And now people are becoming more aware of the unreliability of what they know.
I'm not to sure if people are becoming more aware of anything. Aside from (some of the) people who read the Irish Times and/or Slashdot, I'd say things are pretty much the same as usual, with the same small retractions being printed occasionally. I don't see any evidence that people are becoming more intelligent. One would hope that educated people who work in very public facing industries (like a newspaper) would at least use some common sense.
That just goes to show how much of a rat race life is. People working as fast as they can to spit out crummy, non referenced work to please the higher-ups.
It's not about working fast, or Wikipedia, or referencing sources. It's about people and companies making a professional living supplying news in a non-professional manner. Some people spend tens of thousands of dollars to go to school to learn how to do research and journalism, and some people actually write their own essays without any help from their friends or families. Those people, unfortunately, have the disadvantage of being honest and intelligent. When it comes down to it anybody can do journalism, but it's only people who can write good resumes that will get the job. It's the same in all industries. The world keeps on turning, however slanted the orbit may be.
Hopefully the citizens of Britain and Australia and Germany can get a hold of this software so that they can use the Internet without government censorship impeding them.
I guess if the rest of the world had a problem with potatoes you'd fawn over the "sensibility" of regulating and taxing potatoes and only allowing people to own potatoes in small amounts, right?
I could presume you are one of the enlightened folk who are against taxation? I'd prefer potatoes to be illegal so that I can buy them on the black market tax free.
As I understand it the law allows one to possess mary jane, but growing it is illegal.
Yeah, it's like the prostitution laws in Canada; you can legally sell your body for sex, but it is illegal to advertise that you are willing to sell your body for sex. And so too medical marijuana is legal in Canada and yet people are (at least sometimes) arrested for growing medical marijuana, and after they win their court case the police refuse to compensate the victims.
This is another case of police fanaticism; they don't only want it to be illegal, but they will go out of their way to hunt you down for growing it, no matter how discrete the grower may attempt to be. I don't understand why the police would go out of their way to make portray themselves as evil.
OK, this is the last time before I put you on my Foes list (so it won't be so easy for me to see your bullshit posts) that I will point out your bullshit so hopefully other people will realize that they should ignore you.
I dunno, maybe if you informed yourself about the issues you were arguing you might have better luck? I'm just saying...
Troll. I (generally) only reply to topics that I am well informed about. I have often spent sometimes hours validating my arguments with reputable sources. Anybody can spend a few seconds finding a link. Spending great amounts of time and effort refuting bad and ill-informed arguments isn't worth the effort, especially when it is obvious that the person will disagree with me not because I make bad arguments, but because the issue goes against his belief system. Arguing against people like you who make things up, lie, and generally Troll is a no-win situation. Your sound-bites are more likely to get up-modded anyway. Well-researched arguments are generally very lengthy and boring to read and they seem to get ignored (here on Slashdot anyways).
And google, as most IT professionals will tell you, is so useful for finding accurate information* it's almost obscene.
Another red herring Troll. The topic isn't 1) IT professionals nor 2) finding good IT information. If you had bothered to inform and educate yourself, finding good quality scientific medical information on the Internet is difficult without subscribing to professional services. Although Google Books is making things easier these days. Still, it's a shitty Troll.
Another Troll post. I'll point out the most obvious biases here. The rant into Newtonian calculus etcetera I will let you have as a freebie:
So don't attempt to invalidate a modern therapudic technique because it's "just a theory". You are revealing your ignorance when you do.
You are ignorant on the subject, and you clearly do not wish to educate yourself. If you did, you might have to alter your opinion, so that obviously won't happen.
Because you're demanding evidence be provided for something that even the most casual web search would have yielded the results you seek.
Lies. I haven't found any evidence to this. You get up-modded for a red-hearing Troll and I get down-modded; now that is proving your point in an ironic way that lay people make silly decisions. One reason why I'm not going to read further. Being here is useless to me. Just because you believe something is true doesn't mean it is.
You never did offer any evidence of longitudinal double-blind studies, instead you make accusations of me of being lazy and implications that I am stupid.
the existence of an entire field of psychology should not need to be spoon-fed to you by me.
What does that mean? Are you going to point me to more Google links? It doesn't matter, I have often spent hours arguing point by point various social science issues. Most people spend a few seconds doing Google searches to "prove" their points and they get up-modded just as fast. It's really not worth being on Slashdot. If you can prove your point then I will respect you.
I'm sorry, this is laziness masquerading as skepticism on your part.
