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Scientist Organizes Resistance To Polygraphs
George Maschke writes "Brad Holian, a senior scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, is using a blog to organize resistance to plans for random polygraph and drug testing of Lab scientists. Holian writes: 'Polygraphy is an insulting affront to scientists, since a committee of the National Academy of Sciences has declared that, beyond being inadmissible in court, there is no scientific basis for polygraphs. In my opinion, by agreeing to be polygraphed, one thereby seriously jeopardizes his or her claim to being a scientist, which is presumably the principal reason for employment for many scientists at Los Alamos.'"
The idea is to convince people to *believe* that the polygraph machine is scientific and will detect their lies so that they're more likely to not lie, or are nervous while questioning, or even don't take the test at all and just spill it beforehand. It's psychological intimidation, kind of like forcing confessions of bad thoughts in a cult environment. That's one reason you see those "you shall not be subjected to polygraphs at work" posters at your job... a nasty employer could really intimidate people (e.g. union organizers) with it.
-b.
Cheers,
-b.
So they attached this to one of those emergency defense appropriation bills:
Your Congress at work.
By that logic because religion has no scientific basis, anyone who is religious cannot also be a scientist. I'm sure this guy gets along real well with Richard Dawkins at parties. It's a standard fallacy: if you claim to be an 'X', you must do 'Y'--and if you don't do 'Y' (whatever I tell you 'Y' is), you cannot possibly be an 'X'. I can do without that sort of mind control, than you very much.
Of course this does not admit the possibility that there are other reasons why a scientist would agree to be polygraphed, including the possibility that someone working at a sensitive facility such as Los Alamos may just feel that it ain't worth the hassle to fight it.
And if you believe it is unscientific for someone to act apathetic rather than engage in advocacy by fighting polygraphs in the workplace, then you have obviously confused advocacy with discovery--a common enough disease in this day and age, I suppose, given the number of "scientific" papers which are little more than thinly veiled advocacy position papers against computer games and pornography.
The FSB, the spun off domestic branch of the KGB like to promote the use of the polygraph amongst companies in russia to ensure employee lotyalty (Yes, I was at one of their presentations a few years back). The joke is that itt was revealed by Vasily Mitrokhin (the KGB Archivist and defector)that faking your way through a polygraph test was simply a matter of training. In other words, the polygraph may catch the person stealing paperclips but it probably won't find the trained spy.
See my journal, I write things there
However, I would accept someone who sees science [or religion, respectively] as a subset of religion [science], because such an opinion could be consequent. And I know people who do see science as subset of religion.
I mean, really...
Isn't it kind of obvious when someone's personal life is interfering with their professional life?
Is it so hard to take the cue from the rest of the world, where such nonsense is not even considered (with no apparent ill effects)?
Oh, for gahd's sake, just because you break a few minor laws does *not* mean that you'd be more likely sell out your country to the enemy-of-the-day. By your "slippery slope" logic, anyone who gets caught for speeding should be pre-emptively shot. After all, who's to say when they'll move from speeding to treason?
-b.
It is one thing to show respect for someone's religious beliefs, but it is another thing to accept a paper with references such as "[1] Divine inspiration" and "[2] Genesis 1:2".
That doesn't make it reasonable, just an unfortunate fact of life. BTW, drug testing by private employers has actually decreased slightly since the early 1990s, since some have figured out that it costs without helping the bottom line.
-b.
That said, having taken a polygraph, I think the true value lies in the "good-cop/bad-cop" environment that it creates.
In the movies, the smart guys can always reveal a liar by looking if the subjects eyes are directed "up left" when he/she says something...
Name a spy caught after failing a polygraph test.
Neither can I. It never happened.
TFA is completely correct on polygraphs.
Tubby or not tubby. Fat is the question
The fact is, the legal system is not ideal, and that is an understatement. If it is not ideal, not all laws should be followed like lemmings, after all the law is for the people and not the other way around.
Laws are essentially codified behaviour rules, and behaviour rules stem from increasing the stability/success of a population and as well as from morals, which stem from the evolutionary advantage presented by cooperative, but grudge-bearing (in case of lack of cooperation) behaviour.
So basically, the simple fact is that breaking a law in itself is not necessarily a bad thing, but it is useful to have the public think that, as it leads to a better enforcement of the law, which, if the law is alright leads to a more stable society. But, a balance must be struck, because as we established the law is not ideal, so it means there are bad laws. Now in order to fix those laws, we need to either get rid of them or rewrite them, but the process of recognizing and disobeying a law upon personal judgement or "morals" helps this process. So basically you want the population to generally obey laws, but also apply their personal judgement to help the process of improving the laws. This has to be done continously, as time passes the moral Zeitgeist of the previous era gets overwritten by the new moral rules and laws have to reflect that.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Wasn't one of the worst betrayals caused by a CIA agent's wife spending all his money? (And he passed a couple polygraph tests, too...)
How else can we screen out subversives that believe in that evolution nonsense?
Faith: n. -- That human impulse that drives them to steal appliances when the power goes out
Long story short: the polygraph is a pile of pseudo-scientific bullshit, that can be easily beaten by anyone that knows how it works. At its core, its basically just a non-standardized investigation protocol for extracting harmful confessions by deceiving the person being investigated.
