WHAT KIND OF PROFESSOR DOES THIS pic.twitter.com/ACtQ0FCwRm
— shahanye (@shaunhin) July 1, 2015
Exceptionally dense:
… The “evil genius” behind the twisted question? Dr. Dylan Selterman… Selterman says the exercise was originally published in a psychology journal 25 years ago and has since been adapted by a number of his colleagues. He says it’s intended to illustrate the tragedy of the commons…
Selterman says only one class — his fall 2011 group — has received the extra credit since he first implemented the exercise in 2008….
Rafikian — whose tweet has since been shared more than 6,000 times — told USA TODAY College: “I honestly wasn’t expecting this tweet to go viral. It was really interesting though to see how people would respond to the question and what they thought was the ‘right’ choice.”
He adds that he was shocked to discover that he was an outlier in the exercise.
“I was surprised and disappointed — surprised by not only how 20% of the class chose six points but also by how many responses on Twitter said to take the six points.”
But Selterman says he was unsurprised by the results, adding that he hopes his students at least walk away from his course with a sense of mindfulness…
This story is popping up all over the ‘tubes, and it will probably surprise none of you how many readers are outraged that a psychology professor for an upper-level course should use “trick questions” to inculcate “our kids” with suspicious liberal ideas like community, personal sacrifice, and predicting results from evidence…
OzarkHillbilly
Heh. Shouldn’t that have been 27% voting for the 6 points? Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Republican base.
Major Major Major Major
Tragedy of the commons not so much. Prisoner’s dilemma much more so. People just don’t understand satisficing.
Shameless open thread plug for the newest chapter in my fish story thing.
mtiffany
@OzarkHillbilly:
That particular, erhm, demographic, tends to be underrepresented in the halls of higher education, being that universities are bastions of left-wing thought and liberal agendas and such.
Another Holocene Human
Isn’t there some sort of ethical issue with human experimentation without consent?
Oh, and don’t these kids immediately recognize this particular game/experiment? They should. Or maybe their professor sucks.
I’ll probably get deleted for this, but I have an issue with your “ironic” use of pidgin Black English, Anne Laurie. It’s not funny.
Major Major Major Major
@Another Holocene Human: where did she use AAVE here?
mtiffany
@Another Holocene Human:
Only if there’s some sort of harm that might result. Not getting ‘extra’ points that you didn’t put any work into earning doesn’t count as harm.
For FSM’s sake, really? Have you been here before?
Major Major Major Major
@Another Holocene Human: how’s the new situation going chemically btw? We started similar stuff at similar times and I’m feeling pretty normal as long as I keep my sodium levels stable.
OzarkHillbilly
@mtiffany: Ah, of course. How silly of me.
mtiffany
If there’s any silver lining to Jordan Sargent’s and Gawker’s atrocious behavior in their pursuit of what they think is journalism, it’s that they lend credence to the argument that a strong social welfare state is not only desirable, but in fact necessary as some people just shouldn’t be allowed to work.
OzarkHillbilly
@Another Holocene Human:
I think they recognize it now and will remember it as well. Seems to me their professor has done his job exceptionally well.
Sloane Ranger
In response to Another Holocene Human – there’s a chance the kids did recognise this game but hoped that 90% would choose to support the community generally, allowing them to gain an advantage from everyone else’s sacrifice.
Clearly planning on going on to get MBA’s or careers in the Republican Party.
Marcolin
10% is an absolute, absolute absurd basis. It’s basically sophistry; telling students that they could have gotten 2-6 bonus points when he was banking on 0. You could get 10% of a class to claim to be martians if it meant a single percentage improvement. That class of 2011 he mentions is either a fiction or a group that heard about it before-hand and signed a blood pledge for 2%.
It’s not so much arbitrary so much as doomed to fail; the gimmick isn’t in greed so much as it is in false hope. A class of 29 only needs 2 wankers to screw over everyone – is that a bet anyone would take?
Anne Laurie
@Another Holocene Human: If you mean the title, I was going for the pseudo-Colonial-Williamsburg “founding father” patois affected by RW third-rate Buckley-imitators. As in “If this be treason… “ and its myriad subliterate imitations. Would it have been better as “Americans Be, Every One, Exceptional!!!”?
Of course, linguist John McWhorter says that AAVE retains to a degree the Elizabethan-English structure that Washington & Jefferson used…
SG
I’d give 10 extra points to any student who refused to play the game.
JPL
Good Morning! The twenty percent were practicing to be part of the I have mine, crowd.
It’s going to be another hotlanta day. I have errands to run and then need to mow. Sons and the S.O. come over this after noon to do birthday chores. The S.O.’s birthday chore is to make Wine Coolers.
Gene108
I was subject to an expirement human nature, when I was in undergrad (geology major) from our Crystallography and Mineralogy professor, in our first lab assignment.
The lab was really, really hard, but we all slogged through it.
When we handed in our lab, you could see how hard we struggled on our faces. The prof had a big grin on his face and said “anybody read ahead to Lab Assignment 2?”
We all looked at him funny and basically responded “of course not (who reads ahead of the assignment that’s due)”.
He suggested we look at assignment 2.
We did this.
To our horror and dismay, Lab Assignment 2 pretty much explained and answered how to do Lab Assignment 1, i.e. he put the answers in the next assignment knowing no one reads ahead.
Sadly none of the future labs had this “quirk”.
Chet
@Another Holocene Human: @mtiffany: it depends on what you intend to do with the results. If you are publishing it as research, you need informed consent from all participants. If you are using it as a demonstration for your class it’s OK.
different-church-lady
When one thinks about it, there are choices like this everywhere in consumer life nowadays. Airlines, in particular, seem to revel in playing these games: “If I lure you in with cheap airfare, you run the risk of surprise fees. Or, you can purchase your way out of this game in the form of premium clubs and the like.”
As I grew older I started to realize the cost was, in an invisible way, much higher than the “gain”, and when faced with a choice like this one I take the third option — I simply walk away from the game. Because the extra points just aren’t worth the psychic toll.
Baud
@different-church-lady:
The only way to win is not to play.
Tommy
You know when I was in college I would have taken those six points and not worried about it for a second. I could go mess around and not care about the next test. You know I think I have become a better person and not sure I’d take anything I didn’t need.
