New at Reason

Julian Sanchez | November 4, 2005

Ron Bailey prays for deliverance from politicized drug policy.

Comments

|11.4.05 @ 1:21PM|#

God gave us the ability to choose to do right or wrong, and God's "agents" are trying to take that ability away.

Without the ability to choose, none of our choices are moral. I guess I see making right choices as a means, while the nannies and tyrants see it as an end.

If we could only do away with people, then the world would be cleansed of immorality!

|11.4.05 @ 1:21PM|#

Wow 3000 deaths a year just to "promote" morality. Do these people not recognize true evil when they see it? Next they will be develope their own STD's for the good of society.

I guess this puts to rest the idea that our extremists are any better than terrorists.

|11.4.05 @ 1:27PM|#

In a sermon Dr. Hager later declared, "I argued from a scientific perspective, and God took that information, and he used it through this minority report to influence the decision. Once again, what Satan meant for evil, God turned into good."

And people wonder why I see theism as a threat to liberty.

|11.4.05 @ 1:28PM|#

Hell, relieve us from drug policy. You can't de-politicize a government activity, so it'll always be political.

Explaining the silence of scie|11.4.05 @ 1:30PM|#

Maybe the effort to block the cervical cancer vaccine will fail to delay the drug. That is what I am hoping will happen and that is what I think will happen.

I think that the problem with Plan B is that termination of zygotes is involved. Although science initially considered these zygotes as having no value akin to that of human life, this is a non-falsifiable proposition. Science realized that and promptly shut up about Plan B, as it always must in the face of non-falsifiable propositions. Hence, the non-scientific debate on Plan B.

|11.4.05 @ 1:30PM|#

I wonder if Dr. Wallis has removed the seatbelts from his kids' cars. Wouldn't want to send the message that they can drive unsafely without consequences.

Eric, I defy you to come up with a pre-Bush example of the FDA so politicizing the review of a drug. You think you're making a point about govenment, when all you're doing is making an excuse for individuals acting in bad faith who work for the government.

|11.4.05 @ 1:31PM|#

joe, you realize that if you only ask for one example somebody will find it.

Ask for two.

|11.4.05 @ 1:31PM|#

Wow 3000 deaths a year just to "promote" morality. Do these people not recognize true evil when they see it?

Well, you see, if they accept JEEZ-us as their personal lord and savior, then they won't have to worry about death because they'll go to heaven...

...Yeah, I don't believe it either.

|11.4.05 @ 1:34PM|#

Although science initially considered these zygotes as having no value akin to that of human life, this is a non-falsifiable proposition.

Science isn't about making value judgements.

|11.4.05 @ 1:38PM|#

"Eric, I defy you to come up with a pre-Bush example of the FDA so politicizing the review of a drug."

Why would he have to to make his point?

|11.4.05 @ 1:38PM|#

joe,

Ahh, the "morning after" pill is one such example.

The whole process of liberalizing the use of non-brand drugs was very polticized and worked out over decades.

Of course FDA review of any drug is quite political, if by that term you mean that influence is used to get the FDA to approve or deny it. Its one of the main, oncurring complaints about the FDA by liberals in fact.

|11.4.05 @ 1:40PM|#

Proving once again that even in the modern world, controling women's coices is still the most popular way to control the masses behavior.

|11.4.05 @ 1:40PM|#

thoreau,

In light of the very dramatic history of the morning after pill joe is right to be scolded for being so anti-Bush as to simply erase a very contested history like that. I mean really, we had people protesting its non-approval by entering the U.S. with the drug throughout the 1980s.

|11.4.05 @ 1:42PM|#

Of course FDA review of any drug is quite political, if by that term you mean that influence is used to get the FDA to approve or deny it. Its one of the main, oncurring complaints about the FDA by liberals in fact.

Sometimes it seems like the liberals (or conservatives) forget, when they say X activity needs intrusive regulation, that the conservatives (or liberals) will be back in office one day and will regulate it wrong.

|11.4.05 @ 1:43PM|#

joe,

A pre-Bush II example of the political nature of drug approval from the viewpoint of liberals: http://www.cnsnews.com/Nation/Archive/200012/NAT20001201a.html

|11.4.05 @ 1:44PM|#

i swear to God i'm gonna do drugs

|11.4.05 @ 1:44PM|#

Eric, your entire argument depends on pretending not to know the difference between a technical expert hired by the government to do a technical job, and a politician pushing an ideology.

When the DPW engineers calculate the gradient of a stormdrain, is that politicized?

|11.4.05 @ 1:45PM|#

Er, the viewpoint of conservatives.

|11.4.05 @ 1:47PM|#

joe,

And your entire viewpoint depends on the rather whimsical notion that the technical expert is the main decisionmaker. Honestly joe, the FDA's budget is in part paid for by the fucking drug manufacturers! Nothing political there. No sir. And never has been until Bush II came into office. Your knee-jerk anti-Bushism leads to some very absurd points of view I must say.

|11.4.05 @ 1:52PM|#

To expand on my last post:

Besides the fact that science doesn't deal in "values," even if it did, the idea that science could not prove a zygote has "no value akin to human life" is falacious. You can't prove a negative. The burden of proof that "life has value" (whatever that means) falls upon the proponents, not the opponents.

Also, just who are these "scientists" who are "silent" about Plan B?

|11.4.05 @ 1:53PM|#

This thread is already beyond hope.

|11.4.05 @ 1:54PM|#

Akira MacKenzie,

Are you trying to summone crimethink/unborn angel? :)

|11.4.05 @ 1:54PM|#

Hope for what, exactly?

|11.4.05 @ 1:56PM|#

Eric the .5b,

thoreau's hope for a happy, slappy world full of bunnies I guess. :)

|11.4.05 @ 1:57PM|#

Hak, chill.

|11.4.05 @ 1:58PM|#

You know, if the Democrats didn't tend to have their own "religion" about the environment, GM foods, or several other sacred topics, I might vote for them just to ensure that no religious loon would be making scientific decisions. Some of the weird Funtamentalist tripe that lives in the GOP was reputedly behind the dismantling of the OTA, an office that actually helped to slightly depoliticize science.

As for religion in general, I say worship Calvin--he doesn't care if you wear your seatbelt or not:

But Calvin is no kind and loving god! He's one of the old gods! He demands sacrifice!

|11.4.05 @ 2:00PM|#

Eric the .5b,

In regards to what?

|11.4.05 @ 2:00PM|#

thoreau, let's just go get a beer.

|11.4.05 @ 2:00PM|#

Are you trying to summon crimethink/unborn angel? :)

Beetlejuice... Beetlejuice... Beetlejuice...

|11.4.05 @ 2:00PM|#

Eric-

Hope for interesting discourse.

We've already got a ton of accusations flying against joe, a denunciation of theism, somebody with "www.farceswannamo.com" on his handle trying to remind us that science isn't omnipotent, and all the other signs of a clusterfuck in the making.

|11.4.05 @ 2:01PM|#

I meant "Fundamentalist tripe", though I hate Funtamentalists, too, with all of their Candid Camera references.

|11.4.05 @ 2:02PM|#

Phil-

Any chance you'll be joining us on Nov. 12?

I second your motion to get a beer. Warren?

|11.4.05 @ 2:03PM|#

thoreau,

For someone who rarely ever writes anything interesting here - in that your comments essentially are the same "joke" repeated over and over again - you sure do mouth off a lot about the content of thise blog.

|11.4.05 @ 2:03PM|#

I will. I'll send you an email; meant to do so earlier, but between work and H&R posts, well, you know.

|11.4.05 @ 2:04PM|#

Hope for interesting discourse.

We've already got...

Good point. I'm out...

|11.4.05 @ 2:04PM|#

Akira MacKenzie,

Too bad Winona Ryder isn't around. :)

|11.4.05 @ 2:05PM|#

Holy Flurking Schnit. I can't believe I just read what I just read.

|11.4.05 @ 2:07PM|#

Eric the .5b,

Well, one has to ask, what novel thing could be said about the ideas which Bailey is writing against? The Christian fundamentalists are stupid and wrong on these matters and anyone else acting like them is as well. Care to add to this?

|11.4.05 @ 2:07PM|#

Finger has long been a proponent of the benefits of virginity

Wow 3000 deaths a year just to "promote" morality. Do these people not recognize true evil when they see it?

But, you see, it's harm coming to women, not men. So therefore it's not really evil, in the eyes of the religious. To them, there's nothing wrong with using the life of a woman to make a moral example of her. Traditionally speaking (and this is true of all the major religions), women have second-citizen status. If there were some life saving drug for a men's disease (ok, barring AIDS, since the religious blame homosexuality for that one), I really don't think that the issue of sexual morality would even have risen. And people wonder why I despise religion.

|11.4.05 @ 2:09PM|#

thoreau,

Let us note that it was your glorious Catholic Church which opposes condom usage, opposed the development of anti-syphillis drugs, etc.

|11.4.05 @ 2:09PM|#

Finger has long been a proponent of the benefits of virginity

Really...Is that so?

|11.4.05 @ 2:10PM|#

I cannot believe words I read sometime.



The role of the FDA, even though I disagree with the organization, is to decide if drugs are safe or if they aren't. They have NO obligation to decide if it is "morally" correct or not. I cannot believe these type of people have any control what so ever over any policy in this country. This isn't the 11th century anymore.

|11.4.05 @ 2:12PM|#

OK, now that I've admittedly poisoned the well, to get back to the subject at hand I'll channel Cathy Young while my code runs:

I doubt that there were ever "good old days" when drug approvals were free of political problems. That said, problems can wax and wane over time. So one need not engage in unwarranted nostalgia to think that a problem is particularly bad right now.

As far as HPV vaccines, the article includes some scary quotes but nothing on how close the vaccine is to being considered for approval, or just how many people with clout are seriously opposed. Yeah, I know, Ron Bailey mentioned one guy on an advisory panel. What about the rest of the panel?

The opposition to Plan B is, well, not surprising. One need not agree with it to see why it's happening. But I would be much more surprised if the HPV vaccine opposition is anywhere near as significant.

If I'm proven wrong, well, I'll be very sad.

|11.4.05 @ 2:14PM|#

This is just twisted.
These social conservative nitwits are really starting to piss me off.
Why the hell would the FDA be listening to these people?
And people really take seriously the argument that medical progress is bad because it makes life less risky and allows people to enjoy themselves more?
What is it with these peoples' views of life? I guess it's the suffer on earth and be rewarded in heaven thing or something, but, Jesus, this is fucked-up.

Did you hear that Jesus?
These people are asking for your guidance all the time -- instill some damn sense in them, will ya?

|11.4.05 @ 2:14PM|#

smacky,

Christianity's very dim view vision of women was summed up long ago by St. Jerome.

|11.4.05 @ 2:18PM|#

What did he say Hak?

|11.4.05 @ 2:19PM|#

Smacky,

So what you are saying is that, if the drug in question innoculated men against a disease that caused their dicks to turn purple and fall off, we wouldn't even be having this discussion?

If that is what you are saying, I'd have to agree.

|11.4.05 @ 2:19PM|#

somebody with "www.farceswannamo.com" on his handle trying to remind us that science isn't omnipotent,

He'll eventually get around to pointing out that because science can't disprove something doesn't exist, our default position should be to assume it does.


Lest we forget, the religious at the center of this debate care nothing about protecting people from dangerous behavior. They're worried that their God will punish them for "allowing" others to sin.

Dave W.|11.4.05 @ 2:19PM|#

Please tell me that you didn't actually have to check the sig link to know it was me.

Clarifying *my* position: Personally, I think Plan B should be freely available, notwithstanding concerns about the zygotes. My metaphysical reasoning runs thus: zygotes are routinely flushed away already; teherefore they have little value; therefore I don't worry about terminating them, at least at the social compact, non-theological level. I think this argument is more persuasive than Bailey's technique of finding the least articulate opponents and cleaning their stupid clocks.

|11.4.05 @ 2:22PM|#

Dave W-

First, I know it was you, but I promised not to engage in identity speculations. So I decided to be circumspect. Yeah, I broke the promise anyway, but it was a misdemeanor violation only :)

I like your contributions to this forum, but I think we exhausted all there is to say in another debate on the limits of science. And while I tried to remain civil in that debate, other people accused you of basing decisions on your "imaginary friend" or something like that. So I was pessimistic that the debate would go anywhere.

|11.4.05 @ 2:24PM|#

On the matter at hand, you make a good point. And Ron Bailey does seem to have a habit of finding weak opponents.

|11.4.05 @ 2:25PM|#

Akira MacKenzie,

Some very nasty things about women. Suffice it to say, St. Jerome was a fanatic.

|11.4.05 @ 2:31PM|#

Akira MacKenzie,

More to the point, major Catholic figures throughout the Church's history have had generally very dim views of women. I'd say, as with most things, the Church's views only began to change when started to reject their misogynistic notions.

|11.4.05 @ 2:33PM|#

thoreau,

It could be the fact that the opponents are weak simply because the things we disagree with are indeed based on weak, etc. ideas.

|11.4.05 @ 2:33PM|#

mk,

Yes, that is exactly what I was alluding to.

