I dunno why these nice smart folks bothered to make this fine paper.
3 words: publish or perish
It's how you get a job in academia and it's how you keep it. But, it IS interesting... often the results of research seem really obvious - but someone had to take the time to put it in such a way.
This can be easily explained. Most universities in the country were finished in mid June and sent the kids home. The kids don't normally have access to that sweet T-3 when they are at home. So of course file-sharing went down.
I doubt it has little to do with the RIAA threat.
In other news, truancy drops by 90% after mid June.
I don't know... most medicines I've taken have come in the pill or capsule form that was made by the drug companies. I would assume that most drugs come in sizes that are some kind of standard dose.
Look at motrin. I've seen it come in 200mg, 400mg, and 800mg. If the doc thinks I need 600mg, he can just prescribe a 200 and a 600. That would be 2 packs according to this scheme.
What this hospital is doing can be good on many levels. It can help keep people from stealing meds. It can also be used to help make sure the patient is getting the correct med. I don't think it's such a bad thing in this example.
Well, think about all the communications that go on in the world today. They're job is to monitor all of that, translate it, analyze it, and determine it's meaning and potential threat to the US. Oh yeah, and it has to happen at near-realtime, because you want to figure out that the bad guys are going to do something before they do it.
As for knowing if the NSA is doing what they are supposed to, that's the job of our elected representatives on the Intelligence committees in congress. It's not much, but hopefully it's better than nothing.
The way I see it, these little graphics/text things are for convenience. The mail provider gets to provide mail and can be reasonably sure that it's not a spammer's computer opening the account. The graphic means they don't have to have a full-time staff authenticating the person requesting the account.
It seems that a simple solution would be to also provide a phone number someone could call (and read, using a braille web reader) to also activate the account.
As you say, these images will only work for so long anyway.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who does a lot of work in genetics and PCR for amplification, etc.
We got on the topic DNA evidence and I was really surprised by what I learned.
It sounds silly, considering the human genome project took so long, but I had always been under the impression that when they do DNA evidence, it's a "byte by byte" comparison of the DNA samples. THat would, now that I think of it, take a tremendous amount of time.
Rather, for DNA evidence, they select only certain proteins within the DNA and see if those match.
In my naive assumption, the only person that might match in the first method would be a an identical twin. In the 2nd, they just have to be pretty close.
Think of it this way. Suppose you wanted to use someone's entire academic history as a method of identification verification. The chances are pretty slim that someone out there would have taken exactly the same classes at the same time and gotte n exactly the same grades.
If they compared every single class and every grade and test score, I would feel pretty confident.
But, suppose they only took 10 different sample grades from throughout your history to make the comparison. All of a sudden, I'm not so confident that you have a good match. That's how today's DNA evidence works!
I'm hardly either,and in fact, I'm usually at the other end of the scale. But, I do have ADHD. My problem is difficulty keeping attention on one thing.
Actually, though, I find menial labor strangely satisfying. I think it's because my mind can wander about while my body is working away at the menial task. But, I don't necessarily have any more vigor and energy than anyone else.
To say that ADD is a product of the 1990's is hopelessly naive. Where are you getting your information?
I should have been more clear by what I meant by "fairly new", because I never said 1990's.
Humans have been practicing medicine for a long time, so compared to other things, ADHD is a fairly new kind of diagnosis compared to things like syphilis, cancer, epilepsy, etc.
Compared to other fields of medicine, psychology is also fairly new, so when I said that, I was implying "about a 100 years" or so.
As for caffeine, I once heard an interesting theory that it was the reason for the renaissance. Coffee was brought to Europe from... well, wherever it came from. All the "mad geniuses" who normally couldn't function suddenly could think straight and get things done. Plus, people gathered at coffeeshops and talked among themselves outside of a church or work setting and began to get the ideas for demanding political rights and such. Who knows if it's true, but it's kind of a neat thought!
If you get sidetracked easily, try music, it helps keep one of your senses busy.
Funny you mention that. It's not unusual for me to have talk-radio/npr going on the radio and some music playing on my computer while I'm playing piano.
