I've been working on a certain post for a while, so now that I've published it, it's before some posts that I published earlier, but started later. Sorry about that- it's irritating, but I can't find a way to change it.
So, here it is: Morons Will Be Morons.
Ylerecnis,
N
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
Ignorance Is Only Bliss For the Ignorant
Ah, ignorance strikes again and again! You'd think this kind of ignorance would be gone, but alas...
Some people believe that the earth is flat. No kidding. The Flat Earther's Society uses pseudoscience to "prove" it. (I can't help wondering, though... is it true idiocy, or is it subtle satire?... I'd like to believe that people aren't quite so stupid. In any case, I recommend the site, it's very interesting.)
Education is going down the drain in the USA. Other countries do way better than we do.
People talk passionately about what they don't understand. Americans have a better understanding of science than people of third world countries, but sometimes the logic is no better. There's nothing wrong with the reading rates, but ignorance runs amok.
The world is full of idiots! Well... I guess that's no surprise. But it makes the world far more irritating.
The education system must be doing something wrong. What is it, exactly? I think that it's a system based on getting students to pass more than it is about learning- that's why this is happening.
But, honestly, what can I do? Force people to listen as I attempt to do CPR on thier brains? For most morons, it's far too late. What we need is an idiot-prevention program. We need a better system of education, for those who don't seek enlightenment on their own.
Ylerecnis,
N
Some people believe that the earth is flat. No kidding. The Flat Earther's Society uses pseudoscience to "prove" it. (I can't help wondering, though... is it true idiocy, or is it subtle satire?... I'd like to believe that people aren't quite so stupid. In any case, I recommend the site, it's very interesting.)
Education is going down the drain in the USA. Other countries do way better than we do.
People talk passionately about what they don't understand. Americans have a better understanding of science than people of third world countries, but sometimes the logic is no better. There's nothing wrong with the reading rates, but ignorance runs amok.
The world is full of idiots! Well... I guess that's no surprise. But it makes the world far more irritating.
The education system must be doing something wrong. What is it, exactly? I think that it's a system based on getting students to pass more than it is about learning- that's why this is happening.
But, honestly, what can I do? Force people to listen as I attempt to do CPR on thier brains? For most morons, it's far too late. What we need is an idiot-prevention program. We need a better system of education, for those who don't seek enlightenment on their own.
Ylerecnis,
N
Friday, January 25, 2008
Space Travel
I just read about the new tourist spaceship that's been developed, SpaceShipTwo (creative, huh?). Six rich passengers will get to pay $200,000 dollars to ride in this in order to experience four and a half minutes of weightlessness. If I had money like that, it'd be worth it.
I'll have to wait, though. The space age is coming! SpaceShipTwo will launch in just a few years. I'll probably be able to do something like it in my lifetime, for a longer trip, even. Someday in my lifetime, space travel will become much more affordable. I know I'll want to try it.
Ylerecnis,
N
I'll have to wait, though. The space age is coming! SpaceShipTwo will launch in just a few years. I'll probably be able to do something like it in my lifetime, for a longer trip, even. Someday in my lifetime, space travel will become much more affordable. I know I'll want to try it.
Ylerecnis,
N
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Personality Tests
I must confess that I enjoy taking personality tests, but a lot of the ones I find on the internet are crap. Quiz mills will have the occasional quality quiz, but most of them are made by people who had nothing better to do, and they're neither entertaining nor accurate.
I've found a great personality test, though. It's called the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Test, or the Jung Typology Test. This is based on four aspects of personality- Introversion/Extroversion, Intuitive/Sensing, Thinking/Feeling, and Perceiving/Judging. Whether or not this is all junk is up to the interpreter. I think that it says a certain amount about psychological tendencies, but not necessarily about how they're expressed. Also, it's not unusual for people to score differently as they age.
Click here to take the test. This is one of the few versions out there that doesn't ask for your email address and doesn't want you to be a member of something.
More info on your type. Seriously, though, you can do a Google search and get all kinds of results.
