The Axon Terminal

12:08 AM

@JoshGitlin it's happening again ...lol... another unupvote-downvote, and a downvote, see if I can get a collection

@JoshGitlin chicken spaghetti... mmmm yummo!

oops no, it's just 2 downvotes

lol

@JoshGitlin you got all the stars cause you are a star!

anyways, thought I'd let you know that I intend to 'selectively' answer some questions - it is like your chicken spaghetti @JoshGitlin, irresistable

Josh Gitlin

I will see what I can later tonight @Damien regarding voting

Damien

12:29 AM

@JoshGitlin I am not worried - I seem to have an anonymous nemesis of sorts ... knd of amusing.

I am more interested in how good your chicken spaghetti is/was

@JoshGitlin you must relax, almost-doctor's orders!

@JoshGitlin I am sure I could mathematically model my rep as an approximate sine wave. I referred to rep changes once as a 'rep-quake'

@JoshGitlin what ingredients do you use for your chicken spaghetti?

Taal

1:06 AM

yeeeess someone voted up my answer i literally did spend like an hour on at cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/1264/…

8

Q: How to measure student activity, participation, tendency to ask questions, etc?

We would like to compare students from different education systems on the following variables: tendency to actively participate on lessons tendency to ask questions tendency and experience in presenting own opinion etc. Questions What studies provide examples of measuring these variables? ...

Damien

@Taal it is a very good question!

Taal

but what about the answer

i was worried that the way i laid out verged too much into psychopathology

Damien

good answer too

Taal

my answer to the other featured question sucked pretty hard tho

Damien

nah, its not too bad

and this will shock you - I have answered a question

even though my rep is experiencing another rep-quake and a couple of my questions are being downvoted... I thought what the heck

Taal

1:09 AM

that actually doesn't shock me :p

i know you'd feel better

Damien

I am just being selective

I don't even vote on some people's questions and answers, let alone answer them

Taal

yeah, i need to do that a bit more sometimes

Damien

3

Q: Why do people overestimate future happiness when they imagine acquiring something like a house or winning the lottery?

When a person says he would be happy to win the lottery he is usually wrong? Why are people bad at judging their happiness in the future? A person who knows that he will get a fancy house in the future thinks he will be happy. But when he ends up living in it he is not as happy as the thought he ...

cognitive-psychology well-being

I liked this question a lot

Taal

yeah, your answer just made me think about life differently

like, holy shit

im not just saying this either

Damien

I felt the same way reading the article

Why Do You Think That Is True

1:14 AM

I'm leaving, thought I'd say goodbye

Damien

reading that article and looking into the link that AsheeshR provided in the comment got me thinking, quite a revelation

Taal

wtf why

@i cant spell all your name

Why Do You Think That Is True

It won't effect the site, as the posts are still there

Taal

thats exactly what damien said last night

are you guys the same person

@damien yeah i always hated the hedonic treadmill analogy

Why Do You Think That Is True

Hahaha no he's a boy, I'm a girl

Damien

1:16 AM

I assure you @Taal we are very different individuals

Taal

are either of you causing the other to want to leave? because if so, i want a citation

Why Do You Think That Is True

I spend too much time here

Taal

i do too, so i try to limit it for breaks like 10 mins

im paying $5 an hour for an amazon web server supercomputer now too

Damien

@Taal I had never heard of the hedonic treadmill until I read the comment link

Taal

heh its a depressing concept

Why Do You Think That Is True

1:18 AM

Nah, no half measures

Taal

dont you do research on psychology/have a job/grad student thing based on it?

Why Do You Think That Is True

Taal so you pay for your usage?

Damien

@Taal but like anything, it is how you choose to interpret it, my answer is partly my interpretation based on the authors of the article

Taal

@damien haha yes i know that technique :)

i cant do @ at skippy

thanks for the spaces

yea i have 80 columns of data im trying to fit into a binary logistic regressional model using excel

Damien

@Taal my answer is not too bad for someone with no formal training in this field (am an atmospheric physicist and teacher)

Taal

1:21 AM

80 columns with about 22000 rows

Why Do You Think That Is True

Oh well not going to stay in the school playground being ignored by Damien

Taal

i wish i could provide you all some mdma so everyone would be happy again

thats what they do in marriage counseling

Why Do You Think That Is True

Anyway wanted to say goodbye and cheerio to the rest of you

Damien

@Taal I am pretty happy today - finished my PhD!

