ODDS & ENDS ISSUE
EDITORIAL
WORKING WITH THE RETARDED
Rick Rosner
In the late 70's, Christopher Reeve did a public service announcement urging
people to become volunteers. There was a
life-size poster of Reeve at the 3.2 beer bar where I often went trying to lose
my virginity, so I took him seriously.
The Carmel House was a home for about six dozen high functioning retarded
people in my home town. I volunteered to
take some of the residents roller skating every
Sunday. We had a pretty good time. Keith, a little guy with Down's Syndrome, supposedly had an IQ of 25, the lowest in my
cohort. David, a deaf and dumb skater,
had an IQ of 110, I was told. I don't
know sign, so he'd write stuff out.
Once, he pointed at my shiny disco jacket and wrote
"METALLIC."
My flat feet make skating somewhat painful, which focused my
concentration. I'd skate fast and think
about physics. Or I'd go play
pinball. I'd help some of the
One resident knew a lot about the van we used, so one night I let him drive a
few blocks. It had a stick shift, but he
did pretty well.
After about a year and a half, the people in charge of the volunteer program
booted me out because I was often 15 or 20 minutes late, which agitated the
skaters. The residents were more
competent than I at living up to our arrangement. In terms of living up to the demands of each
of our lives, the residents were more competent in general (though I saw them
at their best). If a gap of 100 IQ
points or more made a difference, it was in their favor.
"BALLPARKING" THE MEGA
It'd be nice if we had more members--Noesis might contain more and different stuff, for instance. Our standard source for recruits is Ron Hoeflin's tests, which are great at measuring perseverance
and ingenuity, but which require a time commitment larger than many clever
people are willing to invest. Ron's very
hardest problems are the ones which require the largest time investment, so
that even an abridged version of his tests could take a long time. Some of the number series problems, however,
involve flashes of insight rather than the laborious construction of solutions
and don't necessarily take a long time.
Perhaps an abridged version of the Mega could contain the hardest
"short-time" problems, as well as what I call "ballparked" versions of the most time-consuming
problems. The hardest problem on the
mega seems to be the three interpenetrating cubes. Presenting it as a multiple choice problem
would wreck and squander it. I suggest
it be presented accompanied by two numbers which would serve as a mean and a standard
deviation. To receive credit for the
problem, a test-taker would submit something like a z-score, indicating where
he or she thinks the solution lies in relation to the given mean.
If the three cubes problem was accompanied by a mean of 100 and a standard
deviation of 8, an answer of +1 would indicate that the test-taker thinks that
the exact solution is between 100 and 108.
An answer of -10 indicates a solution between 20 and 28.
Say a tough problem is "How many chucks could a woodchuck chuck if a
woodchuck could chuck wood, and an urn contains eight tan and two gray woodchucks?". The exact
answer is 17,292 and takes an average of 60 hours to solve. What if the problem is ballparked
by presenting it with a mean of 8,000 and a deviation of 1,200? The correct z-score is +8. It still takes an understanding of the
problem to get a ballpark solution, it gives away very little about the exact
solution, and it might be a way to find clever but impatient members.
(Additional points could be awarded for finding the exact solution.)
EVOLUTION
Having taken some cheap shots at Cattell in the
previous issue, I suppose I should present my sloppily-reasoned perspective on
evolution, so y'all can take shots at it.
Here goes:
Darwin assigned emotions to animals, but later interpreters of survival of the
fittest present animals as automated competitors in a vast video game, mindless
masters of might makes right. The
biggest, bloodiest claws are raised in brainless, behaviorist victory.
I think evolution hinges on the survival of the unfittest--that
some lousy organisms are compelled to blaze new evolutionary trails.
Well-adapted animals don't have to be very smart--everything is laid out in
their genes, they just have to be their unthinking selves. It's only when something goes wrong, with an
organism's body or in a changing environment, that
animals must rouse themselves to some slightly higher level of awareness and
attempt to deal with the problem.
Brains are inherently conservative--it takes energy to know things, and it's
wasteful to know things unnecessarily.
It's safer to know a few things with high certainty than lots of things
with low certainty. Brains are
structured to make information compact--to store as little information as
possible to maximize the reliability of the information, except when compaction
itself costs too much. Brains are
structured to:
1. Minimize
uncertainty
2a. Systematize information in order to--
b. Minimize the amount of stored information
3. Approach novelty only with reluctance
A happy brain is not taxed with too much
information. It doesn't want to think
any more than it has to. Thought
involves error and risk.
