Now I understand, it's a reading comprehension problem on your behalf. I was replying to some tool who belittled psychology as a pseudoscience equating the situation down to the cliche sexual repression statement. If it's such a bullshit smoke and mirrors snake oil act, why is our system embracing it and it can be used to sign you off to a nut ward? It goes to the heart of establishing something called CREDIBILITY in real life situations, not just what wonders through the mind of geeks in defense of their e-peens. It's called looking at the end results in real world applications.
I understand the need for a geek who feeds 500 frogs an aspirin and another 500 frogs a placebo to defend his "science" from those who aren't doing "pure scientific research" like he is. It's his tiny little "feed frogs stuff" science world and he needs to feel good about it. For him or one of his lackeys to rail against another science really cries out for them to have some perspective. Yes, you can feed Kermit an aspirin, but a shrink can effect where a criminal spends his incarceration, or they can have someone hauled off to a nut ward, or even have your kids taken away from you. That's pretty good for a bullshit pseudoscience, no?
I understand, and forgive you. You came in late to the conversation and jumped to conclusions without really fully comprehending the conversation. It happens.
Ok, stop right there. As a retired lit prof, you are going to talk out your ass about IT AND Engineers? Seriously? You can rail on IT all you want, but lumping Engineers in with them is down right insulting, and has to be a result of ignorance. Then you dash off into tool and die makers, auto mechanics and plumbers? WTF?
First if you are to compare and contrast IT with any of these it would be an auto mechanic. Each of the other fields are involved with making something, those two are just maintaining a system. They aren't braving new worlds, they aren't creating anything out of raw materials. IT at BEST in their creativity write software for an already established system. Of course they have to be creative in their solutions often, but they aren't reinventing the wheel, they are keeping it greased.
Before you start pissing on Engineers, know everything around you is a result of engineering. If you don't think so, lets drop you off in some God forsaken part of the world that has no engineering influences on it whatsoever. Let's see how long you survive without resorting to some kind of engineering. You wouldn't even be a lit major without engineers, there would be no books produced in mass, hence nobody but the elite rich would own them because they would have to be penned by hand.
Science and Engineering are two different things, but incredibly related. I know I don't have to explain that to you. IT is a byproduct of both of these and it's new and part of our wonderful information age. But it's a child field of these, it doesn't overshadow them.
Ah yes, resort to the name calling, that really drives your point home with such eloquence.
I didn't know that we were suddenly back hundreds of years, or are you bringing up a completely irrelevant point? Of course I know what the word means, I have to wonder if you do. I am also aware of how territorial geeks are about what they deem as "science". I've dealt with this little quirk with various professors and I always find it worth at least 5 minutes of them ranting if I press those buttons.
As far as the ".22 short to the skull" statement, that is something called hyperbole. It's pronounced HI PER BO LEE, not HYPER BOLE by the way. Look it up, that is your education assignment for the day.
I find those who critique the "science" of psychology, tend to fall into a few simple of categories.
a. The butthurt hard science geek. Nerd rage because your precious field is obviously one of "science" yet others have the audacity to call what they do science. b. Newbies who regurgitate what (A.) nerd raged about, thinking they can be smart by parroting what they heard. c. Various combinations of a and b.
Personally, if I was going to work in the field I would head into the "neural plasticity" aspect of it. This I believe can be can be according to Nerd Hoyle, a real "science". I wasn't aware of that particular term "neural plasticity", I called the application "neural remapping". I will not bore you with the details, but setting up scenarios to study is relatively easy, hence replicating it for study over time, can be done. It's not a perfect "science" like chemistry, but we are dealing with the human mind which have a lot of variables, making it problematic by nature to replicate situations to study.
It's a damn difficult field, and it's littered with land mines, such as the entire SCIENCE of it having credibility problems. Rightfully so with as many "hacks" infesting the field, but not so much as the techniques of those who truly are approaching it "scientifically".
Let's get back to the my first point. The minds of today, which are echoed through our system and the laws of the land, deem it a science and use it as a practical application. If you don't think we have come leagues away from hundreds of years ago when we burned people at the stake at the word of a priest, then I should pipe down and realize that you are completely mad. Surely you aren't so naive or undereducated to think that psychology has nothing to offer, that there aren't techniques in it that have merit.
I going to chalk it up as tunnel vision and caught up in a passionate/nerd rage argument about the ever lasting geek eye tick argument of what constitutes a true "science".
ha ha! Linux! You would think that would cut down on your headaches. If there ever was a IT demographics that has room to be arrogant it would be the linux people I would think. But working in that environment you probably have a more intelligent user base, no? It's one of the hallmarks I look for in a competent IT person, how well do they know linux. Frankly, I delved very little into it. I set it up as a network between two computers back in 1994 when myself and a friend of mine wanted to learn it because we wanted to start the communities first ISP. We were BBS sysops at the time and could see the writing on the wall.
We bit off more than we could chew, not to mention we couldn't get a phone company to work with us. We were looking at laying line over a hundred miles just to get it to town. It was a crash course into deep telecom territory and they weren't a bit helpful or friendly. We got routed to their "advanced product team" who knew even less than we did it seemed or at least pretended to. We gave up on that project before we went blind reading reams of manuals we printed out. Frankly I got lost at the kernel, it and my Pentium 90 were fighting it out, but it would go on the 486DX just fine. By the time we got the network cards to talk to each other, I was ready to kick puppies over the moon. I gave up, I was too young to die of a heart attack or aneurism from stress overload which was going to happen at that pace.
That's nice and wonderful and I applaud your friend. But she wouldn't run down to the local clinic and pull a splinter from Cracky McCrackhead when the President of the United States is in her operating room needing her talents. I know it's hyperbole, but the vast gulf is about the same.
