sake of full disclosure I own my own optical, but my opinion has been the same despite this fact. 60 Minutes Luxottica Video Segment After reading many of the comments about the video I felt it was my duty… nay, my moral obligation to give my two cents on the topic. Luxottica is affectionately known […]

Nutrition

Aug 15, 2012Alvaro Cordova1 CommentPersonal Opinions

I’ve been reading quite a bit about many different types of diets; The Standard American Diet (USDA approved), The Vegan/Vegetarian Diet (ie China Study), Atkins, Paleo Diet/Primal Blueprint, Smarter Science of Slim (SSoS), and a few others like the Abs Diet which isn’t as comprehensive as the others. I’ve been given the talk. You know the one… Your blood pressure is a bit high, your overweight, it’s time to go on a diet etc… As some of you may know, I started a business and time is a premium, always. It’s hard to find time to exercise, to go shopping, to prepare food and eat healthy in general. Since June was a relatively slow month, I decided itwould be a good time to start a diet

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Internet Defamation

May 29, 2012Alvaro Cordova3 CommentsOptician's Friend Blog, Personal Opinions

At some point in our internet browsing, we are becoming familiar with ratings and reviews from a variety of sites like yelp, patch, Google and many others. If one has a business, one will have to confront negative reviews by vandals and others who do not care to smear one’s good name for their desire […]

A contrarian view on tax cuts

Dec 1, 2011Alvaro CordovaPersonal Opinions

What little experience I have regarding owning a business, I have learned that tax cuts for businesses do not make jobs. I’ll take my business as an example. We may be hiring in the next six months or so, because as the business grows, I become less capable of performing the ever growing list of tasks that must be (more…)