Religion is one of the only "legitimate" organizations of today that still allows the undermining and blatant demeaning of a massive group of people (women). Funny that, the suppression of women is one area on which Christians, Jews, and Muslims can all agree.

|11.4.05 @ 2:40PM|#

mk,

Religion has been a traditional bulwark against societal change and certainly a weapon for those in power. Of course, its also been a weapon of the weak, though one generally of an ameliorative, rather than a revolutionary character; a role which people become distant from once they are free.

|11.4.05 @ 2:42PM|#

Where the hell's our Friday Fun Link, anyway?

|11.4.05 @ 2:44PM|#

Somebody just start a thread called "Religion is stupid" so that certain posters (OK, mostly one poster) can vent in several consecutive posts, and those who actually want to interact with our most obnoxious poster can do so. When the thread disappears from the main page, start another one with the same title.

Personally, I'm more interested in finding out whether Bailey made a mountain out of a mole hill on the HPV vaccine. I know that Plan B has been a major bone of contention, but I can't gauge from his article whether the HPV vaccine will face the same opposition.

|11.4.05 @ 2:45PM|#

Phil,

Sure, change the subject....oppressor!

|11.4.05 @ 2:46PM|#

Phil,

The FDA did not approved it. :)

|11.4.05 @ 2:47PM|#

Oh, and start a thread called "joe's a commie" so we don't have to hear it in every other thread.

|11.4.05 @ 2:47PM|#

OK, uncle. I admit it.

Conservatives have been politicizing the FDA since before Bush.

|11.4.05 @ 2:50PM|#

thoreau,

Gosh, can't have any criticism of religion. No sir. It might undermine thoreau's pathetic little reality.

|11.4.05 @ 2:51PM|#

I'm grouchy when my code isn't working.

|11.4.05 @ 2:53PM|#

I'm grouchy when my code isn't working.


thoreau,

me, too.

|11.4.05 @ 2:55PM|#

thoreau,

More to the point, you're a Catholic. You don't like criticism of your church or its history for that very reason. Its unfortunate that you remain so woefully ignorant of your Church's history; if you actually delved into it you'd see it isn't worth spit.

|11.4.05 @ 2:55PM|#

That's doctor thoreau to you, you unaccomplished weirdo.

|11.4.05 @ 2:56PM|#

*checks back in*

Can we throw in a "You libertarians should all get a clue and become Democrats, the only people who deserve oxygen" thread? ;)

And sympathies. Broken code does that...

|11.4.05 @ 2:58PM|#

Phil,

"unaccomplished weirdo?" Me? Why, thank you!

|11.4.05 @ 3:01PM|#

Hak, in answer to your question - chill on the freaking harping. Thoreau has his quirks like the rest of us, but he's a nicer and slower-tempered commentor than most people here, including myself. He's also honest about his opinions. Getting a rise out of him isn't an accomplishment, it's a hint you might be doing something wrong.

|11.4.05 @ 3:03PM|#

Phil, check your yahoo account. Some of us libertarians have embarked on a strike of sorts, and in your email there's an invitation to join us in our Gulch.

Smacky, I'm pretty sure he wasn't talking to you. But if you take it as a compliment, well, we all love you here, so we'll call you whatever you like.

|11.4.05 @ 3:05PM|#

No, no, smacky, you're an accomplished weirdo. As distinguished from me, an unaccomplished jerk. There's whole hierarchies here. It's very complex.

|11.4.05 @ 3:06PM|#

Do I qualify as an "accomplished jerk?"

|11.4.05 @ 3:07PM|#

"unaccomplished weirdo?" Me? Why, thank you!

Don'T sell yourself short, smacky. You're a very accomplished weirdo.(apologies to ty webb)

|11.4.05 @ 3:09PM|#

Phil,

PhDs are a dime a dozen.

Eric the .5b,

Sorry, but thoreau's the one who is the one harps, not I. Watching thoreau blog is like watching a movie over and over again.

|11.4.05 @ 3:09PM|#

No, joe, you're an accomplished schmuck. Jerkdom requires more profanity. Like I said, hierarchies.

I think I have a pamphlet here somewhere . . .

|11.4.05 @ 3:11PM|#

I swear to allah and all that is holy, there are a couple of people on here who fight like an old married couple.

I'm not naming names...so don't ask.

|11.4.05 @ 3:11PM|#

Holy crap!

If a man is unable to get along with thoreau, such a man is unable to get along with anyone.

I tell you verily, such a one is not fit to live among you, O Jerusalem. Drive him out unto the wilderness, yea, to howl and gnash his teeth. And he shall feed upon grass and beetles, and be as like one of the beasts of the field.

|11.4.05 @ 3:13PM|#

I'm only too happy to live with theists like thoreau. He seems content to live his own life without trying to live those of others.

That said, I really don't care if the anti-HPV crowd is one man grumbling alone in his basement or a billion members strong. The fact is they exist, and given the political and religious make up of the current Administration, I don't think it is irrational to worry that they might find a sympathetic ear in the FDA.

|11.4.05 @ 3:13PM|#

Stevo Darkly,

I always wanted to play the part of Jesus. :)

|11.4.05 @ 3:14PM|#

Phil, David, thoreau, et al.,

accomplished weirdo

I try hard!

Thank you! I'm here....indefinately.

|11.4.05 @ 3:15PM|#

Hakluyt, you do seem a bit on about thoreau's Papist tendencies. What gives? It's not something to do with Guy Fawkes Day, is it? I mean, I think it might've done the world some good if James I had gotten blown up. I say that as a nominal Protestant, I suppose I should add.

|11.4.05 @ 3:15PM|#

Do I qualify as an "accomplished jerk?"

Well, we all have our moments, joe.

|11.4.05 @ 3:15PM|#

smacky,

Oh, I like thoreau well enough, but his constant effort to be the hall monitor is rather annoying.

|11.4.05 @ 3:16PM|#

Everyone's code is broken today. I'm so exasperated, I'm seriously thinking of going back to waiting tables.

Of course, its also been a weapon of the weak, though one generally of an ameliorative, rather than a revolutionary character

I'm sure Edward Gibbon would have agreed with you. That's one of the reasons why I enjoyed his mag opus so much actually.

|11.4.05 @ 3:18PM|#

Here's another article on the topic. I'm not going to engage in the religion/anti-religion debate, but reading this article, one must admit that the conservatives are going a bit too far, especially in light of the fact that the vaccine is "almost 100% effective".

|11.4.05 @ 3:19PM|#

P.L.,

I say rather mean things about all religions.

I point these things out to thoreau because he is a Catholic. If he were a Baptist, Muslim, etc. I'd point out the similarly terrible history of those groups.

Now why I wrote them specifically to him today? If he feels free to fire shots across my bow, why can't I do the same?

|11.4.05 @ 3:21PM|#

mk,

Well, for all the benefits that Christianity gave to American slaves as an ameliorative agent, it never provided much in the way of a revolutionary spirit for them to take down the system. Slave ministers would speak in code (numerous historians have spent numerous years looking just at sermons) about Moses that masters certainly would have found problematic, but ultimately they never used that Biblical tale as a means to encite a general revolt.

|11.4.05 @ 3:23PM|#

I tell you verily, such a one is not fit to live among you, O Jerusalem.

Er, I wouldn't say that. I've griped at him after all for irritating, but tiny things. :)

|11.4.05 @ 3:25PM|#

I point these things out to thoreau because he is a Catholic. If he were a Baptist, Muslim, etc. I'd point out the similarly terrible history of those groups.

Hmmmmm... I wonder if the Buddhists ever did anything as nasty as the Abrahamic religions?

Just asking mind you.

|11.4.05 @ 3:27PM|#

Oh, well, it takes a lot to get under my skin, and I'd rather not get personal. . .most of the time. I think I lost my temper once with joe on some crack he made about southerners; otherwise, this is just a comment thread on a blog. Not the center of the universe. Unless solipsism is correct, and I am the only being in existence. In which case, of course, this whole process is comically pointless.

|11.4.05 @ 3:27PM|#

Hope for interesting discourse.

We've already got ... all the ... signs of a clusterfuck in the making.


Oh, come on. Mr. Marius can still get in on this argument and point out that techne / scientism / whatever the hell he's calling non-spiritualism these days can't solve our problems. I get the sense you've just done a Kyle Broflovski (sp) whenever Eric Cartman comes up with a particularly stupid or evil idea--"I'm out."

Yes, I am SOOOOO SLLLLOOOOOOWWWW at responding.

|11.4.05 @ 3:28PM|#

Akira,

To my recollection, the major Eastern religions (Buddhism, Hinduism) have anti-woman patriarchies also...possibly not to the extent of the other major religions -- I can't verify how bad their misogyny is, but I do know it's there.

|11.4.05 @ 3:29PM|#

Don't take me too seriously. For some reason I just had a Biblical flashback. It's a contrarian thing.

I always wanted to play the part of Jesus. :)

I was probably thinking more along the lines of Nebuchadnezzar, for some subconscious reason.

|11.4.05 @ 3:31PM|#

Akira,

Buddhists have done some pretty vicious stuff over the years. Indeed, the Dalai Lama has stated on numerous occassions that the attack on Tibet in 1959 was karmic comeuppance for past bad acts.

|11.4.05 @ 3:34PM|#

Stevp Darkly,

I know, but I just wanted to turn your comment against you. :)

smacky,

In at least some sects (maybe all) of Buddhism a woman can't reach nirvana. I had an argument over this very point with a Tibetan Buddhist monk I was studying with.

|11.4.05 @ 3:35PM|#

I've always thought one of the reasons Christianity appealed to slave cultures--Nietzsche's views aside--was its strong Stoical component. Yeah, okay, it might not inspire you to kill the masters and free your brothers, but it does help to free the spirit. And I mean that in the philosophical sense, not the metaphysical one. Naturally, you could get the same effect with just applying Stoicism without the Christian baggage, but that's not how it worked out. Interestingly, a major Stoic philosopher, Epictetus, was a slave. Contrast that with Marcus Aurelius as Stoic and emperor to get a headache, if you like :)

On the other hand, Gandhi was heavily, perhaps ever primarily influenced by Christian principles when it came to putting together his revolution through nonviolence. Go figure.

|11.4.05 @ 3:37PM|#

OK, I have to respond to this one:

Hak, you go to a top 5 department, you get past the attrition rate, you find an exception to a hotshot's theory, you do another project that is a successful collaboration with industry, you get yourself a postdoc at one of the best research institutes in the world, and then we'll talk about dime-a-dozen. And if I ever get this code to work, I'll have even more things to rub in your face.

Just go away. Please. Before you embarass yourself any further. We're sick of you.

Back to my boycott on responding to him.

|11.4.05 @ 3:40PM|#

thoreau,

The problem is that all of things are more than simply a PhD. There is a flaw in your analysis in other words. Again, PhDs are a dime a dozen.

|11.4.05 @ 3:43PM|#

thoreau,

If you simply told me, as I was told by Phil there, that you have a PhD, I'd go "so what?" Lots and lots of people get PhDs, they are a very common thing any more.

|11.4.05 @ 3:44PM|#

thoreau,

And you never had a boycott. You made up some bizarro, hypocritical rule that you wouldn't argue with me. A rule you continually break I must add.

|11.4.05 @ 3:45PM|#

I've noticed many of the same things P.L.

It seems to me that Stoicism was a lot like Christianity but without the big payoff at the end. I can't help but notice that many of Aurelius' notes in his Meditations dwelt on his upcoming death. The lack of a concentration on the afterlife, however, probably kept his mind on earthly matters. One of the reasons why he was such an effective emperor, I guess.