I liked your IBM punch card reference. You do realize that the tech advances, and people advance with the tech. People who were doing the punch cards, if they were really IT, they would be rolling with the changes. That is part of the nightmare of being IT, you have to deal with a field that is evolving at an exponential pace. Now your good doctor friend on the other hand, I am sure has a tough job, but she isn't dealing with evolution every 6 months. Once she understands a human mechanic, it doesn't change. Sure there are an obscene amounts of variables she has to contend with, and I am sure her field is complicated, but she isn't having to constantly run to keep up with the changes. She isn't having to read about God putting out "liver 2.0".
IT puts rules in place for a reason. One of their chief jobs is protecting not only the business, but the employees from outside attacks through the network. The vast majority of the problems I have even seen were from people violating these rules. Its hard not to consider people stupid, when they are told something, and ignore it and do what they want and cause serious problems. This tends to be the "smart" people, the ones that think they are more intelligent than the admins. They might be, but on this subject, they are morons it seems.
Don't tell me you haven't seen professionals act like retards in an area outside their expertise because their ego got the best of them. Here is something else to consider. IT will be the last thing that goes in the information age, so don't feel like gloating at the IT people like someday they will be going the way of the IBM punch card machines. Like I said, IT adapts to the tech, those machines aren't around, but I am sure plenty of the people running them still are, but have evolved with the tech. Secondly, technology is replacing lots of people and it's not going to slack off. Robots are what the "experts" are worrying about taking our jobs, not illegal immigrants.
Once the technology gets to that point, only IT will be required to maintain it. But don't worry, once we have AI, IT will be obsolete as well, but so will the rest of humanity. They call that a "singularity", the point in artificial intelligence happens and from that point on. The implications of such are profound to say the least and much fiction has been published about it. None of it is cheery by the way, but I think that is the nature of selling a book. Most literature I find that is any good tends to be an exercise in voyeurism into some dystopian-ish setting of some degree.
Your doctor friend also deals with certain realities that people react to differently than they do with IT. For example, if she does a liver transplant, she doesn't have to tell the patient not to run around hallways throwing themselves headlong into everything until they rip open their stitches and about bleed out on the floor before anyone can get to them. IT has to deal with such craziness as people who will violate a policy, require a fix, then do it all over again next week. It's like the patient doing that, then blaming your doctor friend for it happening, then wondering why she gets an attitude, when she has to do 5 surgeries on the same moron for doing the same thing.
IT often gives simple answers. They tell you don't do this. Then you want to know why. The reason why could be a vastly complicated reason that you will turn glassy eyed 10 seconds into. Are you versed in this technology? No? Then what will an explanation do for you? Will it satisfy your ego, knowing that you commanded someone's time to speak something you don't understand to you? Ask your doctor friend how she likes her years of expertise argued with by patients who have read a page or two of WebMD. Ask her how
Obviously your education in the mater is sorely lacking, but sadly it doesn't stop you from expressing an opinion. My guess is you harbor some issues with the system due to a personal experience with it. Perhaps you got a lousy therapist, or perhaps you just need one desperately and are in denial. Perhaps you are trying to take a stab at elevating yourself at someone expense.
Society deems it a science. A psychologist can sign you into a hospital for evaluation, the cops will bag you up like you are wild life on Wild Kingdom, and put you in a padded room. For a "pseudoscience" that is a lot of power. Of course that is moot, right? Instead of arguing the point, you just attack the person. They have names for that tactic, "argumentum ad hominem" is the Latin term for it. Obviously it's been around for a while, and frankly it was boring back then even.
To try to breed some substance into this conversation, I will inject that I seriously doubt they were going on about "sexual repression". I can see a company hiring an organizational shrink to help smooth out stress in the job and to enhance performance of the people by helping them interact properly. If you have an element not interfacing with the others, and it happens not with just individuals, but as part of behavior of a certain job/skill set, it needs exploring.
Let me break it down simply. If Bob in IT is a dickhead, it's a personal thing with Bob and firing him can cure the problem. But if everyone in that department shows symptoms of "dickheadedness" no matter who you hire or fire, then there is something to be gleaned from the situation. I know IT attracts dickheads. I have known plenty of them when I worked as IT.
But IT is one of those "shade tree mechanic" jobs that about any dickhead can break into with enough self study. I have had "friends" that I grew up with get into it, and they were the worse kinds of people to be attracted to the field. They only liked it for some perceived status it gave them. They loved rubbing things they knew and nobody else did in people's faces. Myself, I am immune to IT arrogance, because there is little about it that intimidates me. I have done my own IT work for years, and did it when nobody around where I lived had a clue about it. I got several of those working their own IT companies into it. One out of working with me, and another who was jealous and copycatted out of ego. What I don't know is either a Google search away or a phone call to a friend capable of anything I can imagine in IT. (Redhat Certified IT Pro)
But I understand people's grief with poor IT. The college I attend has the worse IT I have ever seen. If they worked for me, I would have to take the entire lot of them out in the country and put a.22 short in the thin of their skulls due to the fact they shouldn't be allowed to pass their stupidity on to other generations. There isn't one damn thing intelligent about our computer network at school. Not to mention, they take it down right when we need the thing constantly. You couldn't count on it for real work.
Lastly, I can understand why IT gets an attitude. Some competent IT people operate at extremely high levels of expertise and for them to be answering questions about your email is a slap in their face. It's like asking the award winning brain surgeon to go down to the clinic and take splinters out of some crackhead's big toe. What every IT department of any size needs is at least one "human interface" person to deal with the mundane things and the "idiots". Someone has to gear down their brain out of IT mode and translate things to "normal" people. Not everyone can do that without wanting to snap and take a claw hammer to people's faces.
