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Politics and Beliefs in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, October 12 2005 21:21 Profile #126
quote:
Originally written by Thuryl:

People have been trying to get individuals (by which, of course, is always meant "individuals other than themselves") to take responsibility for themselves since the beginning of recorded history. It's not going to work any better now than it has at any other time.
I meant for the individual to take responsibility for their own learning, I did not mean to imply anything other than this. From many of your other posts, it is obvious that you do so, and it is also painfully obvious that many of the members of these boards do so as well. If it is possible for some, then it is possible for others, also. The problem is that public schooling in the U.S. is geared in the opposite direction. While not everyone can "take responsibility for their learning", American public schooling, as it is now, does not encourage its students to do so.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Politics and Beliefs in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, October 12 2005 20:40 Profile #124
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:


quote:
Originally written by Synergy67:

Now we crank out worker drones where all is focused on career and money. We're not taught to critically think or question the authorities of knowledge, though occasionally we pay lip service to it. Schools are socializing institutions as much as anything else. Hello Huxley. Hello Orwell. Bye Bye Brain.
This is dramatic and fun to say but also not generally true. Most of my education has been centered on critical thinking. Philosophy was an important part of my middle school curriculum. And although I went to private schools, my experience is surely not unique or even necessarily unusual.
Actually it is almost entirely true. Public schooling is a cesspool of apathy and incompetence, and has been since the days of John Dewey. Private schooling, which I have no experience in, does not seem to be, and it seems rather impractical and short-sighted to compare the two.

Public schooling is more than intent on almost literally babysitting their students. In fact, in my high school the last action done of any consequence in the school was to strip the vending machines of any junk food. This completely insignificant and immaterial "concern" is one of many that plagues public schooling and undermines the quality of education given. Public schools are no longer concerned with education. Or if they are, those in charge are much too stupid to act to any effect.

quote:

And in college (which is, I believe, the only real school), no one forces you to become a business major or anything pre-professional.
Neither does public schooling, but that isn't the point. College, or I should say university, is so much different from public schooling, because these institutions are not just stations of learning, but establishments of progress. It is the people who attend and work at these places that push society into ever increasing heights of thought. These people learn, not because they believe they should, but because they know they must.

This is what the point of education should be, but isn't. To impart that learning is not just a means to an end, but the means of living; to show that learning is what emancipates life from the shackles of mere existence; to convey that thought is what gives meaning to free will, this, this should be the goal of schooling. But it isn't.

quote:

History majors and English majors and a variety of other specialists work on critical thinking and analysis. Physics classes put a great emphasis on putting you in the lab to see the actual experiments upon which your laws of physics are based (well, at least in theory they do).
This is what I have recently started calling (most likely in a caffeine induced bout of hyperactivity) the philosophy of a subject. This "philosophy" includes how the subject has been carried out, how it is currently carried out, and generally how progress is made in the particular area. The philosophy of science, the philosophy of english, the philosophy of history, etc., these are the subjects that modern public schooling attempts to teach through the current curriculum. They spout the facts of a subject, while trying to give a sense of the aforementioned philosophy. This subversive method, though I believe effective in the past, is failing due to one modern actuality.

I have found that in my high school, the average teacher has never actually worked in their particular field other than to teach it. In fact, I have only had one science teacher that actually worked as a scientist. Furthermore, most teachers I have had came straight out of a local community college, which, as it turns out, makes the same mistakes public schooling does. The repetitive nature of this problem has obvious consequences. No teacher is able to teach the philosophy of a subject, and for the sake of their jobs, they don't.

For a clear example, buy the Baron's AP Physics B book and the Baron's AP Physics C book. One was written by a physics professor at Brown, and the other was written by a high school teacher.

quote:

Don't get me wrong: many — and probably even most — public middle and high schools that I know of are conformity machines. But usually there are alternatives to the normal track at the local public high school (be they AP classes, separate programs, private schools, whatever),
These alternatives either depend on the quality of teaching or one's income. AP courses are brilliant only because they can be done through independent study (except those that require lab time, such as AP Chemistry). Their tests are usually very well designed, and weighted practically. Unfortunately most students do not know how teach themselves, as this requires a great deal of critical thinking. So they take the class, and subject themselves to more of the same.

