kengr, posts by tag: idiots - LiveJournal — LiveJournal

04:44 am - needed skills

Been reading a lot of Tales from Tech Support, as well as other videos about Reddit posts.

I've noticed a ubiquitous problem that I first noted in second or third grade. People can't read something out loud.

Oh, they can "read" it. But what they say is *not* what the text says. They change words. Usually to some other word that they *think* is the same thing, but isn't. Other times it's a *completely* different word that only shares a few characters.

Some people go as far as "hearing* things this way. That it's, they are told X, and "hear" Y.

An example from one of the tech support stories was the tech telling the guy he needed to clean out his mailbox and the guy hearing it as "wash the computer". "Clean" and "wash" do *not* mean the same thing!!

More commonly this sort of thing comes up when the tech asks the person what the error message on the computer is. What they tell you is paraphrased, usually *badly*.

Now, I don't expect end users to know all the "technical terms" (though they really should know the difference between a monitor and a computer for just one example). Details *matter* with many, MANY things in modern life.

But people *really* need to be able to read back the *exact* wording on an error message. And to read the *actual* instructions on the screen or on a page *without* rewording them.

Yet even back in grade school I noticed folks misreading stuff when asked to read a passage from a book aloud. And the teachers rarely said anything about it.

Yeah, being able to get across the gist of something in your own words usually (but not always!) indicates that you understood what you read.

But we *really* need to start teaching people that young that details matter. When asked to *read* something aloud, you need to read what's written. Not give your interpretation odf the text. If you are asked what it *means* that's a different situation.

The concept that *details matter* needs to be taught. As well as the concept that there are times when you should *not* paraphrase things. Especially when some asks you to read back something that they can't see but you can.

Maybe also spend more time on the concept that different words really do mean *different* things. They don't exist just to be fancy or something. Synonyms *do not* mean the same thing. They have *similar* weirds, but they aren't the same.

Crimson and burgundy are *not* the same color even if both can be called "red".

these skills would prevent *(so* many problems and misunderstandings...

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06:21 pm - tele-spammers

Ok, this is ridiculous.

I got something like 16 calls in a 48 hour period. They were rather obvious too.

My number is (AAA)BBB-xyzt

The spam calls were all supposedly from numbers of the form (AAA)BBB-xxxx where the xxxx was different every call.

I'm told this is common pattern for these sorts of calls. The dumbest part is that since these were made with a predictive dialer (dials several numbers at once and hangs up the others when one answers) they were often hung up before I could have gotten to the phone anyway.

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05:22 pm - Perspective

The population of the Us is about 330 million. The number of Covid-19 death, is more than 330 thousand.

That means that more than one out of every thousand people in the Us has died from Covid-19.

Yet we still have folks trying to say it isn't serious or that sensible precautions are "government overreach" This entry was originally posted at https://kengr.dreamwidth.org/1133058.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

12:58 am - Two steps forward and one step back...

(to give you and idea how messed up I'm feeling, I origianly had the subject line backwards. Oy)

Any, the new SSD arrived today, about the time I'd beaten the computer into submission with its temporary drive C:. In the process, I'd found that I actually *had* an image backup of the system that was only 2 days old. I hadn't realized that the Windows image backups were still working If I had, I'd have done pone more before tearing things apart.

So I got the new drive in, booted for the Windows install DVD and told it to repair the computer. Since I could point it at image backup, this was merely time consuming. I don't want to think abut how long it might have taken with a normal drive.
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Current Mood: exhausted

06:12 pm - Freedom to be stupid

In Union county, Oregon, they went from 22 Covid-19 cases last week to 224 this week. this in a rural, low population area.

It appears that the increase is mostly due to *one* church there. Even though the county was in phase 1, which means no large gatherings they had a service with several hundred people in attendance. There was a video of it up on their website (which has since vanished, but people saved copies)

Said video shows nothing remotely resembling social distancing. Doesn't show any masks either.

I'm sure they felt they were exercising their rights. Freedom of religion (which hasn't actually been restricted), freedom of assembly (which *has* been restricted and quite *legally* restricted)

What they actually did was exercise their right to be stupid. And exercise the *non*-right of endangering other people.