Cervantes
@Gene108:
Spring semester? If so, I hope someone turned the table on April 1!
mtiffany
@different-church-lady:
The Third Law of Thermodynamics says otherwise. Opposite, in fact.
different-church-lady
@mtiffany: I don’t care much for thermal blankets, or whatever the hell it is you’re talking about…
Tommy
@Baud: And there you go. I would have played at the time. Now I like to think I wouldn’t. As others have said here I would turn around and walk away.
Botsplainer
Getting ready to head to Mexico tomorrow with Mrs. Botsplainer for some serious beach/dive time. I had enough points for two free tickets and some perks, and the missus had some freebies due, so we get a free all-inclusive for a full week. Only things I’m paying for is diving, tips and cab fare to the dive shop (that’s about a half hour trip – logistics rendered doing a night dive impossible for her, considering how early we have to be out and ready in order to make an 8 am dive boat). It would have been a bit…much. Figure that it is a really nice trip to a top notch property for under $1500 total.
Old Dan and Little Anne
The hound absolutely hates thunder and lightning. This morning’s 4 a.m. provided a first, though. A huge clap of thunder woke me up and I watched out the window for a bit. I could hear feet but I didn’t know where the hell it was coming from. Yeller was hiding in the bathtub.
RSA
@Chet:
It sounds educational. My favorite example is from a friend who taught an e-commerce class, in a section on auctions. Differences in the rules of an auction can affect the best strategies for winning. My friend would give a live example in class: it would be an open demand auction, with all the students repeatedly and publicly bidding on a single item, if they chose to take part. The twist in the rules was that the second-highest bidder would have to pay up what he or she had bid, but only the highest bidder would actually get the item. My friend would tell his students the rules and then hold up a dollar bill to be auctioned off.
Memorable.
Tommy
@Botsplainer: Where did you research the dive shops? I got some money burning a hole in my pocket. Plus parents have more “points” then they can use at a high-end timeshare. Looking at the locations and Mexico might be my choice although there is this place in Maine that looks pretty neat.
currants
@Anne Laurie:
:-)
RSA
@Another Holocene Human:
I’m sometimes surprised at how many people use the phrase “me likey” or “me no likey”, which was originally stereotyped Chinese-English, though they don’t realize that, I guess.
Germy Shoemangler
@RSA: For years I couldn’t go with co-workers for chinese restaurant miso soup without hearing the accounting guy do the “Me so horny!” gag. He literally could not help himself.
A good argument for a bag lunch eaten quietly at my workstation.
RSA
@Germy Shoemangler: Wow. I’ve only heard it used, let’s say, incidentally, without the Asian context.
Baud
@RSA:
Unconscious, mostly. Once a meme or phrase hits the popular culture, people may not appreciate it’s derogatory origins.
Tommy
@Germy Shoemangler: LOL. My parents have pretty limited food experiences. Parents in town this week house/dog sitting for my brother. Mom was over and I was fixing some Miso soup for lunch. I got her to try some and she said it was one of the more amazing things she’d had.
Germy Shoemangler
@RSA: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me_So_Horny
BGinCHI
My biggest worry is the writing skills of the psych prof. The final sentence in his paragraph has an ugly comma splice.
Germy Shoemangler
@BGinCHI: Should have been split into two sentences. Or if he was feeling frisky, one sentence with a semi-colon.
Some psych papers are so dense as to be almost unreadable.
Percysowner
@Gene108:
A friend who was a teacher did the same thing, sort of. She gave a test where the first instruction was “read the entire test before you start answering questions”. The last “question” was don’t answer any of the questions. She would watch while most of the class would work very hard to pass the test, while one or two would actually read the entire test. I adapted a form of this for hiring a student assistant. The first instruction was to sign your name after you took an apiitude test to see if you paid attention and could remember instructions. About 50% couldn’t.
I have no idea which option I would have chosen back in the day. I was really, really good at academics, so I unless I thought I really blew the test, I wouldn’t have needed the 6 points and I wouldn’t have missed the 2 points, so I would have shrugged and picked one. I’d like to think I wouldn’t have picked either or complained about the extra point thing in general, but I probably would have b**ched to my classmates after and that would have been as far as I would have pushed it.
RSA
@Germy Shoemangler: Thanks. I lead a sheltered life.
debbie
@BGinCHI:
The dreaded semicolon instead?
Baud
@Germy Shoemangler:
It does have a better rhythmic quality than “I am exceptionally horny.”
Germy Shoemangler
@debbie: In an earlier thread you mentioned The Triplets of Belleville. I saw that film when it came out and even bought the soundtrack. The same animators made a film about a magician. I think it was based on a script by Jacques Tati? Can you recommend it?
Germy Shoemangler
@Baud: Invariably, the follow-up gag would be “me love you long time” which made me realize he was quoting the movie.
What I found embarrassing was that they didn’t care this was within earshot of the waiters.
Tommy
@Percysowner: I am the asshole that might have bitched to the teacher about offering free points/grades to other students when I worked my ass off to get good grades on the test.
Amir Khalid
@debbie:
That would work, yeah. But a period would also have been fine.
Cervantes
@Germy Shoemangler:
The waiters probably could not have cared less. Plus they were serving miso soup in a Chinese restaurant, and if that’s not asking for trouble I don’t know what is.
jharp
To me it is a no brainer to pick 6 points.
The only way anyone could gain on you regarding the actual test scores would be for you to get 2 points and 10% of the class getting 6.
And if everyone gets 2 points then isn’t that the same as everyone getting 0 points?
the Conster
@Germy Shoemangler:
My parents had friends who for years owned a coin-op laundry called the Helpy Selfy. It’s long gone, and I can’t imagine a laundry named that now. Times change.
debbie
@Germy Shoemangler:
I had not heard about this, but after watching the trailer on youtube, I will be tracking it down. Thanks!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMqpU7lUlLg
Cervantes
@Amir Khalid:
Selamat Hari Raya!
Full stop.
Germy Shoemangler
@Cervantes: It was one of those places that serve Chinese food along with a sprinkling of Japanese as well as American pizza and hot dogs.
I’m not a foodie so I have no idea if what I was eating was authentic.
I remember the movie “International House” from the 1930s. W.C. Fields tells the Chinese waiter “Bring me a thousand-year-old bird’s nest boiled in perfume.”
