I can Fix that.
Submitted by PriceRip on Sun, 04/23/2017 - 2:25pm
We are prone to Apophenia the tendency to perceive meaningful patterns within random data. Or, more generally, the tendency to perceive problems and/or solutions based upon prior experience (often the source of Apophenia).
So, when the Raptor Recovery people got a call from a concerned citizen about an injured bird it took a bit of time to sort out the problem. It seems the poor bird had an unfortunate encounter with a large window. The homeowner was concerned that there was "Something wrong with its beak." and nothing seemed to work as he tried to straighten it out.
Sometimes you need to step back and reevaluate the situation. Sometimes there may not be a solution to the task as presently defined.
Comments
Seems to me the overlap could be labeled
…(Your focus). Or to get existential about it, (Knowing the difference).
I resist labeling it (What's possible) because I don't entirely believe in the impossible.
BTW, what does that homeowner do for a living?
[Edited for afterthought.]
Carry a burning candle and share the light.
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I am not sure that was related in the telling ...
This story was told over dinner one evening a few seasons ago. I just love the imagery of someone trying to "help" a Crossbill by straightening its bill. For context: The story was told at Rowe Sanctuary during Crane Season. The Crane Cam is still on-line, but the cranes have flown north, but the Nebraska Wind is at full force.
The cardinality of {Things That Matter} ∩ {Things
YouI Control} seems to be decreasing, and I find that very frustrating.Well, it's the essential diagram of a bureaucracy, too.
The bureaucrat is issued a few tools and a checklist. You bring your application. You also bring your explanation and extenuating conditions. But those don't fall into the intersection and are not heard. They do not matter and thus, do not exist.
I imagine that might trigger this:
…for it is rife and civilian life is increasingly a system-down operation. If you don't fit the system, your issues, ideas, and concerns do not get processed. It's an epidemic in the political interface, where entire demographics do not matter. And it is on the rise. Best to get your papers and affairs in order while you still can, especially if you have any extraordinary plans.
Carry a burning candle and share the light.
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Your summary is spot on.
A short time ago I saw yet another young man standing near his minivan containing his small family. His sign read, "Family in need ...". Damn it this is not the 1950s! This is not supposed to be happening!
This is not the future I wanted. But, I suppose, it's the reality I must endure. We are a society of disposable entities (must not use the word "humans", wouldn't want of be too empathetic, might not be good for the digestion. right?) on a disposable world.
A bird emergency is an emergency. Lucky me, Vet School
and Lab of Ornithology in town. I would bail to ask for help on that one, because I can.
Mine: There is something larger that a mouse in the interior floor of my house. I am reluctant to cut a hole in drywall, it seems to travel between lower and upper level ceiling/floor. Paralysis. In a week I can look for probable entry points, hoping it's a bat. Why I do not know. Quiet during most days. No urine stains.
I hate being disabled now.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
Squirrels would be likely suspects.
They have a rap sheet a mile long for that sort of behavior.
native
have you heard the joke about the motorcyclist who was
riding home one night, when the weather turned cold and wet? the zipper on his jacket was broken, so he stopped and turned the jacket around, the better to keep himself dry and warm.
unfortunately, he hit a wet curve and slid off the road. shortly afterwards, a passing motorist stopped to lend assistance, calling 911 and performing some elementary first aid. when the ambulance arrived, the EMTs asked the motorist for a quick rundown. the motorist says, "I dunno, he didn't seem to be doing too badly, until I turned his head back around the right way."
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
That's down right funny!
I love those quasi-morbid jokes.
e.g. A tractor rolled over a farmer last night completely crushing his left side. He's all right now.
My brother slipped using a draw knife. He's my half brother now
There is no such thing as TMI. It can always be held in reserve for extortion.
Thank you for this, PriceRip.
Apophenia is a new term for me, but it well describes a phenomenon that has long been an important element of my work as a painter. I had no idea that it had been a subject of studies in neuropsychology and psychopathology.
It's a mysterious process indeed, the method by which we humans perceive meaningful patterns in any given set of data. It is a very significant process IMO, one well worth investigating. I shall straightaway check out the writings of this Claus Konrad fellow.
Ain't it wonderful, how random internet communications among strangers can draw together similar lines of thought? It's almost like the old quasi-legal coffee houses of Ben Franklin's day... though sadly lacking in their earthiness.
native
When I was at ASU
At a physics grad student party one of my colleagues introduced us to her new boyfriend. He was a working on a perceptual psychology dissertation. I engaged him in a conversation about various perceptual brain teasers and optical illusions. I really didn't intend to NIGYSOB him.
