Searching for a useful analogy

[hodad]

And there you are. You just stated the argument for free speech.

No. Your very strong biases led you to misinterpret what I said in a manner that best suited your argument.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

No. Your very strong biases led you to misinterpret what I said in a manner that best suited your argument.

Your simple statements required no interpretation. But keep dodging. It's entertaining.

 

[cyrano]

in some cultures old people are embraced and respected for their wisdom, gained from life experience (not here apparently). Sadly some older people are destined to die ignorant, many young people too.

Those old people were in their fifties or sixties at most. They also were a small minority. They deserved respect for getting to that age.

Today, we're facing an important number of people in their eighties or nineties. They've had time to forget. And some of them are tired of living...

In fact, the growing number of elderly is the number one problem. The math is easy enough. Less young people to be productive makes it harder and harder to care for the elderly by using a part of that productivity.

And no, you can't count on people for taking care of their own pension.

Unless of course you take the decision to accept a lot of homeless on the streets, waiting to die. Too many scammers selling pension plans to people whose judgement isn't really fresh anymore.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

Those old people were in their fifties or sixties at most. They also were a small minority. They deserved respect for getting to that age.

I have ancestors who lived into their 80s and older 200 years ago in rural and difficult conditions.

Today, we're facing an important number of people in their eighties or nineties. They've had time to forget. And some of them are tired of living...

Wow. Both my great grandmother (born 1898) and my grandmother (born 1923) lived into their mid-90s with full mental faculties. My grandmother had an incredible memory of people, events, dates, and details of the life she lived up until the last two weeks of her life.

In fact, the growing number of elderly is the number one problem. The math is easy enough. Less young people to be productive makes it harder and harder to care for the elderly by using a part of that productivity.

Wow.

And no, you can't count on people for taking care of their own pension.

Yet many do. At least around here.

Unless of course you take the decision to accept a lot of homeless on the streets, waiting to die.

Wow. The homeless problem here in the US is not primarily a condition of the elderly, but the middle-aged and young who have allowed themselves to become addicted. There's also a lot of untreated mental illness.

Too many scammers selling pension plans to people whose judgement isn't really fresh anymore.

This is true.

I'm almost afraid to ask what you think the "solution" is to this "number one problem" we have. I hope you aren't looking at Canada as an example.

And again we've strayed far from the thread topic...

 

[hodad]

It is too "familiar"

Hmmm......maybe "the gentleman from Hickory?" Should we institute Roberts' Rules of Order here? Is this the solution to all our social media troubles? Should we all be less "familiar?"

 

[JohnRoberts]

Hmmm......maybe "the gentleman from Hickory?" Should we institute Roberts' Rules of Order here? Is this the solution to all our social media troubles? Should we all be less "familiar?"

The gentleman from (living in) Hickory, is asking you to stop calling me out by name (perceived by me as trolling). To claim this is breaking the rules requires a little too much subjectivity on my part so to be fair I will let it pass. Don't use this extra rope to hang yourself.

Be the magic....


JR

PS: I have long posited more aggressive restrictions on ad hominem including restricting insults aimed at celebrities, politicians, and non-members. Allowing so much coarse speech normalizes bad behavior toward members. Robert's rules is related to parliamentary procedure and not applicable here. I try to follow Ethan's slender set of rules strictly but some are vague.

 

[Jim McKeveny]

Those old people were in their fifties or sixties at most. They also were a small minority. They deserved respect for getting to that age.

Today, we're facing an important number of people in their eighties or nineties. They've had time to forget. And some of them are tired of living...

In fact, the growing number of elderly is the number one problem. The math is easy enough. Less young people to be productive makes it harder and harder to care for the elderly by using a part of that productivity.

And no, you can't count on people for taking care of their own pension.

Unless of course you take the decision to accept a lot of homeless on the streets, waiting to die. Too many scammers selling pension plans to people whose judgement isn't really fresh anymore.

Its frustrating when people don't fit the model..

 

[cyrano]

Why is it so hard to comprehend that stats aren't about individuals?

 

[Jim McKeveny]

Why is it so hard to comprehend that stats aren't about individuals?

Its frustrating when people don't fit the model..

Don't know if that is snark... (I think we are on the same team).

There are always wildcards that will destroy any given model, but (1) policy without generous slack is doomed to fail (2) there is an institutional tendency to "fight the last war" rather than anticipate change, making ignorance of the first point more critical.

 

[JohnRoberts]

Don't know if that is snark... (I think we are on the same team).

There are always wildcards that will destroy any given model, but (1) policy without generous slack is doomed to fail (2) there is an institutional tendency to "fight the last war" rather than anticipate change, making ignorance of the first point more critical.

Outliers are part of the data set which is why results are averaged over large numbers to get a usable distribution (curve). Over reliance on anecdotal evidence can skew findings.
===
Fighting the last war is a common flaw of military planning, while the current war resembles the last wars a little too closely for comfort. I figured by now they would have figured out non lethal techniques other than freezing or starving a population to death (that was also used before during WWII).

JR

 

[cyrano]

Don't know if that is snark... (I think we are on the same team).

There are always wildcards that will destroy any given model, but (1) policy without generous slack is doomed to fail (2) there is an institutional tendency to "fight the last war" rather than anticipate change, making ignorance of the first point more critical.

It was just a reflection, aimed at AnalogPackrat mostly, as he's good at finding meaningless exceptions. Wasn't too sure where you were going with models. The stats about an aging population are just numbers. Simple math anyone should be able to do. No AI or models needed, really. Even most politicians understand and agree, for once.

 

[AnalogPackrat]

It was just a reflection, aimed at AnalogPackrat mostly, as he's good at finding meaningless exceptions. Wasn't too sure where you were going with models. The stats about an aging population are just numbers. Simple math anyone should be able to do. No AI or models needed, really. Even most politicians understand and agree, for once.

The "meaningless exceptions" are actual human beings. The tails of the distribution must also be considered in rational public policy. Anyone who's looked into "average life expectancy" stats knows that the data are skewed by infant mortality and deaths among younger people. There's a reason why median is used instead of mean and why looking at the actual distribution is best. AssUMing a Gaussian is idiocy.