After educating myself, I passed a polygraph easily the first time, without any preparation or practice, while directly lying to my investigator. For the record, what they were asking was none of my employer's business (in my opinion). I was previously warned that the average session takes an hour, and can sometimes run into 3-4 hours when there are "complications". However, by manipulating my physiological responses to a few critical control questions, and pretending to be appropriately intimidated and impressed by the investigator and his machine, I was out of there in 15 minutes, which I was later told was something of a record.
From http://antipolygraph.org/:
The dirty little secret behind the polygraph is that the "test" depends on trickery, not science. The person being "tested" is not supposed to know that while the polygraph operator declares that all questions must be answered truthfully, warning that the slightest hint of deception will be detected, he secretly assumes that denials in response to certain questions -- called "control" questions -- will be less than truthful. An example of a commonly used control question is, "Did you ever lie to get out of trouble?" The polygrapher steers the examinee into a denial by warning, for example, that anyone who would do so is the same kind of person who would commit the kind of behavior that is under investigation and then lie about it. But secretly, it is assumed that everyone has lied to get out of trouble.
The polygraph pens don't do a special dance when a person lies. The polygrapher scores the test by comparing physiological responses (breathing, blood pressure, heart, and perspiration rates) to these probable-lie control questions with reactions to relevant questions such as, "Did you ever commit an act of espionage against the United States?" (commonly asked in security screening). If the former reactions are greater, the examinee passes; if the latter are greater, he fails. If responses to both "control" and relevant questions are about the same, the result is deemed inconclusive.
The test also includes irrelevant questions such as, "Are the lights on in this room?" The polygrapher falsely explains that such questions provide a "baseline for truth," because the true answer is obvious. But in reality, they are not scored at all! They merely serve as buffers between pairs of relevant and "control" questions.
The simplistic methodology used in polygraph testing has no grounding in the scientific method: it is no more scientific than astrology or tarot cards. Government agencies value it because people who don't realize it's a fraud sometimes make damaging admissions. But as a result of reliance on this voodoo science, the truthful are often falsely branded as liars while the deceptive pass through.
Perversely, the "test" is inherently biased against the truthful, because the more honestly one answers the "control" questions, and as a consequence feels less stress when answering them, the more likely one is to fail. Conversely, liars can beat the test by covertly augmenting their physiological reactions to the "control" questions. This can be done, for example, by doing mental arithmetic, thinking exciting thoughts, altering one's breathing pattern, or simply biting the side of the tongue. Truthful persons can also use these techniques to protect themselves against the risk of a false positive outcome. Although polygraphers
Speaking of bad logic. Your argument is a straw man, which is a logical fallacy.
>Holian writes: 'Polygraphy is an insulting affront to
>scientists, since a committee of the National Academy of
>Sciences has declared that, beyond being inadmissible in
>court, there is no scientific basis for polygraphs. In my
>opinion, by agreeing to be polygraphed, one thereby
>seriously jeopardizes his or her claim to being a
>scientist, which is presumably the principal reason for
>employment for many scientists at Los Alamos.'"
I sure hope he tells them that one down at the unemployment office!
Brett
It's already there. You've committed a crime that can be used to blackmail you. The same can hardly be said about speeding. Also, I'm not talking about shooting anyone. I'm talking about not hiring them for a position that you said was vital to our nation's defense. Obviously, you found nothing wrong with my actual point. Otherwise you wouldn't have tried to change what I said. I eschew slippery slope arguments.
Oh, and yes, speeding is also breaking the law. People who lightly dismiss it as such demonstrate contempt for the rule of law. In your case, I'm not very concerned as I suspect you don't claim to hold the highest regard for the law in the first place. (This is not meant to be an insult, so correct me if I'm wrong.) However, for people who do make such claims (typically Republicans), I find such dismissal to be hypocritical.
And just to be clear, I'm hardly a conservative, although I'll admit to holding 2 or 3 views that others might consider to be conservative.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Fine, if you want to openly break the law, à la Thoreau, as a form of protest, you have my respect. However, if you're breaking the law just because you feel like it, that's another story.
Ben Hocking
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Still, for matters dealing with national security, I think it's not too much to ask that employees stay off the ganja. I will admit that having never been tempted by the stuff, I'm not in the best position to judge. Still, we are talking about nuclear technology.
Ben Hocking
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Considering the "brainscan" approach to polygraphs that the future may hold. I am kind of interested in
how a 100% accurate polygraph or lie-detector would affect civilization. How it would affect law enforcement
and judiciary. How would it affect business agreements and politics. If a really good lie detector were
readily available, then what would it do to society, government, economies, education, religion...
Its fun to imagine how the world would reshape itself. Would it be good, or a disaster.
Quite simply, LANL employees' biggest problem is that we aren't unionized. We stand idly by and watch management (LANS/NNSA/DOE) hammer us again and again and again with policies that decrease the quality of workplace life (without adding jack to the real safety and security of the institution). The "substantially equivalent" requirement for benefits between the last contractor and the current contractor has been revealed to be a stinking pile of bullshit. With a strong collective bargaining agreement, there'd be some pushback against this unrelenting spiral into hell. There is none, however, because nearly everyone in Los Alamos County believes that unions are dues-sucking liberal plots that exist solely to protect the slackers and lackwits. Efforts to unionize have been and will continue to be fruitless. And so, things will get worse.