When the Internet was younger and so was I, I worked an ISP help desk and had to deal with fixing Windows 95 issues with the Internet over the phone with people who barely understood how to turn the computer on. That's a process that will let you know if you have the patience and people skills for working with "
I am thinking it's a known left leaning publication and the Right wants SOPA jammed through because they want a foot in the door, to lay down foundations for more intrusive measures into the Internet. Frankly it's a thorn in their sides, they could have swept OWS under the rug if it wasn't for the Internet. I figure it's another cheesy black ops project ran by some out of control spooks either from an alphabet agency or worse, some corporate cowboys that are completely off radar.
If they can disturb enough sheeple on the Left, attacking their precious NYT, they might cave on SOPA, being it's to protect us from those evil hackers. For the children...and other BS, you know. I wonder if it's the same operatives who orchestrated the scandal on the IMF chief a while back in NY? The question remains, did the IMF ever gain access to Ft Knox to check out the rumor it's empty of gold? Or did that blatant scandal scare them off from coming to American soil, after we proved we would defecate all over diplomatic protocols to protect this big fat rumor. Face it, we gave the world a thinly veiled F YOU, with that whole ordeal.
Not to mention NYPD was busted working with Government black ops and nothing became of it. Shoved under the rug like everything else. Expect more "Left" targets until enough hysteria is generated and they can jam SOPA or something worse through.
If you have a business. IT is cheap. You don't want engineers, people's who's time is infinitely more important than "fixin' the computers", to be fixing the computers. Seriously, you have to be insane not to have an IT person designated at least. I've had small business operations where I was quite capable of doing it myself, but I assigned the business to a friend and associate to handle it.
Why? Time is money. Let's look at it from what one example I have done personally.
Retail: As owner, my best time is interfacing with customers. Customers LOVE having the owner handling their business. It's a personal touch that empowers them and allows me to bring the full blunt of my resources at meeting their wants and needs. If I have my head stuck in a computer, customers feel off put by it. That's the draw back of being charming and charismatic, if you don't put in face time, it can have an opposite reaction. You can become "stuck up" and they will turn negative towards you. They don't shell out volumes of cash at you then. I feel like such a man whore working retail. I digress....
My brilliant friend, who wears that ball cap everywhere, who has bad teeth, and a hen pecking fat wife who calls him every other nanosecond to whine about kids she's too fat to get up and beat properly, needs a job. And is so damn overqualified for fixing my computers and keeping it all running properly that if there is a computer problem, it will be because ninjas from another dimension have gated in, and chopped them up with energy swords, after they beat Chuck's (my friend) ass into the ground. Sans that or something equally fantastic, I know the computer situation will be in good hands.
Chuck works cheap. If he isn't working, he's miserable. My time is worth money, lots of if I am doing my damn job. I can pay Chuck well, and come out ahead because I can deduct what I am paying him from what I make and still be out ahead. This is just thinking about a very small business in means of employee numbers. As you increase the amount of people involved, it becomes exponentially needed in part of the equation of balancing out your employee's time.
If your business is built around computers as vital tools for anything beyond simplistic small business book keeping, you are daft in my opinion for not assigning at least ONE human element to focus on IT.
Welcome to modern fascism, where have you been? It's been gradually leading to this for decades, now it's kicking into high gear. I wish they had done this when I was younger. I am too old for the "rampaging rebel" scene. But don't worry, about the time we are ready to revolt again, they will have another handy "terrorist" attack, take whatever freedoms we have left away and send us to another fucked in the head war.
IMHO, hell doesn't burn hot enough for these fuckers delving into our personal lives, but I insist we send them there anyway.
Frankly, I think it's kind of a mistimed project. We should be in space, it's a much easier environment to work with. And we should be working like ants out there on projects. Of course I am an undergrad engineering student, not a scientist, what do I know? But I would imagine that working outside the atmosphere in a relative vacuum with little gravitational influences, one could put up some amazing arrays of sensors. Unless vast amounts of sea water crushing down upon you is their idea of the pristine environment to detect neutrinos, it seems like quite the handicap to give oneself for a working environment. Not to mention, why the Mediterranean? It's like a cesspool so to speak, with all of Europe washing into it. Is that what they want to filter through?
Anyway, the whole thing seems like something that wastes resources that should be going for space. Once we are in space we will have crazy amounts of resources to work with, we can come back and build our underwater labs with gleeful abandon due to the fact we can drop all the materials we mined and refined right on the construction site. Personally, I want a giant submarine that all my friends can live in, we will paint it yellow. No reason....lol.
Good luck with that project of yours, I like science...seriously I do.
I just got to level 10 and am looking for the advanced class trainers. The game so far is pretty decent, the game play is good, the interface is nice, the combat system doesn't make me nuts like their last one did. It's pretty polished and worth a good look. It will keep you home for the holidays and off the streets and roads.
We are all falling for the big "Christmas Fund Drive" for Congress. They get a tool to run a insanely unpopular bill, and everyone gets rich from lobbyists fighting it. It's win/win. How does it feel to watch these chuckleheads laugh all the way to the bank?
Armed revolt isn't something we want, seriously. Use your votes and send them packing next election. Yes, they are begging for a lynch mob to string them up on the front lawn, but that isn't how we do things. Nor if we did snap, does it require many people to be extremely problematic. We just don't need that kind of crazy being let off the leash.
Once upon a time in America in order for a corporation to be granted, it had to serve a specific function for the people. For example, a water company for the community could incorporate. The rich saw the advantages of these corporate laws and have been wrestling themselves into them ever since. Imagine the horror of those before us, those that understood the powers of a corporation, if they could see us now.
I blame the "dumbing down of America" on this. It's ironic that we have such vast technologies of information, but we are still the most ignorant people it seems on the planet. It's so easy to dominate an ignorant uneducated people. Have you looked at the Republican base lately? It's not rich businessmen, it's idiot rednecks watching Fox News, listening to Gen Beck and Rush. They are all convinced they are fighting commie pinkos at home, and Jesus will be angry with them if they don't vote Republican. Republicans can get away with murder as long as they toss a few bones to these people.