But, I really find it annoying to not have some kind of sounds - music, talk, books on tape, whatever. I don't even pay attention, but I feel unnerved without the noise.
I'm going to print your message out and stick it above my computer!
It took me 11 years to get my BA. I'm planning to finish my MBA in 2 (4 classes left!). I was recently diagnosed with ADHD - Inattentive. It's actually been helpful to see there is a reason I've struggled so much in my life.
I will definitely be trying many of the things you suggest!
Re:Moderators beware casual trolling!
on
Working with ADHD?
·
· Score: 1
I don't think ADHD is made up, and it's not a matter of "not coping".
Myself, I'm smart, and I work hard, but over the course of working a job for a year (sometimes even just a school term), it's just impossible to stay focused, no matter how hard I try. I see this as a problem. (this is why I prefer jobs with a variety of challenges and lots of "high stress" emergency type stuff - I can stay focused during the intensity).
When a certain medication helps me stay focused and get things done on a consistent basis, without dulling my moments of inspriation, then I would call that a solution.
I WANT to stay focused and function normally. But the mere act of forcing myself to stay focus requires its own focusing effort.
Think about you being in your office doing whatever you do. But, every 3 minutes, someone comes in and interrupts you. This is often what it's like, except it's in my head. I might be working on accounting homework, but the next thing I know, I'm thinking about conjugating Arabic verbs. It's not like I'm daydreaming about laying on the beach - my mind is actively interested in something else... something other than what I'm doing.
The next thing I know, there is a gnawing feeling that my laundry isn't done (or the dishes, housework, homework for business law, etc). If I don't do something about that, it gets louder and louder in my head until it's the only thing I "hear".
Call it what you will, but it's like hundreds of people walking in your office all day interrupting you. And if you ignore them, they come more often and they yell at you louder to pay attention.
That's why several of these posts talk about having several projects going at once. You work a while on one, then another "pings" you for attention and you go work on it until you get pinged by another. For me, and many of us, that's a very effective way to get things done, and maybe the only way.
So for me, I'm not looking for a reason not to cope or perform. I like working hard and accomplishing things, but it can be very difficult because of the interruptions in my own head.
There are apparently a large number of people who have to deal with this, and they are diagnosed with ADHD. I accept the diagnosis I was given because I have the same problems in common with other ADHD people.
Most of my friends are not ADHD, and when I try to explain how it is for me, they can't understand how I get anything done. But they also confirm that there is something different about me.
Re:ADHD a thing of the 90s?
on
Working with ADHD?
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
I can only answer some of your questions, and that only based on what I've heard and been told.
1) ADHD is fairly new. But people have always had it. Instead of being diangosed, they were often called lazy, unfocused, or hyper.
3) There are different types. I know of ADHD - Hyperactive, and ADHD Inattentive, and a combination. There appears to be different severities of ADHD, but I don't know how it can be quantified. I have "inattentive".
5) Certain brain chemicals like serotonin and dopamine and norepinephrine are suggested as being a factor. Wellbutrin, which can be used to treat both depression and ADHD, acts on reuptake of dopamine and norepinephrine. I have heard anecdotally that MRI scans of patients with ADHD show significant differences from the "norm".
6) anecdotally, as I said, I've been diagnosed with ADHD. I would say I had a great homelife as a child. My parents loved me, never abused me, fed me well, I played a lot, mom stayed home, etc. I was always well behaved, but had a terrible time focusing.
So, is ADHD real? Well, I don't know.. like I said, some would just say it's laziness or lack of focus. But here are some examples from my life that were the basis of my diagnosis.
In the 1st grade, we shared a room with the 2nd graders. I was always held in at recess because I would pay attention to the 2nd grader teacher, not my teacher. On the other hand, I was always way ahead in our math workbook (she would say do page 20, and I would already be at 40).
Mom was often worried because I would "get obsessed" over something and ignore everything else for long periods. Maybe it was dinosarus, astronomy, dungeons & dragons, a girlfriend, etc.
My whole life has been a big cycle of starting something with incredible passion and energy, and then struggling to finish. I reached "Life Scout" by 14, and just barely finished my Eagle a week before my 18th birtday, for example.