Fortunately for me I had a scientist for an AP Chemistry teacher, and as a result most of my class (including yours truly) received fives. Now my school is not what you would call decent. It is, rather, one of the worst in its county. In fact, last year, the school considered a grade of 25% and over a D. Recently, I heard of another school in Mississippi whose grading scale was punctuated by 5% blocks, meaning 95% and up was an A, 90% and up was a B, etc. This school also had an AP Chemistry class, and, apparently, the only person who actually felt confident enough to take the test, got a 2.

quote:

and colleges almost universally teach critical thinking over conformity.
But one must get admittance to a good university, and 18 years is much too long a time to wait for a decent education.

--------------------------------------------------

From my experience of public schooling I believe I can safely say that if public schooling does not change soon, it will be the downfall of American society. Of course this raises the question, how to create change?

The problem with teachers seems to be the biggest. The obvious answer to this would be to either raise teacher standards or train better teachers. Of course if better trained professionals wanted to be teachers, they would be teaching in our public schools. The fact is, there are too many opportunities out there for the trained professional, so affecting the selection of teachers would be rather unnecessary. Actually, touching the system in any way would do little good.

It seems that the only way to improve the education of the average citizen is to delimit society's tendency to educate, and instead emphasize the individual's need to learn. Learning is intrinsically individualist, and so must be treated as the individual's responsibility.

[ Thursday, October 13, 2005 13:20: Message edited by: KernelKnowledge12 ]
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Pop-rivet my skull, please. in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Sunday, October 2 2005 19:11 Profile #5
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:

In fact, I imagine that once the BoA Editor Re-make is finished, we can just make the editor automatically generate a fixed custom objects script with each new scenario.
Actually it'd be easier to create a base custom object script and package it with the 3D editor, as is done with the warrior's grove data. I'd have to add a few extra lines to the code to automate copying, which I won't be able to do for a week or two, but after that is done it would only be neccessary to update the base script. Of course someone will have to build the OS X version.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Pop-rivet my skull, please. in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Sunday, October 2 2005 19:11 Profile #5
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:

In fact, I imagine that once the BoA Editor Re-make is finished, we can just make the editor automatically generate a fixed custom objects script with each new scenario.
Actually it'd be easier to create a base custom object script and package it with the 3D editor, as is done with the warrior's grove data. I'd have to add a few extra lines to the code to automate copying, which I won't be able to do for a week or two, but after that is done it would only be neccessary to update the base script. Of course someone will have to build the OS X version.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Do you like school? in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Monday, August 29 2005 09:51 Profile #79
Not quite, but close. A programmer creates concepts and defines them, using the tools at his/her disposal. In a modern C++ sense, this would be essentially describing types such as objects/ideas/concepts and defining how they are to interact with each other in a theoretical playing field. Before putting things together, a programmer must first conceptualize/create the "things".

This should be kind of hard to grasp for programmer and nonprogrammer alike as it is rather complicated to explain, unless you've actually programmed like this.

On Topic:
What English courses are you taking? Any AP/IB or something of the same stature? Those tend to be more college oriented than the more than ridiculous Honors/Regular English courses.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Do you like school? in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Monday, August 29 2005 08:21 Profile #77
quote:
Originally written by Eldibs:

How does writing have anything to do with programming? The only thing I could see a programmer writing (on paper) is something in pseudocode or a flow chart. And the only thing that they should be typing is code for programs.
Although, as far as I know, most people do not think of programming this way, writing and programming are very similar. Most of the basic skills involved in writing are neccessary in a good programmer. While this was not true in the days of procedural programming and even a bit of object oriented programming, it is becoming more and more evident as C++ becomes more and more a language on par with the spoken word.

That being said, writing and programming are not exactly alike. A writer describes, while a programmer defines.

(Just to be clear, I am not saying writing is harder/better than programming or vice versa.)
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
BoA Editor Remake in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, August 10 2005 18:20 Profile #142
Well the annoyances should go in either the support requests or the feature requests. If you really don't feel them to be important, you don't have to enter them, but I'll still try to address them.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
BoA Editor Remake in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, August 10 2005 18:20 Profile #142
Well the annoyances should go in either the support requests or the feature requests. If you really don't feel them to be important, you don't have to enter them, but I'll still try to address them.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
BoA Editor Remake in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, August 10 2005 17:07 Profile #140
Hmmm, I didn't think there'd be this many. It would probably better to enter them in the bug tracker at the sourceforge site. It would be easier for me to manage them.

