Of the public schools I have worked in, in two states, their video libraries consisted of 90% VHS tapes.
Some valuable teaching tools (videos) are going to be really difficult to find on DVD, and a lot of them just won't be found.
I am not saying VHS should stick around, but as the format dies there will be a somewhat substantial loss.
I don't want to write an epic rely here, but you really ought to go into older high school's libraries to see what I'm talking about. Even if they have the tapes (which wear out eventually), not having VHS players that work is going to be an issue.
I still believe that 'dark matter' is only a temporary constant inserted into an equation modern scientists don't truly understand.
In time they will discover what is causing the effects of this 'dark matter' - it will not be super strange matter, nor another form of matter, but will be either a change in the overall calculations of our universe's energy or it will be some type of substance that was not accounted for.
Theorists throw in some offbeat number to the calculation every 30 years or so to account for what they just can't figure out.
What they're missing is that the best soldiers, under tough situations, have a LOT going on in their heads, AND are doing their best to sum up what they want by commands and hand signals.
Training soldiers to think in short thoughts will invariably cross-over into actual thought patterns that will reduce soldiers' creativity, adjustability and preparation for future events.
You can see the effects, now, of how the Army trains vs. how young soldiers actually think when they come out of Basic and AI training - the world is all black and white. From my family's experience, Reserve units are often more flexible in the field and do better at war games because they can think on their feet.
Robotizing our forces' thinking, even unintentionally, is a serious step that they ought to fully consider.
How about some sensor in a glove or on the weapons' grips that would pick up finger pressures and send those out as hand-signals instead? With an on/off momentary switch of some kind, signals would be sent when the soldier wanted them to be, and not when he was merely gripping differently.
I'm sure they used weather forecasting, but a micro-cell in a warm, water-rich state is going to spring up now and again; Then where are ya with a 40-ton load?
As a high-school teacher I just don't know where I stand on this issue. I have taught kids who do learn, and progress, in my class that really did have some sort of problem, and were quite behind the rest of the class. Nonetheless, with my help they refined, and improved upon, what they gave me - and all I know is that I don't have a crystal ball, so I really don't know where their progress will end.
On the other side of the spectrum are the ones born who really are borderline retarded (and I'm serious in using that term, even though it's not really correct). I feel bad for them, but at the risk of having some students in my classes learn absolutely nothing, I have to leave these 'included' students behind in daily conversation. I can do my best for them in other areas, but it just becomes an exercise in babysitting if the sole leader in the classroom (the teacher) spends too much time with them, or teaches at too low of a level.
Perhaps test, instead, solely for those who want to be there, and who know there is more to learn - even if, at the same time, some of them know they have a learning disability. There is a difference between using a disability as a crutch, and putting one's nose to the grindstone no matter what the factor.
There is the argument, too, that inclusion builds empathy for people who are 'different' than our smarter thinkers. To some degree I see the point, but I wish it did not mandate a 100% inclusion, all the time, because it can build frustration and ruin potentially talented students' attitudes and foci by being dumbed down all the time.
What concerns me is that a separation of the masses for any length of time may build a social structure equivalent to the Nazi regime - one where certain qualities will be considered desirable, and a future where a non-empathetic class of people take political control, develop policies, and somehow dictate breeding based on a very harsh, and stratified, upbringing.
If you don't want someone of incredibly low intelligence building your house, or attempting to fix your car, then do it yourself. There are quite a few fields that do hire people who would never pass a rigorous high-school's requirements.
My younger brother had to quit eve for the very same reason - a wife, kids, cats, and a house take up the time that a complex game would otherwise demand.
For that short of a time period, hell, I really don't mind FPS military games from even a few years ago - a few successful sniper shots, making other people's days a little more miserable, and I'm happy. That's accomplishing something right there, and just what the doctor ordered.
Most of the games I used to play were even downloaded demo versions that were enough for me, for those short time periods I had to play. I don't remember the names of them, but they were all WWII games.
I've never played WoW, but I've heard there was very little sense of accomplishment because nothing gained is ever lost.
It's going to happen to all of you, eventually - why fight it, and why put yourself behind, skill-wise or monetarily, when you can just subscribe to Eve Online now?
