My mother told me she's going to retire in a few months. While this is hardly surprising, it was unexpected, if that makes any sense at all. Her boss is horrible, and what was once a nice job has since become a little bit of a nightmare. But I just had no idea that this was coming, that's all. She didn't either.
And, to a certain extent, this annoys me. I want to quit. Not all of it, mind you, but a good deal of the everyday boring uselessness that goes into getting an education these days. I want to scale it down to the basics, and actually get something of value out at a reasonable time use rate. But I Can't. I'm not in control. And that doesn't make me happy. It never has.
Bear in mind, however, that mother dear has endured this for a good deal longer than I have. She's earned it, if you will. Thrice my age and certainly a good deal more suffering in that time. She's finally going to call it quits, because she wants to and has decided she can get away with it. I don't get that.
And that's the annoyance in life: that we don't get what we want, and we don't have control, and it's all so damned unnecessary. We suffer, surviving our lives, until we finally die, having survived our lives, and not lived it.
Good luck, Mom. Good luck, everyone. May you find in retirement what you should have found in work.
27 January 2013
18 January 2013
Visualizing Personality Type
A lot of my meatspace and Facebook friends have been subjected to my recent interest in personality type, but I make no apologies. Personality type can tell you a great deal about a person, and knowing yours can improve your life immensely.
To begin, every person has four different indicators, running in a spectrum. You are either introverted or extroverted, sensing or intuiting, thinking or feeling, and judging or perceiving. From these, you get a four-letter code. An extroverted, sensing, feeling, perceiving person would be an ESFP. An introverted, intuiting, thinking, judging person (such as myself) would be an INTJ.
You can find plenty of tests floating around the Internet to test your personality type, and learn more about the results. I won't bother you with much in the way of analysis, I trust that you can do that on your own (or are just another bot, in which case you hardly matter). The important thing is that you do it--it could save you life, it will definitely improve it.
The vital part of my argument, however, is that personality type can be visualized as a tesseract (a 4th dimensional cube, for the poor souls out there). Similar to a Nolan Chart--an entirely different topic--each edge represents one of the indicators. If we assume the cube has an corner at the origin, the x-axis runs out 200 units from extroversion to introversion, the y-axis from sensing to intuiting, the z-axis from feeling to thinking, and the w-axis (the one we have trouble visualizing, being 3D creatures) from perceiving to judging.
In this notation, a "perfect" ENFP would be at the corner (0, 200, 0, 0), for example. However, a very small percentage of the population has a "perfect" score on any one indicator, let alone all four. I'm an exception: the last time I took the Humanmetrics test, I score 100% Introversion. Altogether, I'm I(100%) N(75%) T(88%) J(22%). As you can see, I'm a strong INT, just slightly J--an this is the highest I've ever scored on J. Using our notation, I would be at (200, 175, 188, 122).
Notice, of course, that I've tipped the mathematical scales in my favor. For fairness, I'll do another example: E(45%) S(67%) T (14%) P (73%). They would be (55, 33, 114, 27).
Very few people are near a corner. This is the big takeaway. Most people people are near an edge, but not on it. Some are in the center, or only close to two edges. If this is true for you, read up on both side of that indicator. I found that everything I wasn't as an INTJ I was as an INTP, and the converse.
So, you visual-learners out there, and even you non-visual ones: think about it. Every person is somewhere in that 4D cube, and it can tell you a lot about them. Where are you?
To begin, every person has four different indicators, running in a spectrum. You are either introverted or extroverted, sensing or intuiting, thinking or feeling, and judging or perceiving. From these, you get a four-letter code. An extroverted, sensing, feeling, perceiving person would be an ESFP. An introverted, intuiting, thinking, judging person (such as myself) would be an INTJ.
You can find plenty of tests floating around the Internet to test your personality type, and learn more about the results. I won't bother you with much in the way of analysis, I trust that you can do that on your own (or are just another bot, in which case you hardly matter). The important thing is that you do it--it could save you life, it will definitely improve it.
The vital part of my argument, however, is that personality type can be visualized as a tesseract (a 4th dimensional cube, for the poor souls out there). Similar to a Nolan Chart--an entirely different topic--each edge represents one of the indicators. If we assume the cube has an corner at the origin, the x-axis runs out 200 units from extroversion to introversion, the y-axis from sensing to intuiting, the z-axis from feeling to thinking, and the w-axis (the one we have trouble visualizing, being 3D creatures) from perceiving to judging.
