The unfortunate side-effect of playing SF2: Turbo on the highest Turbo and difficulty settings since I got my SNES in '93 or '94 is that everything else seems painfully slow.
One of my professors, one of the old guard of the department, told an interesting story to my Formal Languages class a few weeks ago. He said that back in the 70s, Kernighan and a few of the other Bell Labs guys had been at our university for some conference or another. Our professor asked them about the design of C, and they told him this:
Some of the members of their group had expressed their concerns with the language - that it was a bit confusing, and that the many levels of precedence were a pain to deal with. They replied with, "Don't worry, it won't see any outside use."
It's not my definition of effective. Its the groups who hold the world ranking tournaments that have setup these systems. In regards to the people entering in the tournaments, if one art supplies two times as many record-breaking fighters it seems more likely to assume that that art is more effective. Note I did not say my art was the most effective, as it's not. As far as tournament winning and fighting style, it is one of the best. Subjectivity aside, the medals awards and dissertations affirm this.
I agree, it says much about the effectiveness of an art, but only as far as tournaments go. Effectiveness is an insanely hard thing to measure.
I also agree with your statement about no art being the most effective. One of my interests is in language theory in computer science, and for years people were looking to design the "perfect language", before realizing that it was better to design languages with specific strengths (perl for text manipulation, prolog for first-order logic, etc), and using the best language for the job.
Since it's foundations are traditional, it still maintains the aspects of a traditional art.
Absolutely. It maintains aspects of a traditional art, though that does not in and of itself make it traditional. You're going to get varying definitions of "traditional" from art to art, practitioner to practitioner. Personally, my view is that it must be almost totally true to the original form to be traditional. Though, for instance, kyukushin karate was established circa 1967, it is not considered by most to be a traditional style (like shuri-te, or shotokan-ryu, or what-have-you).
However, it's important to realize that an art doesn't need flash to not be bland.
Err, I think this is what I was saying with regards to karate.
However, keeping a closed mind to the aspects of other arts is dangerous and will only lead to lack of achievement. This is the main reason why I know 5 arts, and have just now settled on one that I will probably continue as long as I live.
I don't have a closed mind about other arts. Well, okay, I'm not terribly fond of tae kwon do, but that's mostly because of the schools in my area and their practices.
I personally feel that I have to achieve a certain level in one art before tackling another. I don't yet feel that I'm at the point at karate where I can successfully concurrently learn something else. Perhaps when I reach 1st dan, perhaps sooner. But not yet.
I ask you, have you studied any art other than Karate? Another statement you have made seems to reflect you have not.
Yes, I've studied Judo as well. I intend to start Aikido or maybe one of the Phillipine arts once I start making more money. (they're not cheap here)
I understand the definition of a traditional art. It was your use of "effective" that seemed totally subjective. Indeed, rankings are very subjective, too - they tend to be entirely dependent on people entering tournaments, an idea which is not central to many arts.
Some would consider a martial art created in the last thirty years to be very non-traditional. Of course, since it's your system, those in there have a vested interest in calling it traditional.
But your original statements explaining the lack of adrenaline and excitement...
Actually, when I practice karate I do get an adrenaline rush. The 'blandess' I was referring to before was the lack of flash that you were talking about when referring to karate and TKD. I really enjoy the style I practice.
I think, fundamentally, we have different outlooks on the martial arts, and should agree to disagree.
Best.
I study traditional Shito-ryu karate, and though there is much emphasis on the power of the strike, and on the (many) kata, our sensei also teaches non-traditional takedowns, joint locks, and grappling.
Basically, the idea seems to be that if you actually find yourself in a fighting situation, do your best to keep the attacker at a good distance, and use powerful strikes. Failing that, here's what you do on the ground. etc.
It is, all in all, fairly thorough.
I have learned...
But not karate, I notice.
Karate is a very adaptive martial art. Each movement fluidly leads into a number of others. Each block is a set up for a counter-strike, or a takedown.
I firmly believe that one should train in both striking and grappling martial arts. If Kung Fu and those other Chinese arts you mentioned work for you, fine.
What I have a problem with is this:
if you look at the traditional effective arts, kung fu forms and grappling arts are always ranked higher than any japanese-based stand up art.
