Well, it's very true that taking any medication over a long period of time makes your body get used and adapt to it. The longer you take it, the less of an actual effect it has on your system. Once you've reached that point where the body has fully adapted to it, but the medication hasn't eliminated the source of the problem, you've actually done more harm than good to your body. (Now, after taking away the drug, it will effectively have worsened the symptoms. Until the body readapts again.)
So taking any medication that surely has some effects on the body over a long period of time, but we're not so sure whether it helps the body eliminate the source of illness, can in fact be very dangerous. This is why the whole idea of "Try this anti-depressant over the next few months, maybe it helps! We have data it helps about 20% of patients that share your symptoms!", seems kind of insane to me. Let's say it's an SSRI, then surely the body will conclude over that few months that it has to produce less serotonine to adapt to it in many cases. The solution? Try a different one, increase the dosis and take it over an even longer period of time?
I'm not saying anti-depressants can't help people, I'm just saying that taking them over extended periods of time, just in case they might help, is kind of insane. Most psychologists would agree that taking SSRIs without a corresponding behavioural therapy isn't advicable (their bias is obvious, but so is the bias of the opposing parties). The source of the problem are not SSRIs, but the incompetence of the people prescribing them. And in many countries, they even receive certain boni for being that incompetent.
So if I lock down all ports except for one, and allow access to that port only with certain user names and the correct password for each one, that's a firewall?
I guess any tool which allows you to do that is called a firewall?
On topic: How about the Gnome Sort gnome for a mid-stage boss? :p
Common enemies should obviously be bugs, deadlines and memory leaks. A deadline would maybe fry the entire part of the screen to its left after a certain timer reaches 0 (there could maybe be something like a rand(0-60) frames tolerance span to make it more realistic). When hit by a bug, the controls and maybe also the entire gaming world could be slightly glitched, until you kill it. (just xor random garbage into the input every now and then to glitch up the controls) Just ignoring it and running on won't fix it and if you ignore too many of them, you'll be screwed for good. :p Memory leaks could slow you down over time and limit the number of bullets on the screen or something like that. They should also be difficult to find, as they usually are, so maybe they should be camouflaged and you could only detect them from some distortions in the backgrounds. (This might not be the best idea)
Maybe it'd also be fun to impose some ridiculous "coding standards" on the player. (you mustn't hold more than 3 buttons at a time, you mustn't release the charge button during door transitions, you must let go of the jump button once you're clearly past the highest point of your jump, etc). Violating any of these could maybe slightly hurt the player (Coder Man?).
Instead of losing energy you should gain energy when hurt, eventually leading to a stack overflow. (because the way Mega Man games usually display energy levels kind of looks like the representation of a stack)
Thank you 4matsy. It always astonishes me how many people think that reducing the world's population is an evil agenda. Here are some more numbers:
http://www.science.org.au/nova/newscientist/027ns_005.htm
F.e. the problem of global warming might not be as bad as hinted at by the video though for several reasons (about minutes 10-30):
Link to video
In those situations, we generally laugh out of a combination of the emotional relief as we find out that in fact no serious injury has occurred and the feeling of superiority that it couldn't have happened to ourselves. The first half of that condition isn't morally questionable in any case, for the second half I'll consider two sub-cases. In case A, we laugh because it was some very strange (yet completely undangerous) coincidence. In case B, it couldn't have happened to ourselves because we think we are intellectually superior to the victim. So with regard to the feeling of superiority, in case A we feel superior to chance (because even though something totally unpredictable happened, it proved to be completely undangerous), in case B we feel superior to the victim.
Laughing is a kind of feedback we give to the victims of the accident as observers. If that feedback is dishonest or the one who laughs overestimates their level of superiority, it quickly becomes morally questionable in both cases. For case A, if we laugh, but something terrible could easily have happened under similar conditions, we offer dangerous feedback. The victim might carelessly get into the same situation again, but this time he/she maybe wouldn't be so lucky. It is as morally questionable as playing down any kind of serious danger in this world. For case B, we laugh over the sheer stupidity of the victim. If only few other human beings would have been as stupid as he/she was, then to laugh at him/her is a way of offering constructive feedback. If that feedback is however dishonest, it is as morally reprehensible as boasting, lying or mobbing.
For videos, I'd say case A is only morally questionable if somebody else noticed that you were laughing.
