iguy

69 ms·

721.
by iguy 8y ago
But which year's crop of psychiatrist ideas should we enshrine in law? In 1950 there were rebels who didn't buy the consensus, and their ideas won, things improved. Why wouldn't this change have been prevented? Or worse, how
722.
by iguy 8y ago
But in mathematics the experts really do know what they are talking about, for the most part. Many things aren't like this. Just today there was a thread on mental illness, and the crazy grab-bag of ideas which passes for expert consen
723.
by iguy 8y ago
> For instance we don’t allow peddlers of snake oil to make whatever claims they desire The important word here is “peddlers”. We regulate the sale of medical products. (And advertising related to such a sale.) But we do not regulate w
724.
by iguy 8y ago
I think the analogy to species is misleading. While there are interesting edge cases, the basic idea that there are different kinds of animals is really obvious & clear: Sparrows don't try to mate with owls, seagulls, pigeons, let
725.
by iguy 8y ago
Maybe the patients to whom they offer their private numbers, and the patients who "tell me they've got to have my private number" are non-overlapping sets. I'm sure that experienced doctors can spot people who are going
726.
by iguy 8y ago
Die down, not die off. The melting pot is a great idea, but Balkanization is a terrible one. I worry that the drift is toward the latter. And, I'd support policies to actively discourage aspiring pop stars, of all flavors! But I do mea
727.
by iguy 8y ago
Do you know why? Were they just confirming that you hadn't wriggled & they got the right spot?
728.
by iguy 8y ago
These aren't hobbies. Number theorists and topologists have minds that work in profoundly different ways. Talented 12-year-olds will like some kinds of problems much more than others. I think a great outreach goal would be to get them
729.
by iguy 8y ago
I would bet that in almost every one of those categories, Americans of New England descent are over-represented compared to people of Christian Italian/German/Polish descent. (With the least money on the sporting ones.)
730.
by iguy 8y ago
But "shares your cultural background" is in large measure something we choose. Not necessarily as individuals, but as a society, in what we emphasise. Why can't "American" be the right cultural background, or better
731.
by iguy 8y ago
Perhaps. It's possible a cold stalemate between the two non-nuclear armies would have lasted a while, I don't think there was much enthusiasm for full-scale fighting.
732.
by iguy 8y ago
Sorry not intended as snark, I do think you raise a good point, and may yet dim my enthusiasm for pure consumption taxes. But would be good to generate more examples to think through. One unfairness is people who have spiky incomes, like a
733.
by iguy 8y ago
Depends where and when "old days" means, but half the population not working was pretty rare. Farms had lots and lots of different kinds of labor, in and outside the house, in different seasons, but everybody worked hard. Victoria
734.
by iguy 8y ago
Fair point. How about a decade off raising kids?
735.
by iguy 8y ago
Right now we charge someone who earns their lifetime income in 20 years much more tax than someone else who earns the same total income over 40 years. A change like this would remove this unfairness, but to collect the same total amount (ov
736.
by iguy 8y ago
> abstract testing away from educators so they can focus on teaching Some systems attempt this, at the level of individual courses, and what seems to happen is the educator focuses ever more on bureaucracy. It means that they can't
737.
by iguy 8y ago
Yup. And this should have been blindingly obvious to everyone involved in writing/reviewing/editing the original paper -- the effect size reported was just far too large. <10% parole before and >70% after lunch? That's
738.
by iguy 8y ago
Right, this is a good measure. The national-level one is just proportion of GDP spent by the government, however they collect it, and IIRC the figures are about 25% in the US, vs. about 45-50% in Germany.
739.
by iguy 8y ago
I'd wager that even without nuclear weapons, dividing Germany in half and keeping half a million or so foreign soldiers there for 50 years would have been pretty effective at keeping the peace.
740.
by iguy 8y ago
Sure, I don't mean that too literally. But the current system seems to syphon huge amounts of money to a few owners, and may well be replaced in the not-too-distant future. Websites do not cost $30/article to run.
741.
by iguy 8y ago
That's a point. I bet it does right now. But if it became commonly done after graduating, then I imagine it would not predict much about whether you will pay the mortgage on your house (which is anyway secured by the house) and so lend
742.
by iguy 8y ago
The problem IMHO is that the "discomfort of declaring bankruptcy" is hard to predict. Right now it caries some social stigma I believe, but that could change. I don't think that's a great mechanism for deciding who pays
743.
by iguy 8y ago
Nurses might be a good benchmark for setting this up -- google says "Registered Nurses made a median salary of $70,000" which sounds to me like they'd be a decent bet. Training lots of people in currently high-wage jobs would
744.
by iguy 8y ago
Certainly affection for things you have a personal connection to is different. For most of us this applies to certain foods, and certain paintings, books, too. Maybe my point is that it's not just "whatever buildings were most cos
745.
by iguy 8y ago
> STEM career and simply shadowed professionals for 4-8 years and learned through first hand experience I believe that's called a PhD :) But I totally agree that much of the system we've invented is a mistake, basically from ha
746.
by iguy 8y ago
I totally agree that almost all of these job licensing regimes should be weaker, including doctors. But I'm not sure they should be non-existent. The world in which you have to spend half an hour googling which taxi companies aren&#x27
747.
by iguy 8y ago
Here's another idea for a better equilibrium: Cap non-dischargeable loan payments at (say) 15% of taxable income, written off after 20 years. Then they can never become an impossible burden, and lenders will become very picky about wha
748.
by iguy 8y ago
> each course credit ... should all be subject to review on a periodic basis ... needs of the country This sounds horrifying. You want every change of a course to go via some central bureaucracy for approval? This bureaucracy will be sta
749.
by iguy 8y ago
Well, paying for journals more expensive than sci-hub is largely a waste. And I've seen lots of renovations of libraries which add a lot of pretty luxurious study space... although I'm not sure that was on the library budget.
750.
by iguy 8y ago
Whether you think it should be higher or lower, my main point is that I think you should flip things around (banning instead of prescribing) and see whether you agree with yourself. I'm not sure workplace safety is so different -- I th

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