To specifically address the current outrage, Director Mike Anastasio's plan to expand random drug testing, one can say that it's true that LANL has had far, far too many security and safety incidents over the past decade. But I can't think of a single one in which the cause was traced back to drug use or alcohol overconsumption. This means we'll be spending money that the contractor doesn't have (they're facing a $150M + shortfall this year) to solve a problem that the lab doesn't have, and raping the Fourth Amendment in the process. (Yes, I know the workplace drug laws have been routinely upheld, but when the courts write that some things are too important for Constitutional protections to apply, what're you to think?) THIS is the kind of visionary thinking that made LANS the winning contractor?
/Pee in cups for LANL
//Take polygraphs for LANL
///Hates self for it
Learn to spell: nickel, missile, lose, solely, amendment, speech, kernel, probably, ridiculous, deity, hierarchy, versus
If the law is stupid, useless, and outdated, why aren't you fighting to change it?
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
I'd tell them to get stuffed (in exactly those words), if they implemented drug testing at my place of work. I do my job to the best of my ability. I know full well that my value to them is higher than the amount they pay me whether I take drugs or not. If they want to get rid of me, it will cost them more than it costs me. I really don't get it.
One would think that it was obvious that a scientist (or any other employee) who do a good job should keep his or her job, and someone who does a poor job should be fired. It is the responsibility of the management to determine who belong to each category. For small companies, where management is typically close to or equivalent with the owner, this is also how it works.
For large organizations, for some reason management is often afraid to fire people with the explanation that they do a poor job. They want some kind of objective criteria. This is why productivity in large organizations tend to suffer under all kinds of silly metrics, and why management there can think personality tests, drug testing, horoscopes, or polygraphs can be useful tools.
Do you really want a law breaker "dealing with dangerous (from a proliferation standpoint) materials and experiments critical to national security". If it weren't illegal, you might have a point. However, it is illegal, so someone who smokes pot is already showing that they have a penchant for ignoring laws that they don't think apply to them.
So should we sack all government employees who receive a speeding ticket? Should we give extra scrutiny to make sure they haven't cheated on their taxes? Should we also do random testing for other crimes, and randomly polygraph test employees on recent murders?
Exactly the point. You are susceptible to influence and may compromise national secrets. Blackmail, ideology, money, and thrill-seeking (I think there's one more) are the top reasons for why people sell out their country.
Supposedly money will get you info, but they won't put their necks out. Ideology gets you great info, but they're unstable. Thrill seekers are james-bond wannabees... and blackmail, well, people do things to protect their dirty secrets.
All I gotta say is "Tough Shit". If you want them to come up with a more reliable lie detector than a polygraph, then you certainly are encouraging them. Perhaps the one that monitors your brain waves when you're in a drugged state? I'll take the box over that any day.
He doesn't have to put up with upper management imposing nonsensical practices on their employees. Polygraph testing is just one of those things... I bet they have plenty of others. If you want to have a functional laboratory, or a productive company, or a working research team, then somebody has to fight (every day) to keep the bureaucracy under control. There will always be managers who firmly believe in an extra regulation, an extra test, an extra form, an extra meeting, an extra manager, to make things work better. Frankly, I have rarely met a manager who doesn't.
Somebody has to fight the bureaucratic ... --- Are impolite terms allowed on /.? And as a principal scientist, you ought to take up the fight for the lowly technicians, who don't have the clout to do so. And as a scientist, you are more or less expected to be eccentric and difficult, so you can get away with it... In the same way a beautiful woman can get away with awful gaffes for which a man would be crucified, just different :-)
And as an European (principal) scientist, I frankly don't understand at all why Americans put up with their employers imposing drug testing or polygraph detectors. "Over here" that would be downright illegal, in breach of every privacy law on the book.
But I know that there is a cultural difference as regarding personal freedom and privacy. On the whole Americans are willing sacrificing more of it, because they trust their government. That's why the US and EU always have such a difficult time agreeing on the exchange of personal data of airline passengers etc...
Well, for one thing, a brilliant scientist is less easily replacable than a lowly technician, so you want him to stay with the "company."
-b.
Sharon Scranage - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharon_Scranage
Jim Nicholson - convicted of spying for Russia
There's two. There's hundreds found... and even many more before they get off the ground- how many people could be compromised had they been given access?
...you drink the KoolAid.
Don't like it? Show 'em you mean business and take your talents elsewhere. There are lots of places that need scientific expertise. And just think of all the cool gadgets the old people play with in the country just to the south of your new home.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
I used to have a job that involved "selling" (something I didn't enjoy at all). My former boss told me that when a client gives you more than one reason for why he doesn't want the product, the truth is that the real reason is probably one not given.
You say there are more ways to change a law than one. I agree completely. There's civil disobedience. There's running for office. There's even voting. What these have in common is that they involve a certain amount of effort and/or risk. (OK, well breaking the law and trying to get away with it also entails a certain amount of effort and risk.) Seriously, the worst strategy for trying to change a law is ignoring it and hoping that it goes away.
