I am reading the posts from the bottom up.:) I found your first comment very funny.
+1 insightful.
To generalize, you stopped externalizing your responsibilities, started assimilating yourself into your group by accepting the similarities between yourself and the group and overlooking the differences that you otherwise would be intolerant to.
The issue of harmony in music as well as social circles, is about all members playing in unison in a way that doesn't result in discord. People continue to refine their groups as they get older as I can understand it.
I beg to differ. The key to humility is in bonding, understanding and empathizing with others. Humility is not about self, it's about the group; your attitudes are humble when you can mirror the groups personality traits back into the group. Furthermore, an individual can demonstrate perfect humility and still not recognize his/her flaws and mistakes. Lastly, humility is a cultural attribute that differs in various parts of the world.
The problem may not be that Suzie Q can't understand what is communicated. It may be that she gets distracted by the way the exchange happens. It could be that her social-butterfly meter starts distracting her or causing her to reject you and your information completely. Remember it's those very skills that causes her naturally to gravitate to other such Suzie Qs.
There is a type of intelligence appropriately names, social intelligence. Much like mathematical or logical intelligence, the attribute results in natural abilities that become favored or preferred by the host. If you believe in Darwinism, it's this "join the similar, reject the incompatible" survivalism that gets to work here. It's clearly evident as discrimination whether it is to give special preference in consideration or as a segregative social force. It's the reason for the issues associated with racism.
A nerd must be confident with his/her intellectual capacity as well as knowledge to qualify as a nerd. Nerds may compensate or permit social deficiencies by "offsetting" those deficiencies with mental strength much like a social butterfly can compensate for not knowing what sqrt(2) is by being popular.
In my experience, and through my own introspection, I've concluded that, as part of the mental discipline maintaining proper intellectual models of knowledge and working theory, it's important to be able to reject conflicting or bogus information. That equilibrium in the acceptance of information carries itself out by an "argument" barrier beyond which you accept information and update your intellectual model. It's a way to accept new information where that information may have attributes that conflict with some prior belief.
Because of this intense focus on validating new information combined with the need to be able to externalize the validation process, sometimes the social norms are overlooked and a perfectly valid challenge externalized in response to new information can appear as arrogance. That is especially true if a 3rd party observes these types of high level exchanges between two nerds.
The only way to overcome the appearance of arrogance as it appears to a non-nerd 2nd party is to develop and observe more social norms/skills. To overcome the judgements of a non-nerd 3rd party, formalization for information exchanges and challenges need to be made. The most perfect and elaborate formalization of such a thing is defined as the Rules of Civil procedure as used by our court system. I will add that the players in that arena also display as much arrogance as any arguing nerd group despite the formalization, which obviously was conceived with the idea of humility to the courts in mind.
Very well said. The other obvious thing Muslims from that part of the world everyone needs to learn: not everything that is made into a film is true. The fact that a provocative film sent and offensive message is one thing. The fact that whole countries decided to bow to an equal level of decadence is quite another. And their reaction only served to further compel an argument that the films message has merits, regardless and separate of any offensive interpretations.
Now had these countries reacted in a way that more constructively, like put the film in it's proper light, then any reasonable third party could more objectively examine those questionable aspects of the film, rather than focus on examining a religious group of people and their reaction.
All that being said, even though there has been much focus on this isolated incident, it does not offer any evidence that one system of beliefs is superior to another. In fact it merely supports my notion that humanity is humanity. We thrive in our own suffering whether it be of the making of our own hands or those of our proclaimed rivals. Nobody is really willing to follow the advice of a great icon who suggested that upon receiving a slap to the face, we should turn the other cheek, perhaps because such a gesture is politically/genetically incorrect.
If we define religion as simply as "a system of beliefs" deliberately to include the vagaries of political beliefs. There has been no war on the face of the earth that has not been motivated by religion. Conventional understanding of the word is an inflection of human interest to classify and segregate ourselves . The real idiocy is when we hold those values so dear we pick up arms and march a "jihad" of some form. Quick examples: war on terror, Vietnam, WWI and WWII and even the stripping of Tour de France titles from Lance Armstrong.
Let's face it Muslims are an easy target and that's why they are targeted. Their whole culture and system of beliefs are controversial in the west. Nobody can simply make a film depicting western governments as corrupt, filthy or demonic, and expect the American public to march over to a foreign embassy and ransack it.
We get down the basic issue Dr Seuss writes about in "The Sneetches" once you put god into perspective and see the cultural-centric eccentricities as bellies. The fact is those plain bellied Sneetches accepted the counterparts superiority by moping about it rather than than organizing and demonstrating their own superiority.
Who says that you need to run a red-light while speeding? Especially with the face recognition stuff not working...
The risk is that you can get t-boned. Then you get to face the insurance guys but heck, who says that insurance claims are no fun, might as well smile for that too.
I must admit, James Holmes does raise the bar of public shootings to a completely new level; his actions represent the pinnacle of a fantasy enacted into a display of creative civil violence that surpasses school and workplace shootings that have occurred over the years. But his actions, notwithstanding his creativity and fantasy, are still dim and/or irrelevant when compared to government sponsored violence like Waco Texas or any war the US has recently engaged in.
The shame is that our ESPN poster doesn't have creativity to write something original and must appeal to the tragedy of others in his plight for attention, classic troll!
There is no line between the what and the how you mention above, that's just flavoring; some people like to demonstrate their creative talents with descriptive writing. The "explicit" line you refer to, and IMO the only one that should matter as far as the law is concerned, is the line between talking and doing.
The fact is that this country has gotten to the point where talking is doing; and that's one reason why this country has economic problems: too much talk!
Finally a posting that puts the whole thing in real perspective!
People keep on whining about what they think ought to be right. The issue boils down to how subjective threat interpretations are.
Law enforcement bodies here clearly prefer the "heavy handed stick" approach rather than the "home of the free" attitude. But hey, if a tool goes out and makes stupid comments to call attention to himself, he now has that attention he sought. The nail with its head sticking out gets hammered; this guy stuck his head out.
