This gets rated 5??!! This posting is so full of nonsense and inaccuracy that it's not even worth replying to. Short message : disregard everything said here, it's all wrong. There is plenty of real information on the net about Japanese orthography - if you're really interested (and it is a fascinating writing system). Omniglot.com might be a good place to start.
For clarity's sake, I am a feminist in the "I believe in equal rights" way, not the "I believe in special treatment" way.
So what does a man who believes in equal rights call himself then? The feminist tag is problematic in itself, as it creates a divide between the genders rather than uniting all people (male, female, transgender) who believe in equal rights regardless of gender.
I found Rosemary Sassoon's Teach yourself better handwriting very useful. It is specifically targeted at ppl who are trying to fix up their handwriting and not at child first time learners. Rosemary states in the book that very different approaches are required for these two different pedagogical needs.
An interesting part of the book is where Rosemary addresses pen-grips and suggests a rather radical option of holding the pen between index and middle finger. I've switched over to this and enjoy it as I never felt comfortable with the oppositionary tension between index and thumb of the standard grip.
Here is an addall link to the book (2nd edition) so you can compare prices.
Here is a link to the book (1st edition - the one I used) on Amazon so you can check the reader reviews
Here is a link to the publisher's page on the book (2nd edition)
Here is a link to some information about the author Rosemary Sasson
John Gray, author of Straw Dogs, one of the best books you could read this year, suggests that the Latin alphabet, with its complete abstraction from physical objects, has been the basis of western philosophical models, mainly to the detriment of our view of the world. He suggests that Chinese iconography, in contrast, helped the establishment of a worldview in which humans played less of a central role.
Firstly, spare us the gratuitous superlatives, such as 'one of the best books...'.
Secondly, this John Gray appears to be spouting off about Chinese orthography with out any real knowledge of it, and is thus exposed as a fool. Chinese orthography is simply not 'iconographic' and thus the whole basis of his argument is erroneous.
dvdeug has already posted a good rebuttal to your posting. For some more complete rebuttals of this chinese 'iconographic' myth that you are helping to perpetuate see : Ideographic Myth and Difficult Characters
Well, IANASA (stock analyst) but after the release of their last quarterly results, you can observe how MSFT has diverged significantly from the NASDAQ index. Perhaps this indicates that people are starting to worry?
Watch Grave of the Fireflies and tell me that anime not a serious artistic medium. After you stop crying your eyes out.
I went out of my way to watch Grave of the Fireflies and I found it sentimental kitsch that left my eyes completely dry. I also found the animation style more about showing off technical skill than artistic expression. For the record, Akira also left me completely unimpressed. I did, however, enjoy both Spirited Away and Ghost in the Shell
So in summary, yes I agree with the argument that anime is a medium not a genre. And successful expression in any medium requires a story and insgiht into the human condition. Fireflies had neither I think.
"I have not seen anything like it in my entire career as a solar physicist. The probability of this happening is so low that it is a statistical anomaly."
If this has been reported correctly it seems a fairly unprofessional thing to say. Does he really have enough data after 30 or so years to calculate the probability of this happening?
Imagine a group called the Society for Appreciation of Large Numbers.
They have a website. Members of the Society list their favourite large numbers and the reason why they like this number.
Some of these numbers are quite large, i.e. about the same size as the binary number produced when a 3 minute song is encoded as a FLAC file.
Some members post their favourite numbers along with comments like : "this number reminds me of the song Novacane by Beck".
Would this be illegal? After all, even if this number actually sounds distinctly like Beck's song Novacane when treated as a FLAC audio file, it is still just a (large) number.
The parent comment demonstrates the common paucity of hard knowledge about chinese orthography. A book which sets out to debunk most of the myths about chinese characters is:
The Chinese Language: Fact and Fantasy by John DeFrancis
John DeFrancis is emeritus professor of Chines at the University of Hawai`i.
...and used to be in english which is why we have vestigial 'k' retained in the spelling of some english words, perhaps the most obvious being 'knight' which used to be pronounced k - ni - cht (the 'ch' exactly the same as at the end of Bach and loch i.e. a devoiced velar sibilant)
Since that time (old english to early middle english) english phonology has lost intial 'k' in words and also the velar fricative - modern german however still retains them
moral of the story - english spelling was actually pretty logical back in the day when it was transcribing the pronunciation of that time
I also have used the brain and found it interesting.
Big downsides however are:
1. It is not free software. 2. It uses a proprietary data format, which remains unpublished. This means that your data is locked up and only accesible through the proprietary software it was created under.
