MarsAscendant
Did you mean to say "rectify" as in "fix/adjust"? It sounds like you might have meant "reify" – as in, "create" – but I don't know whether you had the scrapper before that.
You can use Bandcamp Downloader [https://github.com/Otiel/BandcampDownloader] to download the artist's music – including any or all albums and any of the songs – just by entering the addresses of the pages.
Might make getting the audio easier, considering you've already paid.
My argument was against what I saw as a notion that human beings must always express the intelligence we all undoubtably possess, simply because we do. I don't think that's the case. It's not about using straight logic, either: it's about empathy, and the emotions that influence (or even underline) our decisions, and the bigger picture, and whether being angry right now is worth our time...
I think we all can be like that. I think we're not encouraged enough to act that way.
There are certainly selfish motives to every single one of us – and yet, some of us are superb at overriding those motives for the sake of a better act, some struggle to the point of giving up, and others yet barely even tap into the altruistic motives.
I think it all has to do, in half, with the environment we're in. Generally speaking, fear promotes fear, and empathy promotes empathy. There's about 40 to 60% to do with genetics (the number I've seen was 55%), but that much we can't control.
We can control our environments, to an extent.
I don't think we are.
We sure as hell can be. Seeing bright minds at work is a special kind of inspiration, and its own mental turn-on for me. People aspiring to do well by their desires and talents – that's quite a picture. But it only happens when effort is put forth to surround ourselves – and others around us – with the kind of attitude we seek to promote.
Imagine punishing a child for not seeing things the way you do, from the height of the years of experience and the education you'd received. Imagine promoting literacy when you're yet to read a book meaningfully. Imagine moving others to start exercising more, while you're raiding the kitchen every couple of hours for another snack or two.
I don't think we're supposed to be intelligent. I think it's in our best interests to be, but I also see the effort to put forth if you seek to improve someone's livelihood. Not against their will, obviously: this much you can't do even if you try really hard – but encouraging them through the natural flow of things, setting an example, or even writing better guides.
Perhaps we don't choose, either. For all I know, we might as well be only semi-autonomous, or have no free will to speak of. Maybe we just are.
That's a sentiment I never understood.
I'm not to deny your feelings, or claim that my view is somehow superior. It's been my observation, however, that people are generally okay, leaning on a good side. (I think it says something that both Henry Rollins, the punk-rock icon, and /u/kleinbl00, a Reddit veteran, share this view.) It seems to me – and, again, I'm not to stand above anyone on this – that people often undervalue or overlook the good parts about others or humanity in general.
Maybe it's genetically-dictated, the way we look at these things. I've always been an optimist and an idealist, despite whatever I've been through, saw, or felt. It just makes sense to me. I've seen people do some really good things to strangers, and it has always inspired me. Otherwise never clicked with me, though I understand where some of it's coming from, because I, too, felt parts of it at different points of my life.
I used to be terrified of people (mostly because I was mortified at the prospect of disappointing them), which lead to me assuming the worst of those around me. I notice the same with my parents: both deeply dissatisfied with their lives and stuck in a rut, and both aiming low whenever they meet someone. Father is the "that guy who yells at the TV whenever their favorite team loses" sort of a person. Mother assumes deception whenever possible. It never appealed to me, that kind of an outlook, but I engaged with it when I was younger: perhaps because I knew little else; perhaps because I felt exactly as upset.
Things changed for the better once I started engaging with more people. ("The better" being "a more positive outlook towards myself and others".) When I started seeing more and more of what people are, things gradually became clearer: people are... well, people: exciting, interesting, diverse, deep (even the ones that act shallowly), and mostly trying to do good by themselves, those they love, and the world at large – even if they don't know how to do it well.
