It's even more acceptable! >> ^00Scud00:

I wonder if it's acceptable to sing this if you've had a boob-job.

Thank you, therealblankman!
In reply to this comment by therealblankman:
That's some *quality soul right there.

>> ^bareboards2:

philosophy
I love this talk. I find that some atheists can be just as dogmatic and invasive in imposing their point of view as any evangelical. This guy has it nailed.


There were some interesting ideas, but mostly I wasn't impressed.

He opens by talking about the "kind of atheist that likes christmas carols". So, for example, Richard Dawkins?

He then talks about how we can use the "tools of religion" to make our lives better. He's essentially talking about 2 things, community and indoctrination.

Community, I think we can all agree happens easily without religion. Just look at this site. For a more real world example, last years earthquake in my home town saw groups of people coming together to dig out liquefaction from each others houses.

Indoctrination, on the other hand, I can live without.

As for the sense of mysticism or wonder, again that's not an issue I worry about. On this site alone there are hundreds of videos that talk about a secular sense of wonder about the universe (pretty much anything with Carl Sagan, Neil DeGrasse Tyson or Brian Cox). At a more local level, that "sense of belonging to something bigger" comes back to community for me. Whether that's a group of friends, a city trying to rebuild itself, or even in the larger sense that we all inhabit the same rock flying through space.

>> ^Fletch:

Embedding disabled.


Thanks! Should be fixed now.

For anyone interested in hearing more: Story here.

1 more comment have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

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These are from a five part series. The other two are...

Reindeer: http://videosift.com/video/Reindeer

and from @AdrianBlack Pole Dance: http://videosift.com/video/Pole-Dance
>> ^RadHazG:

ha! best out of the 3.

As @Phreezdryd mentioned, the eleventh Doctor used psychic paper in "The Eleventh Hour." Apart from that, he used it in the episodes "The Vampires of Venice," "The Hungry Earth," "Vincent and the Doctor," "The Lodger," "A Christmas Carol," "The Rebel Flesh," "A Good Man Goes to War," and finally, "Night Terrors". I don't think that's much less often than his predecessors.

>> ^brycewi19:

On another note, I just realized that the 11th Doctor doesn't use the psychic paper any more.
What gives?

@blankfist

Research that purporting that teaching is a difficult job based on 6 criteria. I suggest the whole document but here's the jest of it.
______________________________________________
---------->Societal Attitude:
The participants in this study believed that the attitude of society toward the teaching profession was unfair and detrimental to their overall functioning. They did not believe that they were valued, despite their advanced levels of education. In a recent nationwide survey of over 11,000 teachers and teacher candidates, Henke, Chen, Geis, and Knepper (2000) found that only 14.6% of the teachers surveyed were satisfied with the esteem in which society held the teaching profession.

--->Denise, a high school English teacher addressed the issue of respect:

"There is a lack of respect for teachers. It's not just the money, but also the attitude I get from administrators and politicians that teachers are trying to get away with something. We have taken these cushy jobs where all we have to do is stand up in front of a bunch of kids and BS for a few hours, and only work ten months of the year, at that teachers have it easy! Every time we ask for something (like, in my county, that the county pay our contribution to the state retirement system, for example), they make us out to look like whiners - give 'em an inch; they'll take a mile. The truth is, though, that teachers care so deeply and work SO much beyond our "contract hours." I can't tell you how many come in for weeks during the summer, as I do, and take on clubs after school (for which we are not compensated), and work during vacations. This lack of respect for teachers gets me down."
______________________________________________
---------->Financial Issues:
On top of the perception that they are not being valued by society, teachers are notoriously underpaid in our country. Four years after their graduation, Henke et al. (2000) surveyed a large sample of college graduates between 1992-1993. They found that the teachers were tied with clerical staff and service workers for the lowest salaries. A recent report from the American Federation of Teachers (AFT, 2000) found the following to be the case for the 2000-2001 school year:

For new teachers, the $28,986 average beginning salary lagged far behind starting salary offers in other fields for new college graduates. For example, accounting graduates were offered an average $37,143; sales/marketing, $40,033; math/statistics, $49,548; computer science, $49,749; and engineering, $50,033.
The $43,250 average teacher salary fell short of average wages of other white-collar occupations, the report found. For example, mid-level accountants earned an average $52,664, computer system analysts, $71,155; engineers, $74,920; and attorneys, $82,712.
The majority of the participants in this study related that they were simply not paid enough to live comfortably. They drove old cars and lived in inexpensive apartments. Others struggled to save enough money to buy a home.

