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10-20-2009, 06:01 AM
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Uber TechnoKiller
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Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: New Jersey
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Quote:
Originally Posted by Shake
Quote:
Originally Posted by curses
Today I learned that I'm better at algebra than I thought I was
Oh and we discussed the rule of thirds and how to do basic photo composition.
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I've been learning recently that some people think algebra is hard. Then again, my classes pretty much assume a working knowledge of basic calculus, and the profs toss about phrases such as, "... and then the rest is just algebra," or, "I won't bore you with the algebra here ...".
Anyway, today I learned about how to map the s-plane into the z-plane. Where s is a complex number of the form <sigma> + jOmega, where <sigma> is the real part, and Omega is the imaginary part. Yes, Fourier and z-transforms, for filter design.
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If you have time. Can you elaborate?
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10-20-2009, 06:22 AM
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mesospheric bore
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Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: New Zealand
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Reading a recent article by Elinor Ostrom ( abstract). She's recent co-winner of the Nobel economics prize, and seems to have done some interesting work on the factors that encourage people to organise amongst themselves to sustainably use common resources. Interestingly she only identifies one governance-related factor as important in avoiding tragedies-of-the-commons, and it's to do with users being in control: "When users... have full autonomy at the collective-choice level to craft and enforce some of their own rules, they face lower transaction costs as well as lower costs in defending a resource against invasion by others."
In the examples given, "users" seems to refer to individuals or small groups in local communities, so in these cases defending resources would seem to include keeping businesses from outside the area from accessing the resources unless they conform to the locally-made rules. This would be backed up by the fact that such businesses don't share with locals various user attributes that Ostrom identifies as important, such as common ethical standards and attitudes on the importance of the resource. I'm sure I'm going way beyond what Ostrom might say, but the idea that if you get both government and corporations out of the way people are more likely to sort out their own resource issues in a sustainable way holds a lot of appeal.
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10-21-2009, 04:34 AM
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mostly harmless
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Nunya
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
I don't have much time, Ohm, but the wiki on the Z-transform is pretty thorough and does a good job of explaining it. It also discusses its relation to the Laplace and Fourier transforms. These are all useful tools for solving certain types of problems.
At the heart of such things, is a very important concept known as convolution. The animations there speak volumes to explain the mathematics behind it. They show some relatively simple cases, but I think it's enough to get the general idea of the concept. Once you have this idea down, it's easier to move on to the transforms. As the first link I posted mentions, they deal with seeing how functions in the time domain react in the frequency domain, and vice-versa. Convolution is a messy process. Not terribly difficult (necessarily), but tedious. Using transforms allows one to use easier operators, such as straight multiplication, rather than convolution.
__________________
Through with oligarchy? Ready to get the money out of politics? Want real progressives in office who will work for the people and not the donors? Want to help grow The Squad?
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10-21-2009, 05:54 PM
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simple country microbiologist hyperchicken
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: georgia
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Today I learned about primates in the oligicene, that even millions of years ago,there were some primates that were like modern prosimians and other primates that were like modern antrhopoids.
I also leaned that primates came to south america from africe, and rats too.
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10-21-2009, 05:55 PM
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A fellow sophisticate
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Cowtown, Kansas
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Who told you that? Some sciencey-type, I bet.
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10-21-2009, 06:51 PM
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California Sober
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Silicon Valley
Gender: Bender
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
I hear Africe is beautiful this time of year.
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10-21-2009, 07:07 PM
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A fellow sophisticate
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Cowtown, Kansas
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
And those ant rhopoids are something else over there.
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11-05-2009, 03:26 AM
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mesospheric bore
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Join Date: Jul 2005
Location: New Zealand
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Been teaching myself matrix algebra.
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11-05-2009, 03:32 AM
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mostly harmless
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Nunya
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Bleah. I hated linear algebra. It always gave me fits.
Today, we learned how to do convolutions of periodic signals. Very similar to the above process, but with a slight twist. Still not too difficult once you get the hang of it.
__________________
Through with oligarchy? Ready to get the money out of politics? Want real progressives in office who will work for the people and not the donors? Want to help grow The Squad?
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11-05-2009, 04:29 AM
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the internet says I'm right
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Join Date: Sep 2008
Location: Western U.S.
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Today I learned about conversational past participles in my German class. As one might imagine, this rocked my world.
__________________
For Science!Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur.
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11-10-2009, 04:39 AM
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mostly harmless
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Nunya
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
This class (digital signal processing) has also provided some good real world stuff. The professor was good to relate concepts to say CD recordings, like why your audio CD is made up from 44,000 samples per second of whatever music you're listening to. Your CD player has to know that rate in order to accurately reproduce the music.