Oh yeah, about that freedom of religion bit. It'd only be a restriction on that if church gatherings were restricted aand other types weren't.

Since *all* gathering above a certain size are restricted there is *no* religious component to the restrictions.

the protests that it is infringing their freedom of religion are just another case of people thinking that their religion (almost always Christianity in the US) is somehow "special" and deserves to be exempt from the rules.

Sorry doesn't work that way.

And I trust the jump in cases demonstrates the idiocy of "god will protect us".

We've got free will. And that means god *has* to let us suffer the consequences of making bad choices. This entry was originally posted at https://kengr.dreamwidth.org/1117827.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

07:42 am - Religion vs science

I came across this in a news article (they are referring the *country* Georgia, not the state)

In Georgia, while the church has told worshippers not to spend long periods of time in churches and not to come if ill, it has rejected calls to abandon the reusing of spoons, claiming that as communion is a holy ceremony it is not possible to get ill during it.

I find their faith touching. I also find it very disturbing.

Like a number of sects in the Us, this sort of thinking is going to get people killed.

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01:28 pm - This is why statistics are important

How Panic-Buying Revealed the Problem With the Modern World

The false "efficiency" they talk about is due to misuse of statics. they are planning for "average" usage.

Trouble with that is that it means half the time they have enough to cover usage. and half the time they *don't*.

What they need to do is use z scores. Using those you can take the data and determine what levels will cover 50%, 80%, 90% etc.

For stores 80-90% ought to be ok. for medical and other ctritical services, 99% or higher would be better.

Incidentally, this is the kind out stuff that's done to come up with "10-year", "100-year" etc values for storms and floods.

Which brings up another factor. You have to *keep collecting* data and revise values as usage changes. That's why the estimates for storms and floods aren't doing so good these days.

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12:47 pm - Ableds are weird

If you are on Twitter check out
#AbledsAreWeird

My friend Fayanora has posted a bunch of links from there that are *so* educational.

https://t.co/4q3N4KtP69
http://twitter.com/A_Silent_Child/status/1108166798858469377
http://twitter.com/DarkGemini88/status/1108695834084999172
http://twitter.com/2KarenRr/status/1109943603412025349
http://twitter.com/samhalls3/status/1108518145591898112
http://twitter.com/ArtistOn_Olden/status/1109205874554355713
http://twitter.com/Barb_Crofts/status/1108282762841206784
http://twitter.com/Esperink/status/1109346880058613760
http://twitter.com/Brooke_Waffles_/status/1109595625006473216
http://twitter.com/OnTheAspieSide/status/1108530409082634240


My comment on the "ripping people" one:
"I was just joking" is *never* a "real" response. It's an attempt to avoid admitting that you *were* picking on (bullying) someone. And indicates that you knew so at the time.

It ranks right up the with "apologies" along the lines of "I'm sorry that you took it that way"

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01:11 pm - Yes, people actually say this stuff..

https://www.newsweek.com/kansas-official-tells-black-woman-hes-member-master-race-dont-ever-forget-1216506?fbclid=IwAR24Iis7I1UErVf_6mkjassGpz0ygdf7MYpyTzxEmUdM_pU7FQeQnYh5FIs

I guess he's too young to remember that Washington and Lincoln *both* had federal holidays. When they started moving holidays to Mondays, it was felt that February was too short to have two in it. So they combined the two to make "Presidents Day".

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04:23 pm - This isn't even "reaching"...

The Multnomah County Republican Party is claiming that the local school district is "brainwashing" kids against the second amendment.

Why? Because of the student walkouts about the Parkland school shootings.

They are claiming it wasn't the kids idea, but that teachers and staff set it up.

They are talking about a lawsuit, and filing public records requests to try to "prove" this.

I'm with the school district on this one. It was the kids idea and teachers and other staff may have helped the kids with planning, but they didn't talk the kids into it.

This is beyond "grasping at straws".

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03:26 pm - The CDC gag rule is worse than you may have heard

Quote from a Washington Post article:

“In some instances, the analysts were given alternative phrases. Instead of “science-based” or ­“evidence-based,” the suggested phrase is “CDC bases its recommendations on science in consideration with community standards and wishes,” the person said. In other cases, no replacement words were immediately offered.”