--->Calvin, a high school science teacher, talked about his pay:

"I love teaching, but I don't know if I love it enough to deprive my family and myself of necessities. I have a baby and another on the way. I can't see how I can ever save enough to make a down payment on a house, even with a second job in the summer."
______________________________________________
---------->Time Scarcity:
Many new teachers were physically and emotionally fatigued to the point of exhaustion. They reported that they worked long days at school, and then took home lesson plans to create, papers to grade, and parents to call. They also worked nights and weekends on school-related work.

--->Jessica, a high school math teacher:

"I work 70 hours a week, and after 3 years it's not getting any better. When Friday night rolls around, all I want to do is fall asleep at 8 p.m.! Obviously that doesn't lead to a very exciting social life, or much of a "life" at all, if I can hardly stay awake long enough to go out to dinner with my friends and family. Even at holidays there are always papers to grade."

--->Fred, a high school English teacher also had difficulty with the amount of time required to do his job, pointing to the effect the time constraints had on family relationships:

The time commitment is the worst. During my first two years of teaching I worked 70-80 hour weeks, including time worked during the school day, in the evenings and over the weekend. Time commitment varies with the subject taught and with experience, but this aspect of the job nearly ran me out of teaching on several occasions and I witnessed one great new teacher leave teaching for this very reason. "It's my job or my marriage," she explained. "I never see my husband, and we're living under the same roof."

______________________________________________
---------->Workload:
The data reveal that it is nearly impossible for a conscientious teacher to complete all that is expected of them in one school day. At the high school level, teachers were teaching five or more classes in a traditional school, and three in a block schedule school. For each class this meant that the teacher's task was to design a complete lesson lasting at least one hour. This lesson had to follow the state curriculum, be engaging and interesting to students, and include various components as required by the school district, such as a warm-up, class activities, and homework. The teachers wanted to use outside resources such as the Internet to connect the material to real world applications. Additionally, they reported that there were often several special needs students in the class, and each of them needed some special accommodation. They found that planning was not a trivial task; it took several hours to design one effective instructional plan.

According to the teachers in this study, class sizes were another difficult feature of the teacher's day. In public high schools, most class sizes ranged from 25 to 35 students for a total of 125-175 students in a traditional school, and 75-105 in a four period block school. Henke et al. (2000) reported that the average number of students taught by secondary teachers each day is 115.8.

--->Abby, a high school history teacher explained the effect of large class sizes:

"Imagine any other professional trying to deal with the needs of this many "customers" at one time. If a physician were seeing patients, and grouped this many together, it is readily apparent how ridiculous it would be to expect her or him to address the needs of each person. The same is true for teachers.
Each student is an individual, with needs and issues that must be addressed. In a class period, the teachers expressed frustration because they could not address the needs of 25 or more students. "

--->Gina, a former high school science teacher described the variety in her workload as well as in her students' abilities:

"What I least expected was the amount of paperwork I had to do. Grading papers, progress reports, parent conferences, English-as-a-Second Language, exceptional students, ADD paperwork, and even work for absent students seem to take more time than "teaching."

To compound the issue, teachers also related many learning issues, where students had questions or misunderstandings that could easily have been cleared up with a few minutes of one-on-one time. They also reported discipline issues that got more serious when they were not addressed. Some students were bored. Some lacked basic skills and could not perform without help. In general, the teachers expressed being frustrated because they are educated professionals who could address these issues, if there were time to get to everyone. There was simply not enough time to address the variety of issues that simultaneously too place. Farkas et al. (2000) reported that 86% of new teachers report that the change most likely to improve teaching is reducing class size.

--->Eva, a high school English teacher summed up her frustration with large class sizes.

"This was not a matter of poor time management; it was a matter of too many students with too many needs and one harried teacher trying to be superhuman. There were times that I had a great lesson plan, only to have it totally derailed because of one or two students who needed individual attention and could not get it."

The total number of students that this professional was expected to evaluate, plan, and care for each day was as many as 150.
______________________________________________
---------->Working Conditions:
School administrators varied in their support of young teachers, and many teachers reported that this support was inadequate. The new teachers felt that they were evaluated and judged, but they would have preferred real feedback and suggestions for improvement of their teaching. They felt that they were often not supported in discipline issues or in conflicts with parents.