On Smacky's topic, I don't remember old Marcus saying anything particularly misogynistic. He comes across as a rather nice and wise, if a bit pathetic at times.

|11.4.05 @ 3:47PM|#

Feh.

Now I'm ignoring you to, Hak.

|11.4.05 @ 3:50PM|#

I worship Tweek. All others must be bombed.

|11.4.05 @ 3:50PM|#

mk,

He was dumb enough to create Commudus as co-emporer. :(

I've always like his statue on Capitoline Hill. :)

|11.4.05 @ 3:51PM|#

kmw,

As in the character from South Park?

|11.4.05 @ 3:52PM|#

Eric-

Welcome to the strike! I was actually about to email you an invitation to a valley occupied by many reasonable H&R commenters, a copper tycoon, and a pirate (who has nothing to do with global warming, I assure you! ;)

I won't identify our members on the forum, but our name is Legion, for we are many.

|11.4.05 @ 3:55PM|#

Come to think of it, just today I was reading an article at Slate about how Lincoln's "depressive realism" helped to make him an exceptional president. Having just read a fair portion of Meditations, I think the same goes for Aurelius.
Also, Hak, I think depressive realism explains a lot about how Commodus ended up in power :)

Already today I have uncovered the hidden relationship between health care coverage and indie-rock band size. Now I have finally put Aurelius and Lincoln together as compatriots. I dare say that I am halfway to being less than completely clueless.

Oh and Thoreau, Smacky. LEt's try doing each other's code. Really, it couldn't get any worse on my end.

|11.4.05 @ 3:56PM|#

Hrm. Now I am serious. Hak, you're getting nasty.

*shrug*

thoreau, you have my e-mail address in case you ever need it, right?

|11.4.05 @ 3:57PM|#

Hak,

Yep, that's the one. "Simpson's did it first" is probably my favorite episode.

|11.4.05 @ 3:58PM|#

mk,

Its not a way I've ever thought of his decision before. I've always assumed it was a blindspot caused by the fact of their relationship. He certainly couldn't have picked a worst person to succeed him.

|11.4.05 @ 3:59PM|#

Stevo Darkly,

How am I getting nasty?

|11.4.05 @ 4:00PM|#

Already today I have uncovered the hidden relationship between health care coverage and indie-rock band size.

Do tell, mk.

Oh and mk, regarding: Let's try doing each other's code.

I guess I should correct my previous statement. It's not so much that my code is "broken" as it is I'm not done with it yet. H&R is a procrastinator's dream come true. Especially on these infighting threads.

Rick H.|11.4.05 @ 4:01PM|#

That said, I really don't care if the anti-HPV crowd is one man grumbling alone in his basement or a billion members strong. The fact is they exist, and given the political and religious make up of the current Administration, I don't think it is irrational to worry that they might find a sympathetic ear in the FDA.

I think you meant to say the pro-HPV crowd, which is what those god-fearing creeps really are. And, I agree.

|11.4.05 @ 4:02PM|#

smacky-

My code is compiling just fine. But the numbers aren't coming out right. Not even on simple test cases. So it's most definitely "broken."

How can I ever hope to revolutionize microscopy if I can't even calculate an intensity-intensity correlation function properly?

|11.4.05 @ 4:03PM|#

smacky,

Well, there is one of the many benefits to being ignored I suppose - less opportunity to procrastinate. :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:04PM|#

Who said that?

|11.4.05 @ 4:04PM|#

Herr Doktor Thoreau,

Pretty strong provocation but I have rarely seen you so browned off. I saw a theory a few - well a lot - of threads back that Joe was just a piece of code. Maybe M. Hakluyt is just a pimply teenager with a Asperger Syndrome or a piece of code that mimics one?

I hope your code works out. (I'm assuming it's computer code not Morse Code.)

QFMC cos. V

|11.4.05 @ 4:07PM|#

Fabius maximus,

You should see thoreau when he starts to threaten the life of any lawyer he can get his hands on. :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:08PM|#

smacky,

The ghost.

|11.4.05 @ 4:08PM|#

mk, I just know I've run across something about Christ likely having some exposure to Stoicism. Unless you just have to assume everything was divinely inspired, it makes sense. The Romans knew about and advanced the philosophy, and I think there's little doubt that Christianity proved to be a hybrid of Hellenistic thinking and old Jewish ideas. Frankly, one wonders if the religion of Christianity might not have had a less checkered past if it had focused more on those Stoic principles and a little less on the "next life". The emphasis on death has had major reprecussions, I think.

Religion aside, I find Stoicism quite admirable as an ethical philosophy. Wish I were tough enough to call myself one, but I seem to lack the necessary detachment. Still, there's something truly noble--and scary--about someone who lives for virtue and takes the world as it comes. Wow.

|11.4.05 @ 4:09PM|#

Fabius-

Matlab code. Yeah, I know, nothing sophisticated like a software engineer would be impressed by. The challenges are mathematical, not technical. I'm proudest of my efforts to avoid ever having to calculate a square root during a loop. Evaluating functions like that slows the thing down massively. In grad school, I remember a person in my lab writing code to calculate something with light scattering. She had to evaluate the cosine of a parameter. Rather than evaluating it once at the beginning of the code, she evaluated it again and again and again, every time the parameter came up. Slowed her down tremendously.

My algorithm involves taking the square root of a different parameter every time, so I can't just evaluate it once. Instead I use the parameters as much as possible rather than the square roots, which poses another set of technical challenges. But I solved those challenges, and I now have a program that gives wrong answers very efficiently.

OK, time to do like OJ and take another stab at this.

|11.4.05 @ 4:10PM|#

Ha ha! That's my new favorite insult: "You piece of code."

It's actually a really funny gag: My favorite is when some fundie jackass spouts on and on about some stupid thing, and then I pretend like he's a robot that I'm debugging.

|11.4.05 @ 4:13PM|#

As "he who must not be named" might say, "Bonne chance".

|11.4.05 @ 4:14PM|#

P.L.,

The cross currents between Christianity and Greek and Roman philosophy are many.

|11.4.05 @ 4:15PM|#

Fabius Marximus,

Don't go breaking the rule now. :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:16PM|#

Back in my days in academia (working, I mean), my NSF money guy told me he respected my terminal degree (the JD, that is) and most other terminal degrees, so long as they weren't in education. I cast no aspersions myself, but I tend to respect technical and scientific PhDs as a general rule. On the other hand, I reserve judgment to a case-by-case basis for doctorates in the humanities and in the social sciences. And often in the law, if it makes any offended folk out there feel any better :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:17PM|#

I think you meant to say the pro-HPV crowd, which is what those god-fearing creeps really are. And, I agree.

I think I meant "anti" in the sense that they oppopse the approval and distribution of HPV.

|11.4.05 @ 4:18PM|#

Fundie Jackass must be a relatively simple program. Not much variation, hence predictable.

The genius who programmed Joe v2.7 and Hak v7.91 is a great man.

Me? I was Lurker v0.3 but I'm open source so I evolved.

|11.4.05 @ 4:19PM|#

P.L.,

Well, an education graduate degree is all about the "science" of pedagogy. Having watched a graduate school course in education being taught once for about fifteen minutes, I can say I would have shot myself if I had to deal with that stuff full time.

|11.4.05 @ 4:20PM|#

Apostate Jew,

"Fundie Jackass" is easy code, even for beginners. It's just an infinite loop. :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:20PM|#

Apostate Jew,

:)

|11.4.05 @ 4:22PM|#

Akira, "HPV" stands for Human Papilloma Virus.

|11.4.05 @ 4:22PM|#

Apostate Jew,

That was one of the funniest things I've read in a while.

|11.4.05 @ 4:22PM|#

I share the same feelings P.L.

According to Barzun, there have been resurgences of stoicism in Europe down through the ages, but none that ever broke out of the intellectual elite of the time (passing fads iow).

When I first saw The Life Of Brian as a teen, I completely missed the running joke about the stoicism of the Romans compared to the other characters in the movie. When I saw the movie again later I enjoyed that movie on a whole new level.

Anyway, my code isn't really broken so much as I have found a bug in the way that Microsoft Access front-ends can't really talk to SQL 2k back-ends. Not my fault really. Nothing that several hours of redesigning my front-end won't fix.
*sighs*

|11.4.05 @ 4:23PM|#

Apostate Jew,

You want to try the Beta version of Hak8.0? :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:31PM|#

Oh Smacky,

Back in the latest Canada thread. We started discussing how canadian rock bands get loans from the government. It was a short leap from that to realizing that the Arcade Fire, New Pornographers and the Broken Social Scene all have an enormous ever-rotating rosters as opposed to US bands like White Stripes, Black Keys and Death From ABove 1979 who seem content feature only two musicians. Naturally, I concluded that the health care and welfare situation in Canada would inevitably lead to mass starvation in indie-rock circles there as their indie-rock economy collapses under it's own weight, leading to further government programs etcetera.

|11.4.05 @ 4:31PM|#

Nothing that several hours of redesigning my front-end won't fix.

mk --

If it makes you feel any better, I think your back-end is just fine the way it is!

bada-bing!

|11.4.05 @ 4:34PM|#

mk,

So what you're saying is that you think there are more indie bands in Canada, churning out more records and more tours, because of government arts funding? If that's what you're saying than I completely agree.

|11.4.05 @ 4:35PM|#

First, the "female sexist pig" comment wasn't mine, even though the poster used the faux email address that I use when joking ([e-mail])

Second, since this thread has become a code blog, I fixed one major problem. I got reasonable numbers in a simple case. Now I'm waiting for the more general case to run.

|11.4.05 @ 4:36PM|#

mk, to engage in a little GM-like eschatology, it's rather sad that Stoicism has such a weak following today. We could use it, that's for sure. I wonder how much fun the media would poke at a truly stoical leader. Probably enough to crush even him. We really hate nobility in this time and age.

Hakluyt, while I have no real personal contact with education PhDs, I have my suspicions about the value of that particular degree program. However, as an undergraduate, I will say that when I wanted to meet the most babe-a-licious girls, I studied at the college of education. When I wanted to study, I studied at the engineering school.

|11.4.05 @ 4:36PM|#

You want to try the Beta version of Hak8.0? :)

I bet you use that line at the disco bar every weekend.

|11.4.05 @ 4:37PM|#

thoreau,

Lots of people use it. No one really associates it with you.

|11.4.05 @ 4:38PM|#

Akira, "HPV" stands for Human Papilloma Virus.

Oh... Is my face red. I thought the "V" stood for "Vaccine." Excuse me, I have to find a large blunt object to beat myself with.

|11.4.05 @ 4:38PM|#

not a boycotter,

Ha ha ha. Someone topped Apostate Jew. :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:39PM|#

Excuse me, I have to find a large blunt object to beat myself with.

Can I help?

|11.4.05 @ 4:41PM|#

Why not? I'm already a mental masochist, I suppose it's not too far a jump to the physical variety.

|11.4.05 @ 4:42PM|#

P.L.,

My experience was merely by chance. I happened to be leaving a classroom that was connected to another classroom and divided by those flimsy accordion-like dividers and as I was leaving they started class up and I decided to listen in for a bit. I nearly fell over and had a stroke just that bare amount of time.

|11.4.05 @ 4:42PM|#

Smacky,

I'm saying that american indie-rock is lean and mean and ready to play in the global marketplace. The Canadians have given up their competitive edge. Also, as more and more canadians give up their successful careers to join indie-rock collectives, the Canadian economy will reach a point where they will have to change their policies. Much the same phenom has occurred in Scandanavia where 1 in 10 college graduates have left careers in disposable furniture design to join satanic death-metal bands.

|11.4.05 @ 4:43PM|#

"Where the hell's our Friday Fun Link, anyway?"

I think Hak ate it.

|11.4.05 @ 4:43PM|#

Akira,

I have a nice mace you could use. :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:45PM|#

I will say that when I wanted to meet the most babe-a-licious girls, I studied at the college of education.

Pro-Libertate,

Really? Most of the education majors at my school knew how to cake on a whole lot of makeup and wear overpriced yet tacky clothes...still many came off as though they were frontally lobotomized. (Frontal lobotomy != sexy, imho.)

|11.4.05 @ 4:48PM|#

Jason Ligon,

Wasn't that a movie? :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:53PM|#

Most of the education majors at my school knew how to cake on a whole lot of makeup and wear overpriced yet tacky clothes...still many came off as though they were frontally lobotomized.