Which means that species find rules of behavior that work and
stick to them. Healthy,
well-adjusted organisms don't want to think. Thought involves risk. Over time, successful rules of behavior
become increasingly hard-wired.
Which brings us to the ill-adapted organism. This animal has physical flaws or is living
in a changing environment. This animal
is forced to think (as well as it can).
Appropriate stress forces thought to become more fluid, forces the brain
to risk novel thought, to try to construct novel associations. It's time to think or die (probably think
_and_ die). The ultimately stressed
organism sees its life pass before its eyes as its brain attempts a desperate
complete melt down. Thought is for
desperate situations--everything else should be on autopilot.
Long-term stress habituates the unlucky organism to thought. What a pain that
it must think all the time to survive.
If it does survive, it develops new behaviors. Perhaps it communicates those behaviors and
other species members adapt them. If the
behaviors persist over generations, they become hard-wired. Hard-wired behaviors determine new fitness
criteria.
Thought is often the punctuation in punctuated equilibrium. Stress forces
organisms to think, thought induces behavioral change which contributes to
physical re-adaptation, after which species can go back to being stupid for
another .3 zillion years.
Obviously species with little or no brains can't think very well, and a planet
full of such has less co-evolution and a slower overall rate of evolution.
Thought itself becomes a selection criteria. Some emerging species incorporate
increasingly-flexible thought patterns into everyday behavior. Bigger brains help minimize the potential for
error in such behavior.
Some species become more flexible at thinking than their environment
merits. They add artificial complication
to their cultures. After all, with
thought as a selection criteria, and with most species members adequately able
to address natural components of their environment, artificial challenges must
be constructed.
Species at home in their surroundings don't need to think much, but they must
retain the capacity to address change, should it occur. You're gonna get
populations of dumb, well-adjusted animals, with a few ill-adjusted, anomalous
thinkers. The majority must tolerate but
contain the anomalous members. Thinking
members have the potential to disrupt the culture and must be distracted if not
ostracized. (What would happen to
realtors and stockbrokers if physicists decided that the important thing isn't
to discover the structure of the universe but to make hellacious amounts of
money?)
Where to look for evidence of thought as a catalyst in punctuated
evolution? Well, appropriately-stressed
animals should show more flexibility in thinking than their unstressed
counterparts. Such flexibility should tend to transcend the nature of the stress--different
experiences should lead to similar increases in ingenuity. Stressed animals should show different ways
of approaching all sorts of problems than unstressed animals. Stressed animals made fat and happy might
return to unthinking behavior.
Unstressed animals, once stressed, should fall into thoughtful behavior.
I guess what I'm looking for is an evolutionary theory that isn't just a
teeming battleground with vast numbers of nearly-identical species members in
mindless conflict with their environment.
I want
narrative evolution--evolution with heroes and a story line. I want a theory in which one single, geeky
organism can use its tiny but awakened nervous system to change the course of
its species and of
history.
Much of this ill-founded theorization is based on my own self-observation under
pressure. I find my own thinking to be
more flexible under stress--I'm able to find associations between things that I
usually don't think of together. The type
of stress doesn't seem to matter that much; it can be physical, emotional,
situational. I definitely feel that I'm smarter for having done lots of dumb
stuff that put me under unnecessary stress (though not overt physical
danger--as a spaz, I can't trust my coordination to
get me out of trouble).
LETTERS & OTHER STUFF
Dear Rick,
Thanks for Noesis
#60. I'll send my phrenological
measurement (23" circumference) to Ron.
If he gets significant correlations, I'll eat my hat.
As for manual dexterity, I type about 100 w.p.m.. play
guitar, operate ATM's about 2 - 5 times faster than average, etc., but some of
these are due to training. I guess I'm
ambidextrous. I operate calculators
& ATM's with left, turn pages with left, check dipstick with left, but write with right and turn screwdrivers with the right and
throw with right. Ahem, I'll stop there!
What electronic mail system do you use?
The headers indicate it could be a Unix system
at Peregrine, Inc.?
I guess the Post Office isn't too picky--recent Noesis mailings have been about
1.5 oz.