Looking at my college transcrips, you see A's, C's and F's (but few B's and no D's). A's are when I could stay focused. C's are when I didn't do half the work. I got A's on what I DID do, and I was often praised on the quality of it. F's are where the teacher wouldn't accept only half the work, or would not accept work late, or I simply didn't go to class. There are many Incompletes that never got completed.
I had a class from last summer that I managed to get an "I" in. When it finally was "finish it or get kicked out of school", I was able to somewhat focus. I finished 3 papers in 3 days, but my friends kept calling to make sure I was on task. It's like pulling teeth sometimes!
Oh, and why did I get an "I" on that class? I couldn't force myself to finish the work. I was getting to go to Europe and spent my evenings labelling Star Trek recordings I'd made from the TV (about 6 per tape, 30 tapes or so). I had this feeling like I just needed to get that done so my house-sitter wouldn't see how unorganized I was.. I guess! She doesn't even watch star trek!
It's a bear to keep my house clean - there ALWAYS has to be a mess somewhere.. I can never get it totally clean! Even in basic training, I had a drawer that was a total mess (the one we could lock). Later in the army, my roommates all (different bases) all joked that my wall-locker exploded on weekends. I would just shove all my stuff back in there during the week.
For example, right now I'm in finals week at school! I finished two presentations this week - within an hour of presenting them. I have 2 finals tomorrow and the next... but I'm here on slashdot answering your questions.
I've often not done my own homework while helping others with theirs.
It's like I'm in a constant state of "something else is always more interesting", and sure it's just a matter of will to stay focused, but I even get unfocused from the effort of staying focused.
I was recently diagnosed with ADHD - the Inattentive variety - I'm 32.
I will do anything except what I need to be doing - I have created paintings, learned to play songs on the piano, and cleaned my house to an imaculate level - when I should have been doing homework or preparing for test. Of course when I'm supposed to clean my house (parents/guests are coming), I find myself with my 10 year old calculus book in my lap and I'm reading about Greene's theorem!
Slashdot has been my latest fixation (oh, about 2 or 3 years) - I find I have to check slashdot - and I do it compulsively! It's like I can't focus on my work, but I remember to check slashdot.
Welbutrin had no effect except to exacerbate my sleeplessness.
ADHD often goes hand in hand with depression. So last year I tried prozac. Wow - talk about uselessness. I couldn't even concentrate on the things that normally distracted me. I felt like B4 on Star Trek Nemsis... "I'm in a room... with lights."
You're right! And don't forget repeat-rentals! Most retailers want customers to visit their stores because that's where they end up buying stuff. Blockbuster won't necessarily think this is great if it cuts the number of customer-visits in half!
Speaking of painting, here's a quick question I've wondered about.
I paint every now and then. I usually give my best paintings to my friends. You know, when I'm famous and dead, the paintings will be worth millions. Okay, maybe 10s!
So, if I give the painting as a gift, with no contract, do you have any idea how that works? Do I retain the copyright? I know they can sell the painting, but can they make their own prints of it?
If I want them to be able to make prints, do I simply write a letter saying "I made this. I give all copyright to ___"?
Slashdot Mirror
I dunno why these nice smart folks bothered to make this fine paper.
3 words: publish or perish
It's how you get a job in academia and it's how you keep it. But, it IS interesting... often the results of research seem really obvious - but someone had to take the time to put it in such a way.
I knew Oregon was a state full of oddity...
most of the state schools here are on quarters and finished around June 15th this year.
The school I go to is on Semesters, and it's summer term ended June 20th.
My reasoning may be off, but I think it works for this whacky state, anyway.
You bring up some good points, to be sure.
This can be easily explained. Most universities in the country were finished in mid June and sent the kids home. The kids don't normally have access to that sweet T-3 when they are at home. So of course file-sharing went down.
I doubt it has little to do with the RIAA threat.
In other news, truancy drops by 90% after mid June.
I think most managers would rather see the first one...
Well, that only matters if you want to get the same kind of job you already have/had.