At least he didn't get sent off to Guantanamo; I'm willing to bet foreigners who got stuck their heads in the wrong place and the wrong time got sent there for much less; this guy should stop whining and own to his actions like a man.
All that being said, it's a damn shame liberties like free speech has been eroded to this point.
Can you post a link to the study that backs your claims? What reason do you have to believe that the judicial system is less vulnerable to bribes and pressure?
And even if you can back your claims, if the judicial system is about maintaining the status-quo idea of fairness and justice, would it not be true that those holding that "higher ground" would likely have more money and power? So perhaps while blink biker may have shared a shallow perspective of it all, he is not incorrect, is he? Perhaps belligerent of history and a bit hyperbolic, but not incorrect.
I have tried to tread lightly on the subjective ideas that warrant merit in arguments, but in fact blink biker is not incorrect about the letter or spirit of the law not mattering. Are you familiar with a clause in the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 where it states that payment of a debt cannot be required to be made in any specific species of money? Now try drafting your own note as payment for your mortgage and see if the court that hears the case after the bank sues you will follow the letter or spirit of the law as it applies in that clause.
I agree with your last sentence, although not necessarily with "hate". A lesser "hate" would be omission where you forgo potential innovation to spare yourself the trouble of going through defeat.
I consider prostitutes to be more honest than politicians, at least you get what want, then you pay with prostitutes. Politicians hike taxes and then don't deliver on their promises.
I think Bettina Wulff is taking a step down the ladder with her attitude, especially in the name of politics.
You're looking at Federal Level, mostly working for a lab that actually handles the few remaining samples. Military would be the 'easier' subset, just due to scale.
Thanks, an interesting tidbit. I supposed as much. You know that information would provoke conspiracy theorists to exhibit compulsive behaviors like arm twitches, right?
Food-born bacteria that exist naturally in meats or fish double in population every 40 minutes if left at room temperature.
It actually took me a minute to see where this was coming from. I'm talking about disease in general - and how the disease, whether virus, bacteria, or other replicates once it's in the body. Remember, 90% of our vaccines are against viruses, which don't multiply outside the body anyways. Plus, you can't refrigerate your body to slow down the disease.
Basically, with a disease you ALWAYS get a small initial exposure - a virus could be a few dozen actual bodies, but once it gets in the cells it multiplies rapidly, you could have millions of viral bodies within a few days. After a while the immune system starts reacting, and it's generally exponential as well, at least up to the body's resources. Hopefully it ramps up faster than the disease, plus as time goes on the immune system 'learns' the disease and gets better at detecting and neutralizing it.
It takes like 2 hours and 30 minutes for a piece of meat to get to the point where it is no longer consumable.
Depends on the meat, the exact temperatures, exposure, etc... In reality, the 150 minute time span is a general rule of thumb for how long it takes for enough bacteria to multiply to actually cause an infection in an compromised immune system individual. There's additional multiplication necessary to reach levels high enough to cause symptoms.
Fair enough, the 150 minute => non-consumable thing has to do with consuming raw fish in Japanese cuisine, I didn't specify that in the previous post (oops). Cooking meats kills almost all bacteria. And of course, we can't cook a living body! (just because you made a similar comment above. : )
It depends on the disease. There are LOTS of already existing defenses against things like bacteria, especially in your digestive tract. It's already a rare bacteria that makes it through the stomach, for example. If it makes it through there, it has to compete against the naturally occurring gut flora. Contact with a skin penetration can be far easier(for the bacteria), as well as inhalation. The human body is actually pretty hostile for bacteria.
Your immune system is more reacting within hours for many diseases - colds, for example. But depending on the disease it can take longer, and can take longer yet to reach maximum response. That's where drugs like antibiotics come in - they rarely actually kill all the bacteria, but it's like opening another front. You already have the ramping immune response, then you go and kill a bunch of the bacteria and more importantly you slow down their reproduction.
Viruses, until relatively recently, we had no option but to support body function until the immune system could control it on it's own. Now we have some drugs that help, but they tend to be expensive. However, it just so happens that once an immune system has 'learned' a virus, it's very good at neutralizing it. It also 'remembers' viruses for varying amounts of time, but trending past 30 years for most. Thus vaccination - which is basically an artificial method to teach the immune system a virus, so it hits 'code 4' almost instantly vs taking days to do so. That way the immune system is hitting like a sledgehammer at 10k viruses, not 10M.
Viruses are, relatively speaking, the sneakier ones, not having biological processes to speak of on their own.
That is absolutely the way I understand it, thanks for that explanation. Bacteria competition is an inte
Could it be local government, like state or municipal level government that may make a solicitation for such a vaccine or are we talking about military or federal level requisites? I'm interested in getting the vaccine.
Food-born bacteria that exist naturally in meats or fish double in population every 40 minutes if left at room temperature. That problem is almost solved by refrigeration where 99% of cultures go dormant, so indeed there is an exponential growth curve. It takes like 2 hours and 30 minutes for a piece of meat to get to the point where it is no longer consumable. So I believe the immune system takes action faster if not immediately although perhaps the bodies resistance to a foreign pathogen be minimal at first and increase with time (perhaps exponentially up to a certain point).
Good information. While normally I'm an advocate of immunity through exposure...
If I where interested in getting the small-pox or anthrax vaccine, do you foresee red-tape or some type of administrative resistance to the administration thereof?
BCG is that vaccine that leaves that lifelong scar on the upper arm... I don't have a scar on my arm so either I didn't get that one, or a new scar free vaccine is used stateside.
The scar on the arm vaccine, at least for the states, was the smallpox vaccine. Oddly enough, I'm one of the considerably less than 1% of those under 40 in the USA to be vaccinated against it. I very much had an immune response(so we know the vaccine took), but due to my reaction the infection spread more along the skin rather than going deep - I have no visible scaring from it. Had minor blistering down to my elbow though. Knew another guy they ended up giving two sets of pokes, only to determine that he's naturally immune.
