bittired

Hope you were able to make some sense of this. Didn't have time to clean it up last night...

I hope you found no offense in my earlier comment. Please understand that I am sorry.

I'm going to try to respond to your response, but know that other than having been diagnosed myself with slight Asperger's like tendencies, I really have no idea what it is like to be you. I really don't understand what it is like to be autistic, but neither do either of us. I still hope that you can better understand my position with this, if it matters.

I think most people are insanely self obsessed. From this I can understand why empathy is seen as being absolutely necessary. Frankly, I think most people with autism spectrum disorders actually lack the self obsession that would normally be redirected onto others via empathy.

I believe you are right about most people having a love of self and/or selfish needs. In fact the feeling of love and the ability to do more than just try to simulate love involves what is called a "soul" in religion. That is not to say those more into the autism spectrum have less love. Those just that sometimes they know it is there, but they have to work much harder to be able not to ignore conscience since they do not have what others call empathy- because it is not chemical/"feeling". This conscience should not be defined by someone else or others (this is my ultimate point, btw), but it must belong to the person as a very quiet voice (not those in our heads- in fact you will almost never actually hear it as a voice or even a thought- it is what you just know is right when you eliminate the rational calculations/logic and all of the voices).

A completely rational human that tends to good but has no feeling or understanding of self will tend to utilitarianism, eventually. This is NOT conscience. Let's see why...

BTW- I know this is annoying, but as a quick detour, if unfamiliar with the fallacies of communism or socialism or pure capitalism for that matter, they may tend to one of those, but eventually they realize the goal they seek is utilitarianism- which is a goal only reachable by rules and management that cannot be carried out by those that can be corrupted. Ok, now back to utilitarianism...

The only thing capable of instituting pure utilitarianism that has the highest chance of working are altered, non egotistic, fully altruistic humans or non-humans.

We can't get there to start with, so in the short-term we as would-be utilitarians for the non-egotistic fully altrustic good of society institute an electronic/real democracy. Heck, I would.

But this just means the lobbyists have to lobby everyone. This is called marketing. It is already done. Problem solved for the elite that wish to rule rather than be overrun by the people.

So the people rebel again, replacing with a system that learns and manages humanity, if it does not intentionally or unintentionally destroy it in the process, of course.

So, then (long after we die when they institute it), we would have pure utilitarianism, which is a paradox- it is "perfection in survival and existence", but, in its pure form, it abhors the self (the "ego") to a fault, leading to some very nasty things that "must be done for the good of humanity". There is no conscience here, because any voice, quiet or not, belonging to an individual is wrong utilitarian "utopian" (really dystopian) world if it conflicts with the majority of others.

I very much appreciate the rest of what you said. I think your sense of self is stronger than you are giving yourself credit for, as you are certainly self-aware. Please don't take that as an afront to asperger's- I think it is a benefit to have self-understanding, no matter how your mind works.

Good luck in your future, and feel free to shoot any of this down if you must.

Not sure why I'm surprised I got -1'd, but I'm guessing it is because someone wanted to prove my point?

Great post.

I personally think that people that reply indicating that anyone who doesn't believe in the traditional sciences, not including Philosophy but rather using our "accepted body of Physiological and Psychiatric knowledge" as truth, are one step away from Asperger's. I do not mean that in a derogatory sense, since many with Asperger's are highly functioning, but their tendency to clinch onto mathematics and incomplete (but widely accepted) science and use it as the answer for everything is childish. I believe that our universe (the entirety, beyond what we experience) is not completely "rational", but some just cannot accept that. We would not be where we are today without Philosophers like Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle. However, if a conservative talk show host came along saying the same thing as these philosophers, they would attempt to beat him/her down for being an idiot.

There is much to be learned by thinking outside of the box and trying to understand others' points of view. I'm a conservative-leaning moderate and independent (U.S.). I actually listen to both sides of the story (or more if possible), and then make up my mind which works with my existing belief system and where I can improve, knowing that both of them are biased and probably neither are completely right or wrong.

