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I'm not Paranoid, they ARE all out to get me!!!

Listed below are comments made by I'm not Paranoid, they ARE all out to get me!!! between Saturday, 8th August 2009 and Sunday, 9th August 2009.

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Keeping time 6:21pm on 09 Aug 2009 My #1742 should, of course, have referred to #1741.
Keeping time 6:15pm on 09 Aug 2009 #1742, oldnat:

"in the 1970s ... [rubbish teachers] were simply shuffled from school to school."

Sorry, but I can't resist the temptation to ask if you were atypically mobile during your career....
Keeping time 2:02pm on 09 Aug 2009 #1732, Neil_Small147:

"Perhaps in a few hundred years there will finally be a common language for most of the world's population."

[Mandarin] Chinese?
Miracles don't happen twice 12:14pm on 09 Aug 2009 If the Australians had responded to their Lords defeat with the same level of panic being illustrated by many posts here, precious few of the tourists' Headingley team would even be playing.

Get real, and keep it real.

This has been a poor match for England, and shows the need to pick individual players of ability rather than sticking with a 'team' which had muddled through in the past.
Keeping time 12:10pm on 09 Aug 2009 #1730, oldnat:

"Only a fool would think there is something magic about half marks being a pass."

Just so.

However, the notion of a 'hard' exam or an 'easy' one calls into question the competence of the question-setter(s), and indeed the purpose of exams.

[RANT]

When I was at school - a long time ago (though it seems even longer) - it was well-understood to the student body that the value of exam passes was purely comparative (i.e. an A in 1977 was better than a B in 1977 but an A in 1983 an A in 1977 were qualitatively unrelated) rather than indicating any prescribed aptitude or level of absolute achievement.

In those days, of course, employers/universities took their pick from school-leavers and you were then set for life. Now, with the employment market more fluid, it should be important for job applicants' certificates to be directly comparable, so that someone who left school in 2006 is not disadvantaged as compared with this year's outpouring.

At the conclusion of my own secondary education, I had my choice of university courses upon which to embark; now, the same number and level of passes would not get me into any of the ancient Scottish universities other than in 'soft' subjects. (However, I suspect that - with 'easier' exams - my achievements would also have been somewhat elevated.)

I presume that, even if the numerical starting-point is the same, to qualify as a teacher in today's Scotland requires a lower standard of education than was the case in the distant past - I remember certain of my teachers who knew their subjects inside-out and were happy to expand upon topics outwith the curriculum for their pupils' broader benefit, rather than as now being devoted solely to teaching examinable material - and I frequently wonder if the standard of examination is related to the known abilities of teachers to provide the appropriate installation of knowledge.

Today's schools provide "knowledge"; in the past, they offered "learning".

[/RANT]
Miracles don't happen twice 10:15am on 09 Aug 2009 Pay the players win bonuses only, nothing for a defeat.

Then, just maybe, they might play as though they care....
Keeping time 10:03am on 09 Aug 2009 #1727, gedguy2

I, too, have chosen to airbrush the six-and-a-half years of John Major's premiership from my mind.
After the deluge 09:59am on 09 Aug 2009 Continuing the glass metaphor (half empty/half full), I still get the impression that liquid is being poured in [at the top] without first bunging up the hole near the bottom through which it is almost as quickly draining away, evaporating into clouds of nothingness in the heat of the financial services sector.

Perhaps the most alarming factor in the banking meltdown is that even those with access to the most detailed (and specific) information continue to profess ignorance as to the overall magnitude of the difficulties in which we find ourselves.

Are they being disingenuous (if we knew the true extent, we would lower our heads, proclaiming "We're all doomed!) or is the culture of concealing bad news so endemic to bonus-driven banking salaries that no one knows where all of the bodies are buried?
Keeping time 00:01am on 09 Aug 2009 #1718, oldnat

"1700 is the first year of the 18th century"

Indisputably (but, that said, I could start an argument alone in a phonebox) 1700 WAS the first year of the 1700s, and - for clarity - that is usually the fashion in which I prefer to identify periods of years.

After all, we don't refer to the Roaring Third Decade [of the Twentieth Century] or to the Swinging Seventh Decade, but to the Twenties and Sixties. Of course, each pairing of terms coincides only for 90% of the period covered - a decimated decade, handclapping!

Thanks, oldnat, for drawing attention to Dionysius Exiguus; I hadn't realised that attribution of the designation of AD could be so personally exact, and it occurred somewhat earlier than I had imagined...
Keeping time 10:14pm on 08 Aug 2009 #1713, oldnat,

Of course, the Romans didn't 'number' years at all, preferring to identify them in terms of tribunal terms.

Indeed, when the Pope signs his encyclicals, etc., he identifies the year in terms of his Pontificate, e.g. "caritas in veritate" was "given in ... the fifth [year] of [Pope Benedict XVI's] Pontificate".

As to BC/AD, the confusion arises because of the relatively modern insistence on using cardinal numbers to identify years. In fact, the transition should be considered in terms of ordinal numbers, i.e. it was from the FIRST year BC to the FIRST year AD - translating this to cardinal numbers, it can be shown that the putative "Year Zero" lasted for TWO YEARS (730 days)!!!

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