Reading up on BCG - it's used when babies are exposed to people with TB, it's 80% effective(in infants) for ~15 years, and it's not really used in the USA because it's less effective on adults and the risk analysis people here decided we don't have enough adults with uncontrolled TB running around exposing babies to make the vaccine worth it. Brazil has recommended the vaccine since 1967-68, the USA has depended upon 'detection and treatment of latent tuberculosis'.
I've been vaccinated against a lot of stuff (shot records are now 3 pages long), but not TB. Of course, I get the annual scratch test for TB, which goes in my records... That and the flu shot are probably a page alone...
Working with a doctor is hard because very few people can listen and/or learn from someone they believe to be less knowledgeable. The credibility barrier.
As I understand it, the trick is a combination of a good doctor, a frank honesty that you're a specialist in YOUR condition(s), and building up a good working relationship.
No scientific evidence exists to suggest that mothers or babies are healthier because of the incision rather evidence shows it's unnecessary, but it's performed anyway because that's the way they teach it in med school. Doctors believe it's part of the procedure and that without it birth is hindered/obstructed.
Then your doctors/surgeons are particularly non-scientific; here in the USA they tend to at least pay attention to such studies.
Interesting. I don't know if I ever got the small-pox vaccine. Just out of curiosity, was it your option to be receive the small-pox vaccine? Did you have a specific reason you would share, for having received that vaccine? Does it have something to do with your work?
Anyway, I believe it will prove to be a valuable vaccine to have taken, but that's only because of a conspiracy theory I've heard... Never mind.
Yes the BCG vaccine targets bone tuberculosis. I understand it takes 3 months to take effect when it works.
I used to get the TB scratch test at school every year because my mom has the disease. Her immune system reacted by encapsulating the bacteria with calcium so her chest X-rays have white spots in them... Anyway in the 80's when I was going to school, I had to take those tests as a measure the school board took because of the circumstances... I don't think my mom ever had the TB vaccine but she did receive treatments when it was detected about 40 years ago.
Thanks for the tip regarding building a working relationship with a good doctor.
Hmm... CDC has only HepB at birth-1 month. I don't see BCG at all; must be a thing for your country.
BCG is that vaccine that leaves that lifelong scar on the upper arm... I don't have a scar on my arm so either I didn't get that one, or a new scar free vaccine is used stateside.
Still, I'd like to point that just because somebody is a doctor doesn't mean they're a scientist. They're human too; which means they can be lazy.
That's a very good observation. Doctors follow a doctrine of professionalism that is not entirely based on science. They have a system of beliefs about how things should be done and follow that system based on faith. A perfect example is how almost all natural births here are done with an episiotomy (vaginal cut). No scientific evidence exists to suggest that mothers or babies are healthier because of the incision rather evidence shows it's unnecessary, but it's performed anyway because that's the way they teach it in med school. Doctors believe it's part of the procedure and that without it birth is hindered/obstructed.
I'm not saying that a more scientific based medical system is better. It boils down to each individual choosing some point between individualism and collectivism.
I support doing your own research to help ensure your own health; just realize that there's a lot of kooks out there with bad information. It's up to you, at that point, to sort the wheat from the chaff. It's entirely possible to know more about your own condition than a doctor. You're right there, after all, and only need to become expert on 1-6 syndromes. The doctor needs to know hundreds. Finally, I'd suggest working to find a doctor willing to work with you.
+1
Working with a doctor is hard because very few people can listen and/or learn from someone they believe to be less knowledgeable. The credibility barrier.
I can't agree more with the first response you have given. However the knowledge or faith barrier is used in a very similar way especially in the medical field and it rears its head as a challenge of credibility when someone "is not qualified" regardless of the science. More so when the issue of someone's life is at issue. I find that line of reasoning a very similar parallel to "take it on faith". All the information easily found by Google regarding illnesses is actually recognized as a competitor/threat to doctors within the industry; they resist the idea that people can know more about an issue because it sometimes creates barriers for "effective" treatment. I believe doctors actually prefer a less informed patient because it makes their work easier; I talked to a pediatrician yesterday (poor woman); she burned her credibitlity in my eyes. First she agreed that new-borns gain resistance to illnesses due to being breast-fed for a period of "6 months", I didn't challenge that, seems reasonable. Then she insists that I should have given the child a BCG (bone tuberculosis) vaccine during its second week of life because the child was "unprotected". I think her efforts to evade the following question where for the best.
Economics vs science. The fact is it's perfectly ok for scientists to disagree, it's even healthy as far as the search for knowledge is concerned. Politically, though, it's unhealthy and serves only to create discord because you have these other people who throw their weight around in a way that does not result in further knowledge.
I don't know if Bill could have just come out and say that. It would be offensive; better beat around the bush. Politically it's stupid to talk about religion (or politics lol). So he attacks the fruits of their beliefs instead. That only works because of a commonplace preconception of a distinct and favorable distance the concept of science has from religions; Bill is awesome.
Fundamentally creationism is the result of using the context of a religion and trying to explain observations and questions in that context. So for what its worth, a plausible definition would be applying creativity and imagination to explain an observations or answer a question in a religious context.
If you understand science to be a religion (and it fits the definition http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion except item 4 because scientist isn't in the list) modern scientific theories are also results of creationism insofar that an application of creativity and imagination are/were used to explain observations and answer questions in the religious context of science and its underlying belief(s). All scientific knowledge is based on at least one belief => that what is observed and/or measured is the truth. And while that may not be completely untrue, it also is not completely true; you just have to make up your own mind, take it on faith, or not.
It is reinterpreted by the powers of the day in a way that suites the interests of such those powers once the victors have receded into the shadows of time.
Either way, perhaps an interesting perspective to take when reading any history and perhaps something that may shed light on your issue with the nature of God, is that God is also a reflection of man; the book was written by men.
I mean to say: While the claim is that man was made in the image God, the God that exists in written works can only be a reflection of its creator, the author. Without such a reflection readers would not be able to associate himself with gods qualities and create a relationship with god because the readers ability to associate and create relationships depends on the mental capacity to associate the subject with some known context that has been experienced. The expression "Use a LAMP stack to construct a web interface" means nothing unless you can associate it to the IT context it certainly implies; that requires exposure/experience with that context.