These two points constitute a contract I am not willing to accept and thus I do not use nor would I recommend this product.
yup - submitters are the lifeblood of slashdot yet they are treated like shit by the editors
this could be rectified if the submission process was opened up as a transparent process (i.e. submission queue viewable by regular readers) but this proposal has been repeatedly rejected - it's hard not to see it as anything but a power play
Every base is isomorphic (can be represented in) to every other base.
Bullshit. One third can be represented exactly in a ternary base (i.e. 1 * (3 ^ -1)). Please show me how one third can be exactly represented in a binary base.
Go to Marks and Spencer and buy a packet of Earl Grey tea.
starting to lose me here - Earl Grey is the insipid-as-hell tea preferred by 9 out of 10 feckless tea-poseurs.
Put a couple (or three, depending on the size of the pot) of tea bags into the pot.
tea bags??!! ok, lost me completely now
-and stuff asking the English on how to make tea, or even buying English (packaged, not grown) tea - the best tea comes from the country that invented it - China of course (good quality tea is also produced by Japan and Taiwan)
Real quality Chinese tea, mostly of the green or oolong variety, is a revelation. It will cost you a fair bit more than grotty tea-bags made with black tea dust and various synthetic flavourings but it is actually very good value for money compared to other connoisseur products such as fine wine or good whisky.
If you're interested here's a site (one of many) to clue you in.
I guess one difference is that it has a long history, since it was first distributed in 1991. In those days nobody talked about "open source", and Richard Stallman [founder of the Free Software Foundation] wasn't very well known and the GNU General Public License didn't exist.
parent poster (Slothrup) :
WTF? The GPL didn't exist in 1991? I guess I was hallucinating when I was using GNU Emacs and GCC in the 80s.
Yes, I was also surprised at this large factual error.
Earlier forms of Copyleft licenses also existed from before 1989. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985 and has of course always released its work as 'Free Software'.
p.s. Slothrup, I suggest evening tea at Miss Quoad's would be a suitable punishment for van Rossum's inaccuracy. As a man who named his language after an English comedy group, I'm sure he has the required sensibility to appreciate the full horror of this particular engagement.
Slashdot Mirror
This gets rated 5??!! This posting is so full of nonsense and inaccuracy that it's not even worth replying to. Short message : disregard everything said here, it's all wrong. There is plenty of real information on the net about Japanese orthography - if you're really interested (and it is a fascinating writing system). Omniglot.com might be a good place to start.
So what does a man who believes in equal rights call himself then? The feminist tag is problematic in itself, as it creates a divide between the genders rather than uniting all people (male, female, transgender) who believe in equal rights regardless of gender.
offtopic
Intrigued by this word I went and googled it. First, it is actually spelt Autopoiesis.
There's a lot of stuff on the web about it. This page seems to have a good overview on the theory. It includes this tutorial.
The tutorial contains two quotes that seem to sum up the foundation of the theory, viz.
"Everything said is said by an observer."
"All knowing is doing, and all doing is knowing."
I found Rosemary Sassoon's Teach yourself better handwriting very useful. It is specifically targeted at ppl who are trying to fix up their handwriting and not at child first time learners. Rosemary states in the book that very different approaches are required for these two different pedagogical needs.
An interesting part of the book is where Rosemary addresses pen-grips and suggests a rather radical option of holding the pen between index and middle finger. I've switched over to this and enjoy it as I never felt comfortable with the oppositionary tension between index and thumb of the standard grip.
Here is an addall link to the book (2nd edition) so you can compare prices.
Here is a link to the book (1st edition - the one I used) on Amazon so you can check the reader reviewsHere is a link to the publisher's page on the book (2nd edition)
Here is a link to some information about the author Rosemary Sasson
Firstly, spare us the gratuitous superlatives, such as 'one of the best books...'.
Secondly, this John Gray appears to be spouting off about Chinese orthography with out any real knowledge of it, and is thus exposed as a fool. Chinese orthography is simply not 'iconographic' and thus the whole basis of his argument is erroneous.
dvdeug has already posted a good rebuttal to your posting. For some more complete rebuttals of this chinese 'iconographic' myth that you are helping to perpetuate see : Ideographic Myth and Difficult Characters
Well, IANASA (stock analyst) but after the release of their last quarterly results,
you can observe how MSFT has diverged significantly from the NASDAQ index.
Perhaps this indicates that people are starting to worry?
observe how microsoft's stock has significantly diverged from the nasdaq index
since they reported their last quarter results
Watch Grave of the Fireflies and tell me that anime not a serious artistic medium. After you stop crying your eyes out.
I went out of my way to watch Grave of the Fireflies and I found it sentimental kitsch that left my eyes completely dry. I also found the animation style more about showing off technical skill than artistic expression. For the record, Akira also left me completely unimpressed. I did, however, enjoy both Spirited Away and Ghost in the Shell
So in summary, yes I agree with the argument that anime is a medium not a genre. And successful expression in any medium requires a story and insgiht into the human condition. Fireflies had neither I think.
