Only bad until you're not so bad. Not that it's worth getting into, mind you. Just that math is not a super power.Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
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Only bad until you're not so bad. Not that it's worth getting into, mind you. Just that math is not a super power.Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
You're right. I lived a self-fulfilling prophecy when it came to things like that. One of my biggest regrets is not thinking more of myself when it came to athletics and the maths and sciences. I could've been good, I just needed to work really hard, and I didn't want to do that. I found literature and music more enjoyable, and they came more easily to me, so that was my comfort zone. And I was a self-congratulating slacker.Quote:
Originally Posted by a500lbgorilla
Then again I'm 24 so they don't really need to be "big regrets."
I've entertained the notion before of having some kind of mathematical side project, slowly working myself up to calculus over a period of years, lol. I dunno.
Saying something is valid, or important, or "correct" because it's used by string theorists is glorifying string theory into something useful, which it's not (yet... but it's been decades with no results). Also, the brilliant people who've dedicated their careers to string theory are not infallible.
Nonetheless, these counter-intuitive results are confirmed from multiple approaches, so there's no need to invoke the magic of string theory.
Calculus could be taught to 8 year olds. It's really not hard. It's just one step past arithmetic. Sure, there's algebra, but that's not strictly needed for calculus. So... if you can understand the basic concepts of algebra, then you can understand the basic concepts of calculus.Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
Here's calculus:
There's some bowl, with a very funny shape, and we want to determine the volume. Unfortunately, we can't use liquids, only solid blocks. If we use a small number of large blocks, we count the blocks and multiply by the known volume of each block. As we use smaller and smaller blocks, we can fit more and more of them in the bowl. As we fit more and more of them in the bowl, we more adequately fill in the little funny nooks and crannies in the bowl's shape. If we could use smaller and smaller blocks, without restraint, then we could ultimately know the volume of the bowl exactly.
That's calculus. Finding the volume (or area or ...) if you could measure only with crude shapes. The advantage of the crude shapes is that they have a volume (or area ...) which is known exactly. The disadvantage is that they don't fit well. To overcome the disadvantage, we assume that we can make the blocks "infinitely small".
calculus
"calculus" means "stone" and literally means the counting of stones, as in the counting of tiny stones to fill a building.
Something that I was going to post anyway but that happens to follow science/math posts (even randomness should appear to have order, sometimes)
Are perpetual motions machines possible in a universe with different physical laws than our own?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lukie
If baseball were rugby, could the the fire department win the space race?
Excelsior!Quote:
Originally Posted by boost
Technically, if baseball were rugby then the fire department already won the space race.Quote:
Originally Posted by boost
nes, yo, maybe hoQuote:
Originally Posted by boost
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lukie
I guess that says it all without actually saying it.Quote:
Originally Posted by boost
As long as you're throwing out physical law as we know it, then anything's possible.
It's the conservation laws that trip this up in our universe. Entropy doesn't really help, but from a QM point of view, entropy doesn't exist. As long as mass-energy can neither be created nor destroyed, then a device that produces energy (or mass) output with no energy (or mass) input can not run forever.
There must be a fuel that burns. The energy you wish to extract from the machine must come from somewhere. It can not be created by the machine.
I know that the bit about the energy having to come from somewhere. There was more implied in the question itself though. It seems to be a more growing consensus that there is more than one universe (correct me if I'm wrong) and perhaps the more pressing implication of that is that should those universes have the same physical laws as our own? Do they have to? Why or why not? What would the universe be like if light traveled at 1 mile per hour and all that affects?
Seems kinda relevant
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-26151062
It seems to me that either these "other universes" can be observed, and the physical laws that hold there are the physical laws that hold here... OR they cannot be observed and there is no intelligent prediction to be made about the nature of physical laws there.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lukie
In the first case, even if it were discovered that something contradictory with our current theory was going on, then the theory would be amended to include the new observations. Anything which can be observed is under the purview of physical law, if a physical law is shown to be incorrect, then it is discarded from the canon of law.
By this hand-waving, I declare that any universe we will encounter will share the same physical laws are this universe we know today.