And when you can understand that, creationism either dies, or takes on a whole new meaning. I would be inclined to claim the latter.
That's sort of what the Catholic Church did. One of the original amendments of god in the bible is, "Thou, shall not worship any other god than me", meaning no worshiping of deities other than the creator himself. Yet the catholic church has their pope, (a deity since they treat him as some holy or divine being). They even changed the bible so that amendment says something that suits them better.
Another interesting tidbit. In the constitution of the United States, it explicitly lays out the separation of church and state. Had the catholic church been a backer of the free the colonies, certainly a debt for their (economic) favors would have included them in the governance of the new land and today they would have significant influence in the most powerful nation in the world.
If god does/did support the Catholic church or Christianity, it would not be beyond the reaches of clairvoyance to be able to foresee the end of the reign of creationism and the Church, especially because the holy book seems to give such emphasis on the gods need/desire to be worshiped, and have compelled the leaders of the church in the 1780's and 1790's to stand beside France and fund a revolutionary war against Britain (a defector of the church in fact if memory serves) and claim a right that would place such encumbrances in the constitution of the new nation sufficient to secure the power and influence god and the worshipers would certainly covet.
After all, isn't that part of investing in nation-building? Securing your interests in the new nation? That's what the US did in Iraq anyway.
Having said all of that, I have no evidence that god does not exist; and conceding to her existence, she certainly does not favor Christianity, Islam, or any of the other religions that emerged from the old testament.
Building our relationship with god as individuals is important because when we can find strength, reason or courage and do what we believe needs to be done, we are stronger because of god. Perhaps irrationally stronger but who can claim that reason is better or more important than intuition?
Still, an interesting tidbit (this historic context of the word).
In Chinese medicine an equilibrium is the balance of two opposing forces (yin and yang energy), life and death as disease may be at issue are only two such forces. PH levels, levels of salts, happiness and anger, odds of helping and odds of harming etc. all represent other such equilibriums.
I'd be careful about those. I'm not a biologist,...
Your caution reminds me of a quote from Winston Churchill. "There are three types of lies: Lies, Damned lies, and Statistics":)
Any science depends on observations and interpretations of those observations. While I agree with your tone regarding the wacko/conspiracy types and how their pseudo-scientific findings can seem credible, I'd like to point out: if you look at the standard definition of religion: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion, science fits all but the fourth definition and only because the term scientist doesn't appear.
The idea that science is based on knowledge rather then believe does not separate it from any other religion because all their "knowledge" is still based on belief. The belief that what is observed and measured is truth, in fact, observation and measurements are still faculties a human beings. Scientists distance their other beliefs or volition from their papers to try and put it in an impartial light but that too isn't always beneficial or even possible.
but from what I've seen of them they pull many of the same tricks with misinterpreting scientific data and deliberately
Half the world scientists can't agree on the cause of global warming, there are significant political agendas that look to science to back it. So when you use the words "tricks", "misinterpreting data" and "deliberately", I don't think any scientist, whether medical or otherwise is more or less wacko. Back to the same "insanity is subjective" theme.
Global warming is more a political "hot topic" than vaccines because we hear about it more, but it's no less polemic. It makes perfect political sense to try and discredit anyone who might challenge that delicate equilibrium for the good of the population. Therein lies the real issue, our various levels of committees of doctors can very well be in collusion, after all it's their credibility that comes to question if they don't agree. They are strong only if they remain united, classic games theory. They actually have no other choice.
To put it another way: The whole 'vaccination causes AUTISM!!!!' was started by a doctor with an interest in a lawsuit against vaccine companies; he stood to gain if it succeeded. Instead he eventually ended up losing his license.
I won't be joining the herd to feel secure by choosing to believe everything my committees of doctors say; I even go so far as to say that they may actually know but won't say because they too can't fall out of the ranks without personal consequences. But I offer no more generosity to the credibility of the "wacko/conspiracy" types after all they are the flip side of the same coin. I am not a biologist, so all I can do is shrug. It's an interesting paper, there are other interesting papers out there too. The world isn't perfect and nor are vaccines.
It seem that resisting vaccines because of a few hidden cases (case for conspiracy) where they did harm is a political trend. But if there where no vaccines, it would be very easy for people to easily justify those few lives for the lives of so many others a vaccine could save. It's only now that disease seems to be such a remote possibility to some people (thanks in part to vaccines, but also hygiene, scientific knowledge an others) that they feel inclined to give issue attention. Politics again!
So weighing the benefits vs the side effects...:) Please feel free to email me: lcambilargiu@gmail.com I've enjoyed our conversation.
PS. Sorry about chopping your original posting to bits. I'll try to be more mindful next time.
Thanks for the reply. I think we are on the same page with a lot of our ideas.
I am the father (of the newborn) actually, and yes breast-fed...:)
You asked for a reference regarding a pediatrician coining a variation of a latin word for something known until then as a serum sickness: http://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/14/8/1399 Download the full PDF version and look at the bottom of page 23.
I initially got a hold of this paper reading some anti-vaxx materials. It's interesting because it goes into the biochemistry of serum applications (vaccines included). The material certainly indicates a lot of details that vaccine development need to consider. And while it may give some credibility to the idea that vaccines can be dangerous, we all need to accept that we are our own last line of defense...
I believe the anti-vaxx view and interpretation of the paper may be an extreme interpretation, however that being said, vaccine studies rely in part on statistical analysis of observations made to exposed organisms. If those observations are not impartial because of some political motivation, then there truly be more merit in concerns regarding vaccines.
My "ref needed" point is because I gleaned that information from someone in a conversation but haven't researched the claim. No wikipedia ref there sorry.
Slashdot Mirror
LOL
There are three types of lies according to Winston Churchill
1. Lies
2. Damned Lies
3. Statistics
I am reading the posts from the bottom up. :) I found your first comment very funny.
+1 insightful.
