Glider

One of the best suggestions I've heard this year. You're a student, aren't you...I can tell. If you're not, you should be, so I can tell you you shouldn't be....er

Precisely, and where does accountability lie should some hapless student be wildly misled?

True, but it makes it no more acceptable. I know language must evolve, but 4 is a number, 'u' is not a word and sentences containing such appreviations are not acceptable in formal documents. Even accepted abbreviations such as can't, won't and don't are not acceptable in formal academic writing. Students are taught this, and yet they persist...little weasels!

Would mentors be 'screened'? If so, how would that work?

Tragically, you're probably right. It has started appearing in essays and research reports submitted by students (can you believe that?). It's insidious, you begin to see thing like "4 example, previous research suggests...". I hate it and I've warned them that if I see it, I'll stop reading the report at that point and fail them. Aha! I see...hehehe.

Hehehe...I couldn't decide on one, but these three had me in some pain: "One horsepower is the amount of energy it takes to drag a horse 500 feet in one second." "Water vapor gets together in a cloud. When it is big enough to be called a drop, it does." "A hurricane is a breeze of a bigly size." My ribs hurt! I once marked an essay that contained the phrase: "Ivan Pavlov, the father of salivating dogs..."

I think it shows deep insight and self awareness on the part of our US cousins. Either try to teach American schoolkids to spell properly (e.g. colour, behaviour, haemglobin, foetus), or make the words easier to spell (color, behavior, hemaglobin, fetus). Which way would you go?

The 'living' material of a tree (the cambium) is the outermost layer between the heartwood and the bark. The centre of the tree (heartwood) is dead and provides structural support. The xylem (just inside the cambium) consists mainly of tubules which carry water and minerals up the tree. The phloem (just outside the cambium) carries food (sugars) both up and down the tree. The cambium layer (which also stores sugars) is constantly growing and dividing, and as the trunk expands, the inner, older part of the cambium becomes the xylem, the newer outer part of the cambium becomes the new phloem (inner bark). As the tree grows, the old xylem lignifies to become heartwood, and the old phloem becomes bark. Amazingly, the cambium layer, even in the biggest trees, is a single cell layer, a bit like a 'living skin', but excluding root-tips and leaves, it is the only living part of a tree. I knew that bonsai training would come in handy

The danger lies in numbers. It is rare in the 'normal environment' to find such high concentrations of bacteria (at least in any form you would go anywhere near given the choice). The concentration increases the risk of infection because such numbers can overcome your primary immune defences more easily than the relatively lower concentrations to which we are normally exposed. Add to this the fact that you don't know precisely what bacteria are thriving in the culture, and I would say caution is required. In short, doing the experiment naked would be a bad plan.

What 'secret'? No we don't. Whilst we have a relatively small point of attentional focus, everything that falls within the perceptual field of any given sensory modality will be processed; this is universal and unconditional. This assumes cognition precedes affect, which is not the case (see for example Zajonc, 1980; 1984). Affect precedes, and therefore influences, what we think. It is true that people have problems maintaining a constant vigilance over their own thoughts. Due to the focussed nature of our conscious attention, we cannot both self-monitor and function in our environment. However, practice won't help. The automatic, preattentive evaluation of our immediate environment is non-conscious, so we cannot consciously monitor it. Most of the stimuli that are evaluated, we are not even aware of on a conscious level. Further, the affective-motivational changes have been shown to occur within 250ms (1/4 of a second), on exposure to stimuli of 40ms (e.g. Bargh, et al. 1996). It is not possible to consciously monitor these events. References: Bargh, J. A., Chaiken, S., Raymond, P., & Hymes, P. (1996). The automatic evaluation effect: Unconditional automatic attitude activation with a pronunciation task. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 32, 104-128. Zajonc, R. B. (1980). Feeling and Thinking: Preferences Need no Inferences. American Psychologist, 35, 151-111. Zajonc, R. B. (1984). On the primacy of affect. American Psychologist, 39 (2), 117-123.