And it's not like I don't see the bad side. Some things infuriate me; some make me sad; some – a little more lonely. Even the people I admire are not ideal and have done things I don't appreciate. When I was a teen, seeing such a thing in an idol of mine meant losing all respect for the person, as if one flaw devalued their whole being. Now, when I'm older (24), I'm starting to see more clearly that people are not black-and-white, morally, emotionally, intellectually, culturally, or in any other way. We differ – and if someone stands out with the values that resonate with my own, that's... a treasure in itself.
I see the bad side – but it doesn't overshadow the rest of it. Maybe it's because I see my own darkness with a certain clarity, and its presence in my life changes the way I see others. (What is light without darkness, right?) Sure, there are some despicable people in the world, guided by the perverse-yet-so-natural desire for power and control, in however many ways it presents itself. (Greed, arrogance, promoted ignorance, seeding mistrust and fear...) Sure, they do things that make many's stomachs turn – and that's just things we know of. Hell, even the "good people" you can think of are probably battling the same darkness, and maybe it's sheer luck – of their childhood conditioning or genetics – that keeps them from a less-moral path. (Jordan Peterson spoke a lot on that, and there are quite a few public figures that talk about similar experiences. For one, listen to Chuck Palahniuk on the Joe Rogan podcast: he talks about being outright evil, and maybe he has a reason to believe that.)
But... it doesn't detract from the good things I see around me. It's similar to what got me through my existential crisis a while ago. I was stuck in a loop, thinking that since there's no "basic", universal reason for anything, that life is not worth living. Then I figured: I may not appreciate living, but I sure don't want to die (and I've weighed my options for some time there), so I might as well live more consciously, you know? For me, the same idea applies to the good in people: sure, there's a lot of bad things to look at here, but all looking at it does for me is make me more depressed, and I have ambitions that need fulfilling, so I might as well look for the stuff that makes me want to keep going and do better.
Again: I'm not saying your, or any other person's, view isn't valid. I thought mine was worth expressing for the same reason yours is: because it may resonate with others, and maybe even shed some light on how they feel.
I think there's a lot of meaningfully-good things in the world because we made them so, from the depths of our nature and from the basic passions that guide us everywhere. Looking at them makes my own passions ignite. In simple terms, that's what that is.
Surely that's not true: otherwise, children wouldn't have learned their native tongue(s) the way they famously do.
Not sure what kind of theory the author's been immersing themselves with. When I was studying for a language tutor, along my linguistics program, the context was put forth as the most important part of learning anything, let alone a language.
> I studied French in elementary school — supposedly the “ideal” age to learn a new language, according to some people — and somehow continued to get As and Bs while retaining almost no ability to speak the language at all.
Perhaps they haven't because language acquisition, like most any mental skill¹, requires an interest to maintain, let alone improve. My suspicion is this is also why people dislike maths so much: because it's a tenuous process that requires considerate effort to develop. Without a passion for it – often gained either through a natural aptitude or an inspirational teacher – it might be difficult, in those two fields, or in any other of similar requirements, to obtain and retain the skills necessary.
¹ I have a sneaking suspicion – and might well be wrong – that, in physical skills, muscle memory or related mechanisms may affect retention. There've been studies suggesting that writing things down helps memorization, which is a rather "muscle" activity. Perhaps the latter is related to the former?
That didn't make sense to me: the small (~700px wide) images I have in the library are all 50±20kB.
I went to Pexels, which hosts free stock photos, and I took the first one off their front page that had enough colors and didn't show faces: https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-pouring-coffee-on-white-...
Its maximum size is excessive unless you aim to support 4K: 5472×3648. It weighs 4.9MB. A lot!
I then went to Squoosh.app, which allows one to optimize images in various ways. The default option – MozJPEG at 75% quality – reduced image size by more than a half, down to 2.24MB, with no apparent loss of quality even at the high zoom. Illustration: https://i.imgur.com/2bkHrot.jpg
Do you really need to serve a 4K+ image, though? I reduced the image to 1920×1280, using the same app, with the same compression settings. 184kB! Illustration: https://i.imgur.com/52MctSN.jpg
At 33% zoom (which is necessary for a reasonable comparison, since Squoosh stretches the smaller image for comparison), the compressed image looks very good. It lacks the noise the original had, and looks more glossy. There are also advanced settings that one could tinker with, perhaps to a better compression with equal losses.