Trust me, it gets worse. Look into the definition of fascism and it's history. Contrast and compare it's classical rise in history and it's ideals with today's America. I am sure most reading this are intelligent to understand the saying "those that ignore history are doomed to repeat it." Yes, it's ugly, but vigilance is necessary for freedom and that vigilance has to begin with examining one's own self. If we don't have the guts to examine ourselves for what we are, where we are going and what we will become, nobody else will.
Tyranny doesn't require intelligent people to enforce it's will, in fact it requires the opposite. Consider that and whom they have put behind a trigger.
That is overly simplistic and a rather naive romantic view of them. If only that was what they are, simple tools that have go astray and need put back in their places.
But in the real world that's not what is going on. Corporations are owned by corporations and so forth. There is a ladder of them, and as you try to climb through this you will find that the money and power starts to focus down to a few. This kind of power and money can't be ignored, it has it's way because it has means to influence the very laws of the land in which it resides.
It's interests stretch beyond borders and into the entire planet, able to orchestrate governments for it's will. We as free people should NOT allow this kind of power to be held by a few with little to no answering to the rest of us for their actions. It's illogical and not very intelligent to allow an environment like this to exist, let alone let it form to begin with. We've been lulled into some kind of a dream to let something like this slide by us, only to awaken in chains.
It's a wonderful dream, to believe that the system is fair and that any of us can "make it big". If only it was true, if only...
What you end up with is the same 0.01% still in charge, but only now they have even more of an advantage.
How about we just outlaw all bribery of officials? It's not free speech, it's BRIBERY. It's not free speech if it's a crime. I can't call "free speech" if I say to you, "hey fucker, give me your wallet or I will shoot you and fuck your pretty wife", that's ROBBERY. I look at lobbyists as criminals that we should have lynched a long time ago. If you want to influence your Congressman, you write him and letter and plead your cause. Anything else should be considered a bit of intimidation or influencing of our legal system and should be considered a capital punishment crime. Not only for those to try to influence our politicians and officials but those same politicians and officials if they take the bribes, it should be capital punishment.
Only then will we be rid of career politicians who spend millions of dollars to get a job that pays little in contrast to what they spend to get there. Only then will we have a nervous representative system that fears and respects it's masters and works for our interests. Public servants, not public masters. We must assert our freedom or it will be taken from us, that is the nature of the world. The Constitution isn't magical, we have to do the damn work, lately we have slacked off and it's becoming void and nil.
Inhabitants name their water planet after dirt!
on
Is the Earth Special?
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· Score: 4, Funny
Aliens don't stop because they are busy searching for INTELLIGENT life.
Dear Aliens, Don't be racist, Thank you. The People of Earth. P.S. Do as we say, not as we do.
Why did the human cross the road? Because he's still stuck on his planet and can't fly.
A human walks into a bar with some Uropian gas termite his shoulder. The bartender before he throws them out asks, "Where did you get that disgusting thing?" The gas termite says "On planet Water, these dumb fucks are everywhere."
Do you remember in High School the retarded kids and their classrooms? Did you ever go in them? Did you know the retarded kids? Don't feel bad, nobody did. You knew where they were though so God forbid you stumble anywhere near there and be mistaken for a retard. If retards spoke, you just ignored them. Well I hate to tell everyone, but Earth is the Retard Class of the Galaxy. There are plenty of Aliens out there that know damn well where we are. But do you see them coming here? They don't want any of that "retard" rubbing off on them. Oh sure, we get sightings and such, but nothing official. Do you know why? These are the Aliens that are throwing spitballs at us and calling us RETARDS and running the hell off before they end up in detention or suspended.
"Why?" do you ask????
Well imagine our Alien benefactors who waited breathlessly and patiently for us to come out to space and prove we are intelligent. Who do we send? A dog! Imagine that? So they do a mind probe to find out WTF it wants and it wants a bone. They consider the situation and just leave and chock us all up for being retarded.Word gets around you know. Yeah...that new planet..? It's retarded!
So you ask me, is Earth special? I say yeah, it's special alright, it's Special Ed.
Nice troll. But let's pretend your serious. We have an entire planet to deal with, and some of them for some reason don't like us. We're out number in ways that are hard to comprehend. We have some important things that need done and it's going to take probably the entire human race to do it or else we are all going to die. The clock is ticking and we haven't got forever. And if you haven't noticed we have LOTS of people who aren't doing so well, who need work, the list goes on and on of problems that need addressed.
We can mess around and be stupid about this, and lose everything we have, or we can work together, get through it and get back to whatever. It's that simple. Anything less is a barbarian mindset that needs a serious upgrading to modern times.
Thank you for your hard work, but you knew this gig couldn't last. They are onto us all and it's over. It was sweet while it lasted. Meet at the same place and we will all have a big party. Our next gig is coming soon, so enjoy your vacation and try to stay out of prison.
Times are tough. Some start looking back with rose colored glasses. It's understandable. But we have to move forward and adapt to the modern world. We can't think as a shattered collective. We need to be a damn team. We fight too much. We need solutions that are full of win for all of us. Both of our sides need to look at each other and say, "help us help you." We are one, if we stab the other guy, we kill ourselves. Dig it?
There are solutions that will work and be just down right awesome. People need to stop fighting and start working.
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Now I understand, it's a reading comprehension problem on your behalf. I was replying to some tool who belittled psychology as a pseudoscience equating the situation down to the cliche sexual repression statement. If it's such a bullshit smoke and mirrors snake oil act, why is our system embracing it and it can be used to sign you off to a nut ward? It goes to the heart of establishing something called CREDIBILITY in real life situations, not just what wonders through the mind of geeks in defense of their e-peens. It's called looking at the end results in real world applications.