12:28 pm - reactions to accusations

Sat, 18:44: quixylvre: aphobic-soundwave: aphobic-soundwave: “if somebody becomes panicked when you accuse them of...
https://t.co/U6ETGhyIz2 (read it, it makes a lot of good points)

The reverse happens too. I shared a room with another kid in a foster home. I hadn't really paid attention to him messing with the wall with a key. I just wrote it off as being pretty much the same as kids at school idly gouging at the wood of the desks (in lower grades anyway, and he was a bit "slow").

Anyway, turns out he'd been using the key to "drill" a hole through the plasterboard to the girls room on the other side.

We both got accused of it, and I got special attention because I *didn't* get all panicky at the accusation.

Hey, I knew I didn't do it. so why would I panic?

But nooo the fact that I *didn't* panic was "evidence" of guilt.

Basically, this sort of thing is used to "confirm" what the person already believes about your guilt.

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03:34 pm - It's that time of year again...

Friday I went to run some errands. Mostly a trip to the hardware store to get a nut for the grabber thingie I bought a while back. I need that to get stuff off the floor without having to bend over, or worse kneel down.

I'd been picking up some recycling that'd spilled from the bag it was in, and all of a sudden "Spung!" one of the two suction cup shaped things was gone.

After some search I found it,but not the acorn nut that had held it on. Since I'm trying to get the place presentable in anticipation of the "annual" inspection (I use quotes because this is the one by the management company, there's another one by HUD later in the year, and sometimes others) I needed to get it working again.

Getting the 71 to the Parkrose transit center was easy. But once there, texting the Tri-Met info number with the stop ID said the next 21 was "scheduled" for half an hour from then. When it says "scheduled" instead of how many minutes that either means the bus in question doesn't have GPS (so they don't know exactly where it is) or (rarely) that there's problem.

The time came and went. Finally the *next* bus (which also showed "scheduled" (WTF?) showed up.

Note that the driver of the 71 had said there were some sort of problems, including one lane of I-84 being close. and there'd been an insane amount of traffic on Sandy.

Any, t was only a few minutes to the hardware store.
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08:22 am - Humans and the Earth

Trump's stance on climate change made me dig up this old comic

http://humoncomics.com/mother-gaia

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04:53 am - Stupid writers

On Criminal Minds tonight they they had someone poisoning people with an "irradiated poison".

I was willing to accept that, though it was kinda silly. and it apparently *swiftly* (like within a couple of minutes) induced symptoms of a heart attack. Then, besides radiation poisoning it was cause multiple organ failures. The radiation was short half-life so it was "harmless" with in a day or two.

Turns out the perp had been stealing the stuff for six years or so from various hospitals radio-medicine units.

Which just plain *doesn't work*.

If it has that short a half-life it'd not be capable of causing radiation poisoning within *days* after it was stolen.

Also, nothing these used for radio-medicine is *remotely* that toxic. Nor would it do the "induce a heart attack" bit.

Also, they evacuated a neighborhood because the perp had dumped some down a sink. Yet at the same time, the perp who *worked* with this stuff and thus knew how to safely handle it, carried a container around in her *pocket*

Basically, if it can be safely carried in a pocket, even for a short time, it winding up in the sewer isn't a big deal.

So, essentially, the writers did *no* research.

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04:26 pm - this explains so much...

I was thinking about the Dunning–Kruger effect and it suddenly hit me.

It would explain *so* much about teen males and sex (and a few too many adult males as well).

11:41 pm - Railroads and dangerous cargoes

Once again the local news has folks spouting out all sorts of things about the oil train derailment while back near Mosier.

Many of the folks getting shown are, frankly, idiots.

One was going on about how oil was only 5% of the cargo the railroad carried and they must be making lots of money on it to be unwilling to quit carrying it.

And she and others go on about he danger.

Ok, no argument, *something* was wrong for the railroad to not have spotted those broken bolts during inspections.

That said, these folks are *woefully* off base on the rest of things.

First off, railroads are common carriers. Legally, that means that they are not *allowed* to refuse cargo unless it is illegal or fails to meet safety rules. Period.