Is it a big deal? Perhaps – especially when you look to present the image as-is, with minimal losses between conversion from RAW to, say, PNG. For most websites, though? I reckon it's not going to be a problem: it's the sense of the image that matters, not the details.
And if you regularly serve 1MB+ images, maybe there's some sort of an indicator or tag that you could apply that will tell the browser: "Hey, look, I know you want to save bandwidth, but it's kinda my schtick to show really good images, so let me through, yeah?"
If you don't wanna read it, that's fine. I'm just saying that if you do, there's a way.
There's a lot more to say about such practices, but that's the gist of it.
When you hear "heavy" as used to describe something, you automatically assume it to mean negative. "Half is heavy" has a more negative connotative meaning than "Twice as light", even though they have the same denotative meaning. In other words, they effectively mean the same thing, but represent that thing differently.
I also suspect it has to do with the positive/negative framing. Ideally, you want to leave a positive impression on your audience. If you're talking about scientific discoveries – especially something as cool as a material that's comparable to titanium in terms of strength, yet is much lighter – I reckon you want your audience to feel excited and inspired. In this case, using positive framing is reasonable and conducive to the goal.
I'm not sure how appropriate it is for a popular-science publication to refer to framing when talking about new discoveries, and am not offering support for or against such usage in this context. The decision to put the phrase in such a way, however, may well be an informed choice that makes sense from the perspective of the goal of such a publication.
I don't think that's for either of us to declare.
I'm at least quarter-Ukrainian from my father's side (I think my parental grandfather was Russian, but parental grandmother was certainly Ukrainian). You sound like you have much less than that in you. We're in no position to dictate who's one people and who aren't.
I do consider Ukrainians and Belarussians brotherly peoples, from my view as a Russian. I wish either of them no harm, and all the best, and hope that no major conflict arises between either of the three.
But they're going to be the ones to tell me what nation they are and what other traits they identify themselves with.
> and Slavic culture has always been defined by culture, not necessarily ethnicity.
I don't think Slavic culture – if there is, indeed, such a thing – defines itself with itself. It can't be its own description, see?
Aside from that... Don't you think there's this whole new massive issue of nationality that defines a people?
I've read that it would increase their protection (legal, and sometimes financial, I suppose?), and that it's supposed to improve working conditions (because unionized workers will have a more solid foundation to push against as they demand those conditions).
How deep does this go? Is there any other benefit? Something specific to the industry, perhaps?
That's beside the point. Right now, there's a growing nationalist sentiment growing in Ukraine. If you go to Ukraine and shout this historical fact in the streets of, say, Kiyv, you might just encounter a group of people who violently disagree with the "underlying idea" (which you won't express, but they'll perceive) that Ukraine is Russia's bitch.
Imagine shouting about the Armenian genocide in Instanbul, or about the extermination and oppression of Native Americans in a major city in Texas.
Maybe not exactly, but you get the idea.
> My ancestors never immigrated from a country called Ukraine even though they were Ukrainian (or back then often called Ruthenian)
That kind of Ruthenian? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Galicia%E2%80%93Vol...]
Or that kind of Ruthenian? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruthenians_and_Ukrainians_in_C...]
Your ancestry might as well be "Polish with a mix of Lithuanian", 'cause who knows at this stage, no? Did you take a DNA test?
"My name is Bond. James Bond."
The big difference, of course, is that Mesopotamia is unlikely to commit crimes on foreign soil any time soon because you dismiss its territorial ambitions... unless I'm missing something everyone else gets here.
There were both what they've been called, sure, but given the current state of relationship between Russia and any of the two countries, it's like looking for trouble.