I understand the need for a geek who feeds 500 frogs an aspirin and another 500 frogs a placebo to defend his "science" from those who aren't doing "pure scientific research" like he is. It's his tiny little "feed frogs stuff" science world and he needs to feel good about it. For him or one of his lackeys to rail against another science really cries out for them to have some perspective. Yes, you can feed Kermit an aspirin, but a shrink can effect where a criminal spends his incarceration, or they can have someone hauled off to a nut ward, or even have your kids taken away from you. That's pretty good for a bullshit pseudoscience, no?
I understand, and forgive you. You came in late to the conversation and jumped to conclusions without really fully comprehending the conversation. It happens.
Ok, stop right there. As a retired lit prof, you are going to talk out your ass about IT AND Engineers? Seriously? You can rail on IT all you want, but lumping Engineers in with them is down right insulting, and has to be a result of ignorance. Then you dash off into tool and die makers, auto mechanics and plumbers? WTF?
First if you are to compare and contrast IT with any of these it would be an auto mechanic. Each of the other fields are involved with making something, those two are just maintaining a system. They aren't braving new worlds, they aren't creating anything out of raw materials. IT at BEST in their creativity write software for an already established system. Of course they have to be creative in their solutions often, but they aren't reinventing the wheel, they are keeping it greased.
Before you start pissing on Engineers, know everything around you is a result of engineering. If you don't think so, lets drop you off in some God forsaken part of the world that has no engineering influences on it whatsoever. Let's see how long you survive without resorting to some kind of engineering. You wouldn't even be a lit major without engineers, there would be no books produced in mass, hence nobody but the elite rich would own them because they would have to be penned by hand.
Science and Engineering are two different things, but incredibly related. I know I don't have to explain that to you. IT is a byproduct of both of these and it's new and part of our wonderful information age. But it's a child field of these, it doesn't overshadow them.
Ah yes, resort to the name calling, that really drives your point home with such eloquence.
I didn't know that we were suddenly back hundreds of years, or are you bringing up a completely irrelevant point? Of course I know what the word means, I have to wonder if you do. I am also aware of how territorial geeks are about what they deem as "science". I've dealt with this little quirk with various professors and I always find it worth at least 5 minutes of them ranting if I press those buttons.
As far as the ".22 short to the skull" statement, that is something called hyperbole. It's pronounced HI PER BO LEE, not HYPER BOLE by the way. Look it up, that is your education assignment for the day.
I find those who critique the "science" of psychology, tend to fall into a few simple of categories.
a. The butthurt hard science geek. Nerd rage because your precious field is obviously one of "science" yet others have the audacity to call what they do science.
b. Newbies who regurgitate what (A.) nerd raged about, thinking they can be smart by parroting what they heard.
c. Various combinations of a and b.
Personally, if I was going to work in the field I would head into the "neural plasticity" aspect of it. This I believe can be can be according to Nerd Hoyle, a real "science". I wasn't aware of that particular term "neural plasticity", I called the application "neural remapping". I will not bore you with the details, but setting up scenarios to study is relatively easy, hence replicating it for study over time, can be done. It's not a perfect "science" like chemistry, but we are dealing with the human mind which have a lot of variables, making it problematic by nature to replicate situations to study.
It's a damn difficult field, and it's littered with land mines, such as the entire SCIENCE of it having credibility problems. Rightfully so with as many "hacks" infesting the field, but not so much as the techniques of those who truly are approaching it "scientifically".
Let's get back to the my first point. The minds of today, which are echoed through our system and the laws of the land, deem it a science and use it as a practical application. If you don't think we have come leagues away from hundreds of years ago when we burned people at the stake at the word of a priest, then I should pipe down and realize that you are completely mad. Surely you aren't so naive or undereducated to think that psychology has nothing to offer, that there aren't techniques in it that have merit.
I going to chalk it up as tunnel vision and caught up in a passionate/nerd rage argument about the ever lasting geek eye tick argument of what constitutes a true "science".
ha ha! Linux! You would think that would cut down on your headaches. If there ever was a IT demographics that has room to be arrogant it would be the linux people I would think. But working in that environment you probably have a more intelligent user base, no? It's one of the hallmarks I look for in a competent IT person, how well do they know linux. Frankly, I delved very little into it. I set it up as a network between two computers back in 1994 when myself and a friend of mine wanted to learn it because we wanted to start the communities first ISP. We were BBS sysops at the time and could see the writing on the wall.
We bit off more than we could chew, not to mention we couldn't get a phone company to work with us. We were looking at laying line over a hundred miles just to get it to town. It was a crash course into deep telecom territory and they weren't a bit helpful or friendly. We got routed to their "advanced product team" who knew even less than we did it seemed or at least pretended to. We gave up on that project before we went blind reading reams of manuals we printed out. Frankly I got lost at the kernel, it and my Pentium 90 were fighting it out, but it would go on the 486DX just fine. By the time we got the network cards to talk to each other, I was ready to kick puppies over the moon. I gave up, I was too young to die of a heart attack or aneurism from stress overload which was going to happen at that pace.
That's nice and wonderful and I applaud your friend. But she wouldn't run down to the local clinic and pull a splinter from Cracky McCrackhead when the President of the United States is in her operating room needing her talents. I know it's hyperbole, but the vast gulf is about the same.
I liked your IBM punch card reference. You do realize that the tech advances, and people advance with the tech. People who were doing the punch cards, if they were really IT, they would be rolling with the changes. That is part of the nightmare of being IT, you have to deal with a field that is evolving at an exponential pace. Now your good doctor friend on the other hand, I am sure has a tough job, but she isn't dealing with evolution every 6 months. Once she understands a human mechanic, it doesn't change. Sure there are an obscene amounts of variables she has to contend with, and I am sure her field is complicated, but she isn't having to constantly run to keep up with the changes. She isn't having to read about God putting out "liver 2.0".