Tommy
An entire bowl of cherry tomatoes and cucumbers just picked. Gosh I love my garden.
Cervantes
@Tommy:
Those free points aren’t free. They exact a terrible psychic toll.
debbie
@Amir Khalid:
No, I’d stick with the semicolon because the two thoughts are so closely related.
I used to do a lot of editing for academics and they generally tended to write as they spoke, using commas as pauses. This is a good example of that.
TheMightyTrowel
@jharp: in a class with a curve sure, but outside the sciences curves aren’t that common. In one of my classes an extra two points would shift the avg from a C to a B- (australian grade categories are different, this is US equivalent). It would push a number of students over the line from C to B and that would be a big deal to them.
pluege
since ~30% of the society is greed-obsessed. ‘eff everyone but me’ republicans, the results are not surprising at all.
Cervantes
@Germy Shoemangler:
Fields was a genius but even he did not foresee the Rape of Nanking.
(Someone here was violently criticizing non sequiturs the other day. I’m walking on egg-shells.)
Amir Khalid
@debbie:
I’d prefer the semicolon too. But a period wouldn’t strike me as wrong.
Botsplainer
@Tommy:
I usually hunt dive shops through a combination of TripAdvisor reviews and ScubaBoard. Haven’t been burnt yet.
I’m pretty picky.
Cervantes
@Botsplainer:
Safe travels. Have a great time with Mrs. B.
LosGatosCA
Obviously the professor has been failing in his teaching, but he can learn and thereby help his students learn as well by telling this joke to them:
Two billionaires are in their limo being driven to work (think Randolph and Mortimer Duke) and when they arrive at work they encounter a 10 year old boy pan handling. The one billionaire says to the other, ‘I’ve see this kid everyday and he’s just like everyone in his class – dumb as a box of rocks. That’s why we’re more deserving. Watch this.’
The billionaire walks over to the kid and holds out a $5 and $1 bill.He asks which one do you want? The kid thinks on it and then takes the $1 bill. He turns to the other billionaire and says ‘See, dumb as a box rocks, he takes the $1 bill every time, never fails.’
The pompous cash offering billionaire the strides into the building while the other billionaire stops to ask the kid a question: ‘Why did you take the $1 bill?’
The kid replies – ‘He does that every day. How long will he do that after I take the $5 bill?’
Cervantes
@LosGatosCA:
There’s a kid who knows what he’s selling.
MBunge
@jharp: And if everyone gets 2 points then isn’t that the same as everyone getting 0 points?
Only if the class is being graded on a curve.
Mike
Germy Shoemangler
@LosGatosCA: I like that story, but I can see how a conservative might twist it into an argument against raising the minimum wage: “If the opportunity-creator is forced to pay more, he’ll stop!” or some such thing.
MomSense
Back home today and about to dispose of the shoes I wore in NYC. I think the best part of the trip for my son was the Museum of Natural History. If you ever go and want to witness something beautiful, watch the faces of little kids as they enter the dinosaur exhibits. Pure joy.
jharp
@TheMightyTrowel:
I graduated from a Big Ten University 30 plus years ago and everything was curved.
And since you brought up Australian grading I will add this.
I had an Australian professor for Cost Accounting who gave us multiple choice exams.
My memory fails me a little but scoring was close to something like this.
5 choices. A through E. 40 questions. Plus 2 1/2 points for every correct answer and minus 1/2 for an incorrect answer. Zero if you left it blank.
I don’t believe I left any blank.
Germy Shoemangler
@MomSense: why are you disposing of the shoes you wore in NYC?
mtiffany
@jharp:
No. SMH.
jharp
@mtiffany:
It was where I went to school.
Cervantes
@Germy Shoemangler:
They’re probably worn out.
Emma
@MomSense: A few years ago I visited the Royal Ontario Museum. They have (or had at the time) a fantastic dinosaur exhibit. I think I spent more time watching the kids than I did the dinosaurs.
(edit) after checking, it’s a permanent gallery. I remember it being advertised as an exhibit. I’m glad they kept it)
catclub
@Marcolin:
I cannot tell if you are messing with me, here. Is that because you have already assumed that you are picking the 6?
A different rule would be: If over 10% choose 6, Just the ones who wanted 6 get zero. Or lose 2 points.
mtiffany
@Cervantes:
That’s what you get for not using the trigger warnings that the Self-Appointed Righteous Protectors of Everybody’s Fee-Fees and Dignity have so magnanimously decided that we should use.
mtiffany
@catclub:
Bolshevism! How dare you punish the future job creators and Masters of the Universe!
Pogonip
@different-church-lady: Me too. I walked away and didn’t play Twitter and Facebook after calculating “Well, let’s see, I can feed my ego and have a little more fun and all I have to do is let them sell every bit of information about me to God-knows-whom…”. No, thank you.
I do use Amazon but their algorithms are so comically inept I’m not too worried about them. They are STILL trying to sell me chick lit, and they also bombard me with ads for whatever was the last thing I bought. Amazon, I know all about the Acme Left-Handed Widget, I just ordered one from you! Your algorithm SHOULD be trying to sell me things that widget buyers also bought.
I recently read an article about how Oprah’s Book Club can make a writer and publisher very rich, which also explains the bombardment of chick-lit ads, because of course every 55-year-old American woman pays close attention to Oprah! (I haven’t seen her show in at least 15 years.)
mtiffany
@jharp: If we add 2 dollars to my bank account, and we add 2 dollars to YOUR bank account, we’re both 2 dollars richer. So no, adding an extra two points to everyone’s grade is not the same as awarding everyone zero extra points. So, if that’s the kind of math you were taught at that school you went to and you paid to go there, you might want to ask for you money back. Just be sure to have someone else count it for you.
Tommy
@Emma: Yeah I used to live on Capital Hill in DC. I only had to peddle my bike a few times and world-class museums all around me. You’d see a bus load of 10-year-olds walk into the Natural History museum and the sheer joy on their faces was to die for.
But I also saw that look on the faces of adults.
When I’d have friends from out of town visit I’d explain there was only one thing we MUST do. That the only Leonardo da Vinci outside of Europe is just a few blocks away. I’d explain I often go there by myself and just look at it for hours.