Very simply, you have to take the highest frequency used (for audio approximately 15 kHz), doubling it, and then adding some extra room to prevent any 'aliasing', which is the addition, or more accurately, some overlapping of the high frequency information.
__________________
Through with oligarchy? Ready to get the money out of politics? Want real progressives in office who will work for the people and not the donors? Want to help grow The Squad?
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11-12-2009, 07:40 PM
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Yesterday, I learned nothing, it was a holiday, so no school.
Monday however I learned all about Flash buttons. I am having fun designing with Flash. A new creative tool for my tool box.
Last edited by Plant Woman; 11-12-2009 at 08:16 PM.
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11-13-2009, 07:24 AM
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Dogehlaugher -Scrutari
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Join Date: Jan 2007
Location: Northwest
Gender: Female
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Today I learned what a serious low blood sugar looks like in a diabetic. Then I got to see the various ways (some ineffective) in which one can raise one's blood sugar.
I got to call 911 too.
Scared the shit out of me!
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11-13-2009, 06:04 PM
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A fellow sophisticate
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Cowtown, Kansas
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
I learned that English is a bastard language with many fathers. Bungalow, a word I've heard several times recently as I've been looking at real estate, is Hindi, meaning low thatched cottage, particularly in Bengal.
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11-13-2009, 06:52 PM
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California Sober
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Silicon Valley
Gender: Bender
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
We get a lot of our words from Hindi, including pajamas and shampoo. It makes me wonder what kind of naked, unwashed heathens we Euros were before the Indians schooled us.
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11-13-2009, 07:01 PM
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Member
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
What are pajamas and shampoo?
I learned that Marianne Moore, the famous modernist poet, idolized Christy Mathewson as a young woman. This is significant in the battle for supremacy between baseball and gridiron football. No woman of quality ever loved a football player.
__________________
"It's lovely to live on a raft. We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss about whether they was made or only just happened."
- The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
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11-17-2009, 11:12 PM
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Fishy mokey
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Furrin parts
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
I learned something today watching The Weakest Link.
Turns out the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are not part of the UK or of the European Union
They are Crown Dependencies.
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11-17-2009, 11:35 PM
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A fellow sophisticate
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Cowtown, Kansas
Gender: Male
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ensign Steve
We get a lot of our words from Hindi, including pajamas and shampoo. It makes me wonder what kind of naked, unwashed heathens we Euros were before the Indians schooled us.
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Without Hindi we would be without a cot or cushion to rest upon, a dinghy to row, gunnysacks for thugs to haul their stolen tom-toms to the jungle, pundits wouldn't be pariahs or juggernauts, we couldn't lacquer our polo mallets, nor would we be able to have a toddy on the veranda just to name a few.
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11-17-2009, 11:38 PM
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puzzler
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Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: UK
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Quote:
Originally Posted by Watser?
I learned something today watching The Weakest Link.
Turns out the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are not part of the UK or of the European Union
They are Crown Dependencies.
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I knew that I thought you were going to say that you learned that Ann Robinson is a plastic faced bitch, but I guess you knew that already.
__________________
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11-17-2009, 11:44 PM
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Fishy mokey
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Furrin parts
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Well, duh
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11-18-2009, 01:35 PM
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California Sober
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Silicon Valley
Gender: Bender
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dingfod
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ensign Steve
We get a lot of our words from Hindi, including pajamas and shampoo. It makes me wonder what kind of naked, unwashed heathens we Euros were before the Indians schooled us.
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Without Hindi we would be without a cot or cushion to rest upon, a dinghy to row, gunnysacks for thugs to haul their stolen tom-toms to the jungle, pundits wouldn't be pariahs or juggernauts, we couldn't lacquer our polo mallets, nor would we be able to have a toddy on the veranda just to name a few.
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Heathens, I tell ya.
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11-19-2009, 02:09 PM
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California Sober
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Silicon Valley
Gender: Bender
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
The guitar riffs and solo in the Beastie Boys' No Sleep Till Brooklyn were played by Slayer guitarist Kerry King.
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11-19-2009, 09:44 PM
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liar in wolf's clothing
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Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: Frequently about
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Offensive non-mutual collateral estoppel!
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11-19-2009, 09:50 PM
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Just keep m'nose clean, egg, chips & beans, I'm always full of steam
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Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: so far out, I'm too far in
Gender: Bender
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
Oh shit, he's got Law Student Tourette's.
__________________
"Her eyes in certain light were violet, and all her teeth were even. That's a rare, fair feature: even teeth. She smiled to excess, but she chewed with real distinction." - Eleanor of Aquitaine
...........
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11-20-2009, 04:37 PM
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an angry unicorn or a non-murdering leprechaun
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Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: Edge of Society
Gender: Female
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Re: The "This is what I've learned today." Thread
I learned I need to go on a roadtrip during my break.
The website is lame but the place looks fantastic!
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