dusqi

dusqi @ 2007-05-09T12:19:00

2007-05-09T11:24:23Z

From the BBC:
"Celebrity heiress Paris Hilton is backing an online petition seeking a pardon of her 45-day prison sentence because she enlivens "mundane" lives.

In a message on a MySpace website, Ms Hilton apparently endorsed the online appeal, saying: 'My friend Joshua started his petition, please help and sihn it (sic). I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!'"

You know what enlivens my mundane life?

The prospect of seeing Paris Hilton go to jail.

∞

What do you think of bankers? Trustworthy? Think again.

2007-04-26T14:25:09Z

It's funny how I stereotype bankers as being intelligent, but nowadays they're really not. All the people in the branches are just salespeople. They don't make any decisions, they aren't interested in your what's best for your situation, they just try to sell you whatever gives them the better commission. You never see the real bankers.

Three banking experiences stand out:
1) Natwest taking 5 months to set up my credit card at the beginning of my student life - including me having to wait for hours in a queue of international students all trying to sort out their own credit cards - twice, because the first time they screwed it up.
2) Last year, going into Abbey National to set up a savings account, and the sales lady trying to sell me all sorts of other rubbish (which I'd already researched before coming in). The only reason I was getting the savings account was because it had a special rate of interest, usually their products are far below par.
3) A few months ago, going into HSBC to ask about their student account, and waiting at the information point only for the bank manager to saunter up to me and bark "what do you want?" - What do I fucking want? Some fucking respect as a customer, thank-you very much.

My advice? "Bankers" aren't intelligent. They're not polite. They don't care about customers, only their own commission - and most importantly - they can't be trusted.

None of this is new, there is already an outcry about banks (illegally) charging customers £30 every time they go overdrawn. There are programs on television with undercover reporters who infiltrate banks and expose how their staff cheat and lie to customers. They take 3 days to transfer money electronically when it could easily be done within an hour. Some banks (HSBC) are trying to charge £10 per month just to have an account - despite making £11.7Bn profit in 2006 - that's the equivalent of £195 from every person in the UK.

Now, don't get me wrong, I have nothing against corporations that make massive profits. Every time someone uses a bank, both sides agree to the deal, so banks must be providing some worth to consumers. But personally, I question what the banks are doing. Are they providing something so wonderful that warrants this profit? If someone made a new drug that made everyone live 10 years longer, I'd love for them to make a massive profit and dance off into the sunset with it. But banks provide a shoddy service at best. So the question is, why are they providing a shoddy service and still raking in a massive profit? If the market was working, then we should expect other banks to come in and provide a better service, then consumers would change to them, and the shoddy banks would be left with nothing. But banks have been around for a long time and it's just not happening. And this is what bothers me.

∞

dusqi @ 2006-11-29T14:10:00

2006-11-29T14:10:36Z

Quotes from the Nov 17th edition of New Scientist (which I read yesterday for 3 hours when I should have been working :X ). The 50th anniversary one, discussing science's answers to the 'Big Questions'.

"The point of writing is to take charge of the voice in someone's head. This is what I am doing. My words have taken posession of the language circuits of your brain. I have become, if only transiently, your inner voice" - Paul Brookes, University of Plymouth

"We are all just a stumble or burst blood vessel away from being someone else"

"Brains operate causally, that is, they go from one state to the next as a function of antecedent conditions. Moreover, though brains make decisions, there is no discrete brain structure or neural network which qualifies as 'the will' let alone a neural structure operating in a causal vacuum."

I especially love the first one. I read it and feel it at the same time. For a few fleeting seconds I feel as if I could never escape from the power of the writing, as if it controls me totally.

∞

dusqi @ 2006-10-16T19:16:00

2006-10-16T18:26:06Z

This week is the Protect the Human week for Amnesty International. So the Amnesty Society at uni is running a few events. The first of which is a Comedy Night this Tuesday, to which we've invited some semi-professional comedians.

John, who is the main organiser for the night, went away and came back with these posters, which make me chuckle :p

∞

dusqi @ 2006-09-06T22:51:00

2006-09-06T21:55:22Z

Theodore W. Gray

"What's the best style for addressing the youth of today? Should you try to use their language? Only if you're the same age as they are, otherwise it sounds stupid. The way to reach anyone of any age or generation is to speak directly, clearly, and in your own voice about things you know and care about."

"Oliver Sacks describes the process of growing out of his youthful enthusiasm for chemistry as a painful feeling of loss. I know exactly what he's talking about.

"And I also know that there are a lot of kids who never feel this sense of loss, because by the time they are teenagers, they have nothing left to lose. Whatever enthusiasm, creativity, and focus they started with has long since been driven out of them, destroyed by television, video games, horrible schools, horrible opportunities, and horrible role models. The bright flicker of our television screens is the stolen incandescence of a thousand young minds."

