User talk:Moulton/Archive 3

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[edit] Older Archives

[edit] A Collegial Dissent From Moultonism

:So, you wander over to WR, talk shit, promote shit, encourage others to spread shit, come back from WR, without admitting that your view of NPOV might've been shity and might've caused a shitload of nonsense, and then, you beg to be allowed back to spread more shit? No shit, really. Nah. •Jim62sch•dissera! 23:07, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Jim, this kind of comment is hardly constructive - Alison ❤ 23:21, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
No, its just a demonstration of his class :) ok ok I'm not being constructive either ...195.216.82.210 (talk) 11:04, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
While I understand the frustration, I have to say I agree with Alison that this is a bit impolitic and inappropriate here.--Filll (talk) 13:20, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
I appreciate the collegiality of your dissent, Filll. —Moulton (talk) 13:51, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Jim, you asked me this at ArbCom, "I'd at least appreciate an apology for those ill-considered comments nonetheless." Does this apply to you here? Or do you expect accountability from others that you don't apply to yourself.? Fair question. Cla68 (talk) 14:16, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Stricken. I apologise for the poor choice of words, but I'm afraid that the point still remains -- I simply cannot condone Moulton's actions here or on WR. If it were just a case of being snarky, I wouldn't care (how could I? I'm snarky myself), it was, and still is, everything else. •Jim62sch•dissera! 18:38, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Yeah, right.

From yesterday's New York Times...

The Science of Sarcasm (Not That You Care)

By DAN HURLEY
Published: June 3, 2008

There was nothing very interesting in Katherine P. Rankin's study of sarcasm — at least, nothing worth your important time. All she did was use an M.R.I. to find the place in the brain where the ability to detect sarcasm resides. But then, you probably already knew it was in the right parahippocampal gyrus.

What you may not have realized is that perceiving sarcasm, the smirking put-down that buries its barb by stating the opposite, requires a nifty mental trick that lies at the heart of social relations: figuring out what others are thinking.

More at the link.

Even though the above is yesterday's news, it includes some interesting memes, including barbs and put-downs, social cognition, irony, sarcasm, anger, comedic ridicule, curiosity and fascination, political silliness, social drama, and getting inside someone else's head with an insightful and comprehensive theory of mind.

All that's missing is a bowl of buttered popcorn.

Moulton (talk) 13:33, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Huh, like I'm going to read that! WAS 4.250 (talk) 16:08, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Ya' think? —Moulton (talk) 16:46, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Substance P

There is a neuropeptide called Substance P which I first learned about a year ago last week. It's a tachykinin that's implicated in a lot of stuff, including fibromyalgia pain, vomiting, anxiety, and various other stress responses. Environmental stressors seem to stimulate release of Substance P.

Substance P is involved in the transmission of pain impulses from peripheral receptors to the central nervous system. It has been theorized that it plays a part in fibromyalgia. Capsaicin has been shown to reduce the levels of Substance P probably by reducing the number of C-fibre nerves or causing these nerves to be more tolerant. Capsaicin is a Substance P antagonist. It acts to reduce the level of Substance P. In the central nervous system, Substance P has been associated with the regulation of mood disorders, anxiety, stress, reinforcement, neurogenesis, respiratory rhythm, neurotoxicity, nausea, emesis (vomiting), and pain.

Tachykinins tend to speed up the neural firing rate, to improve the response time in the face of danger. The psychological effect is that things appear to happen in slow motion. You feel you have more time — more clock cycles — to figure out what to do. Capsaicin is the hot stuff in chili peppers and Mongolian Fire Oil.

One of the more interesting beneficial effects of Substance P is neurogenesis. Evidently, Substance P causes the brain to generate brand new neurons, perhaps to enable the brain to host new adaptations to cope with persistent stressful and problematic situations.

Moulton (talk) 20:32, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

How does this help us with making Wikipedia a better encyclopedia? Would you like to be unblocked so that you can improve the article? WAS 4.250 (talk) 00:28, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
If you read the first comment by the thistle, you will see that he found the wording of the Wikipedia article ambiguous. Now I was just learning about Substance P for the first time, myself, so I am hardly qualified to correct the Wikipedia article on the subject. But perhaps I have an obligation to convey to someone here the useful feedback of the thistle. But at the moment, the only talk page where I might post a remark about that conversation is here in my own little grudgingly provided MicroShtetl. But if it pleases you or KillerChihuahua or MastCell to take that communication channel away, who am I to deny Wikipedians the ecstasy of their fervently held convictions? —Moulton (talk) 00:49, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
Would you like to be unblocked for the purpose of making edits on that talk page? I'm not going to move your edits from this page to other talk pages just because you choose to not ask to be unblocked. WAS 4.250 (talk) 01:03, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
I wish for Wikipedians to do what they think is best. —Moulton (talk) 01:30, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
How might that be determined? WAS 4.250 (talk) 02:25, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

My best practice for devising Best Practices may be found in this essay, The Calculus of Ideas.