It's complex, and even frustrating, because it's an adult-level game. If it was simple, thousand would leave it like they've left WoW (one does not go from Eve to WoW, but how many WoW players left WoW for Eve?)
It has PVP with a lasting effect - you know you just took away something someone worked an hour, or days, for when you kill them, and they don't get it back.
WoW may never be beat as there are always new pre-teens and teens willing to waste time, but when you've finally matured and need that 'something else' every WoW player knows is out there, the vacuum of space will be waiting.
If I ever get to the point where I have enough to work on, and have my business connections set in a way that doesn't require the computer - though a secretary and accountant may need them - then I'd consider myself to be doing something right.
I can, and do, use e-mail because my days aren't productive -enough- .
One thing the manufacturers of the rain-wiping chemicals don't advertise is, at least with Rain-X, it increases glare.
I wasn't sure why I was having such a hard time driving at night until I came across reports of it happening, and wasn't sure even afterward - so I tested the theory.
After allowing a good amount of time for the product to wear off of the windshield, I applied it up to a point at which I was happy with, and no higher. When driving at night, I adjust my head to see through the area I applied it, then above it, numerous times. I found that yes, using Rain-X, at least, did increase the glare from oncoming headlights, so I stopped using it.
The glare increase wasn't extreme, but since I was fining night driving bordering on just being painful, any little improvement would be a good thing.
Maybe I'm a little less tolerant of glare than others, but I do know that night driving is nowhere near as painful as it used to be while I was using a rain wiping chemical.
Let's see - you're claiming they were leaps and bounds ahead of western culture, but they were beat back to the stone age by a small island?
Yes, I see your point now: Chinese are living in fear that Cuba will invade, effectively knocking them back to the paleozoic era.
With an understanding of tracking and their speeds, couldn't governments (like the $@$@!& Chinese) (had to join in on that) focus a large amount of light (such as mirrors reflecting the sun, or lasers) in the area of the satellite to pretty much not allow it to see anything?
It is supposed to be a quasi-hot rod. It's almost useless as a truck as I think its payload and towing capacities are lower than that of a standard F-150.
Well, at least that episode exemplifies - to some small extent - the differences between what our market is looking for and what the European market looks for. Personally, I can't believe anyone would road-test that small of a truck... even if it does seem a bit too large for their paths and parking spaces.
I'm not sure my truck (extended cab, long-bed, 4x4) would even make it through the middle of some English towns...
Here's to wide open spaces, and not being forced to live like a woman (a shopping trip and pastries?). Give me black coffee, a big job that requires a truck, and a man's territory any day of the week.
Wow, thank you!
And here I was dead-set that if I were to buy a car (moving from a large F-150 4x4), it would be a Mustang for getting around. I figured that, by now, Ford had created an up-to-date car with HP and handling.
They make it seem a little disappointing, and since I couldn't afford the GT500, mine would be even more of a pig in the turns...
Do we still call is "Natural Selection" if the more intelligent people are having fewer, or no, offspring, while the... let's just call them "very much less gifted"... meet, marry, and have offspring, and sometimes MORE offspring, that can - and will - live full lives in the world?
Is this, by definition, "Natural Selection" of a species, or is the the possible beginning of a branching of a species? Or am I misunderstanding that Natural Selection would try to keep around the adept (used to be strongest and smartest, but these days "smartest" serves very well in a lot of cultures) while discouraging the non-adept from having as many offspring?
I am not trolling - I swear. I'm a high school teacher, and I readily see who is ending up with whom, and am very curious as to how the offspring of some (not all) of the couples I see might manage, as the couples, themselves, are already challenged by what society expects them to be able to do.
So if the occupants were to live, and stand, on the base of their living quarters - the base being the 'lower' part of the module that connected to the top of the shock-absorber part, perhaps the 1-G force would be like gravity here on earth?
The surging, if standing on it, seems like it would be the rhythmic up and down of the deck of a boat whilst on the ocean. Heck, if that's the way it is, Shiver me timbers! - it'll be their sea-legs, matey, that'll be the weird part when they finally land and start walking around the surface of Mars.
Yarr.
Which is exactly what I was thinking about slashdot, but...