If you feel strongly that the law is unjust, stand up and fight it. If you just feel like smoking some dope and hope you don't get caught, then you're part of the problem and not part of the solution.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Ben Hocking
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Sure enough, I did. Anyways, you're probably right. I'd like to believe that most of them are not deliberately speeding, but I'd also like to believe that this is the year that we'll see peace in the Middle East.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
This isn't about religion and its relationship to science. Its about a test that doesn't do what its supposed to do but still identifies large numbers of people as having lied.
See http://www.fas.org/sgp/congress/2001/042501_iacono .html, where an expert tells the Senate judiciary committee that "No spy has ever been uncovered because of a failed polygraph test", that "can learn to defeat these tests", and that, when tested, "innocent people fare little better than chance on these tests, with 40% or more failing on average".
See http://www.fas.org/sgp/eprint/sullivan.html, where another expert indicates (after criticizing the first for hyperbole) that one particular spy had been given at least three polygraph tests, passed them all, and "did more than 90 percent of the damage he did in the interval between his first and second tests." The witness goes on the real that he knows "of no security procedure that would have stopped" the spy's "first venture into espionage."
Good security is based in good research rather than faulty methodologies.
Davis http://davis.foulger.net
I understand the scientist's difficulty with the issue. And, the blog is a funny way of approaching it. I just logged into Slashdot to make this post, and I was looking at my old comments, and it's quite telling. You can really learn a lot about me by looking at my old posts. You could probably learn more by what I am saying now, then by asking me direct questions in a polygraph test. However, the polygraph machine is a means of control. In any institution, there will be those on top making decisions and pushing the buttons. Control is inevitable. I understand his resistance to that control and am shocked if this is the first time he has felt it. I don't know how much they get paid at Los Alamos, but I imagine it's a decent salary and that they have opportunities that a lot of others would love to have. This guy has two options: Stay or quit. Stay and deal with a shitty administration that obviously doesn't care about the human behind the white coat, or quit and join a lab and do work for someone who you think cares about you. Trying to go against such a machine is not going to get you anywhere, unless you are above such things.
Well, I guess we just have different moral philosophies, and that's OK. Personally, I think that laws should be followed unless there's a compelling reason not to. Because you "want to" is not very compelling. OTOH, I can think of a few things that I might be tempted to break the law over if they were made illegal, even without a reason I'd consider "compelling". I also believe that (almost) all laws have some rationality behind them; it's just a question of whether you agree with that rationale. Part of my views on this have arisen from positions where I've been in authority (e.g., lifeguard) and have had to exercise that authority on those who could not comprehend the reasons behind the rules. Just because you don't understand why a law is in place doesn't make it a bad law. Anyways, this is largely a question of philosophy, and I strongly suspect that nothing I say will change your mind (and vice-versa).
As for your personal note, I couldn't agree more (except for my part about following the law).
Ben Hocking
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he was the creator of the polygraph and also Wonder Women.. i mean come on... another thing i've always wondered about the test, what if your nerves got the better of you when it came to answering a truthful question.. for example Im about to be asked a really serious question but im so nervous of my answer coming out as a lie surly this would make it look like i was hidding something?
So should we sack all government employees who receive a speeding ticket?
Funny you should mention it... speeding tickets can get you disqualified from nuclear work.
Simple Machines in Higher Dimensions
Well, I'd say that another of those could also show up in your urine for a long time to come, unless you take the proper regimen of antibiotics. I'm just sayin'...
Ben Hocking
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What's interesting to me about this is the amount of degrading and ridiculous crap that valuable experts will go through for a clearance when they throw fits when employers even hint at questioning their credentials. For example, we like to give a pretty good basic technical knowledge test when we hire programmers. Basically, you should be able to read some basic code (nothing tricky) and answer some simple conceptual questions about data structures (e.g. Describe some differences between a linked list and a binary search tree. Give an example for the use of each.). We have had more senior guys go batshit insane when asked to spend 30 minutes running through and proving that they have some memory of the task that they're being hired to perform. Heaven forbid we bruise their egos.
On the other hand, these same guys will gladly bend over and answer the most intimate sorts of questions while hooked up to a dowsing rod operated by a professional interrogator.
Personally, I've gone through a few background investigations to get security clearances. I've always been honest and gotten through them without too much trouble (other than trouble of the bureaucratic type). I don't mind legitimate investigations, really. I shouldn't be given a clearance if I have a serious criminal record, if people who know me think I'm dangerously unstable, or if I'm so far in debt that I've been reduced to giving handjobs behind the 7-11 for spare change. I also don't mind being asked to demonstrate competence in the type of work I'm being hired to do. Even so, I'm not particularly cool with having somebody wave a magic terrorist-detecting crystal at me and putting a mark in a file somewhere based on whether I produced good or bad energy. The polygraph is little different. Maybe it's just ego, but I think that my reputation deserves more considered input than that.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
At least then we'd know that no more bad laws would get passed. OK, no more good laws would get passed either, but that's a small price to pay... ;)
Man, could you imagine Bush getting "fired" for illegal drug use? Wouldn't that be sweet?
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
...when you sell out your objectivity. Be honorable, or be elsewhere. Same thing with the "global warming" (or as they call it in the winter, "climate change".) Money is perverting science, all over.
