Re: engineering graduate school question

On Jul 28, 9:27 pm, R.Lyons@_BOGUS_ieee.org (Rick Lyons) wrote:
>
> When you're walkin' down the street at 11:00 PM
> in an American city and a group of young men
> are walking toward you, you better hope to Hell
> those young men are white men.

now Rick. i gotta cite an exception that is within my own personal
experience.

when i was a Northwestern Student and living in Evanston Illinois, i
had an occasion of being at a meeting, in the winter, with some other
folks in an inner city church (the Pilsen neighborhood in Chicago) and
after the meeting was over i was the last to get to my car (all the
other folks got in their car and drove off). as i was walking to my
car, seemingly outa nowhere was a bunch of black kids walking up and
one of them pointed to me and said something like "there's an adult,
let's get him." and i thought holy fuck, i'm gonna get my ass kicked.
but these kids just wanted to throw snowballs. they were horsing
around.

now i had to examine myself a little afterward to see if my reaction
and assumption that i was gonna get my ass kicked was correlated to
race and if it was reasonable.

r b-j

"robert bristow-johnson" <rbj@audioimagination.com> wrote in message
news:1185678146.808355.241480@w3g2000hsg.googlegro ups.com...
> On Jul 28, 9:27 pm, R.Lyons@_BOGUS_ieee.org (Rick Lyons) wrote:
>>
>> When you're walkin' down the street at 11:00 PM
>> in an American city and a group of young men
>> are walking toward you, you better hope to Hell
>> those young men are white men.
>
> now Rick. i gotta cite an exception that is within my own personal
> experience.
>
> when i was a Northwestern Student and living in Evanston Illinois, i
> had an occasion of being at a meeting, in the winter, with some other
> folks in an inner city church (the Pilsen neighborhood in Chicago) and
> after the meeting was over i was the last to get to my car (all the
> other folks got in their car and drove off). as i was walking to my
> car, seemingly outa nowhere was a bunch of black kids walking up and
> one of them pointed to me and said something like "there's an adult,
> let's get him." and i thought holy fuck, i'm gonna get my ass kicked.
> but these kids just wanted to throw snowballs. they were horsing
> around.
>
> now i had to examine myself a little afterward to see if my reaction
> and assumption that i was gonna get my ass kicked was correlated to
> race and if it was reasonable.
>
> r b-j
>

How smart would a lottery winner be if they continued to play the lottery?

((never mind the argument about how smart they are to play in the first
place))

In article <TridnT-PPKGcfzDbnZ2dnUVZ_r2nnZ2d@centurytel.net>,
no@thank.you says...
>
> "robert bristow-johnson" <rbj@audioimagination.com> wrote in message
> news:1185678146.808355.241480@w3g2000hsg.googlegro ups.com...
> > On Jul 28, 9:27 pm, R.Lyons@_BOGUS_ieee.org (Rick Lyons) wrote:
> >>
> >> When you're walkin' down the street at 11:00 PM
> >> in an American city and a group of young men
> >> are walking toward you, you better hope to Hell
> >> those young men are white men.
> >
> > now Rick. i gotta cite an exception that is within my own personal
> > experience.
> >
> > when i was a Northwestern Student and living in Evanston Illinois, i
> > had an occasion of being at a meeting, in the winter, with some other
> > folks in an inner city church (the Pilsen neighborhood in Chicago) and
> > after the meeting was over i was the last to get to my car (all the
> > other folks got in their car and drove off). as i was walking to my
> > car, seemingly outa nowhere was a bunch of black kids walking up and
> > one of them pointed to me and said something like "there's an adult,
> > let's get him." and i thought holy fuck, i'm gonna get my ass kicked.
> > but these kids just wanted to throw snowballs. they were horsing
> > around.
> >
> > now i had to examine myself a little afterward to see if my reaction
> > and assumption that i was gonna get my ass kicked was correlated to
> > race and if it was reasonable.
> >
> > r b-j
> >
>
> How smart would a lottery winner be if they continued to play the lottery?

Dunno, the news just had a report about the guy who won the largest
single pay-out ($300M). Five years later he's broke (though he
claims someone made off with his last $50K). How smart is that?

> ((never mind the argument about how smart they are to play in the first
> place))

True. The odds are horrible, the expectation lousy but if you do get
hit by lightning it will change you life. Worse are the scratch-
tickets and pull-tabs. 50% expectation with a win of maybe $100?
Well, at least the pull-tab proceeds go to charity (by design,
anyway).


--
Keith

BobF wrote:

...

> How smart would a lottery winner be if they continued to play the lottery?
>
> ((never mind the argument about how smart they are to play in the first
> place))

As dumb or as smart as s/he was to play before winning.

I'm reminded of the milquetoast who, for safety, always carried a bomb
when he traveled by air. He figured that if the odds were 1,000,000:1
against a bomb being aboard, it was 1,000,000,000,000:1 against two
bombs. As he had no intention of detonating his own, its presence made
him 1,000,000 times safer.

Jerry
--
Engineering is the art of making what you want from things you can get.
¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯ ¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯¯

"Jerry Avins" <jya@ieee.org> wrote in message
news:XuGdnecGr_39gDPbnZ2dnUVZ_rqlnZ2d@rcn.net...
> BobF wrote:
>
> ...
>
>> How smart would a lottery winner be if they continued to play the
>> lottery?
>>
>> ((never mind the argument about how smart they are to play in the first
>> place))
>
> As dumb or as smart as s/he was to play before winning.
>
> I'm reminded of the milquetoast who, for safety, always carried a bomb
> when he traveled by air. He figured that if the odds were 1,000,000:1
> against a bomb being aboard, it was 1,000,000,000,000:1 against two bombs.
> As he had no intention of detonating his own, its presence made him
> 1,000,000 times safer.
>

I'm sure you know this, but the point about odds on a completely different
subject.

On Sun, 29 Jul 2007 01:27:54 +0000, Rick Lyons wrote:

> When you see the official statistics you will learn that that roughly
> 90% of interracial crime in America is blacks against whites.

But, what crimes? Robbing somebody of $30.00 is a lot different from
murder by torture.

Thanks,
Rich

On Mon, 30 Jul 2007 19:17:16 GMT, Richard The Dreaded Libertarian
<null@example.net> wrote:

>On Sun, 29 Jul 2007 01:27:54 +0000, Rick Lyons wrote:
>
>> When you see the official statistics you will learn that that roughly
>> 90% of interracial crime in America is blacks against whites.
>
>But, what crimes? Robbing somebody of $30.00 is a lot different from
>murder by torture.
>
>Thanks,
>Rich

Hi Rich,
Humm, ... I agree. But I'm not sure
what point you're trying to make.

[-Rick-]