Hope you like taking the test. Whether you consider it accurate or not, it's food for thought. If you're wondering what I am, I'm an INTJ. The names for this type include free-thinker, strategist, and mastermind. Take that as you will. Mwahahaha!
Ylerecnis,
N
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
FreeRice.org
Here's a cool link to a place called FreeRice.org. Please visit, especially if you're a vocabulary nerd.
This is how it works- you are given multiple-choice vocabulary questions. For each word you get right, you donated 20 grains of rice through the UN. The reason why this works is that there are advertisements at the bottom of the screen. They're not really noticable, though.
Anyway, end hunger, build up your brain, blah, blah, blah. I just like doing it.
Ylerecnis,
N
This is how it works- you are given multiple-choice vocabulary questions. For each word you get right, you donated 20 grains of rice through the UN. The reason why this works is that there are advertisements at the bottom of the screen. They're not really noticable, though.
Anyway, end hunger, build up your brain, blah, blah, blah. I just like doing it.
Ylerecnis,
N
Morons Will Be Morons: My Real Opinion on Marijuana
If you write for the school newspaper, you don't always get to write what you want. One example is my editorial for this month's issue of The Bell. I was chosen to write the Con side of the issue of medicinal marijuana. Although I'm honored to know that my editors respect my ability to write on both sides of an argument, I support the other side of the issue, and I want to write about it in this blog entry.
Let me make this clear- all the data I included in my editorial are factual. In fact, here are the sources I used: The White House Drug Policy Report on Marijuana, the methods of medication for medicinal marijuana (click on the last question), Marinol, and a lot more information on Marinol. All of these present useful information that is good for anyone involved in this argument to know. If you haven't read my article, go read it now. If you can't, you'll just have to go without it.
In my article, my main idea was that marijuana has no place in the medical field. It's true that marijuana is not an good option in health care. I know for sure that I, if I were in such a position, would choose the pill over a joint. It's far safer and more effective. However, I firmly believe that people should have the option. Here's why:
1. Marijuana actually does help treat symptoms because it contains THC. Marinol is a better option, since it's dose-regulated and has far fewer excess chemicals (61 being unique to marijuana), although I'd like to point out that it has some of the same side effects. It does have THC in it, after all. THC is the chemical that makes it marijuana medicinally useful, but also psychologically harmful and addictive.
Also, let it be known that no actual deaths have been associated with marijuana at any time in U.S. history. Two thousand deaths a year are caused by aspirin. Marijuana is not healthy, but in some ways, it's less risky than something used every day.
2. Most of the violence associated with marijuana comes from the drug war that our country is fighting. Marijuana users are violent in the same way drunks are violent- their brains are addled. This causes impaired driving and reasoning, but it also involves sitting around wasted. There's a reason why it's called "getting stoned." More of the fighting occurs when drug dealers come together in gangs to fight against the police force.
Do laws stop drug use? I have one word: prohibition. Despite these laws, alcohol consumption increased. On top of that, alcohol consumption was driven underground and alcohol-related violence increased (think "Al Capone").
3. People should simply have the right to do what they want to their own bodies (without harming others- for example, people should definitely not drive stoned). We already allow alcohol (which kills 80,000 people a year) and tobacco (390,000 people/year). Also legal are more bizarre practices that are really more psychological than anything, such as acupuncture. If we allow things that are more harmful or even just bizarre, why don't we allow this?
This began as an argument for medicinal marijuana, but it comes to this opinion- I think it would make more sense for marijuana to be made completely legal (with restrictions). I've said that before, and people have laughed about it, but I'm completely serious.
What would happen if marijuana was legalized? Would all hell break lose?
Does the word... Holland... strike fear into your heart?
The Netherlands (note: in case you didn't know, Holland is a region in the Netherlands) "tolerates" marijuana in small amounts, if one is over 18. It's possible to purchase it in some coffee shops. Does this place have a reputation as a weed-consumed society? On the contrary, it has lower marijuana usage than the U.S. does. This is because legalization of a drug takes away a lot of the illusory mystique. (Other countries that allow restricted use of marijuana include Canada and Spain.)