I'm pretty close to finishing the scripting engine for editing, but if I can't get it to compile by tomorrow, I'll start working on fixing these bugs.

If there are any other bugs/suggestions please say so.

[ Wednesday, August 10, 2005 17:08: Message edited by: KernelKnowledge12 ]
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
BoA Editor Remake in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, August 10 2005 17:07 Profile #140
Hmmm, I didn't think there'd be this many. It would probably better to enter them in the bug tracker at the sourceforge site. It would be easier for me to manage them.

I'm pretty close to finishing the scripting engine for editing, but if I can't get it to compile by tomorrow, I'll start working on fixing these bugs.

If there are any other bugs/suggestions please say so.

[ Wednesday, August 10, 2005 17:08: Message edited by: KernelKnowledge12 ]
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Help with a Carbon program in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Wednesday, August 10 2005 09:27 Profile #4
quote:
Originally written by Not I:

Except it seems to round out colors to the closest ones on the BoA pallete, which if demonstrations are correct, BoA does not do...
According to Isaac, the tinting code was obtained directly from Jeff so it most likely is not at fault. What you may be noticing is BoA's lighting engine, which the editor does not mimic.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Our President in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, August 5 2005 04:14 Profile #110
quote:

Essentially, the argument is that the American government is not and never was meant to represent the views of the people
I would guess that this view has something to do with the specifics of the electoral college. Since that representatives can vote any way they please, in conformance with or in violation of the popular vote, it can be argued that they are more informed of the needs of the union than the common man. Even if the founding fathers intended this, it seems rather archaic.

quote:

that elections are simply a way of making sure that bad governments are removed from power, and the fact that they favour governments that promise to do what the people want them to do is merely an unfortunate side effect
This, I don't get.

quote:

These are the kind of people who say "America is a republic, not a democracy, and it's a good thing that's the case".
Well the first part of this sentence, if I'm not mistaken, would deal with mainly with the amount of participation in the U.S., and furthermore how well informed the common man is. Whether the productivity of the union should be held over the individual is another matter entirely.

quote:

it's a view that I've commonly seen among Republicans.
Really? I don't think I've even heard of this argument before now. You wouldn't happen to know of any places where I could read up on this particular outlook, would you?
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Our President in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, August 5 2005 03:26 Profile #108
quote:
Originally written by Thuryl:

Not that it's a view that I personally endorse, but there are plenty of people who'd say that too much democracy can be just as bad as too little; that it's neither necessary nor desirable for a government to be completely democratic.
What do you mean by completely democratic? As in mobrule? Although I would contend that is more of an expansive oligarchy, I can see where this viewpoint comes from. I don't, however, get what this has to do with my post. Please explain.

Actually, now that I think of it, I can't seem to think of any examples of a nation in a state of "complete democracy" (unless you are referring to direct democracy, which is another matter alltogether) that is not in essence an autocracy. Take, for example, the well-known French Revolution. It began as a democratic endeavour, but rapidly turned into an authoritarian fiasco. Is this what you mean by completely democratic, or am I just not understanding?
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Our President in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, August 5 2005 02:50 Profile #105
I'm not sure why, and its very surprising, but no one here seems to fully grasp the idea of Separation of Church and State. Although Freedom of Religion is a principle deeply rooted in U.S. History and Culture, it has very little to do with the aforementioned democratic ideal.

