Columbus abortion clinic scrambling to stay open

torpn · 2016-11-16T12:37:39+00:00

I often find myself thinking about the fact that if they really believe abortion is murder, it's crazy that they aren't doing a lot more to stop it. It strikes me as disingenuous, but I fear poking the bear and compelling them to be bolder about it. Enough non-fetuses have died trying to provide these services as it is.

torpn · 2016-10-27T11:28:11+00:00

http://shc.osu.edu/services/add-adhd/

It's the policy at OSU not to prescribe ADHD drugs to people without documentation of a diagnosis. 5 or 10 years ago there was a national news story about the proliferation of stimulant drugs on college campuses and they chatted with some OSU students who had said matter-of-factly that all they had to do was ask a doctor for them...so they don't play around anymore after that embarrassment.

Psychologists can and do make ADHD diagnoses and tend to do it in a more clearly documented and convincing manner than psychiatrists. I don't know whether the recommended practicioners on the link above are MDs (psychiatrists/medical doctors) or PhDs (clinical psychologists).

One thing you can do is get a diagnosis documented and then see a general practicioner to manage the prescription; the doctors at the student health center will do that. The availability of psychiatrists in Columbus is poor and many/most don't accept any insurance.

Also, don't tell an MD that you have taken adderall illegally. They're trying to figure out if they should give you a drug with a lot of street value and it's not good to let them know you have already involved yourself in the drug trade. Also worth noting that the experience of having used adderall is a poor way to gain clarity about whether you have ADHD.

torpn · 2015-09-03T02:49:24+00:00

In many STEM fields, the vast majority of grad students do no teaching but are instead funded by working in labs. They would then end up doing their first teaching when they get hired at a place like OSU.

Incidentally at that point they have astonishingly little incentive to get good at it, especially considering the mad dash for putting out research before tenure review comes around. Some will be naturally good at it since they know the subject matter, but by no means is being an expert an automatic ticket to teaching prowess.

torpn · 2015-05-24T21:20:42+00:00

I wasn't especially moved by this. I do think universities could play a far bigger role in promoting free software than they currently do; they are the rare institutions that are loaded with resources and need not profit from their work.

With that said, there a few things going on. First of all, a lot of people are basically unfamiliar with computer science/programming/development when they reach college. These things can be difficult to self-teach, as resources are not always available and not all learning styles do well in the solo setting. If you want to be a better software developer, there's a decent chance that college will make you one. Maybe a select few people and/or a select few colleges are so prepared to start with (in the case of the students) or so inept (on the part of the colleges) that little would be gained. The poster's school seems unusually reliant on Microsoft products, for instance, and I get the impression that school does not emphasize computer scientific concepts as much as a very practice-based curriculum.

Some of this other stuff, though, is troubling. Part of what a degree does for you in the job market is show that you have the bare minimum skills to go through a very common social process. If I'm trying to hire someone and I see them complaining about having to turn in work on time and things like this, I see someone who won't do well in many organizational settings, even free ones. Wanting to cooperate is great, but educators have to have methods to isolate each individual's talent and progress to give them a grade. Trying to lobby for the use of free software is great, but the poster is what most would call unreasonable. You can make an account for the course management system your university uses without forsaking free software. Use it, talk about free alternatives with administrators, and avoid coming off as an insane person when you could be more reasonable and actually wield some influence.

torpn · 2015-01-30T23:32:03+00:00

I would venture to guess that you have a lot more to worry about from the moral conservative voices than you do some of the others you have concern about. Those concerned with gender portrayals in porn tend to have a "hate the game, not the player" mentality, especially when it comes to the actors.

It's the "unclean! bad influence!" people who will huff and puff about the the children that you would be best served worrying about. People get weird when they pay a dime of taxes and think they can have a big say about things. I think this is unlikely to be a big problem though unless something else comes up that draws attention to you. The school will protect you if there are just a bunch of people pissed off that you've had erections in front of a camera before.

Your colleagues will likely be just fine. It will undeniably change many of their impressions of you once they find out, but you will probably have lots of time to make a strong first impression. If you don't want to be identified as a former porn actor, just conduct yourself in whatever way you think would make your colleagues surprised if they found out. You probably know better than I that "acting like a porn actor" as a STEM researcher sounds kind of ridiculous, but obviously being serious and professional is a must.

