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Showing posts from December, 2010

Understanding Problems

What pisses me off is when in a bad situation the other party I'm with doesn't want to try to understand what went wrong. This leaves me alone and mostly at fault in the situation. At the point the other party ceases to care or want to understand the problem, it becomes my problem. Its frustrating because in the end, I'm the one who has to come out as "understanding" in something that takes more than just my own effort to communicate. I'm the one who ends up being appearing unhurt because I'd rather "coldly" figure it out that give into emotions that prevent me from thinking about the situation. I get angry, and the emotion organizes responses of probing and aggressive answer seeking. Emotions are organizing and irrational, but you can't remove them from the equation and they essential to build a motivation for a course of action. In this case, I can be angry at my self and my own failure and seek to correct my self by building up narrative

temptation to buy and hangovers

Temptation . There is this really good deal on a Sig556 full metal for 3,500! Thats really cheap, it also has free shipping so Its no effort for me to buy. Its a strong temptation right now when I need to save up for the baby. I never had this problem when I was more miserly, but thats what happens when one gets a new source of catharsis... I know I've got a lot of irrationality riding on it. I keep trying to force my self to focus on work, since its my income generation ability which makes such purchases relatively cheaper... its getting harder cause my internet haunts have become scares and I find myself involuntarily checking out the prices again... :( I'd buy it if I can sell my two 2nd hand m4s which I haven't used yet. Anyway, I have a long list of things to do before going there. I have to attempt to fix the chronograph thats broken. I need 2 more 1.2V rechargable batteries but CDR-king is out of stock. I need a container to put them and Voltage Tester a new battery

The pro-life case against birth control, nursing, and exercise. - By William Saletan - Slate Magazine

The pro-life case against birth control, nursing, and exercise. - By William Saletan - Slate Magazine : I need this here. I get so much loonies with their inconsistent logic, mostly using "God" as a legitimizer to their arguments. I begin to realize that anyone claims being spoken to by god or being right because they could fit in "god says I'm right" in their argument are those who don't appreciate the science of cognition the MOST. If they had even the slightest humility or motivations to wonder how they can be wrong, fall prey to irrationalities, or prevent them selves from making the same mistakes they would stumble on to this most common sense answer to study up and gather evidence or proof. The nut jobs, and I'm really calling them nut jobs in my blog, are getting to me. Update . My proponent wants to help gather evidence against this psychopath. This guy is scary, he knows who to bribe so tactically, I think he got to our lawyer thats why we were

N. Korea warns Seoul to cancel military drill - World news - Asia-Pacific - North Korea - msnbc.com

N. Korea warns Seoul to cancel military drill - World news - Asia-Pacific - North Korea - msnbc.com ...Or what! You can only exact so much out of threat, hopefully NK is not as versed as Neuman Game Theory. They know they can hurt the US, SK and Japan but they must know will fall so fast their head will spin. NK is only thinking of themselves, most likely they have the gun pointed at Seoul and maximize horror. If you have the gun pointed at someone, you may need to check if they think your going to pull it anyway... because if it looks like NK will anyway. SK will be more motivated for a uber hurting pre-emptive strike, what gets to their mind is that they want this to end as quickly as possible. Dun DUN DUN!!! That military drill is not a drill, its an excuse to have a TON of force in place. Once intelligence confirms NK is "crazy", then its going to be "On like Donkey Kong."

Synthetic Biology Doesn’t Need More Rules, Ethics Panel Says - NYTimes.com

Synthetic Biology Doesn’t Need More Rules, Ethics Panel Says - NYTimes.com Too bad people don't appreciate the domestication of plants and animals humans have done for thousands of years. This is usually the first thing people overlook when they think of franken food. I look forward to this, as well as dread the super strains of disease, pestilence and famine this can create in the wrong hands.