I’d see that same joy on their faces. It was a total pleasure.
cahuenga
Altruism is overrated. /snark
Kay
DougJ has infiltrated the Jim Webb campaign:
https://twitter.com/JimWebbUSA
Do Republicans have one of these candidates? A Jim Webb- the Democrat for Republican voters? Is there a candidate on the GOP side that is a Republican that only Democrats might vote for? No.
Hal
Dakota Meyer, medal of honor winner, and Bristol Palin’s baby daddy, has a Facebook post about the Chattanooga killings in which he is calling for a “full implementation of the 2nd amendment.” um, wtf does that mean? I wasn’t aware the 2nd amendment was not already implemented.
Also, I’m very perplexed seeing comments in which people are gun control laws are going to be passed using this shooting. What? The murder of 20 children got a couple of weak laws passed in a couple of states but 4 dead marines is going to inspire politicians to pass gun control?
Woodrowfan
heh, that was my first thought too.
Germy Shoemangler
@Hal: Gee, he sounds like he’d fit right into that bunch (palin family)… I wonder why he walked away?
I mean if he had stayed he could have set up his own PAC
Cervantes
@Tommy:
Yes, DC’s museums are wonderful.
It’s the only museum-owned da Vinci outside Europe.
Baud
@Kay:
They had Huntsman last time around.
MomSense
@Germy Shoemangler: @Cervantes:
They are worn out as are my feet.
Glidwrith
@Germy Shoemangler: Wow, people in the 1990’s were actually arrested for obscene song lyrics AND the clerks that sold the songs?
Got a nice thunderstorm with rain rolling through the area. Unlike some people complaining about the rain, we can sure use it.
Cervantes
@MomSense:
Never knew a great mom whose feet were not.
Tommy
@Hal: My dad starting going to military schools when he was like 12. Worked 30+ years for the DoD. Might have been something of a bad ass. Never confused with a liberal.
When these situations happen and people are like well if everybody has a gun this wouldn’t happen. Some good citizens would stop it. Dad is like that is crazy talk. He is skilled. Trained. He doesn’t think for a single second if somebody starts to open fire in a movie theater the best course of action on his part is to pull out a gun and fire back.
Kay
@Hal:
A sitting member of Congress was shot in the head and nothing happened. That combined with the slaughter of the first graders, and… nothing. After that we had the multiple murders by the terrorist at the prayer meeting.
“Capture” isn’t a strong enough word to describe this insanity.
Amir Khalid
@Hal:
Dakota Meyer is clearly incoherent enough that if he did marry Bristol Palin he’d fit right into her family.
mtiffany
@Hal:
Yeah, I’ve just taken to posting and tweeting this whenever there’s a shooting…
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10207187074064290&l=59618782fd
MomSense
@Emma
To be fair, the whole museum is a delight. One of the YMCA summer camp groups went through the African mammal exhibit rooms with us. My son was reading the descriptions and the little kids sort of crowded around him and just went with us through the room. It was really fun to see it through their eyes. They noticed details that I missed.
debbie
@Kay:
Not even the shooting of the beloved Ronaldus Maximus could change anything.
boatboy_srq
@Major Major Major Major: My thought exactly.
MomSense
@Cervantes:
Awww. With that bit of sweetness, I will happily do the chores that are waiting for me.
Have fun, jackals!
Tommy
@Kay: Amen. I just don’t get it. Dylann Roof should not have been able to pass a basic background check, but he slipped through the cracks. If I am working in my house I might need a hammer I can buy now. In what world does a person need a gun this very second? I don’t see why, at the most basic, they can’t wait a day or two. A few weeks. A month.
Kay
@Baud:
Okay. He fits, I think. I’m glad it isn’t unique to Democrats. The Boston Globe reporter who is in Iowa says that Webb keeps mentioning Sanders which is a little too opportunistic for my taste. Trying to climb aboard the Bern train :)
Baud
@Kay:
Webb’s supporters probably want much of what Sanders wants, but only for Appalachia.
Tommy
@Kay: I’ve said this a ton here. My mother was a lifelong Republican until a few years ago. She isn’t a raving fan of Obama but found herself unable to continue to vote for Republicans.
Somebody like Huntsman is very similar, in what I know about him, to my father. I keep telling dad we got a pretty big tent over here and you can come on in. You are welcome. We don’t have to agree on everything.
You openly admit to me there is a lot of crazy in your party. My party is far from perfect, but honestly we don’t have much crazy running around.
Chris
@Hal:
What I’m getting from conservative acquaintances is that on-post regulations forbid a lot of military personnel from carrying their own weapons – so basically, another version of “oh, if only they’d had guns.”
Omnes Omnibus
@Chris: Speaking as an former army officer, the idea of soldiers walking around armed while off duty is scary.
SRW1
@Marcolin:
That’s a clever math numeracy test, right? Cause a class of 29 actually would need a minimum of 3 such species.
Baud
@Kay:
BTW, I’ve been reading the news about the political alliances on the NCLB rewrite. Interesting dynamics, especially on the Democratic side.
Tommy
@Chris:
I don’t know the exact regs of the bases I grew up on/around, but I can’t recall a single person with a weapon unless they were at a guard post.
SiubhanDuinne
@Germy Shoemangler:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvain_Chomet#The_Illusionist
burnspbesq
Jesus H. Christ on a Segway, for all the good work she is doing, Senator Warren makes me fcuking nuts sometimes.
Seriously, Senator, where the fcuk do you get off insulting all the good people who have given years of devoted service to DOJ, the SEC, the IRS, the FTC, and pretty much every other Federal agency before or after working in the private sector?
Or do you seriously want the Federal government to be completely unable to compete for top-level talent?
The revolving door is not the droids you’re looking for. Period, full stop.
mtiffany
@Tommy:
Which is just further evidence that Obama is using his control of the spacetime continuum to weaken America at every point in history.
Chris
@Tommy:
I keep comparing this to more mundane life situations like interviewing for a job, speaking in public in front of a strange crowd, or asking someone out – when you’re thinking about it or practicing for it long in advance, in your own head, of course you pull it off with flying colors. But when you’re actually in that situation and feeling the pressure for the first time – usually, not. Oftentimes, you just panic and fuck it all up.
