JakeAl

Do they need warranties? Doesn't Amazon have a return anything, anytime policy? I thought I read stories about people just buying stuff, using it, and returning it years later after it's worn out for a refund or replacement. I think I heard this in one of the many Amazon returns mystery box videos on YouTube.

It doesn't do that for me. Must be your settings.

It's been in widespread use for decades. Back in the 90s there was Digimarc who inserted copyright details into photos and video by changing the shading of pixels in an unnoticeable pattern, and they even said the method could be applied to car paint. All you need is a high resolution scanner, and given that the cameras on your typical game console are high enough to see skin temperature variances and determine one's emotional state (best in combination with galvanic skin response), the scanners are everywhere. Think about that the next time someone complains about data tracking.

I think before we change the system we might want to get politicians to actually do their job and represent the people in their district. With all these people voting by mail and all these government provided or subsidized phones and internet connections it's not only trivial but should be mandatory to quantify and qualify what each person who votes wants as a matter of a public record of accountability rather than having some party line being towed. If the politicians were doing their job and not serving some party or political agenda, the electoral college I think would work just fine. Popular vote/mob rules? I don't think so. The majority should never rule over the minority, and the only good government is a democracy where the majority vote in the best interest of all citizens and compromise in order to do so. Or as I like to sum it up, don't confuse a coop game with a competitive game.

No, it is not artificial life, they synthesized life from that which already gave rise to life. This is an important distinction because what they did involves growing and manipulating existing systems. It's no more artificial than a an animal which has been bred, this is just on the level of molecular genetics. If we ever transcend, creating human/"machine" interfaces will require such technology. No you won't jack in like Neo, no we won't download our souls and thoughts to a computer, synthetics will replace organics slowly. The computers and people will meet in the middle.

"Grievance studies" are all rooted in conflict theory, which was developed by one of sociology's three founding fathers, Karl Marx. They are literally rooted in a single (disproven) theory that all relationships are based on power and dominance. These are the people I believe we are talking about, the ones who speak of power and oppression and some tribe or class that is in control and must be stopped in the name of virtue, subsequently going on a witch hunt finding evidence and evils wherever they look because they have been taught to use post-modern reasoning, a form of irrational reasoning meant to question logic but not be used as logic.

The tactics they use, weaponizing shame and applying post-modern reasoning/critical theory, is a Marxist socialist tactic when combined with his ideology that cuts to the core of the most fundamental human psychological need -- the need for social connection, validation (psychological or scientific), and by using reasoning that cannot be argued with rationally is disarming if not disorienting in a political fight/argument. There's even a word for when they use it against other radical socialist groups -- leapfrog paranoia -- meant to get the different intersectional factions to unite against a common enemy in order to seize power. This is all in their own words.

(sidebar - watch the documentary Hard Times at Douglas High, where an inner city debate team uses critical theory in a debate about anything to make it about racism in order to win. In other words all debates became about their narrative, and these were Baltimore kids in what was the first integrated high school, indoctrinated by their professor back in the 90s).

It's coercive and dishonest, not simply persuasive, and a form of violence. They force people to submit under threat of social disconnection, which research has shown is more brutal than physical violence because it's psychologically traumatic, permanent, and has a biological impact on the individual as well as a sociological impact. Guilt is saying you did something wrong, shame is saying you are something wrong. There is no greater authoritarian or fascist behavior, which needs to be pointed out as distinct from the field of study itself.

So if the words "grievance studies" or "social justice warrior" are offensive, perhaps a better and more historically accurate and verifiable label to apply would be to call them Marxists or conflict theorists? I don't think that would be completely fair because as pointed out, few even know what those words mean let alone the roots and origins of their own beliefs, the nature of the tactics they use, or the nature of reasoning and belief systems themselves. What word wouldn't be offensive that embodies the characteristics that define them to others? The "grievance studies" label seems scientifically accurate and neutral without any attached ideology or behaviors.

If this offends anyone it is not meant to, I take no sides in any of this and seek the value in studying all of it.