EDIT: accepting that our current understanding of the laws may be laughably foolish and mostly wrong.
Probably because clean equations are just easier. You'll get your ire up chewing through an unnecessarily unintelligible one.Quote:
Originally Posted by rong
Is the universe a perpetual motion machine?
It's a marble.
This seems like as good of an explanation as any.Quote:
Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey
I feel very snarky and old today. All i want to do is get d0zer on skype and berate him for playing digital card games.
lol wife's in bed soon bud! go download hearthstone while yer waiting!
you know what that means. it time fo some BATTLE SEX.Quote:
Originally Posted by d0zer
or wait maybe i'm confusing that with something else. the girl is conscious during battle sex, right? isn't there another one where she's unconscious and the goal is to try and finish before she awakes?
im pretty goddamn sure any time dozer has sex there's a battle going on
even if only in my mind, yes
Fuck! I forgot Valentine's day. Not going down well.
Ouch :(Quote:
Originally Posted by rong
I was in Tesco last night and they had basically made a huge display right at the front of the store for wine, flowers, chocolates. Loads of half panicked guys milling around it lol
I figure at least I can get stuff for half price today.
False economy, you have to buy more because you forgotQuote:
Originally Posted by rong
http://www.treehugger.com/culture/wh...tines-day.html
"If you thought slavery had ended, think again. In Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, children are often kidnapped from neighbouring Mali and Burkina Faso in order to provide slave labour on cocoa plantations. In Bitter Chocolate, journalist Carol Off describes the conditions in which these child slaves work:
“The farmers were working the young people almost to death. The boys had little to eat, slept in bunkhouses that were locked during the night, and were frequently beaten. They had horrible sores on their backs and shoulders… Farmers were paying organized groups of smugglers to deliver the children to their cocoa groves, while police were being bribed to look the other way.”
These children are responsible for climbing cocoa trees, cutting down bean pods, and chopping them open with machetes, which leads to inevitable accidents. They are exposed to hazardous pesticides that they spray without protective equipment. They are fed corn paste and bananas, the cheapest food available, and they’re not paid.
When one former child slave was asked what he’d stay to chocolate-eating Westerners, he answered, “When people eat chocolate, they are eating my flesh.”"
This will not stop me eating chocolate. Sorry.Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
The £25 of chocolate I just bought tells me you're right.Quote:
Originally Posted by Luco
Not all chocolate. You can buy fair trade chocolate. Might be a bit pricier but I think it's worth it, if it's within your means.Quote:
Originally Posted by Luco
You have already solved your own problem. Go down well, and the day will be saved.Quote:
Originally Posted by rong
btw, I worked in a large grocery store many moons ago, and one of my favourite annual events was the flocking to the greeting card aisle on the morning of Feb. 14 every year. The crowd was obviously 98% male.
I think the 25 quid of chocolate saved it all by itself.
Galapogos yet again proves why he is the king
I got mine wine and chocolate and she got me wine and chocolate.Quote:
Originally Posted by Galapogos
Yeah, it's fun thinking about this stuff-- like if the physical laws were only slightly altered, it's easy to imagine how insanely different the universe would be. As a parallel, look at predictions of what alien life might look like on planets with different atmospheres, levels of gravity, etc. Or you can take the guess work out of it and look at animals which are at home in the extreme deep sea. Changing the physical laws in the slightest would surely have a butterfly effect.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lukie
^ agreed
I just made a ham bone and navy bean soup. Ham bone came from a precooked 9-10 lb ham I had a while back which I baked in the oven, mangled it in all sorts of different ways (i.e. attempted to cut it up), and froze a fairly meaty ham bone for a while in the fridge.
Today I added to my crock pot: Said ham bone, a diced onion, a few diced carrots, a few diced celery stalks, navy beans (1lb. dry that soaked in water overnight), a small amount of sea salt, parsley flakes, garlic powder (I forgot to add the real stuff in the beginning, so I put this in a little later), and several cups of water.
It cooked on low for 8 hours or so, I took the bone out, put whatever was left of the good meat back in, pureed a few cups of the soup in the blender, and poured it back into the crock pot.