To generalize, you stopped externalizing your responsibilities, started assimilating yourself into your group by accepting the similarities between yourself and the group and overlooking the differences that you otherwise would be intolerant to.
The issue of harmony in music as well as social circles, is about all members playing in unison in a way that doesn't result in discord. People continue to refine their groups as they get older as I can understand it.
I beg to differ. The key to humility is in bonding, understanding and empathizing with others. Humility is not about self, it's about the group; your attitudes are humble when you can mirror the groups personality traits back into the group. Furthermore, an individual can demonstrate perfect humility and still not recognize his/her flaws and mistakes. Lastly, humility is a cultural attribute that differs in various parts of the world.
The problem may not be that Suzie Q can't understand what is communicated. It may be that she gets distracted by the way the exchange happens. It could be that her social-butterfly meter starts distracting her or causing her to reject you and your information completely. Remember it's those very skills that causes her naturally to gravitate to other such Suzie Qs.
There is a type of intelligence appropriately names, social intelligence. Much like mathematical or logical intelligence, the attribute results in natural abilities that become favored or preferred by the host. If you believe in Darwinism, it's this "join the similar, reject the incompatible" survivalism that gets to work here. It's clearly evident as discrimination whether it is to give special preference in consideration or as a segregative social force. It's the reason for the issues associated with racism.
A nerd must be confident with his/her intellectual capacity as well as knowledge to qualify as a nerd. Nerds may compensate or permit social deficiencies by "offsetting" those deficiencies with mental strength much like a social butterfly can compensate for not knowing what sqrt(2) is by being popular.
In my experience, and through my own introspection, I've concluded that, as part of the mental discipline maintaining proper intellectual models of knowledge and working theory, it's important to be able to reject conflicting or bogus information. That equilibrium in the acceptance of information carries itself out by an "argument" barrier beyond which you accept information and update your intellectual model. It's a way to accept new information where that information may have attributes that conflict with some prior belief.
Because of this intense focus on validating new information combined with the need to be able to externalize the validation process, sometimes the social norms are overlooked and a perfectly valid challenge externalized in response to new information can appear as arrogance. That is especially true if a 3rd party observes these types of high level exchanges between two nerds.
The only way to overcome the appearance of arrogance as it appears to a non-nerd 2nd party is to develop and observe more social norms/skills. To overcome the judgements of a non-nerd 3rd party, formalization for information exchanges and challenges need to be made. The most perfect and elaborate formalization of such a thing is defined as the Rules of Civil procedure as used by our court system. I will add that the players in that arena also display as much arrogance as any arguing nerd group despite the formalization, which obviously was conceived with the idea of humility to the courts in mind.
Very well said. The other obvious thing Muslims from that part of the world everyone needs to learn: not everything that is made into a film is true. The fact that a provocative film sent and offensive message is one thing. The fact that whole countries decided to bow to an equal level of decadence is quite another. And their reaction only served to further compel an argument that the films message has merits, regardless and separate of any offensive interpretations.
Now had these countries reacted in a way that more constructively, like put the film in it's proper light, then any reasonable third party could more objectively examine those questionable aspects of the film, rather than focus on examining a religious group of people and their reaction.
All that being said, even though there has been much focus on this isolated incident, it does not offer any evidence that one system of beliefs is superior to another. In fact it merely supports my notion that humanity is humanity. We thrive in our own suffering whether it be of the making of our own hands or those of our proclaimed rivals. Nobody is really willing to follow the advice of a great icon who suggested that upon receiving a slap to the face, we should turn the other cheek, perhaps because such a gesture is politically/genetically incorrect.
If we define religion as simply as "a system of beliefs" deliberately to include the vagaries of political beliefs. There has been no war on the face of the earth that has not been motivated by religion. Conventional understanding of the word is an inflection of human interest to classify and segregate ourselves . The real idiocy is when we hold those values so dear we pick up arms and march a "jihad" of some form. Quick examples: war on terror, Vietnam, WWI and WWII and even the stripping of Tour de France titles from Lance Armstrong.
Let's face it Muslims are an easy target and that's why they are targeted. Their whole culture and system of beliefs are controversial in the west. Nobody can simply make a film depicting western governments as corrupt, filthy or demonic, and expect the American public to march over to a foreign embassy and ransack it.
We get down the basic issue Dr Seuss writes about in "The Sneetches" once you put god into perspective and see the cultural-centric eccentricities as bellies. The fact is those plain bellied Sneetches accepted the counterparts superiority by moping about it rather than than organizing and demonstrating their own superiority.
And now it's going to get hammered.
The FTC will double their resolve, they get to help Apple while defying congress.
What could be better.
Who says that you need to run a red-light while speeding? Especially with the face recognition stuff not working...
The risk is that you can get t-boned. Then you get to face the insurance guys but heck, who says that insurance claims are no fun, might as well smile for that too.
When you go through the red-light, big smile for the camera!
I must admit, James Holmes does raise the bar of public shootings to a completely new level; his actions represent the pinnacle of a fantasy enacted into a display of creative civil violence that surpasses school and workplace shootings that have occurred over the years. But his actions, notwithstanding his creativity and fantasy, are still dim and/or irrelevant when compared to government sponsored violence like Waco Texas or any war the US has recently engaged in.
The shame is that our ESPN poster doesn't have creativity to write something original and must appeal to the tragedy of others in his plight for attention, classic troll!
There is no line between the what and the how you mention above, that's just flavoring; some people like to demonstrate their creative talents with descriptive writing. The "explicit" line you refer to, and IMO the only one that should matter as far as the law is concerned, is the line between talking and doing.
The fact is that this country has gotten to the point where talking is doing; and that's one reason why this country has economic problems: too much talk!
Finally a posting that puts the whole thing in real perspective!
People keep on whining about what they think ought to be right. The issue boils down to how subjective threat interpretations are.
Law enforcement bodies here clearly prefer the "heavy handed stick" approach rather than the "home of the free" attitude. But hey, if a tool goes out and makes stupid comments to call attention to himself, he now has that attention he sought. The nail with its head sticking out gets hammered; this guy stuck his head out.
