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What are you going have consequences in the project management office of a gov contractor that probably has no real competition, besides maybe multiple years la

by dmix 3y ago

What are you going have consequences in the project management office of a gov contractor that probably has no real competition, besides maybe multiple years later when it's politically convenient? Fire the lower level union workers slacking off? The fact every single major infrastructure project is a decade late and 3x over budget is just normal and tolerated by the people running the show across the US/Canada. The gov workers picking who wins these gov contracts (usually the same small set of companies) doesn't seem to care, despite extensive track records of the same behaviour. They probably have jobs lined up at these companies there afterwards. It's only natural human behaviour to not put effort in if there's no consequences or risk in doing so. This is Public/private partnerships 101.

ireadmevs 3y ago
> It's only natural human behaviour to not put effort in if there's no consequences or risk in doing so. That’s nonsense. That’s like saying that it’s only natural human behavior to abuse and be abused. If I put myself in the shoes of an underpaid sewage worker, that has a family to maintain, that sees the owner and investors of said private companies getting obscenely rich just by closings contracts under their AC… yeah, I’d slack the s* out of it too.
- imchillyb 3y ago
  > ...That’s like saying that it’s only natural human behavior to abuse and be abused... I think that's exactly what experiments have shown the world. There are many follow-up experiments that prove exactly that. The Stanford Prison Experiment has become one of psychology's most dramatic illustrations of how good people can be transformed into perpetrators of evil, and healthy people can begin to experience pathological reactions - traceable to situational forces. Those traceable situational forces can be minor and subtle things, and yet.
  - zimpenfish 3y ago
    > The Stanford Prison Experiment Thoroughly debunked[1][2][3], no? [1] https://themindlab.co.uk/academy/epic-fails-what-can-we-learn-from-recently-debunked-psychology-studies/ https://themindlab.co.uk/academy/epic-fails-what-can-we-lear... [2] https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17449118/stanford-prison-experiment-fraud-psychology-replication https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17449118/stanford-prison-exper... [3] https://gwern.net/doc/psychology/2019-letexier.pdf https://gwern.net/doc/psychology/2019-letexier.pdf
    - CamperBob2 3y ago
      No. The SPE was unethical and its methodology was garbage, but the observations were valid enough. When someone refuses to commit an atrocity for you, all you have to do is ask the next person in line. You won't have to go too far down the line before you find someone who is not only willing to follow an illegal order from an authority figure, but happy to. See also Milgram. The conclusion was self-evident before they ran the experiment, so another criticism that could be leveled at the experiment was that it was redundant.
      - scubbo 3y ago
        > The conclusion was self-evident before they ran the experiment, so another criticism that could be leveled at the experiment was that it was redundant. "It's just common sense" is not a solid scientific proof. Testing something that we _think_ we know (but have no proven) is not a bad thing.
        photonerd 3y ago
        Ish. It’s usually more useful to test hypotheses about why something is. If that something isn’t then you can’t get an answer & will often demonstrate the counter-factual. Simple “we confirmed water is wet” tests are not very good science. Whereas “what is wetness & why does it happen” is.
      - JackFr 3y ago
        Milgram experiment debunked too https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/01/rethinking-one-of-psychologys-most-infamous-experiments/384913/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/01/rethinkin... https://www.psypost.org/2019/11/unpublished-data-from-stanley-milgrams-experiments-casts-doubts-on-his-claims-about-obedience-54921 https://www.psypost.org/2019/11/unpublished-data-from-stanle... https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/why-almost-everything-you-know-about-milgram-wrong https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/why-almost-everything-yo...

by dmix 3y ago

ireadmevs 3y ago

> It's only natural human behaviour to not put effort in if there's no consequences or risk in doing so. That’s nonsense. That’s like saying that it’s only natural human behavior to abuse and be abused. If I put myself in the shoes of an underpaid sewage worker, that has a family to maintain, that sees the owner and investors of said private companies getting obscenely rich just by closings contracts under their AC… yeah, I’d slack the s* out of it too.

imchillyb 3y ago
> ...That’s like saying that it’s only natural human behavior to abuse and be abused... I think that's exactly what experiments have shown the world. There are many follow-up experiments that prove exactly that. The Stanford Prison Experiment has become one of psychology's most dramatic illustrations of how good people can be transformed into perpetrators of evil, and healthy people can begin to experience pathological reactions - traceable to situational forces. Those traceable situational forces can be minor and subtle things, and yet.
- zimpenfish 3y ago
  > The Stanford Prison Experiment Thoroughly debunked[1][2][3], no? [1] https://themindlab.co.uk/academy/epic-fails-what-can-we-learn-from-recently-debunked-psychology-studies/ https://themindlab.co.uk/academy/epic-fails-what-can-we-lear... [2] https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17449118/stanford-prison-experiment-fraud-psychology-replication https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17449118/stanford-prison-exper... [3] https://gwern.net/doc/psychology/2019-letexier.pdf https://gwern.net/doc/psychology/2019-letexier.pdf
  - CamperBob2 3y ago
    No. The SPE was unethical and its methodology was garbage, but the observations were valid enough. When someone refuses to commit an atrocity for you, all you have to do is ask the next person in line. You won't have to go too far down the line before you find someone who is not only willing to follow an illegal order from an authority figure, but happy to. See also Milgram. The conclusion was self-evident before they ran the experiment, so another criticism that could be leveled at the experiment was that it was redundant.
    - scubbo 3y ago
      > The conclusion was self-evident before they ran the experiment, so another criticism that could be leveled at the experiment was that it was redundant. "It's just common sense" is not a solid scientific proof. Testing something that we _think_ we know (but have no proven) is not a bad thing.
      - photonerd 3y ago
        Ish. It’s usually more useful to test hypotheses about why something is. If that something isn’t then you can’t get an answer & will often demonstrate the counter-factual. Simple “we confirmed water is wet” tests are not very good science. Whereas “what is wetness & why does it happen” is.
    - JackFr 3y ago
      Milgram experiment debunked too https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/01/rethinking-one-of-psychologys-most-infamous-experiments/384913/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/01/rethinkin... https://www.psypost.org/2019/11/unpublished-data-from-stanley-milgrams-experiments-casts-doubts-on-his-claims-about-obedience-54921 https://www.psypost.org/2019/11/unpublished-data-from-stanle... https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/why-almost-everything-you-know-about-milgram-wrong https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/why-almost-everything-yo...