Yes, you can eventually learn to be good at these things, but usually, it takes lots and lots of repeated practice.
Gunfights… would be that kind of situation, cranked up to eleven because it’s actually a life and death situation, and because the average citizen is very unlikely to get the amount of practice that would make him good at it. (No, blowing the shit out of some targets at the shooting range isn’t the same thing).
No, I don’t know how to use a gun, but even if I did I wouldn’t rely on one for defense, because the odds are better than even that I’d simply either freeze up, or panic and start shooting everywhere until I’d shot everyone but the “bad guy.”
Tommy
@burnspbesq:
This is kind of a pet peeve of mine. When I lived in DC I didn’t work for the government. Many of my friends did. They had advance degrees. Graduated at the top of their classes from major universities.
They could have made so much more money working in the private sector. But they choose to work for the government. The EPA or the State Department. I get so pissed when I hear people mad somebody is a lawyer in the enforcement division of the EPA, 30+ years, and they are mad he is making $150,000.
Kropadope
@SRW1: No, I think we’re just meant to assume (s)he would obviously take the 6, cuz who wouldn’t?
Seriously, though, I’d mark the 2 all day and not lose sleep over it if the class went over the limit. What does it matter? It’s just extra credit.
One of my political science teachers held an experiment one time. He asked everyone to first list the ten commandments. Then he asked “Yes or no, do you think law should be based on religion?”
Predictably, the people who most wanted religious law were the people who knew the fewest commandments. However, he said that no one got them perfect and I took mine home and compared them to my Bible. They were all correct. Is there some version of the ten commandments floating around that’s different than the Catholic ones?
Kropadope
@burnspbesq:
While I’m not a big fan of the revolving door, I’m of the mind that people should be allowed to take whatever jobs they want.
I also think it’s tragic that it’s hard for the government to compete for top-level talent, but I think the best solutions are better pay and less politicization of the work they do.
Kay
@Baud:
I was at the 2008 convention and they put Ohio in a very good spot on the floor- they seat according to how “swingy” the state is, you know, because we might bolt and become Republicans so they have to coddle us.
The most interesting part to me was watching media work because I don’t ordinarily see that part. I had this heated exchange with an AP reporter because she asked us for the Hillary delegate who was mad and not supporting Obama- there was one and she was interviewed over and over. I had become pals with this woman who was a Hillary delegate and switched to Obama and no one interviewed her, although she was AA and that might have been interesting. She WAS interesting, really, where the other woman was basically a crank. Anyway, they line up the politicians who are going to appear on cable tv and start smearing makeup on them. Jim Webb’s FACE while this was happening. Just the picture of misery. I was thinking “why in the hell does this guy put himself thru this? He hates this job”.
Tommy
@Chris: What you said. When I lived in DC I was mugged twice. Car broken into. House robbed. I thought of getting a gun and mentioned this to my father.
He is like are you flipping crazy? First you don’t know how to use a gun. Two, guns are illegal in DC. Third, you know most likely that gun will be taken from you and used against you. He ended with do you even have it in yourself to kill somebody, because if you point a gun at somebody you better be willing to pull the trigger.
I was like that is why you are my father and always wiser than me. I didn’t get a gun :)!
gian
@Germy Shoemangler:
I have a hunch the baby isn’t his
shell
Wasnt this a Twilight Zone episode…
The Other Chuck
@Tommy: The process alone of applying for government jobs is so Kafkaesque that it’s a wonder anyone bothers at all. It seems to attract people with no other prospects who can wait for the wheels of the hiring process to finally grind them through.
Baud
@Kay:
Yeah, I’m curious to see what his angle will be.
Tommy
@The Other Chuck: My brothers wife was looking to change jobs. She had other options but frankly wanted a job working for the government as she and my brother started a family with a young kid. Good health care. Flex time. Childcare.
She needed to apply for a security clearance. She knew my father had about the highest clearance you can get. I don’t know how many hours they spent trying to fill it all out.
Kay
@burnspbesq:
I do think it harms credibility Burns. I don’t know how to fix it but particularly for prosecutors there has to be some recognition of the importance of credibility. They have enormous power and a lot of discretion. They don’t just have to be clean, they have to look clean. This system we have is 95% voluntary compliance. They literally could not police or regulate if the process becomes discredited. We couldn’t hire enough prosecutors or regulators if people start to feel it’s selective or there’s some competitive disadvantage to playing by the rules and they start to see decreases in voluntary compliance. They are handed trust when they walk in the door but it isn’t a given that they keep it forever. It’s a gift that was earned by the people who came before them in the job. It can go away. That’s possible.
Cervantes
@Baud:
Obtuse.
Jparente
@Botsplainer: Cozumel? Tulum? I’m jealous! Have a ball!
Kryptik
I still full on never understand the mindset that, unless you’re armed at all times, you in danger of everything. The mindset that the only real security is guns, the only real safety is guns, and anything less means dangers from all sides will pounce on you the moment you look away.
It’s such a paranoid, piss-scared mindset, and yet it’s offered up instead as the height of bravery. The pinnacle of vigilance, the proof that you’re a rib-rocked hero ready at all times to defeat the spectres of injustice, and that unless you’re armed and ready to shoot at every shadow you encounter, you’re the worst sort of coward, unprepared to do what really needs to be done. It honest to god baffles me how this is treated as the height of courage, rather than paranoid fantasy.
Chris
@Tommy:
Well, the other thing I always figured, specific to muggings and other “lesser” forms of assault (as opposed to crazed gunmen who really do mean to shoot everybody)… is that the gun’s an escalation.
If you’re being held up by a guy with a knife who just wants your wallet, you’ll probably survive as long as you hand over the cash. Maybe even if you turn and run like hell. On the other hand, if the guy sees you pulling a gun, he’s going to go “oh SHIT!” as it suddenly becomes a life and death situation for him… and react by trying to stab you right then and there, or trying to grab the gun and wrestling you for it until it goes off… etc. Again, you’re probably just making things worse.
(That’s if he’s holding you up with a knife. God forbid he have his own gun).
Kropadope
@Chris:
Of course not, a gun has no defensive capability. The best you can hope for is counter-offense.