At least he didn't get sent off to Guantanamo; I'm willing to bet foreigners who got stuck their heads in the wrong place and the wrong time got sent there for much less; this guy should stop whining and own to his actions like a man.
All that being said, it's a damn shame liberties like free speech has been eroded to this point.
Can you post a link to the study that backs your claims? What reason do you have to believe that the judicial system is less vulnerable to bribes and pressure?
And even if you can back your claims, if the judicial system is about maintaining the status-quo idea of fairness and justice, would it not be true that those holding that "higher ground" would likely have more money and power? So perhaps while blink biker may have shared a shallow perspective of it all, he is not incorrect, is he? Perhaps belligerent of history and a bit hyperbolic, but not incorrect.
I have tried to tread lightly on the subjective ideas that warrant merit in arguments, but in fact blink biker is not incorrect about the letter or spirit of the law not mattering. Are you familiar with a clause in the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 where it states that payment of a debt cannot be required to be made in any specific species of money? Now try drafting your own note as payment for your mortgage and see if the court that hears the case after the bank sues you will follow the letter or spirit of the law as it applies in that clause.
I agree with your last sentence, although not necessarily with "hate". A lesser "hate" would be omission where you forgo potential innovation to spare yourself the trouble of going through defeat.
muahahahaha, plagiarism?
I consider prostitutes to be more honest than politicians, at least you get what want, then you pay with prostitutes. Politicians hike taxes and then don't deliver on their promises.
I think Bettina Wulff is taking a step down the ladder with her attitude, especially in the name of politics.
You're looking at Federal Level, mostly working for a lab that actually handles the few remaining samples. Military would be the 'easier' subset, just due to scale.
Thanks, an interesting tidbit. I supposed as much. You know that information would provoke conspiracy theorists to exhibit compulsive behaviors like arm twitches, right?
Food-born bacteria that exist naturally in meats or fish double in population every 40 minutes if left at room temperature.
It actually took me a minute to see where this was coming from. I'm talking about disease in general - and how the disease, whether virus, bacteria, or other replicates once it's in the body. Remember, 90% of our vaccines are against viruses, which don't multiply outside the body anyways. Plus, you can't refrigerate your body to slow down the disease.
Basically, with a disease you ALWAYS get a small initial exposure - a virus could be a few dozen actual bodies, but once it gets in the cells it multiplies rapidly, you could have millions of viral bodies within a few days. After a while the immune system starts reacting, and it's generally exponential as well, at least up to the body's resources. Hopefully it ramps up faster than the disease, plus as time goes on the immune system 'learns' the disease and gets better at detecting and neutralizing it.
It takes like 2 hours and 30 minutes for a piece of meat to get to the point where it is no longer consumable.
Depends on the meat, the exact temperatures, exposure, etc... In reality, the 150 minute time span is a general rule of thumb for how long it takes for enough bacteria to multiply to actually cause an infection in an compromised immune system individual. There's additional multiplication necessary to reach levels high enough to cause symptoms.
Fair enough, the 150 minute => non-consumable thing has to do with consuming raw fish in Japanese cuisine, I didn't specify that in the previous post (oops). Cooking meats kills almost all bacteria. And of course, we can't cook a living body! (just because you made a similar comment above. : )
It depends on the disease. There are LOTS of already existing defenses against things like bacteria, especially in your digestive tract. It's already a rare bacteria that makes it through the stomach, for example. If it makes it through there, it has to compete against the naturally occurring gut flora. Contact with a skin penetration can be far easier(for the bacteria), as well as inhalation. The human body is actually pretty hostile for bacteria.
Your immune system is more reacting within hours for many diseases - colds, for example. But depending on the disease it can take longer, and can take longer yet to reach maximum response. That's where drugs like antibiotics come in - they rarely actually kill all the bacteria, but it's like opening another front. You already have the ramping immune response, then you go and kill a bunch of the bacteria and more importantly you slow down their reproduction.
Viruses, until relatively recently, we had no option but to support body function until the immune system could control it on it's own. Now we have some drugs that help, but they tend to be expensive. However, it just so happens that once an immune system has 'learned' a virus, it's very good at neutralizing it. It also 'remembers' viruses for varying amounts of time, but trending past 30 years for most. Thus vaccination - which is basically an artificial method to teach the immune system a virus, so it hits 'code 4' almost instantly vs taking days to do so. That way the immune system is hitting like a sledgehammer at 10k viruses, not 10M.
Viruses are, relatively speaking, the sneakier ones, not having biological processes to speak of on their own.
That is absolutely the way I understand it, thanks for that explanation. Bacteria competition is an inte
Could it be local government, like state or municipal level government that may make a solicitation for such a vaccine or are we talking about military or federal level requisites? I'm interested in getting the vaccine.
Food-born bacteria that exist naturally in meats or fish double in population every 40 minutes if left at room temperature. That problem is almost solved by refrigeration where 99% of cultures go dormant, so indeed there is an exponential growth curve. It takes like 2 hours and 30 minutes for a piece of meat to get to the point where it is no longer consumable. So I believe the immune system takes action faster if not immediately although perhaps the bodies resistance to a foreign pathogen be minimal at first and increase with time (perhaps exponentially up to a certain point).
Good information. While normally I'm an advocate of immunity through exposure...
If I where interested in getting the small-pox or anthrax vaccine, do you foresee red-tape or some type of administrative resistance to the administration thereof?
BCG is that vaccine that leaves that lifelong scar on the upper arm... I don't have a scar on my arm so either I didn't get that one, or a new scar free vaccine is used stateside.
The scar on the arm vaccine, at least for the states, was the smallpox vaccine. Oddly enough, I'm one of the considerably less than 1% of those under 40 in the USA to be vaccinated against it. I very much had an immune response(so we know the vaccine took), but due to my reaction the infection spread more along the skin rather than going deep - I have no visible scaring from it. Had minor blistering down to my elbow though. Knew another guy they ended up giving two sets of pokes, only to determine that he's naturally immune.