In this notation, a "perfect" ENFP would be at the corner (0, 200, 0, 0), for example. However, a very small percentage of the population has a "perfect" score on any one indicator, let alone all four. I'm an exception: the last time I took the Humanmetrics test, I score 100% Introversion. Altogether, I'm I(100%) N(75%) T(88%) J(22%). As you can see, I'm a strong INT, just slightly J--an this is the highest I've ever scored on J. Using our notation, I would be at (200, 175, 188, 122).
Notice, of course, that I've tipped the mathematical scales in my favor. For fairness, I'll do another example: E(45%) S(67%) T (14%) P (73%). They would be (55, 33, 114, 27).
Very few people are near a corner. This is the big takeaway. Most people people are near an edge, but not on it. Some are in the center, or only close to two edges. If this is true for you, read up on both side of that indicator. I found that everything I wasn't as an INTJ I was as an INTP, and the converse.
So, you visual-learners out there, and even you non-visual ones: think about it. Every person is somewhere in that 4D cube, and it can tell you a lot about them. Where are you?
01 January 2013
Welcome to 2013
It's a new year, and no one thinks anything of it.
Oh, they know it's happening, for sure. They may even talk themselves into feeling they're a part of something significant. But they're not.
All around, there's noise, the sounds of "celebration"--but nothing of any value. That's all it is--noise--devoid of any significance or value. It's a New Year, and opportunity to wipe the slate clean and say, "This time, we'll do it better!" but they've no interest in that. They're out there, partying, ignoring the problems, the world, ready and eager to repeat the same mistakes that got us into this mess. Why don't people think?
Well, why should they? It's not their strong suit.
Here I am, trying to think something profound, drowning in a sea of the mundane, and I feel all alone.
You laugh, think I'm over-inflating myself. Sure. But consider what happens when you try to think a coherent thought in the sea of the not-precise.
Then get back to me.
Oh, they know it's happening, for sure. They may even talk themselves into feeling they're a part of something significant. But they're not.
All around, there's noise, the sounds of "celebration"--but nothing of any value. That's all it is--noise--devoid of any significance or value. It's a New Year, and opportunity to wipe the slate clean and say, "This time, we'll do it better!" but they've no interest in that. They're out there, partying, ignoring the problems, the world, ready and eager to repeat the same mistakes that got us into this mess. Why don't people think?
Well, why should they? It's not their strong suit.
Here I am, trying to think something profound, drowning in a sea of the mundane, and I feel all alone.
You laugh, think I'm over-inflating myself. Sure. But consider what happens when you try to think a coherent thought in the sea of the not-precise.
Then get back to me.
31 December 2012
Mandatory Rant on the Textbook Racket (Spring 2013 ed.)
Like many of my fellow college students, I'm looking into the necessary textbooks for the coming semester, and once again I'm struck by a blow of disgusted helplessness. We're essentially at the mercy of a non-competitive, non-structural monopoly that exists to prevent us from learning.
That's correct. I firmly believe that college is as much an institution of anti-learning as it is of learning. Consider that no effort is made to assign good professors to incoming students who naturally will have difficulties transitioning to college education. The opposite is true: some of the worst professors are assigned to teach 100-level classes. People who have had doctorates longer than their students have been alive fail to understand their students' frustrations dealing with the basic concepts that the professors had memorized when their students' parents were on honeymoon. To add insult to injury, many of these professors then actively work to fail students, because they have to "weed-out" those who aren't up to standards, but that's like using size to separate apples from oranges: plenty of oranges will get through, and plenty of apples won't.
Colleges mostly benefit when students fail courses. If they fail enough, the students will loose scholarships and/or have to pay for extra semesters. Instead of doing their best to help students, in many cases, colleges actively work against them. (Side speculation: this is a product of the "everyone goes to college" meme in circulation, and failing students is necessary because state schools cannot easily raise admission standards.)
Textbook companies benefit from this. Fail a course enough times, and the student will have to buy a new textbook even though they're still in Chemistry 101. Said companies actively create new editions which usually vary in little more than font and color scheme, containing almost identical information.
Online homework, integrated with the textbook, is a further difficulty. I've experienced this several times, and it's frustrating to think that the schools are too incompetent to built their own homework interface. Where else are my $30,000 a year going? But that's another rant.
Textbooks companies are a parasitic industry, dependent on colleges for their source of income. Colleges give them monopolies in essence, by mandating that their students purchase a specific book, no matter that any other book from the last 40 years contains essentially identical information in many cases. Colleges are the cause of the problem, textbook companies vultures that swoop in and eat the scraps of savings leftover after the all-but-theft of tuition payments.