How do you know what I'm thinking? Actually, know you don't. You're a Troll and I'm wasting my time. You are hyping up Art Therapy to boost a bogus point and yet it is obvious to me that you don't have any education in Art Therapy other than what you just recently Googled (and I doubt you actually read the book that you found on Amazon). Really. You think I'm an idiot. You think I'm silly. You shouldn't even bother replying to my posts. I've met people like you before. I sometimes wonder why I reply to Trolls. Maybe you are correct in your thinking. I probably am an idiot.
I think it's an excellent resource, and pulling it because of the twin towers is just bogus.
I had a brief glance at it. I agree pulling the book because of one image is (or may be) an over-reaction. I should have referred specifically to the picture rather than the entire book in my post.
There's a whole branch of psychology known as Art Therapy [wikipedia.org] built around this premise.
I am aware of Art Therapy. I was referring more specifically to the FEMA colouring book though. I am not aware that children who have lived in New York during 9/11 are the only people who have access to this coloring book. Though I think the book has been published many years too late for it to be of any benefit.
That being said, and on the more tangential topic of Art Therapy; neither the original poster nor you have given any evidence as to the efficacy of Art Therapy. According to Wikipedia "According to the American Art Therapy Association, art therapy is based on the belief...". Beliefs are fine and dandy, but evidence and proof is necessary for people who don't live on Faith alone.
I would say the guideline would look something like this: when you have a bunch of people with no psychological qualifications whatsoever complaining about something that a large majority of psychologists actually feel is beneficial, the whiners are being silly.
That has some merit. I myself have a lot of education in the social sciences and psychology (though I am not an expert or credentialed) and have found that most people would rather believe in folklore than science. I would take your definition of silliness more seriously if it had more logic to it than just majority opinion. Some people can't just live by Karma alone.
Seriously, if you are going to the FEMA site for tips on how to talk to your kids about terrorism, you have bigger problems than the disappearance of a coloring book.
FEMA is like God; you can pray to it and give your tithing, but don't expect to be saved when the you really need assistance.
Since people think you are Insightful (and I don't) maybe you can clue me in. You said:
Because the people who are asking them to take it down are silly, that's why.
What evidence do you have that they are "silly"?
Things like coloring or drawing pictures (and talking about the pictures thus drawn) of traumatic events is good therapy.
What evidence do you have that making children draw and colour tramatic events is good therapy? Do you recommend that children be given colouring books picturing Jeffrey Dahmer raping and eating people as therapy? Do you think such a colouring book is a good educational tool?
Removing something that supports that is silly.
What evidence do you have that removing this is "silly"?
But they should also know when a few people are being silly and complaining about something that is actually worthwhile.
How is the government supposed to know when people are being "silly"? and what metrics does the government use to decide that making children colour and draw morbid pictures is "good therapy"?
Censorship is a bigger danger to the American Public than any FEMA publication.
It depends on what they publish. If you are referring to this specific incident then I say any "censorship" question is irrelevant and exaggerated. In this case common sense and good taste are the applicable subjects. I suppose the public does have a right to have input into what their tax dollars are being spent on. Unfortunately, because this is FEMA and because 9-over-11 itself is a political topic, the whole issue is likely to be politicized into a Left versus Right type of debate.
Whether such a coloring book would have any type of educational value at all (versus any possible psychological trauma) is somewhat besides the point; education (of infants) should be left up to parents and schools and not to FEMA. The whole concept was ingenuous to begin with and shouldn't have happened. The government should (instead) spend money on sex education instead of giving it to FEMA to make up morbid colouring books for children.
This is the same as Alien conspiracies in the 90's - So much bullshit and misinformation, interest eventually peaked, and then most people got bored and forgot about it.
So you're one of those alien conspiracy deniers. It's people like you who make all the evidence look bogus. Nice try. Why don't you admit that you are in cahoots with the aliens?
I think its quite abhorrent that it seems that you, and others in this thread think that the son should abandon his Mother and not let her see her Grandchildren because she is mentally ill.
Nice flame. You obviously never lived with people who have had mental illnesses because your attitude speaks volumes. I would certainly not let any of my children be subjected to the kind of harassment and insanity that stalkers exhibit.
And once again, to emphasize, it would be helpful also if the medical profession had some empathy and intelligence as well because they often treat mental patients like customer service reps treat customers; with canned solutions like drug therapy.
The excuse being that poor people are more likely to want to steal. The real reason is that big companies that steal and engage in other criminal activities just consider poor people too stupid to get away with theft, and thus are likely to bring their company down.
Creating hate for poor people is just another scape goat. It's sad that if you are lucky enough to be in a "visible minority" then you get to be a part of "affirmative action", but if you are poor it is legally and socially acceptable to discriminate against you.