Biased against Short Sighted Selfishness

Altruism is some kind of selfishness, particularly one that works on the evolutionary motive of surviving with one's "tribe" as intact as possible. In a thread talking about Dying for Atheism , my take was: No, who dies for not choosing something? I'd make a serious sacrifice for the freedom to make my own choices. I'd save dying for something like family and loved ones. I find dying for Freedomes pointless, If no one I care about will benefit. Dying for an Idea for the Ideas sake is stupid or irrational (in the economic sense). Note that Loved ones is the clear objective in any Smart Altruistic sacrifice, if loved one's don't gain to benefit by the sacrifice then there is some serious consideration and reflection in order. Having my own kid, despite him being just some little thing kicking my wife's belly at 5am, is still something I'd die for... as for freedomes, our capacity to surmount adversity is pretty able as a species. We've evolve

Maturity and Evidence

The personal Bias, the self centered idea that the universe is "designed" is disgusting for me. As I find narcissistic, self serving nature that reached boundaries of delusion and becomes a barrier for a more long range self interest (altruism). Interestingly, I'm able to make more and more accurate and exacting observation of my own behavior because I write my thoughts down and I am able to note the frequency of my own irrationalities. I guess thats why in Professor Hinshaws's lecture developing a personal narrative is not only essential for growth, but also for humanization. I guess I have to give my mother some credit for encouraging me to write, when I do realize now that I did write crap... but the perceived truth she believed was important in giving me intermediary goals to draw me out and try some more. I think when my kid is born, I'll be just as encouraging but I would have the ability, which many people past their 20s learn (according to the lecture) to

Watched Restrepo

I appreciate the work they do and I'm not an american. As a soldier your job is to be a good soldier (which is already a tough job) and be placed in these weird and difficult situations. The negotiating with the locals was tough, and even though I would, (skeptically) probably, be more skilled in dealing with them I don't think any soldier can just put up for diplomacy and cultural appreciation lessons like that. What skilled diplomat would get into soldiering when diplomacy makes a ton of money in business? Heck a culturally adaptive and diplomatic person has a whole world of opportunities open to them in the business world, I think soldiering would be a choice that would require very rare and unusual set of circumstances. The part about the dying and dead baby, holy crap. I mean your enemies are intentionally fighting you using civilians as shields/buffers. You just have to take the unfair criticism and all that irrationality that wants to simplify you as a murderer. Damn. Oh

Cognitive Biases of Lotto or Dooms Days and Destiny

Looking Back to the Past and saying the Present was Destined . Making a decision and thinking only after learning that such a decision was wrong only by the consequences of the decision, and stating that one could have known better is such an annoying Cognitive Bias. It falls under the Cognitive Biases where the Person Completely takes for granted the sequence of events that lead to learning/acquiring that particular set of information. Cognitive Biases related to this. Outcome bias – the tendency to judge a decision by its eventual outcome instead of based on the quality of the decision at the time it was made. Post-purchase rationalization – the tendency to persuade oneself through rational argument that a purchase was a good value. Wishful thinking – the formation of beliefs and the making of decisions according to what is pleasing to imagine instead of by appeal to evidence or rationality The Justification of Winning the Lotto or the World Ending . I won a bet with a friend

The Social Cancer by Jose Rizal - Full Text Free Book (Part 1/11)

The Social Cancer by Jose Rizal - Full Text Free Book (Part 1/11) This is the English translation in Public Domain of Noli Me Tangere. It would be nice to make a Audio Book of it as a pet project, maybe just me and my wife making the voices. I can say the same about Procopious's History of Wars. Not a lot of people would like to read it, but in audiobook form it will have some of an audience. I can say the same about a lot of Public Domain Books. Making a free audiobook of them would be fun thing to do. Imagine playing it for my little boy, daddy reading to him noli me tangere.

Emerging markets - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Emerging markets - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Since Third World has been made obsolete, the new terms are Advanced and Secondary Emerging Markets. I'm not for Politically Correctness, i just need to find a name for what stage of development we are or a country happens to be.

Political corruption - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Political corruption - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia : "new governments often confiscated previous government's corruptly-obtained assets" I've been researching this for a while. I remember one of my lectures mentioned an Index used to measure how long a legitimate business can last in corrupt countries before being done in by the corruption. I can't find it, and I've been thinking about it especially since it illustrates a number of hazards one has to look at when they go into any emerging market country.