Reading up on BCG - it's used when babies are exposed to people with TB, it's 80% effective(in infants) for ~15 years, and it's not really used in the USA because it's less effective on adults and the risk analysis people here decided we don't have enough adults with uncontrolled TB running around exposing babies to make the vaccine worth it. Brazil has recommended the vaccine since 1967-68, the USA has depended upon 'detection and treatment of latent tuberculosis'.
I've been vaccinated against a lot of stuff (shot records are now 3 pages long), but not TB. Of course, I get the annual scratch test for TB, which goes in my records... That and the flu shot are probably a page alone...
Working with a doctor is hard because very few people can listen and/or learn from someone they believe to be less knowledgeable. The credibility barrier.
As I understand it, the trick is a combination of a good doctor, a frank honesty that you're a specialist in YOUR condition(s), and building up a good working relationship.
No scientific evidence exists to suggest that mothers or babies are healthier because of the incision rather evidence shows it's unnecessary, but it's performed anyway because that's the way they teach it in med school. Doctors believe it's part of the procedure and that without it birth is hindered/obstructed.
Then your doctors/surgeons are particularly non-scientific; here in the USA they tend to at least pay attention to such studies.
Interesting. I don't know if I ever got the small-pox vaccine. Just out of curiosity, was it your option to be receive the small-pox vaccine? Did you have a specific reason you would share, for having received that vaccine? Does it have something to do with your work?
Anyway, I believe it will prove to be a valuable vaccine to have taken, but that's only because of a conspiracy theory I've heard... Never mind.
Yes the BCG vaccine targets bone tuberculosis. I understand it takes 3 months to take effect when it works.
I used to get the TB scratch test at school every year because my mom has the disease. Her immune system reacted by encapsulating the bacteria with calcium so her chest X-rays have white spots in them... Anyway in the 80's when I was going to school, I had to take those tests as a measure the school board took because of the circumstances... I don't think my mom ever had the TB vaccine but she did receive treatments when it was detected about 40 years ago.
Thanks for the tip regarding building a working relationship with a good doctor.
Hmm... CDC has only HepB at birth-1 month. I don't see BCG at all; must be a thing for your country.
BCG is that vaccine that leaves that lifelong scar on the upper arm... I don't have a scar on my arm so either I didn't get that one, or a new scar free vaccine is used stateside.
Still, I'd like to point that just because somebody is a doctor doesn't mean they're a scientist. They're human too; which means they can be lazy.
That's a very good observation. Doctors follow a doctrine of professionalism that is not entirely based on science. They have a system of beliefs about how things should be done and follow that system based on faith. A perfect example is how almost all natural births here are done with an episiotomy (vaginal cut). No scientific evidence exists to suggest that mothers or babies are healthier because of the incision rather evidence shows it's unnecessary, but it's performed anyway because that's the way they teach it in med school. Doctors believe it's part of the procedure and that without it birth is hindered/obstructed.
I'm not saying that a more scientific based medical system is better. It boils down to each individual choosing some point between individualism and collectivism.
I support doing your own research to help ensure your own health; just realize that there's a lot of kooks out there with bad information. It's up to you, at that point, to sort the wheat from the chaff. It's entirely possible to know more about your own condition than a doctor. You're right there, after all, and only need to become expert on 1-6 syndromes. The doctor needs to know hundreds. Finally, I'd suggest working to find a doctor willing to work with you.
+1
Working with a doctor is hard because very few people can listen and/or learn from someone they believe to be less knowledgeable. The credibility barrier.
I can't agree more with the first response you have given. However the knowledge or faith barrier is used in a very similar way especially in the medical field and it rears its head as a challenge of credibility when someone "is not qualified" regardless of the science. More so when the issue of someone's life is at issue. I find that line of reasoning a very similar parallel to "take it on faith". All the information easily found by Google regarding illnesses is actually recognized as a competitor/threat to doctors within the industry; they resist the idea that people can know more about an issue because it sometimes creates barriers for "effective" treatment. I believe doctors actually prefer a less informed patient because it makes their work easier; I talked to a pediatrician yesterday (poor woman); she burned her credibitlity in my eyes. First she agreed that new-borns gain resistance to illnesses due to being breast-fed for a period of "6 months", I didn't challenge that, seems reasonable. Then she insists that I should have given the child a BCG (bone tuberculosis) vaccine during its second week of life because the child was "unprotected". I think her efforts to evade the following question where for the best.
Economics vs science. The fact is it's perfectly ok for scientists to disagree, it's even healthy as far as the search for knowledge is concerned. Politically, though, it's unhealthy and serves only to create discord because you have these other people who throw their weight around in a way that does not result in further knowledge.
I don't know if Bill could have just come out and say that. It would be offensive; better beat around the bush. Politically it's stupid to talk about religion (or politics lol). So he attacks the fruits of their beliefs instead. That only works because of a commonplace preconception of a distinct and favorable distance the concept of science has from religions; Bill is awesome.
Fundamentally creationism is the result of using the context of a religion and trying to explain observations and questions in that context. So for what its worth, a plausible definition would be applying creativity and imagination to explain an observations or answer a question in a religious context.
If you understand science to be a religion (and it fits the definition http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion except item 4 because scientist isn't in the list) modern scientific theories are also results of creationism insofar that an application of creativity and imagination are/were used to explain observations and answer questions in the religious context of science and its underlying belief(s). All scientific knowledge is based on at least one belief => that what is observed and/or measured is the truth. And while that may not be completely untrue, it also is not completely true; you just have to make up your own mind, take it on faith, or not.
Bill is an idiot.
A very interesting perspective.
History is written by the victors.
It is reinterpreted by the powers of the day in a way that suites the interests of such those powers once the victors have receded into the shadows of time.
Either way, perhaps an interesting perspective to take when reading any history and perhaps something that may shed light on your issue with the nature of God, is that God is also a reflection of man; the book was written by men.