∞

I get far more excited by Game Theory than I should

2006-03-24T15:56:19Z

So, I did an experiment today at CeDEx. It was a 30 round game. A pair of players were each given 250 credits (each credit worth 0.1p) at the beginning of each round. There was a lottery which would be drawn at the end of each round with a prize of 200 credits for which both players could buy tickets. The problem was, for player A the tickets costed 0.5 credits, whereas for player B they costed 2 credits.

So, what should happen, assuming rational choice theory is correct? Player A can always buy more tickets than player B, so basically player A should dominate the lottery. Even though on a social level, it's better that the least money goes into the lottery as possible, since this is wasted money, sadly there will not be a stable equilibrium at this level, because there's always a temptation for both players (but especially player A) to buy a couple more tickets cheaply, and have a much greater chance of winning the 200 credit prize.

Thus, in the long run, player A should buy about 80 lottery tickets each round, at a cost of 40 credits. Player B should buy about 10 tickets, at a cost of 20 credits. This gives player B a 1 in 9 chance of winning 200 credits from 20 credits (a worthwhile gamble in the long run, even if it seems "unfair").

But, what happened to me when I did this today? I was lucky enough to be selected by the computer to be player A. So I started off being mean and buying 80 tickets each round. I assumed that after a bit of time, player B would realise that it was pointless to compete, and would just buy 10 tickets or so, allowing me to win the prize 8 times out of 9. Instead, player B went crazy.

Player B started matching the number of tickets that I bought every round. So, I was buying 80 tickets at a cost of 40 credits, and player B started buying 80 tickets at a cost of 160 credits. Examine player B's payoffs. Player B was spending 160 credits to get a 50% chance of winning 200.

Assuming that player B was going to keep matching my ticket buying, and currently I'm spending 40 credits each round in order to get a 50% chance of winning 200 credits, what should I do to maximise my payoff?

At first glance, it seems obvious. My tickets are 4 times cheaper than player B's. I can just buy 250 tickets, which player B can never match since the maximum possible that player B can buy each round is 125. Then I'd win it 2 out of 3 times and spend 125 credits each round. Sadly, this would put me worse off than before.

Instead, the opposite started happening. We both started buying less tickets, until we both bought 1 ticket per round, and thus both had a 50% chance of winning 200 with an expenditure of 0.5 or 2 credits each.

So, I was stuck in this crazy situation, where I should have been winning it 8 times out of 9 since my tickets were much cheaper, and instead I was buying just one ticket per round and letting us both have a 50% chance. So, player B's crazy irrational strategy worked out rather well in the long run :-) (It's worth mentioning that I doubt player B worked all of this out and did it on purpose. More likely it was just a "fairness" belief, which happened to create a strategy much like 'tit-for-tat'. It was also risky, if I had just kept buying 80 tickets each round, then player B would have done much worse in the long run).

Did you know?

2006-02-28T00:49:58Z

I went to a seminar last week given by Normal Freeman from the University of Bristol. I came across my notes for it today as I was tidying up, and decided to share this snippet since I think it's interesting.

When children learn to draw, at first they draw a load of unrecognisible scribbles. But eventually they start drawing figures that look like people. They draw people that all look like the one on the left, with ovals for bodies.

No child ever spontaneously starts drawing stick figures like the one on the right. Ever. They are entirely taught from exogenous sources: older children or parents. Yet something about them is so compelling that most children entirely abandon their oval bodied drawings, and draw stick figures for many years afterwards (I still draw them!). Why? Why do children not spontaneously draw stick figures in the first place? and what's so compelling about stick figures that they become the normal template for drawing people?

:D

Check out these cerebra ;)

2005-05-11T17:29:35Z

I participated in an auditory learning experiment today, in an fMRI scanner at Nottingham University. I spent 2 hours in the scanner as well as some resting time between scans, so it was fairly long, but I got paid £40 at the end. Anyway, the lady doing the scan printed out some little pictures of my brain at the end (she's going to send me a proper one later) so here's a resized and cropped one of me :D (it's being used as an avatar at the moment, I'll upload a decently sized picture once I get the proper one).

The magnet in the scanner was 3 teslas. Medical ones are usually 1.5 teslas. There's a 7 tesla scanner being constructed at the University which will be the largest scanner in Europe, close behind an American one also under construction.

Pompeii ~ Robert Harris

2005-04-18T17:55:33Z

"What was leadership, after all, but the blind choice of one route over another and the confident pretence that the decision was based on reason?"

