the thoughts and experiences of Heather Meadows
Well, this sort of changes my opinion.
I’m guessing that since he didn’t expect it, he was so humiliated by being caught that he hoped to die quickly, to escape his embarrassment.
I’m not going to say that he “deserves” to die. It’s beyond my ability to judge what a twisted person like Kobayashi deserves. I just hope that whatever he gets keeps him off the streets for good.
While some devices, like a dying cellphone, require only a few minutes of charging to regain short-term use, most devices, like laptops, take much longer. It is not uncommon for users of electronics with more ravenous appetites to camp out for hours near an electrical outlet. In some cases, those staking a claim do so by plugging in a device – even a $2,000 laptop – only to leave it unattended while fetching a $4 coffee.
The battery problem lives on.
Yahoo! Entertainment: 10 Crazy Facts about Howard Hughes
I especially like number 10 :D
In his recent piece “The Twelfth Commandment“, Eric Burns underlines the dangers of generalizing with a very powerful example.
From Yahoo! News: Oddly Enough:
No one knows how long the shepherds on the island of La Gomera have used the rare whistled language called the Silbo Gomero, but American and Spanish researchers said on Wednesday that the brain processes it like a spoken language.
I’d like to know what other activities cause those regions of the brain to be used. Obviously, the whistling transmits semantic information, but I don’t think this study proves that it is a true language. How much variation is possible in a whistled language? Enough for a robust lexicon? What kinds of inflection exist in Siblo Gomero?
Today on Language Log, Mark Liberman presents some phrases, their apparent meanings, and their “actual” meanings (originally spotted in an article in the Economist). Pretty damn funny.
(I think I’m becoming a fan of Mark Liberman.)
Today is Sean and my second wedding anniversary :)
When we first met–in person, that is–we went on a date down to Riverwalk and just strolled around, looking at everything. I’ve loved it there ever since and have gone back several times. Today, in celebration of our two years of marriage, we went back there and wandered around together :)
I took my camera, but only got a few pictures. I took a couple of pictures of Sean, and he took one of me, but none of them really came out splendidly, as it was getting dark. Still, I’ll have them to remember the day by :) Sometime, we need to get a professional picture made of the two of us.
Slashdot links today to a fascinating proposal by Ravi Purushotma of MIT (*sigh*, MIT…) concerning how video games (“You’re Not Studying, You’re Just Playing That Sims Game of Yours”), the Internet (“You’re Not Studying, You’re Just Browinsg the Web”), and other multimedia technologies (culminating in “You’re Not Studying, You’re Just Doing What You Enjoy — Wow”) can help students of language learn more effectively. (You’ll note that the article is somewhat dated; Mr. Purushotma links to an updates and comments page at the end of his piece.)
It’s all very intriguing, and it makes me wonder why stuff like this isn’t already being done. Here’s just one example, demonstrating how the technology of digital music can be used to teach:
Now that most digital songs are using ID3v2 or higher, one feature useful for language learners is that synchronized lyrics can be embedded directly into MP3 files. Combined with an OCR-capable translator, this allows learners to follow along with a foreign song as it is playing (see Figure 10). For older songs, synchronized lyrics can easily be inserted or retrieved from online databases.
In an ideal world, rather than clicking each word for an electronic translation, we would simply have a bi-lingual friend or teacher always standing beside us whenever we wanted to listen to a foreign song — ready to translate any unfamiliar words for us. While always using a friend may not be so realistic, it can be simulated practically using 3D spatialized sound technology. By delaying the timing at which a given sound is delivered to each ear, insertions can be made to songs that sound as though they are coming from a physical location different from the ambient song. This allows educators to embed instructional content directly into a song (or other audio content) while still maintaining a clearly audible distinction so as not to detract from the main song. (see Figures 11, 12, and 13).
