Reunion Denied?

A righteous day, so far. Lovely fog this morning, the kind with big lazy particles that don’t have much optical effect other than making a big glow. And the gym was two day typically sparse of weight bouncers and educationalists so the atmosphere was decidedly pleasant, at least for a gym. Despite the ORF aroma of BenGay and musty.

The episodes were of science podcasts and not too bad: a bit about early bacteria that had hydrogen sulfide flatulence; and a bit on self-learning in children. Sadly the latter was a TED talk and hence almost worthless for content. I sometimes think the “T” stands for THEATER because that is certainly what those talks are about. I was almost amazed at the so-called discovery. How has the contemporary educationalist instrumentality managed to forget how widespread self-learning has been? Pride does precede a fall.

I also ran across this cartoon [Link]

yesterday and it gave rise to some reflection.

I should comment that in the forty-something years since I matriculated from undergraduate shule I have received zero announcements or invitations to a reunion. My high shule class, and its temporal neighbors, have reunions every five years but I long ago ceased to attend because they were boring and inefficient. They are always held in the high summer in places with no or inadequate cooling, which is a negative when you have inadequate body heat regulation. You go and seek out the folks you know but haven’t seen and then after a half hour there is nothing left but food, ethanol, bad patter, and worse music.

I can’t eat the food for medical prescriptions, and the ethanol is too polluted for me to waste my ration points on. The same folks who couldn’t communicate but were ‘popular’ in shule are still talking and can’t communicate but they have lost almost all of their popularity. And my taste in music was not rock and roll but folk so the music is trash and noise.

But none of my colleges have summoned me and I had occasion, courtesy of this cartoon. I am not sure I would attend. My high shule class was, round numbers, 500; my undergrad class 5000. If there ate few at the high shule reunions I want to talk to, how many fewer at the undergrad? SO I suspect I would not attend just out of expectation of disappointment and distress.

But I would like the chance.

education, humans, behavior, college, nonsense

Bribery Failure

Back to modal, I hope. At least week in and some activity.

On which note, I was a bit abashed by an article [Link] on some work at U Chicago about a practice I was unaware of and am not sure I understand. The lead paragraph states, of the study,

“More than 30 percent of high school graduates were offered state financial aid if they went to college in state, but less than 3 percent changed their decision about where to go to school or where to live once they graduated”

I think this says that of the population offered scholarships at in-state colleges, 0.1 were unmoved. But that wayward “and” is confusing.

I think I can comprehend the mechanics of offering top ranked (by whatever idiosyncratic metrics) high shule students scholarships to attend in-state colleges in hopes of retaining them. But what is not clear is whether the scholarship has a covenant requiring such. And that seems to be a critical factor in this presentation that got left out.

But leaping into a series of unjustified assumptions< let us suppose that most of these students are going to major in the employable disciplines: business; STEM; medicine; or law. Success in all of these is a matter of as good an educations as possible so if there is a perception that a better education is available elsewhere, then go there. The same goes for career.

So where’s the drama coming from? Why the wonder?

politics, college, humans, behavior

Mind will CLOSE

Strange. That is about as well as the description gets.

I walked into gym this morning. There was a computer printed one-page MegaHard Word/PowerPoint sign taped to the door
“The gym will CLOSE on Thursday.”

The gym, it may be recalled, is closed on Sundaes in an exhibition of discrimination against all those who do not observe pseudo-sabbath on that day of the week. Hence it is open the other six days. Hence it closes at some time each of those days.

I thought about asking if someone mistakenly  thought that not-open was equivalent to closed? I did not. Stupidity of this depth would likely not understand the question. And if anyone did they would probably take offense and threaten me with damage. This is, after all, an adjunct to a hospital where the greatest peaceful (i.e., not-war) damage to humans occurs.

Plus, given the rather noxious penchant of the place to close for any excuse, however specious or flighty, the sign almost assuredly meant that.

I did reflect on the nature of the management of this place, once more. And speculated whether:

1. the manager made the signs; or
2. the manager directed the signs be made and didn’t check implementation; or
3. the manager directed the signs be made and did check implementation.