When Bush speaks to the people of the United States, he is the representative of that nation's government. As such, he CANNOT endorse a religion, not because it may alienate some of his constituents, but because religion, in its developed form, is naturally undemocratic. By praying while on the job, Bush suggests the U.S. government is one of God's peons. This is not only wrong, but an insult to demcoracy in its entirety. A democratic government serves neither God nor Devil. It is a direct construct of the people and so, only serves the people. The moment religion is directly integrated, to a level of any effect, in a government, the government can no longer, in principle, be called democratic.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Orb of thralni in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, August 5 2005 02:21 Profile #150
quote:
Originally written by Marvin, the paranoid android:


quote:
Originally written by The Almighty Doer of Stuff:

remove screen stretching plz
I'd love to, but I don't know how to.
Your post with the script has some very long strings. Get rid of them.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Orb of thralni in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, August 5 2005 02:21 Profile #150
quote:
Originally written by Marvin, the paranoid android:


quote:
Originally written by The Almighty Doer of Stuff:

remove screen stretching plz
I'd love to, but I don't know how to.
Your post with the script has some very long strings. Get rid of them.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Crossbow in ASR in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, July 29 2005 16:25 Profile #10
I wrote a quick program to check, and the item does not exist in the .BAS file. I do not believe it's in the scenario.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
Crossbow in ASR in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Friday, July 29 2005 03:16 Profile #6
quote:
Originally written by Lucidus:

but I haven't yet been able to install it successfully
Are you using the 3D Editor? There should be no real installation if so. Just download 'n run.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
3D Editor Crash in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Sunday, July 24 2005 14:32 Profile #17
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:

Okay, Apple has now claimed that sound resources are "third-party software," so they cannot provide any technical support.
The sound resources aren't corrupt, the part of OS X that loads/plays them is. Fixing this is Apple's responsibility. Perhaps you should explain this to them.

If they still refuse to help, I googled OS X Support, and got this site:
http://www.macosx.com/

Seems promising.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
3D Editor Crash in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Sunday, July 24 2005 14:32 Profile #17
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:

Okay, Apple has now claimed that sound resources are "third-party software," so they cannot provide any technical support.
The sound resources aren't corrupt, the part of OS X that loads/plays them is. Fixing this is Apple's responsibility. Perhaps you should explain this to them.

If they still refuse to help, I googled OS X Support, and got this site:
http://www.macosx.com/

Seems promising.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
PHP help here in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Sunday, July 24 2005 13:24 Profile #18
quote:
Originally written by Kakakaka:

Regarding PHP-sucks-persons:

PHP sucks.
Perl sucks more.
Ruby sucks even moreso.

I don't know about Python, but I doubt I'd put it underneath Perl.
All scripting languages suck. They are the quickfix created by people who instead of creating code to simplify their problem, create entirely new languages that end up creating new problems. They are designed with fast production in mind, and are intrinsically commercial. Of these languages, Perl is fairly powerful, and Python is probably the best to use due to the implications of Boost-Python.

quote:

I'd recommend getting Crimson Editor to use as a PHP editor, though, instead of Notepad (Dreamweaver is nice, too, but it's quite expensive).
I never used it, so I can't really be sure, but Dev-PHP (http://devphp.sourceforge.net/) might be helpful.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
PHP help here in General
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Saturday, July 23 2005 14:28 Profile #10
For web programming, Perl. For GUI programming, C++/Java.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
3D Editor Crash in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Saturday, July 23 2005 13:53 Profile #15
Well there's some good news in that. Since you can build the editor's source code, you should be able to get rid of sound in the editor (I can tell you what to do if you want to) and get that to work. Also, you can manually go into BoA's preference file and turn the sound off (with a Hex Editor) to get BoA working. This might help, in case fixing the bug takes longer than expected.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
3D Editor Crash in Blades of Avernum
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Saturday, July 23 2005 13:53 Profile #15
Well there's some good news in that. Since you can build the editor's source code, you should be able to get rid of sound in the editor (I can tell you what to do if you want to) and get that to work. Also, you can manually go into BoA's preference file and turn the sound off (with a Hex Editor) to get BoA working. This might help, in case fixing the bug takes longer than expected.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00
3D Editor Crash in Blades of Avernum Editor
KernelKnowledge12
Shock Trooper
Member # 4557
 written Saturday, July 23 2005 13:11 Profile #13
quote:
Originally written by Kelandon:


EDIT 2: It appears that my computer has some sort of serious internal error. Thanks guys, but I don't think we can solve it here.
If you ever do find out what the problem is, could you post it? It seems odd that an internal error would only affect BoA/Editor.
Posts: 264 | Registered: Wednesday, June 16 2004 07:00

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