(Pssst...post #20 is by Crash. I didn't post on determinism until #24, but anyway...) ...AHA! I see now Kevin Conti Very interesting post. However, the mechanism of determinism I'm talking about works on a much more fundamental level. It is a preattentive process and has been described as 'Universal and unconditional'. It doesn't require cognition, nor does it require pre-existing constructs concerning social status and attention seeking behaviours. For example, social status is defined differently between cultures (although increasingly less so), but the automatic preattentive processes I'm talking about are universal to the species. It is not a learned process, but is 'hard-wired'; non-volitional and occurs outside of conscious awareness. It is based upon the preattentive processing of environmental information, most of which we are not consciously aware, yet which influences our basic affective-motivational state and which results in concomitant changes to our behavioural propensity. Whilst we do have overall 'executive control' over our behaviour, the our affective-motivational state carries significant weight in the decisional process and our behaviour is invariably influenced, moreso the less we think about it.

You're welcome.

This is pretty much what I said. Whilst the fact that we react, and the nature of our reaction, are not under our control, we do have 'executive control' over our ultimate behaviour (usually). er...not sure where that comes from. I believe we cannot control our initial emotional responses to things and subsequent behavioural propensities because I am aware of the large (and growing) body of emprical evidence in support of it. We can alter the class of affective-motivational response to a thing over time and with effort, e.g. using cognitive behavioural intervention in dealing with phobias. But our basic affective-motivational state is constantly changing throughout the day, and usually in response to things we are not even aware of. Our environment influences our emotional state. We have no control over that. This, in turn, will have an influence on our behavioural propensities on a very basic level. We have no control over that either. What we can control is the ultimate output (behaviour), which we monitor and 'edit' according to learned social mores. To assume that we have total control over everything we feel and what we think is simply vanity. We simply can't conceive of ourselves as being anything less than in total control of our own minds. The very idea is abhorrent to us. Well, we're going to have to get over it. We do not have the degree of control we think we do. I have no idea.

The flavouring substances in gum e.g. mint etc., cause localised vasodilation (the veins and capillaries in your throat dilate). The tonsils at the back of your throat in particular are highly vascular. When you drink icewater, this causes sudden and severe vasocostriction (a vasopressor response to cold immersion), which results in pain. You find the same effect if you drink something very cold after drinking something hot, and the same principle applies in 'ice-cream headaches'. It's the relative degree of change in vasopressor state that results in pain. If you want to find out more, try Googling the net for 'cold pressor response' or 'cold pressor test'. Hope this helps.

It's not that much fun really. With all the automatic weapons I have used, if you get the first round in the target, chances are the second and third will hit too, but that's it. All you end up with after that is a sore cheekbone, a ringing in the ears, coughing on cordite fumes (I still love that smell though) and lots of wasted ammunition. The only way you have a hope of staying on target is controlled bursts of two or three. I heard that's why they had to redesign the M16 to lock after three rounds. It was easier than training the US troops to release the trigger before the magazine is empty One time in Cyprus, we went to the ranges and were told we had to use all the ammunition we had brought (a budget thing; if you don't use it, it's cut next year). This equated to a box of a thousand rounds or so per station, six or seven stations. Using LMGs it took a surprisingly long time to get through the boxes. One man loading magazines like mad, the other firing long bursts (standard targets, 300m range), the gun-teams swapping over every two or three magazines. The only way to hit the damn targets were to aim at the ground well in front, and then follow the splash, guiding it onto the targets. Even using that method, the hit rate was absolutely pathetic. Using two or three round bursts, we would have been there all bloody day. At the end of the day, the barrels were white, we were all deaf and our right eyes had all closed up due to being smacked in the cheekbones 180 times a minute. Back at the barracks, we couldn't strip the weapons for cleaning because they were so coked up, the bloody barrels were locked on. We spent all night in the armoury trying to get these buggers apart. The armourer went nuts! Nearly punched out the RSM (upon whose orders we had so abused his precious charges). Funny thing about the LMG. It's braced on a bipod at the front. As you fire, this skips forward and locks in the dirt. As the next round goes, it skips forward again. If you fire a protracted burst, the bugger starts 'walking' forwards, so you get a completely out of control weapon charging forwards whilst loosing a wall of full metal jacket at everything in front, dragging some hapless and totally out of control gunner behind it. Hysterical in retrospect. Quite painful at the time. Just a li'l anecdote there