I am not at all sure which is worse but it adds a bit more to my file on mismanagement in the medical arena to use in lectures and monographs. And this one is a DOOZY!

And then I went motoring off to Nawth Alibam’s Shining City on the Hill and ran across what has to be the greatest demonstration of college loyalty of any alumnus I have ever seen. I shan’t mention the college other than it is not in Alibam, but I ran into this alumnus who maintains a false record of residence, a false vehicle registration, and a bank account in that state just so he can purchase vanity plates of his alma mater for his motorcar.

My neck has not felt this limber in years.

And then I met with one of my colleagues who related how the students of another colleague’s graduate ‘introduction to business for non-business graduates’ course, almost entirely populated by graduate engineers, are universally frightened of having to do interpolation from tables. The colleague, Magnetic Inductance Force, is of the opinion that it is the table look-up that is frightening, rather than the interpolation itself. Not that the interpolation may not be frightening, but these GEN Us have never not used calculators and hence probably do not know how to look up numbers in a table.

This would explain why they are also so bad at statistics?

Anyway, on that note, Selah.

management, health, organization, college, maths, stupidity

Sundae Stupidity Cherry

After our discussion yesterday of doing maths problems while less than conscious of them, I ran across another, related, article [Link] from Washington U that cites a survey indicating that as a group folks suffering from some form of Autism are more likely to major in STEM disciplines. I fear this is little more than academic legitimization of what has already been known. It certainly has been the norm since I was an undergraduate and could first observe the population directly, albeit a relatively small segment of the population. But I will go further and assert that autism sufferers are more likely to be nerds in general.

There are a couple of obvious reasons for this. The crowds are smaller. And one tends to do much of one’s work alone, or at least in a small group. And because there are few – my undergraduate physics major class cohort had a population of five! – there is less chance of encountering strangers.

This is not to say that there are not extroverts present, but there are very few bogs. They tend to fall away and go do something bogs can do, like business or something else I can’t immediately think of. I am not sure if it is that physic in particular, and STEM in general, is too hard or requires too much dedication, but the bogs tend to fail more often.

But what is worrying is that the STEM social engineers seem committed to driving the nerds, those with autism especially, away by making the whole information presentation thing – what we used to call lectures and labs – more social and extrovertish. And that drives away those who only want to operate in their heads. The physics classroom is no place for extrovert partying but that is what too many fools are making of it. And they are dragging Amerika into third world status all the faster.

And none of this gives us any insight into the key questions: like is string theory more than a maths game and were the founding fathers: Galileo and Newton and Boyle and Hooke also autistic?

Next, we have a rather disappointing report [Link] that the boson recently observed at Hadron Downs Racetrack, aka the LHC, is nothing more than a plain vanilla Higgs boson. While this does offer one more straw on the camel’s back of upholding (?) the Standard model it is terribly disappointing in that all that effort was spent not breaking theory. The search must continue since there should be other Higgses out there. Hopefully they will be outre enough to actually break things and give us something to do other than refresh the liquid nitrogen vats.

Next, a rather disappointing piece from the campus of the Boneyard [Link] where they looked at the relationship between cellular telephone bans and motoring incidents. They found that repressive laws decreased motoring incidents in dense situations but may increase them in vacuous environments. No word on how banning cellular telephone use causes traffic accidents in rural areas. Could it be that the absence of attention gathering increases sleeping at the wheel? Hopefully those social parasites will get off their academic posteriors and actually do some real observations.

Of course, things can get so dull out in the ‘real’ boonies that people play bumper cars with their motorcars just for some excitement. But there are quite a few such places in Illinois, like around where they water ski in borrow pits.

And finally, we have a rather unrelated article [Link] that is so abysmally bad I just had to include it. And since it comes from TIME (magazine) it illustrates just how decrepit and execrable that rag can be. (See my earlier blots about movie selection.)  This is a list of “unrealized” college costs and they are totally whacked. Not because they are inaccurate but because I cannot suspend disbelief sufficiently to credit that they are “unrealized”. Back when I went off to college my parents and I knew almost all of these as a result of information provided by the campus instrumentality or through that most uncommon of things today, common sense.