Then again, a lot of the girls at my school were like that....maybe I shouldn't be discriminating by major.

|11.4.05 @ 4:55PM|#

smacky,

Where did you go to school?

|11.4.05 @ 4:55PM|#

Sure, the availability of the HPV virus is a good thing, and it's nuts to try to ban it on the grounds that it might lead impressionable youngsters into sex. But the rantings of obscurantists right-wingers isn't the entire story. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, there are some people who want to make the virus *mandatory*: "'I would like to see it that if you don't have your HPV vaccine, you can't start high school,' said Juan Carlos Felix of the University of Southern California, who leads the National Cervical Cancer Coalition's medical advisory panel."

And that's just nuts. It assumes that sexual activity is the default setting. It's as nuts as the Coburn-Ackerman proposal from a few years ago to make AIDS testing for newborn babies mandatory, even if their mothers are monogomous non-drug using heterosexuals married to monogamous non-drug using heterosexuals.

|11.4.05 @ 4:56PM|#

If it makes you feel any better, I think your back-end is just fine the way it is!

This is the nicest thing anyone has said to me for some time.
*wipes away a tear*

|11.4.05 @ 4:56PM|#

Well, to be fair, smacky, I went to the University of Florida, which has a radically disproportionate number of attractive women. I certainly have always preferred smarter women, but I daresay that I may have had other emphases back in my youth. Anyway, there were plenty of plastic girls in education, but they were offset by the truly hot. This was in the mid-80s, I might add, when Florida girls were wearing Dolphin shorts and tanktops. I just added a year to my life remembering that :)

|11.4.05 @ 4:57PM|#

How am I getting nasty?

Dude, it's cumulative.

First you take a whack at thoreau. Thoreau, for God's sake. Whose biggest "fault" is that he hopes some of these threads generate more enlightenment and entertainment than flame. Then you take a whack at him for that.

Then you denigrate the content of his posts here, which dammit, I think most people would agree are consistently interesting and witty. Which is more than one can say for Rant Against Religion #4671.

So then you take a more biting and rather gratuitous swipe against his religious belief -- gratuitous because thoreau is extremely mellow as believers go, and hardly a theocrat. He's not hurting anyone. Also, there's a difference between "criticizing" and doing it in a dickly manner.

And then you denigrate his Ph.D., which you know he busted his ass on and prizes as an accomplishment, which it is. You're not even attacking ideas and arguments anymore, you're just jabbing at the things that he holds most dearly. Next you'll be laying into his wife and his momma.

Your tactics are unworthy; your choice of a target is mystifying.

PS: While I was writing this, I had to take a client call. Now it looks like maybe this thread has moved on. Should I still post this?

I think I will. For next time. Although the heat has chilled a bit.

|11.4.05 @ 4:57PM|#

Hak,

Some third-tier, Midwestern religious joint. Proper names are inconsequential and likely not neccessary.

|11.4.05 @ 4:58PM|#

I meant to include a link to the SF Chronicle article:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/10/31/MNG2LFGJFT1.DTL#story

|11.4.05 @ 4:59PM|#

The hot chicks were not in the physics department, though I had hopes with Centre being a liberal arts school and all.

I did meet the wife in college though. International Relations and Spanish double major. It was one of those build your own liberal arts degrees.

|11.4.05 @ 5:02PM|#

This is the nicest thing anyone has said to me for some time.


mk,

You're welcome. *wink*

|11.4.05 @ 5:02PM|#

Ah, the ala carte liberal arts degree! I dated a girl who had one of those. She got a degree in "independent studies". Like, I've been independently studying my whole life. Should I be getting an honorary PhD or something?

|11.4.05 @ 5:03PM|#

Pro L,

Boo hoo hoo, there's not enough stoicism in the world! Oh, boo hoo! ;-)

I went to school in DC, and you would not believe the women in that place.

|11.4.05 @ 5:06PM|#

Seriously, you would not believe the women there. They lie through their teeth constantly.

AND THERE IS SO NOT ENOUGH STOICISM JOE!
*sobs, pulls out hair*

|11.4.05 @ 5:07PM|#

The worst thing about science and engineering departments is that any woman who actually wants a boyfriend has one. The rest have lots of male friends whom they callously string along. I eventually jumped off of that treadmill and went to a church singles dance, where I met a very nice woman. A year and a half later I proposed to her. Today we're happily married.

The code is, well, better. Still somewhat surprising, but functional. My big plans may yet come to fruition.

|11.4.05 @ 5:10PM|#

joe, I must acknowledge DC's status in the World of Women. When I worked at the White House as a fellow in '95, I was taken aback by the amazing number of young hotties. I figured out why they were there pretty quickly, but it was still something I hadn't expected. The WH staff had a disproportionate share of them, but I was told that that was true when Old Man Bush was there, too. Still, it only reminded me of UF; it didn't surpass it.

Stop attacking my Stoicism, or I'll throw a temper tantrum.

|11.4.05 @ 5:13PM|#

The worst thing about science and engineering departments is that any woman who actually wants a boyfriend has one. The rest have lots of male friends whom they callously string along.

Yes. But to be fair, thoreau, some of them won't go away. They are delusional and into self-flagellation and that sort of crap. They can be total Cleopatras (Queens of Denial). For every time I've heard the phrase, Ladies, he's just not into you! thrown in the face of an angry Maureen Dowd-type feminist, here is one place where I can reciprocate. (Nothing personal intended, thoreau, if you were alluding to being denied in the past by said women...)

|11.4.05 @ 5:16PM|#

There is one guy I have in mind, who after being rejected by me blatantly on multiple occasions, still asked me what I was doing on Halloween weekend this year.

|11.4.05 @ 5:18PM|#

The worst thing about science and engineering departments is that any woman who actually wants a boyfriend has one.

The same can be said for us gamers. Gaming is pretty much a male dominated hobby--one populated by largely unattractive guys. Competition for the few females who do come into the hobby is fierce, especially for the rarer, attatactive women.

|11.4.05 @ 5:19PM|#

smacky-

I could be bad, but never that bad. If they kept their distance I took the hint. But if they kept flirting and enjoying the attention that mixed signals will bring, I tended to hang around for a while. Eventually, though, I realized what was happening and stopped falling for that game. I swore off scientists and engineers and am now happily married to a bookstore employee.

|11.4.05 @ 5:20PM|#

THoreau,

I work in a Mental Health center. Imagine the situation you describe, but with the added insult that virtually every single one of your co-workers is female.

Where was this church dance again?

|11.4.05 @ 5:21PM|#

Lemme tell ya, there's nothing like being married to somebody who gets 30% off on books and 50% off on baked goods!

|11.4.05 @ 5:21PM|#

In fact, I've rejected him not only on certain terms, but in fact one time I was actually what some may call "mean" about it....still not getting through. I'm only going to start worrying when he goes all Ken Schultz' girlfriend on me and starts posting on here to be around me.

|11.4.05 @ 5:23PM|#

vabs-

Thanks for bringing us back on topic!


mk-

St. Jude's Parish, West Lake Village, California. St. Jude is the patron saint of lost causes, interestingly enough.

|11.4.05 @ 5:23PM|#

smacky, chasing strange girls around post rejection is for losers. Now, if you know someone and like her enough to maybe endure a little doubt on her part, fine, but I'm not too interested in a woman who doesn't have the sense to like me, in all my humble, Stoical glory :) Women weren't a big problem for me at that age (I was in the business college after all, and had free time), though I was often frustrated by their seemingly random taste in men. I did really well with hippie chicks, "good girls", and crazy sluts. Don't ask.

|11.4.05 @ 5:26PM|#

Pro Libertate,

I did really well with hippie chicks, "good girls", and crazy sluts.

Doesn't that pretty much sum up to every female you met? :)

smacky, chasing strange girls around post rejection is for losers.

Yes, I think that's what I was getting at, in a roundabout way.

|11.4.05 @ 5:27PM|#

smacky,

Some of us men are guilty of eternal optomism and/or extreme thick-headedness (or a combination of both).

OTOH, a small monority of us are deranged creeps, but I'm sure that you realize that already. Do you have a taser?

|11.4.05 @ 5:28PM|#

smacky, chasing strange girls around post rejection is for losers.

Heh... Even a social retard like me knows that.

|11.4.05 @ 5:30PM|#

Do you have a taser?

Meh-heh-heh Yeah! Use tha taser! The taser! Meh-heh-heh Shoot him in the butt!

|11.4.05 @ 5:31PM|#

Lemme tell ya, there's nothing like being married to somebody who gets 30% off on books and 50% off on baked goods!

I confess, I initially read that as something like:

"Lemme tell ya, there's nothing like being married to somebody who 'gets off' 30% of the time from reading books and 50% of the time from eating baked goods!"

I apologized for the bizarre speculations on your sex life that this briefly engendered.

|11.4.05 @ 5:33PM|#

I apologized for the bizarre speculations on your sex life that this briefly engendered.

Don't feel bad. I was under the same impression for few seconds myself. However, after the "anti-HPV" slip above, I didn't want to say something else stupid... at least, not in this thread.

|11.4.05 @ 5:34PM|#

Gosh no, smacky, I didn't mean to imply that. I'm not sure how to clarify, but I'll say that I failed the usual 80% of the time. I've always been reasonably popular with women, but I'm not like some . I was drunk most of the time I was there, anyway, which explains a lot, I think. Including why I'm a lawyer and not a PhD in physics. Oops.

Incidentally, you can have the crazy sluts. Not worth it, even at 17.

|11.4.05 @ 5:34PM|#

Stevo,

Initially I read it the same way. I think I'm starting to understand the way your mind works.

With that thought, maybe I should take a break from H&R for a while...

|11.4.05 @ 5:36PM|#

"like some [fill in the blank]". Danged comment software.

|11.4.05 @ 5:37PM|#

Incidentally, you can have the crazy sluts.

No thanks; I had crazy sluts for breakfast.

|11.4.05 @ 5:37PM|#

Hey smacky! I can't believe it - what are the odds that I'd run into you here? I didn't know you liked H&R too! See, we have so much in common it's almost uncanny. Any plans for Thanksgiving?

|11.4.05 @ 5:38PM|#

Jeez, to further clarify, that would be me at 17, for the love of God.

|11.4.05 @ 5:39PM|#

They should make a movie called "There's something about Smacky."

|11.4.05 @ 5:40PM|#

I nominate Hakluyt to play "Woogie".

*lol*
*gasp*

|11.4.05 @ 5:40PM|#

Gee, smacky, he sounds like a swell fella. I think you should give up your crazy sluts and go out with him. It'd be keen.

|11.4.05 @ 5:41PM|#

They should make a movie called "There's something about Smacky."

Personally, I'm waiting for the Smacky/Jennifer Swim Suit Calendar.

|11.4.05 @ 5:42PM|#

Stevo darkly,

First you take a whack at thoreau.

No, thoreau took a whack at me, and was rather specific about it. While trying to ignore me at the same time tried to insult me. I mean really, at least he could grow a sack and actually stop his childish antics of ignoring me while writing to me at the same time. If you are going to ignore me, then ignore me; quit vacillating between the two, while trying to take a swipe at me when it is convenient.

Whose biggest "fault" is that he hopes some of these threads generate more enlightenment and entertainment than flame.

Dude, flame wars don't start here because of me, and if he has a problem with them he shouldn't visit this site. I sat out of commenting for a week or so just to see what would happen; my lack of presence neither diminished or increased the amount of flaming going on. Furthermore, whenever thoreau wants to flame someone he goes right ahead and does it, whereas us less enlightened masses mustn't partake of such. What a joke. When thoreau can practice what he preaches he might be worth listening to.

Then you denigrate the content of his posts here, which dammit, I think most people would agree are consistently interesting and witty.

Actually, they are the same thing over and over again. And when does say something original he comes up with the goofiest things like his rant about WMDs.

Which is more than one can say for Rant Against Religion #4671.

I see, so, someone else disses religion, and I respond to that diss, which makes it my rant? Right.

...gratuitous because thoreau is extremely mellow as believers go...

Someone who doesn't actually believe in the particulars of the Church that they weekly attend deserves to be swiped at.

And then you denigrate his Ph.D. ...

No, I wrote that PhDs as a rule are a dime a dozen. I didn't denigrate his in particular. You're reasoning is confused.