I must say one more thing however: this is not the fault of capitalism. Proper, laissez-faire capitalism would prevent this monstrosity from forming, and still has the power to kill it. Capitalism would not create state-funded colleges: all institutions of learning would be paid for entirely by philanthropists and the students. Consequently, their would be competition between schools to keep tuition low in hopes of attracting the best students. Furthermore, students would be given options about what textbooks are sufficient for courses, and would not be bound to buying a book to complete a course.
Well. I hope that wasn't too all-over-the-place. You don't have to live in my brain.
P.S. I think that textbook companies are in cahoots with schools to fail us, because they're atrociously written. I would have gotten a much better grade in Calc 2 if I could have just read the bloody thing, but it was insultingly vague.
That's correct. I firmly believe that college is as much an institution of anti-learning as it is of learning. Consider that no effort is made to assign good professors to incoming students who naturally will have difficulties transitioning to college education. The opposite is true: some of the worst professors are assigned to teach 100-level classes. People who have had doctorates longer than their students have been alive fail to understand their students' frustrations dealing with the basic concepts that the professors had memorized when their students' parents were on honeymoon. To add insult to injury, many of these professors then actively work to fail students, because they have to "weed-out" those who aren't up to standards, but that's like using size to separate apples from oranges: plenty of oranges will get through, and plenty of apples won't.
Colleges mostly benefit when students fail courses. If they fail enough, the students will loose scholarships and/or have to pay for extra semesters. Instead of doing their best to help students, in many cases, colleges actively work against them. (Side speculation: this is a product of the "everyone goes to college" meme in circulation, and failing students is necessary because state schools cannot easily raise admission standards.)
Textbook companies benefit from this. Fail a course enough times, and the student will have to buy a new textbook even though they're still in Chemistry 101. Said companies actively create new editions which usually vary in little more than font and color scheme, containing almost identical information.
Online homework, integrated with the textbook, is a further difficulty. I've experienced this several times, and it's frustrating to think that the schools are too incompetent to built their own homework interface. Where else are my $30,000 a year going? But that's another rant.
Textbooks companies are a parasitic industry, dependent on colleges for their source of income. Colleges give them monopolies in essence, by mandating that their students purchase a specific book, no matter that any other book from the last 40 years contains essentially identical information in many cases. Colleges are the cause of the problem, textbook companies vultures that swoop in and eat the scraps of savings leftover after the all-but-theft of tuition payments.
I must say one more thing however: this is not the fault of capitalism. Proper, laissez-faire capitalism would prevent this monstrosity from forming, and still has the power to kill it. Capitalism would not create state-funded colleges: all institutions of learning would be paid for entirely by philanthropists and the students. Consequently, their would be competition between schools to keep tuition low in hopes of attracting the best students. Furthermore, students would be given options about what textbooks are sufficient for courses, and would not be bound to buying a book to complete a course.
Well. I hope that wasn't too all-over-the-place. You don't have to live in my brain.
P.S. I think that textbook companies are in cahoots with schools to fail us, because they're atrociously written. I would have gotten a much better grade in Calc 2 if I could have just read the bloody thing, but it was insultingly vague.
30 December 2012
Some Thoughts on Maturity
I've no intention of watching Emily Owens M.D., as I've neither the time nor the interest, but I saw a small portion of the pilot this evening. In essence, I walked out (or rather climbed off the couch) after it appeared that this was going to be a show about how adults are just as vindictive and immature as high school students.
Don't you think we've have enough of that?
I've spent the last 9 years or so waiting to finally surround myself with rational people, to no avail. People just won't grow up. I was told to "act my age, and lighten up" by someone 2 or 3 years older than me when I was 13. A few weeks ago, we had a literal overgrown schoolyard bully show his true colors in my dorm.
People are irrational. They don't have to be, but being irrational is irrational, and consequently you cannot simply "convince" them to be rational. You have to ease them into it, helping them eliminate minor contradictions until finally they eliminate the major ones.
Growing up is in some ways an extension of this process. The young mind has plenty of contradictions, many of them planted (intentionally or unintentionally) by adults. But the young child has the ability to resolve these contradictions. Growing up is the process of resolving both internal contradictions and contradictions with reality.
An individual is "mature" when they have resolved all of the major contradictions with them-self and the world around them.
This is not, however, the way the term "mature" is generally used. In my experience, the word "mature" is used to mean "bowing to societal expectations, regardless of their rationality."
Thus, a mature individual is one that behaves the way they're supposed to. Who sets the rules? A collection of somewhat to largely irrational individuals from John Dewey back to Moses. There's no one to argue with (that's another issue entirely), you're just supposed to accept despite the fact that their is no reason nor satisfactory justification.
Thus, we find that to be mature is good, but for others to think you mature is probably bad.