Doing research, just because it will allow you to get grant money is the wrong thing to do. No amount of money going to Washington, DC will change what the environment is doing.
But more specifically, at Los Alamos, they've had quite a problem with security, spies, and missing hard drives. It might be time to flush the personnel.
--- For a good time mail uce@ftc.gov
Are you arguing that "people" are somehow forced to posess said plants, so that it's entirely the law's fault that these people (who shall remain nameless, of course) are criminals?
I'm sure it could be argued, but you'd have to be stoned to buy such an argument. ;)
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Oh, for gahd's sake, just because you break a few minor laws does *not* mean that you'd be more likely sell out your country to the enemy-of-the-day.
Wrong.
If you break a few minor laws, you are more likely to turn traitor than someone who never breaks the minor laws. It's the difference between "I love my country" and "I believe in the rule of law", and it was enough for Bennedict Arnold to turn traitor.
"They do not show whether someone is lying, or telling the truth. They do however show if someone is becoming stressed. They should not be relied upon, as some people can learn to control some of the variables at will."
You should have stopped at the first sentence quoted above. Since polygraphs can't show whether someone is lying, it's irelevent whether some people can learn to control some of the variables. In any case, I suspect the "stressed" argument is a circular one, we "know" the subject is stressed because we define stress as an increase in blood pressure etc. It still doesn't correlate with what the subject is thinking unless there's some mind-reading going on.
It is contrary to intelligence - a single word for such a thing is stupidity.
The man gave the Soviets the theories and initial drafts of the workings of the hydrogen bomb, while working at Las Alamo. While he was a scientist which no one disputes, his political leanings and actions endangered the world.
While he was exposed because of the VERONA project code breakers, if lie detector tests were used on him, that would have given his interrogators leverage to press harder.
Doctors and Lawyers don't work a lot of extra hours without pay like engineers and programmers do, so if Doctors and Lawyers are the gold standard for "Highly skilled people", I guess engineers and programmers don't qualify
There's also the question of whether you're obeying the law versus the spirit of the law. For example, speeding on a highway is against the law because, presumably, it's dangerous. However, at reasonable highway speeds the safest speed is the median speed of the cars around you (it minimizes relative speed and induced lane changes). Therefore, if everyone is going 5-10mph above the speed limit, the safest speed will usually be 5-10mph above the speed limit. So you have a choice to put yourselves and others at risk to obey a law just for obedience's sake, or to obey the spirit of the law and maximize safety at the same time.
E pluribus unum
Nurses and teachers do.
It's up to you to decide whether or not the fact that these are the only professions which are traditionally "women's work" is relevant or not.
sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
Anyone interested in learning the secrets of how polygraphs (don't) work ought to take a look at the excellent website AntiPolygraph.org.
Back in the day, you could lose it by getting the clap too many times.d d-5210_42.htm/
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/doctrine/dod/do
In GOD we trust, all others we monitor.
Then they could have the results come out just the way they wanted:
http://www.snopes.com/legal/colander.htm
Unfortunately, this only works for rednecks and (other) STUPID criminals. Any scientist worth having the job title would recognize they're putting a colander on his head and pushing the "copy" button on a copier with a sheet saying "He's Lying!" on the glass.
Tag lost or not installed.
As someone who is subjected to these tests, I must say that I sympathize with the man who is organizing this. The polygraph, in particular, is particularly gruesome. Nevertheless, while the test itself is not accurate at determining a lie, it is very important that the government continues to use it for high level clearances. Drug tests are a no-brainer. A typical clearance background investigation is particularly concerned with drug use and financial trouble. The two are related. A person who uses drugs is far more likely than one who does not to sell or give away secrets (to support their habit, pay off debts, or prevent blackmail - also, they could be compromised simply by a "friend" asking questions while high and vulnerable to such probing). Drug use is a major national security risk. The polygraph is a little more nuanced. The "test" is a very effective interrogation technique. It is extremely intimidating, especially since one's job is on the line, and I can say from experience that one is prone to tell all rather than risk being failed. An examinee is made to believe that the test is detecting lies, while he/she knows the test is not accurate, the perceived belief that the examiner believes the results leads one to "spill the beans." One will tell them about every little indiscretion and white lie ever committed in hopes that truth will save the day - it does for most people who are not legitimate security concerns. Basically, it helps keep people in line, and could find potential problems before they actually surface and cause damage. It sounds fascist, I know. Nevertheless, that is the price that is paid for holding a high level clearance. If they do not want to be subjected to such intensive scrutiny, I suggest they find another place to work than in the national security community - no one would blame them.
"In God we trust, all others we monitor." -- Unofficial NSA motto
We aren't talking about all government employees. We are talking about employees at facilities that require high-level security clearances. People whose lives will be very closely monitored both on and off campus.
If a Scientist fails their polygraph, does that mean there's a chance that all of their scientificly proven facts are actually bullshit ?
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
Our past president smoked weed and only God knows how many laws our current president broke. Why should anyone care if some nuclear physicist at Los Alamos smoke pot? The man is obviously smart enough to control himself and obviously reliable enough to have been hired in the first place.
Drugs are obviously not effecting someones work-life if the only way to discern the subject has used drugs is a biological test.
Polygraphs have been shown to be nothing more than interogation theater.