...which you know he busted his ass on and prizes as an accomplishment...,/i>

No, I didn't know any of that. I don't know everything about thoreau after all.

|11.4.05 @ 5:42PM|#

Initially I read it the same way. I think I'm starting to understand the way your mind works.

That is scary on so many levels.

Maybe if you wear the same goggles that Spock wore when he met with the Medusan ambassador...

(Ubergeek reference.)

|11.4.05 @ 5:44PM|#

whoosh!

What was that thing that just flew over my head? Oh, it must be Stevo's last comment.

|11.4.05 @ 5:45PM|#

Hak: You're right, of course.

Viking Moose (aka drf)|11.4.05 @ 5:45PM|#

thoreau -

how are you with transfer function estimation in SAS? i'm having trouble with the crosscor var=x(1) bit.

(that's a serious question - i can't figure out how to get the impulse response function weights out of this). nor can i figure out if B34S (since nobody knows what that is...) is doing it "correctly". hrumph.

matlab at least is more user friendly than RATS. :)

(if that were a useful distinction)

but people - what's with all the snark today?

remember Hak's wise words once: BE THE DUCK! (i'm paraphrasing, of course).

Be the duck.
Pour the drinks.
Be the duck.

|11.4.05 @ 5:46PM|#

Maybe if you wear the same goggles that Spock wore when he met with the Medusan ambassador...

"Brain and Brain! What is Brain?"

(Not the same episode, I know. But...)

|11.4.05 @ 5:47PM|#

Oh! The above comment was not intended to be comment on the intellegence of anyone in the H&R boards. It was the best Spock-related qoute that came to my mind at that moment.

|11.4.05 @ 5:47PM|#

drf-

Sorry, not familiar with your jargon. We'd need to sit down in person and work out a translation. I'm still banging my head against my problem. I solved some of it, but now I've got some weird stuff going on. When I fix one thing another thing breaks. When I un-fix the first thing that fixes the second thing.

I'm not going home until I figure this out. I may be here for a while.

|11.4.05 @ 5:47PM|#

P.L.,

I did really well with hippie chicks, "good girls", and crazy sluts.

So you covered all three types, huh? :)

Viking Moose|11.4.05 @ 5:52PM|#

Hak-

now if we could figure out where "white zin" drinkers fit in with that unholy trinity of sweaty, sweaty, heaving lust.

(oh my! mercy!)

oh well. sorry for the bother Thoreau. sigh. with code issues experienced by you, Smacky, and me, you'd think it was like a, i dunno, mondae :)

good luck! (i can see if matlab buddy is home - is it a syntax issue you're having?)

|11.4.05 @ 5:52PM|#

Oh, for the love of Zeus. Let's say very hippie girls, very good girls, and very crazy sluts to tighten up the range. Bitchy chicks didn't like me, I remember that, and there were plenty of them at Florida. And proto-Yuppie types turned me off as I offended them.

Is that better? I should've been geekier, but I radically changed majors during rush, when I decided to spend college inebriated. On second thought, considering that I was eligible to go Ivy League and went to UF anyhow, maybe I went crazy earlier on.

|11.4.05 @ 5:53PM|#

Stevo Darkly,

Right or wrong, if thoreau doesn't want to converse with me, he should what he says he is going to do. My lord, its like having a freaking lost puppy at one's side.

smacky,

Damn, you beat me to the punch.

|11.4.05 @ 5:54PM|#

There was an episode of the old Trek about an alien amassador who was so unbearable to look upon that it would drive human insane. Spock has to wear special goggles when in contact with the alien to keep his sanity intact.

Understanding how my mind works is similarly dangerous. Protect your mind, smacky.

|11.4.05 @ 5:55PM|#

P.L.,

Going to an Ivy League school can be a fat waste of time.

|11.4.05 @ 5:57PM|#

Of course, Hak.

Viking Moose|11.4.05 @ 5:57PM|#

Stevo:

frightening how well at our chicago meeting that pretty much all the minds worked pretty well together.

chocolate or vanilia? :) heh!

|11.4.05 @ 5:58PM|#

thoreau,

i made a small comment on the topic, but i don't think i brought the discussion back on topic. i appreciate your comment though.

i knew your wife isn't a harlot for baked goods, by the way. at least, not in a sexual sense.

happy coding and happy friday...

|11.4.05 @ 5:59PM|#

Hak,

You won't admit to being even more aggressive and caustic than you used to be? I've certainly noticed it over the last, oh, month and change maybe.

An argument that has flaws from your perspective can likely be enhanced by calling attention to the weak spots. That is all part of normal discourse. It doesn't follow that a person who makes such an argument is incredibly stupid, though, and making such comments is, well, off putting, you know? Starkly commenting on your lack of respect for someone is a pretty big stick to pull out. I don't know about quantity of flames, but most of the real unpleasant ones I've seen over the past several weeks have involved you. On some of these I agreed with your general position, but, damn bro, it seemed to me like you should take your foot off the gas. You can do whatever you want, of course, I'm just sayin' ...

|11.4.05 @ 5:59PM|#

Stevo Darkly,

For someone reason I was thinking of the episode about Spock's brain and that contraption Spock had to wear on his head that had the blinking lights.

|11.4.05 @ 5:59PM|#

Hakluyt, true enough, and I don't believe for a second in measuring a person by where he went to school, but I have a sneaking suspicion that the alternative reality me who went to MIT and invented and built a space elevator in 1989 and skipped the advanced dating course and settled down with a nice girl back then would be a little more satisfied with his life now. Still, it leaves me something to work towards. Good thing I'm a Stoic :)

|11.4.05 @ 5:59PM|#

By the way, I would just like to say to anyone out there, that I have met Viking Moose, a.k.a. drf, and he is one of the nicest, most pleasant and articulate people you'd want to meet -- and unlike any impression one might erroneously glean from his postings, he exhibits absolutely no detectable signs of drug use.

Viking Moose|11.4.05 @ 6:04PM|#

that's cuz there were no white zin drinkers out there. nosireebob.

happy friday.

*hic*

except "most pleasant ... people you'd want to meet" sounds like you're channeling the Manchurian Candidate again. ohno! heh!

(plus you read my "get to know you questionnaire" .......)

|11.4.05 @ 6:05PM|#

Jason Ligon,

That may be true.

The general point is that someone tends to insult me first, and then I insult them back the "Chicago Way."

That's true of thoreau's behavior today. Here I am, not even making a comment to him, and he takes a swipe at me. What the fuck does he expect? A kiss on his rosy red cheeks? I mean really, here is "ignoring me," while at the same time taking swipes at me. What sort of asshole expects to get away with such silly behavior. Now, I've personally offered to never speak an ill word of thoreau again if it really bugs him that much (with no strings attached I might add). So far, he's simply avoided my offer.

|11.4.05 @ 6:06PM|#

Stevo Darkly,

Oh yeah, he's a great guy. I believe I've written that before too.

P.L.,

Well, either that, or you could have gotten lost in those MIT tunnels. :)

|11.4.05 @ 6:08PM|#

drf,

You may of course decline my endorsement. :)

|11.4.05 @ 6:14PM|#

Alright, one more response, on the forum rather than email, so everybody else can read what I have to say:

Even if you never insult me again, when you go after everybody else it drags the thread down. I'm tired of reading threads like that.

Today I made the mistake of responding to you, and it made things even worse. I admit that I am partly to blame. My bad. I started by indirectly responding, observing that the thread was being brought down by the way you were going after joe. You kept going so, in disgust, I proposed a special ongoing thread where you can recycle your well known position on religion.

Even if you never go after me again, and even if I cease all indirect responses (which I'll try to do, in an effort to claim the high ground), you'll just keep doing your thing with other posters, dragging down threads and making them less interesting to read.

That's all I have to say.

And yes, I know, my promises to never respond probably sound a lot like Mona's subscription cancellations. I may be a hypocrite, but at least I feel bad about it! :)

|11.4.05 @ 6:14PM|#

Okay, I've had a killer week with no sleep, and I have a screaming headache, and I'm unable to do anything productive, so I'm going home to crash. I'm taking tomorrow off, too.

Happy weekend, all.

Viking Moose|11.4.05 @ 6:16PM|#

appreciated (endorsement, that is, will ignore the opt out, grin).

enough of this arguing stuff. "lets get sushi and NOT PAY!"

(you see, quoting Repo Man, might serve as a good distraction from the bicker[ing] and argu[ing] about 'oo killed 'oo)

so just follow the gourd. remember to keep your fargin bells out of a corking icehole sling. "nobody's perfect". and "impressive. most impressive" (best darth vader quote, imo).

"and doctor. you would not have survived it" (a favorite Spock quote).

(exeuent. pursued by bear)

|11.4.05 @ 6:17PM|#

I guess my last post wasn't very Stoic.

But the heck with Stoicism. Really, Skepticism is where it's at. Skepticism is the One True Philosophy!

Adios.

|11.4.05 @ 6:18PM|#

This code is going nowhere. Procrastinating isn't helping, and banging my head against it isn't helping either. I'm going home, and I'll come back to the office on Sunday to work on it. I'll get it done on Sunday, one way or another, and then on Monday I'll be able to start the week with the most crucial test of my theory.

And if that works, well, it's time to figure out how to promote the hell out of this. This one will be good, I promise.

Oh, and to drf: Thanks for the offer to put me in touch with your Matlab guy, but my problems are syntax. They're mathematical. The code executes, it gives numbers that are reasonable, but something isn't being normalized properly. And it's not just a matter of multiplying the whole thing by one number to fix it all. It's more subtle. But I can tell that it comes down to a normalization issue, and the way I handle what you might call "diagonal terms."

|11.4.05 @ 6:24PM|#

I went to school in DC, and you would not believe the women in that place.

Word. Let me tell you, I drop off and pick up my wife every day at ARC headquarters on E Street, which is right next to the GWU campus. Good dog in heaven, the scenery.

Although I shouldn't say that. I'm nearly old enough -- nearly -- to be some of these freshman co-eds' father.

|11.4.05 @ 6:24PM|#

thoreau,

Even if you never insult me again, when you go after everybody else it drags the thread down.

According to you, about half the posters here should be banned. And they call me an egoist?

I started by indirectly responding, observing that the thread was being brought down by the way you were going after joe.

No, your response was far more general and attacked a number of posters.

Let's recap your earlier statement:

We've already got a ton of accusations flying against joe, a denunciation of theism, somebody with "www.farceswannamo.com" on his handle trying to remind us that science isn't omnipotent, and all the other signs of a clusterfuck in the making.

See, you can flame people to your heart's content, so long as no one else acts that way. You're the archetypal school hall monitor.

...dragging down threads and making them less interesting to read.

Less interesting for whom? You. And they call me an egoist.

I may be a hypocrite, but at least I feel bad about it! :)

I seriously doubt it.

|11.4.05 @ 6:26PM|#

Channeling Mona here, and coming back anyway:

At 2:22 pm and 2:24 pm I explained myself to Dave W.

|11.4.05 @ 6:27PM|#

Phil,

The cops could arrest you for such statements in our "thought police" society.

|11.4.05 @ 6:28PM|#

thoreau,

Whether you "explained" yourself to Dave W. or not, you still flamed people. Dude, you're like an alcoholic being the head of MADD.

|11.4.05 @ 6:31PM|#

thoreau,

Here, I'll make a quid pro quo for you. If you refrain from discussing code here, I'll never flame anyone here again. :)

Viking Moose|11.4.05 @ 6:38PM|#

Hak-

i think everybody is gone. oh well.

but my wife is now home. gotta go.

all- have a great weekend, and let's mix it up again next week!

cheers.

|11.4.05 @ 6:49PM|#

Viking Moose,

Yes, I should be heading out the door too.

You have a good weekend as well. Mine will be lacklustre and industrious. I am many, many miles distant from my wife right now, and will be for weeks to come, which just sucks. I hope you really aren't drinking white zinfandel, btw. :) Go get yourself some savignon blanc by Sancerre.

We'll see if thoreau will take me up on my offer.

|11.4.05 @ 7:06PM|#

"But I can tell that it comes down to a normalization issue, and the way I handle what you might call "diagonal terms.""

Probably best not to look at it for a while, thoreau. It's making you all tenser.

Ha. ha ha. Whoo.

|11.4.05 @ 7:11PM|#

Tsk, tsk, Thoreau, I leave the Gulch for one day and look what happens!