Not that it would happen, but if every citizen was to be required to be a cop for two years of their life - what measures and brutalities do you think would happen, and at what rate, while they figure out how to go home uninjured or, better yet, living, throughout each shift? We'd probably have a good amount more tazered and bullet-shot citizens.
My main disagreements with treating Eve Online's economy in such high regard is the level of 'fake-ness' imparted on it by forces that do not, and can not, exist in the real world.
For example, there are taxes in eve; yet, unlike the real world, this 'money' goes nowhere. It's just taken out of the system.
Another would be that the magical supply-demand economy isn't really 100% player driven. The demand-side is, of course, but the game is just about as fake as WoW (never played it, but... ) in that any item can be bought from the game, itself - though those items are all basic-versions of what the player-base could improve on.
So let's talk banking now... We're talking game-money invested for... what reason? For interest? The whole reason banks offer interest is to make money off of the money they get to hold on to for a while that, in turn, they use to pay salaries, pay other investors, and use to buy whatever-it-is that banks buy.
Introducing a game-based bank wouldn't serve any useful function - or at least any useful function that would correlate into a real-world revelation.
Lastly, the good Dr. is right - the game's economy does revolve around loss. This too, though, puts a strange dynamic on real-life studies as the "losses," or at least parts of the losses, completely disappear from the game. It seems to me that, in the real world, one person's loss is usually another's gain (that is, unless each country experiences a Hurricane-Katrina every year...). Thus the miners go out to get minerals from their quasi-limited resources (limited to a certain amount, per area, per day) to hoist it back up again.
Personally, I believe that hiring such a high-level economist for the Eve economy is pretty misguided, and that the Dr., himself, is valuing the tool at more than its worth.
Slashdot Mirror
Of the public schools I have worked in, in two states, their video libraries consisted of 90% VHS tapes.
Some valuable teaching tools (videos) are going to be really difficult to find on DVD, and a lot of them just won't be found.
I am not saying VHS should stick around, but as the format dies there will be a somewhat substantial loss.
I don't want to write an epic rely here, but you really ought to go into older high school's libraries to see what I'm talking about. Even if they have the tapes (which wear out eventually), not having VHS players that work is going to be an issue.
I still believe that 'dark matter' is only a temporary constant inserted into an equation modern scientists don't truly understand.
In time they will discover what is causing the effects of this 'dark matter' - it will not be super strange matter, nor another form of matter, but will be either a change in the overall calculations of our universe's energy or it will be some type of substance that was not accounted for.
Theorists throw in some offbeat number to the calculation every 30 years or so to account for what they just can't figure out.
What they're missing is that the best soldiers, under tough situations, have a LOT going on in their heads, AND are doing their best to sum up what they want by commands and hand signals.
Training soldiers to think in short thoughts will invariably cross-over into actual thought patterns that will reduce soldiers' creativity, adjustability and preparation for future events.
You can see the effects, now, of how the Army trains vs. how young soldiers actually think when they come out of Basic and AI training - the world is all black and white. From my family's experience, Reserve units are often more flexible in the field and do better at war games because they can think on their feet.
Robotizing our forces' thinking, even unintentionally, is a serious step that they ought to fully consider.
How about some sensor in a glove or on the weapons' grips that would pick up finger pressures and send those out as hand-signals instead? With an on/off momentary switch of some kind, signals would be sent when the soldier wanted them to be, and not when he was merely gripping differently.
Even with the teaching degree, most states require teachers to take two or three different tests for subject-area and general knowledge.
Though, after what I've seen of southern colleges and the low-level students scores of them accept, maybe that's for a reason.
Sweet - thanks guys.
Let's say someone plays, oh, I don't know ... one of the MMO's just about every day.
No - let's say they just leave it on all month. How much bandwidth would that typically use?
I think I still have a piece of the Goodyear blimp that got stuck in a Micro-cell storm in Coral Springs, FL, a few years ago.
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Goodyear_blimp_crashes_in_Florida
I'm sure they used weather forecasting, but a micro-cell in a warm, water-rich state is going to spring up now and again; Then where are ya with a 40-ton load?