The Calculus of Ideas

The process of defining, organizing, and executing projects embodies a variety of important skills. At the intellectual heart of the matter is a kind of thinking that I like to call The Calculus of Ideas.

The Calculus of Ideas subsumes a discipline that ought to be a central thread in any college curriculum.

The first stage of the Calculus of Ideas is to identify Values. One can spend a semester constructing a Value System, which is really a topic in Philosophy.

Given a System of Values, the second stage is to derive Goals.

A Goal is a Future State of Affairs which is Feasible, Desirable, and Reachable.

Feasible means that the Goal State is not a physical impossibility. It doesn't violate the Laws of Physics, or any other inviolable constraints.

Desirable means that within the Value System, the Goal State is preferable to the current state of affairs.

Reachable means that the Goal State can be attained with available resources of time, energy, and materiel.

Given a Goal, the third stage is to develop a Plan for reaching the Goal State from the Present State of Affairs.A Plan is a Course of Action. Planning begins with Ideas. An Idea is a Possibility for Changing the State of Affairs.

Most of the work in Planning is in discovering and evaluating Ideas, to find those that provide the best Strategy.

One can evaluate Candidate Ideas many ways, but in the Calculus of Ideas, we tend to focus on Model-Based Reasoning. In Model-Based Reasoning, we consider the likely consequences of each candidate idea. Oftentimes, this work requires technical analysis, simulation, or experimentation.

Once a Strategy is selected and reduced to a Plan, the actual work can be broken down into Tasks.

A Task is a discrete unit of work that can be assigned to an individual or team. The various Tasks often comprise a lot of grunt work. The motivation to do all this grunt work comes from the compensation or expected payoff for completing the Plan and reaching the Goal.

To carry off an entire project, you need Sponsors who are Values Oriented, Directors who are Goal Oriented, Creative Problem Solvers who are Idea Oriented, Decision Makers who are Plan Oriented, and Workers who are Task Oriented. (Bureaucrats, who are Rule-Oriented should be dispensed with, and replaced by computers.)

Moulton (talk) 11:25, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Patience, Perseverance, and Exasperation

On the weekends, I supervise a puzzle activity in Cahners Computer Place at the Boston Museum of Science.

Not everyone has the temperament to focus their attention for a long spell on a challenging puzzle.

One of the first observations I can make of a would-be puzzle solver is if they have patience and perseverance, or if they get frustrated and exasperated.

Patience and perseverance are the hallmarks of a potential scientist, academic, or researcher. It's not uncommon when a family comes in that one sibling or parent will exhibit patience and perseverance, while the other will be impatient and easily frustrated or exasperated.

Which leads me to one of my favorite puzzles...

When someone is exasperated, they will make a sound something like, "Arrgghhh!!!" I call this an Exhalation of Exasperation. It's an easily recognizable phase of the discovery learning cycle.

So here's the puzzle. If Exhalation of Exasperation is the name of a commonly observed phase, what is the complementary name of the exact opposite phase?

Moulton (talk) 08:09, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

What is the point of this question? ++Lar: t/c 17:20, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Dunno, but it's actually made me ponder the question ... against my better judgment! :) - Alison ❤ 18:16, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I will boldly predict that Alison will solve it first. —Moulton (talk) 19:21, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
I will boldly predict that it has zero direct bearing on whether or not you will be unblocked whether it is solved or not. (and a net negative secondary effect) My question stands. ++Lar: t/c 20:37, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
The point is very clear, Lar. In the process of solving a difficult problem, there is an intermediate phase where one experiences the emotional state of exasperation. Then, at a later phase, when the solution miraculously appears, there is a phase change to another affective emotional state. If the intermediate phase is recognized by an Exhalation of Exasperation, who here can characterize the successor phase and supply the linguistically comparable name for it? —Moulton (talk) 22:22, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
Or it is an exhalation of complete frustration on the part of each of these editors who have stuck their collective necks out on your part. Ya know, whichever is easier to understand. Baegis (talk) 00:25, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I demand a refund for the time wasted in reading this. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 00:33, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Inhalation of Inspiration. Guettarda (talk) 05:07, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Very good! —Moulton (talk) 15:35, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Aha! Our mystery puzzle solver from Atlanta turns out to be a Wikipedian after all. Well done, Guettarda. —Moulton (talk) 02:00, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
Uh, yeh. Philosophically and linguistically this is effluvium: recognized by an Exhalation of Exasperation, who here can characterize the successor phase and supply the linguistically comparable name for it? At least try to be poetic when spewing honeyed scarf to the masses. •Jim62sch•dissera! 20:34, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
Alas, poetry is my short suite, Jim. But I understand you have a knack for crafting rhyming verses, so I invite you (or any other would-be contestant) to recast the above puzzle in the form of a clever poem. —Moulton (talk) 11:46, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
From da OED: "elevated or sublime in expression." You really don't want me to write a poem, it'd be far too satirical for these tender pages. Oh, it's "suit"•Jim62sch•dissera! 20:11, 24 May 2008 (UTC)