This video is a good primer on burnout by an expert.

"Understanding Burnout," Prof. Christina Maslach (U.C. Berkeley) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kLPyV8lBbs

This article is a summary of what's in the above speaker's book

Recovering from Burnout https://kierantie.com/burnout/

I also want to mention the article above has a link to Mind Tools, which is a web site that has a test you can take but I recommend reading their articles on leadership as it helps one understand their place and the direction they need to take as leaders of their own life as well as leaders in the lives of others, which is an interesting perspective in the context of the listed topics.

Don't forget the US subsidizes the defense of European nations. How prosperous would they be if they had to defend themselves against foreign invaders?

This is not a valid statement. Entering a country illegally is illegal immigration, as is overstaying one's VISA. Until they are granted legal entry, it's illegal entry, and they are illegal immigrants. The solution is simple, asylum should only be granted to those with a current legal status. If they enter illegally, they get sent back to their country of origin where they must get in line with all of the others applying. There's a backlog in applications (400K+), but it's because of all of the people jumping the line which interferes with the quotas set for legal immigrants and clogs the system.

Toffler made predictions about culture and society, not tech. He "predictions" were about about the impact of tech on the systems of society and culture as dictated by the major waves of tech evolution since the dawn of man. The Third Wave outlines the waves of history, Future Shock is about the friction of assimilating to rapidly changing tech and culture, Powershift is about the shift in power from a top down system to a producer-consumer system due to decentralization and Revolutionary Wealth is about the revolution where new business and economic models emerge such as patreon, bitcoin and the Gig economy. I recommend all of these books as they outline a framework for understanding the nature of the technological imperative.

I just want to recommend people read the Alvin Toffler quadrilogy as he described decades ago the changes that would take place due to technology.

In The Third Wave he provides a historical context and background for the evolution of technology and it's impact on society; In Future Shock he talks about the growing pains as technology enables the individual to do things the group (government, education, business) could only do before; In Powershift he discusses the shift in power from those at the top to the individual; In Revolutionary Wealth he discusses the new producer-consumer business models.

If you look at social media and businesses such as YouTube, Kickstarter and Patreon they are the future, and traditional businesses can only survive by embracing and capitalizing on their value to these new models, or by clinging to the old models as they die off which means Disney buying up as much content as possible as distribution costs drop and channels approach infinity. They are trying to lock up as much popular content as they can for the built in audience and brand because they are a goliath that can't compete with an army of Davids.

This has all happened before, all you have to do is look at the history of print, live performances, radio, television, cable, even web portals. It's a predictable cycle of growth and consolidation with an existing system as it spawns new systems independent of but predicated upon the systems that came before it. Marshall McLuhan spoke a lot about such things as well as Neil Postman.

Given Google's role in surveillance through advertising and frameworks when they could actually redesign the whole system to be as private, secure and distributed as possible, I don't think they have any moral ground to stand on. IT's obvious to me why they had to drop the 'Don't Be Evil' motto. They can't help but be evil unless they give up the control that gives them all of their power and profits.

Just to clarify, a refugee as someone who is outside of his or her homeland, and has been persecuted in his or her homeland or has a well-founded fear of persecution there on account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.

Political asylum is for someone already in the United States, and protects an individual from removal to a country of feared persecution.

In either case the problem is people entering the country illegally versus legally and how to handle them in a way that doesn't create a queue of 600,000+ asylum seekers (which is what we have now). Think about that number given that I'm sure many of you know what limits we put on the number of legal immigrants each year.

For those who may argue for open borders I recommend studying the field of cultural pluralism. We're talking about a risk versus reward scenario where the risk is the existing culture being required to accommodate (replaced by) the incoming culture rather than the incoming culture assimilating to the existing culture and both changing at a manageable/stable rate. This is a function of two things most notably, the desire to assimilate to the culture and fit in, and the rate at which newcomers are allowed. The studies have shown it takes on average six years for a person who wants to assimilate to the culture to do so completely (this is from the field of cultural pluralism studies). From other studies about tipping points I can say that at most 25% can be allowed because that's all that's needed for a major shift and displacement of an existing culture, and that would be the number of people that are a part of a culture versus total immigrants (so unassimilated must remain below 25% at any given time).