Unfortunately monetary (or even criminal) penalties will not help this woman, nor will it likely stop her obsessive/compulsive behavior. The son needs to get a new phone number and make sure that he only shares it with a very small group of highly trusted individuals.
I've dealt with people like this (as a schlimazel), and from my experience anti-psychotic drugs (alone) don't seem to work either. I would think operant conditioning would help in such cases, but the medical profession seems to be more interested in drug therapies, and to a lesser extent social counseling like group therapy.
It's scary how many posters here apparently can't tell the difference between (a) censoring a list of links, mainly to child porn, that is, rightly or wrongly, illegal to redistribute in the country concerned; and (b) killing or incarcerating millions based only on racial/religious prejudice.
The Nazis were putting people in prison for political reasons long before they created death camps. There is some historical relevance here, but unfortunately it has grown into a cliche and thus become mundane. In the 1930s people didn't care that it was Jews and homosexuals, and today people don't care that it is pedophiles. We all need something to hate.
And really, it's all bullshit, FUD, lies and propaganda. The "child porn" on these lists isn't that of children being kidnapped and forced to be sex slaves, it is modeling sites and political sites like Wikileaks. The truth shall set you free. Censorship will always subvert the truth.
A lot of what he said is illogical and untrue. Wikileaks does fact check, and in fact if what they posted wasn't true then it wouldn't be so controversial, and governments around the world wouldn't be attempting to shut them down. And no they don't post juvenile and second rate stories; a lot of what they publish is of important political and human interest.
Well it seems I've unintentionally replied to the GP in a round-about way.
Some customers... found it had racist overtones, Elfinger said.
Well of course, if you are a member of a "race", then any product depicting a member of that race would be "racial". I don't know what an "overtone" is, though.
It's like the think-of-the-children crowd sees child pornography in things like underwear advertisements, and yet another political group sees "racism" in plant products. At least this incident doesn't involve book burnings or people being arrested for pornography or hate crimes.
Slashdot Mirror
Good resume? You don't even have to have that. You just have to have the right school on your resume, and you're in. It's all about the connections.
Which makes it a good resume.
And now people are becoming more aware of the unreliability of what they know.
I'm not to sure if people are becoming more aware of anything. Aside from (some of the) people who read the Irish Times and/or Slashdot, I'd say things are pretty much the same as usual, with the same small retractions being printed occasionally. I don't see any evidence that people are becoming more intelligent. One would hope that educated people who work in very public facing industries (like a newspaper) would at least use some common sense.
That just goes to show how much of a rat race life is. People working as fast as they can to spit out crummy, non referenced work to please the higher-ups.
It's not about working fast, or Wikipedia, or referencing sources. It's about people and companies making a professional living supplying news in a non-professional manner. Some people spend tens of thousands of dollars to go to school to learn how to do research and journalism, and some people actually write their own essays without any help from their friends or families. Those people, unfortunately, have the disadvantage of being honest and intelligent. When it comes down to it anybody can do journalism, but it's only people who can write good resumes that will get the job. It's the same in all industries. The world keeps on turning, however slanted the orbit may be.
Information does not "want" to be free.
It's more like information has a tendency to diffuse like a gas. It's hard to keep information bottled up.
Hopefully the citizens of Britain and Australia and Germany can get a hold of this software so that they can use the Internet without government censorship impeding them.
I guess if the rest of the world had a problem with potatoes you'd fawn over the "sensibility" of regulating and taxing potatoes and only allowing people to own potatoes in small amounts, right?
I could presume you are one of the enlightened folk who are against taxation? I'd prefer potatoes to be illegal so that I can buy them on the black market tax free.
As I understand it the law allows one to possess mary jane, but growing it is illegal.
Yeah, it's like the prostitution laws in Canada; you can legally sell your body for sex, but it is illegal to advertise that you are willing to sell your body for sex. And so too medical marijuana is legal in Canada and yet people are (at least sometimes) arrested for growing medical marijuana, and after they win their court case the police refuse to compensate the victims.
This is another case of police fanaticism; they don't only want it to be illegal, but they will go out of their way to hunt you down for growing it, no matter how discrete the grower may attempt to be. I don't understand why the police would go out of their way to make portray themselves as evil.
OK, this is the last time before I put you on my Foes list (so it won't be so easy for me to see your bullshit posts) that I will point out your bullshit so hopefully other people will realize that they should ignore you.
I dunno, maybe if you informed yourself about the issues you were arguing you might have better luck? I'm just saying...