I'm not better than anyone else, but I get frustrated, as it is farcical how one-sided conversations here can be, and how little people give and come to terms with each other.

Apparently you were really reading that. I don't think dress code is out of the question though. Thong swimsuits would be a horrible thing to speak in.

I know the conversation is over, but

Sorry, genetics don't work that way and poor people aren't all stupid.

If you reread what I've said in multiple places in this topic, I don't think that at all. In fact, that is why I started arguing with the initial post. To summarize:

1. Being poor does not make you stupid.

2. Giving money to the poor is best handled by an organization that can ensure the money is not being abused. In the U.S., the cost of adequate administration of aid to the poor is not possible, and they do such a poor job at it that welfare is abused to the point that it is hurtful to the poor because it keeps them down and dependent on the government or worse it keeps them using drugs. Charities such as the Catholic church which gives more money and time than any other organization including the Red Cross are better fit to do this, however the growth and acceptance of atheism/child abuse by priests/the economy/several other rights (gay right to marry, pro-choice, wanting openly-gay/female priests) issues continue to lower giving without a similarly efficient organization (nuns who work for room/board without families) getting those funds.

3. I understand that not all have the opportunities I've described (libraries, computers), and I think they should. It is more common in the U.S., and one of the main reasons it isn't used as much or in the right way is due to parenting and community. I think that we need to spend more time working on all of that, not just using the welfare system (which in the U.S. is a bureaucratic mess that is unable to effectively manage how funding is allocated).

btw- just to be clear, I think that Africa deserves a lot more aid that it is getting, and the the U.S. has a lot of areas that could use more money- one of our largest cities, Detroit, just went bankrupt. And with atheism spreading through government, entertainment, and media support, the money given by the world's largest charity, the Catholic church, has started to go down because fewer are giving, which will affect the entire world. We definitely don't need to stop giving. We need to start giving. But the progressive, statist agenda in the U.S. unintentionally adds layers and layers of bureaucracy that poorly administer this money. I would be in favor of putting more money towards U.S. teachers (which should not be tenured but should be higher paid) and education in-general, and even smart housing programs that don't colocate the poor, but not welfare.

Obviously there are exceptions, but most poor schools do not have internet access for the students or computers for them. If they do have a library, it is generally inadequate and most are not encouraged to use it.

I appreciate your response, but I believe that your experience is based of your childhood in Africa. In our local county library we probably have 30-40 computers available for free internet access. This was not the case 10 years ago, so perhaps you should visit the public library in the area of the U.S. where you believe that there is a lack of internet access and I would be surprised if at least one computer is there with internet access that could be used. I would bet that there is, and I doubt people would be discouraged from using it.

Tarring poor people (or any other sort, for that matter) with some sort of genetic failing is a convenient way to explain why they are less successful than you are...

You missed my point entirely, I'm afraid. I don't think that poverty is genetically linked to lack of success. Poverty is not genetic. What I was saying was that if you have a group of people that are less intelligent because they are genetically predisposed to being less intelligent, then that group has a greater likelihood of being less successful and therefore poorer.

Here, the combination of factors listed seem to point to an urban American child.

Everything I've been arguing about is about the U.S. I am definitely not speaking about Africa or other parts of the world, and I'm sorry that you took it that way. I think that there are a lot of places in the world in worse condition than in the U.S. I am only making the arguments I make here because throwing money at poverty does not help. It must be applied with care and education and guidance are even more important, at least when people are willing to listen and be taught. Unfortunately, some cultures and peoples are not interested in changing.

fix the Gmail UI.

They just tried recently.

I'd like to stop using GMail, but there aren't worthy competitors (free, large, mostly reliable). My ISP (which is a major one) sucks at mail compared to Google.

Thanks! Corrected. You're right that it isn't equivalent. There is no substantial effort afaik to only rid one of the branches of government (executive, legislative, judicial), so the secession movement is the closest I can think of to the UK's Republican party, which really isn't that close at all.