What is a "traditional effective art"? I wouldn't call an art founded in 1969 traditional (as effective as it may be). You seem to be throwing around terms here.
Are they always ranked higher? That's a strong assertion. Who ranks them higher? The practitioners of those arts? If everyone ranked them higher, then there would be nobody studying Japanese and Okinawan arts. And also, what do you mean by "ranked higher"?
Karate can said to be 'bland', if by bland you mean lacking lots of useless flash. Karate is a useful martial art. It grew out of a basic need for self-defense, at a time in which weapons are banned (contrary to popular belief, weapons are taught in some karate styles. Shito-ryu, for instance, teaches traditional Okinawan weaponry). You don't learn a huge number of moves, but you learn to effectively use what you do learn. Karate is about the mastery of a small set of moves and a large set of forms.
While I have much respect for Kung Fu (which style? Wing Chun? One of the animal styles? there's no such thing as just "Kung Fu"), I find it difficult to accept that all Japanese martial arts are inferior to all that are Chinese.
Blanket statements tend to be dangerous. You should take a look at your prejudices and re-evaluate them.
Re:If I was the person in charge Ida CRUCIFIED him
on
McOwen Case Settled
·
· Score: 1
You may be a hacker and have "roots" (accounts, or roots as a hacker?), but your grammar, punctuation, and random capitalization leave something to be desired.
Actually, I'm one of those casual Linux users. I've been using Linux on a dual-boot basis since 1997. I write a fair amount of C code, and like using X as my desktop. But I've never compiled a kernel. Why?
1) My first distribution was Slackware, and my first few installs didn't go well. I was well aware that Linux could fuck with my hard drive. I was also aware of what a kernel was, and that compiling in wrong things could be very, very bad.
2) I've got a lot of stuff on my hard drive. I can't risk any kind of failure. (I don't have a CD burner and therefore can't do large backups)
I don't fear my OS, but I do assume that I'll break something when mucking with my system unless I know *exactly* what's going on. Just because things are supposed to proceed logically doesn't mean that they will.
A kind of kernels-made-easy is intriguing, and I'd consider giving it a go.
Anonymous Coward is the account you post as if you select the "Post Anonymously" checkbox. There are hundreds if not thousands of people who post as AC on a regular basis.
FreeBSD is a nice, stable Unix. I haven't used it for any great length, but my impressions were that it's at least as good as Linux. I was quite happy with it.
I disagree with you about 9; that game revitalized my faith in Square. 8 was terrible, 7 wasn't bad (but had zero replay value), and Tactics was godly. That's the only game I've sunk 99:99 into.;)
Exactly. FF9, 4, and Tactics were the best of the series. 8 was godawful, and it put it down in disgust after five hours. Hell, I even liked the original more than that (not counting the nostalgia value).
Both are excellent movies in their own rights. Very rarely does a movie brainfuck me; Memento did that.
Fellowship of the Ring, however, was excellent in that it told a story very well, with stunning visuals, great special effects, and some great acting. It wasn't nearly as unconventional as Memento, but it was still an great movie.
Also, FOTR is only one of two movies I've seen twice in the theatre (the other being The Matrix).
Sorry, but that doesn't count. Otherwise, I could claim three to four years of C experience which I don't have. Working on my pet project doesn't count as industry experience.
I've been programming for six or seven years now, but my "industry experience" so to speak is the four months I spent last summer writing VB code.
The last thing you want to do is misrepresent yourself. Just tell the truth about what you've done, and then let your skills speak from there.
You forgot to mention that fvwm2 (at least, in all the incarnations I've seen) is rather ugly, whereas WM has a kind of elegance to it. It looks nice, and doesn't clutter things up.
It's nice. I alternate between KDE, BlackBox, and WM, depending on mood and the phase of moon.
Slashdot Mirror
Our gaming group tends to start each session with a couple of games of Settlers. Damn it that is an awesome game.
Not really. It works out to about $.50 USD.
;)
The unfortunate side-effect of playing SF2: Turbo on the highest Turbo and difficulty settings since I got my SNES in '93 or '94 is that everything else seems painfully slow.