It is really good.
Sounds awesome. Only suggestion would be: in the future don't salt legumes until they are done cooking. Depending on the bean it can make a huge difference in texture.
Just watched "House of Cards" Season 2 Ep 1.
Def. a good episode. Loved the last seconds.
How does that affect the texture of the beans? Mostly in general but also for this recipe, considering there will be a good amount of sodium because of the ham/ham bone anyway. I didn't put much extra salt in for that reason.Quote:
Originally Posted by boost
But yeah it turned out really well, I just had a bowl and am kind of blown away by how flavorful it is.
gordon ramsey told me not to salt my scrambled eggs until they're done cooking. But meats you salt before searing, so what's the theory there? Are there any generalizations about salting foods before/during/after cooking?Quote:
Originally Posted by boost
Yeah, beans are great man! Like potatoes, they are a really nutrient dense food, and are cheap cheap cheap.
I can't explain the exact chemistry behind the early salting on legumes have undesired effects, but I know it's true. It seems to vary by bean, but it can make them never get fully tender, and/or make them split and shed their husks, leaving a pot of empty skins and mush. The latter isn't a problem if you're planning to puree anyways, I guess, but the former can ruin a whole pot a beans.
Interesting, I have read stuff to that effect before. Just to be clear, I only pureed a small portion of the soup (perhaps a quarter of it), but the beans that remained still had what seemed like perfectly good texture.
I don't know the chemistry, but I think the general advice is to add the salt last, because a tiny amount of salt right on your tongue is equivalent in intensity to a much higher amount of salt dissolved into the dish.
I'm not convinced that salt is bad for you, but if you have a reason to limit salt, then leaving it out until the end significantly reduces the amount you use, while giving the same flavor.
Generally the advice is to add salt early in the cooking process, as it helps to intensify and develop other flavors. Maybe Boost can comment more on that.
Also people have their own preconceived notions and like to label various nutrients as good or bad, salt is one that often gets labeled as bad, but it is a lot more complicated than that.
Might be relevant (I say might because I only read a few paragraphs and got too damn bored): http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK50958/
So then we can also do this:Quote:
Originally Posted by a500lbgorilla
X = 10 - 10 + 10 - 10 + ..
+ X = +10 - 10 + 10 - ..
2X = 10
X=5
or X = any number you want.
Which is consistent with the idea?
Yes, that means you get it... as long as you recognize that thisQuote:
Originally Posted by jackvance
1 - 1 + 1 - 1 + ....
is totally different than this
10 - 10 + 10 - 10 + ...
and is also quite different than this
1 - 1 + 0 + 1 - 1 + 0 + ...
Adding a finite number of zeros doesn't change the sum, but adding an infinite number of zeros in a recurring way changes the sum of the infinite series.
Last night I tried out those sticky strips that you put on your nose to open up your airways as you sleep.
It was amazing!
I didn't realise I had issues breathing through my nose when I was laying down until I heard someone else speak about it, but apparently it's really common to have things like one nostril shutting off when you lay on your side and various other little things that effect your breathing and htese strips solve those issues. It's a noticeable difference in how I breath and I have a much better nights sleep.
Not that sexy though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LGEiIL1__s
These guys have lots more awesome skits.
i'm going to take the liberty of speaking for wufwugy and say that this is one of our personal favorite key and peeles: http://www.comedycentral.com/video-c...s---uncensored
Duh, yeah. Unless you believe that it had a beginning, which implies it has an end.Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
So... you're saying that there is no objective reality, and whatever is believed serves as the structure of the universe?Quote:
Originally Posted by OngBonga
So that if I believe that there was a beginning, then there was a beginning; if you believe there was no beginning, then there was no beginning - and therefore, all evidence to the contrary, you and I don't live in the same universe? Because we believe different things? ... and belief is reality?
Would any 2 people share any experience if all experiences are based on belief, and not some underlying something?
Does that actually make sense to anyone?
No.
Actually yes, but the way you worded it was kind of confusing, and I couldn't resist such a simple punch line (there I had to go and ruin it.)