As I mentioned before, criminalizing drugs does not stop drug abuse. If that was all it took, we'd have wiped out drug use by now.
In conclusion, I think that drug use is a choice that belongs to the user- not the government, not anyone else. Marijuana illegalization only causes problems and wastes considerable effort on the part of the government because people don't stop using weed- instead, it is driven underground. It'd be nice if we could do away with harmful drugs altogether, but millions of dollars are spent per day in a losing drug war. Morons will still be morons, no matter what the law is.
For more on the issue of legalizing (medicinal) marijuana, check out the this information on ProCon.org. It provides information and opinions on both sides of the issue.
Ylerecnis,
N
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Knowing Our Religions
Earlier this week, in history class, our assignment was to visit this website about the basic beliefs of Islam (check out Chapter 3: General Information on Islam). I think that it tells a lot about Islam (although it's obviously a bit biased toward how great Islam is), and I urge you to read it. Islam is part of our world. There are even Muslims at LHS (none I know personally).
Sadly, though, there are people who are ignorant about religion, even the religion they belong to. I've even heard a case of someone (a Christian) who didn't know that Jesus died. This kind of thing has got to stop.
For information on the beliefs of any religion, religious conflicts, and ethical debates, visit ReligiousTolerance.org.
To learn more about Catholicism and the Roman Catholic Church, here's the Wikipedia Article.
To learn more about Atheism, visit American Atheists.
If you'd like a laugh (with spiritual benefits), here are links to: The Church of Google, The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and the Virtual Temple of the Invisible Pink Unicorn. Keep in mind than none of these are true religions- they're examples of satire with a message.
Ylerecnis,
N
Sadly, though, there are people who are ignorant about religion, even the religion they belong to. I've even heard a case of someone (a Christian) who didn't know that Jesus died. This kind of thing has got to stop.
For information on the beliefs of any religion, religious conflicts, and ethical debates, visit ReligiousTolerance.org.
To learn more about Catholicism and the Roman Catholic Church, here's the Wikipedia Article.
To learn more about Atheism, visit American Atheists.
If you'd like a laugh (with spiritual benefits), here are links to: The Church of Google, The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and the Virtual Temple of the Invisible Pink Unicorn. Keep in mind than none of these are true religions- they're examples of satire with a message.
Ylerecnis,
N
The Right Attitude!!! :)
Here are some phrases I've heard from my teachers...
"You have to put in the effort to be successful."
"You need to have the right attitude."
"You have to put in the effort."
These are not exact quotes, but this captures the essence of the message that some of my teachers are telling to a class full of my peers and I. It is a noble thing to try and motivate students, but to be honest, it seems like splashing water on a brick wall. It doesn't really do much.
In every class, there are obviously different kinds of students, with different degrees of inner motivation. Some want to do the work, others don't want to, or don't care as much. Lecturing hurts both groups, because the workers don't need to be motivated, and an urgent message of preparing for the future very rarely reaches the others- in the end, all it does is waste everyone's time.
I put myself in the group of motivated students. Whenever a teacher of mine talks about things that I find obvious, such as the fact that you have to do actual work (gasp!) to get anywhere, I only listen on the surface, waiting for it to be over. My classmates either look with glassy stares or don't look at the teacher at all. The message, however true and important, isn't reaching people. In fact, it kind of reminds me of the pointy-haired boss in Dilbert, who's always trying to get his employees excited about things like "being proactive" and "optimizing performance." It's a rare person who wants to get speeches like that.
So, how are students motivated? What is the essential difference between hard workers and slackers? My guess is that it comes from their upbringing, internal values, and sense of reality in the world. These are difficult things to change, especially for a well-intentioned teacher urging on a class of high school students.
I think that one way that teachers could help, though, is to treat their students on an equal level. The only thing that lecturing is doing is making students feel that teachers don't respect them (although obviously they do, otherwise they wouldn't care if we failed our classes). In my personal experience, teachers who have respected me as a person have earned a great deal more respect from me.