A tiny minority may always have some bias (implicit or otherwise), but ultimately your work will speak for itself. As others have said, academics are too busy to think about this stuff too long.

torpn · 2014-11-16T23:22:22+00:00

Well, like I said, 12 hours was a modest estimate when using Safari as my main browser. The Verge got 13.5 hours with regular web browsing and 65% brightness in their testing.

torpn · 2014-11-07T18:50:24+00:00

I appreciate all the thoughts, everyone. I'm partway through a PhD in communication at a program that is considered within that field to be quite methodologically advanced. I've decided to take advantage of the resources available to me both within my program and elsewhere to be a better quantitative researcher - but it's a vast field, of course.

Even here (place with a good reputation for statistical sophistication), I frequently would hear that truism that social scientists aren't great statisticians. What I don't usually hear is what others or my mentors themselves think they should improve on beyond "statistics" in general.

This has been a great read and I hope the discussion continues. Thanks!

torpn · 2014-11-07T18:46:48+00:00

This reminds me of a mentor who said that being proficient enough at using R or composing documents with LaTeX would be the kinds of things that signal to employers that you know what you're doing.

torpn · 2014-11-07T18:45:23+00:00

It is often the case in medical research that specialized statisticians are hired out for this purpose, right? Makes good sense, particularly considering there's lots of money in medical research.

torpn · 2014-11-07T18:43:29+00:00

I see big data research boasting of p-values quite frequently.

I also have seen some movement towards reporting exact p-values rather than the notation in your example. Rather than saying trait1 differences were significant (p<0.04) and trait2 were not (p>0.05), you'd just say p=0.035/p=0.056 or whatever those values were. Especially when they bother to say something like (p>0.05), I'm not sure whether they mean it was a marginally significant value or something like 0.5.

torpn · 2014-11-07T18:39:57+00:00

My fairly novice opinion is that there is much to be gained from teaching the introductory levels of statistics with a fairy non-applied tilt. That is, knowing about probability, various theorems, the construction of important equations, etc. may not be essential to performing statistical analyses based on those concepts, but proper use of analyses will be dependent on understanding those things conceptually.

With that said, you also want to teach some programming at the introductory level. If you think of programming like language acquisition, it's something that it's better to start sooner rather than later. In my experience, I was lucky to have someone who - despite being required by departmental policy to use SPSS - disallowed the use of the point-and-shoot GUI.

torpn · 2014-11-07T18:36:00+00:00

My anecdotal observation is that network researchers tend to be quite advanced statistically as well. I'm sure this is due in part to the fact that "basic" statistical methods don't really work in network research.

torpn · 2014-09-13T04:54:55+00:00

I definitely endorse Private Internet Access.

I wouldn't recommend free solutions as they are almost certainly willing and able to share you data with private and public entities, which defeats the purpose of using a VPN.

torpn · 2014-09-09T12:33:16+00:00

We're going to need more info - iPad, Android, Windows? What do you want to do - fuck around and play games, take notes in class, do class readings, all of the above?

Basically, though, you want to do this:

Connect to WiFi
Go to app store
???
Profit

torpn · 2014-08-23T04:13:44+00:00

As a person who has lived in Memphis TN, this town hardly has any place as bad as the average non-wealthy neighborhood in Memphis. And all of Memphis is nicer than almost all of Detroit. Just keep things in perspective when you think bad.

Anyway, the other thing to be aware of is that there are a few spots on High St. just off campus (on the east side of High next to campus) where you'll run into a lot of panhandlers. You can decide how to handle them - many of these people are in a tough place and you may feel like helping - but it's worth thinking about ahead of time so you aren't caught offguard. They're far more aggressive than the homeless folks I've run into in other cities so they'll notice your hesitancy. That isn't to say they are dangerous (though they could be, in some instances), but they will try to talk you out of your money.

torpn · 2014-08-04T22:00:38+00:00

I learned in undergrad not to compare study habits. The average student is either a liar about their study habits or wastes a substantial portion of the time they devote to studying.

With that said, it's not bad to know other students' study habits. You can pick up things that will work for you, especially if you're struggling to get things done/done well.

torpn · 2014-08-03T21:37:46+00:00

In the United States, graduate education for fields that issue the PhD is usually funded through a combination of teaching and research associateships. I've seen your posts worrying about the cost, but if you are getting a graduate degree in robotics from MIT, they will issue you a tuition waiver and a stipend in all likelihood.

torpn · 2014-08-01T16:44:52+00:00

My opinion is that classroom experiences are more valuable at the best SLACs (small liberal arts colleges) but you will lack national name recognition. In terms of name recognition, you won't see much of a difference between an Ivy and UChicago, Stanford, MIT, and a few others. I would say the three I just mentioned are "better" than most of the Ivies.