The entire population regularly breaks at least a few laws (including the POTUS and the neo-inqusitioners).
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Be aware of the difference between a law passed by Congress and a DOE regulation. One is an act of legislation and the other is an act of the Executive Branch. These little details are important because often Congress takes the hit for some nonsense that's being perpetrated by politically appointed bureaucrats.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Can't help but think of The Gambler after reading the posts in the blog...
Do you really want a law breaker "dealing with dangerous (from a proliferation standpoint) materials and experiments critical to national security".
You have a point there. The real solution is not getting rid of workplace drug testing, but instead just legalizing drugs.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
This comment is guaranteed*
*not guaranteed
That is a very good point.
I almost crashed a few days ago because of the difference. I was driving slightly above speed limit like everyone else, it was already early evening so it was dark already and suddenly people realized that the police were using a speedtrap by the road. People hit the brakes and it resulted nearly in multiple collisions.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
For those who are reading fast, DHMO is water. Someone with too much time on their hands made an entire official web site discussing the dangers, linked in the parent comment.
Consider machine W. It costs 87 million dollars. It weighs 112 tons and occupies a large dedicated building. The thing has superconducting magnets bathed in liquid helium. The victim must be given drugs to paralyse the body, then have their skull screwed into a metal frame to keep it perfectly still. The victim must be injected with a mildly harmful substance. Numerous technicians are required to operate the device. Result: the device is used on suspected spies and terrorists.
Consider machine X. It costs 6 million dollars. It weighs 5 tons and occupies a dedicated room. The thing has superconducting magnets bathed in liquid nitrogen. The victim must lie still inside a cramped tunnel. A technicians is required to operate the device. Result: the device is used for government clearances, some major business contracts, and occasionally for employment decisions.
Consider machine Y. It costs 20 thousand dollars. It weighs half a ton and occupies as much space as two home refrigerators. Any decently bright person can operate the device after watching a 30-minute instructional video. Result: many businesses get one, a few well-off people get one, and everybody else has to rent one minute-by-minute.
Consider machine Z. It is built into a cell phone for an extra 60 dollars. It provides a simple bar chart to indicate strength of "lie" and "non-lie" signals. It can operate quietly, up to 3 feet away from the victim's head. Result: we all check everybody.
Our past president smoked weed and only God knows how many laws our current president broke...
Irrelevant. The President is essentially the guy who decides who's an ally and who's a foe -- it's about as impossible for him to "collaborate with the enemy" as it is to breath in and out at the same time.
Why should anyone care if some nuclear physicist at Los Alamos smoke pot?
Because in order to trust someone we need to know them, and their willingness to break the law and smoke pot are both two very significant factors in their personality. (Did you know that the US army cares about an applicant solider's credit rating and family history?)
Back in the 80's, I was a restaurant manager. At the time I had a theft problem. At one point, some money showed up on one of my employees. I had her take the test and she failed. I ended up firing her, all the while thinking that it could not be her. Turned out that the problem continued and it was somebody else. I fired an innocent gal based on that shit. There is nothing that would convince that that crap works. It is pure voodoo and is absolutely worthless. IMO, you would be better off casting bones then polygraphs. At least you do not subject the person to total humiliation.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Did you know that the US army cares about an applicant solider's credit rating and family history?
Obviously, it easier to recrut poor immigrants.
...should be: "Are you now, or have you ever been a scientist?"!
They care becasue it is relevant information when it comes to giving that person a security clearance. Say a soldier decides to apply to one of the special operations units such as the green berets. In addition to being able to pass the course (highly nontrivial), he would need to get a security clearance so that he is trusted to be dropped off in Whereisthatistan in the middle of the night with a GPS, submachine gun and a million dollars in cash.
The most amazing aspect is a science project of then 14 year old Nathan Zohner in 1997. He wrote a pamphlet pointing out the dangers of DHMO, and set up a petition to have it banned. Then he asked his classmates to sign the petition. 43 signed immediately, six were undecided and only one actually detected that Nathan was talking about water. Nathan then published his findings as his ninth grade science project with the title "How gullible are we?"
See also http://snopes.com/science/dhmo.asp.
> It's already there. You've committed a crime that can be used to blackmail you.
Smoking a joint in the US set you up for blackmail?
Or is that a case of "we *have* to fire people we discover have smoked a joint, because if someone else discover that they smoked a joint they would be vulnerable for blackmail, since they would be fired if it was discovered"?
(Such perfect circular logic used to be used for keeping homosexuals out of some jobs back in the dark age).
I am sure this is why army recruiters concetrate their efforts on the poorest neighborhoods: they are searching for folks with excellent credit to deliver a million dollars to Whereisthatistan. And if they can afford their own funeral expenses, then it's an added bonus.
You have a valid point, but its a question of whether advantages outweigh
disadvantages. I strongly suspect that createive independent thinkers would
be less likely to work for a place which employs random drug dealing whether
they indulge or not.
http://rareformnewmedia.com/
That brilliant scientist would also have access the lowly techs don't, making him a greater security risk. People are people, the b-s is no more moral than the l-t. Check.
I wish presidency required high security clearance, then.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
Not an extremely close correlation, true, but it's there.