I mean to say: While the claim is that man was made in the image God, the God that exists in written works can only be a reflection of its creator, the author. Without such a reflection readers would not be able to associate himself with gods qualities and create a relationship with god because the readers ability to associate and create relationships depends on the mental capacity to associate the subject with some known context that has been experienced. The expression "Use a LAMP stack to construct a web interface" means nothing unless you can associate it to the IT context it certainly implies; that requires exposure/experience with that context.
And when you can understand that, creationism either dies, or takes on a whole new meaning. I would be inclined to claim the latter.
Amen to that.
That's sort of what the Catholic Church did. One of the original amendments of god in the bible is, "Thou, shall not worship any other god than me", meaning no worshiping of deities other than the creator himself. Yet the catholic church has their pope, (a deity since they treat him as some holy or divine being). They even changed the bible so that amendment says something that suits them better.
Another interesting tidbit. In the constitution of the United States, it explicitly lays out the separation of church and state. Had the catholic church been a backer of the free the colonies, certainly a debt for their (economic) favors would have included them in the governance of the new land and today they would have significant influence in the most powerful nation in the world.
If god does/did support the Catholic church or Christianity, it would not be beyond the reaches of clairvoyance to be able to foresee the end of the reign of creationism and the Church, especially because the holy book seems to give such emphasis on the gods need/desire to be worshiped, and have compelled the leaders of the church in the 1780's and 1790's to stand beside France and fund a revolutionary war against Britain (a defector of the church in fact if memory serves) and claim a right that would place such encumbrances in the constitution of the new nation sufficient to secure the power and influence god and the worshipers would certainly covet.
After all, isn't that part of investing in nation-building? Securing your interests in the new nation? That's what the US did in Iraq anyway.
Having said all of that, I have no evidence that god does not exist; and conceding to her existence, she certainly does not favor Christianity, Islam, or any of the other religions that emerged from the old testament.
Building our relationship with god as individuals is important because when we can find strength, reason or courage and do what we believe needs to be done, we are stronger because of god. Perhaps irrationally stronger but who can claim that reason is better or more important than intuition?
Still, an interesting tidbit (this historic context of the word).
In Chinese medicine an equilibrium is the balance of two opposing forces (yin and yang energy), life and death as disease may be at issue are only two such forces. PH levels, levels of salts, happiness and anger, odds of helping and odds of harming etc. all represent other such equilibriums.
I'd be careful about those. I'm not a biologist,...
Your caution reminds me of a quote from Winston Churchill. "There are three types of lies: Lies, Damned lies, and Statistics" :)
Any science depends on observations and interpretations of those observations. While I agree with your tone regarding the wacko/conspiracy types and how their pseudo-scientific findings can seem credible, I'd like to point out: if you look at the standard definition of religion: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/religion, science fits all but the fourth definition and only because the term scientist doesn't appear.
The idea that science is based on knowledge rather then believe does not separate it from any other religion because all their "knowledge" is still based on belief. The belief that what is observed and measured is truth, in fact, observation and measurements are still faculties a human beings. Scientists distance their other beliefs or volition from their papers to try and put it in an impartial light but that too isn't always beneficial or even possible.
but from what I've seen of them they pull many of the same tricks with misinterpreting scientific data and deliberately
Half the world scientists can't agree on the cause of global warming, there are significant political agendas that look to science to back it. So when you use the words "tricks", "misinterpreting data" and "deliberately", I don't think any scientist, whether medical or otherwise is more or less wacko. Back to the same "insanity is subjective" theme.
Global warming is more a political "hot topic" than vaccines because we hear about it more, but it's no less polemic. It makes perfect political sense to try and discredit anyone who might challenge that delicate equilibrium for the good of the population. Therein lies the real issue, our various levels of committees of doctors can very well be in collusion, after all it's their credibility that comes to question if they don't agree. They are strong only if they remain united, classic games theory. They actually have no other choice.
To put it another way: The whole 'vaccination causes AUTISM!!!!' was started by a doctor with an interest in a lawsuit against vaccine companies; he stood to gain if it succeeded. Instead he eventually ended up losing his license.
I won't be joining the herd to feel secure by choosing to believe everything my committees of doctors say; I even go so far as to say that they may actually know but won't say because they too can't fall out of the ranks without personal consequences. But I offer no more generosity to the credibility of the "wacko/conspiracy" types after all they are the flip side of the same coin. I am not a biologist, so all I can do is shrug. It's an interesting paper, there are other interesting papers out there too. The world isn't perfect and nor are vaccines.
It seem that resisting vaccines because of a few hidden cases (case for conspiracy) where they did harm is a political trend. But if there where no vaccines, it would be very easy for people to easily justify those few lives for the lives of so many others a vaccine could save. It's only now that disease seems to be such a remote possibility to some people (thanks in part to vaccines, but also hygiene, scientific knowledge an others) that they feel inclined to give issue attention. Politics again!
So weighing the benefits vs the side effects... :) Please feel free to email me: lcambilargiu@gmail.com I've enjoyed our conversation.
PS. Sorry about chopping your original posting to bits. I'll try to be more mindful next time.
Thanks for the reply. I think we are on the same page with a lot of our ideas.
I am the father (of the newborn) actually, and yes breast-fed... :)
You asked for a reference regarding a pediatrician coining a variation of a latin word for something known until then as a serum sickness: http://www.mdpi.com/1099-4300/14/8/1399 Download the full PDF version and look at the bottom of page 23.
I initially got a hold of this paper reading some anti-vaxx materials. It's interesting because it goes into the biochemistry of serum applications (vaccines included). The material certainly indicates a lot of details that vaccine development need to consider. And while it may give some credibility to the idea that vaccines can be dangerous, we all need to accept that we are our own last line of defense...
I believe the anti-vaxx view and interpretation of the paper may be an extreme interpretation, however that being said, vaccine studies rely in part on statistical analysis of observations made to exposed organisms. If those observations are not impartial because of some political motivation, then there truly be more merit in concerns regarding vaccines.
My "ref needed" point is because I gleaned that information from someone in a conversation but haven't researched the claim. No wikipedia ref there sorry.