EDIT: what?
It's clear now that he's been a successful businessman, with great achievements in bodybuilding and physical culture that will have him remembered for a long time after he's dead, as well as a number of what a regular Joe would consider big breaks: his acting career, and his political career. People might not know he's a sharp businessman, but he's made his millions before acting somehow. The book, however, portrays him as a juggernaut of success. "I did that, then I did that, and that, and that..."
After reading Vladimir Pozner's Parting with Illusions – an insightful autobiography of vivid images of his time – this just didn't seem right. Pozner had a lot of success in the field of journalism, he's been on TV, he owns a number of businesses – but in the book, he also speaks about his failures and his worries – something noticeably absent from Schwarzenegger's.
(Apparently, Schwarzenegger writes about his affair in one of the chapters of the book. I never read past about the middle of it: couldn't stomach it.)
(EDITed to add: I recognize that both men are writing autobiographies – the "auto" part I find difficult to believe in Schwarzenegger's case – which means they're going to be somewhat biased to their own side of the story, especially with something that's happened a while ago and is no longer so full on detail. I realize, too, that Pozner's book was biased in such way, regardless of how much effort he'd put into averting it.
I do posit, however, is that Pozner's account is far less biased than Schwarzenegger's, in no small part because of the heart-felt, genuine nature of the former's stories.)
There was this blog post by Dan Abramov, of overreacted.io, called "Things I Don't Know as of 2018" [https://overreacted.io/things-i-dont-know-as-of-2018/]. It lists Dan's known unknowns, and encourages others to do the same publicly, in an effort to shed the idea that a developer must know everything in their field to be considered capable.
I think this is what we need more of: to know that people arounds us, amateurs and experts alike, are fallible, before the pedestal is violently broken down the line. It doesn't necessarily mean that their expertise is, as well, but as human beings, we're all failing in some areas where others wouldn't be able to guess. Scientists, artists, businessmen, craftsmen of other calibers...
From personal experience, it's one of the big things that keep artists anxious about their craft: that they aren't good enough because they're not as good as their aspiration figure. They don't know that the person they revere got to where they are partly because they struggled until they got their big break.
We may not have control over external circumstances, but we do have control over what we choose to do with our own self. Practice is what brings skill about.
Any reviews from people who've read it?
It's good presentation. With a bit of work, it could be an amazing first-impression tool for people interested in scripts or linguistics.
The design is pretty good, but you can't get away with `position: absolute` these days unless you need it to set something steady on the screen.
`overflow: hidden` on an open full-size modal is also not a good practice, I agree.
Is 300ms too slow for you? I've always considered 250ms to be a generally-agreeable animation time.
2. There's a general passive-combative conversation about browsers going on ("I like Firefox, I don't get why people like Chrome" and vice versa) that I never wanted to be a part of, mostly because of how disrespectful and counterproductive it is.
3. In a thread about ad-blocking, I got what is effectively an ad for Firefox.
I don't want any of this nonsense on my side of the table. "Use my product because I value it!" No, go away, I don't need this.
My choices are rarely uninformed. I spend time considering what to pick where I'm able to. I'd like my choices to be respected as such – not have my face plastered with someone else's unprompted opinion.
Here's an example of a better conversation:
– I liked this part of Firefox, and I wish it was in Chrome too.
– Do you not like Firefox whole, then? If so, why?
– Because of X, Y, and Z. I used it intensely for a month or so, so I got a good look at the way it behaves. I know X is solvable, but not Y or Z (I tried), and they're critical to my browsing experience.
– Okay, I see. I hope you consider (browser diversity, or whatever issues using Firefox's supposed to solve), because they're important.
– Oh yeah? Can you tell me why?
...and so on. A respectful conversation that sparks curiosity and provides context, without annoying any of the parties in the process.
Otherwise, you get what you give. Seems a fair approach to me.