I've not responded to Hak since that insanely literal "serf" incident (the sort of thing which makes, me in all seriousness, agree with Fabius Maximus--Hak probably is an Asperger's sufferer), and then Dr. T and I joined up and recruited others. Until today we thought it was showing some effectiveness in turning down the heat and frequency of the flame wars.

Anyway, since it's out in the open I'll echo Dr. Thoreau's call to all: Join us!

|11.4.05 @ 7:59PM|#

My god, what a self-absorbed little clique some of you have formed here. Several others well before you encouraged everyone to just ignore Gary/Hak and others when they go off their meds; they just took the novel approach of actually _doing it_, instead of egging him on under the guise of "claiming the high ground." And while it would be nice if Gary would raise his level of discourse to at least 3rd grade recess level, one thing he implied has some truth - posts have gotten progressively less interesting as this little circle-jerk has developed. It's disheartening how often some poster or another will make an interesting point that is generally ignored, then (most commonly) thoreau repeats the point as his own, and suddenly it's original and insightful. There's a strange little cult of personality that's formed. Your formerly consistently interesting posts are more and more full of repetitive, condescending disclaimers and other smarminess. Where are the thoreaus and Jennifers (among others) of yesteryear?

|11.4.05 @ 9:25PM|#

Jennifer,

I've not responded to Hak since that insanely literal "serf" incident...

That's not true. You went on for weeks about the incident.

...Hak probably is an Asperger's sufferer...

There is no one so arrogant (or foolish for that matter) as someone who makes blog diagnoses.

Until today we thought it was showing some effectiveness in turning down the heat and frequency of the flame wars.

You'd have intensive flame wars here whether I was here or not. Jeez, joe is the flamewar king and you yourself are hardly immune from starting them. How many times have you in an unprompted manner start calling people stupid, dense, etc.? Many, many times. Like thoreau, you're like an alcoholic who is alos the head of MADD.

You've just infested yourself with a meme that I am somehow worse.

Sparky,

...they just took the novel approach of actually _doing it_, instead of egging him on under the guise of "claiming the high ground."

They are possessed with overweening self-righteousness, ergo they desire to strut their supposed moral superiority. Their shit doesn't stink in other words.

|11.4.05 @ 9:26PM|#

thoreau, Jennifer, joe, etc.,

In other words, before you come after me, look in the mirror.

|11.4.05 @ 9:29PM|#

Jennifer,

Oh, and I don't mean literally look in the mirror, I mean examine your own actions before you examine mine. And I'm not literally talking about your shit either. Gee, how can I use such non-literal language. I have Asperger's syndrome remember? You know, the thing you diagnosed me with as a means to avoid your own bullshit? Oh, I'm not talking about literal bullshit mind. :)

|11.4.05 @ 10:18PM|#

I've been lurking here for several years because the people here seem pretty smart, interesting and are usually funny. Over time, I started clicking the H&R link just because I liked so many of the characters and personalities here.

I've been watching this thread since lunch time and this thread has devolved into one of my all-time favorites. It's amazing how professional, grown-up people can end up acting exactly like they did in high school. Cliques. The Kool Kids. Dorks. Secrets. Drama. Outcasts. Even hall monitors.

I want to thank all of you here for just being you.

|11.4.05 @ 10:38PM|#

TheDumbFish,

Wow, I'm the outcast having to deal with thoreau and Jennifer's drama. Cool. :)

|11.4.05 @ 10:45PM|#

The other week, when I watched Gillespie on C-Span, he said something about people identifying themselves with media outlets these days. He suggested it was similar to sports team fanatics, and I suppose that's true of me. There's very little I'm indifferent about, and that includes all of you. I'm a man of many and great passions.

Sometimes they get the better of me; I know they have on this board. ...and I've flamed a foe or two in my time. On bad days, I've flamed friends too. ...I almost always feel bad about it later, but sometimes I flame people for fun.

...I've really enjoyed reading all your comments over the years. Jennifer, Thoreau, joe, Hakluyt, G. , and many others--I wouldn't trade any of you for anyone. With that out of the way--and for what it's worth--I'd like to put in my two cents.

I don't think Hakluyt flames people any more than anyone else. ...or, at least, any more than anyone else who flames people. I think his flames, when they come, tend to be more memorable, and that can make it seem like it happens more often than it does. His kung fu's the best!

I've seen him go after people without obvious cause--less often than I have. ...usually, when I see him go after someone, it's when they respond to his questions or answers with stupidity or rudeness. Treat him rudely, and you'll get back more servings than you dished. ...Be both rude and stupid or wrong, and you'll find yourself--quite rightly--on the bad end of a serious rebuke. Isn't that as it should be?

But what I've been reading between the lines over the past week or so is the suggestion that somehow Hakluyt should be shunned, and the first thing I think when I consider that suggestion isn't who got so fucking Amish around here that he or she wants to lead a group shunning of someone else.

...and the first thing I think about isn't why Hakluyt should care whether anyone else is shunning him--I'd hope he does care, very much. The first thing I think is that shunning someone, and suggesting that others do likewise, is worse than flaming someone for no apparent reason.

Silence on something like this can be easily misinterpreted as condoning something like this. ...and I wouldn't want anyone to think I was condoning this--just in case it was happening. So I spoke up. I feel like I've got friends here; I hope I haven't offended anyone. ...but I think this place is special on the web.

The credit for that belongs first with the good people at Reason that make it so very freakin' cool, and, second--but not unimportantly--to knowledgeable, intelligent commenters like joe and Gaius and throeau and Jennifer and so many others...

...especially Hakluyt.

|11.4.05 @ 10:50PM|#

Sparky-

If I'm recycling ideas without attribution I apologize. I try to include statements like "As others have said..." or "I like so-and-so's suggestion of..." I don't always remember to do it because if an idea circulates long enough I don't recall who had it first, or if it just sort of soaks into my subconscious I might not recall that it's not my own.

I'm surprised that you think I've started offering more disclaimers. I thought I'd offered fewer of late. When I first started posting here a few years ago, I got more accusations of being a lefty so I'd include more disclaimers along the lines of "Yes, I know, ideally we'd do this, I'm not defending the status quo, I'm just saying...."

I'll try to pay more attention to my comments and stop myself from getting sloppy with attributions. And I'll be more sparing with the disclaimers.

And Dave W., in case I didn't make it clear before, I do value your posts. I apologize again for my post pronouncing the thread dead. Not only did I insult you, I poisoned the well.

Anyway, not that this is likely to get back on topic, but Akira brought up that even if the opposition to the vaccine is small it's still unacceptable. I agree. But Ron Bailey seemed to imply that the opposition is not only deplorable, but potentially strong enough to have a real impact. I'd like to know more before I draw that conclusion. There will always be idiots out there, but some are more dangerous than others.

|11.4.05 @ 11:51PM|#

Ken Shultz,

Wow, that was an impressive bit of writing.

...and the first thing I think about isn't why Hakluyt should care whether anyone else is shunning him--I'd hope he does care, very much.

Oh, I care, which is why I tried to strike a bargain with thoreau. So far, no dice. (BTW, I'm not talking about literal dice here.) I guess

thoreau,

You should really drop the holier than though "altar boy" routine.

|11.5.05 @ 2:59AM|#

1. Ken Shulz is back, Hurray etc ! Now we need Lazarus & Jean Bart to revivify.
2. I hope the clique will publish who's out and who's in so the rest of us can participate in the hazing. Heh heh ... just kidding folks ...

|11.5.05 @ 3:38AM|#

SM,

You want Lazarus back from the dead? :)

|11.5.05 @ 4:26AM|#

I hate insomnia.

And no offense to Thoreau, but I'd like to point out that I'm not part of his "clique". After all, one of the people I've given up on responding to is in that group. I deal with who I want to deal with, and some people I just don't want to deal with.

|11.5.05 @ 8:56AM|#

No offense taken, Eric.

|11.5.05 @ 11:09AM|#

Eric the .5b,

No, I'm the outsider, joe, thoreau, Jennifer, ? , are the clique. We can call them the "Drama Queens." Is Maury Povich still on the air? Maybe they can get on the show and release their drama Cartman-style! "Whatever! Whatever! I do what I want!"

Viking Moose (aka drf)|11.5.05 @ 11:12AM|#

sheesh. it goes on and on!

Hak: no white zin here :) a gr�ner vetliner from near Melk (wachau) Austria. A friend of mine is from Salzburg and tries to get all Austrian on us :)

SM: i'd bet Jean Bart is still close. But Laz and Lefty are in the sweet-by-and-by...

Great sentiment Ken. snap snap.

Akira: no need for being red faced. You've earned the game ball a bunch of times the past few weeks. No worries. No fouls. :) hokae?

|11.5.05 @ 11:17AM|#

Viking Moose,

I've had few successful outings with Austrian wines. Maybe my palate is heavily attuned to various French and Italian terroirs (if you believe in such things).


snap snap

Huh?

|11.5.05 @ 11:22AM|#

Viking Moose,

sheesh. it goes on and on!

Oh, it definately will. And it will be fun. :)

Why'd you change your nick, BTW?

Viking Moose|11.5.05 @ 11:33AM|#

Hak:

i dunno why i changed it.

it was my original email address when i moved to chicago from copenhagen... i guess it was a fun little move.

(i just dug unsuccessfully for the name of the good red from the piedmont we enjoyed the other day. "Fine Wine Brokers" on North Lincoln Ave here in Chicago is a really fun place where we go to get some good stuff)

just stay away from the michigan wines :)

"snap snap" = "two snaps of approval" (have forgotten the original reference, tho).

and i'm glad it's fun. like was said in "good morning vietnam", "it's only radio"... :)

we need a sociologist (ahem) here to study the little ins-and-outs of the past few years with H&R. you know, a good old fashioned game theory base with some other krap could get a great dissertation out there!

amicalment,
VM aka drf. aka oh nevermind :)

|11.5.05 @ 1:55PM|#

In other news, Ron Bailey still thinks opposition to Plan B, the use of which can destroy an already-conceived embryo, can only be based on fear of promiscuity.

Think outside the box, Ron -- is there any other possible motivation for someone to oppose this drug?

|11.5.05 @ 2:12PM|#

I have two comments regarding the Gully-Hakluyt Conflict of 2005:

First, Hakluyt stands head and shoulders above everyone else here in frequency and intensity of personal attacks. My arguments come under fire from a lot of people here, but the vast majority of the personal insults against me have come from Hakluyt and his former identities. So it is laughable for him to play the part of the victim.

Second, despite all this, he seems to be a very intelligent person in many different fields. This forum would be the poorer, I think, without his knowledge. Also, despite our arguments, I suspect that he and I are actually quite close politically.

So, I think Eric the .5b has the right idea. Ignore or engage on a case-by-case basis. Anyone who cares about what we discuss here, is bound to flip their lid once in a while, and if such a person is also a frequent poster here they will let their temper contaminate their posts.

|11.5.05 @ 2:34PM|#

In other news, Ron Bailey still thinks opposition to Plan B, the use of which can destroy an already-conceived embryo, can only be based on fear of promiscuity.

Where do you get the idea that he thinks opposition can only be based on fear of promiscuity? In this piece he cites fear of promiscuity as a reason, but it hardly seems he's claiming it is the only possible reason. Of course given that, as he points out, "49 Republican members of Congress signed a letter to President Bush urging that Plan B's prescription-only status be maintained because wider use could result in more sexual promiscuity and venereal disease" it certainly seems reasonable to conclude that this is one of the primary reasons being advanced by opponents of Plan B and to address it as such.

Besides, I think it's clear that this promiscuity issue is either in conjunction with, or a simple cover for, abortion opponents. I mean come on, it's not hard to figure out that when promiscuity complaints come from Jennifer Taylor, identified as a member of the anti-abortion Human Life International, that abortion opposition plays a significant role in their motivation. Even FDA panel member Dr. David W. Hager who voted "no" is identified as "pro-life." And there's this, "However, proponents saw the FDA's assertions as a political move to appease the Bush administration's pro-life allies." I think it's abundantly clear that Mr. Bailey, and everyone else, recognizes the anti-abortion angle to all this.

But whether it's truly a concern about promiscuity, or a desire to stop abortions, the conclusion is the same - it's simply not the FDA's job to do.

|11.5.05 @ 2:51PM|#

Besides, I think it's clear that this promiscuity issue is either in conjunction with, or a simple cover for, abortion opponents.