As a high-school teacher I just don't know where I stand on this issue. I have taught kids who do learn, and progress, in my class that really did have some sort of problem, and were quite behind the rest of the class. Nonetheless, with my help they refined, and improved upon, what they gave me - and all I know is that I don't have a crystal ball, so I really don't know where their progress will end.
On the other side of the spectrum are the ones born who really are borderline retarded (and I'm serious in using that term, even though it's not really correct). I feel bad for them, but at the risk of having some students in my classes learn absolutely nothing, I have to leave these 'included' students behind in daily conversation. I can do my best for them in other areas, but it just becomes an exercise in babysitting if the sole leader in the classroom (the teacher) spends too much time with them, or teaches at too low of a level.
Perhaps test, instead, solely for those who want to be there, and who know there is more to learn - even if, at the same time, some of them know they have a learning disability. There is a difference between using a disability as a crutch, and putting one's nose to the grindstone no matter what the factor.
There is the argument, too, that inclusion builds empathy for people who are 'different' than our smarter thinkers. To some degree I see the point, but I wish it did not mandate a 100% inclusion, all the time, because it can build frustration and ruin potentially talented students' attitudes and foci by being dumbed down all the time.
What concerns me is that a separation of the masses for any length of time may build a social structure equivalent to the Nazi regime - one where certain qualities will be considered desirable, and a future where a non-empathetic class of people take political control, develop policies, and somehow dictate breeding based on a very harsh, and stratified, upbringing.
If you don't want someone of incredibly low intelligence building your house, or attempting to fix your car, then do it yourself. There are quite a few fields that do hire people who would never pass a rigorous high-school's requirements.
I wonder why my paragraphs won't parse? Damn, that's annoying.
My younger brother had to quit eve for the very same reason - a wife, kids, cats, and a house take up the time that a complex game would otherwise demand. For that short of a time period, hell, I really don't mind FPS military games from even a few years ago - a few successful sniper shots, making other people's days a little more miserable, and I'm happy. That's accomplishing something right there, and just what the doctor ordered. Most of the games I used to play were even downloaded demo versions that were enough for me, for those short time periods I had to play. I don't remember the names of them, but they were all WWII games. I've never played WoW, but I've heard there was very little sense of accomplishment because nothing gained is ever lost.
Oh, you mean Eve Online?
It's going to happen to all of you, eventually - why fight it, and why put yourself behind, skill-wise or monetarily, when you can just subscribe to Eve Online now? It's complex, and even frustrating, because it's an adult-level game. If it was simple, thousand would leave it like they've left WoW (one does not go from Eve to WoW, but how many WoW players left WoW for Eve?) It has PVP with a lasting effect - you know you just took away something someone worked an hour, or days, for when you kill them, and they don't get it back. WoW may never be beat as there are always new pre-teens and teens willing to waste time, but when you've finally matured and need that 'something else' every WoW player knows is out there, the vacuum of space will be waiting.
If I ever get to the point where I have enough to work on, and have my business connections set in a way that doesn't require the computer - though a secretary and accountant may need them - then I'd consider myself to be doing something right. I can, and do, use e-mail because my days aren't productive -enough- .
One thing the manufacturers of the rain-wiping chemicals don't advertise is, at least with Rain-X, it increases glare. I wasn't sure why I was having such a hard time driving at night until I came across reports of it happening, and wasn't sure even afterward - so I tested the theory. After allowing a good amount of time for the product to wear off of the windshield, I applied it up to a point at which I was happy with, and no higher. When driving at night, I adjust my head to see through the area I applied it, then above it, numerous times. I found that yes, using Rain-X, at least, did increase the glare from oncoming headlights, so I stopped using it. The glare increase wasn't extreme, but since I was fining night driving bordering on just being painful, any little improvement would be a good thing. Maybe I'm a little less tolerant of glare than others, but I do know that night driving is nowhere near as painful as it used to be while I was using a rain wiping chemical.
Let's see - you're claiming they were leaps and bounds ahead of western culture, but they were beat back to the stone age by a small island? Yes, I see your point now: Chinese are living in fear that Cuba will invade, effectively knocking them back to the paleozoic era.
