rob_lewis said:
An interesting read:
Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds
-Rob
Very cool - thanks for posting. But for me at least, it is already very close to what I believe (haha).
I think there is a prevailing theory right now that the reason homo sapiens prevailed over all other homo species is not because of our smarts (there are reasons to believe other homos were smarter) but rather because of our willingness to align our beliefs with those of our peers.
Think of how many people share the common belief of "money". Think of the power that gives us as a society. Then also think of how hard it would be to change some of our fundamental beliefs.
Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to STM317 :
wondering if folks in here will 'resist' those stats as much as they resist the covid ones (by pointing out all the reasons a stat may be wrong or misleading).
If by "resist" you mean "question the validity" of the data, I would certainly hope people NOT stop doing that. Its almost always good to question things. Summarily dismissing or accepting conclusions is the primary danger I see.
For the COVID data, as we have seen it, it's pretty clear there are issues with the conclusions that are being created from the data available.
Regarding the chart presented. As noted, pretty obvious stuff. I would question why race is considered an important variable here. There is no evidence that I know of that would indicate that the virus has differing effects on people based on their race or genetic makeup. It seems pretty obvious the relevant variable here is economic status, not race. Yes, they are correlated, but as noted, the driving factor is economic, not genetic. If you ask the wrong questions, you get the wrong answers (a very important thing to remember with statistics).
One aspect that the chart is missing (no real way to measure it now of course) is the effect on education across different economic levels. Certainly all children will effectively have a "lost year" of education/schooling, and in that way, it is an equal impact. The reality is though, those with means will more likely be able to compensate for that loss (tutors, more access to remote learning etc). What impact this will have in the future, who knows, but for primary school kids at least it will almost certainly have some noticeable effect. If nothing else, a ripple that runs through the schools for years to come.
Snowdoggie said:
aircooled said:
z31maniac said:
It should be BLATANTLY obvious that post counts on ANY forum have no direct correlation with intelligence or credibility.
You should know... Mr big brain! I will go with what you said 
Besides, we WAY "outrank" him!!
z31maniac has posted 16685 times in the forums.
aircooled has posted 15363 times in the forums.
Snowdoggie has posted 340 times in the forums.
(to be clear: meant to be funny, but I do agree.... and tend to agree with Snowdoggies concerns...shades of grey...)
I don't spend enough time on this board. Probably because I work more that 40 hours a week and since I am an "essential worker" I didn't get any time off during the shutdown. I won't get any time off during the next shutdown, and when the world ends I will probably be following the four horses of the Apocalypse with a shovel and a trashcan and getting overtime for it. Between work and being a caretaker for my elderly mother, I really haven't had an entire day off in years.
It really sucks not having time to finish a car for the model car contest. The Corvair still isn't painted yet.
I'm working right now.
But we have dead time during the day. Like when I'm waiting for a 1.5 hour long Zoom meeting I recorded to compress/make it's self a file, or waiting for a Help build, etc.
Today I was in meetings from 7:30-11:30. Now I need help with a Domain/SSP Application linking problem. The guy that can help won't be out of meetings until 2 and there isn't really anything I can work on until then as I need a functioning test site.
Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:
rob_lewis said:
An interesting read:
Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds
-Rob
Very cool - thanks for posting. But for me at least, it is already very close to what I believe (haha).
I think there is a prevailing theory right now that the reason homo sapiens prevailed over all other homo species is not because of our smarts (there are reasons to believe other homos were smarter) but rather because of our willingness to align our beliefs with those of our peers.
Think of how many people share the common belief of "money". Think of the power that gives us as a society. Then also think of how hard it would be to change some of our fundamental beliefs.
I know. I read people saying the government is purposefully restricting the cash supply, so we go to cashless economy so they have more control.
How the hell am I supposed to tip the strippers? It's not like I can slide my card between 'dem cheeks. 
FWIW, I watched a few YouTube videos over the weekend on influencing behavior.
Cliffs Notes summary of current thinking among behavioral psychologists...
1. Peer comparison - as stated above, we want to belong and be accepted (example - you're less over weight than 20% of the population)
2. Positive reinforcement - focus on the good (example - congratulations on losing 5 Lbs. not you're 5 Lbs. over weight)
3. Path to success - graphically show progression towards the goal (example - at this rate, you're hit your target weight in two weeks)
Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:
I think there is a prevailing theory right now that the reason homo sapiens prevailed over all other homo species is not because of our smarts (there are reasons to believe other homos were smarter) but rather because of our willingness to align our beliefs with those of our peers.