Kjeld Hvatum
P.S. Just got a free Random House
College Dictionary from their Managing Editor for corrections I've sent them.
P.P.S. Perhaps
you should list the membership in Noesis.
1111111111111111111111111
Editor's comments: Dean Inada, Chris
Cole and I are tied into a computer system called GNU. I don't know what that means or how to
specify how to get in touch with us. But
I'll have Chris or Dean give you the specs.
I'll include a membership roster in the next issue. Let me know if you don't want you address
listed. While we're talking about
membership--do any readers have suggestions for increasing membership?
More on dexterity--I'm good at slow, precise tasks such as drawing and
manipulation of objects in the millimeter range. I'm average at skills such as typing, and my
learning curve might be flatter than average at such tasks. Any dexterity I do have I attribute not to my peripheral nervous
system but to a better than average
understanding of spatial relationships.
My reflexes have been slow, probably because I am absent-minded, but with
practice, I've made them better than average for some tasks. (I'm pretty good at catching falling objects,
though I used to be terrible. Again,
this is due to practice picking up broken glass off of bar floors and having a
good mental picture of the dynamics of falling objects.) I'm better than average at getting through
crowds (again, from working in bars).
My natural level of gracefulness is indicated by these teachers' comments which
were included in my permanent scholastic record: Grade 1 Ricky does very well
scholastically, but he needs to develop better social habits. He also needs to develop big muscle
coordination. Grade 2 Very poor muscular control--self conscious--social
problems--wants to be one of the group--needs help in joining groups
Worries--Dr. is helping Ricky with his "worry problems" [This is
1968, the end of the golden age of shrinks.] Grade 3 Ricky's social contacts
blossomed this year. Very intelligent
child but needed to have friends. Seeing
a psychiatrist has definitely helped Ricky.
He has been a lovely student and reads a good deal [thus wrecking my
eyes]. Would rather do
this than play outside. Grade 4 Ricky does not work up to his
ability. [This was the year Rob Bekuhrs found a coverless, torn-up copy of The Pearl--Victorian pornography, not
Steinbeck--on our teacher's desk.
Evidently, Miss Garrett had found it on the playground and dropped it on
her desk without realizing what it was. We
swiped it and passed it around and from it learned everything any six-year-old
knows nowadays. The boys in the class
walked around with tented pants. The
girls asked to see our penises. I, of
course, was the only one who showed them.
This was also the year the boys in the class spent waiting for the
mini-skirted Miss Garrett to bend over.
When she finally did, late in the year, we were shocked and disappointed
to find that she wore a large pantry girdle.]
He can be very distracting to others.
Very creative. Tends not to
mind at times. Mother very
interested. Grade 5 Excellent mind--can figure out ANYTHING! Writing is atrocious. Great sense of humor. Not too coordinated (to put it mildly) but
even goes out and plays softball now!
Beware--must be challenged, bores easily!
Being a spaz caused me much distress, and I've wasted
my life overcompensating. The school
system and I were co-conspirators in making me care less about learning and
more about being popular. I've developed
a slightly schizoid dual personality--the smart guy and his evil twin. The smart guy wants to stay at home and read
and think and isn't good at everyday tasks.
His evil twin takes great joy in tormenting the smart guy--distracting
him with trivia, making him say and do trashy things. The evil twin is _too_ good at everyday
tasks. I'm like a Harlequin Romance rolled into one person--the rugged
take-charge manly man who forcefully seduces the quaking ethereal heroine.
222222222222222222222222222
In the last issue, Chris Cole presented three Harry Anderson magic tricks &
asked readers to attempt to figure them out.
Here're my solutions:
Today's newspaper headline in the locked, proctored box--The skeleton key
contains the rolled-up headline. It's
injected into the box as the box is unlocked.
The linked class rings--Since Harry approaches the ring donors one at a time,
two dummy rings can be linked to each donated ring in turn. Each donor sees his ring linked to two other
similar rings, but did the three donors get together afterward to compare?
Harry telepathically finds a phone number at random from the white pages--I
know this one 'cause it happened to me at The Magic Castle. Harry switched his set of numbers with the
numbers written down by audience members.
At The Magic Castle, a magician had three audience members write down
five-digit numbers in a small spiral notebook.
Another audience member (I volunteered) added up the three numbers. The magician had the sum written down all the
time, except my sum didn't agree with his sum.