"I have not seen anything like it in my entire career as a solar physicist. The probability of this happening is so low that it is a statistical anomaly."
If this has been reported correctly it seems a fairly unprofessional thing to say. Does he really have enough data after 30 or so years to calculate the probability of this happening?
Parent comment is either a troll or astroturfing.
Imagine a group called the Society for Appreciation of Large Numbers.
They have a website. Members of the Society list their favourite large numbers and the reason why they like this number.
Some of these numbers are quite large, i.e. about the same size as the binary number produced when a 3 minute song is encoded as a FLAC file.
Some members post their favourite numbers along with comments like : "this number reminds me of the song Novacane by Beck".
Would this be illegal? After all, even if this number actually sounds distinctly like Beck's song Novacane when treated as a FLAC audio file, it is still just a (large) number.
The parent comment demonstrates the common paucity of hard knowledge about chinese orthography. A book which sets out to debunk most of the myths about chinese characters is :
:
The Chinese Language
Fact and Fantasy
by John DeFrancis
John DeFrancis is emeritus professor of Chines at the University of Hawai`i.
sorry - devoiced velar fricative
Unlike English, the k in kn is pronounced.
...and used to be in english which is why we have vestigial 'k' retained in the spelling of some english words, perhaps the most obvious being 'knight' which used to be pronounced k - ni - cht (the 'ch' exactly the same as at the end of Bach and loch i.e. a devoiced velar sibilant)
Since that time (old english to early middle english) english phonology has lost intial 'k' in words and also the velar fricative - modern german however still retains them
moral of the story - english spelling was actually pretty logical back in the day when it was transcribing the pronunciation of that time
its inutility was the source of his sobs and curses and rage and despair
inutility? bleh!
Agreed. Nicely put.
I also have used the brain and found it interesting.
:
Big downsides however are
1. It is not free software.
2. It uses a proprietary data format, which remains unpublished. This means that your data is locked up and only accesible through the proprietary software it was created under.
These two points constitute a contract I am not willing to accept and thus I do not use nor would I recommend this product.
yup - submitters are the lifeblood of slashdot yet they are treated like shit by the editors
this could be rectified if the submission process was opened up as a transparent process (i.e. submission queue viewable by regular readers) but this proposal has been repeatedly rejected - it's hard not to see it as anything but a power play
1. It's the birth place of media tyrant Rupert Murdoch (and still where News Corp holds its AGM).
2. It's one of the few cities that exist in a timezone which is fractional - i.e. Adelaide time is nine and a half hours in front of Greenwich time.
Every base is isomorphic (can be represented in) to every other base.
Bullshit. One third can be represented exactly in a ternary base (i.e. 1 * (3 ^ -1)). Please show me how one third can be exactly represented in a binary base.
Go to Marks and Spencer and buy a packet of Earl Grey tea.
starting to lose me here - Earl Grey is the insipid-as-hell tea preferred by 9 out of 10 feckless tea-poseurs.
Put a couple (or three, depending on the size of the pot) of tea bags into the pot.
tea bags??!! ok, lost me completely now
-and stuff asking the English on how to make tea, or even buying English (packaged, not grown) tea - the best tea comes from the country that invented it - China of course (good quality tea is also produced by Japan and Taiwan)
Real quality Chinese tea, mostly of the green or oolong variety, is a revelation. It will cost you a fair bit more than grotty tea-bags made with black tea dust and various synthetic flavourings but it is actually very good value for money compared to other connoisseur products such as fine wine or good whisky.
If you're interested here's a site (one of many) to clue you in.
van Rossum :
parent poster (Slothrup) :
Yes, I was also surprised at this large factual error.
GPL Version 2 : June 1991
GPL Version 1 : February 1989
Earlier forms of Copyleft licenses also existed from before 1989. The Free Software Foundation was founded in 1985 and has of course always released its work as 'Free Software'.
p.s. Slothrup, I suggest evening tea at Miss Quoad's would be a suitable punishment for van Rossum's inaccuracy. As a man who named his language after an English comedy group, I'm sure he has the required sensibility to appreciate the full horror of this particular engagement.
Wired Story on Burt Rutan and the White Knight/Space Ship One aircraft/spacecraft can be found here
two of my fave criss-cross words together in a heading
:
united ~~ untied
nuclear ~~ unclear
other criss-cross words
marital ~~ martial
parrot ~~ raptor
cocaine ~~ oceanic
leader ~~ dealer
well argued post, thanks for taking the time to write it