Swedishmartin: I share your feelings about age and accomplishments. But on the other hand, it doesn't matter. What's in the past is in the past. And you can't get a Ph.D. in the next two years just because a 12 year old managed to get one and write an emulator at the same time. Don't worry too much about "catching up", just look forward. Don't look at the list of goals you want to reach and force yourself to go for all of them at the same time, just because you feel that ideally you should already have reached them. Just take one step after the other. Pick one thing at a time. You want to write an emulator? Then figure out the exact steps you need to take to write one, and then take one step after the other. Easy and relaxed, but determined. Because if you really do that, you are definitely going to reach your goal. If you aim far too high and try to reach several difficult goals at once, then chances are you're going to fail at absolutely everything. It's called overcompensation and usually results in paralysis (in German there's the term Handlungsverweigerung for it, but unfortunately I can't find an exact translation for it into English). What's going to happen is that you won't even seriously start writing an emulator because you don't think you're good enough yet, and to improve yourself you're going to eventually create 10 new goals instead*, maybe resulting in a vicious circle.
*)You'd, f.e., look at some people who have indeed managed to write an emulator. Then you'd see one of them has been holding lectures at a university before he started his project. And you'd find out another one has programmed several small games before writing his emulator. etc. And you'd feel like ideally, you'd have to be able to do all of that before seriously attempting to reach your goal. You're going to feel inferior. You'd decide before you start writing an emulator, you'd first have to reach some of these other goals. etc.
Also, for another example, you wouldn't think you're good enough to get a girlfriend because you feel like you haven't really achieved anything big in your life yet. (not to mention that some people look way better than you, and others have already managed to become rich at your age!) So you'd look at several people who have achieved something really big and make it your goal to be as good as them, but that's overcompensation. It doesn't work and only results in paralysis (you won't even ever directly attempt to get a girlfriend). Just pick one goal at a time and everything will be fine.
You'd maybe also find the somewhat pagan idea of Cosmic Unity interesting. It means that we are all the same being, that there is only one soul in the entire universe, that we are one. We only have different bodies and brains, which make us different. It means you don't have to be as good as anybody else because you are him and he is you, and therefore you already are as good as him. It makes no sense to "catch up" and relive somebody else's life. Focus on doing something unique and different instead and you're going to make this world a better place. :)
My point was that the knowledge you are missing, nobody really has. They aren't 100% sure of what it means either, they'll just assume something without giving much thought to it and make it real through the way they respond to it. Try reading a book about body language, and you'll know more than the average person about it, but if you're still afraid to just assume you're right and act based on that, it still wouldn't really change anything. You'd just feel more confused. Of course all of that doesn't apply to absolutely every situation, just wanted to get the general idea out.
If you're really having that much trouble, some general ideas are that subtle turning towards something and subtly mimicking something express sympathy. Open and closed body postures generally tell you if that person feels like engaging in social interaction atm, or how safe that person feels. Looking upwards means trying to remember some concept, looking downwards means trying to remember a certain feeling. If people feel insecure about something they've said, they're going to turn/look away after the fact. Body tension in various areas can also be very telling, but it's very context dependant.
I can totally relate to that. I have trouble reading body language in real life too, so oftentimes I either try (and fail) to guess what the subtext of someone's dialog is, or ask them to play Captain Obvious and spell out what they're really feeling.
If their body language is sending out ambigious signals, feel free to just take that interpretation which would be most beneficial to you and reward them with a smile. They most likely won't argue against it. If you deliberately ask them for why they used a certain kind of body language, chances are they're first going to be as clueless as you are, and then reply with that interpretation that'd be most beneficial to them instead. (probably that interpretation which is most congruent to how they want to see themselves. identity is just a construct.)
"What makes us who we are?" The survey is with regards to 'identity'.
On a scale of 1 to 10 (low to high), rate the importance of the following ten factors in terms of how they have helped to shape who you are today. The emphasis is placed on who you are, so there are no right or wrong answers.
- family and upbringing: 10
My upbringing has taught me that it's important to be excellent in everything I do, which made me the quasi-perfectionist I am (I'll either try to do a close to perfect job or get frustrated and quit if nobody forces me to finish the project. And I'm never positively surprised with the outcome). My younger relatives have at times been what's most important to me in my life, but nowadays they're old enough that they don't need me anymore.
- friends, peer groups: 8
I have learnt over the course of my life that friends come and go. The emphasis has been on the go part for me and as I'm a very long-time oriented person, I have figured the energy I need to invest to make new friends or to keep them just isn't worth the benefits. Under different circumstances, I might have become a people's person.
- sexuality: 10
My low libido has been one of my core problems when growing up, and it still is, but nowadays I'm already pretty used to it. My idea of love and relationships have always been totally different to those of the people around me. As I've felt somewhat incompatible with both sexes, I have at times claimed to be totally assexual (as an attempt to accept permanent failure in that area and move on to something else). However nowadays, I strongly desire to have a permanent female partner at some point again. As a result of my low libido, I'm presently not capable of making female beings feel loved and desired though. It's essentially what makes me the failure at life that I am.