Not to sound cheesy, but that's the right attitude to have.
Ylerecnis,
N
"You have to put in the effort to be successful."
"You need to have the right attitude."
"You have to put in the effort."
These are not exact quotes, but this captures the essence of the message that some of my teachers are telling to a class full of my peers and I. It is a noble thing to try and motivate students, but to be honest, it seems like splashing water on a brick wall. It doesn't really do much.
In every class, there are obviously different kinds of students, with different degrees of inner motivation. Some want to do the work, others don't want to, or don't care as much. Lecturing hurts both groups, because the workers don't need to be motivated, and an urgent message of preparing for the future very rarely reaches the others- in the end, all it does is waste everyone's time.
I put myself in the group of motivated students. Whenever a teacher of mine talks about things that I find obvious, such as the fact that you have to do actual work (gasp!) to get anywhere, I only listen on the surface, waiting for it to be over. My classmates either look with glassy stares or don't look at the teacher at all. The message, however true and important, isn't reaching people. In fact, it kind of reminds me of the pointy-haired boss in Dilbert, who's always trying to get his employees excited about things like "being proactive" and "optimizing performance." It's a rare person who wants to get speeches like that.
So, how are students motivated? What is the essential difference between hard workers and slackers? My guess is that it comes from their upbringing, internal values, and sense of reality in the world. These are difficult things to change, especially for a well-intentioned teacher urging on a class of high school students.
I think that one way that teachers could help, though, is to treat their students on an equal level. The only thing that lecturing is doing is making students feel that teachers don't respect them (although obviously they do, otherwise they wouldn't care if we failed our classes). In my personal experience, teachers who have respected me as a person have earned a great deal more respect from me.
Not to sound cheesy, but that's the right attitude to have.
Ylerecnis,
N
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Obedience and Electric Shock
"The experiment requires you to go on."
What if you were being told this? You're participating in an experiment on learning. The "student" is in one room, an electrode attached to his arm. You were chosen at random to be the "teacher." Your job is to sit in an adjoining room, read off words, and have the student repeat them back. Each time the student misses a word, you administer an electric shock.
The shocks start at 15 volts and goes all the way up to 450 volts. There are a total of 30 settings, each in 15-volt increments, and each switches are labeled, from "slight shock" to "severe shock." The last two switches are labeled "XXX." For each word the student gets wrong, you must increase the voltage given. As you increase the voltage, the student's reaction to the shock becomes more and more disturbing- they complain, then beg, then scream for the experiment to stop.
The experimenter is sitting in the room with you. Although you are nervous, they urge you to continue. "Please continue." "The experiment require you to go on."
What would you do?
This was a real experiment. In response to the Holocaust, a scientist named Stanley Milgram decided to perform an experiment on obedience to authority. The "students" were really actors- only the "teachers" were being experimented on. So, what were the results?
No subject stopped the experiment before shocking the student with 300 volts. A total of 65% of the teachers went all the way to the 450-volt switch labeled "XXX." At this point, the student went silent, feigning death.
Obedience to authority is shockingly strong. It's a frightening concept. It's not even like the subjects continued gleefully- they shook, sweated, and acted anxious. They knew something was wrong, and they felt fearful. But they kept on going, just because someone told them to. We have to trust our own impulses on this to guide our actions. This experiment is a warning to everyone.
For more information on this experiment, please follow these links:
What if you were being told this? You're participating in an experiment on learning. The "student" is in one room, an electrode attached to his arm. You were chosen at random to be the "teacher." Your job is to sit in an adjoining room, read off words, and have the student repeat them back. Each time the student misses a word, you administer an electric shock.
The shocks start at 15 volts and goes all the way up to 450 volts. There are a total of 30 settings, each in 15-volt increments, and each switches are labeled, from "slight shock" to "severe shock." The last two switches are labeled "XXX." For each word the student gets wrong, you must increase the voltage given. As you increase the voltage, the student's reaction to the shock becomes more and more disturbing- they complain, then beg, then scream for the experiment to stop.