Best Slashdot Co
Did he say that people are *forced* to buy Pot, or did he suggest that because people like to, a law against it will make a criminal of people who do what was legal before the new law? By my reading of it, it seemed that he was saying that by picking things people like to do, you make it more likely that they will keep doing these things, thus being criminals.
It sure sounded like he was saying that they have no choice but to break the law. It's hard to argue that the law made them criminals when the law was around long before most (all? I don't know how old the law is, but I know it's more than 40 years old) pot smokers started smoking pot. As someone else pointed out, the same logic would say that making murder illegal turns murderers into criminals. I'm not equating the two, I'm just pointing out the errant logic.
Yes, good point. However, I'd like to think that I wouldn't try to deny it, either. I'd like to think that I'd engage in civil disobedience (not sure that my wife would be keen on making that public, however). Of course, I'd also like to think that I wouldn't spend so much time posting on slashdot. :)
Pot might be less harmful than tobacco and/or alcohol (I really have no idea, and quite frankly I don't care), but it is hardly non-harmful. Note, I'm not arguing for or against legalization of pot. I'm just arguing for respecting the law unless there's a compelling reason not to (i.e., a higher morality). I don't find "getting stoned" to be very compelling, but maybe that's just me (it sure seems like it's just me).
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
But I also see differences. As far as I understand, being a homosexual is far less of a choice than smoking pot. Of course, I have no familiarity with either being a homosexual or smoking pot, so this is based mainly on what I've heard of the former and on what I've intuited of the latter.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Well, if /. is any indication, it seems you are correct. I consider myself to be a creative, independent thinker, and I wouldn't be bothered too much by random drug tests (assuming they're not too frequent and/or intrusive), but I also realize that as a creative, independent thinker, my thoughts/feelings won't necessarily be shared by other creative, independent thinkers.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
If 1 in 100 people shows a response, it definitely does *not* mean that person is associated with the crime (p
Inappropriate use of statistics -- such as that in this thread -- is dangerous. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutor's_fallacy
Show me a single person who's never broken any laws, and I'll show you a lier.
I'm not arguing for anything, I'm explaining the reasoning (as I understand it) of this policy. Personally I think subjecting scientists to polygraph tests and random drug tests is pretty unsettling, but I'm not in the business of ensuring security either.
6 years of Bush has created an atmosphere of mindless paranoia at the Lab. Included in this has been a multi-million dollar boondoggle in the form of vehicle inspection booths on state highways there. It's completely unnecessary that my truck be inspected before I go skiing at Pajarito Mountain or mountain biking at the Valles Caldera.
Many of you may not be old enough to remember Barney Miller. It was a comedy show about New York Cops in the 1970's. There was an episode where a particularly brainy detective named Dietrich exasperated a polygraph examiner in an internal investigation by getting Truthful readings when he stated that he was born "a long time ago ... in a galaxy far away". :-)
>Nobody know about the new MRI based lie detectors?
People die because there are waiting lists and prohibitive costs for MRI, yet we have no problem
getting one if we want to show someone is lying about smoking pot?
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
I can agree with the fact that a polygraph is not an accurate measurement and probably is a horrible method of security insurance, I note most people on this subject are more worried about the fact that they are being questioned at all rather than the method. Let me address those of you with that particular problem... When top scientists are fucking stealing NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY and attempting to sell it to foreign fucking countries...A BODY CAVITY SEARCH SHOULD ONLY BE THE BEGININNG!!! We are talking about national security and the security of this entire fucking planet you morons! Do you honestly think it isn't worth making you piss in a bottle to save billions of lives!?! As for those of you who so boldly state that you don't work for anyone you makes you take a drug test or submit to a background investigation, I'm glad to say I will never have to work with you. Good luck getting a job anywhere besides flipping burgers...oh wait, I think even McDonalds and Burger King drug test employees. Guess you're fucked. I hear Darwin had a good explanation for people like you...
There's been no scientific proof that God doesn't exist, nor can science prove such a thing.
Just because certain churches have an axe to grind doesn't mean that Religon and Science are opposed. For some reason, Churches insist on a static universe where things cannot change, and when they make statements that turn out to be incorrect like, "The Earth is at the center of the universe." or "The Sun revolves around the Earth." their policy of a static universe doesn't provide them an avenue of correction.
So, they do what any self-perserving organization does, which is try to discredit the messenger (or better yet, kill him), and they use strong appeals to authority to ignore the real world and preserve the status quo. God didn't come up with the church sponsored ideas of how the world works, so churches don't have to weaken their foundations to accept that the universe changes. It's a self-inflicted wound when churces insist that the world only works one way, because sooner or later, ideas about the Universe will be refined, reorganized, and reworked.
It's not about being apathetic with discovery. Polygraphs are known to discover a lot of information. It has also been proven that none of that information has anything to do with lying. If you answer truthfully, but you ex walks into the room, the needles will jump, and the activity will be read to imply that you lied. For a real lie detector test, the environment shouldn't matter. If the environment matters so much, it's just a test to see if you get nervous, or if you can lie calmly.
I want to see a lie detector test that works while someone is skateboarding. If it detects truth even when people are nervous, then it's a much better design that the mis-labeled "nervousness detector test" which people keep trying to call a "lie detector test".