With an understanding of tracking and their speeds, couldn't governments (like the $@$@!& Chinese) (had to join in on that) focus a large amount of light (such as mirrors reflecting the sun, or lasers) in the area of the satellite to pretty much not allow it to see anything?
It is supposed to be a quasi-hot rod. It's almost useless as a truck as I think its payload and towing capacities are lower than that of a standard F-150.
Well, at least that episode exemplifies - to some small extent - the differences between what our market is looking for and what the European market looks for. Personally, I can't believe anyone would road-test that small of a truck... even if it does seem a bit too large for their paths and parking spaces. I'm not sure my truck (extended cab, long-bed, 4x4) would even make it through the middle of some English towns... Here's to wide open spaces, and not being forced to live like a woman (a shopping trip and pastries?). Give me black coffee, a big job that requires a truck, and a man's territory any day of the week.
Wow, thank you! And here I was dead-set that if I were to buy a car (moving from a large F-150 4x4), it would be a Mustang for getting around. I figured that, by now, Ford had created an up-to-date car with HP and handling. They make it seem a little disappointing, and since I couldn't afford the GT500, mine would be even more of a pig in the turns...
Do we still call is "Natural Selection" if the more intelligent people are having fewer, or no, offspring, while the ... let's just call them "very much less gifted" ... meet, marry, and have offspring, and sometimes MORE offspring, that can - and will - live full lives in the world?
Is this, by definition, "Natural Selection" of a species, or is the the possible beginning of a branching of a species? Or am I misunderstanding that Natural Selection would try to keep around the adept (used to be strongest and smartest, but these days "smartest" serves very well in a lot of cultures) while discouraging the non-adept from having as many offspring?
I am not trolling - I swear. I'm a high school teacher, and I readily see who is ending up with whom, and am very curious as to how the offspring of some (not all) of the couples I see might manage, as the couples, themselves, are already challenged by what society expects them to be able to do.
So if the occupants were to live, and stand, on the base of their living quarters - the base being the 'lower' part of the module that connected to the top of the shock-absorber part, perhaps the 1-G force would be like gravity here on earth? The surging, if standing on it, seems like it would be the rhythmic up and down of the deck of a boat whilst on the ocean. Heck, if that's the way it is, Shiver me timbers! - it'll be their sea-legs, matey, that'll be the weird part when they finally land and start walking around the surface of Mars. Yarr.
Which is exactly what I was thinking about slashdot, but... Not that it would happen, but if every citizen was to be required to be a cop for two years of their life - what measures and brutalities do you think would happen, and at what rate, while they figure out how to go home uninjured or, better yet, living, throughout each shift? We'd probably have a good amount more tazered and bullet-shot citizens.
Now why isn't this gentleman's post modded higher than it is? His points are clear, concise, and well organized.
It would be genius if more of it wasn't fake.
... what reason? For interest? The whole reason banks offer interest is to make money off of the money they get to hold on to for a while that, in turn, they use to pay salaries, pay other investors, and use to buy whatever-it-is that banks buy.
My main disagreements with treating Eve Online's economy in such high regard is the level of 'fake-ness' imparted on it by forces that do not, and can not, exist in the real world.
For example, there are taxes in eve; yet, unlike the real world, this 'money' goes nowhere. It's just taken out of the system.
Another would be that the magical supply-demand economy isn't really 100% player driven. The demand-side is, of course, but the game is just about as fake as WoW (never played it, but... ) in that any item can be bought from the game, itself - though those items are all basic-versions of what the player-base could improve on.
So let's talk banking now... We're talking game-money invested for
Introducing a game-based bank wouldn't serve any useful function - or at least any useful function that would correlate into a real-world revelation.
Lastly, the good Dr. is right - the game's economy does revolve around loss. This too, though, puts a strange dynamic on real-life studies as the "losses," or at least parts of the losses, completely disappear from the game. It seems to me that, in the real world, one person's loss is usually another's gain (that is, unless each country experiences a Hurricane-Katrina every year...). Thus the miners go out to get minerals from their quasi-limited resources (limited to a certain amount, per area, per day) to hoist it back up again.
Personally, I believe that hiring such a high-level economist for the Eve economy is pretty misguided, and that the Dr., himself, is valuing the tool at more than its worth.