Make of that you will, but as far as I can tell those are the major variables and numbers that need to be carefully considered and measured when it comes to the diversity, qualifications, and numbers of those we choose to allow emigrate legally and the criteria for the limitations we and other nations implement and control through the law. The reality is without significantly affecting an existing culture, meaning changing it at a rate faster than the resident population can accommodate reasonably without causing widespread problems/disruption for them or those coming here.

Skin color is not synonymous with race. Every race has people that span a wide range of skin tones, and skin tone fades with age, so you may as well be arguing it's ageism.

Education is what you make of it. Make of that what you will.

This site is a simple and straightforward primer on critical reading and writing and hence thinking: http://criticalreading.com

But while most books on critical reasoning and thinking are decent, so far this is my favorite as it addresses barriers to critical thinking and the various types of logic pretty well: https://www.amazon.com/Critical-Thinking-Introduction-Gregor...

I was even able to download a previous edition as a PDF for free.

That's known as 'the structure of scientific revolutions' but it applies to revolution/innovation in general.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Structure_of_Scientific_Re...

The book is free online.

That's a failure of the project manager. Before any deadline is set the dev team leads are supposed to meet with all of the leads on the project, who in turn meet and come to a consensus with their teams. The results of the negotiations are supposed to start at the top with the idea and goals, go all the way down to the people who will be executing them, and then go all of the way back up to the top over and over until everyone until a consensus is reached. Things may change, but in proper/formal project management a change management process is in place where the leads must come to a consensus before any change is approved. Good management enforces this process, and good leadership at any level makes everyone above and below them aware of the implications of what everyone wants. Everyone has to be on board and working towards a common goal, and come to agreement to how best to reach that goal. The biggest problem I see is at the organizational level, where the project manager is not the one with authority to control the process. When this doesn't happen, the people above and below them are not protected from the implications and things go bad for everyone. This is taught in PMP courses, but what isn't taught is what happens when the organization doesn't give the project manager authority but instead turns them into a project coordinator or project expediter. A formally trained, knowledgeable and experienced project manager with the authority to control the process can and will make sure everyone is on board, but they can't do that when their authority is undermined by the organization, client, or teams. Likewise for the team leads. This is the definition of cooperation.

I'll go with maybe.

Bi-partisan does not mean non-partisan.

> Basically, Neoliberalism doesn't seem to be societies natural order.

That's a narrow view. It comes down to conflict versus cooperation. Both exist in nature and both are beneficial. The trick is in maintaining a balance -- homeostasis -- between the two that promotes healthy growth at large and not just for one group or individual.

There is just as much male privilege as there is female privilege, and the same goes with any group. It's entirely situation. Seniority in a job is privilege. Merit-based success is privilege. A person with a driver's license is privileged over one who doesn't have a driver's license. Feel free to list examples of marginalized groups that enjoy no privilege and I'll show you others not part of that marginalized group when introduced to that group demonstrate a lack of privilege.

csoze: "Rather than calling it dogma because it doesn't agree with YOUR world view." galacticpony2's statement was valid, csoze, yours is not. As Damore and the scientists who have done the research have stated is biology is PART of the reason. The social constructivists TEND to say the opposite, meaning they TEND to say it's entirely social and literally deny any evidence of a role played by biology even when the evidence is undeniable, such as when experiments involve manipulation of brain chemistry, or control for social influence. That's dogma, and validates galacticpony2's assertion.

If you watch Peterson's video, or more importantly looked at the links in the description, the theory of social constructivism has been disproven through experimentation. The more gender equity there is in a social, the more disparity there is between the interests of men and women and this is universal across all cultures. And what you said about conditions that reduce social factors is false. As Peterson explained there's no reproducible valid science showing that what you say is true.