That's an interesting idea. But I wonder whether the promiscuity argument is really a "cover" for abortion opponents. To me, the promiscuity argument seems rather weak. The argument that Plan B sometimes destroys a human life, OTOH, is what it is. Although Plan B doesn't always abort a fertilized egg/embryo/unborn angel/insert-preferred-term-here, it does on at least some occasions from what I understand. The moral status of that [insert term here] is of course a matter of contention, but at least it's an argument with a receptive constituency. I really wonder how many people would be receptive to the promiscuity argument.

I don't doubt that many Plan B opponents are motivated by something other than promiscuity concerns, but I wonder whether their "cover story" is going to go over any better than their real concerns.

|11.5.05 @ 2:54PM|#

Clarification: When I say "The argument that Plan B sometimes destroys a human life, OTOH, is what it is", I probably should have written "That argument is what it is." I meant that the argument may not be convincing to some, but it's clearly convincing to others, so at least it has a constituency. The promiscuity argument doesn't seem as likely to be persuasive to as many people.

|11.5.05 @ 3:07PM|#

Well, yes thoreau I think that's s good point; philosophically speaking, I'd agree that the abortion argument is stronger. But I think opponents realize that the FDA isn't the place for a philosophical showdown on abortion - it hardly has that jurisdiction. So perhaps the "promiscuity leads to STDs" approach is an attempt to find some legitimate health issue to give the FDA something to hang it's decision on other than the real motivation which is abortion opposition. So I guess that is what I meant by it being a cover.

|11.5.05 @ 3:13PM|#

crimethink,

So it is laughable for him to play the part of the victim.

Well, being the victim doesn't preclude me from also being the perp on other occassions. My entire point was that despite thoreau's holier than thou attitude, he's as much a serial flamer as anyone else is. Then of course there is the bomb thrower extraordinaire joe.

The only thing we seem to disagree on is abortion and things related to it. Remember, I'm a uniter and not a divider. :)

Brian Courts,

Yes, it is a stalking horse for other issues.

So perhaps the "promiscuity leads to STDs" approach is an attempt to find some legitimate health issue...

Well, anti-abortion types do that in a number of areas, so why not here?

|11.5.05 @ 3:43PM|#

Brian-

That makes sense.

I will reiterate my (only half joking) call for a 4th branch of government. Send all the abortion issues to them, so that it doesn't contaminate anything else. Call it the "Obstetric Branch." The number of people elected to this branch should be the number of people standing in front of clinics on an average day, multiplied by two. Get the activists from both sides out of our hair.

Viking Moose|11.5.05 @ 4:33PM|#

Thoreau -

how did yer issue work out?

here it seemed to turn out okay, but there was some loss of efficiency (large CI)... the second part is really cool - we're trying to replicate the Stokes/Neuberger (1979) paper on M2 and interest rates :)

cheers!

|11.5.05 @ 4:47PM|#

thoreau,

That's not your idea thoreau. That was a joke bounced around at least five years ago.

Get the activists from both sides out of our hair.

Yes, its unpleasant having to deal with a free society, isn't it? No wonder you and joe get along so well.

|11.5.05 @ 4:49PM|#

Brian Courts,

Where do you get the idea that he thinks opposition can only be based on fear of promiscuity?

one of several quotes:

The brewing values fight over the new HPV vaccine mirrors the U.S. Food and Drug Administration�s (FDA) ongoing effort to regulate the sexual morality of American women.

|11.5.05 @ 4:56PM|#

Remember, I'm a uniter and not a divider. :)

Well, you seem to have united thoreau, joe, Jennifer, et al... ;-)

|11.5.05 @ 5:09PM|#

crimethink,

Well, they were like-minded holier than thou snots to begin with. They united around their own "values." (Note that I am not talking about real snot here. Nor do I really think they are holy.) :)

|11.5.05 @ 5:14PM|#

crimethink,

The good thing is that I get to blast apart joe's uninformed analysis of case law without him yapping back at me; when he protests it always led me to have to humiliate him.

Jennifer and joe are both as likely to conjure up here some popular historical myth that I have to summarily beat down.

As to thoreau, well, he really doesn't say anything. He just stands in the corner and acts the role of the disappointed mother.

|11.5.05 @ 5:19PM|#

thoreau,

We're sick of you.

Quite clearly many people aren't sick of me. You'll just have to put up with free expression, a free society, etc.

|11.5.05 @ 5:25PM|#

You see, Hakluyt, that's what I'm talking about. Even if what you say about them is true, it wouldn't need to be said, because it would be obvious to everyone. And if what you say is false, you destroy your credibility with the rest of us.

Thus, insulting other posters can serve no purpose but to harm your own reputation. By all means, go for the jugular of a foolish argument, but let those who read it determine for themselves if the one who makes it is a fool.

|11.5.05 @ 5:49PM|#

crimethink,

Dude, no one has any credibility here with anyone. That's obvious from the behavior of the members of this forum.

Case in point is thoreau's treatment of Dave W. and the felow who goes off on any Japanese internment arguement. thoreau pretends like he's a nice guy, but he constantly shovles perfume soaked shit all over those two guys. Which is why apologies from thoreau to the both of them are so utterly disingenuous and flat out silly. thoreau thinks he takes the high ground, when in fact he doesn't.

Thus, insulting other posters can serve no purpose...

You don't get it. Its fun. What is annoying are all these psycho-babble conversations started by that particular clique. Some people have seen a therapist too often.

...but let those who read it determine for themselves if the one who makes it is a fool.

The reader can do what he or she wants to. I'm not here for the reader, I am here solely for myself. I tell you people this every so often, but you don't seem to get it - here, I am an uber-egoist, and I quite enjoy it.

|11.5.05 @ 6:02PM|#

I'm out of town, thought I'd check H&R, and see a thread going over 260, so I thought I'd see what the fuss was about. Holy Cow.

Do people still use SAS? I remember my dad using it in the 70s when I was a kid. 30 years for humans is like 700 in computer years.

And I want some sort of prize for actually reading 268 comments.

|11.5.05 @ 6:05PM|#

dead elvis,

268? I'm very impressed. Sorry to have to add to burdens by adding 269 and 271. :)

|11.5.05 @ 6:15PM|#

Viking Moose-

I'll go into the office tomorrow and work it out. Today I was doing errands, relaxing, etc. I just got back from a Korean restaurant, and now we're about to look up movies online.

Speaking of Korean restaurants, I'm tired of being racially profiled! Every time I go to an Asian restaurant and order something spicy they try to talk me out of it. Once, while dining with a friend of Vietnamese descent at a Thai restaurant, the waitress actually gave my friend a questioning look, my friend nodded like "It's OK", and then the waitress wrote something down.

I'm suing for racial discrimination! How dare they profile me as somebody who can't take the hot stuff!

:)

|11.5.05 @ 6:36PM|#

Ken Schultz,

The first thing I think is that shunning someone, and suggesting that others do likewise, is worse than flaming someone for no apparent reason.

Well joe and thoreau are Catholics, and Catholics are into excommunicating people - or burning them at the stake - or arguing that drugs related to sexual practices are evil - or controlling how you determine the end of your life - or ... :)

|11.5.05 @ 7:20PM|#

"I'm out of town, thought I'd check H&R, and see a thread going over 260, so I thought I'd see what the fuss was about. Holy Cow."

Precisely the reason I decided to eschew real posts in favor of inane ones. People argue as if the fate of the Republic somehow depended on the destruction of other posters.

Although it is often entertaining to watch some presumably sane people battling it out with the "posting bots".

QFMC cos. V

|11.5.05 @ 7:53PM|#

Fabius,

You never know, our future dicta--I mean, leaders--may be reading this thread as impressionable youths. The outcome of the pixelated battle of Hakluyt vs the Gullyites may come to move worlds...

|11.5.05 @ 8:28PM|#

"snap snap" = "two snaps of approval" (have forgotten the original reference, tho).

drf, er, I mean Viking Moose,

It's from "Men on Film" (a skit by Damon Wayans and David Allen Grier, seen on "In Living Color"):

http://www.thedigitalreview.com/forum/showthread.php?t=955


I have some comments I wanted to make on the flame wars, but being that it is a Saturday night, hopefully I'll be making my way from my computer shortly...if not, I might be able to say something further at a later point in time.

Viking Moose.. errrr ... yeah|11.5.05 @ 8:54PM|#

Hi Smacky -

i know the living color sketch. loved it. we'd watch in college and be stoopid. their 1992 super bowl halftime show was a classic!

sadly, i was thinking of a faux sinister setting. kinda like some of the internet tough guys we get on other threads here.... heh.

the two snaps i was thinking of was done by an evil robert davi in some mobster b movie from the 80s. he'd snap twice if it was okay. or some such...

the bummer was that i was not even referencing that excellent sketch, but some third rate B 80s movie with big hair and silicon and terrible explosions and some sound that someone once told me was "hard rock".... but what the hell! GOOD TIMES! :)

Have a great evening, smacky :)

count on you at the chicago holiday reason gathering?

|11.5.05 @ 9:53PM|#

crimethink,

Outcome? Heh. Sort of like how Passchendaele or Verdun had outcomes? :)

Rich Ard|11.5.05 @ 10:05PM|#

Wow - what a miserable weekend you folks must be having.

|11.5.05 @ 10:15PM|#

Rich Ard,

If reading hundreds of pages is miserable, then I guess so. :)

|11.5.05 @ 10:41PM|#

Hakluyt,

Actually, I was thinking more like Tours. Or Constantinople (718), if you prefer -- I don't want to trigger a historian's wrath for choosing the wrong "Battle that Saved Western Civilization".

|11.5.05 @ 11:57PM|#

You never know, our future dicta--I mean, leaders--may be reading this thread as impressionable youths. The outcome of the pixelated battle of Hakluyt vs the Gullyites may come to move worlds...

Some day, Cavanaugh's mercy in not making the ban permanent could determine the fate of billions.

Many that post deserve bans. Many that are banned deserve posting rights. Are you wise enough to give it to them?

|11.6.05 @ 12:03AM|#

YOU CANNOT POST!

|11.6.05 @ 2:14AM|#

Speaking of Korean restaurants, I'm tired of being racially profiled! Every time I go to an Asian restaurant and order something spicy they try to talk me out of it. Once, while dining with a friend of Vietnamese descent at a Thai restaurant, the waitress actually gave my friend a questioning look, my friend nodded like "It's OK", and then the waitress wrote something down.

That's hilarious! I've never had that happen in Thai places here, but then it's Texas and we're all supposed to be able to handle it, I guess. An exemption of sorts.

|11.6.05 @ 2:35AM|#

crimethink,

Heh. There have been so many. :) My fellow graduate students and I used to joke about all the monographs which were essentially about one or another battle or war which "saved" Western Civilization (never mind that the term Western Civilization is so fluid as to be almost incomprehenisible after a point).

There's also the lumpers v. dividers routine. I never could figure out which one I am.

Then there are things that students say in class. Here are a few of the funniest:

One student asked in class, "What is a Pope?" Not, who, what. As in, a twenty year old didn't know what a Pope is. Had never heard of such a creature. Didn't know such a thing existed.

Another student answered, after a short story about Jezebel, "Huh. That's what my mom calls my girlfriend."

On the subject of cloth making one student said, "You mean cotton comes from plants?"

gandalf,

Ha ha ha. That was fucking great. :)

|11.6.05 @ 2:43AM|#

crimethink,

Oh, and discussing Jezebel is part of the "salacious story" routine that a lot of lecturers who teach Western Civ. do. You know, Henry VII's monkey, Juana la Loca, various scandals associated with the ancient Olympics, various royal murders, etc.

|11.6.05 @ 3:23AM|#

BTW, a fellow with the nick WinAce whose posts I lurked on over at Panda's Thumb and other places died on Saturday. I dunno if any of y'all encountered him, but he was sharp as a tack and interesting to read.

http://users.rcn.com/rostmd/winace/index.htm

|11.6.05 @ 3:27AM|#

He died at age 20 of cystic fibrosis (his other three siblings died before him of the same disease).

|11.6.05 @ 8:03AM|#

Any individual whose regular online behavior is the kind that would get him or her punched repeatedly in the fucking mouth were he to conduct him- or herself that way in person is probably not worth reading. Any person who derives amusement from insulting others without provocation, doubly so. And I am not exempting myself from that statement.