Not just will - by force if necessary :)
Think about the huge chunks of history where having/supporting a belief that contradicted the governing religion would result in death.
I am increasing questioning whether I want to keep living in this country.
Edit: This was supposed to be in the minor rant thread...
93EXCivic said:
I am increasing questioning whether I want to keep living in this country.
It's a lot harder to permanently move to most countries you would actually want to live in than most people think.
Although I do think it would be fun to live in one of the cities where we have other offices, just for a few years. Specifically, Barcelona or Montevideo.
z31maniac said:
93EXCivic said:
I am increasing questioning whether I want to keep living in this country.
It's a lot harder to permanently move to most countries you would actually want to live in than most people think.
Although I do think it would be fun to live in one of the cities where we have other offices, just for a few years. Specifically, Barcelona or Montevideo.
I could do the UK really easily because of having a British birth certificate. Not 100% sure that is that much better...
aircooled said:
Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to STM317 :
wondering if folks in here will 'resist' those stats as much as they resist the covid ones (by pointing out all the reasons a stat may be wrong or misleading).
If by "resist" you mean "question the validity" of the data, I would certainly hope people NOT stop doing that. Its almost always good to question things. Summarily dismissing or accepting conclusions is the primary danger I see.
For the COVID data, as we have seen it, it's pretty clear there are issues with the conclusions that are being created from the data available.
Regarding the chart presented. As noted, pretty obvious stuff. I would question why race is considered an important variable here. There is no evidence that I know of that would indicate that the virus has differing effects on people based on their race or genetic makeup. It seems pretty obvious the relevant variable here is economic status, not race. Yes, they are correlated, but as noted, the driving factor is economic, not genetic. If you ask the wrong questions, you get the wrong answers (a very important thing to remember with statistics).
One aspect that the chart is missing (no real way to measure it now of course) is the effect on education across different economic levels. Certainly all children will effectively have a "lost year" of education/schooling, and in that way, it is an equal impact. The reality is though, those with means will more likely be able to compensate for that loss (tutors, more access to remote learning etc). What impact this will have in the future, who knows, but for primary school kids at least it will almost certainly have some noticeable effect. If nothing else, a ripple that runs through the schools for years to come.
I may be the only one, but I didn't know who NORC was. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NORC_at_the_University_of_Chicago
Also I question why and how they get such data (% of americans) from only 2,012 respondents...
But overall I was going for the ironic joke flavor of how all of us will simply accept some data and violently refute other (or somewhere in between); by calling out that I was curious if the response to the data would be similar or different than other data presented in this thread.
Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:
.....Also I question why and how they get such data (% of americans) from only 2,012 respondents...
But overall I was going for the ironic joke flavor of how all of us will simply accept some data and violently refute other (or somewhere in between); by calling out that I was curious if the response to the data would be similar or different than other data presented in this thread.
You can extrapolate to very large populations from seemingly small samples. The key is making sure the sample you are taking is representative (same percentage represented) of the population you want to extrapolate to in reference to the relevant variables involved (in this case education, race, financial issues...). This sort of survey is unlikely to have any variable that are missed (e.g. things vary in different areas and you didn't sample different areas), so it should be pretty safe. I cannot comment on the exact numbers needed, but it doesn't sound unreasonable.
It is a good point about not refuting it through. I would say the primary reason why it would not be questioned in general is because it's a pretty obvious conclusion that almost no one would be surprised by (confirmation bias). That said, it certainly doesn't mean it is correct just because of that.
In reply to aircooled :
As time passes, we'll see a further distancing between the "haves" and the "have nots" when it comes to education. I have seen it with my own co-workers and their children. We all work from home now, but our comfortable, good paying white collar jobs also allow us the flexibility to work around caring for kids. For example, my direct supervisor is generally unavailable during the afternoon so he can take care of his two young boys while his wife does her WFH meetings. He then goes back to working during the late afternoon and into the evening. Flexibility not generally afforded those in service jobs who generally need to work a fixed schedule.
They can also help their kids with remote schooling. They tend to live in districts with more resources to provide for remote schooling.
In the end, the "haves" will get through all of this reasonably well. The rest will fall further behind.
z31maniac said:
I know. I read people saying the government is purposefully restricting the cash supply, so we go to cashless economy so they have more control.