--->Carol, a former high school math teacher:

"I was very frustrated with the lack of support from my principal/administration in that after three observations I never got any feedback either in written or verbal form. I never really knew how I was doing. I felt I was doing a good job, but did not think the administration cared one way or the other."

--->Fran, a high school mathematics teacher expressed a need for more funds:

"Teachers should be given all the supplies that they need - $25 is not enough! At all other jobs that I have worked at, whatever you need to do your job is provided."
______________________________________________
---------->Relationships with Students and Parents:
A common problem reported by beginning teachers was student apathy. Many of the novice teachers reported that students had no interest in learning. In addition to attendance problems, a number of students often came to class without pencil, paper, and textbook. It was difficult to force or entice them to participate in classwork, and virtually impossible to get them to do homework.

--->Owen, a former high school mathematics teacher, was frustrated by his students' apathy:

"The vast majority of my students had no interest in learning math and I quickly tired of trying to force them (or entice them). They refused to bring paper or pencil to class, refused to do homework or classwork, and frequently came to class late or not at all. Most of them, to my great surprise, were not at all belligerent or confrontational about their refusal to do anything in class; they just had no intention of working at anything."

--->Mattie, a former high school history teacher, could not deal with the frustration:

"I just became very frustrated teaching to a class of 20 students and about 5 were interested or at least concerned with their grades. I decided not to return, because I was so exhausted and depressed at the end of the year. I just couldn't see "wasting" my time in a classroom where the kids don't care about themselves or what you're trying to accomplish."

--->Eugene, a former high school math teacher, also reported problems with apathy:

"I was frustrated with the apathy of the students. Many days I felt as though I was standing up there talking to myself. It was the longest year of my life. I was an emotional wreck because I felt as if the kids/parents didn't care enough to try or participate."

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Louis, CK, early, years, NY, minorities, gay, caroling, dont know, again, brush' to 'Louis CK, early, years, NY, minorities, gay, caroling, dont know, again, brush' - edited by xxovercastxx

Tags for this video have been changed from 'Louis, CK, drinking, lessons, christmas, caroling, group, jack daniels, naked, ex' to 'Louis CK, drinking, lessons, christmas, caroling, group, jack daniels, naked, ex' - edited by xxovercastxx

>> ^rottenseed:

Your pain is my amusement. Oh well, you did get a pretty badass story out of it >> ^skinnydaddy1:
Found a nest of those the hard way. Was helping a guy prepping a house for painting. I was on the roof prepping some over hangs. When I got stung the first time. No biggie I thought I'll swat it and go on. I looked down and saw about 10 of the fuckers on my stomach and more streaming out of a hole in the roof. Then as more and more landed on me they all stung about the same time. I screamed, rolled, fell, landed on top of a fence, pinwheeled and landed on the guy. (All the while getting stung again and again) we both screamed. We are now both being stung. Scrambled and dove in to a near by pool. 80+ stings. 3 cracked ribs and 2 broken fingers. (No idea how I broke them) I decided no to work outside anymore after that.
Mother nature does not like me and I've not found enough money to buy a flame thrower so I could fight back.



Well the old saying it true. "“Comedy is tragedy plus time.” -Carol Burnett
and thanks to the internet that comedy gets to the public even faster.
I feel we shall be laughing at the maker of these videos soon. The act of using glass bowls over wasp spray or more efficient means will provide the general public with pain and comedy soon.

I have been doing some research lately into the Aristotelian ethics, so thanks for the additional sources of reading material!

>> ^Ariane:

I agree with what she is saying totally, and the scientists and researchers in "Positive Psychology" would agree. We have been led to believe that having a positive attitude will bring about positive change and there is no data to support that. Its a lie started in American theology called the "prosperity doctrine" and then secularized and adapted by the new agers.
If you want to learn what will really make us happy, start with Dan Gilbert, then move on to Dr Barry Schwartz and Dan Pink, and Carol Ryff. Their seemingly strange conclusions about what makes us really happy are backed up by scientific research. The conclusion that they draw is that the whole "American Dream" is a piece of fiction that will ultimately lead to misery.
What we need is a "meaningful purpose", and we need to work with others on that purpose. Our endeavors do not even have to succeed, as long as our purpose is clearly defined, we are able to see progress, and there is some hope for success, it will lead us to eudaemonia as Aristotle called it or lasting "well-being" and contentment.