Kay
@burnspbesq:
I don’t think this is a good response. We don’t know them. It isn’t about them personally. They can’t ask us to rely on their good character. That’s why we have ethics and conflict rules, so we don’t have make crazy, ill-informed judgment calls about individuals from afar. I think you know this, too, burns. We have the process so we don’t have rely on scuttlebutt or rumor and it can protect them as much as it limits them.
Tommy
@Kryptik: You said it better than I could have. I have no desire to live in fear. Heck I refuse to live in fear.
Chris
@Kryptik:
This mindset also mistakes guns for some kind of bulletproof forcefield, as if you couldn’t get killed when carrying a gun. (You’d think it would give them some pause that gang members get killed all the time, even the ones packing Dirty Harry sized firearms).
Davis X. Machina
@Kropadope: There’s a difference…
Generally speaking, some, but not all, Protestant sects — and usually Jewish sources — follow a numbering tradition that separates “you shall have no strange gods…”(1) and “you shall not make any graven images” (2) nto separate commandments, which throws the numbering off. In Catholic sources, they’re combined, as the first.
There’s not 11 commandments, though, because the same tradition combines the “do not covet your neighbor’s wife” with “do not covet your neighbor’s possessions” into one commandment.
I’m not sure that there isn’t a connection between the often-extreme iconoclastic tradition of Reformation Protestantism and the division of the first two commandments.
Kropadope
@Davis X. Machina: Ahhh, good to know.
Kay
@burnspbesq:
I was ashamed of the Ferguson prosecutor not because he’s a crook, I don’t know that he’s a crook, but because he would not put himself SECOND to the people in that community. It became about his honor and whether or not he’s a racist. That isn’t what it’s about. He should have recused because he has a duty to give them credible process. The end. That was an easy call. “They don’t trust me with this? Okay. I hand it over”.
catclub
@Kropadope:
Yes! I think the graven images bit is kind of elided in the Catholic one.
I just looked, and to fill it out, Catholic 10 commandments has two those shalt not covets.
But no: Thou shalt have no other gods before me/ worship no graven images
Tommy
@Chris: And that is it. As I said if you point a gun at somebody you better be ready to use it. I had this pounded into my head as a kid. I pointed a toy gun at my dad’s head and it ripped it out of my hand and shooked me. Maybe the only time my father was remotely aggressive with me. I might have been 6 or 7. He said something that didn’t make sense at the time but now at 46 makes TOTAL sense. Don’t point a gun at somebody unless you plan to use it!
Mack
A couple of things: When I was with the 7th at Fort Ord, I was assigned to guard post at an ammo dump. No ammo, hell, not even a whistle. I am probably considered very well trained with respect to firearms, i was with the 6th U.S. Army shooting team, and I ranked “expert” during my police academy stint. I try to tell people that just because you are “armed and ready”, once the first shot rings out, you are more likely to duck and cover because the noise is disorienting for those not ready. The shooter will always have the advantage, he or she IS ready. And, yes, firing back under duress reduces accuracy by a factor. It amazes me how many Americans embrace the culture of the gun. I seriously blame television for that. Ever notice how when people brandish guns they always make this menacing noise in the movies? Well, they dont, until you cock them, and by then it’s too late anyway. Sweet Jesus.
Lastly, I am no academic, but the exercise by the professor was fascinating to me. Seems to me, (since this would have been my reaction) I’ll pick 2, if only because it might help someone not fail.
Tommy
@Mack: Yeah. My brother married into a far, far right family. There is this kid at events. My brothers wife’s nephew. He is 17. A shooter. I think nationally ranked. By all accounts he is really good with both a pistol and a rifle.
He is a little bit of a “black sheep” of the family. I kind of know what that feels like so I go out of my way to talk with him. He seems to think all problems in the world could be solved with more guns. I would like to tell him he is wrong. He is too young to understand the world around him. But I don’t.
Chris
@Mack:
I don’t think television is to blame per se, because television is giving people what they want to see.
I do find it interesting that the farther most Americans get from this kind of violence in real life (switch to an all-volunteer force in the seventies and eighties, plummeting crime rates of the nineties and 2000s), the more graphic, bloody, and over-the-top violent our entertainment has become.
Gravenstone
@Tommy:
Ask Snotty Walker and our broken (read, Republican controlled) Wisconsin state legislature. They thought it was important enough that they rescinded the waiting period to buy a handgun. Yeah, that’s going to end well.
burnspbesq
Every photo I’ve ever seen of so-called open carry activists shares a common characteristic: it shows that the average open carry activist’s situational awareness is for shit. If the photographer was a competent and motivated shooter, the guys in the photos would be down before they even knew there was a threat.
Gravenstone
@Chris:
Yup. Three (and counting) of the pander bears running for the Republican nom have all regurgitated that general “argument”. Moar gunz in moar places makes us safer! Also, too!
Riley's Enabler
@Percysowner: I had a 4th grade teacher who did that exact thing. Written at the top of the 2 page test were the instructions: “read the entire test before beginning”, and the very last statement at the bottom of page 2 was “Do not answer any of the questions.”. We all failed – every one of us – but we learned a hugely valuable lesson. Stuck with me all through school, and I taught my kiddo that same lesson when he was in 4th grade. He was APPALLED – but he reads all the way through now.
Also, the test was mimeographed and I still remember that purple smell.
boatboy_srq
@Tommy: The problem is that for most people there’s a disconnect between “government employee” and “professional.” They hear “government worker”: and in their heads they see the ten-person CALTRANS crew where only two are actually doing anything when they drive past; the meter-maid that won’t cut them slack when they’re five seconds late with the quarter for the meter; and the prune-faced troll that demands fifteen different photo IDs just to renew a #($&#*ing driver’s license. And they resent the hell out of paying their accountant hundreds just to keep the IRS from dropping the A word on them. Most of them have no idea what Occupation X pays in the public sector vs the private sector – in part because guidance counselors when they bother to discuss career stuff don’t mention anything besides “you can make $$$ doing this job” and in part because salary surveys don’t make a distinction – so they don’t realise that attorneys aren’t all rich, scientists aren’t all making a killing in Big Pharma and all the benefits they claim need somebody qualified and proficient (and hence valuable) to manage the programs. They hear private-sector salary figures, they perceive public-sector hindrances to their routine, and that’s as far as they go. That their tax bill to them represents the salaries of people who make their lives difficult is just additional fodder for their resentment.