Second, they are oh so worried about the trains carrying oil. Yes, there was a fire. and if it hadn't been a calm day, it'd have been a lot worse.

However, there are *far* more dangerous cargoes carried by rail. I used to work next door to a plant that had long lines of tank cars outside. they weren't carrying oil. They were full of caustic soda (only dangerous if it gets splashed on something), hydrochloric acid (very nasty if it was to be in a wreck), and *chlorine*. Liquified chlorine gas under pressure.

If that wreck had had chlorine tanks instead of oils tanks, Mosier would be a ghost town.

Hopper cars full of ammonium nitrate? Big crater.

Lots of other common cargoes would result in major disasters. Relatively speaking, oil trains are only a *moderate* hazard. Mostly environmental, with other hazards *if* a fire starts.

Once again we see proof that humans are *horrible* at risk assessment. We could be a lot better, but that'd require an *educated* population. Not merely with facts, but also with logic and math. Logic to recognize bad arguments and bad logic. Math so you can recognize what all those numbers *mean*.

10:05 am - This is the problem

I came across this post today
Getting Straight To The Point

TL;DR: guy worried about gays hitting on him, instructors asks hopw many girls have hit on him

This demonstrates an all too common problem. Men are afraid of "gays" hitting on them.

I'd have been tempted to ask the guy "Do you hit on girls?" And (assuming he said yes) "So what do you do if they say no?"

*That* is what most of these guys are actually afraid of. That gay men would treat them the way they treat women.

Pointing that out might just help them to treat women better.

04:10 am - More legislative idiocy.

About that Mississippi "religious protection" bill. This section is going to give some lawyers *lots* of fun.

that “male” and “female” refer to someone’s “immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy and genetics at time of birth.

Ah yes, ignorance of biology strikes again.

Sex is *subjectively* determined by doctors at time of birth. There are "standards" for making the determination, but they aren't always followed.

And even when they are followed they are pretty damned arbitrary. Stuff like length of penis/clitoris.

Genetic testing is rarely done on newborns. When it is, it's because genetic problems are suspected *or* because doctors are having trouble figuring out what sex the baby is.

So a lot of intersex babies *don't* get IDed at birth. Anybody with AIS/CAIS for example. Or guevedoces.

There aren't just two sexes even if the public (and most doctors) would like to believe there are.

And gender is even *more* complicated.

Some day we are going to have to get laws put in place recognizing the *spectrums* of sex & gender. Because that's what it's going to take to end this sort of nonsense.

02:10 am - Thoughts on sex education (and other things)

alex_antonin's post here got me thinking.

As I pointed out to him, getting people to agree on what constitutes "proper" sex education is going to be quite a trick.

But themn something struck me. One of the big arguments is that the parents should be teaching it, not the schools. And that's when my evil side took over.

Go ahead and make sed ed mandatory. And require that it be *passed*.

Parents feel that they should teach it, not the schools? Fine. Then their kid has to pass the final exam for the course (and the exam will be changed every term so you can't just copy answers, you have to actually *know* them.

I can hear the screams now.

Heck, lets do the same with the various "controversial" science courses. Their kids don't have to teach that "horrible" class that teaches evolution. Just as long as they can pass the exam. And again, the exams need to be randomized enough that rote memorization won't work, you have to demonstrate that you *understand* the material.

And in both cases, I'm quite willing, in fact I'll *insist* that the questions don't require you to *agree* with things. Just that they are the answers that lots of research and expertise have come up with.

If you want to believe in abstinence only, or in creationism, fine by me. But you'll damn well demonstrate that you *understand* the arguments and evidence for the other side.

What I'd *really* like to do is require classes in logic, "rhetoric" and how to evaluate arguments. (ie how to think and draw conclusions). Alas, they tried that back in the 50s with the intent of teaching kids to spot and reject communist propoganda. Unfortunately, they spotted and questioned *oour* propoganda too. even the stuff most don't realize *is* propoganda.

So the idea was dropped in a hurry. Can't have people questioning *our* inviolate assumptions now can we?

Besides horrifying politicians who pretty much *depend on the public not knowing how to spot BS and rhetorical tricks, the advertising industry would be up in arms as well.