The experimenter is sitting in the room with you. Although you are nervous, they urge you to continue. "Please continue." "The experiment require you to go on."
What would you do?
This was a real experiment. In response to the Holocaust, a scientist named Stanley Milgram decided to perform an experiment on obedience to authority. The "students" were really actors- only the "teachers" were being experimented on. So, what were the results?
No subject stopped the experiment before shocking the student with 300 volts. A total of 65% of the teachers went all the way to the 450-volt switch labeled "XXX." At this point, the student went silent, feigning death.
Obedience to authority is shockingly strong. It's a frightening concept. It's not even like the subjects continued gleefully- they shook, sweated, and acted anxious. They knew something was wrong, and they felt fearful. But they kept on going, just because someone told them to. We have to trust our own impulses on this to guide our actions. This experiment is a warning to everyone.
For more information on this experiment, please follow these links:
Report by Milgram: The Perils of Obedience
Ylerecnis,
N
Monday, January 14, 2008
Does This Describe You?
Hey, you! Yes... you. This is your personality description. On a scale of 0 to 5, how accurate is it?
You have a need for other people to like and admire you. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have considerable unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them. Disciplined and self-controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside. At times you have serous doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You pride yourself as an independent thinker, and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. But you have found it unwise to be too frank revealing yourself to others. At times you are an extrovert, affable and sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, and reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be rather unrealistic.
This personality test was devised by a man named Betram Forer in a famous experiment in psychology. Forer selected random phrases from an astrology book and pieced it together into the description you just read. He gave this description to all of his college students (he told them that it was based on results of a test score), asking them to determine how closely the description matched their personality, on a scale of 0 to 5 (5 being most accurate). The results amazed him- 87% of his students marked a 4 or 5!
Why is this? Well, you may have noticed that most of the statements in the personality description are very vague. I can confidently say that most people want others to like or admire them. Also, there's some flattery present. Who wouldn't pride themselves as an independent thinker? More importantly, who, if told they were an independent thinker, want to deny it?
So, next time you look at your horoscope, think very carefully about what you're reading. Just how many people would this apply to?
Ylerecnis,
N
(The information from this blog was found in Quirkology, by Richard Wiseman, P.h. D.)
You have a need for other people to like and admire you. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have considerable unused capacity that you have not turned to your advantage. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them. Disciplined and self-controlled on the outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure on the inside. At times you have serous doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing. You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations. You pride yourself as an independent thinker, and do not accept others' statements without satisfactory proof. But you have found it unwise to be too frank revealing yourself to others. At times you are an extrovert, affable and sociable, while at other times you are introverted, wary, and reserved. Some of your aspirations tend to be rather unrealistic.
This personality test was devised by a man named Betram Forer in a famous experiment in psychology. Forer selected random phrases from an astrology book and pieced it together into the description you just read. He gave this description to all of his college students (he told them that it was based on results of a test score), asking them to determine how closely the description matched their personality, on a scale of 0 to 5 (5 being most accurate). The results amazed him- 87% of his students marked a 4 or 5!
Why is this? Well, you may have noticed that most of the statements in the personality description are very vague. I can confidently say that most people want others to like or admire them. Also, there's some flattery present. Who wouldn't pride themselves as an independent thinker? More importantly, who, if told they were an independent thinker, want to deny it?
So, next time you look at your horoscope, think very carefully about what you're reading. Just how many people would this apply to?
Ylerecnis,
N
(The information from this blog was found in Quirkology, by Richard Wiseman, P.h. D.)
Thursday, January 10, 2008
THE ULTIMATE ANSWER
ATTENTION EVERYONE! GOOGLE HAS SPOKEN (and Google is god- see The Nine Proofs that Google is God)!
The meaning of life is now clear. Do a Google search for "answer to life the universe and everything" (exactly like that, or it doesn't work), and the answer will be revealed to you! As a philosopher, this was an answer I just couldn't ignore.