IT puts rules in place for a reason. One of their chief jobs is protecting not only the business, but the employees from outside attacks through the network. The vast majority of the problems I have even seen were from people violating these rules. Its hard not to consider people stupid, when they are told something, and ignore it and do what they want and cause serious problems. This tends to be the "smart" people, the ones that think they are more intelligent than the admins. They might be, but on this subject, they are morons it seems.
Don't tell me you haven't seen professionals act like retards in an area outside their expertise because their ego got the best of them. Here is something else to consider. IT will be the last thing that goes in the information age, so don't feel like gloating at the IT people like someday they will be going the way of the IBM punch card machines. Like I said, IT adapts to the tech, those machines aren't around, but I am sure plenty of the people running them still are, but have evolved with the tech. Secondly, technology is replacing lots of people and it's not going to slack off. Robots are what the "experts" are worrying about taking our jobs, not illegal immigrants.
Once the technology gets to that point, only IT will be required to maintain it. But don't worry, once we have AI, IT will be obsolete as well, but so will the rest of humanity. They call that a "singularity", the point in artificial intelligence happens and from that point on. The implications of such are profound to say the least and much fiction has been published about it. None of it is cheery by the way, but I think that is the nature of selling a book. Most literature I find that is any good tends to be an exercise in voyeurism into some dystopian-ish setting of some degree.
Your doctor friend also deals with certain realities that people react to differently than they do with IT. For example, if she does a liver transplant, she doesn't have to tell the patient not to run around hallways throwing themselves headlong into everything until they rip open their stitches and about bleed out on the floor before anyone can get to them. IT has to deal with such craziness as people who will violate a policy, require a fix, then do it all over again next week. It's like the patient doing that, then blaming your doctor friend for it happening, then wondering why she gets an attitude, when she has to do 5 surgeries on the same moron for doing the same thing.
IT often gives simple answers. They tell you don't do this. Then you want to know why. The reason why could be a vastly complicated reason that you will turn glassy eyed 10 seconds into. Are you versed in this technology? No? Then what will an explanation do for you? Will it satisfy your ego, knowing that you commanded someone's time to speak something you don't understand to you? Ask your doctor friend how she likes her years of expertise argued with by patients who have read a page or two of WebMD. Ask her how
Obviously your education in the mater is sorely lacking, but sadly it doesn't stop you from expressing an opinion. My guess is you harbor some issues with the system due to a personal experience with it. Perhaps you got a lousy therapist, or perhaps you just need one desperately and are in denial. Perhaps you are trying to take a stab at elevating yourself at someone expense.
Society deems it a science. A psychologist can sign you into a hospital for evaluation, the cops will bag you up like you are wild life on Wild Kingdom, and put you in a padded room. For a "pseudoscience" that is a lot of power. Of course that is moot, right? Instead of arguing the point, you just attack the person. They have names for that tactic, "argumentum ad hominem" is the Latin term for it. Obviously it's been around for a while, and frankly it was boring back then even.
To try to breed some substance into this conversation, I will inject that I seriously doubt they were going on about "sexual repression". I can see a company hiring an organizational shrink to help smooth out stress in the job and to enhance performance of the people by helping them interact properly. If you have an element not interfacing with the others, and it happens not with just individuals, but as part of behavior of a certain job/skill set, it needs exploring.
Let me break it down simply. If Bob in IT is a dickhead, it's a personal thing with Bob and firing him can cure the problem. But if everyone in that department shows symptoms of "dickheadedness" no matter who you hire or fire, then there is something to be gleaned from the situation. I know IT attracts dickheads. I have known plenty of them when I worked as IT.
But IT is one of those "shade tree mechanic" jobs that about any dickhead can break into with enough self study. I have had "friends" that I grew up with get into it, and they were the worse kinds of people to be attracted to the field. They only liked it for some perceived status it gave them. They loved rubbing things they knew and nobody else did in people's faces. Myself, I am immune to IT arrogance, because there is little about it that intimidates me. I have done my own IT work for years, and did it when nobody around where I lived had a clue about it. I got several of those working their own IT companies into it. One out of working with me, and another who was jealous and copycatted out of ego. What I don't know is either a Google search away or a phone call to a friend capable of anything I can imagine in IT. (Redhat Certified IT Pro)
But I understand people's grief with poor IT. The college I attend has the worse IT I have ever seen. If they worked for me, I would have to take the entire lot of them out in the country and put a .22 short in the thin of their skulls due to the fact they shouldn't be allowed to pass their stupidity on to other generations. There isn't one damn thing intelligent about our computer network at school. Not to mention, they take it down right when we need the thing constantly. You couldn't count on it for real work.
Lastly, I can understand why IT gets an attitude. Some competent IT people operate at extremely high levels of expertise and for them to be answering questions about your email is a slap in their face. It's like asking the award winning brain surgeon to go down to the clinic and take splinters out of some crackhead's big toe. What every IT department of any size needs is at least one "human interface" person to deal with the mundane things and the "idiots". Someone has to gear down their brain out of IT mode and translate things to "normal" people. Not everyone can do that without wanting to snap and take a claw hammer to people's faces.
When the Internet was younger and so was I, I worked an ISP help desk and had to deal with fixing Windows 95 issues with the Internet over the phone with people who barely understood how to turn the computer on. That's a process that will let you know if you have the patience and people skills for working with "
Interesting.
I am thinking it's a known left leaning publication and the Right wants SOPA jammed through because they want a foot in the door, to lay down foundations for more intrusive measures into the Internet. Frankly it's a thorn in their sides, they could have swept OWS under the rug if it wasn't for the Internet. I figure it's another cheesy black ops project ran by some out of control spooks either from an alphabet agency or worse, some corporate cowboys that are completely off radar.