The magician looked at my set of numbers and said that I'd mistaken a
seven for a one, thus the discrepancy.
My wife had been one of the three people to write down a five-digit
number. After we left, I asked her what
number she'd written, and it wasn't any of the ones I'd seen. The magician had flipped a page in the spiral
notebook, substituting his numbers for the numbers supplied by the audience.
333333333333333333333333333
No new puzzles this time, but last time I offered ten bucks to anyone who could
come up with the next term in this sequence: 3, 7, 19, 29, 71, 103, 103, 191,
233, 317, 577, . . . No one attempted it. Each number in the sequence is the largest
member of a set of primes. Each member
of a set is the smallest prime larger than a given prime that has a particular
remainder when divided by the given prime.
The set is complete when all remainders are represented. This isn't very clear. Here are some sample sets: for 2--{3} for
3--{5, 7} for 5--{7, 11, 13, 19} for 7--{11, 13, 17,
19, 23, 29}
The next term in the sequence is . . . I dunno. I've lost my notes. Have to logout and go searching.
O.K. Found
it. The term after 577 is 439, which is
the largest member of the remainder set for 37-- {41, 43, 47, 53, 59, 61, 67,
71, 73, 79, 83, 89, 97, 101, 103, 107,
109, 113, 131, 137, 139, 149, 151, 167, 173, 179, 193, 197, 199,
229, 233, 239, 277, 317, 383, 439}
What possible use is this? Suppose you
were lost on the number line, which is marked only P for prime or C for
composite. You can move only to the
right--to increasing numbers. How far do
you have to go to find out where you are?
Until you cover a set of primes whose spacing tells you the identity of
the first prime you encountered. Here's
your number line: P P C P C P C C
C P C P C C C P C P C C C
P C . . .
The sequence P P tells you that you started at
2. P C P C P indicates you started at
3. Obviously, P P
and P C P C P show up nowhere else on the number line.
555555555555555555555555555555555555
I got a subscription offer from the Skeptical
Inquirer, published by the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of
Claims of the Paranormal. Its aim seems
to be to debunk psychic garbage. Maybe some of you would be interested. (Maybe some of you already subscribe. Is it worth it?) It's $14.95 a year or $27.50 for two
years. It's a quarterly. The number is 1-800-634-1610 outside
WAVE FUNCTIONS IN DOPES
by Rick Rosner
People who make their livings using quantum mechanics have had two
objections to outsiders who attempt to mess around in the quantum realm. They object to metaphors and analogies being
used to help visualize quantum phenomena.
Feynman issued especially strong cautions against trying to construct
mental pictures of quantum events.
Some physicists also object to quantum analogies being extended to the
macroscopic world. They say that the
Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle can't be applied to love or politics.
But people continue to make sloppy quantum analogies. I do regularly, especially in traffic or in
crowds. I see people as wave functions,
expanding to fill all space, until an event collapses them back to a point.
I'm not talking about the population expanding indefinitely. I'm referring to
individual, oblivious persons. Someone
who isn't paying much attention to his or her surroundings takes up a huge
amount of space. Drivers without a
vector maintained by constant attention are all over the place, and in
Women's Studies professors will tell you that men take up more space than
women. It's not that they have more volume, it's that they unconsciously take custody of more
space by sprawling with limbs akimbo, by swaggering.
In
It's basically a failure of imagination that causes people to have undefined
positions and velocities. People tend
not to maintain a constant mental picture of themselves in their surroundings. After all, they're there, why should
they? Only when someone sees themselves
as on an urgent mission do clear vectors snap into place--that is, as long as
they imagine themselves as in a movie, maintaining a constant image of their
position in space. Unfortunately, the people who see themselves as stars in
their own movies are usually high school guys in Trans Ams,
who use their clear vectors to slice through traffic and piss everybody off.
New Yorkers must climb lots of stairs.
Usually, they fail to imagine people going the opposite direction and
thus expand to fill the entire stairwell.
Until they nearly bump into somebody.
then they define themselves for a few seconds,
sometimes resentfully. It's work to
maintain an image of yourself in space.
New Yorkers are good about elevators.
When attempting to enter an elevator, they tend to imagine passengers
exiting. New Yorkers usually stand aside
before entering in expectation of people getting off. People in