That said, I also want to address the idea of immaturity. Immaturity, in social context, is the refusal to bow to social mores. It can mean anything from laughing with a friend when you fart in the car, to refusing to put clothes on when taken to Buckingham Palace (Sherlock, "A Scandal in Belgravia"). This sort of immaturity can be good: it is an active act of rebellion and independence against the irrational Establishment. It makes people think. It's relatively harmless when practiced among rational individuals.
The other type of immaturity is intellectual immaturity. This is incredibly dangerous.
Intellectual immaturity is the unconscious? refusal to resolve internal contradictions. The intellectually immature have in many cased damaged or destroyed their faculty of identifying contractions, or at the very least chosen not to use it. They cannot be reasoned with in the traditional sense. Handle with care.
The intellectually immature are those people who expect you to forget that they were complete monster to you in high school, or that they can initiate the use of force still be the victim (they're also likely to think that force and violence are synonyms). They are a danger to themselves and others, but are tolerated because they can put on a good facade of social maturity when necessary.
Keep these in mind next time you see someone do something "immature." It probably is, but which kind.
P.S. That overgrown bully in my dorm? I called him immature (among other unprintable things), and his response was mismanaged sarcastic answers about going to "play with his toys." Playing with toys isn't immature, at most a possibly indicator of social immaturity. Immaturity and youth are not synonyms.
Don't you think we've have enough of that?
I've spent the last 9 years or so waiting to finally surround myself with rational people, to no avail. People just won't grow up. I was told to "act my age, and lighten up" by someone 2 or 3 years older than me when I was 13. A few weeks ago, we had a literal overgrown schoolyard bully show his true colors in my dorm.
People are irrational. They don't have to be, but being irrational is irrational, and consequently you cannot simply "convince" them to be rational. You have to ease them into it, helping them eliminate minor contradictions until finally they eliminate the major ones.
Growing up is in some ways an extension of this process. The young mind has plenty of contradictions, many of them planted (intentionally or unintentionally) by adults. But the young child has the ability to resolve these contradictions. Growing up is the process of resolving both internal contradictions and contradictions with reality.
An individual is "mature" when they have resolved all of the major contradictions with them-self and the world around them.
This is not, however, the way the term "mature" is generally used. In my experience, the word "mature" is used to mean "bowing to societal expectations, regardless of their rationality."
Thus, a mature individual is one that behaves the way they're supposed to. Who sets the rules? A collection of somewhat to largely irrational individuals from John Dewey back to Moses. There's no one to argue with (that's another issue entirely), you're just supposed to accept despite the fact that their is no reason nor satisfactory justification.
Thus, we find that to be mature is good, but for others to think you mature is probably bad.
That said, I also want to address the idea of immaturity. Immaturity, in social context, is the refusal to bow to social mores. It can mean anything from laughing with a friend when you fart in the car, to refusing to put clothes on when taken to Buckingham Palace (Sherlock, "A Scandal in Belgravia"). This sort of immaturity can be good: it is an active act of rebellion and independence against the irrational Establishment. It makes people think. It's relatively harmless when practiced among rational individuals.
The other type of immaturity is intellectual immaturity. This is incredibly dangerous.
Intellectual immaturity is the unconscious? refusal to resolve internal contradictions. The intellectually immature have in many cased damaged or destroyed their faculty of identifying contractions, or at the very least chosen not to use it. They cannot be reasoned with in the traditional sense. Handle with care.
The intellectually immature are those people who expect you to forget that they were complete monster to you in high school, or that they can initiate the use of force still be the victim (they're also likely to think that force and violence are synonyms). They are a danger to themselves and others, but are tolerated because they can put on a good facade of social maturity when necessary.
Keep these in mind next time you see someone do something "immature." It probably is, but which kind.
P.S. That overgrown bully in my dorm? I called him immature (among other unprintable things), and his response was mismanaged sarcastic answers about going to "play with his toys." Playing with toys isn't immature, at most a possibly indicator of social immaturity. Immaturity and youth are not synonyms.
Into The Void
I've never blogged before. I didn't even start using Facebook until my last month of high school. I'm not a particularly social person.
But I want to do an experiment.
My mind is constantly alive with ideas, an endless monologue jumping from topic to topic, from casual whispers to impassioned rants. I think it's time I made an effort to put these into of format that's fit for public consumption. Practice, if you will.
So, here we are. Will you leap with me into the void?
But I want to do an experiment.
My mind is constantly alive with ideas, an endless monologue jumping from topic to topic, from casual whispers to impassioned rants. I think it's time I made an effort to put these into of format that's fit for public consumption. Practice, if you will.
So, here we are. Will you leap with me into the void?
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