Taal

we'll see you tomorrow skippy

Why Do You Think That Is True

1:23 AM

I'm not leaving because of Damien

Taal

wtf you finished your phd?

Damien

and found out my chest pains were not heart failure

just needs to be assessed

Taal

LOL i told you i had an EKG done a few weeks ago

with "elevated ST segment"

oh man i researched the hell out of that scared the crap otu of me

but yeah you're usually fine

btw here's an example of a post i made at crossvalidated

that got flamed HARD at first, and i like flamed them back

but it has since gotten me like 10pts/day since then

9

Q: What exactly does a non-parametric test accomplish & What do you do with the results?

I have a feeling this may have been asked elsewhere, but not really with the type of basic description I need. I know non-parametric relies on the median instead of the mean to compare... something. I also believe it relies on "degrees of freedom"(?) instead of standard deviation. Correct me i...

nonparametric nonparametric-bayes

the first dude literally tells me to go to wikipedia

Damien

LOL I see that

holy crap!

Taal

they deleted all my angry comments

i kept making more after they deleted them too

Damien

1:26 AM

that is a good question though - if I were a member there I would have upvoted

got some good answers as well

Taal

glen and the other guy did

peter floum nsm

Damien

@jonsca good morning (or is it still yesterday where you are?)

jonsca

Still yesterday for 2.5 more hours :)

Damien

this time travel thing is trippy

jonsca

How's tomorrow looking? hehe

Damien

1:31 AM

sunny with intermittent meteorites, and pancakes....lots of pancakes

Taal

@WhyDoYouThinkThatIsTrue we know you're not leaving, you're addicted just like the rest of us.

jonsca

That's good. I'll look forward to the pancakes, then

Damien

@jonsca maple syrup too

jonsca

Nice

Damien

@jonsca how is yesterday going for you?

jonsca

1:34 AM

Pretty well, just winding down

While you're winding up

hehe

Damien

I am always wound up...;P

Taal

apparently he just got his PhD

that's pretty ridiculous

Damien

well, still needs to be assessed

Taal

wtf who changed my pic!

Damien

but it's pretty well in the bag

jonsca

1:36 AM

Your main argument wasn't "because I said so"?

That's when you know you're good.

Taal

my roommate was going for his phd and it took him like 8 years i think?

in psychology

Damien

its taken me 2.5 years

Taal

yeah his research kept getting rejected lol

jonsca

That's super fast

Damien

nah, my argument - "cause I said so, and here are some pretty graphs and an app to prove it"

jonsca

1:37 AM

and you were working, too

Damien

full time teacher

jonsca

I really really hope you put "There's an app for that" in your writeup somewhere

Taal

so...usually i've heard that PhD students have to go thru some intense classes like...stats 5

Damien

I think I did - twice

no classes for me... pure unadulterated research... it was orgasmic....lol

Taal

what was your thesis on?

jonsca

1:39 AM

No classes? Wow.

Taal

you should post it as a question somewhere :)

Damien

atmospheric physics

that's my therapy against the hedonistic treadmill

Taal

like any domain in there in particular?

like tornados....or was it something like such and such does this in a vacuum

Damien

UV radiation studies

Taal

oh, what did you find?

jonsca

1:41 AM

"Tanning and You: My Dissertation, by Damien"

Damien

LOL

Taal

:p ever heard of melanotan?

Damien

I found tht the sun is very bright and every time I forgot my sunglasses I felt very light headed

(I am sure there is a pun in there)

jonsca

Ho ho

Damien

lol

but after posting an answer.... I felt a rush....

Taal

1:45 AM

so like you tested this theory with surveys? is the sun bright?

Damien

the sun is very intelligent indeed....

I had to do 3 hour measurements of the sun, followed by 12 hours of wrestling with Excel

40 of those tests

Taal

statistical stuff?