"The natural impulse of men is to follow, he thought, and whoever has the strongest sense of purpose will always dominate the rest"

dusqi @ 2004-12-09T16:43:00

2004-12-09T17:00:23Z

Friedrick Nietzsche, a German philosopher, wrote a story in his book "Thus Spoke Zarathustra" about a person walking on a mountain trail. Along the trail, a troll suddenly jumps out and kills the person. The person, however, is immediately reborn to the same parents, is given the same name, and lives the same life as before. Then one day, again the person is walking on a mountain trail and a troll suddenly jumps out and slays the person, who is reborn to the same parents, is given the same name as before, and lives the same life. And once again, the person is walking along a mountain trail when a troll jumps out and slays the person. Once again the person is reborn and so on. The point, Nietzsche says, concerns what a person would think about this eternal return of our lives. If you would not want to live your life over and over again, then perhaps you should make some changes in it now, as you are living it. The person who says, "Yes, I wouldn't mind another go-around of my life, even if it were all the same," is someone who is satisfied with his or her life as a whole, then they can approach the ending of life with integrity

Larson, R. J. and Buss, D. M. 2002, Personality Psychology, McGraw-Hill, P.208

dusqi @ 2004-12-07T23:31:00

2004-12-07T23:35:26Z

Umberto Eco: The Name of the Rose.
You are a mystery novel dealing with theology, especially with catholic vs liberal issues. You search wisdom and knowledge endlessly, feeling that learning is essential in life.

Maybe I should check it out?

I am a Professional Guinea Pig

2004-12-01T17:08:38Z

Being as no one wants to employ me for any useful work... I've been participating in these experiments in the psychology department which pay you for your time :P I earnt £25 ($42) today :D I don't think I'm very good at them though. Today I was doing an experiment which involved me staring at a computer screen, on which was randomly displayed computer-generated faces for a few hundred milliseconds each. I had to press a button depending on whether the new face was the same as the preceding face, then a tone indicated whether I was correct or not. I didn't think I was doing very well, since I seemed to be getting it right about 50% of the time :P and then at the end of the experiment, the guy supervising seemed rather depressed, as if I was so bad at it that he didn't expect very favourable results :P However, I got paid nonetheless :P

Real Life Irony

2004-10-23T21:15:31Z

I was reading a book called "The Psychology of Attention" today. Then I almost fell asleep. o:)

Which not prefer do you prefer? :P

2004-10-01T15:57:04Z

It came to my attention during a lecture that there is no antonym for "prefer". The lecturer used the word "disprefer", sheepishly realised his mistake then emphasised "prefer not" next time he had to use it :P

So, which antonym of prefer do you prefer?

- disprefer?
- unprefer?
- inprefer?

or do you have some other preference? :P

legola5 wipes out Psychologists in 2 sentences.

2004-07-05T00:21:36Z

legola5 says:
you need to learn to use your brain
legola5 says:
not marvel at what it does

~~

Well, that showed me :P

Don't trust yoghurt pots...

2004-05-25T22:44:02Z

... when prising the top off a yoghurt pot, i ended up slashing my right-index finger open on the silver foil on the top... necessitating the use of a plaster.

typing with my right index finger in a plaster is annoying >.<

edit: I just noticed that it's spelt yoghurt. I should have known.

[Headmaster's speech] I had a recurring dream...

2004-05-21T02:42:51Z

...and in my dream, 4 of the top schools in the county where competing against each other to be named best school in the country.

So the judge steps up, and says that each school will have to show metaphorically why their education is better than others, by the use of a glass jar.

So the head girl from the first school steps up, and reaching into her pocket, she picks out a load of rocks. She drops them into the glass jar and says that each rock represents a field of academic excellence, and that in her school pupils participated in a lot of these.

So then the head boy from the next school steps up, and reaching into his pocket, he brings out a load of pebbles. He drops them into the jar between the rocks, and says that each pebble represents an extracurricular activity and pupils at his school achieved academic excellence in a wide range of subjects, as well as having lots of opportunities for extracurricular activities.

So then the head mistress from the next school steps up, and reaching into her pocket, she brings out some handfuls of grains of sand, and packs them into the glass jar so tightly that no daylight can be seen through it and it's filled to the brim. She then says that each grain of sand represents a close-personal relationship between pupils or teachers, and that pupils at her school had these in addition to the 2 things previously mentioned.

Then it was the turn for the headmaster's own school, so he looked around but none of the teachers or pupils seemed to know what to do. Until unexpectedly, [pupil (known for being a 'lad')] bounds forwards and reaching into his pocket he brings out some vodka and pours it into the jar. The vodka soaked into the sand so that the jar did not spill. So the judges asked the pupil what the metaphorical significance of the vodka was, to which the pupil replies "at our school, no matter how much there is to do, there's always room for alcohol".

Of course the headmaster's school won the competition and was proclaimed the best in the country.

loopholes.