If you get hired by the manager that prefers #1, you'll get more of the same.
If you get hire by the manager that prefers #2, you're more likely to be satisfied with your job, and it's probably worth the wait.
Going back to women - do you marry the first woman who'll fuck you? Or do you wait and marry someone you can build a meaningful relationship with?
That reminds me of George Carlin's joke:
I never fucked a ten. But one night, I fucked five two's.
Did I tell you that the 20mg of Prozac my doc gives me in 3 10mg pills is really helping me concentrate on small details? :)
I don't know... most medicines I've taken have come in the pill or capsule form that was made by the drug companies. I would assume that most drugs come in sizes that are some kind of standard dose.
Look at motrin. I've seen it come in 200mg, 400mg, and 800mg. If the doc thinks I need 600mg, he can just prescribe a 200 and a 600. That would be 2 packs according to this scheme.
What this hospital is doing can be good on many levels. It can help keep people from stealing meds. It can also be used to help make sure the patient is getting the correct med. I don't think it's such a bad thing in this example.
Well, think about all the communications that go on in the world today. They're job is to monitor all of that, translate it, analyze it, and determine it's meaning and potential threat to the US. Oh yeah, and it has to happen at near-realtime, because you want to figure out that the bad guys are going to do something before they do it.
As for knowing if the NSA is doing what they are supposed to, that's the job of our elected representatives on the Intelligence committees in congress. It's not much, but hopefully it's better than nothing.
Don't forget $1 = 6 packages of Top Ramen
and $1 = 10 packages of cheap ramen
What is ticketmaster's issue?
I mean, you're providing a credit card number and address? That should make you real-enough.
Unless someone is going to use a script and a stack of stolen cards to buy-out an event.
You mean, "who fired the first shot"?
Or do you mean "who imposed crippling economic conditions at the end of WWI that led to the start of WWII?"
Or, "which treaties caused a local conflict to become a world war when the participants' allies were dragged into it."
Intelligence, artificial or not, can be a tricky thing!
Now you're discriminating against the stupid. You can't do that - too many government employees, particularly the elected variety, would be kept out.
The way I see it, these little graphics/text things are for convenience. The mail provider gets to provide mail and can be reasonably sure that it's not a spammer's computer opening the account. The graphic means they don't have to have a full-time staff authenticating the person requesting the account.
It seems that a simple solution would be to also provide a phone number someone could call (and read, using a braille web reader) to also activate the account.
As you say, these images will only work for so long anyway.
I was just talking to a friend of mine who does a lot of work in genetics and PCR for amplification, etc.
We got on the topic DNA evidence and I was really surprised by what I learned.
It sounds silly, considering the human genome project took so long, but I had always been under the impression that when they do DNA evidence, it's a "byte by byte" comparison of the DNA samples. THat would, now that I think of it, take a tremendous amount of time.
Rather, for DNA evidence, they select only certain proteins within the DNA and see if those match.
In my naive assumption, the only person that might match in the first method would be a an identical twin. In the 2nd, they just have to be pretty close.
Think of it this way. Suppose you wanted to use someone's entire academic history as a method of identification verification. The chances are pretty slim that someone out there would have taken exactly the same classes at the same time and gotte n exactly the same grades.
If they compared every single class and every grade and test score, I would feel pretty confident.
But, suppose they only took 10 different sample grades from throughout your history to make the comparison. All of a sudden, I'm not so confident that you have a good match. That's how today's DNA evidence works!
Is that a green screen monitor and an orange screen monitor?
ADHD doesn't always mean hyper or energetic.
I'm hardly either,and in fact, I'm usually at the other end of the scale. But, I do have ADHD. My problem is difficulty keeping attention on one thing.
Actually, though, I find menial labor strangely satisfying. I think it's because my mind can wander about while my body is working away at the menial task. But, I don't necessarily have any more vigor and energy than anyone else.
To say that ADD is a product of the 1990's is hopelessly naive. Where are you getting your information?
I should have been more clear by what I meant by "fairly new", because I never said 1990's.