Well, doubting that leaks of information won't have a negative impact on our security is pretty obtuse also. I'm not afraid, but I also wouldn't be surprised if we have a greater number of terrorist attacks in the coming years. It's in their interest to complain for multiple reasons.

I like the cartoons used, but why set the bar high with chunky bacon:

http://mislav.uniqpath.com/poignant-guide/

http://mislav.uniqpath.com/poignant-guide/images/the.foxes-4...

I guess the closest thing we have would be a confederate flag button in the U.S. That flag still seems to be embraced by the area of the country that most wishes to seceed (part of South Carolina).

As for a U.S. "Republican" button, Google basically already has that of sorts in their news; it attempts to determines that you don't respond well to certain news and won't show those items. I don't read Google news much anymore though, because I feel like they intentionally or otherwise are influencing my world-view.

I think it is great that David Cameron is trying to protect his country.

But, I think the implementation of anything that restricts the internet before content gets to the client will take things down a bad road, which is why similar efforts keep getting struck down in the U.S. When you give the power of restricting communication to the government or even to a contractor for the government, how will that not be abused? You may as well let them open every bit of mail and every parcel and check to see what you are wearing each morning to ensure it is appropriate.

This is already done through the WIC program. If you look at the shelves in the grocery store, you'll see the WIC label on certain foods. It does not stop poor food choices. The only way to make it work would be to shutdown all fast food restaurant and pull all crap off the shelves in the store, and that will never happen. Anything that can be abused to get more caloric intake for less money will be abused.

Unless every fast food restaurant is outlawed and shutdown and all crap food is outlawed and removed from the shelves of every store in the U.S., you are not going to stop anyone (low income or not) from eating it.

In fact, the U.S. actually provides incentives for companies to use high fructose corn syrup: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5795478

And for those on WIC, while many crap items aren't on the WIC list, parents can still abuse it by buying things like only Cheerios for their kids to eat instead of veggies, etc. And yes, regardless of welfare, Obesity and diabetes are going to remain very common among the poor in the U.S.

Is anyone aware of any documented reports of well-known "reputable" antivirus/antimalware companies being involved in the development or spread of viruses, etc.? I've heard in the past reports (that make sense) about these companies making business for themselves by ensuring a threat exists to fight, but it is tough to believe that this could happen without it eventually coming to light.

Could John McAfee have known about this or even have been involved, and this is one of the reasons for some of his strange behavior (related guilt, involvement with criminals and criminal organizations)? Or is there no basis to any of that?

I appreciate that you are trying to refute my argument, but just saying that someone does not know what they are talking about has got to be one of the least intelligent ways of doing so. Explain to me exactly how I am wrong. I see no other comments by you in this thread, so I have no idea what you are thinking. I'm not a mind reader.

IQ not intelligence. IQ is meant to be a measure of intellectual capacity. It is nonsensical to say that someone is unable to be intelligent because they are poor.

Let's talk about intelligence, though. Lets say that everyone had the same intellectual capacity, but we still saw the same descrepancy in how well they did on standardized tests. Having little to eat and poor schools do not keep a child from learning from others. There is ready access to the internet through libraries in the U.S. with a wealth of information online, and a lot of books on the shelves there also. If you take away all genetic factors (tendency towards aggression, lower intellectual capacity, etc.) and environmental factors (is the child worried about being shot, peer pressure to join a gang or get into drugs or alcohol, etc.), then in the end it is more about parenting and community, not about poverty. If we were able to teach good parenting skills, social skills, and ethics adequately in schools, and help them develop sense of community, then many of the problems (unrelated to genetics) related to intelligence being lower would go away. I hope if anyone takes home anything from what I'm saying, it is that you can't throw money at a problem like this. Welfare can make things much worse (misusing food funds for drugs, setting up a cycle of dependence on government funds, etc.), but welfare is a perfectly logical solution to lack of money. We made that mistake before, and can't have a whole new generation of people buying into that statist crap.

