Here's an example of giving morons expensive equipment and letting them make 'informed predictions' in the name of the scientific process. Some asshole japanese brain researcher did a study where two groups of kids either did some math exercise for 30 minutes or played games. The other group played Nintendo (not saying what game). Because he had them on radioactive drips, he could scan their brains in MRIs and see what parts lit up. It seems that the game players did not have their frontal lobes nearly as active as the math people. The idea is, your frontal lobes, which are responsible for learning, memory, and strategy, are what makes you able to control yourself, and deal with others. When these areas are active during childhood, you are developing an ability of control, etc.
Now here's why it sounds absurd (keep in mind that the article leaves out a lot of detail). First of all, let's establish the basic premise for his conclusion: Repeated activity of neurons strengthens their synaptic connections to one another, in the form of thicker mylenated-sheaths, and other things. This is the basic Hebbian learning theory that came out in the 40s or 50s. It's kind of like behavioral theory in a biological sense (but don't take it too far). So when Pavlov's dog was shown the bone, he salivated b/c during previous learning cycles the 'I am hungry', 'Bone satisfies hunger', and 'A bone is in front of me' parts of the brain were all lit up at the same time, so they all ended up developing neurological associations with one another. In a smaller scale sense, it is also true. If you remember an image, the shape, objects, colors, textures, etc seem to be described as a distributed network of interconnected neurons. When you see an image, it activates parts of your brain. So you 'recognize' something when something appears the same way as the neurons have captured and 'memorized' it. But this all mostly theory. But it does seem to be true, in a very basic sense.
So anyway, that is why the guy comes to that conclusion (I presume). And sure, if you spend your entire childhood playing unspecified Nintendo games instead of 30-minute sessions of addition, your brain will come out differently. Whether or not you have social skills or can control anger to me seems like a leap into absurdity. How can you extrapolate a 30-minute exercise onto a 15-year long developmental period that no one understands with psychology and cognitive theory, nevermind fucking neurology! I don't know about the state of this science, but it looks like people are so far from understanding the data that's in front of them (because of its, err... complexity) that the cognitive neurosciences need some time to filter shit studies like this one out.
Sure kids that play games probably have less refined social skills (because games are so addictive you naturally some of the time you would have spent with other kids gets spent in front of the screen). I doubt anyone who's played games will dispute that. But this kind of conclusion, based on the setup of the study, seems very naive and too hungry for drawing some kind of insight into 'today's problems with kids'.
What video games? Were they playing Mario Cart, or Tetris, or Zelda? And WTF was that comment about math making us quieter people? What do you think this guy did when he was a kid? Take a guess...
I forgot to mention that I am now a senior in college, who picked CS freshman year because I had done a lot of network support and management. I hated programming, I hated trying to figure out the best way to write an algorithm, and I hated discrete math. But then I started to realize that it's not the theory stuff that I was interested in, it was the stuff you can do with it that is crazy. So maybe try and find something you like to do or think about, and see if someone is using computation in that subject. Almost every science now is. We even copy things from nature and use them to build models (neural networks, genetic algorithms).
Don't know if this helps. But again, the important thing is to make sure you enjoy it, because deploying 20,000 copies of Windows 2010 is going to suck.
What is it that you want to do? The difference is this: CS will give you a strong understanding of computation, the idea of changing relationships between things in order to accomplish some goal, that is, moving bits to do things, at a theoretical level. CIS will give you a good background for using computers for business. This is a popular field of study, and businesses will always need increasing levels of horsepower to keep up with the Joneses. But I think it's like studying engineering versus fuel injection. You can do quite a bit if you know fuel injection, but so much more if you know engineering.
Keep in mind the scope of computation, where it has been used, where it currently is used, and more importantly where it probably will be used. We've basically already got supercomputers sitting on our desks, and everyone knows what Moore's law will say. Sociologists and researchers from many other disciplines are beginning to see the benefit of constructing massive computational models to study things they never suspected were possible.
This all goes to say that if you want to make some decent money working in business-related projects, go CIS. It's easier, and most people can't program well anyway. Personally I think it's short-sighted and too easy. Even CS is too easy compared to the math-freaks that move later on the computation (like, say, von Neuman, who basically invented the majority of the computational paradigms in the 30s that we all unwittingly use), but it's a lot more useful in an abstract sense. CIS skills are good now, but things may change in the next 20 years, and you might find that the people getting out of school then with a BS in biocomputationalnanofreakery are replacing you.
But this is just my opinion. No one really knows what's going to happen. The real answer is just to love other people and be happy.
BTW - 'softmore' is more like 'sophomore' than 'software'.:)
I'd like to know if there are any sophisticated systems out there for commenting, or if Rob is sort of pioneering a new way of passive interactivity on the web. I realize that almost any decent site has commenting / forums, but as far as ratings, viewing options, and well developed moderating program... Also, this type of thing will eventually change the way people comment. A lot of the frustrated and "not worth bothering" users that used to like reading comments until they have gotten this huge may possibly come back. Rob's system has made the commenting system virtually flame-proof, depending upon how you set your options. In implementing the system this way, Rob has removed himself from that dangerous realm of subjectivity, and only the users can decide if they don't want to read some of the shit that has chased people with a genuine interest in comments away.
Anyway, I think a lot of sites will eventually follow the kind of personalized commenting system that Rob is developing. Great job!
Do not give in to the urge to purchase action figures of myself and the apostles. For, I am not getting any royalties, and my lawyer is calling them tomorrow!