I append the list here only to make obvious just how stupid either this article, or some humans, almost surely bogs, are today:

• Books and media: This one is so bad I can’t understand why it’s on the list. Who goes off to college and doesn’t know they need books?
• Class and parking fees: This one might be covert except it isn’t. Colleges inform loudly on this one and anyone who misses it probably should be going to college.
• Having fun: I have to worry about what parents are thinking. Even my folks got this one in my day and had to convince me that it was valid. And kids are a lot more extrovertish these days.
• Fraternities and Sororities: This one is just flat confusing. Are there folks who think Greek stercus is sans cost? Surely they are not ignorant of the most prominent feature of most colleges?
• Getting involved: This one may have some relevance to the expressed nature of the list, but I doubt it. Kids can’t get into college these days with doing community servitude stuff and they and their parents know that helping others costs one money. So this comes across as another insult to not being a slime mold.
• Furnishings: Is there any community in Amerika lacking a big box store? We have a MalWart here in Greater Metropolitan Arab and every late summer they stock all manner of dorm room crap to encumber the students and clutter up the limited space. Those rooms are supposed to be furnished already. So telling me that everyone doesn’t already know about this racket is another insult to intelligence.
• Electronics: When I went off to college I got a new slide rule – actually, a high shule graduation present. Nowadays it’s a lapbox and maybe a tablet and probably an MP3 player and a new ‘stupid’ phone. So this one is unrealized? In what Amish settlement?
• Cable TV:  OK, this one is unrealized to me, and befuddling. The only TV I watched in college was Star Trek (the original) and Laugh In. And nowadays this stuff is available over the internet. So are the kids such bogs they have to have cable?
• Wardrobe: I’ve talked about this one before. It falls into the can’t-be-discussed-between-parents-and-children bin because neither is ready to say that this is part of gaining pseudo-independence. Once you get to college you have to dress to (a) look like others (or the opposite;) and (b) express your independence from parents picking out your clothes. So while this one isn’t unrealized it is a stealth elephant.
• Mobile phone service: This one strikes me as stupid in great magnitude. The expense is certainly known anyplace that cellular service is available. After all, kids these days start carrying cellular telephones in grade one, don’t they? Get real and quit insulting my intelligence.
• Food and beverage costs: Mothers know this up front. College is nothing new in terms of junk fooding except maybe the absence of transportation due to parking restrictions. This one is another insult to anyone not terminally boggish and lithic.
• Travel costs: Ditto. So stupid it doesn’t need repeating.

Overall, this is one of the most insulting and stupid lists I have seen in years, totally antithetic to its avowed purpose. It is even insulting that money was wasted printing it and paying for it to be written. One more instance of third world nonsense in the Yankee republic.

humans, autism, nerds, STEM, college, stupidity

Majors in a very minor key

Back to gym and week in. Rather a skippy sundae with FD SCP off on a sewing excursion. The morning opened poorly with a rather boring episode of the CBC’s “Best of Ideas”. It started off as one of those artsy things but it shortly degenerated into a swamp of stagnant mouthings.

This put me to consideration of an article [Link] from a college newspaper about the ten worst major disciplines. Given my inability to avoid lists and comment on them, what follows is obvious: (they seem to be in reverse order, probably as some journalistic ploy to drama?)

