TI-Burr-Brown parts shartage?

Jim Thompson, reliably ill-informed. This is the guy who thinks I'm a dangerous terrorist, and reported me to the current committee for un- American activities. I'm surprised that he wasn't put a way for wasting police time ....

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

Bill's entirely right.

Graham

About universal gloom and doom? Then I'm glad I'm wrong.

John

He's right about the dead hand of incompetent and unimaginative management causing the above. GEC went on to kill *itself* off too following its insane and pointless rebranding as Marconi and an obsession with mobile telecoms.

Graham

Which is somehow related to "the current U.S. administration" ? And about 287 other downer perspectives?

Boy, I'm glad I'm not educated enough to be that depressed.

John

Birds of a feather....

Cheers! Rich

and

Well, ignorance is bliss.

It helps if you have millions of dollars in the bank - you're apparently over the threshold for inner party membership.

Thanks, Rich

and

and

Your problem doesn't seem to be lack of education as much as lack of attention.

The crack about "the current U.S. Administration" had nothing to with the defects in the management of GE(UK) and other British firms, but came out of a comment deploring Jim Thompson's demented tendency to see violent anti-Americanism in any comment that suggests that the U.S.A. is in any way less than perfect.

To be fair, your current administration isn't quite that demented, but the decision to proceed with the invasion of Irak after the Joint Chiefs of Staff had told them that the U.S. couldn't install a big enough occupying force to maintain law and order after the invasion was demented enough that they should be institutionalised for their own protection (not to mention ours).

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

and

You seem to be the one with the problem. I don't waste much attention on things that don't affect me, that I can't change, and that are basically boring. Given that there are an infinite number of interesting and productive things to learn and do, and an equally infinite number of things you can find to be impotently outraged about, it becomes a matter of temperament - not education, not attention, not sophistication - in which you choose to indulge.

To paraphrase my previous paragraph, if you're not smart enough to be happy, it doesn't matter how much education you've had: you're still stupid.

John

had

insane and

The only rational paraphrase I can find for that is that if one isn't smart enough to fill oneself up with anti-depressants, it doesn't matter how much education one has had, one is still stupid.

Which of course depends on finding anti-depressants that work and don't have nasty side effects - education and observation both suggest that this is a fallacious proposition.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

had

insane and

When I was 16 years old, I figured out that it felt better to be happy than to be depressed. It didn't take too much longer to figure out

*how* to be happy, even given the fact that I'm bipolar to start with. It doesn't involve drugs. For Pete's sake, engineers are supposed to be able to analyze and design things: so analyze and design yourself!

I'm sure glad I got all this worked out before I was exposed to higher education.

Hey, I just slipped with a test lead and put +12 on a 3.3 volt bus, and blew up the prototype delay generator I'm working on. The thermal imager says the CPU and an output driver chip are getting hot, so they are lunched, and maybe a lot more. And it was working great up to that moment. I will *not* let a silly thing like that depress me!

John

Citalopram seems to work for me.

Graham

Chocolate has fewer side effects.

John

Do pay attention. That bit of doom and gloom was fairly specific - I was talking about GE(UK) and generalising to British manufacturing in general. There is so little British manufacturing industry left, that this has to be specific rather than universal.

And there is the point that if you don't male an attempt to work out what is going on around you, you are likely to experience quite unpleasant surprises. Feckless optimism may be good as a form of cognitive therapy, but I do prefer to try and stay in touch with reality.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

Who was it that said: 'I want the power to change the things I can change, the patience to endure the things I can't change, and the wisdom to discriminate one from the other.' It was something along these lines, only phrased better.

I like that attitude, but it requires the ability of not *wanting* to notice the problems that you've labeled insolvable. This leads to the situation that if too many people live by those rules they'll never manage to change things that can only be changed collectively, because each individual has already decided for themselves that being concerned with those problems is futile.

What gets on Bill's nerves (and causes him to get on ours, in return), is the attitude of ignoring the obvious (or only paying attention long enough to toss it into the "unsolvable" bin and forgetting about it).

That's not a correct paraphrase, IMO. Your attitude is better described by saying that you prefer to be ignorant about the things that don't affect you or that you can't change. Selective stupidity is the key to happiness (as is, by the way, complete stupidity). Complete enlightenment, on the other hand, is the key to depression. I'm trying to find some middle road.

robert

Of course not. You're happy to have an excuse to crack out that thermal imager. That thing is your personal anti-depressant for fried baords. Come to think of it you probably slipped on purpose.

robert

"Candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker" ;-)

...Jim Thompson

--
|  James E.Thompson, P.E.                           |    mens     |
|  Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
|  Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
|  Phoenix, Arizona            Voice:(480)460-2350  |             |
|  E-mail Address at Website     Fax:(480)460-2142  |  Brass Rat  |
|       http://www.analog-innovations.com           |    1962     |
             
         America: Land of the Free, Because of the Brave

Lick her is quicker still.