Ylerecnis,
N
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
Automatic Prejudice
I can safely say that most people (at least in the U.S.) feel that discrimination on the basis of race or sex is wrong. I agree. Morally, it is not right to refuse to hire a black person. It's wrong to shun Hispanic people. It's wrong to promote a man over a woman simply on the basis of gender.
I can say for certain, though, that all these things happen. In fact, the majority of people have prejudiced automatic thoughts, to their own surprise (and often, they don't even know it). These same people know that it's wrong to feel that way, but it's a common and natural occurrence. Human brains naturally make inferences and desisions, even if we're not aware of them and choose to act the opposite way.
Don't believe me? Can't say I blame you. It's a hard thing to swallow, especially without data to back this up. That's why I've got some data for you.
IATs (Implicit Association Tests), which measure the reaction time of the association with certain groups and positive or negative feelings. The subject who is taking the test gets a situation like this:
Science or Male Liberal Arts or Female
________ sister _______
________ English _______
________ Biology _______
________ uncle _______
The subject must then sort the words into each category as quickly as possible. After they've done this, different catergories are put together, like this:
Science or Female Liberal Arts or Male
________ sister _______
________ English _______
________ Biology _______
________ uncle _______
________ English _______
________ Biology _______
________ uncle _______
Most people find it easier to pair science with male and liberal arts with female. The IAT test measures the reaction time for each situation and compares the two, determining the assosiation you have with different groups. Unless you're new to the process and make a lot of errors, IATs prove accurate. Try as hard as you want- it's imposssible to change them through pure will.
Please go to the Demo site from this link: https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/ There, you can find IATs on: Race (black/white), age, religion, disability, weight, skin tone, sexuality, Asians, Arab-Muslims, Native Americans, assosiations between gender and science, assosiations between gender and career, and a couple of IATs on preference for certain political figures. Plus, after you take a test, you'll be presented with percentages of other people's results.
So, is it all futile? I think not. There is a way to change your IAT. I know, I just said that you couldn't. But read this excerpt from a book called Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. Gladwell is quoting Mahzarin Banaji.
I had a student who used to take the IAT every day. It was the first thing he did, and his idea was just to let the data gather as he went. Then this one day, he got a positive assosiation with blacks. And he said, "That's odd. I've never gotten that before," because we've all tried to change our IAT score and couldn't. But he's a track-and-field guy, and what he realized is that he spent the morning watching the Olympics.
Yes, it can be changed! I think that's the best lesson we can learn from this. Our assosiations build upon our past experiences. If we can change the data that gets put into our brains, we can change our inner feelings about it. I think this holds a lot of promise for the future.
Ylerecnis,
N
The Meaning of This Blog
If you've stumbled upon my blog, you're probably wondering what it's about. Perhaps, because of the name, you think it's going to be about math. Let me tell you now- I have no plans whatsoever to write about math on a blog. That would be extremely boring, and I don't need that many hecklers. Besides, what would there be to talk about? Numbers belong in the context of a story or an idea, not in a report by themselves.
The "N" in The Nth Power represents both a variable and an answer. Not in math, though, not on this blog. Think of it in the context of science and philosophy. It's just about deducing an answer. Sometimes n has a clear answer, such as in 14n = 588 (n = 42). That's pretty straight-forward, but there are others that aren't so much. Sometimes there's so little concrete information that you get something more like this: (a + b + d^2) / (cfg - h!) + q = n^23 + 6i(jx * 10^-78)
This is more in the field of philosophy (unless it's just a very difficult science problem). Although some aspects of philosophy can be probed by science (such as why we have morals), other aspects are so fuzzy that few people have a concrete answer, and these same people may have very different answers (such as what good morals are, and why they're good).
So, that's what I'll be blogging on- science and philosophy, especially in the context of society. Sometimes I'll report, other times I'll probably border on ranting. What good is a blog if you can't rant?
Ylerecnis,
N
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