- aspirations: 7
I have always had high aspirations, so I've never learned to just accept things as they are. My specific aspirations themselves did rather little to shape my character though.
- education, profession: 5/10
The 5 belongs to the public education system, the 10 to self-education.
- financial status: 9
I have never had to worry about having too little money (partly because I don't particularly enjoy spending it), so that would have to have shaped my life quite a bit.
- culture: 6
I hate Austrian culture. Most of my countrymen are just too carefree, they're happy as long as they can enjoy fun and laid-back lives. That kind of life could never make me happy. I have largely ignored cultural influences and am thus very poorly adapted to my surroundings.
- religion, beliefs: 7
I have never cared a lot about religion. There was one important point in my life though, where I first had to seriously face the possibility that there might not be such a thing as God. Which meant to me that I cannot rely on faith and prayer, but have to solve my problems on my own. Just to be on the safe side. I was around 14 in my life then, and it was around that time when I first seriously concidered suicide as a possible option to end my life. As my entire belief system has been totally shattered at least twice, I nowadays am very sceptical of absolutely everything.
- geography, climate: 9
I have some reason to assume that the amount of sunlight you are exposed to at various times of the year has a tremendous influence on forming anybody's personality.
- scientific and technological advances: 10
The internet has changed my life for the worse. Combine the internet with the fact that I don't really have any friends, and it's suddenly not enough to be among the best in your social circle anymore to be excellent, but I'd have to measure myself with the best of the best of the world. I simply can't, but I'll keep on trying.
My three most disturbing dreams:
1) Spread cheese hell
Basically I dreamt of a piece of bread, with some spread cheese on it, and for the whole night a knife would keep spreading the cheese. And all of that at a very disgustingly high zoom factor. It simply went on forever... When I woke up, I felt very disturbed and deeply embarrassed.
2) Iron Maiden
Pretty straight forward. In that dream I simply opened my wardrobe and entered my iron maiden, which had an unusually high number of salted spikes in it, and closed it. For a while it felt quite exciting, but then I woke up with this burning, salty pain all over my whole body. Took a while till it went away.
3) Purple Space Spiders
I went into space and when I came back, suddenly every human being had purple dog-sized spiders as pets on dog leashes. Clearly, the spiders had somehow manipulated people to accept them as pets, to mind control them and eat them and their children. Before I could do anything at all, one of those beasts attacked me by jumping at me and squeezing me with its many legs. Then I felt some very warm and numbing poison spreading through my body. Then I woke up. Felt very realistic.
Continuing to spam more J-Rock crap. Some massive spamming follows.
A classic. Digital Hardcore. Sick video.
Link to video
Can you spot the actual band that sings this song?
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Pretty decent. Funny hair. Portugese fansub.
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80s J-Rock. Band still exists.
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No studio version of this song exists.
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Bass instructional video by the Animetal bassist.
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1993. Part 1/4. Song is roughly 30 minutes long.
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Not interested yet. But I am curious if I'll be able to see the 3d images at all. Autostereograms don't work for me and I have perceived the 3d effects of the two 3d movies I've watched as a lot less pronounced than they should have been. Except for some visual snow, I have perfect vision.
Edit: At one point the people next to me would instinctively dodge an object that popped out of the screen and moved closer towards us at a high speed, but for me it had hardly left the screen surface. Anyway, I'll see if the 3DS is compatible with me soon enough. ;)
I don't take this thread particularly seriously and realized I may have been a bit weirding out writing that, but I didn't care.
What leads you to believe that I must have been drunk?
I think the "problem" with Free Jazz City is that it sounds too random and static, especially in the beginning. For the drums, it would have been nice to give each hit individual pan/filter/volume/pitch levels, for the part where the first instrument kicks in it'd have been nice to put some sort of gradual envelope over it. No need to go oveboard with it if it's just not your style, but little adjustments like that can work wonders.
How could you've been fooled so easily? xD
Well, I knew this would happen. Most Western men just assume they're female (or gay) because aiming for a cute look with colorful accessories is exclusively associated with the female sex in our culture (why would any straight man want to look cute?). But this association with the female sex is just as arbitrary as associating the word tree with an actual tree. (maybe not exactly, as cute = young = more likely to be a virgin. but whatever)
For an easier proof that he's male scroll to 8:30 and listen to his voice.
Alienated/10
Edit: lol, I didn't even notice the skirt as something unusual until now. :X
The following video may suck too much even for this thread, but it features more gayness plus a little surprise (though the title kind of gives it away): ^^
Link to video