Now I’ve Got You, You Son of a Bitch (NIGYSOB) is reserved for the real jerks of your in-crowd, and not for an outsider. I suppose I was naïve, thinking a perceptual psychologist PhD candidate should understand perceptual psychology. Sometimes I can be a bit insufferable, but it was all for the best, she was way too good for him.
Well, I've never paid much attention
to the upper realms of academia, primarily because they seem to speak in a language foreign to my own, and whenever I have managed to decipher it, it hasn't been worth the bother. I continue to suppose however, that there is real gold to be found somewhere within all the voluminous, and rather opaque academic output.
native
You have interacted with ...
... the wrong scientists, and I know them all too well.
One of my best "gets" was a musician that others thought "didn't get it", turned out to be one of the most creative students I have known. There is a false divide that is reinforced by the shallow people on too many campuses. The best scientists and artists bridge that "gap" all the time. And anyone can do that if given half a chance.
The closer those two circles move together,
and the larger their area of their intersection becomes, the more likely schizophrenia is to occur. The two circles can easily become confused with one another, losing their distinctness in the mind of a troubled individual.
If on the other hand, the circles move too far apart, a different form of mental illness results, one to which many Americans have become particularly susceptible. A surrender of all control to some external authority, along with an abdication of personal responsibility for "Things That Matter", is also a form of mental disease -- though it is not often recognized as such.
Individual mental illness is almost always either rooted in, or nourished by social dysfunction. Individual psychopathology and social psychopathology are inseparable companions. A society that spends its time and treasure raging against imaginary enemies abroad, cannot hope to quell the raging passions of its own most abused members.
native
So, now I understand ...
... the origin of those delusions of adequacy.
Please, what delusions are you referring to,
and how are you defining adequacy?
native
Delusions of Adequacy
A schizophrenic can be identified as having faulty perceptions leading to delusion, and a sense of mental fragmentation. An example of a person with an extreme variant of this is John Forbes Nash Jr. He ultimately learned to live a normal life by "reality checking" to avoid "delusions of grandeur". In spite of the DSM all mental "disorders" lie on a spectrum.
I find it amusing that I often question if I have interpreted social situations correctly. Often, people suggest I am more intelligent than I am, and that makes me very uncomfortable. The reality is that I have been very careful to "play to my strengths", take crazy risks, and not worry about failure. That last is the important bit. This tends to put me into situations where it seems as though I can do anything. (beware of the degrees of grandeur)
I was a poor student, I was told I would not be able to succeed at university, but I squeaked through. I didn't do any of the right things to get into graduate school, but had no problem getting two offers and canceled the other three applications. I expended zero energy to get a summer position at Los Alamos. During a time when many of my cohort were not getting jobs as they left graduate school, I just walked into this college/university and got the job, and canceled the other four applications after having turned down an offer from a college/university on the East Coast. After being here for one year a very good friend offered me an industrial research position at four times the salary plus benefits (I declined the offer). How does that happen?
My daughter did a very similar thing: She was unaware that it was supposed to be difficult to get into a quality law school so, like me, she applied only to schools she wanted to go to (in her case there was only one) and got in.
So ... I keep reminding myself that starting from the time of that photo, my life has been anomalous. But, as I keep reminding myself, not departing in any statistically significant way from any reasonably constructed set of parameters. Put another way, my life once I got past the first 20 years has been remarkably "written" as in, if I were to publish my life's story it would read like fiction. So, the "delusions of adequacy" is my way of staying grounded and avoiding the "delusions of grandeur" that would signal a break with reality.
I have arrived at a place where the universe could say HA!, time to balance the books and BAM it all goes to hell in a hand basket. But for that to be credible Harlan Ellison would have to be the author, no one else could write that script properly. And before anyone "goes there" I don't feel "survivors" guilt, that's not it, it's just that it seems so very fundamentally unreal. These things are not supposed to happen in real life.
Oops, forgot the punch line: On a global scale the circles overlap only a little. On a personal, local scale they overlap by let us say 99 percent.
A fascinating trajectory,
and thanks for the explanation.
I sometimes speculate about the sort of controlled schizophrenia that occurs in the work of artists like Dali, Van Gogh, or Munch. They seem to intentionally tread the boundaries of sanity.
native