Damien

yup

Taal

hmm....that's EXACTLY what i'm doing now....

Damien

but hve been published 3 times now in related research

Taal

1:47 AM

oh

Damien

excel does not fight fair

Taal

so you weren't making a new claim

jonsca

I hope you measured how big it was between your thumb and first finger, now that's science

Damien

several

heck yeah

Taal

which stats add-in did you use for excel? i know these are specific questions but its what im doing as we speak

Damien

1:48 AM

and I also tested to see if the sun actually did shine out of my ex's rear end... it doesn't

jonsca

Bonus points if you said "Mr. Sun, I am squishing you"

Damien

I actually did not use any add in

jonsca

That's worth an "appendix" to your thesis

Damien

LOL @jonsca its like you were there!

ho ho

jonsca

@Taal lol sorry to detract from your actual question

Taal

1:49 AM

no, i'm like in that work/multitask mode now i wish i could joke and laugh too

jonsca

@Damien It was dark

Damien

@Taal - I did not use any particular add in

Taal

renting server at amazon with 64cores 300gigs ram 4000piops

Damien

@jonsca wher ethe sun did not actually shine?

Taal

to run the stats i have to do in excel, which i don't really understand

jonsca

1:50 AM

@Taal Nice

Damien

@Taal that's epic!

Taal

its what i require

jonsca

@Damien Nope. It was a cold day in hell, too

Damien

LMAO, is that the sneezing I heard?

Taal

imagine having 80 indepedent variables and somehow getting it down to 1 binary logistic regression

jonsca

1:52 AM

No, that was me making flatulence noises

Taal

im gonna cry tonight

jonsca

@Taal Yucky

Damien

80 variables???? holy mother mccreedy's chickens!

Taal

im attempting to make an algorithm

to accurate know when I have the correct person's zip code from an GEO to IP database

i have the real values of 22k ips

and then the returned values from 3 different providers

Damien

wow!

Taal

1:54 AM

they seem to fill in holes for each other, but if i can pull this off

ill be rich

jonsca

I would think that would be quite valuable

Taal

of course it won't matter because of the hedonic treadmill...lolz

jonsca

Feels like you need an SVM or something, but I'm not an expert

Taal

what is SVM?

jonsca

Support vector machine

In machine learning, support vector machines (SVMs, also support vector networks) are supervised learning models with associated learning algorithms that analyze data and recognize patterns, used for classification and regression analysis. The basic SVM takes a set of input data and predicts, for each given input, which of two possible classes forms the output, making it a non-probabilistic binary linear classifier. Given a set of training examples, each marked as belonging to one of two categories, an SVM training algorithm builds a model that assigns new examples into one category or th...

Now if you get rich, I want 20% ;)

Damien

1:56 AM

I'll take 20% too

Taal

that sounds like decision tree based stepwise regression

Damien

and so will @JoshGitlin

jonsca

He's already a billionare from site-in-a-box

@Taal Not absolutely sure, but that sounds plausible

Taal

heres the fun part - I got a C- in stats 1 in college

the rest i've been trying to learn

Damien

then I want his 20% and a serve of the chicken spaghetti

jonsca

1:57 AM

Okay

Damien

so @Taal self taught? that is doubly impressive

jonsca

When he says "camping", he means going on his yacht @JoshGitlin

Taal

id have to say yeah - college was pretty useless to me as I didn't find much of it applicable to the real world

i was an entrepreneurship major

Damien

is that the yacht that's actually a cruise liner?

jonsca

Way bigger

Taal

1:59 AM

now im a poor dude with a crazy idea

Damien

starship?

@Taal not so crazy methinks

jonsca

@Damien The yacht has a little door that opens and the cruiseliner comes out

Damien

sort of like a sea-going Tardis?

jonsca

Or a big door, really

Yes

Damien

lol, a real big door!

jonsca

2:01 AM

In Josh's case, they pronounce it "tardy", like it's French

Damien

LMAO

jonsca

as he's always late

Damien

ho ho

I can see @JoshGitlin sitting there, sharpening his goldplated jewel encrusted axe

jonsca

"I'd have gotten away with it, too, if it weren't for those guys on Coggy and their mangy mutt"

2

Damien

so his yacht is called the "mystery machine"?

jonsca

2:04 AM

Yes

Think of him as Velma

j/k lol

Damien

my pepsi just went flying...

