Posts by BenWilson
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I got my first real job with a software house on the strength of having been a debating champion at varsity, according to my boss. My minor in Computer Science was considered irrelevant. My major was Philosophy, and I'm sure I rose quickly through the company because people just loved coming in to argue with me about stuff when they were bored with their work. I was a real sucker for it.
I don't think Philosophy did my mind any good at all. But it is very practical - arguing about shit seems to be a key skill when it comes to office politics, especially knowing exactly when and how to judiciously use argumentative fallacies to your advantage. A well timed ad hominem is usually an argument winner. Modus ponens never seems to have the same impact. Years of martial arts have prepared me for the use of Ad baculum, but fortunately it's never come up. Unfortunately I hate office politics and now work alone, as a programmer. The arguments with myself are interminable and heated. I wish I'd never had my first puff of Philosophy.
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Rob, I was talking shit. The reason I, and practically everyone I associate with, never get stopped any more is we're all older, and mostly more law abiding than we were. That will probably extend to cellphones.
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It wouldn't be hard to ban hands-free kits in cars, much like banning radar detectors. You just fine people who have them, and confiscate them. It would be just as easy to ban car stereos too, they are well known for causing accidents. You could also ban eating and drinking in the car. But such bans could be counterproductive, if hands free were just as illegal, then many people wouldn't bother with them, on the grounds of cost and having to learn how to use them. If car stereos were illegal, people might take to using their portable mp3 players, which would most likely be even more dangerous. If people couldn't eat or drink, it's possible they might actually be more impaired on some kind of statistical average, but simple virtue of dehydration or hunger.
I will definitely find the cellphone ban highly inconvenient, and will most likely get a hands free kit. Until then I'll most likely do what everyone in Australia does (where talking on the cell has been illegal for the longest time), which is keep an eye out for cops, and put the phone in your lap as you pass them. But I doubt I'd ever get stopped anyway - pulling people over seldom seems to happen any more, unless you're really asking for it. The cops are either too busy or too lazy.
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This is the vision of a Mactional party health care.
The private sector takes the cream from the top. The sour difficult nasty stuff at the bottom is picked up by the state - they have the resources.
Seems to work OK. The private care does give you a little more of some things that you might value, which just seem like extraneous luxuries to the public institutions. If you want them, I can't see that you shouldn't be allowed them if you're prepared to pay. If you don't let rich folks get some advantages from all their cash, they get uppity.
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If you work for Company X doing Job A you can't work for Company Y and do job A. It's a clear conflict.
Say what? I do it all the time. It's called contracting. Occasionally it's been for the government, but they're just another client.
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My anecdata: My first son (just got another one, yay!) suffered from a stroke a little after he was born. He was rushed to NICU and we spent 3 nerve wracking weeks there, during which my opinion of the NZ health system climbed dramatically. After stabilization and release, the hospital system itself did everything they could to see to his needs, but a number of people suggested we pursue ACC for him, as the cause of the stroke was never actually known, and it was put down in the end as an accident. It took some time for them to come to a decision about this, about 4 months, but when they did, WOW! He now has lifelong cover for his therapy. From that day on, he has seen a steady stream of specialist therapists, all paid for by the state. This apparently will persist until the day he dies, or some government kills our health system.
He has come an incredibly long way since then. A number of interventions have broken him out of plateaus that he was hitting in all levels of child development.
We actually went with private obstetricians for him, and a private pediatrician. But when the shit hit the fan, and he was having seizures in his bassinet, the public system took over almost 100%. I have no bitterness on the private specialists over this, nor do I apportion any blame on them for his 'accident'. They did everything they could to help out, going well beyond what had been paid for, and even waived some of their bill, but the final point was that they couldn't do very much by comparison with the incredible resources of the state.
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Curious, btw, what does morphine feel like? On a scale from good shit to bad shit...
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A horrendous weekend, hope you make a full recovery.
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Um, OK. I'll try not to take being called 'bitter to my very core' by someone who doesn't know me at all personally.
I've just had to put up with a lot of attitude from you all day, that's pretty much where I got that conclusion. Because you took it personally. Conjecture. Could be wrong. Maybe you like stirring shit too.
As for not talking about your experiences, fine, you stick to your style. I personally like to hear from people who have actually tried things rather than just read about them, and I figure there are other people like me out there.
Stephen, I kind of had an inkling that a tedious fight was in the offing the moment Danielle showed up and started ragging on me. I could have let it slip there, but I wanted to hear at least one refutation of a fairly solid theory, which is by no means my complete view on dieting. That was never asked for, and I will never give it. It's too obvious for general consumption.
As for the intake restriction (I never said anything about counting calories. In fact, I don't need to know anything about calories).
ROR for your points:
1. It proves a lot. It proves that it's not magic, or impossible. In fact, it's simple.
2. Never denied that. It's a backup. That's how I use it.
3. Did I say it was easy? Hell, I never even said it was worthwhile. That's a choice for the individual. All I said was that it's simple and possible.
4. Nor was it sold as such. But it could be the vast majority. Or even a substantial minority. Or it could even be one person out there, who might try it. In all cases, it's worth saying it.
5. Aha! So it is a necessary factor. I'm calling it a night. -
Danielle, I've got simpler advice for you: Don't take it personally.
Dyan, I never said people couldn't get fat from eating very little. But somewhere between whatever you mean by very little, and nothing, they will lose fat.
As for the identical people with identical diets blah, blah fucking blah, I never disagreed with that. Obviously there are lots of factors. But I have a way of measuring them that doesn't have to wait for the total perfection of dietary science.
I never said the human body functions like an internal combustion engine either. It was simply a point about how you can measure output without pulling the engine apart and understanding it's internal physics. That's just not necessary.
Similarly, you can find that break even point which you seem to feel does not exist because of your superior knowledge of all science, (as opposed to my more simple expedient of actually experimenting to see) by cutting back until the raw measure, whichever one it is that you're concerned about, starts to come down. That's science that children can understand. And it actually works too. I don't know if it works for every person. Maybe there is someone who has a body for which there is actually no gap between what you call 'very little food' and no food at all. I'm struggling to think why you can't cut 'very little' in half. Is it atomic? Is there a basic, indivisible unit of food?
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