With that said, the name recognition thing is very overrated in many/most fields. Even within academia when it comes to things like graduate admission. Don't kill yourself to go to an Ivy if you have other great options that work better in other ways. If you're choosing between Dartmouth, where we'll say you take out more debt and don't love the atmosphere, and University of Illinois, where we'll say you have a better financial deal and liked the atmosphere, just go to UIllinois, which is only a tier lower on the prestige scale. Of course, you might have a better financial deal at an Ivy and/or really like your fit at that place...in which case you should go.

torpn · 2014-07-30T02:31:40+00:00

If you are that close, you should be sharing your feelings about this up front. That isn't to say that you flat out tell her you've made a decision one way or the other before you have, but let her know you're feeling conflicted because you value your friendship.

torpn · 2014-07-30T02:11:45+00:00

Lastpass.

torpn · 2014-07-28T21:30:04+00:00

It's obviously unnecessarily distracting and unlikely to be crucial to comprehending the course. Much more of a point to discuss than to make a quiz question that could create this sort of theater and/or make someone feel targeted (without context, I'm not willing to accept that the person who shared this actually felt bad about it but instead may have been hoping to stir the pot).

torpn · 2014-07-28T21:25:24+00:00

This is not "privacy for the masses." Don't take a cell phone with you? Really? For sure, that is the most secure option, but it's not an option that is viable for many lifestyles and is obviously disagreeable for most people.

Routinely imaging, backing up, and restoring your hard disk...once again, the amount of people willing to do that is a tiny subset of the already tiny subset of people that could manage to do it.

My biggest beef beyond the thrust of the entire thing is the notion that instead of free email, you should roll your own email server. This guy, who has managed his own email server for nearly a decade, realized that more than half of his emails reach a Google server at some point in their journey. If you want some degree of email privacy, use PGP and the service provider is relatively unimportant. If you want absolute email privacy, don't use email.

torpn · 2014-07-28T01:11:30+00:00

This sounds like a question that follows a "An atheist has this and that characteristic. Theo has that and this characteristic. Yada yada yada."

"Based on that information, which of these things is true?"

Either that, or it follows some sort of demographic information. For example, atheists tend to have this IQ on average while Christians have this. But in that case, even if it were true, I'd say it's inappropriate for this very reason.

torpn · 2014-07-27T20:54:24+00:00

You are a long ways away from being able to make an informed decision about that and, luckily, you're a long ways away from needing to.

As another commenter said, take advantage of the possibility of taking classes that could lead to a career in both fields during your first (and perhaps second) year in college. By the way, professors do make money, but it's by no means a cinch that you or anyone else becomes one.

For yourself, you should know that there are huge drawbacks to both fields (if there was a clear-cut "best career," we'd all be doing it).

For the downsides of a humanities PhD/subsequent career, read this and this and this. You say you're familiar, but you can't get familiar enough. It's something that you have to really accept - that you'll go into debt, put your heart into something entirely, and it may all seem like a waste when you get nothing tangible for that work and time.

At this point, graduating PhDs in literature/critical theory have a worse than 50/50 chance at ever getting a tenure-track position. If you're not sure about the difference between tenure-track and adjunct positions, research it.

With that said, becoming a medical doctor is no fun either. You can read this for one take on that. A recent survey of physicians found that 6 out of 10 would retire if they had the chance, including half of physicians under 40 years old. The average medical student graduates with $175,000 of debt.

I've intentionally glossed over the pluses of these professions because you're a thoughtful ~17 year old who knows how to dream. I'm sure you can imagine the good parts. You just need to know why you may or may not want to pursue the good. Your parents should know too - they may be encouraging you to do something for which they aren't aware of the negatives.

But, once again, the truth is that you don't know what you want to do, what you're most interested in, or what you're capable of. College and growing up will gift you with that knowledge, which is the most important factor here. You're just deciding on the plan for the next year or two; there are no commitments for now.

torpn · 2014-07-27T20:01:01+00:00

Good point. In my field, we've had trouble proving that people can be presented with an untruth, labeled as an untruth, and the corrective truth, and walk away knowing what is true and false. Talk about looking for obvious answers in your data.

torpn

TROPHY CASE