The point is that the principal scientist has the clout to stand up against idiotic management decisions whereas the easily replaceable employees simply do not. When something really stupid is going on, who should be expected to speak up? The guy who's just scraping by and gets canned as soon as he becomes a "problem" or the difficult to replace guy who has access to management?
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
If you want to have a real debate about drug abuse and truckers, look towards crystal meth, caffeine, and ephedrine-based products like Mag 57. Ephedrine was called "trucker speed" in the 90s for a reason.
That said, the abuses in the industry (WRT to falsifying log books, and the general lack of oversight by the current US administration, what a surprise) would be a more interesting discussion than what drugs a trucker can or can't ingest and still work.
To veer back on topic - polygraph tests are silly and beatable. Just make sure you can identify the "control" questions (they expect you to lie on these) and ensure you have a pain response when answering. Step on a thumbtack in your shoe, bite hard on your tongue, just raise a pain reaction that will be confused with a nervous reaction, and when the REAL question comes you won't spike as much because your pain reaction is absent.
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
Actually, lawyers do quite often.
It's the definitive biography of Feynman. What you get in Feynman's own books is brilliant, hilarious, and iconoclastic, but it is the idealized image of himself that he chose to project.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Spin away!
No joke. Sometimes I do speed accidently. It can happen if the road is exceptionally straight and you're not paying due diligence to your speedometer. That said, I don't think this explains going 75 in a 55 zone.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
The real solution is not getting rid of workplace drug testing, but instead just legalizing drugs.
I don't see why they can't solve the problem for drugs; they already did for homosexuality (in the UK at least).
Poor old Jeremy Thorpe would have been a lot better off these days. Its hard to imagine someone losing his job and being raked over the coals for turning out to be gay nowadays.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
But would a "lie" response be the same level as a pain response? What if all the lies elicit less of a reaction than the control questions? I'd assume that'd raise suspicion too.
-b.
FWIW, M. LostRace, there's quite a bit of grey in this world...
t s4.cfm
;^)
;^)
t +over+yourself
For example, do you do business with any of these companies?
http://www.testclear.com/dtcompanies/companyresul
I'm guessing that you do (as do most of us). I suggest boycott and stopping immediatly if you want to stay on your high horse (lest you compromize your own values by providing profit to companies who do test).
Note that this list has "google" as a urine tester, so you might want to start using yahoo search and avoid logging into youtube (so much for do no evil). Most banks are also listed, so you might just have to stuff your money under your matress. Not to mention avoiding starbucks, coca-cola, pepsi products and canceling your AAA membership and stop shopping at costco, target and walmart, throw away your dell and hp computers, etc, etc...
Can't do that and live your life (or feed your family), well, I guess we're all owned by the man with your definition and might as well pack it in anyhow.
Perhaps we the weak are willing to give up some privacy for convenience, which might mean (paraphrasing Thomas Jefferson) we don't deserve and privacy nor convenience and will lose both. However, everyone has their own threshold as to the battles they wage and the ones that they avoid to fight another day.
However, even Thomas Jefferson had slaves while he promoted an end to slavery he spent pretty much his entire life in debt (many historians think the two were related as he basically couldn't afford to release his slaves). So in many respects Mr. Jefferson lived his life in the practical even though he tried to promote the ideal within the limitations of his own life. Sometimes if we must compromise our privacy to live a more practical convenient life, it isn't totally horrible is it?
Maybe with your priorities and circumstance you can draw the line at employment, but still allow yourself to do business what you regard as companies, but I'm guessing not everyone has your priorities or circumstance, so "get-over-yourself"
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=ge
The idea is to convince people to *believe* that the polygraph machine is scientific ...
Err, excuse me, the polygraph is absolutely scientific. It yields data the *correlates* with lying. The fact that the correlation is not 100% does not make the instrument unscientific. Detective work involves a lot of statistics, for example if you have a dead young woman statistics says look at the husband or boyfriend first. Is it always the husband or boyfriend? No. Now if there is a leak at a high security facility, look at those who flunk the polygraph first. Does the polygraph tell you who is guilty? No. However when there is no other evidence, statistics, science, says its a reasonable place to start, to sort that list of people you are going to look at.
Back in the 80's, I was a restaurant manager ... I fired an innocent gal based on that shit.
Pardon me for being blunt, but you are the problem, not the polygraph. The fact that a user does not know how to use the data from an instrument does not make the instrument bad. The physiological reactions the instrument records correlates with lying, it does not prove it. If you understood the instrument then you poly the people who had access to the money. The results should be used to, *at most*, rank who warrants more attention. Or maybe if you are going to be more aggressive confront the employees and try to bluff a confession. To fire a person merely on poly results is highly negligent, you are the problem, not the machine. Get over your denial, face this fact, and accept your failure. Don't try to scapegoat the machine. OK, that was harsh, maybe you received ignorant and negligent instructions from your supervisor. I apologize if that was the case, I'm suspecting it is not since you seem to be blaming the machine 100% and don't mention corporate or supervisory direction.
Pardon me for being blunt, but you are the problem, not the polygraph.
No, it's that he used a polygraph at all. They don't work worth a damn and often reflect the biases of the operator or the noervousness of the subject more than any objective truth.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"