Thanks for explaining that to me. It probably was two down votes in Main, as it showed up as ten points gone, and then another ten points gone shortly there after.

Some people voted this up, others down- currently it's at -1. Somehow, though, I ended up with 22 less karma points then before I posted it and it was my first post in months. Initially I mistakenly posted it to "General" instead of "Discussion". I moved it as soon as it was pointed out to me, at which point it had -1. I'm not upset, I have a thick skin, but I'm curious about how and why I lost 20 other karma points. Perhaps many people had already downloaded it when it was posted to "general" and voted it down? Either that, or one or more people went through my very old comments and posts down voting.

Sorry about the link being to a pay site, I still thought it was an interesting finding. I posted it without a discussion because I thought the abstract spoke for itself. Also, I've been told that I shouldn't write a summary of what I link to.

Sounds brilliant to me. :)

It's a state, not a country, obviously- but until recently New Hampshire had not sale or income tax. The government was funded almost exclusively by real estate taxes and government run liquor stores.

I think watching people taking acting lessons must be a very good way to learn how to read others. Unfortunately, it's not something that's very convenient for most people to do. I think focusing in on the facial expressions and body language of good actresses and actors while watching movies, t.v., etc. would help, too.

I'm atypical of people on this board, as some of you might know. I found it through my son, who fits the demographics much more. I'm a clinical social worker/ child therapist- thus my name "play therapist". What I didn't see mentioned, which I think is probably a more common problem than people not using the right body language to convey what they mean to, is not picking up on the body language, tone of facial expressions and tone of voice of people you are speaking to. I don't have any easy answers about how to learn to read them, it's something that is intuitive for most people. If you can learn to read people that way, though, it will be a huge help in social interactions. For example, when you say something and there is no response, there will usually be non-verbal cues as to whether you were heard.

Employee compensation generally includes more than just salary- there's the cost of the employers share of social security, health insurance and any other benefits. If these are included in the figures listed, then the employees salaries are considerably less. If the Singularity Institute isn't providing health insurance, than buying individual policies is a major expense for the employees. The Bay Area is also one of the most expensive places to live in the U.S.

In case you didn't figure it out, I thought you were making a joke. As Jimmy pointed out, I don't see "parent", because I look at his history and don't read the sequences. I have been corrected.

No, Alicorn. "Spy on son."

Often I'll see that someone made a comment in response to what someone said as part of a discussion. If there's an easy way to see what specifically they are responding to, without searching through the entire discussion, I haven't found it. I know that one can also click on the name of the person being responded to, but if that person does a lot of posting, it can also be difficult to find that comment. A feature whereby one could click some where and be taken to the comment being responded to, in the context of the discussion would be helpful.