I originally posted this in the poker quotes thread a couple minutes ago, then deleted it since it didn't really fit there. But since it's on my clipboard now, it needs to go somewhere.
---
I really wish I had some of my old chat transcripts. I'm not sure which I derived more satisfaction from:
a) Making a donk/overly aggressive play, sucking out on some reg who played solidly and in response to getting called out, proceed to talk like a fish would talking about wanting to gamble, bad but reasonably believable poker strategies, law of averages/gambler's fallacy (making it sound like I believed in it, etc.)
or
b) Getting into it with fish lol. There is a certain art to doing it. You don't want to berate them such that they leave or play better. It's more about pissing them off, making them WANT to fight back against you. Saying "you should fold K5s out of position to a 3-bet, you fish" is an example of something not to say. "wow you are the worst player in the history of poker" is a bit more constructive and effective (for our purposes.)
so for valentines day i made homemade pasta, stuffed it with sauteed mushrooms, ricotta cheese, and some herbs. topped it with homemade sauce. it was god damn fucking tasty.
also constructed a cake pan out of tin-foil in the shape of a heart to make a cake in. it worked. it was also tasty. boyfran has taken some leftovers with him to work, and is bragging about my cooking. he took some homemade chicken noodle soup i made and one of the guys was like oh that's that homemade soup, and boyfran was like, yeah i dont eat that canned shit.
i feel proud. god damn i'm domestic as shit.
NOBODY SPEAKS FOR ME!Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
but yes, goat sketch is goat
A little. Everyone has their own reality. Most realities are pretty close to one another thanks to the immutable reality we all share. We can build a systematic way to describe reality that gives us all an even greater opportunity to calibrate our realities. And that shit is science, praise it.Quote:
Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey
Edit: For questions outside of the 'scale' of human life, it really doesn't matter how far our realities stray, imo. So if ong wants to believe in the perpetual motion of the universe, let the little fucker.
I need to get out more. Apparently the world got awesome sometime recently.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58-atNakMWw
I was waiting for the big one to fuck them up. I am disappoint.
The Liam Neesons thing isn't really funny. American humour I guess. The goats though...
We just like the absurd silliness of it, especially with the physical comedy... not sure if it's particularly American or not, I dunno.Quote:
Originally Posted by rong
I tend to prefer British comedy over American.
(oh and yeah, the goats video Rilla posted is amazing. I dutifully posted it to my facebook moments after like the pod person I am.)
brits don't like exaggeration. it's more about extreme dryness and deprecation
yep, i like my comedy dry n' droll
Not really.Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
This is silly and funny
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXHaCEhOiWU
also silly and funny. i love "good neighbor stuff." (this has a louis ck-esque silliness to it)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eq3IWp3gzHU&list=UU0vSB46MmHTwwxQrAo62Dgg& feature=c4-overview
This is kinda cool
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8k2AbqTBxao
big really. ur avatar in pointQuote:
Originally Posted by ImSavy
im partially joking. there's all sorts of exaggeration in brit humor. it tends to be laced more with subtlety and dryness though, and usually some sort of deprecation (or at least that's what steve fry says. you have to listen to him, he's basically ur emissary, unless you want that to be piers morgan, which im sure you dont). we 'muricans like 'in your face things' more
explains your heresy in not liking fireflyQuote:
Originally Posted by rong
I hate firefly!
that was a super interesting video rong, thanks. kinda supports my taste for british humor and my undying love for larry david.
my best friend hates firefly too. my impressionable mind doesn't know what to do with the contradictory sentiments - it might explode if i try to watch it.
Exploding would be preferable to watching.
I just spent half an hour watching youtube vids of random American teens trying British chocolate bars/crisps/biscuits/sweets and rating them. I have no idea why but once I started I couldn't stop. Results were mixed.
Even our hiphop is infused with our humour.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDWgtB_MD24
According to wikipedia that's a UK rap anthem. I saw him perform this live at a festival, crown went mental.