One of my professors, one of the old guard of the department, told an interesting story to my Formal Languages class a few weeks ago. He said that back in the 70s, Kernighan and a few of the other Bell Labs guys had been at our university for some conference or another. Our professor asked them about the design of C, and they told him this:
Some of the members of their group had expressed their concerns with the language - that it was a bit confusing, and that the many levels of precedence were a pain to deal with. They replied with, "Don't worry, it won't see any outside use."
Classic.
Or if they read it on Slashdot. :)
Amazon? Profit? It's like there's these words coming out of your mouth, but I don't know what you're saying.
Let's look at it this way: C++ is one of the most godawful languages ever designed, so Ph.D or not, you're still the King of Filth.
I am a lousy troll.
Good bye karma!
Imagine a beowulf cluster of PDP-11s! It'd almost match my 8086! FP
It's not my definition of effective. Its the groups who hold the world ranking tournaments that have setup these systems. In regards to the people entering in the tournaments, if one art supplies two times as many record-breaking fighters it seems more likely to assume that that art is more effective. Note I did not say my art was the most effective, as it's not. As far as tournament winning and fighting style, it is one of the best. Subjectivity aside, the medals awards and dissertations affirm this.
I agree, it says much about the effectiveness of an art, but only as far as tournaments go. Effectiveness is an insanely hard thing to measure.
I also agree with your statement about no art being the most effective. One of my interests is in language theory in computer science, and for years people were looking to design the "perfect language", before realizing that it was better to design languages with specific strengths (perl for text manipulation, prolog for first-order logic, etc), and using the best language for the job.
Since it's foundations are traditional, it still maintains the aspects of a traditional art.
Absolutely. It maintains aspects of a traditional art, though that does not in and of itself make it traditional. You're going to get varying definitions of "traditional" from art to art, practitioner to practitioner. Personally, my view is that it must be almost totally true to the original form to be traditional. Though, for instance, kyukushin karate was established circa 1967, it is not considered by most to be a traditional style (like shuri-te, or shotokan-ryu, or what-have-you).
However, it's important to realize that an art doesn't need flash to not be bland.
Err, I think this is what I was saying with regards to karate.
However, keeping a closed mind to the aspects of other arts is dangerous and will only lead to lack of achievement. This is the main reason why I know 5 arts, and have just now settled on one that I will probably continue as long as I live.
I don't have a closed mind about other arts. Well, okay, I'm not terribly fond of tae kwon do, but that's mostly because of the schools in my area and their practices.
I personally feel that I have to achieve a certain level in one art before tackling another. I don't yet feel that I'm at the point at karate where I can successfully concurrently learn something else. Perhaps when I reach 1st dan, perhaps sooner. But not yet.
I ask you, have you studied any art other than Karate? Another statement you have made seems to reflect you have not.
...
Yes, I've studied Judo as well. I intend to start Aikido or maybe one of the Phillipine arts once I start making more money. (they're not cheap here)
I understand the definition of a traditional art. It was your use of "effective" that seemed totally subjective. Indeed, rankings are very subjective, too - they tend to be entirely dependent on people entering tournaments, an idea which is not central to many arts.
Some would consider a martial art created in the last thirty years to be very non-traditional. Of course, since it's your system, those in there have a vested interest in calling it traditional.
But your original statements explaining the lack of adrenaline and excitement
Actually, when I practice karate I do get an adrenaline rush. The 'blandess' I was referring to before was the lack of flash that you were talking about when referring to karate and TKD. I really enjoy the style I practice.
I think, fundamentally, we have different outlooks on the martial arts, and should agree to disagree.
Best.
It is only rigid if it is taught that way.
I study traditional Shito-ryu karate, and though there is much emphasis on the power of the strike, and on the (many) kata, our sensei also teaches non-traditional takedowns, joint locks, and grappling.
Basically, the idea seems to be that if you actually find yourself in a fighting situation, do your best to keep the attacker at a good distance, and use powerful strikes. Failing that, here's what you do on the ground. etc.
It is, all in all, fairly thorough.
I have learned...
But not karate, I notice.
Karate is a very adaptive martial art. Each movement fluidly leads into a number of others. Each block is a set up for a counter-strike, or a takedown.
I firmly believe that one should train in both striking and grappling martial arts. If Kung Fu and those other Chinese arts you mentioned work for you, fine.
