30 May 2013 (Thursday) - Operant Conditioning

I woke shortly after 4am this morning and lay awake listening to the sound of the rain on the window. After an hour or so I realised that I'd been stroking Fudge whilst laying in bed listening to the rain. When did he sneak upstairs?

I came downstairs to find the batch of beer I'd set off yesterday was bubbling nicely. Hopefully it will do the trick for Brighton Kite Festival. Over a spot of brekkie I watched one of my psychology lectures. Today we touched on operant conditioning . It sounds dull, but is actually quite interesting. There's an example of conditioned learning in action here which demonstrates the point quite nicely.

The radio made for interesting listening as I drove to work. It featured an article about how the government plans to combat childhood obesity by making it illegal for a fast food outlet to be open before 5pm if it is within four hundred yards of a school. An novel concept which should put more than a few people out of work.

Ironically the spokesman from the National Obesity Forum who was being interviewed rejoiced in the name of "Mr Fry".

I got to work and then realised I'd left my phone at home. I then felt rather lost for much of the day. Whilst I rarely use it to make calls or to send text messages, my phone is also my camera and my book. I didn't realise how much I use the Kindle app until I didn't have the phone with me. This made for dull tea breaks at work. But I made the most of it, did my bit and came home again. As I drove there was a program on the radio about how accident and emergency departments are in crisis. It always boils my piss that people in hospitals do the best that they can only to be taken as easy targets for a media looking to stir trouble...