• English takes the number 10 spot. This is unsurprising. Society has decided that the use of syntax is unnecessary so those who (should) know how are not valued.
• Ranked at number nine is sociology. This is not news. Sociology has always, even back when I was an undergraduate been a “lost” major. The kids who majored in sociology were the ones who were so bad they couldn’t even pass psychology.
• Drama/theater arts takes the eighth spot. I have never known any of these people except as observables. Pampered children who have some sort of yen to go into show business but don’t get that to be successful in show business you have to be a street thug. Education is a handicap and reduces you to one of those minion jobs that can only be endured by a masochist.
• Coming in at number seven is the overly broad category of liberal arts. Back when I was an undergraduate we were in the college of arts and sciences. I stayed on the science side of campus as much as possible. The only folks I knew who were majoring in liberal arts were greeks who came to college to party before going into the family business where only the diploma mattered.
• Ranked at number six is the studio arts; painting, drawing, etc. See the comments about theater arts. Same class of phenomena, Success is almost zeroed if you have a college degree in this stuff.
• Number five is graphic design. I think this is commercial art. Making signs and posters and laying out page formats. The author opined wonder at this but the real reason that this one is so poorly paid is that there’s lots of competition for the few jobs around so the S&D curve thing applies.
• Philosophy and other religious studies come in at number 4. Unlike classical Greece, you can’t get a job as a philosopher. You can go do the religion thing with the other part but there are all sorts of social certifications involved so unless you attend a bible thumper “college” don’t bother.
• At number three is film and photography. Again, another one of those education gets trumped by talent, and talent doesn’t need much education.
• Number two is the fine arts as a whole. Again, I am unsure of the distinction here so ehhhhhhhhhhhh.
• Last but not least is anthropology. OK, two things here. Too much watching Indiana Jones movies; and the demise of the academic job. Also, anthropology has sort of done itself in these days by proudly announcing it isn’t a science. The only jobs out there for anthropologists are working for construction contractors doing native american burial site cover ups. Not a very attractive or well paid thing.

Notice what is missing: STEM; business; law; and medicine. Also, that there are a lot of majors out there that only exist for rich daughters to play at before they get married. Further, the size of the department depends more on how many service course students they get rather than how good they are as a major discipline.

Campus Concept

While I was motoring across Nawth Alibam’s Shining City on the Hill Wednesday and being exposed to all sorts of nonsensical advertising I was struck by a model for the three U Alibam campuses:

• U Alibam Tuscaloosa (campus of the Black Warrior) = Winders – It’s bloated and doesn’t work very well and everything you want to do costs money;
• U Alibam Birmingham (campus of the Alibam) = Apple OS – It’s expensive and you have no idea how it works or how to fix it but it does wonders for you; and
• U Alibam in Huntsville (campus of the Tennessee) – Linux – It’s inexpensive, small, works better than the others, and but requires knowledge and competence to use.

I not sure about how this analogy extends to football, but I suspect it’s malware.

Alabama, academia, college, humans, humor

College Attention Span

Ah! Freya’s day. The boundary unbump between week in and out, and my day to sleep in. Till 0530 this morning. So I am not only a bit slow yet but also behind.

It struck me that this should have been the journalism silly season although the only things demonstrating such have been: the olympics; the partisan conventions; and this somewhat silly graphic posted by the HowToGeek folks [Link]

I was a bit surprised when I saw this, mostly because I had not, so far as memory would assure, seen it before. Then I realized that the reason I had not seen was because I was off at college.

That may seem a bit strange, given the propensity of college students to get all torqued over social stuff, especially things that most folks put in the “I can’t do anything about except curse or cry” pile. Happily some of those can be influenced by large numbers of college students doing stupid things, burning building, and getting shot by the militia. What is not mentioned is that those students are the fuzzy middle who major in things like journalism or syntax or literature or some form of ethno-geographic studies. The folks in the wings of the distribution, on the one (lower) end, the Greeks, the jocks, and the party animals, and on the other (upper) end, the STEMS, the pre-Meds, and the pre-Laws (who may also map into the other end since they are often Greeks) do not participate in such demonstrations for somewhat differing reasons, but mostly, generally, orthogonality.

The good academics at the U Maryland have managed to rediscover this [Link] with respect to politics. Glad that the phenomena is now “official” from an academic standpoint. I just hope they don’t tell anyone in the Yankee government lest the students be plagued with some tax money waste program to make them politically conscious. Shades of Chinese politics!