If they can disturb enough sheeple on the Left, attacking their precious NYT, they might cave on SOPA, being it's to protect us from those evil hackers. For the children...and other BS, you know. I wonder if it's the same operatives who orchestrated the scandal on the IMF chief a while back in NY? The question remains, did the IMF ever gain access to Ft Knox to check out the rumor it's empty of gold? Or did that blatant scandal scare them off from coming to American soil, after we proved we would defecate all over diplomatic protocols to protect this big fat rumor. Face it, we gave the world a thinly veiled F YOU, with that whole ordeal.
Not to mention NYPD was busted working with Government black ops and nothing became of it. Shoved under the rug like everything else. Expect more "Left" targets until enough hysteria is generated and they can jam SOPA or something worse through.
Nothing of value lost. He's dissing the NY times as no big loss if you don't get it anymore.
It's probably something schemed up by some agents in support of this draconian bill they are trying to pass.
If you have a business. IT is cheap. You don't want engineers, people's who's time is infinitely more important than "fixin' the computers", to be fixing the computers. Seriously, you have to be insane not to have an IT person designated at least. I've had small business operations where I was quite capable of doing it myself, but I assigned the business to a friend and associate to handle it.
Why? Time is money. Let's look at it from what one example I have done personally.
Retail: As owner, my best time is interfacing with customers. Customers LOVE having the owner handling their business. It's a personal touch that empowers them and allows me to bring the full blunt of my resources at meeting their wants and needs. If I have my head stuck in a computer, customers feel off put by it. That's the draw back of being charming and charismatic, if you don't put in face time, it can have an opposite reaction. You can become "stuck up" and they will turn negative towards you. They don't shell out volumes of cash at you then. I feel like such a man whore working retail. I digress....
My brilliant friend, who wears that ball cap everywhere, who has bad teeth, and a hen pecking fat wife who calls him every other nanosecond to whine about kids she's too fat to get up and beat properly, needs a job. And is so damn overqualified for fixing my computers and keeping it all running properly that if there is a computer problem, it will be because ninjas from another dimension have gated in, and chopped them up with energy swords, after they beat Chuck's (my friend) ass into the ground. Sans that or something equally fantastic, I know the computer situation will be in good hands.
Chuck works cheap. If he isn't working, he's miserable. My time is worth money, lots of if I am doing my damn job. I can pay Chuck well, and come out ahead because I can deduct what I am paying him from what I make and still be out ahead. This is just thinking about a very small business in means of employee numbers. As you increase the amount of people involved, it becomes exponentially needed in part of the equation of balancing out your employee's time.
If your business is built around computers as vital tools for anything beyond simplistic small business book keeping, you are daft in my opinion for not assigning at least ONE human element to focus on IT.
Welcome to modern fascism, where have you been? It's been gradually leading to this for decades, now it's kicking into high gear. I wish they had done this when I was younger. I am too old for the "rampaging rebel" scene. But don't worry, about the time we are ready to revolt again, they will have another handy "terrorist" attack, take whatever freedoms we have left away and send us to another fucked in the head war.
IMHO, hell doesn't burn hot enough for these fuckers delving into our personal lives, but I insist we send them there anyway.
lol, I hope you are just trolling.
Monopoly means its the only one. Ma Bell was a monopoly. Google isn't a monopoly, it's just successful.
I see, we couldn't just dangle the sensors in a gas giant? Just kidding. I was wondering what the relationship was. Thanks.
Frankly, I think it's kind of a mistimed project. We should be in space, it's a much easier environment to work with. And we should be working like ants out there on projects. Of course I am an undergrad engineering student, not a scientist, what do I know? But I would imagine that working outside the atmosphere in a relative vacuum with little gravitational influences, one could put up some amazing arrays of sensors. Unless vast amounts of sea water crushing down upon you is their idea of the pristine environment to detect neutrinos, it seems like quite the handicap to give oneself for a working environment. Not to mention, why the Mediterranean? It's like a cesspool so to speak, with all of Europe washing into it. Is that what they want to filter through?
Anyway, the whole thing seems like something that wastes resources that should be going for space. Once we are in space we will have crazy amounts of resources to work with, we can come back and build our underwater labs with gleeful abandon due to the fact we can drop all the materials we mined and refined right on the construction site. Personally, I want a giant submarine that all my friends can live in, we will paint it yellow. No reason....lol.
Good luck with that project of yours, I like science...seriously I do.
Because it's in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea?
Now I HAVE to get this game. I was going to get it anyway, because I played the old one made by Bullfrog. I hope it's just as good.
I just got to level 10 and am looking for the advanced class trainers. The game so far is pretty decent, the game play is good, the interface is nice, the combat system doesn't make me nuts like their last one did. It's pretty polished and worth a good look. It will keep you home for the holidays and off the streets and roads.
Settle down, Francis.
We are all falling for the big "Christmas Fund Drive" for Congress. They get a tool to run a insanely unpopular bill, and everyone gets rich from lobbyists fighting it. It's win/win. How does it feel to watch these chuckleheads laugh all the way to the bank?
Armed revolt isn't something we want, seriously. Use your votes and send them packing next election. Yes, they are begging for a lynch mob to string them up on the front lawn, but that isn't how we do things. Nor if we did snap, does it require many people to be extremely problematic. We just don't need that kind of crazy being let off the leash.
Organized Crime sound familiar? Honestly, Pauly.
Once upon a time in America in order for a corporation to be granted, it had to serve a specific function for the people. For example, a water company for the community could incorporate. The rich saw the advantages of these corporate laws and have been wrestling themselves into them ever since. Imagine the horror of those before us, those that understood the powers of a corporation, if they could see us now.