Taal

awesome, my spot instance just got owned by someone

jonsca

It appears he can't be drawn out by my normal "insults", I'll have to switch into hyperdrive

Damien

@JoshGitlin calling @JoshGitlin, are you there @JoshGitlin?

@Taal oh?

Taal

@JoshGitlin

jonsca

2:07 AM

Hehe, he probably just refreshed his window

Taal

yeah somehow i got that computer for a 10 cent bid and stupidly kept that

i raised it to $2....bastards

jonsca

Now we've taken him away from his last meal before roughing it

Or, sorry, his last meal served by his "on land" servants

Damien

LMAO

Taal

josh we know you can hear us

Damien

Hey @JoshGitlin and @jonsca - I actually posted an answer! Shocking, I know

Taal

2:11 AM

$4 spotinstance...im taking someone down

jonsca

That's the spirit, get back on the damned horse

Damien

and as @Taal and I found, it was actually quite profound

Taal

your response/

Damien

1

A: Why do people overestimate future happiness when they imagine acquiring something like a house or winning the lottery?

Like many people, I do this a lot, the whole thought process "If I won the lotto...". Following on from the term that AsheeshR linked in his comment, there has been several studies on the phenomenon of the Hedonic Treadmill. One particular study is "Getting off the hedonic treadmill, one step a...

Taal

3

Q: Why do people overestimate future happiness when they imagine acquiring something like a house or winning the lottery?

When a person says he would be happy to win the lottery he is usually wrong? Why are people bad at judging their happiness in the future? A person who knows that he will get a fancy house in the future thinks he will be happy. But when he ends up living in it he is not as happy as the thought he ...

cognitive-psychology well-being

BOOM i just blew some guy out of his spot instance

Damien

2:13 AM

reading the article about the Hedonistic Treadmill has opened my eyes somewhat

Taal

hope you lost your data too !

Damien

@Taal lol I wondered what that noise was

Taal

i was literally paying 10 cents for that computer per hour tho

so he probably just bid like 15

jonsca

You could almost pay off your usage by doing Mechanical Turk work in the meantime ;)

Taal

ah i have some other tricks up my sleeve

Damien

2:15 AM

tissues?

Taal

i just want to get started on this final step, as i've been working on this model for 3 months

unmentionables :p

Damien

oh, frilly handkerchiefs?

closer

@Damien Arms

frilly arms?

2:17 AM

Yes

i have hairy arms

close enough!

Well, there you go

i really hope i get the bounty on those featured questions

the one response i felt was solid

the other, no citations, it was a twisted question

Damien

I think your answers are very good

Taal

2:18 AM

yet you didn't upvote them

:p

Damien

actually, I did

Taal

oh, thanks

lol

i guess it must be delayed

Damien

lol

sometimes they can be, if the SE servers are burping

jonsca

I have to go back through the site this weekend, I'm behind on my voting

but I have liked all of your answers that I have read so far @Taal

Taal

except for the steroids one

Damien

2:21 AM

likewise, I have pretty much upvoted all of them as I read them

Taal

thank you, heh - most of the research experience i've had was just from doing pubmed battles with other crazy people at mindandmuscle tho

@jonsca btw i did add citations into my response for you jonsca

jonsca

"Dueling Pubmeds"

@Taal I did notice! Thanks.