I went to college through several elections. Not sure if I voted in any of them. Didn’t seem worth the effort or the sacrifice at the time. The only politics we were interested in in undergraduate shule was the ‘Nam. The campus of the Black Warrior was too conservative to have much anti-war activity and what there was was limited pretty much to the hippy arts majors and faculty. In fact, when the anti-war hippies did demonstrate, the Greek-ROTC guys counter-demonstrated with truncheons and cudgels. I suspect that’s why the guvnuh declared martial law and sent in the militia. My only perspective was it got me out of final exams since they were trying to empty the campus.

I have been told since that the whole thing was a sham by the FBI, and a response to the Kent State affair. From my perspective neither of these is accurate. The artsy-fartsy staged a march because Dow came to campus recruiting STEMS, and the Greek Elitists raised the ante. But in an effort to make the whole thing seem otherwise, almost all of actuality has been lost.

Not that the students, then or now, really cared for long.

humans, college, behavior, authority, tyranny, whitewash

Off to Campus Advice

This week out I ran across an article [Link] entitled “What College Freshmen Should and Should Not Pack” and being that I am unable to avoid snarking about such things, especially from journalists, here is the snark.

I do have to agree with the article that freshmen often bring the wrong stuff to college. But more so, they fail to bring the right stuff. At least in my day, and while I acknowledge that college has changed since, that doesn’t prevent me from making noise. To start with, they have a list of “Tips” that strike me as fair but poorly posed:

Tip No.1: Pare down the packing list

This one is almost impossible to get right, mostly because of parents.

Tip No.2: Choose Your Wardrobe Wisely

My advice on this one is don’t. Don’t, that is, buy new clothes. Yes, bring a minimum with you but college is not high shule and if you wear high shule clothes in college you’re going to broadcast “hick” and “dweeb” at 40 MW. This goes even to underwear, especially, I am told, for the female gendered. Save your coins and buy clothes after you get to college so you can look like a native and not an auslander.

Incidentally, that pretty well solves number one, except that you still have parents to deal with and frankly they ain’t gonna trust you to buy clothes.

Tip No. 3: Know the rules

The college is going to tell you the rules. Now the real stuff. If you want to take something that is verboten, and it’s small, go ahead. If it’s big, hold off. At least until you can learn (a) which rules aren’t enforced; (b) which rules are only enforced on special occasions; and (c) which rules can be ignored. This is why you don’t want to look like an auslander. If you do, you can’t gather intelligence.

Tip No. 4 Limit valuables and extras

Dorms are made for borrowing, often forever. There’s always a mooch and part of learning the society is learning how you can safely deal with such people. There are also bullies, and quite frankly the college isn’t going to help you. SO keep the costly stuff to a minimum. I’m not sure what “extras” are.

Then they have lists of brings and leaves:

• Bring:
  Bed risers if allowed or if bed isn’t raised already – bring them anyway. They’re small and likely the rule against them will be enforced seldom if at all.
• Dishpan to wash dishes – Lots of colleges don’t allow cooking in room. And communal kitchens are to be avoided like the plague. But a dishpan can be useful for washing clothes too.
• Dish detergent, dish cloth/sponge, dish towel – See above
• Batteries – Scope out the battery situation when you do the campus visit. If the nearest source of batteries is five miles away and you have to walk, then bring, but otherwise, bringing batteries is stupid. Besides, if you have a bunch, they’ll get mooched. Try to never have any more on hand than one extra for every device with consumable batteries.
• Removable tape and hooks for hanging things on walls – Depends on rules. It’s hard to hide these.
• Earplugs – they;re small why not.
• Rain coat and umbrella – one, not both. depends on the custom. If it’s an umbrella campus and you bring a rain coat, you’re an auslander. Also, think about how you’ll handle book pack or bag or whatever.
• Sleeping bag in case a friend or sibling visits – Are you kidding?
• Tool kit – Make sure it has a lock and is small; otherwise mooched or stolen.

Leave at Home:

• Stereo systems – why bother? Bring an MP3 and earphones. Don’t add to the noise pollution. Besides, why waste good space on such?
• Candles (fire hazard) – LED flashlamps – keep secure lest stolen or mooched.
• Halogen lamps/light bulbs – I don’t get this one.
• Space heaters – Almost surely verboten. And enforced.
• Hotplates, toasters, toaster ovens _ Trick, bring an iron, and make a frame to hold it inverted. You can cook on the iron and it won;t be verboten. If permitted, bring a small combination convection/toaster/microwave – and a coffee pot.
• Duct tape, nails or thumbtacks that can damage the walls – Bring the duct tape anyway. 

