Re: DO NOT BELIEVE IN WHAT Jack Tomsky say

On Jul 17, 10:14 am, James216...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
On 17 Jul, 06:27, Old Mac User <chendrixst...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:



On Jul 15, 1:24 pm, Jack Tomsky <jtom...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

For several years now, I've been trying to explain to Afonso the basics of hypothesis testing, but nothing seems to penetrate. I've concluded that nothing will ever penetrate until he takes a class in Statistics 101.

Jack (moderator)

Jack...

He's a lost cause. I, like you, don't give up easily. But this one
probably
would not profit from taking a real course in statistics anyhow. His
mindset
is frozen. Short of an intense emotional experience, he will not
change.

"People do not learn from experience.
They lean from BAD experience".

OMU

OMU is correct. I used to run a mid sized business. In the month
before I retired I was bored and could not start new projects as I was
not going to be there to finish them. So I spent a bit of time
thinking about problem employees I had that had reported to me over
the years. I had roughly 200 people that had reported to me at some
point. Almost all college grads. Of those 200 there were roughly 5%
that were standout problems of major proportions. Of those 5% several
were diagnosed as mentally ill at some point either when they were
reporting to me or after they were no longer reporting to me and were
at some other company. All of the rest of the problems looked to me
in retrospect that they had the same types of symptoms and it was
likely that mental health issues were at the base of their performance
problems.

Some of those problem people had in the past been outstanding
performers both on the job and in school. Yet by the time I got them
they were disfunctional. A couple were members of Mensa so native
intellegence is no measure of success.

It is plain that adumbo is delusional. Talking sense to him is not
going to change his behavior. The voices in his head tell him he is
just fine and it the rest of the world that is nuts. If he follows
the usual path he will only get worse. These people quite often do
not have jobs or if they do have jobs they are janitors or some such.
Today some of them buy a puter and find some niche where they can
spout their nonsense. Usenet is full of examples. Most every usenet
group seems to have one or two such residents.

These peoples egos feed on being able to suck smart people into
arguments just like adumbo does. And they will ignore legitimate
questions about holes in their whacko ideas and just keep arguing as
it further feeds their ego. The only way to get rid of them never
works on usenet. The way to get rid of them is to have no one respond
to anything they post ever. If this happens they no longer have the
ego feedback after a while and go away. It can take months and they
are never ignored this long on an unmoderated group.

Adumbo was probably very, very bright at an earlier time. His
teachers all told him he had a bright future and it did not happen.
The chance of him ever solving his problems are next to nothing. Go
read the book about the mathematician Nash for a great example of
mental illness destroying a brilliant mind. In the Nash case it is
probable that the early stages of his mental illness was also the
factor that allowed him to make his brilliant discoveries. Then as it
progressed he became non functional. His behavior in lots of respects
is much like adumbos behavior. Spend a bit of time prowling usenet
and you will find tons of them out there. Great places to start the
prowl would be sci.med.cardiology or sci.physics or alt.running.

Great post...!!! When working for a major chemical company I had
employees who fit the pattern you described. Our company doctor told
me that our "professionals" would be an excellent study... a wealth of
whacked-out people who started with great promise. (I worked at a
large technical center... lots of PhD.)

Your comment that some end up as janitors hit a note with me. Our
foster son... we took him into our family at age 14... was about as
unpromising as they come. He'd go in the front door of a school and
leave by the back door and catch a bus to ride downtown to waste the
day. He eventually ended up in the army (a volunteer) where some Sgt.
saw his possibilities (as we did) and forced him to get a decent
education. He eventually completed most of the work required for a
B.S. degree, but left the army and returned to civilian life. He
studies constantly, and can converse about nearly all subjects.

So what's the janitor stuff?

Well, after thrashing around for awhile he found his calling. He
became a first-line supervisor for a company that cleans office
buildings. Talk about troublesome employees!! Poor attendance...
drugs and alcohol...stealing...generally goofing off... etc. etc. Our
son was able to cope with this and get good work out of a bunch of
very confused people. He was promoted to higher levels and eventually
had responsibility for more than 800 people... and for bidding on
contracts.

He recently told us about some of the "personalities" he's dealt with.
Some have PhDs (and some Mensas in there, too). Being of a tender
heart he's tried hard to counsel some of those highly educated souls.
It doesn't work. If he can make it stick to them, nobody can. With his
attitudes at ages 14 - 17... his terrible start in life (alcoholic
mother)... getting into fights in the army... and total lack of
interest in working... he's now by any measure a success. I'm
convinced he can get results out of just about any collection of
misfits. But even he is stumped by the psychos.

I had one PhD under my supervision who thin-skinned and would argue
with me or anyone else about anything and everything. He came close to
getting into a fist fight with another PhD. I called both of them
(and the supervisor of the other one) to my office and conducted a
formal "divorce" proceeding. "Thou shalt not be in the company of
each other at any time and for any reason." My thin-skinned one soon
quit and I was pleased.

I suspect that a lot of this sort of behavior (among those who are
highly educated) is rooted in their parents and teachers telling them
how great they are. Do that enough times and there is no hope.

OMU

.

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