Humans have been practicing medicine for a long time, so compared to other things, ADHD is a fairly new kind of diagnosis compared to things like syphilis, cancer, epilepsy, etc.
Compared to other fields of medicine, psychology is also fairly new, so when I said that, I was implying "about a 100 years" or so.
As for caffeine, I once heard an interesting theory that it was the reason for the renaissance. Coffee was brought to Europe from... well, wherever it came from. All the "mad geniuses" who normally couldn't function suddenly could think straight and get things done. Plus, people gathered at coffeeshops and talked among themselves outside of a church or work setting and began to get the ideas for demanding political rights and such. Who knows if it's true, but it's kind of a neat thought!
If you get sidetracked easily, try music, it helps keep one of your senses busy.
Funny you mention that. It's not unusual for me to have talk-radio/npr going on the radio and some music playing on my computer while I'm playing piano.
But, I really find it annoying to not have some kind of sounds - music, talk, books on tape, whatever. I don't even pay attention, but I feel unnerved without the noise.
Whoever you are, AC, thank you.
I'm going to print your message out and stick it above my computer!
It took me 11 years to get my BA. I'm planning to finish my MBA in 2 (4 classes left!). I was recently diagnosed with ADHD - Inattentive. It's actually been helpful to see there is a reason I've struggled so much in my life.
I will definitely be trying many of the things you suggest!
I don't think ADHD is made up, and it's not a matter of "not coping".
Myself, I'm smart, and I work hard, but over the course of working a job for a year (sometimes even just a school term), it's just impossible to stay focused, no matter how hard I try. I see this as a problem. (this is why I prefer jobs with a variety of challenges and lots of "high stress" emergency type stuff - I can stay focused during the intensity).
When a certain medication helps me stay focused and get things done on a consistent basis, without dulling my moments of inspriation, then I would call that a solution.
I WANT to stay focused and function normally. But the mere act of forcing myself to stay focus requires its own focusing effort.
Think about you being in your office doing whatever you do. But, every 3 minutes, someone comes in and interrupts you. This is often what it's like, except it's in my head. I might be working on accounting homework, but the next thing I know, I'm thinking about conjugating Arabic verbs. It's not like I'm daydreaming about laying on the beach - my mind is actively interested in something else... something other than what I'm doing.
The next thing I know, there is a gnawing feeling that my laundry isn't done (or the dishes, housework, homework for business law, etc). If I don't do something about that, it gets louder and louder in my head until it's the only thing I "hear".
Call it what you will, but it's like hundreds of people walking in your office all day interrupting you. And if you ignore them, they come more often and they yell at you louder to pay attention.
That's why several of these posts talk about having several projects going at once. You work a while on one, then another "pings" you for attention and you go work on it until you get pinged by another. For me, and many of us, that's a very effective way to get things done, and maybe the only way.
So for me, I'm not looking for a reason not to cope or perform. I like working hard and accomplishing things, but it can be very difficult because of the interruptions in my own head.
There are apparently a large number of people who have to deal with this, and they are diagnosed with ADHD. I accept the diagnosis I was given because I have the same problems in common with other ADHD people.
Most of my friends are not ADHD, and when I try to explain how it is for me, they can't understand how I get anything done. But they also confirm that there is something different about me.
I can only answer some of your questions, and that only based on what I've heard and been told.
1) ADHD is fairly new. But people have always had it. Instead of being diangosed, they were often called lazy, unfocused, or hyper.
3) There are different types. I know of ADHD - Hyperactive, and ADHD Inattentive, and a combination. There appears to be different severities of ADHD, but I don't know how it can be quantified. I have "inattentive".
5) Certain brain chemicals like serotonin and dopamine and norepinephrine are suggested as being a factor. Wellbutrin, which can be used to treat both depression and ADHD, acts on reuptake of dopamine and norepinephrine. I have heard anecdotally that MRI scans of patients with ADHD show significant differences from the "norm".
6) anecdotally, as I said, I've been diagnosed with ADHD. I would say I had a great homelife as a child. My parents loved me, never abused me, fed me well, I played a lot, mom stayed home, etc. I was always well behaved, but had a terrible time focusing.