I must admit that I am the most interested in browser-based technologies. Purushotma says:
Much like the language data for The Sims, the user interface descriptions for the latest Mozilla and Netscape Web browsers are stored in editable files. This allows anybody with knowledge of XUL, a language similar to HTML/XML, to rapidly reconfigure the layout and design of the browser interface. In most browsers, the upper right hand corner includes a logo known as a “throbber” which animates while loading a Web page. During my German class, I replaced my throbber with a small frame pointing to a Web site containing a randomized vocabulary word from the current chapter of my textbook. Instead of displaying a corporate logo, the throbber in the top right corner displayed a German word and image while loading a Web site, followed by the English translation when loading was complete.In my case, this simply served to flash new vocabulary words while I was waiting for Web sites to load, although such a system could be extended in any number of ways (see Figure 8).
There’s no mention of Internet Explorer here, but I’m long past expecting IE to do anything cool. I just use it because most websites are compatible with it. If I can figure out a way to embed Japanese vocabulary into Firefox, that may be all the impetus I need to switch to that browser. [Edit: See below.]
The prospect of “interrupting” my browsing with language study made me think of “Life Inter rupted”, the article I linked last week about the drawbacks of multitasking. Would embedding learning materials into my browser be too overwhelming? I think it could be, but I also think it could be useful. My preference, then, would be to have a way to shut it off when I felt like minimizing my inputs.
Ultimately, it’s a great article by Purushotma, and a good first step. I hope I can find some resources in this vein. If anyone knows of any, please post them in the comments! I’m primarily interested in learning Japanese, but Spanish would also be useful.
[Edit 2:26pm]: The link to the replaced “throbber” leads to Mr. Purushotma’s personal website. There, I found that there is not only a toolbar for IE, but also an entire page dedicated to his theories for and work concerning technology and language learning.
From New Scientist, via BoingBoing.
The proposed calendar would make figuring out holidays, and college course schedules, much easier. That “extra week” every five or six years is interesting, too…it means a cluster of time that is unrelated to anything, which is kind of wild, and it also means that the seasons would shift just a little bit until the week was reached, and then snap back into place.
The idea is bizarre, but it could work.
His other idea, that everyone should operate on GMT, is also interesting. Nowadays, we can say “What time is it there?” to our friends in other countries in order to get an idea of what they’re up to. If everyone operated on GMT, we’d instead have to either ask directly what they were doing, or ask “What time of day is it there?”, or come up with a whole new paradigm in our heads to cover the timezone difference. I don’t know, I think the calendar idea has more merit.
Still, I don’t really think either of them would catch on.
According to Snopes, the pictures I linked before may not be of the recent tsunami at all.
I was unaware that China celebrated a “tidal festival”.
Snopes has another picture; this one looks extraordinarily fake.
Or does he?
From Mainichi:
Kaoru Kobayashi, 36, a former worker for a Mainichi Shimbun sales agent, has told investigators that he initially denied the allegations and wouldn’t cooperate with investigators because he wanted to be sentenced to death.
“I thought I would be punished with the death penalty if I damaged investigators’ impression of me,” he said.
Is this reverse psychology? Ridiculously stupid reverse psychology? (Granted, Kobayashi has already proven that he’s missing a few brain cells.)
Or was I on the right track before? Was he dissatisfied with his life, trying to break free of the mold? Was his eventual goal to be stopped and to gain “redemption” by being punished by his culture?
I’d like to know what drives people to commit such sick acts.
In the meantime, why not give Kobayashi his wish?
From Mainichi:
An 800-year-old “holy” cedar tree in a quake-hit Niigata shrine crashed to the ground on New Year’s Day in front of locals making their first prayers of the year.
This story reminded me of the trees in Nikko and the Toshogu Shrine. Those trees are gargantuan and very, very old.
And the culture truly owns those trees, as it has been around for just as long as they have.
I wonder what makes a tree holy…how it becomes so, over time.
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In the year 2005 I resolve to: |
Hey, sounds like a good idea to me…
These pictures really give you an idea of how dangerous and scary it was…