My first, last and final word on the flame wars.

|11.6.05 @ 11:33AM|#

Phil,

So, when are you going to put on your hairshirt?

|11.6.05 @ 1:51PM|#

Thoreau;

"The number of people elected to this branch should be the number of people standing in front of clinics on an average day, multiplied by two. Get the activists from both sides out of our hair."

And while we're at it, give them weapons ala the "Gamesters of Triskelion" (old school Star Trek) and let them duke it out on pay per view for our enjoyment. I bid a 1000 quatloos on the anti-choicers, they tend to believe that God is on their side and they would fight to the death. Now, that's entertainment!

A Texas Cage Match, with the losers being tarred and feathered and the winning team captain being killed by the losing team captain also comes to mind as something that might be fun to watch.

|11.6.05 @ 2:16PM|#

I suppose I'll throw my two cents in on this...
Hak-
I don't understand the need to be an asshole to make your points. With your wide breadth of knowledge in history, law, etc. You clearly have a lot to add to the discorse here(unlike me). I know you enjoy it, but why be treated like a troll on a forum like H&R? I'm not saying you should be some neutered robot spouting Spock like statements of fact, but would it undermine your arguments to tone down just a little? At least on the insults?

Also,
PhDs as a rule are a dime a dozen

Could you point me in the right direction? I could sure use one. :-)

|11.6.05 @ 2:51PM|#

the "promiscuity leads to STDs" approach is an attempt to find some legitimate health issue

Many of my best friends work for NGOs and there is an entire division where I work devoted to "Prevention". All of this stuff falls under the umbrella of "Public Health".
Public Health is a phenomenon that has taken on all the characteristics of The Blob (or the Borg, if you like) imo. It has occurred to me several times before that there is very little in the way of checks and balances to reign it in. The religious right's incorporation of Public Health's methods is further proof of how committed and clever they really are.

|11.6.05 @ 3:08PM|#

Cliff-

I like your ideas!

I also think that the Obstetric Branch should be headquartered somewhere other than DC. Maybe the northernmost point in Alaska?

Those who truly believe in their Cause, on either side, will suck it up and go. And if the government contractors who deliver their supplies are as efficient as the ones who supply my lab with equipment, this could easily turn into a Donner Party.

|11.6.05 @ 3:20PM|#

Kris,

The point is that the blog is full of people who act with little or no decorum. thoreau and his pathetic little group have zeroed in on me when they should be far more interested in their own behavior. Honestly, joe deliberately flames people all the time, yet he (along with the other half-wits) is presenting himself as a paragon of virtue? Please. Schultz is basically right; my kung fu is simply better and apparently it has made people quite jealous.

Besides, I made an offer to thoreau, and so far thoreau has refused to take it up. Never discuss coding here again and I will refrain from flaming people here for all eternity. I realize its a quid pro quo, but hey, if I am to give up something, I expect something in return.

What kind of PhD would you like?

|11.6.05 @ 3:48PM|#

Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.

You must conquer your fear, the suffering of the lurkers to end.

|11.6.05 @ 5:36PM|#

Hakluyt,

I'm not saying you have any hatchets to bury. ...but if you did, and the opportunity to bury them presented itself, I bet you'd take it.

|11.6.05 @ 5:40PM|#

Ken Shultz,

Don't we all have hatchets to bury? :)

|11.6.05 @ 5:50PM|#

thoreau,

You gotta admit, "hot" in a genuine Korean, Vietnamese, or Thai place means something completely different than "hot" in an American food restaurant. KFC sells "Hot Wings." Texas Pete is "Hot Sauce."

Those places aren't looking to alienate their customers. The staff acts like that, because they've seen one too many customers jump up and yell "Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!"

Viking Moose|11.6.05 @ 6:47PM|#

Joe:

that reminds me of a time at BW3 where some trixies and their beaux (see: Lincoln Park Trixies) ordered BLAZIN wings and sent them back, because they were "too hot".

We got that problem once at a local indian restaurant, where it took a demonstration before they'd serve us food to our preferred spice. (suffice to say that a bottle of tobasco, a telephone receiver and... oh nevermind)

still, we've not gone back to our share of indian and thai places because they refuse to prepare the food to our order and get that patronizing, arrogant "westie can't take our food" as someone explained once. even after we requested extra stuff to add on. you'd figure that customers could ask to see how hot things are.

on a restaurant listing there is actually a black list for "wimping out" on the spices at thai restaurants/eateries in the area (was in the reader)

and a big congratulations to you on being #300!

yar.

cheerio!
VM

|11.6.05 @ 6:56PM|#

Ah, BW3 . . . makes me homesick for the Flats. To the extent that one can be homesick for the Flats, that is. Me and my friends always used to stop there for beers before going to shows at the Odeon.

|11.6.05 @ 7:17PM|#

"My friends and I," that is.

|11.6.05 @ 7:39PM|#

After a mistake like that, Phil, I'm not sure I can ever take you seriously again.

|11.6.05 @ 7:41PM|#

joe-

Yeah, I know, they're trying to avoid the spectacle of a distressed customer, and so as a libertarian I support their right to refuse service, and I would oppose any coercive measures to end this form of racial profiling.

But it's really freaking annoying! A polite "Are you sure, it's very hot" would be fine, but if I have to debate the waiter then they're violating rule #1 of customer service: The customer is always right.

Anyway, it's just funny that I need an Asian with me to vouch for my ability to handle the hot stuff. Maybe my Thai friend can get me some sort of laminated card with sworn statements in Thai, Vietnamese, Korean, and Chinese saying "He may be white but he's cool. Give him the hot stuff."

And I'm not stereotyping him, he's actually hooked me up before when we've gone to restaurants. I dunno, they just seem to like him.

|11.6.05 @ 7:56PM|#

Viking Moose,

You made a capitalization error.

Basically the lot of you need to learn a little Thai, Korean, etc. that way you will be able reassure them that you're no slackjaw when it comes to eating spicy foods. It helps if you live with a family of each nationality too.

|11.6.05 @ 8:02PM|#

Jennifer, me sorry! Me talk English good!

|11.6.05 @ 8:21PM|#

Thoreau--

Your complaint reminds me of a column I read about twenty years ago, about a Southern hardware-store owner who refused to rent chainsaws to women, unless their husbands or boyfriends were involved. (Seriously.) His reasoning was: those things are really, really hard to start, and most women just aren't strong enough to start them, and he doesn't want them wasting their time and money renting things they won't be able to use. For awhile, there, he'd had a policy where he'd rent them to women if the women could start the chainsaws in his store, but not one ever could. And he got tired of embarrassing them, so he instituted his blanket no-renting-to-women-without-men policy.

Are there useful parallels with your spice situation, or am I just bringing this up for no apparent reason? Discuss.

|11.6.05 @ 11:23PM|#

Perhaps the Thais are simply thinking "These crazy gaijin sue each other over everything. No way am I serving them spicy food!" I did once get an honest-to-god "Thai Spicy" green curry at a place I often frequent and it did me in for the rest of the day. Tread carefully.

|11.7.05 @ 3:39AM|#

thoreau-

Not only have I had experiences like this, but I've even seen my wife(who is asian, dark skin dark eyes) get the same treatment(she'd eat the fire of hell if that's what they served) at a thai restaurant . At indian restaurants there's no problem as she speaks their language fluently and shares their culture. When I go for take out, she has to be the one to call in, or else we get the watered down whiteboy shit.

Hak-

What kind of PhD would you like?

Which ever one can earn me the most money.
They seem to be a pretty valuable asset despite the fact that they come "a dime a dozen"  :)

|11.7.05 @ 3:53AM|#

"a dime a dozen" 

Not sure what the hell that question mark is for?

|11.7.05 @ 4:06AM|#

Ron bailey must be disappointed... Unless he wanted a soap opera

;->

|11.7.05 @ 6:31AM|#

Kris,

Ah well, I largely know PhDs in the liberal arts. They aren't likely to make you much money.

|11.7.05 @ 7:48AM|#

mk-

Good point. Some day, some idiot will indeed sue over the spicy curry.


Kris-

I hear that the Institute for Creation Research has a Ph.D. program. They'll probably make you jump through a lot of hoops to get it, but the hoops won't be intellectually rigorous, just time consuming.

|11.7.05 @ 9:27AM|#

This is the funniest damn thread I can remember. I don't care what anybody says. How gloriously random! How wonderfully Days of Our Lives!

Along the lines of thoreau's ethnic restaurant complaint, I can only say that you haven't seen a watering down of an ethnic cuisine until you have had the misfortune of eating Mexican food in Japan. It is the worst food on the planet, considerably ahead of number 2, which is Japanese Italian.

|11.7.05 @ 9:43AM|#

But Jason, the Japanese have an Iron Chef who specializes in Italian!

|11.7.05 @ 9:57AM|#

thoreau:

Trust me on this. I have a pet theory of how Japanization of foreign cuisines works. You see, Japanese culture very openly puts each type of gaijin into a little box. Yes, everyone has stereotypes, but they have very detailed stereotypes. Broadly, they will assume that every German they meet is smart, for example, because Germans are smart. This phenomenon translates into food as well. When they think of America and food, they think of corn or hotdogs, so if you get pizza America style, you get hotdogs, corn, and mayo on your damn pizza. Let me tell you how unpleasant that is, especially when you aren't ready for it.

Anyhow, I'm pretty sure that Italy = olive oil, so if you want to make something Italian, you just add olive oil to it. So, you go to the restaurant and you get red sauce - olive oil and chunked tomatoes, or you can get my personal favorite seafood sauce - olive oil and squid ink. Then, after you have your sauce, you just put it on stuff you as a Japanese person were going to eat anyway - like rice balls. And whatever you do, don't add any seasoning.

|11.7.05 @ 10:26AM|#

Ah, BW3 . . . makes me homesick for the Flats. To the extent that one can be homesick for the Flats, that is. Me and my friends always used to stop there for beers before going to shows at the Odeon.

I'm terribly sorry to hear that.

(The Flats is a dump now! Nothing to miss.)

|11.7.05 @ 10:56AM|#

Wait, wait . . . The Flats is a dump now? As opposed to . . . ? It was never quite the Champs-Elysees, but at least the east bank provided plenty of opportunities for insane drunkenness and amusing panhandlers.

Viking Moose|11.7.05 @ 11:02AM|#

Smacky and Phil

the flats didn't exist like that for many years and just started "recovering" when i left. and now it's down again. sigh.

phil - i had no idea... what part are you from?

hell, i remember when you'd have to go 271 to the airport the long way around before 480 was built. there were these smokestacks that belched this nasty smoke over the road. then one day the smoke disappeared. and the rust spread... :)

cheers.

|11.7.05 @ 11:17AM|#

Wait, wait . . . The Flats is a dump now? As opposed to . . . ?

Phil,

Yeah, I was going to correct myself, but I thought, "why make Cleveland look as bad as it really is?". I figured I wouldn't correct myself because that way I could at least let The Flats enjoy the fabled 'great history' that was temporarily suggested by my inaccurate comment...

there were these smokestacks that belched this nasty smoke over the road. then one day the smoke disappeared. and the rust spread...

drf,

I feel obligated to correct you: there were these smokestacks that belched this nasty smoke over the road. then one day one of the plants exploded, emitting toxic clouds of waste over the freeway. then one day the smoke disappeared. and the rust spread...

Funny, I just realized the link I posted was written by "Sandy Smith"...I wonder if it's the DC Reasonoid of the same name. Because "Smith", as I know, is a very uncommon last name....

Dave W.|11.7.05 @ 11:39AM|#

Some day, some idiot will indeed sue over the spicy curry.

Lots of idiots probably already sued over spicy curry and lost. When one fails to appreciate this apect of the tort system, opportunistic politicians move in to convince us that the system is broken and needs fixing. Reminds me of my dear mother, who just this morning that they really need more police in my hometown of Binghamton, NY because there is an out of control gang problem there. But, of course, there isn't. Don't be fooled. Instead, be fearless.

Viking Moose|11.7.05 @ 11:58AM|#

Hi Smacky!

good ol' garfield heights. heh!

gotta love it. my little description from the late 70s/early 80s was plagarized by this "smith" person. Fear not: my agents are on the case (since smith is an uncommon name) and are combing the area. I have them in Windsor, Ct.... boohahahahahaha