Firefly's appeal is to the American heartland. Sentiments like "the only code that matters is the code of honor" and "the only person you can rely on is yourself" are deeply embedded in westward expansion. It doesn't surprise me that people from Europe or major east coast cities may not find appeal in Firefly. It's gunslinging in space, where the only people that matter are the people under your protection. In Montana, everybody owns a gun; in Britain, nobody does. Firefly appeals to the former, not necessarily the latter
I think engaging dialogue and character interactions will usually win people over, regardless of underlying sentiments and moral codes.
Yeah that's much more spot on.Quote:
Originally Posted by wufwugy
Although clearly my sense of humour is even too dry for British people because my last post was a hilarious joke.
I've also clearly spent too much time watching Lee & Herring.
lol the dialogue is beyond awful and the characters are ridiculous. You need to see it. I didn't get past the first episode, maybe it gets better.Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
But never mind this firefly rubbish. What do you yanks make of witness the fitness? Tis awesome, no?
Well, Firefly has more of that than just about any show. Pound for pound, it's char dev and dialogue are possibly the bestQuote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
Also, dialogue is overrated. It's the easiest thing to write. The only shows with bad dialogue are truly bad shows. The hard stuff is a streamlined and engaging plot in a unique setting with empathic and dynamic characters. Good dialogue is mainly about avoiding over-thinking it
Holy fuck! At 1 minute 26 seconds the guy on the tv screen on the left looks like my doppelgänger. That's kinda freaking me out a little bit because that could actually be me from 5 years ago when I had longer hair. In fact I think it is me!Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
It's supposed to be primitivistic, somewhat campy, and not up its own ass.Quote:
Originally Posted by rong
As much as we love dialogue in shows like Wire and True Detective, that shit isn't realistic at all. Firefly isn't devoid of its lack of realism with the dialogue, but it does purposely spend more time being less than perfect
Example:Quote:
Originally Posted by rong
http://i60.tinypic.com/2gspld2.jpg
http://i57.tinypic.com/eqxmdh.png
Not the best example, but still....
Firefly is American cowboys in space. It pays constant homage to classic American Cowboy films and TV shows. If you are not more than slightly familiar with that era and style of story, then you will simply miss most of what the show is about. Maybe not what it's about, but what it's referring to, and what it's re-creating in the modern context.
I'm sure you can appreciate the corny, sci-fi-ness of the show as it's own genre.
I never got into it. If it went on for longer, I'd be interested in watching it, though. I just don't feel like single season shows are generally worth watching. It'd be like reading the first third of a book, only to find that the rest was never written.
you need a mullet
I understand the feeling. Firefly is a little bittersweet here, but because the staff knew every episode could be its last, they ended up getting way more done than other shows do in one seasonQuote:
Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey
It's my personal favorite and I've watched it three times
Are you the kind of guy who needs those text descriptions about the futures of the characters at the end of a movie?Quote:
Originally Posted by MadMojoMonkey
Also, Serenity.
No. But... it was probably an old John Cusack movie, so I'd read them for nostalgia's sake.Quote:
Originally Posted by BennyLaRue
this will be the best video you see today.
Firefly is unconditionally awesome.
I thought Firefly was a good, strong show. I can't put it in GOAT tier and I thought the movie was not all that great. I'd watch the series again though.
according to my friend there is a smugness to his writing, like "it already knows it's witty," and he writes in tropes and his characters are all the same. maybe that's an element of what's rubbing you guys the wrong way about firefly, i dunno.
i really liked cabin in the woods and i've enjoyed the random buffy episodes i've seen here and there, so my opinion of him isn't as strong, but that's pretty much how i feel about diablo cody. even though i enjoyed juno and it was legitimately funny at times, it was also really insufferable because of that smugness in the writing. when i can hear the writer prioritizing their own snark above all else it drives me crazy.
also rong holy shit lol, no kidding.. you really do look like him in that picture.
Genius!Quote:
.... when i can hear the writer prioritizing their own snark above all else .....
Agree with rong, that's an excellent turn of phrase.Quote:
Originally Posted by aubreymcfate
I immediately thought of Kevin Smith when I read that... I bet you hate his movies... or am I reading it wrong?