my5thaccount

"Who will train all the NFL stars?" That's really what it boils down to. Training the million dollar gladiators for our modern society. Living vicariously through innocent children. Parental adrenaline rushes. It's sick. We should just ban it. It's worse than corporal punishment and that'll get a teacher fired but we let kids pummel each other on the field and it's fine. It's ridiculous. Those kids aren't choosing that for themselves. We won't let them drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes, but we'll let them do that to themselves to get a smile out of mommy and daddy. It's awful!

I've gone from super excited about life and the future when I sat down at my computer to pessimistic and frustrated with society.

Yeah, I think you're right. Everyone expects a reversion to the mean -- even the batters themselves. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

But maybe it's more than that. The will power to overcome our intrinsic limits eventually runs out. We can only focus on the ball so long before our thoughts wander. And at some point below the average of our capabilities, we get tired of taking a break and start to perform again as well as we know we can.

I was really dismayed when Colin Powell argued for invading Iraq. Yes, there are military people who get it. But just look what's happening.

I guess they have to think, what is the alternative? We can't change our role in the Middle East. We can't just stop supporting Israel for example.

I suppose yes, they tried Camp David. I guess I just want everyone to cease fire.

Maybe the overpowered people resorting to terrorism, I do hate that word, have to think there is a positive outcome from the cease fire. If they cease firing and life doesn't improve, why did they cease firing? At least firing alleviates the frustration of it all. They think they are hurting those who are hurting themselves.

But life for the Palestinians never improves no matter. It just keeps getting worse and worse and worse for them. The people with the power have to stop exerting it over others and selfishly taking more.

I had a buddy in Afghanistan and he said their way of life is 500 years old. I mean, I think okay, if they don't want to progress, that doesn't mean we should use the tools of our progress to take from them so we can progress more.

I think at some point we have to stop betraying people.

No, but thanks for bringing him to my attention! It's amazing how someone like that so long ago could have such an impact on so many fields, while today, it takes teams of people to win the Nobel prize in a single field.

It's a testament to how much we know today relative to yesterday.

Thinking about this and the wisdom of crowds makes my brain feel fuzzy.

Articles like this remind me how rational and practical the military is. I know so many brilliant military minds, yet war itself seems outdated and plagued by so many emotionally irrational decisions. I can't reconcile those two thoughts.

How can people inside the military be so incredibly smart, yet still think it makes sense to ... you know, kill people's friends and families and not expect them to become terrorists.

What am I missing? It can't just be greed. Military industrial complex. The military minds aren't smarter than that? I struggle with it.

There are plenty of things she could have done before calling me, but she could call me and she had a great experience doing so and now loves the product even more and has more confidence using it, because she knows if she faces something really hard, there actually is a person who will help her just a phone call away. If anyone asks her about it, she can say, "Omg, I just called them and they answered and I was in. I've never had that before!"

There's a real value in that and all it cost me was a phone call. No money well spent, imo. I was going to wake up that day anyway.

That's how Hunch worked and it was pretty good.

The only two apps I had in the list were Youtube and Google Maps, both are installed at the factory and it guessed: You are a married guy older than 32 who makes more than $52,000/year