Kryptik
@Chris:
Seriously. Owning a gun doesn’t make you a fucking action hero, but to so many of these fetishists, ownership and possession of a gun instantly makes you fucking Simo Hayha and the ‘bad guys with guns’ are instantly your average Empire Stormtrooper. The fantasy of unerring accuracy, precision, and judgment in the face of danger while the bad guys stumble all over their fucking selves soon as someone shows balls to stand up to them. How this kind of fantasy has overtaken the American mind and driven our policies toward guns will never cease to depress me.
Mack
@Kryptik: This. Another thing that eludes me is how many people in my small town own multiple guns, and will sacrifice other things to buy even more. It’s a huge grift by the firearm industry, yet they don’t see it.
Mack
Let me rephrase a bit. I own multiple guns. I have a shotgun, which from time to time is necessary to remove harmful birds from the barn. I have a 30.6 rifle, the only time I’ve used it was to put down a deer that showed up here with a broken leg, two 22 cal rifles I inherited but are largely useless, and a 357 revolver I keep locked in a drawer, it is useful to scare away coyotes when they encroach on my perimeter, and I used it to put down my dog after 16 wonderful years. But I live on over 90 acres and they are tools, much like my chainsaw or bush-hog. I wouldn’t dream of purchasing another one, and I damn sure don’t stand around admiring them with my buddies.
Kropadope
@Riley’s Enabler: My sewing teacher did a similar thing, she wrote “read each question before answering.” Her intent was the same, but the instruction didn’t communicate it precisely.
RSA
@Mack:
On another forum I recently saw a discussion of a story in the news, where firefighters in helicopters dropping water on fires in California had to delay their efforts because of privately operated drones in the area. Some commenters were asking, “What’s the big deal?” The firefighters should carry along shotguns to shoot down the drones, and if that was too hard, they should just fly through them, taking the risk of their helicopter being damaged.
Now, this may be a snap judgment, but those people are morons. Do they think they live in an action movie? Where people who are trained to do a job and are focusing on that job can just shoot stuff out of the air? And are willing to risk their lives because of other morons’ behavior? God, Americans are exceptional.
smintheus
Students have an intense focus on questions of fairness. Adding points to anybody’s exam arbitrarily is unfair, and adding more points to those who are most selfish is even more unfair. Therefore the reasonable thing for students to do is to request the 6 points and try to nullify the whole operation.
NonyNony
@Another Holocene Human:
The point of the exercise was the professor teaching them the lesson of the tragedy of the commons.
You may think that the tragedy of the commons is an obvious thing that everyone should know about by the time they hit college, but the fact that the phenomenon a) has a name and b) continues to be a problem hundreds of years after it was identified by that name suggests that perhaps it’s a more difficult concept for some to wrap their heads around than you might think…
Mack
@RSA: Yes I saw that mentioned on multiple news reports as well, but wasn’t aware that the simpletons decided it wasn’t a problem for air to air combat trained firefighters. smh.
Splitting Image
It occurs to me that the professor would be gleaning more information about his students’ motives if there was an option to take zero extra points. If you’re opposed to his exercise on principle, the only way to protest is to ask for six points and hope enough other people feel the same way to skunk the entire process.
Not sure how I would have responded if one of my psychology professors had done this back in university. I’m sure that I would have been really pissed off if anyone else had done it.
J R in WV
The psych test with 2 points or 6 points and funny rules: it’s called game theory, and there’s a whole school of thought devoted to it. It was used as Mutually Assured Destruction was being invented to keep us (or the Russians) from starting WW III. Think tanks were paid huge sums of money to game things out, and this is what that was all about.
Very important stuff, strategically. I hope Hill knows it cold, it’s that important in diplomacy and strategic thought. I expect Obama has it at an instinctive level, which is how he has succeeded in an arena full of paranoid hate for his race. 2 points v. 6 points is a simplification, but then the rules about making the choice is not.
In a management class I was compelled to take to get a CS degree we spent most of a semester doing game theory, it was an upper level class, we were all CS or math majors. Pretty interesting, shows that people generally don’t think out a decision tree very well.
I took lots of upper level management classes, and there was a lot of psych being taught, as that is how you are a good manager. Or, if you go into sales, how to manipulate folks into buying your crap. So much of life is learning how other people think, and then using that knowledge against them. Like Karl Rove!
Mack
Okay, I just went and asked my daughter (Sophomore at Vandy) about this, and I was pleasantly surprised when she instantly said “I’d pick the two points, because I probably wouldn’t need it, but someone else might.” Feeling vindicated, I was walking back toward my room when she poked her head out and added, “Oh, Dad, I know a bunch of people in my classes that would have picked the six points so nobody got any free points”.
Sigh.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@Mack:
I am not a fan of guns, but I can understand why people who live in truly rural areas may need them. If it will take a sheriff 30+ minutes to get to your house in an emergency, the “self-defense” argument makes more sense.
It’s the people in exurban areas who are making you look bad. The ones who claim they need to bring their guns to Chipotle because their town of 5,000 people is just SO dangerous.
Mack
@Mnemosyne (tablet): I’m not a fan of guns. Yes, they are handy tools out here, but when I lived in cities and then suburbia, I never dreamed of buying one. The thought of carrying one is embarrassing to me, I’m sorry, but it just screams “LOOK AT ME COMPENSATING OVER HERE”.
Ruckus
@Hal:
Yeah that doesn’t make any sense. They don’t seem to mind sending military elsewhere to be killed and they don’t seem to mind not taking care of vets but let so idiot with a gun shoot some and they go crazy. I’ve seen calls to arm recruiters. Surly they know that the military has better firearm safety than anyone else and works hard at making sure there aren’t guns where they don’t need to be.
jharp
@mtiffany:
I guess you have never heard of grading on a curve.
And bank accounts have nothing to do with it.
Mack
@jharp: I wrongly assumed colleges graded on a curve (showing off my 8th grade education) but my daughter informed me that at least so far, none of her professors do so. When I read your comment upthread, I was nodding my head in agreement.