Pretty sure I gave that an upvote once you did. I'll check again

So much is future proofing these answers for people who are going to read them 5 years from now, it was a great contribution even with the personal experience, but the refs made it even stronger

Damien

very true - we have quite an excellent repository of information here

Taal

i wish i had my friends from mindandmuscle over here

from 3 years ago

apparently they made a private forum, which I could never find

there was this guy there named "Ex Dubio"

he to this day, was the smartest person I've ever encountered online/offline

but everyone's contributions here are going to be indexed in the search engines - google freaking loves stack exchange

usually in the #1 and #2 spot

Damien

Google is watching you

Taal

2:30 AM

and if you think about it, we're like coming up with questions alot of people probably have

and then answering them

its just so perfect

Damien

yup, that is how I see it

Taal

i wish i thought of stackexchange

Damien

I wish I thought of google

Taal

im happy i have the idea im working on now

Damien

I reckon you're going to do extremely well with that idea

Taal

2:37 AM

btw what would happen is - id take those zip codes and regress them back into a database that holds about 4000 variables...from the percentage of people that buy tobacco products in that zip code to what they do when they go to the gym

due to the central limit theorum, their traits manifest - "they" being the potential customer of the product or the customers that buy the product

its hard to explain to anyone not on the internet tho

Damien

most things are like that - hard to explain to anyone not on the net

Taal

like ill explain it to my dad, ive been trying to for 6 months

he still doesnt understand

Damien

lol - my rep is at -29 for the day so far... the rep quake continues

Taal

wtf

who?

Damien

2 days it was -156

yesterday it was +79

almost a sine wave

3 of my answers have been unaccepted, reaccepted and unaccepted in 3 days - sine wave

have a look cogsci.stackexchange.com/users/3180/damien?tab=reputation I actually find literally funny in a mathematical-nerdy kind of way

Taal

2:44 AM

lol yesterday i got just enough points to post in that really hot topic in literature yesterday

about a word that describes "a guy who has his sh*t togethre"

My response was "Matt Damon."

surprisingly it got upvoted twice....bt they deleted it this morning

Damien

I'd agree with that, they deleted it? spoilsports!

Taal

well it'll even out

Damien

always does

Taal

sorry

10

Q: Is multitasking a myth?

Often, the term 'multitasking' is applied to very busy and 'wired' people. There is an adage that women multitask better than men. My question is, do we actually multitask? If so, what are the cognitive processes that allow this? Or, is it a case that we momentarily put a task on hold to do a...

cognitive-psychology memory cognitive-modeling performance

Damien

some of that occurred while I was at a doctor

Taal

2:46 AM

doing this now

Damien

LOL

that was downvoted today

Taal

wow.

my roommate is in the living room outside mine

Damien

but I got good answers on it though

Taal

all of the sudden i hear a girl start gasping and screaming

Damien

wt..?

Taal

2:48 AM

yeah thats a good question

who would downvote that?

(he's having sex with her lol)...

Damien

not sure, but doesn't matter

oh yes, of course

Taal

its definately that we momentarily put a task on hold btw

but isn't that the definition of multitaskign?

Damien

possibly, that is what got me wondering

Taal

0

A: Is there a correlation between people who frequently laugh at their own jokes and narcissism?

No citations here but, from past experiences and my personal opinion: It partially depends upon the social context: If you laugh at your own jokes when you're chatting around with people and they arn't laughing as if it were a "group syncronized" event then it appears (and I feel) most of the t...

just wrote that

not sure

Damien

3:04 AM

that is an excellent answer - I have upvoted it

this is the other one I was downvoted for today cogsci.stackexchange.com/questions/4261/…

Hello @RaghavSood

Taal

the answer?

oh the one where you wree downvoted

wtf why are people downvoting your stuff

you should just ban everyone.

Damien

LOL I am famous

yup, the question is mine and was downvoted, but meh, it is all good

Taal

well i thought it was a good question

as youll see

Damien

thank you kindly good sir

Taal

what pisses me off (unrelated)

is this machine im renting out has 244 gigabytes of ram

yet windows decides to make a pagefile (which it seems to want to use first)

and it won't let me turn it off

like OH NOS WE MAY RUN OUT OF RAM - GOTTA HAVE THE PAGEFILE

Damien

3:15 AM

windows... bah!

Taal

3:26 AM

lol look at this question and answer

21

Q: What is the purpose of having a clock on the desktop?

It is common for a clock to be placed somewhere on the desktop - in Windows, it is on the taskbar. But why do designers do this? It makes sense on a phone, for example, but when on a computer, I believe that most people have a clock within their vision or reach already. Many people wear watches...