This assumes that the two people started from exactly the same point, i.e. that they were psychologically identical in every way. This is never the case. Peoples' responses to stimuli are determined not only by the nature of the stimulus, but their own perceptions of the stimulus, the situation and the context. This, in turn, depends on their cognitive make-up which will have been determined by their individual psychological histories. This is not really an argument against determinism, as modern determinism acknowledges that we (the conscious 'us') have ultimate executive control and can override our initial impulses. In fact, this comment is actually an argument for determinism. You say "...how many times have you been in a situation and got a thought but realised it wasn't appropriate...". It was getting that original thought that was determined for you and the initial impulses that are non-volitional (i.e. determined). As your comment implies, it requires conscious and deliberate intervention to override that initial impulse. Determinism refers to our initial psychological and emotional responses and our behavioural propensities. Usually we have time for 'cognitive intervention', i.e. to consider the possible implications of our actions, and modify them as we see fit, but our initial (affective-motivational) responses, and subsequent behavioural 'readiness' to perfom certain actions (behavioural propensity) are not under our control. The degree to which or ultimate thoughts and behaviours are determined depends on the degree to which we self-monitor (checking for the social acceptability and probable outcomes of our behaviour). In stressful situations (for example) self monitoring becomes impaired. To paraphrase your own question; How many times have you been in a situation where you said or did something that you immediately wished you hadn't? This is an example of us following our initial impulse, prior to applying our social/cognitive 'filters'. If we really were under our own control, would that ever happen? We are never in total control of our own minds.

True. However, whilst cracking your knuckles doesn't cause arthritis, the effects are the same (rough and eroded cartillage). The cracking noise is due to cavitation. The tension creates small bubbles in the synovial fluid, which implode on themselves with incredible force. These small implosions erode the mating surfaces of the joints, making them rough. Have you ever seen the results of cavitation on a propellor blade?

I agree with Daisy too. It's just that; 1) one of the most significant factors in avoiding medical consultation is anxiety. Increased anxiety = less probabilty of presenting. 2) Strident tones of urgency (tend to) = increased anxiety (and 'online' there is no way of evaluating the effects of what we say). I'm glad. But did you go to see your doctor?

The devil is in the details. I think such definitions should be specific. I think that as racism has both a cognitive and a behavioural component, any clear definition needs to account for each, specifically. Specificity in the definition aids understanding of the phenomenon defined.

It wouldn't work, nor could it be made to work, nor would I agree with any attempt to justify it. Ethically the concept of eugenics is fundamentally flawed from the start as it is based upon value judgements concerning entire sections of the population made by another section of the same population. Moreover, the resulting population wouldn't be functional. An entire population of any specific type could not work.

Well said!

Precisely. This is the key. Everything about 'us'; our intelligence, our personality our memories and so-on are much more a function of synaptic connections than sheer numbers of cells. We may be able to replace old or dead cells with new ones, but they would not do what the old ones did. We would have to re-learn and reinforce every synaptic pathway the old cell was a part of (and cortical pyramidal cells, for example, are involved in many).

I define racism (or sexism for that matter) as a combination of Prejudice: Forming conclusions and/or beliefs concerning a person or people based upon irrelevant factors, and Discrimination: Basing one's subsequent decisions and behaviours towards that person or people upon those invalid conclusions. Prejudice accounts for the belief component, and discrimination the behavioural component. The 'irrelevant factors' simply determine which 'ism' is at work (racism/ sexism).

Peters presents a good rebuttal. I notice that Rushton's apparent perspective on race and IQ seems to be comparable to that of Hans Eysenk in some of his books (e.g. Race, Intelligence and Education. 1971).