What I have a problem with is this:
if you look at the traditional effective arts, kung fu forms and grappling arts are always ranked higher than any japanese-based stand up art.
What is a "traditional effective art"? I wouldn't call an art founded in 1969 traditional (as effective as it may be). You seem to be throwing around terms here.
Are they always ranked higher? That's a strong assertion. Who ranks them higher? The practitioners of those arts? If everyone ranked them higher, then there would be nobody studying Japanese and Okinawan arts. And also, what do you mean by "ranked higher"?
Karate can said to be 'bland', if by bland you mean lacking lots of useless flash. Karate is a useful martial art. It grew out of a basic need for self-defense, at a time in which weapons are banned (contrary to popular belief, weapons are taught in some karate styles. Shito-ryu, for instance, teaches traditional Okinawan weaponry). You don't learn a huge number of moves, but you learn to effectively use what you do learn. Karate is about the mastery of a small set of moves and a large set of forms.
While I have much respect for Kung Fu (which style? Wing Chun? One of the animal styles? there's no such thing as just "Kung Fu"), I find it difficult to accept that all Japanese martial arts are inferior to all that are Chinese.
Blanket statements tend to be dangerous. You should take a look at your prejudices and re-evaluate them.
You may be a hacker and have "roots" (accounts, or roots as a hacker?), but your grammar, punctuation, and random capitalization leave something to be desired.
Actually, I'm one of those casual Linux users. I've been using Linux on a dual-boot basis since 1997. I write a fair amount of C code, and like using X as my desktop. But I've never compiled a kernel. Why?
1) My first distribution was Slackware, and my first few installs didn't go well. I was well aware that Linux could fuck with my hard drive. I was also aware of what a kernel was, and that compiling in wrong things could be very, very bad.
2) I've got a lot of stuff on my hard drive. I can't risk any kind of failure. (I don't have a CD burner and therefore can't do large backups)
I don't fear my OS, but I do assume that I'll break something when mucking with my system unless I know *exactly* what's going on. Just because things are supposed to proceed logically doesn't mean that they will.
A kind of kernels-made-easy is intriguing, and I'd consider giving it a go.
You're new here, aren't you?
Anonymous Coward is the account you post as if you select the "Post Anonymously" checkbox. There are hundreds if not thousands of people who post as AC on a regular basis.
This is quite possibly the most unfunny stuff I have ever read on Slashdot. Way to try to get +1 funny, you herd animal.
FreeBSD is a nice, stable Unix. I haven't used it for any great length, but my impressions were that it's at least as good as Linux. I was quite happy with it.
I disagree with you about 9; that game revitalized my faith in Square. 8 was terrible, 7 wasn't bad (but had zero replay value), and Tactics was godly. That's the only game I've sunk 99:99 into. ;)
Exactly. FF9, 4, and Tactics were the best of the series. 8 was godawful, and it put it down in disgust after five hours. Hell, I even liked the original more than that (not counting the nostalgia value).
CS is a degree for people who like machines. FSAs, PDAs, Turing machines...mmm mmm, they're like love in my tummy!
Oh yeah, and you'll write a lot of code, too. But you've got to love logic to do CS.
Both are excellent movies in their own rights. Very rarely does a movie brainfuck me; Memento did that.
Fellowship of the Ring, however, was excellent in that it told a story very well, with stunning visuals, great special effects, and some great acting. It wasn't nearly as unconventional as Memento, but it was still an great movie.
Also, FOTR is only one of two movies I've seen twice in the theatre (the other being The Matrix).
8 data bits, no parity, 1 stop bit.
Sorry, but that doesn't count. Otherwise, I could claim three to four years of C experience which I don't have. Working on my pet project doesn't count as industry experience.
I've been programming for six or seven years now, but my "industry experience" so to speak is the four months I spent last summer writing VB code.
The last thing you want to do is misrepresent yourself. Just tell the truth about what you've done, and then let your skills speak from there.
You forgot to mention that fvwm2 (at least, in all the incarnations I've seen) is rather ugly, whereas WM has a kind of elegance to it. It looks nice, and doesn't clutter things up.
It's nice. I alternate between KDE, BlackBox, and WM, depending on mood and the phase of moon.