Ruckus
@Kryptik:
Well look at how conservatives look at President Obama. On one hand he has so much power that he can single handily destroy the entire country by opening his mouth, while on the other hand he is the weakest man alive and can’t cross the street by himself. They don’t use logic. They don’t understand logic. If they did their entire believe system would fall apart. They run from logic. Rand Paul gets mocked for his never having the same stance for more than a day and his going off the rails every 5 minutes. His mind doesn’t have a logic circuit. None. He is only an extreme example, one of degree.
schrodinger's cat
Whoever said that this is an example of the prisoner’s dilemma, not the tragedy of the commons is right. FWIW it is a pretty stupid trick to play on the students at a stressful time. I want my grade to reflect what I studied not the psychology of the other students taking the class. I hate these stupid mind games.
mtiffany
@jharp: Sweet Zombie Jesus, why would the professor offer to add extra points if the extra points wouldn’t make a difference to the final grade?
Mack
@schrodinger’s cat: Promise I’m not picking a fight(and I fully intend to go educate myself on the prisoner’s dilemma) but the exercise seems pretty harmless and could be fodder for some great discussion, no? As a final exam I agree, but would your opinion change if it were a midterm?
schrodinger's cat
@Mack: I would prefer it if it was a homework assignment, rather than a mid-term or a final.
Kropadope
@mtiffany: Well, he didn’t say his degree was in logic.
Mack
@schrodinger’s cat: Fair enough.
RSA
@Mack:
This is true. As you’ve observed, it’s not a great final exam question because there’s no chance for that discussion to take place. Another reason is that the question has no diagnostic value: the student’s answer gives no information about the student’s knowledge or skill in the context of the class. I can’t see how the aggregate answers would be useful to the professor, either. All in all, it’s a fail as an exam question.
ETA: I’ll confess that I recently gave a relatively frivolous 1-point extra credit question on a final exam, which was simply to ask what my last name is. I don’t believe anyone got this wrong; I’d expected a significant number, based on my email exchanges with students. But now I know: It’s just about email.
Groucho48
A couple years ago I remember reading a study of a variation of the prisoner’s dilemma that was tested out on groups of college students. There was a definite correlation between students who took economics courses and playing “selfishly”. And, if the students were also of a libertarian bent, they virtually always played “selfishly”. When interviewed they would defend their strategy logically. Other students were more likely to play “fairly”–take the two points in this post’s example–because they were willing to take the chance that most other folks also played fairly. We had a bit of a discussion about this on another board at the time. The libertarians on that board were also firmly convinced you had to take the selfish choice, even if that meant no one would ever win. I think part of the reason is that they just didn’t understand the concept that most folks have a certain level of trust in other folks and are willing to take a chance on that trust, while, they, themselves, know they would always pick the selfish choice and assumed everyone else always would.
Anne Laurie
@Groucho48: For a lot of the capital-L Libertarians I’ve known, the “self-interest uber alles” idea resides in the part of their brain that other people use for religion.
I know, from being in similar situations, that asking them to choose 2 points which they’ll get instead of 6 points which they won’t is like asking a committed Catholic to eat meat on a fast day. They might eventually do it, if everyone else on the trip is going to that great steakhouse (or conversely if they’re 100% sure nobody will catch them at it), but it’s genuinely psychologically distressing for them to contemplate!
RSA
@Groucho48:
That’s such a strange reaction, because situations like this have been analyzed to death, and it’s easy to find cases where always making the selfish/greedy choice is inferior to cooperating.
Groucho48
@RSA:
Well, it seems strange to the rest of us because we are willing to take a chance that folks will cooperate. They aren’t. Cooperating is completely alien to them. Not to mention, they don’t want to take a chance that they might lose and someone else might win. That is absolutely intolerable to them. They would rather everyone lose all the time as opposed to someone besides themselves winning while they lose. That’s a big reason why they are naturally Republicans, as opposed to Democrats, who tend to be a lot more libertarian about personal liberties than Republicans are.
Another Holocene Human
@mtiffany: Too late, but yes, Anne Laurie has nuked my posts before.
Another Holocene Human
@Major Major Major Major: It seems to be working out for me, crossing fingers. It seems to take the edge off depression and cut it down to size.
Anne Laurie
@Another Holocene Human: Really? Only times I remember nuking any comments (& I can’t bring any w/your nym attached to mind) it was for attacking other commentors personally. I don’t delete comments attacking just me, cuz them’s the hazards of being a front-pager.
FYWP auto-deletes a certain percentage of comments for reasons not known to us mortals, but I can’t take credit for those.
different-church-lady
@boatboy_srq:
…to their job in a cubicle farm where only two are actually doing anything when you walk past.
Chris
@Groucho48:
I think part of the problem here is that libertarianism/Objectivism/”greed-is-good-ism” today has gone beyond ordinary selfishness and into a full blown cultish ideology, with quite a few people deciding that they have to act in a certain way even once they’re pretty sure that it isn’t going to benefit them.
(E.G. red staters turning down what’s virtually free money from the feds in Medicaid expansion, for the greater “principle” of “fuck the poor.”)
boatboy_srq
@different-church-lady: Yes yes yes – but the white-collar prairie dogs are at their desks waiting for important calls/emails to come in so they can proceed to their next crisis/task…. (/snark) Joking aside, the public sector workload has morphed from something appropriate to something laughably light that “anyone can do”. How much of that is Conservatist propaganda against Big Gummint; and how much of it stems from US workers putting in more hours, shouldering more stress and still not keeping economic pace? Thirty years ago there were still bland pronouncements that by now (the 2010s) a thirty-hour, four-day max work week would be full time, and all the wonderful technology we were developing would be making our lives simpler, more comfortable and less stressful, so we could have lives outside the office, raise a family, live well and be better/smarter/more-creative people. It ranks right up there with the flying cars and robot housekeepers, but it was something talked about with some seriousness. We’ve increased worker productivity – but it’s been leveraged so that while one person can now do the work of three, no small part of that comes from being constantly on-call, working from home, expected to pick up the cellphone while on the bus/train or behind the wheel. “Why didn’t you respond?” regarding an email sent at 2:39 am has become an acceptable question instead of an obscene imposition. Faced with that kind of workload, a 40 hour week with regular breaks, benefits, guaranteed (enforced?) vacation time etc should be enviable; instead it’s laughable because for the last two decades we’ve had it shouted at us constantly that that kind of existence is “lazy.”