Troll. I (generally) only reply to topics that I am well informed about. I have often spent sometimes hours validating my arguments with reputable sources. Anybody can spend a few seconds finding a link. Spending great amounts of time and effort refuting bad and ill-informed arguments isn't worth the effort, especially when it is obvious that the person will disagree with me not because I make bad arguments, but because the issue goes against his belief system. Arguing against people like you who make things up, lie, and generally Troll is a no-win situation. Your sound-bites are more likely to get up-modded anyway. Well-researched arguments are generally very lengthy and boring to read and they seem to get ignored (here on Slashdot anyways).
And google, as most IT professionals will tell you, is so useful for finding accurate information* it's almost obscene.
Another red herring Troll. The topic isn't 1) IT professionals nor 2) finding good IT information. If you had bothered to inform and educate yourself, finding good quality scientific medical information on the Internet is difficult without subscribing to professional services. Although Google Books is making things easier these days. Still, it's a shitty Troll.
Another Troll post. I'll point out the most obvious biases here. The rant into Newtonian calculus etcetera I will let you have as a freebie:
So don't attempt to invalidate a modern therapudic technique because it's "just a theory". You are revealing your ignorance when you do.
You are ignorant on the subject, and you clearly do not wish to educate yourself. If you did, you might have to alter your opinion, so that obviously won't happen.
How do you know what I'm thinking?
Because you're demanding evidence be provided for something that even the most casual web search would have yielded the results you seek.
Lies. I haven't found any evidence to this. You get up-modded for a red-hearing Troll and I get down-modded; now that is proving your point in an ironic way that lay people make silly decisions. One reason why I'm not going to read further. Being here is useless to me. Just because you believe something is true doesn't mean it is.
You never did offer any evidence of longitudinal double-blind studies, instead you make accusations of me of being lazy and implications that I am stupid.
the existence of an entire field of psychology should not need to be spoon-fed to you by me.
What does that mean? Are you going to point me to more Google links? It doesn't matter, I have often spent hours arguing point by point various social science issues. Most people spend a few seconds doing Google searches to "prove" their points and they get up-modded just as fast. It's really not worth being on Slashdot. If you can prove your point then I will respect you.
Oh and the Moderators here can Fuck off.
I'm sorry, this is laziness masquerading as skepticism on your part.
How do you know what I'm thinking? Actually, know you don't. You're a Troll and I'm wasting my time. You are hyping up Art Therapy to boost a bogus point and yet it is obvious to me that you don't have any education in Art Therapy other than what you just recently Googled (and I doubt you actually read the book that you found on Amazon). Really. You think I'm an idiot. You think I'm silly. You shouldn't even bother replying to my posts. I've met people like you before. I sometimes wonder why I reply to Trolls. Maybe you are correct in your thinking. I probably am an idiot.
I think it's an excellent resource, and pulling it because of the twin towers is just bogus.
I had a brief glance at it. I agree pulling the book because of one image is (or may be) an over-reaction. I should have referred specifically to the picture rather than the entire book in my post.
There's a whole branch of psychology known as Art Therapy [wikipedia.org] built around this premise.
I am aware of Art Therapy. I was referring more specifically to the FEMA colouring book though. I am not aware that children who have lived in New York during 9/11 are the only people who have access to this coloring book. Though I think the book has been published many years too late for it to be of any benefit.
That being said, and on the more tangential topic of Art Therapy; neither the original poster nor you have given any evidence as to the efficacy of Art Therapy. According to Wikipedia "According to the American Art Therapy Association, art therapy is based on the belief ...". Beliefs are fine and dandy, but evidence and proof is necessary for people who don't live on Faith alone.
I would say the guideline would look something like this: when you have a bunch of people with no psychological qualifications whatsoever complaining about something that a large majority of psychologists actually feel is beneficial, the whiners are being silly.
That has some merit. I myself have a lot of education in the social sciences and psychology (though I am not an expert or credentialed) and have found that most people would rather believe in folklore than science. I would take your definition of silliness more seriously if it had more logic to it than just majority opinion. Some people can't just live by Karma alone.
Seriously, if you are going to the FEMA site for tips on how to talk to your kids about terrorism, you have bigger problems than the disappearance of a coloring book.
FEMA is like God; you can pray to it and give your tithing, but don't expect to be saved when the you really need assistance.
Since people think you are Insightful (and I don't) maybe you can clue me in. You said:
Because the people who are asking them to take it down are silly, that's why.
What evidence do you have that they are "silly"?
Things like coloring or drawing pictures (and talking about the pictures thus drawn) of traumatic events is good therapy.