2004-03-28T02:49:58Z

it has come to my attention that the university grant that people in the UK get is based upon their parent's income. Since my parents work hard, they have a good income, so i don't get a worthwhile grant.

However! If i'm married, then my partner's income is taken into account instead of my parent's income. Therefore i'm currently looking for a girl to marry who is living in the UK, aged 18, who is also going to university and thus has no income, and who wants to screw the system over and save some money.

We shall marry asap, both go to separate universities and not have sex... thus allowing us to annul to marriage after we both leave university in 3 years.

Any takers? ;-)

Highlight of the (yester)Day

2004-03-09T13:18:34Z

You know you've been an economics teacher too long when...

1) You forget that the perimeters between areas of land actually mark countries, usually based upon politics - and instead mistake them for economic units.

~~Yesterday I walked past my economics teacher in the corridor, and overheard him ask an Asian boy "what economy do you come from?"

2) You name your children after famous economists

~~My economics teacher admitted in yesterday's lesson that his sons were given the middle names 'Meynard' and 'Milton' after the economists John Meynard Keynes and Milton Friedman.

Oh dear.

Highlight of the (yester)Day

2004-03-06T09:55:51Z

I was at a friend's house, and we found this poetry anthology that we were published in when we were 8/9 years old. So we looked at the other poems in it, and found this really cute one :D

We have a hamster at our school
I dropped it in the swimming pool
It didn't sink it floated up
It seemed to think it was a duck
And now each day it has a swim
To keep it nice and fit and trim

Victoria Tan (10 - at time of writing)

Highlight of the (yester)day

2004-03-05T18:42:29Z

I thought that in an effort to write something mildly interesting every day (and probably to demonstrate just how bland and uninteresting i am), i'd do a highlight of the day. However, since it would be impossible to do a highlight of the day, on the day itself since something more interesting might happen later on in the day...

Dusqi presents:

Highlight of the (yester)Day!

Yesterday's highlight was my friend David's random pronouncement:

You've heard of Jesus... well say hello to the second messiah: CHEESUS!

(you have to pronounce Cheesus in a really deep voice :D )

So then later on after school we were talking about it via MSN, and he found a pic! :D

On the topic of good books...

2004-01-06T16:50:20Z

Since i'm an English Literature student, when i went to McDonalds with some friends yeterday evening, i decided to check out a book that came with the ironically named "Happy Meal" called Little Miss Chatterbox, and since it irritated me so much, i decided to share my irritation :P . As it proudly displays, it is written and illustrated by Adam Hargreaves.

Choice quotes include:

Little Miss Chatterbox likes to talk. She can chat away until the cows come home

She can chat until the cows have come home, gone to sleep, got up and gone out again!

Wow, could that be any more condescending? It basically says:

(Insult to reader's intelligence).(Worthless, irrelevant cliché)

(repeat of cliché),(extended, annoying 'joke' about aforementioned cliché)

And she chatted and she chatted and she chatted

Once would have been enough.

Little Miss Chatterbox had spent three days on the phone.

Can you believe that!

Sorry, was that a question?

~~~

buahahaha, i felt like doing something cynical, so i think that was quite a successful piss-take :D however i must concede that the illustrations are colourful and kinda pretty :$ hehe

Disclaimer.

2003-12-21T00:22:34Z

legola5 reminded me in IRC that i am a hypocrite. So i'd like to officially note here that there is an invisible disclaiming * at the end of every sentence that i write.

The * says:

Dusqi is a self-confessed hypocrite. All advice is provided without any prior real-life experience or knowledge. Whenever contemplating anything that Dusqi says you should keep in mind that Dusqi is sheltered and innocent, immature and selfish.

Thankyou.

Christmas Cards

2003-12-19T21:50:34Z

People that give Christmas cards out at school annoy me. I mean.. you have to spend ages making lists of all your friends, making sure that you don't forget anyone (which you always do anyway). Then you have to write them all, then you have to find everyone to give them their card.

and what for..? It's just a massive popularity contest :-\ and like all popularity contests, there's always someone who ends up feeling left out. But unlike most popularity contests, even the winners don't feel good... because all they have is a load of pieces of card with lots of scribbles but which little thought has been put into.

At least when everyone has their own separate houses, after school ends - it's a way of keeping in touch.

Thank goodness christmas cards have gone out of favour somewhat at school this year :D But if christmas cards are still a tradition that is adhered to at your school, i suggest you do your best to quash it by following my strategy ;-)

On the very last day of school, come in with a pile of unwritten christmas cards and a pen. Then only write out christmas cards to those that give you one. With luck, if more people do this - noone will bother writing any cards, and a lot of hassle will be saved ;-)

On an unrelated note, when asked during the program "Have I got news for you" what he would like to see on TV this Christmas, Paul Merton replied "a truely pissed queen" ;-)