How the hell am I supposed to tip the strippers? It's not like I can slide my card between 'dem cheeks.
I've been reading about that in a few places as well. Hard to say if it's paranoid conspiracies or not, but it's something to keep an eye one either way. It also makes a case for "global coverage wireless internet" since without that it would be hard to do cashless transactions.
As far as tipping strippers - that's easy. You just buy "credit slips" from the establishment. Of course, the Govt would love this. They'd know exactly how much the strippers would be getting in tips. And who was buying the tips. It would probably put a severe hurting on that industry for awhile...
Ian F (Forum Supporter) said:
In reply to aircooled :
As time passes, we'll see a further distancing between the "haves" and the "have nots" when it comes to education. I have seen it with my own co-workers and their children. We all work from home now, but our comfortable, good paying white collar jobs also allow us the flexibility to work around caring for kids. For example, my direct supervisor is generally unavailable during the afternoon so he can take care of his two young boys while his wife does her WFH meetings. He then goes back to working during the late afternoon and into the evening. Flexibility not generally afforded those in service jobs who generally need to work a fixed schedule.
They can also help their kids with remote schooling. They tend to live in districts with more resources to provide for remote schooling.
In the end, the "haves" will get through all of this reasonably well. The rest will fall further behind.
I wouldn't even necessarily say it is [only] the have's and the have-nots, but the cans and cannots - those that fall into the category of CAN work from home or CAN take the risk of the virus or CAN decide to go without an income for this period.... and those that cannot.
Similar story with 2-parent households.
I just ran across this. In reference to the effectiveness of masks (note: not scientifically accurate ):
(realistically: I suspect this overstates the effectiveness of common fabric masks)
93EXCivic said:
z31maniac said:
93EXCivic said:
I am increasing questioning whether I want to keep living in this country.
It's a lot harder to permanently move to most countries you would actually want to live in than most people think.
Although I do think it would be fun to live in one of the cities where we have other offices, just for a few years. Specifically, Barcelona or Montevideo.
I could do the UK really easily because of having a British birth certificate. Not 100% sure that is that much better...
No way would I pick the UK over the US. But not really a fair comparison, most people don't already have foreign birth certificate.
Go look up what it takes to be a citizen of Switzerland. Although, I admit, that's probably the most extreme example in the world.
aircooled said:
To use the AutoX example: Assuming you race within the rules, you always want to use the rules as much as possible in you favor to give you the best chance. Will making that one change to your car assure you will win? No, but it gives you a bit more of an edge and a slightly better chance. Certainly no reason not to make as many of those mods as you can, to give you the best advantage possible. A "mask" might be adjusting your camber. or a motor swap, I don't know (!?!?).
Do as many mods as you like to your car. Requiring me to modify mine is the issue.
No one's making you modify your car. If you don't like the rules, you can just stay home 
Margie
If you have to modify your car in order to not be at a high risk of crashing, maybe it makes sense for you to stay home, not change the rules for the rest of us on the off chance we are on the track at the same time.
Steve_Jones said:
aircooled said:
To use the AutoX example: Assuming you race within the rules, you always want to use the rules as much as possible in you favor to give you the best chance. Will making that one change to your car assure you will win? No, but it gives you a bit more of an edge and a slightly better chance. Certainly no reason not to make as many of those mods as you can, to give you the best advantage possible. A "mask" might be adjusting your camber. or a motor swap, I don't know (!?!?).
Do as many mods as you like to your car. Requiring me to modify mine is the issue.
You not wearing a mask is the equivalent of you modifying my car against my will, to follow the analogy.
But we're talking about your high risk of crashing into me. Go without a seatbelt all you want, but if you won't run your headlights at night, you get to stay home or pile up the tickets until you lose your license.
Also, if you really want to post your anti-mask propaganda, take it to Facebook. We're moving on here.
Haven't checked this one since double digit page count. All I can ask is "still"?
OHSCrifle said:
Haven't checked this one since double digit page count. All I can ask is "still"?
Lots of infectious disease experts on this board, who knew?
Lots of people trying to figure stuff out and talk things through in a confusing and stressful time when even the experts cannot provide solid definitive answers.
Some who don't discuss things in the most "gentle" way. Also a few people who like to drop in and do there best to disrupt things.
Pretty much all freedoms are contingent on not affecting others freedoms (e.g. freedom of religion yes, freedom to persecute or punish others for not being part of your religion, no).