What evidence do you have that making children draw and colour tramatic events is good therapy? Do you recommend that children be given colouring books picturing Jeffrey Dahmer raping and eating people as therapy? Do you think such a colouring book is a good educational tool?
Removing something that supports that is silly.
What evidence do you have that removing this is "silly"?
But they should also know when a few people are being silly and complaining about something that is actually worthwhile.
How is the government supposed to know when people are being "silly"? and what metrics does the government use to decide that making children colour and draw morbid pictures is "good therapy"?
Censorship is a bigger danger to the American Public than any FEMA publication.
It depends on what they publish. If you are referring to this specific incident then I say any "censorship" question is irrelevant and exaggerated. In this case common sense and good taste are the applicable subjects. I suppose the public does have a right to have input into what their tax dollars are being spent on. Unfortunately, because this is FEMA and because 9-over-11 itself is a political topic, the whole issue is likely to be politicized into a Left versus Right type of debate.
Whether such a coloring book would have any type of educational value at all (versus any possible psychological trauma) is somewhat besides the point; education (of infants) should be left up to parents and schools and not to FEMA. The whole concept was ingenuous to begin with and shouldn't have happened. The government should (instead) spend money on sex education instead of giving it to FEMA to make up morbid colouring books for children.
This is the same as Alien conspiracies in the 90's - So much bullshit and misinformation, interest eventually peaked, and then most people got bored and forgot about it.
So you're one of those alien conspiracy deniers. It's people like you who make all the evidence look bogus. Nice try. Why don't you admit that you are in cahoots with the aliens?
I think its quite abhorrent that it seems that you, and others in this thread think that the son should abandon his Mother and not let her see her Grandchildren because she is mentally ill.
Nice flame. You obviously never lived with people who have had mental illnesses because your attitude speaks volumes. I would certainly not let any of my children be subjected to the kind of harassment and insanity that stalkers exhibit.
And once again, to emphasize, it would be helpful also if the medical profession had some empathy and intelligence as well because they often treat mental patients like customer service reps treat customers; with canned solutions like drug therapy.
Griefers will love this toy.
The excuse being that poor people are more likely to want to steal. The real reason is that big companies that steal and engage in other criminal activities just consider poor people too stupid to get away with theft, and thus are likely to bring their company down.
Creating hate for poor people is just another scape goat. It's sad that if you are lucky enough to be in a "visible minority" then you get to be a part of "affirmative action", but if you are poor it is legally and socially acceptable to discriminate against you.
Unfortunately monetary (or even criminal) penalties will not help this woman, nor will it likely stop her obsessive/compulsive behavior. The son needs to get a new phone number and make sure that he only shares it with a very small group of highly trusted individuals.
I've dealt with people like this (as a schlimazel), and from my experience anti-psychotic drugs (alone) don't seem to work either. I would think operant conditioning would help in such cases, but the medical profession seems to be more interested in drug therapies, and to a lesser extent social counseling like group therapy.
It's scary how many posters here apparently can't tell the difference between (a) censoring a list of links, mainly to child porn, that is, rightly or wrongly, illegal to redistribute in the country concerned; and (b) killing or incarcerating millions based only on racial/religious prejudice.
The Nazis were putting people in prison for political reasons long before they created death camps. There is some historical relevance here, but unfortunately it has grown into a cliche and thus become mundane. In the 1930s people didn't care that it was Jews and homosexuals, and today people don't care that it is pedophiles. We all need something to hate.
And really, it's all bullshit, FUD, lies and propaganda. The "child porn" on these lists isn't that of children being kidnapped and forced to be sex slaves, it is modeling sites and political sites like Wikileaks. The truth shall set you free. Censorship will always subvert the truth.
This is not about "improperly" suspending a domain name.
Of course it is. And it is also about censorship. Just because the censorship may be about a moral panic issue is irrelevant.
A lot of what he said is illogical and untrue. Wikileaks does fact check, and in fact if what they posted wasn't true then it wouldn't be so controversial, and governments around the world wouldn't be attempting to shut them down. And no they don't post juvenile and second rate stories; a lot of what they publish is of important political and human interest.
Well it seems I've unintentionally replied to the GP in a round-about way.
Some customers ... found it had racist overtones, Elfinger said.
Well of course, if you are a member of a "race", then any product depicting a member of that race would be "racial". I don't know what an "overtone" is, though.
It's like the think-of-the-children crowd sees child pornography in things like underwear advertisements, and yet another political group sees "racism" in plant products. At least this incident doesn't involve book burnings or people being arrested for pornography or hate crimes.