I blame the "dumbing down of America" on this. It's ironic that we have such vast technologies of information, but we are still the most ignorant people it seems on the planet. It's so easy to dominate an ignorant uneducated people. Have you looked at the Republican base lately? It's not rich businessmen, it's idiot rednecks watching Fox News, listening to Gen Beck and Rush. They are all convinced they are fighting commie pinkos at home, and Jesus will be angry with them if they don't vote Republican. Republicans can get away with murder as long as they toss a few bones to these people.
Trust me, it gets worse. Look into the definition of fascism and it's history. Contrast and compare it's classical rise in history and it's ideals with today's America. I am sure most reading this are intelligent to understand the saying "those that ignore history are doomed to repeat it." Yes, it's ugly, but vigilance is necessary for freedom and that vigilance has to begin with examining one's own self. If we don't have the guts to examine ourselves for what we are, where we are going and what we will become, nobody else will.
Tyranny doesn't require intelligent people to enforce it's will, in fact it requires the opposite. Consider that and whom they have put behind a trigger.
That is overly simplistic and a rather naive romantic view of them. If only that was what they are, simple tools that have go astray and need put back in their places.
But in the real world that's not what is going on. Corporations are owned by corporations and so forth. There is a ladder of them, and as you try to climb through this you will find that the money and power starts to focus down to a few. This kind of power and money can't be ignored, it has it's way because it has means to influence the very laws of the land in which it resides.
It's interests stretch beyond borders and into the entire planet, able to orchestrate governments for it's will. We as free people should NOT allow this kind of power to be held by a few with little to no answering to the rest of us for their actions. It's illogical and not very intelligent to allow an environment like this to exist, let alone let it form to begin with. We've been lulled into some kind of a dream to let something like this slide by us, only to awaken in chains.
It's a wonderful dream, to believe that the system is fair and that any of us can "make it big". If only it was true, if only...
What you end up with is the same 0.01% still in charge, but only now they have even more of an advantage.
How about we just outlaw all bribery of officials? It's not free speech, it's BRIBERY. It's not free speech if it's a crime. I can't call "free speech" if I say to you, "hey fucker, give me your wallet or I will shoot you and fuck your pretty wife", that's ROBBERY. I look at lobbyists as criminals that we should have lynched a long time ago. If you want to influence your Congressman, you write him and letter and plead your cause. Anything else should be considered a bit of intimidation or influencing of our legal system and should be considered a capital punishment crime. Not only for those to try to influence our politicians and officials but those same politicians and officials if they take the bribes, it should be capital punishment.
Only then will we be rid of career politicians who spend millions of dollars to get a job that pays little in contrast to what they spend to get there. Only then will we have a nervous representative system that fears and respects it's masters and works for our interests. Public servants, not public masters. We must assert our freedom or it will be taken from us, that is the nature of the world. The Constitution isn't magical, we have to do the damn work, lately we have slacked off and it's becoming void and nil.
Aliens don't stop because they are busy searching for INTELLIGENT life.
Dear Aliens,
Don't be racist, Thank you.
The People of Earth.
P.S. Do as we say, not as we do.
Why did the human cross the road?
Because he's still stuck on his planet and can't fly.
A human walks into a bar with some Uropian gas termite his shoulder. The bartender before he throws them out asks, "Where did you get that disgusting thing?"
The gas termite says "On planet Water, these dumb fucks are everywhere."
Do you remember in High School the retarded kids and their classrooms? Did you ever go in them? Did you know the retarded kids? Don't feel bad, nobody did. You knew where they were though so God forbid you stumble anywhere near there and be mistaken for a retard. If retards spoke, you just ignored them. Well I hate to tell everyone, but Earth is the Retard Class of the Galaxy. There are plenty of Aliens out there that know damn well where we are. But do you see them coming here? They don't want any of that "retard" rubbing off on them. Oh sure, we get sightings and such, but nothing official. Do you know why? These are the Aliens that are throwing spitballs at us and calling us RETARDS and running the hell off before they end up in detention or suspended.
"Why?" do you ask????
Well imagine our Alien benefactors who waited breathlessly and patiently for us to come out to space and prove we are intelligent. Who do we send? A dog! Imagine that? So they do a mind probe to find out WTF it wants and it wants a bone. They consider the situation and just leave and chock us all up for being retarded.Word gets around you know. Yeah...that new planet..? It's retarded!
So you ask me, is Earth special? I say yeah, it's special alright, it's Special Ed.
Nice troll. But let's pretend your serious. We have an entire planet to deal with, and some of them for some reason don't like us. We're out number in ways that are hard to comprehend. We have some important things that need done and it's going to take probably the entire human race to do it or else we are all going to die. The clock is ticking and we haven't got forever. And if you haven't noticed we have LOTS of people who aren't doing so well, who need work, the list goes on and on of problems that need addressed.
We can mess around and be stupid about this, and lose everything we have, or we can work together, get through it and get back to whatever. It's that simple. Anything less is a barbarian mindset that needs a serious upgrading to modern times.
Dear TSA Thugs,
Thank you for your hard work, but you knew this gig couldn't last. They are onto us all and it's over. It was sweet while it lasted. Meet at the same place and we will all have a big party. Our next gig is coming soon, so enjoy your vacation and try to stay out of prison.
Yours truly,
The Joker
You nailed it.
Times are tough. Some start looking back with rose colored glasses. It's understandable. But we have to move forward and adapt to the modern world. We can't think as a shattered collective. We need to be a damn team. We fight too much. We need solutions that are full of win for all of us. Both of our sides need to look at each other and say, "help us help you." We are one, if we stab the other guy, we kill ourselves. Dig it?
There are solutions that will work and be just down right awesome. People need to stop fighting and start working.