As a rule, the more your parents tell you you need to take something, and you distrust/disagree, the less likely you’ll need it. Don’t bring anything that is easy to get on campus. Don’t bring anything that marks you as an auslander. And be prepared to learn how to break rules.

humans, education, college, stuff

College Comments

OK, yesterday was a bit of a rat race. FD SCP drove me into Nawth Alibam’s Shining City on the Hill to see physician, and then since the news was encouraging we did a bit of economic farming.  But as a result I am a bit set upon this morning with (relatively) early rising and a deep queue of tasks and chores.

Yesterday I commented on an article [Link] on “How to Graduate from College in Four Years”. Since this article had a list, I am giving in to the temptation to respond to the list with my own comments:
Do: Find a Major Early This one is difficult and depends on what kind of major you are going to take on. If you’re going to be a STEM (Science-Technology-Engineering-Maths) major, or are serious about law or medicine, then you definitely need to get close to the groove as a first semester freshman. That means you start the long chain courses [1] as an entering Freshman. And learn early on, as a senior, how to read a course catalog and identify these chains. Be especially watchful for cross-department chains.

If you’re going to major in business or some liberal art, it doesn’t matter except for debt avoidance. And if you don’t know what you want to major in, ignore what your parents tell you and go get a counselor to give you a Meyers-Briggs test or some other similar aptitude/temperament instrument and find out what you are good at and will enjoy. Having fun on the job is crucial to not becoming a burned out wreck.

Don’t: Take Fridays/Mondays Off This depends on what you are majoring in, because there may be some semesters when your schedule will wind up being scant on some days. But the point is, don’t avoid classes to get a long weekend, or even to get to sleep late. In fact, seek them out. The smaller the class, the better you will learn and the better grades you will make. So let the bogs and fergs sleep in on long weekend, you can always take a nap mid afternoon.

Do: Reach Out to Advisors for Help with Scheduling I am ambivalent on this one. I found advisors were more detrement than help when I was an undergrad. But the one exception to this is when you have some critical path [2] that can’t be fulfilled. IOW, you end up with two must take courses being taught at the same time. Advisors have some administrative power and maybe can help with this. If not they can buck you to someone who can. So at least make sure your advisor knows who you are enough to be comfortable giving you this kind of help.

Don’t: Transfer Without Planning Ahead OK, this is the primary vertical copulation. Unless you are getting kicked out of shule, or made the mistake of listening to your parents and started out at a two year community college, transferring colleges is a recipe for being a terminal loser. But given that you have to transfer, you need to make sure wherever you are transferring to is going to provide what you need and not be worse than where you are now.
If you went off to some college to follow the love of your life and he/she has become a hate object, suck it up and stay put. Running away is programmed into humans. It’s called fight-or-flight. But make sure you aren’t fleeing into the mouth of a big carnivore, metaphorically speaking. And if your getting kicked out of shule for being stupid, or lazy or naughty, join the Army. That way you can get some behavior modification and can start over after service with a chance of success.

Do: Take Advantage of Time Off I am ambivalent on this one as well. Time off does snot mean party. In fact, if you are a party person and want to major in something real in college, you’re gonna have to give up one of the two. Or be brilliant as Einstein. Parties are for bogs and people who major in business or liberal arts. If that’s you then it doesn’t matter what you d on your time off because you;re never going to matter with probability 0.99+.
If you’re a STEM, then use your vacation/break time to learn something different. Archaeological digs are great for this. You get to do a lot of hard, nasty physical labor and learn a few new things that will stand you in good stead for perspective. And make the STEM courses and labs seem friendly by comparison.