Slashdot Mirror
Here's an example of giving morons expensive equipment and letting them make 'informed predictions' in the name of the scientific process. Some asshole japanese brain researcher did a study where two groups of kids either did some math exercise for 30 minutes or played games. The other group played Nintendo (not saying what game). Because he had them on radioactive drips, he could scan their brains in MRIs and see what parts lit up. It seems that the game players did not have their frontal lobes nearly as active as the math people. The idea is, your frontal lobes, which are responsible for learning, memory, and strategy, are what makes you able to control yourself, and deal with others. When these areas are active during childhood, you are developing an ability of control, etc.
Now here's why it sounds absurd (keep in mind that the article leaves out a lot of detail). First of all, let's establish the basic premise for his conclusion: Repeated activity of neurons strengthens their synaptic connections to one another, in the form of thicker mylenated-sheaths, and other things. This is the basic Hebbian learning theory that came out in the 40s or 50s. It's kind of like behavioral theory in a biological sense (but don't take it too far). So when Pavlov's dog was shown the bone, he salivated b/c during previous learning cycles the 'I am hungry', 'Bone satisfies hunger', and 'A bone is in front of me' parts of the brain were all lit up at the same time, so they all ended up developing neurological associations with one another. In a smaller scale sense, it is also true. If you remember an image, the shape, objects, colors, textures, etc seem to be described as a distributed network of interconnected neurons. When you see an image, it activates parts of your brain. So you 'recognize' something when something appears the same way as the neurons have captured and 'memorized' it. But this all mostly theory. But it does seem to be true, in a very basic sense.
So anyway, that is why the guy comes to that conclusion (I presume). And sure, if you spend your entire childhood playing unspecified Nintendo games instead of 30-minute sessions of addition, your brain will come out differently. Whether or not you have social skills or can control anger to me seems like a leap into absurdity. How can you extrapolate a 30-minute exercise onto a 15-year long developmental period that no one understands with psychology and cognitive theory, nevermind fucking neurology! I don't know about the state of this science, but it looks like people are so far from understanding the data that's in front of them (because of its, err... complexity) that the cognitive neurosciences need some time to filter shit studies like this one out.
Sure kids that play games probably have less refined social skills (because games are so addictive you naturally some of the time you would have spent with other kids gets spent in front of the screen). I doubt anyone who's played games will dispute that. But this kind of conclusion, based on the setup of the study, seems very naive and too hungry for drawing some kind of insight into 'today's problems with kids'.
What video games? Were they playing Mario Cart, or Tetris, or Zelda? And WTF was that comment about math making us quieter people? What do you think this guy did when he was a kid? Take a guess...
Aghh... dumb crappy cognitive studies grumble grumble...
I forgot to mention that I am now a senior in college, who picked CS freshman year because I had done a lot of network support and management. I hated programming, I hated trying to figure out the best way to write an algorithm, and I hated discrete math. But then I started to realize that it's not the theory stuff that I was interested in, it was the stuff you can do with it that is crazy. So maybe try and find something you like to do or think about, and see if someone is using computation in that subject. Almost every science now is. We even copy things from nature and use them to build models (neural networks, genetic algorithms).
Don't know if this helps. But again, the important thing is to make sure you enjoy it, because deploying 20,000 copies of Windows 2010 is going to suck.
Matt
What is it that you want to do? The difference is this: CS will give you a strong understanding of computation, the idea of changing relationships between things in order to accomplish some goal, that is, moving bits to do things, at a theoretical level. CIS will give you a good background for using computers for business. This is a popular field of study, and businesses will always need increasing levels of horsepower to keep up with the Joneses. But I think it's like studying engineering versus fuel injection. You can do quite a bit if you know fuel injection, but so much more if you know engineering.
:)
Keep in mind the scope of computation, where it has been used, where it currently is used, and more importantly where it probably will be used. We've basically already got supercomputers sitting on our desks, and everyone knows what Moore's law will say. Sociologists and researchers from many other disciplines are beginning to see the benefit of constructing massive computational models to study things they never suspected were possible.
This all goes to say that if you want to make some decent money working in business-related projects, go CIS. It's easier, and most people can't program well anyway. Personally I think it's short-sighted and too easy. Even CS is too easy compared to the math-freaks that move later on the computation (like, say, von Neuman, who basically invented the majority of the computational paradigms in the 30s that we all unwittingly use), but it's a lot more useful in an abstract sense. CIS skills are good now, but things may change in the next 20 years, and you might find that the people getting out of school then with a BS in biocomputationalnanofreakery are replacing you.
But this is just my opinion. No one really knows what's going to happen. The real answer is just to love other people and be happy.
BTW - 'softmore' is more like 'sophomore' than 'software'.
Matt
I'd like to know if there are any sophisticated systems out there for commenting, or if Rob is sort of pioneering a new way of passive interactivity on the web. I realize that almost any decent site has commenting / forums, but as far as ratings, viewing options, and well developed moderating program...
Also, this type of thing will eventually change the way people comment. A lot of the frustrated and "not worth bothering" users that used to like reading comments until they have gotten this huge may possibly come back. Rob's system has made the commenting system virtually flame-proof, depending upon how you set your options. In implementing the system this way, Rob has removed himself from that dangerous realm of subjectivity, and only the users can decide if they don't want to read some of the shit that has chased people with a genuine interest in comments away.
Anyway, I think a lot of sites will eventually follow the kind of personalized commenting system that Rob is developing. Great job!
My brothers and sisters,
Do not give in to the urge to purchase action figures of myself and the apostles. For, I am not getting any royalties, and my lawyer is calling them tomorrow!
J.C.