(Any views expressed in the below are the personal views of the author and should not form the basis for making investment decisions, nor be construed as a recommendation or advice to engage in investment transactions.) I have just finished the first book, “Red Mars,” in a trilogy by Kim Stanley Robinson. One of the characters, a Japanese scientist named Hiroko Ai, routinely utters “shikata ga nai” or “it cannot be helped” when referring to situations out of the Mars colonists’ control. As I ...