However, back to the study. Genetic problems with IQ cannot be solved by money, period. Also, being poor does not make you have lower potential for intelligence. That has been my point all over this thread.

You are confusing intelligence with intellectual capacity (IQ).

IQ is the ability for a child to do exemplary things with his/her mind.

Intelligence is building upon that.

Being poor does not make you have lower IQ, nor does it make you less intelligent. A large number of the poor have come up from the depths and are very intelligent people.

No, I was saying that money in pocket != intelligence.

I actually don't believe at a micro-level that causation comes into play at all. I was responding to the statement that at a macro-level there is probability of causation, and it is more rational that poverty is caused by stupidity than poverty causes stupidity. The latter is nonsense.

Good nutrition, stimulation, and education are all important during development.

But not so important that they would have a 40 point IQ difference. If it is, show me the studies confirming that.

Logically money should have no direct affect on intellectual capacity (e.g. see my other argument about taking the money away and giving it to someone else).

In this case, I think the causation is in the other direction. Over time, people with less intellectual capacity will be less successful, and therefore poorer. That is rational. The other direction is irrational.

Agreed. Don't drink too much when pregnant. But, a short glass of wine once a week or so isn't excessive.

Here is the logic:

1. Given all of the smartest 50% of the people in the world.

2. Take all of their money away.

3. Give it to the other 50%.

Lets say we were able to do those three. Now do you think being poor causes lower IQ?

DON'T CONFUSE CORRELATION WITH CAUSATION!

This is going in a bad direction for sure now, but here is this thing:

Some people, regardless of race, have lower intellectual capacity. That is what IQ tests try to measure, but fail to do completely because a lot is still based on education and experience that is difficult to factor out of the tests.

A greater number of those people that have less intellectual capacity are not going to be as financially successful. Unless you just make them. And that "making" them is as temporary as the funds that keep going to them. That is NOT to say that we should not feed the poor and hungry. We should! And, we should try to educate them more, because they need more help. However, that is charity. People deserve love, food, and shelter. But, we are not able to "bring up" people to a level that cannot be sustained because they don't have the intellectual capacity. That is why welfare fails and is taken advantage of. Unless you have some sort of medicine or medical treatment that can make people with less intellectual capacity have greater intellectual capacity to even everyone out, then it should be considered charity to help the poor- not some sort of way to make everyone smarter.

No, what I was saying was that is how the art of medicine handles the official label of "Doctor". That is country-specific. A doctor from the Caribbean != doctor educated in the U.S. Two different governing boards, and I would opt for not being treated by the latter, not because it guarantees that they are incompetent, but because I would have to question competence. A doctor educated in the U.S. could still be incompetent, but I'd have greater confidence in their education and certification.

My point is this: will we consider RMS to be a hacker when he is 98 years old after he has given up coding for years? If he was a doctor, we'd still call him a doctor, but I'm not sure that holds true for hacker. Now, if you call RMS a hacker and enough people do, maybe that is enough to show that he meets the definition still? Is creativity and the ability to write code in C enough when the language and environment has completely changed in the future?

Damn lies and statistics, though. Being poor does not cause lower IQ, nor does lower IQ cause you to be poor. However, you'll find a lot of lower IQ people at poverty level. You can't guarantee that any college candidate that is poor is not going to excel, so poverty, sex, race, religion, sexual orientation, should have absolutely nothing to do with acceptance into any organization, assuming that everything else is equal, which it isn't. Unfortunately clothing, shared experience and knowledge, language, etc. significantly influence testing and decisions.

This brings up a good question: Is RMS a hacker?

He has made important contributions, and at one point could have been considered so, but what has he created lately that is worthy of the title? Some titles like "doctor" are really indicative of the education, not of being a current practitioner, but "hacker" is not one of those titles.

Maybe someone should create an official overseeing body of hackers like "The U.S. Board of Hackers" and a social organization called "The Hacking Society" to go with it, and I could go to school and come out and in front of my name on all formal letters would thereafter be "Hacker". But, until then, I think he was but isn't.