Last, and the most critical thing, is to figure out who to listen to on life and career advice. Your parents are mostly bad sources. They’re not objective and too dated. Your fellow students are as lost as you are and only want the power trip in giving you advice. And your professors are hothouse flowers grown in a controlled environment. And you can’t get into that environment because it is already overpopulated. No trivial answer to this one. But if you don’t get it figured out, all of this going to college is for nothing but serfdom.

[1]  Long chain courses are the ones where the required courses are large in number, > 6, and must be (largely) taken sequentially. If you don;t start with the first course as a Freshman and don’t take one (or two) every semester, you just can’t get them all taken (passed) in four years.
[2]  It’s a management “science” term. Most people end up with at least two long chains of courses (I had five at one point, with three majors.) The one that is the most restrictive is called the “critical path” since you have to get all those courses taken in minimum time.

humans, college, education, nonsense, stupidity

Tide Drain

OK, it’s sundae again which means that I have to scrape off some tabs. Additionally, since I have been operating off my Latitude D420 lap box after FD SCP pointed out lower optical surface area, fewer photons in solid angle, especially since a lap box can be cranked down in emission level more than a desk box monitor, a difference that I still do not grok.

So I also have to make sure a couple of the articles get to one of the desk boxes for storage on one of their BIG data drives.

GAD! I am beginning to sound as banal as Jerry Pournelle writing about toys, and probability one, nowhere near as entertaining! At least I haven’t talked about boat anchors as a metaphor for permanence. They ain’t. I’ve torn up more than one. Now a titanium rod ten meters long and a fourth-meter in diameter? That’s hard to tear up. And it does wonderful things to solid objects if you get it up to over a kilometer per second.

Anyway, the lead off article is one in National Geographic [Link] that nicely illustrates the futility of trying to communicate with bogs. It vastly transcends the idiocy I read earlier about the reporter who asked “what the Higgs means to regular people?” [Link] No snide comments forthcoming about constipation, mental or otherwise.

The point is that the folks at CERN have told the boggery that they have found “the” Higgs. That was one of those things that gets said because the boggery has the attention span of a neutrino. In it’s own frame. What has actuallu happened is that “A” boson has been found and a lot of effort now has to put into finding out its properties and how they compare to those of Higgs, the five other guys who didn’t get historical credit, and the folks since who have worked on what the “Higgs” ought to look like. If we’re very lucky, the two will look little alike and the standard model will not have become a shibboleth. Of course, they can’t say this because the boggery thinks failure is always a bad thing.

While we’re on failure, MegaHard posted the first quarterly loss in a really LONG time! [Link] The broadcast excuse for this is that they botched a takeover but those of us who love MegaHard like crotch rot deeply desire this to be a sign of their impending melt down. Then maybe we can all use an OS that isn’t stercus. Even the mind serfs.

Speaking of mind serfs, I had to watch the national news coverage of the Colorado aftermath. Pure Emotional Vampireism! Disgusting in its depravity. The bogery consumed with gusto.

On which note, Austrian archaeologists have unearthed what the media is calling the world’s oldest bra. [Link] Patently, they have no evidence of this astounding claim. What they have is a bra that is significantly older – fifteenth century – than any previously known bra and hence the oldest known bra. That distinction is evidently orthogonal to modern journalists. Caveat Emptor!

In a related matter, I note [Link] a rating of party shules. The campus of the Boneyard is included but not the campus of the Black Warrior. Evidently the football fanaticism and absence of educational activity is just flat out incompetence rather than actual partying. I shall have to harass my non-alumni fanatic acquaintances about this. They are sometimes sensitive about being mere acolytes and not actual members of the order.

In a related article, I was pleased to read that Princeton has decided to suspend any freshman who pledges a Greek house. [Link] I can recall once hearing a drunk frat rat (redundant – I know) declare that anyone who wasn’t a Greek should be suspended at the campus of the Black Warrior. He was quickly drug off by more rational members of the order for counseling on how that would mean the frats would actually have to admit nerds and furriners. But I will have to admit that the Greek system is a good halfway house for those who cannot perform even minimally in obtaining a college education.

I wonder if that model should be applied to christianist churches?

humans, behavior, science, college, education