So, is ADHD real? Well, I don't know.. like I said, some would just say it's laziness or lack of focus. But here are some examples from my life that were the basis of my diagnosis.
In the 1st grade, we shared a room with the 2nd graders. I was always held in at recess because I would pay attention to the 2nd grader teacher, not my teacher. On the other hand, I was always way ahead in our math workbook (she would say do page 20, and I would already be at 40).
Mom was often worried because I would "get obsessed" over something and ignore everything else for long periods. Maybe it was dinosarus, astronomy, dungeons & dragons, a girlfriend, etc.
My whole life has been a big cycle of starting something with incredible passion and energy, and then struggling to finish. I reached "Life Scout" by 14, and just barely finished my Eagle a week before my 18th birtday, for example.
Looking at my college transcrips, you see A's, C's and F's (but few B's and no D's). A's are when I could stay focused. C's are when I didn't do half the work. I got A's on what I DID do, and I was often praised on the quality of it. F's are where the teacher wouldn't accept only half the work, or would not accept work late, or I simply didn't go to class. There are many Incompletes that never got completed.
I had a class from last summer that I managed to get an "I" in. When it finally was "finish it or get kicked out of school", I was able to somewhat focus. I finished 3 papers in 3 days, but my friends kept calling to make sure I was on task. It's like pulling teeth sometimes!
Oh, and why did I get an "I" on that class? I couldn't force myself to finish the work. I was getting to go to Europe and spent my evenings labelling Star Trek recordings I'd made from the TV (about 6 per tape, 30 tapes or so). I had this feeling like I just needed to get that done so my house-sitter wouldn't see how unorganized I was.. I guess! She doesn't even watch star trek!
It's a bear to keep my house clean - there ALWAYS has to be a mess somewhere.. I can never get it totally clean! Even in basic training, I had a drawer that was a total mess (the one we could lock). Later in the army, my roommates all (different bases) all joked that my wall-locker exploded on weekends. I would just shove all my stuff back in there during the week.
For example, right now I'm in finals week at school! I finished two presentations this week - within an hour of presenting them. I have 2 finals tomorrow and the next... but I'm here on slashdot answering your questions.
I've often not done my own homework while helping others with theirs.
It's like I'm in a constant state of "something else is always more interesting", and sure it's just a matter of will to stay focused, but I even get unfocused from the effort of staying focused.
you have to try to stay focused
I was recently diagnosed with ADHD - the Inattentive variety - I'm 32.
I will do anything except what I need to be doing - I have created paintings, learned to play songs on the piano, and cleaned my house to an imaculate level - when I should have been doing homework or preparing for test. Of course when I'm supposed to clean my house (parents/guests are coming), I find myself with my 10 year old calculus book in my lap and I'm reading about Greene's theorem!
Slashdot has been my latest fixation (oh, about 2 or 3 years) - I find I have to check slashdot - and I do it compulsively! It's like I can't focus on my work, but I remember to check slashdot.
Welbutrin had no effect except to exacerbate my sleeplessness.
ADHD often goes hand in hand with depression. So last year I tried prozac. Wow - talk about uselessness. I couldn't even concentrate on the things that normally distracted me. I felt like B4 on Star Trek Nemsis... "I'm in a room... with lights."
It's okay. I had a beer at lunch, and now I'm much less enthusiastic.
Of course, I'm having trouble finding the motivation to get shit done, but I feel better.
You're right! And don't forget repeat-rentals! Most retailers want customers to visit their stores because that's where they end up buying stuff. Blockbuster won't necessarily think this is great if it cuts the number of customer-visits in half!
Speaking of painting, here's a quick question I've wondered about.
I paint every now and then. I usually give my best paintings to my friends. You know, when I'm famous and dead, the paintings will be worth millions. Okay, maybe 10s!
So, if I give the painting as a gift, with no contract, do you have any idea how that works? Do I retain the copyright? I know they can sell the painting, but can they make their own prints of it?
If I want them to be able to make prints, do I simply write a letter saying "I made this. I give all copyright to ___"?