Sounds to me like the problem is managing stress due to a lack of healthy growth. You are lacking leadership fundamentals guiding you in your life and career. Leadership is about awareness, knowledge, experience and skills in growing roles and responsibilities. That's a trite summary, but in short we are individual contributors, team managers, managers of teams, managers of managers, or organization leaders. We grow throughout these stages and healthy growth means not too fast and not too slow, but at a rate where we develop the experience and master the skills necessary to level up. Often we take on roles before we have the skills to do so, and when this keeps happening the damage piles up and eventually comes back to haunt you. That sounds like where you are now.

In your post when you say you want to do something menial it says that you want to go back to the level of individual contributor. It means in moving past that role you didn't master something to prepare you for the next level and/or what you are doing at your current level is not commensurate with your skills and experience. That means what you are required to do in your role on a daily basis is beneath you or beyond you. Something is not consistent between your level/roles and responsibilities and your experience or else you wouldn't have a problem.

Healthy growth keeps you engaged and moving forward at a rate consistent not with your wants but with your needs. You may not like doing something but that doesn't mean you have developed enough to move past doing it. You may like doing something but that doesn't mean someone at your level should be doing it.

When you get stressed by something. It means you haven't mastered managing stress associated with tackling problems at that level. It may also mean that the organization is requiring you do things a person at your level should not be doing. Either way you shouldn't be getting stressed, you should be taking the appropriate action for someone at your level -- developing what you are lacking to manage stress (awareness, knowledge, experience and skills) or doing what needs to be done so someone at the appropriate level deals with things you shouldn't be.

In short leadership of the company is mess. Most companies are because few understand the most basic principles I've vaguely described here. If you're getting stressed you need to understand why. Look at the levels I've described and start asking yourself in each role/level what stresses you out. That's where you failed to grow as you moved up, and where you need develop your experience and skills before you can move forward.

Stress management and awareness are two of the most difficult things to master because of how entwined they are. Don't listen to anyone telling you to do drugs to manage stress or emotions. Instead, start by getting physical exercise. Go for a long walk alone regularly. It does wonders. It gives you time to reflect and think and plan. Getting the blood flowing physically allows the body to do what it does to manage stress chemically. If you need to do more, then level up your physical exercise to something more strenuous and active, but most people don't find walking to be a burden and can motivate themselves to go for a walk. It will address the most basic physical needs and buy you the time to reflect and address what mentally causes you stress.

>Anyone who builds accomplishments without building lasting and deep relationships with people around them has done something wrong in the process.

This is one of the fundamentals of leadership, and leadership starts with leading your own life. One of the other fundamentals is awareness -- self-awareness and awareness of others, which these comments seem to be touching on.

Diversity of ideas, abilities/skills and experience are what matters. Skin color, sex and gender only matter if you acknowledge there are differences in abilities based on those criteria, which would defy the premise of non-discrimination.

Maybe the most qualified people were all white men. Maybe hiring a woman or minority simply for the sake of having a woman or minority is just racist or sexist.

Not to mention that those descriptions don't judge people by their abilities or the content of their character. She's simply demonstrating prejudice, which is okay as long as she accepts others should be embraced for doing the same, like if a company full of men doesn't want to hire a woman, or gays, or lesbians, or trans because of their perception of them for things completely unrelated to their abilities or the content of their character.

In short it means the pros aka The Market Makers control the market. What that means is they have the ability to see all of the price action which allows them to manipulate the market. When prices go up or down, it's them deciding whether they go up or down or at least throttling the rate to maximizes their earnings. They are both buying and selling at all times. What makes Robinhood such a joke is that they are a middleman between you and a middleman. So instead of buying your drugs from a dealer, you're buying from the pusher on the corner who gets free drugs for every new customer.

If I'm not mistaken trading (commissions) is not where they make their money, which is why most of them offer free trades now in some capacity to compete. If they don't you call them up and tell you are going to someone else and they will give you free trades. They make their money by having your money in their account. This gives them credit with other banks and allows them to trade on margin or borrow or lend and charge interest.