davidvaughan

Droitwich, UK, is a bit revealing.

That idea across there. Just look at it.

That is technically impressive, Hassaan, and thanks for sharing.

One recommendation: I wouldn't have the demo avatar saying things like "really cool setup you have there, and a great view out of your window". At that point, it feels intrusive.

As for what I'd build... Mentors/instructors for learning. If you could hook up with a service like mathacademy, you'd win edtech. Maybe some creatures instead of human avatars would appeal to younger people.

I confess to some scepticism. The lady concerned seems to be a dedicated big cat believer, with seven sightings already[0]. If other witnesses had been present, I would be more accepting of the claim.

[0] https://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/19808796.cumbrias-sharon-...

The writer suggests that a page about a moth is unlikely to provide an opportunity for pushing contentious views.

The edits show there was disagreement earlier this year about the wingspan of the Scrobipalpula crustaria.

Is it 11-13mm or 10-13mm?

People feel strongly about these things.

Do I detect some Aussie tongue in cheek here...

"Mr Renwick was quick to protest his innocence. “You’ve got the wrong feller,” he told reporters."

The adult person under investigation has been named by the media. There is also a 16-year-old, who is too young to be publicly identified.

The novice is less likely to learn from a direct reading of Plato's Republic than to absorb Socrates's arguments and ingest enormous amounts of food for thought.

The novice will then have the capacity to think more seriously about current or historical political questions and devise better responses or approaches to them (better for the novice and better for our societies).

Always go to the masters first - the Platos, the Keynes, the Freuds... They're by far the best exponents of their own thinking.

Csikszentmihalyi says that attention "is an energy under our control, to do with as we please".

If only it were true that we have attention under our control. There are so many things we can pay attention to, and so many people whose job it is to distract us, that we can rarely direct it as we want. And biologically, we're set up to be distracted by threats and unexpected phenomena.

That's not to say we don't pay attention. As he points out elsewhere, Csikszentmihalyi identified 'flow', which is when we get into a nice state of focus on something positive.

Luckily, we're finding out more about how to pay attention to things we want to pay attention to. Prioritising, dividing tasks into chunks, getting enough sleep, choosing what we attend to more wisely are all helpful.

For many people, sleep seems to be the #1 productivity booster. Certainly, the research seems to suggest focus suffers significantly thanks to lack of sleep - not to mention IQ.

Needless to say there seem to be exceptions - Margaret Thatcher famously coped with 4 hours a night. It's been suggested that some people's ADRB1 expression continues while they're awake, which means they need less sleep. However, less sleep is also associated with dementia late in life.

From Carlyle's French Revolution: "No lie you can speak or act but it will come, after longer or shorter circulation, like a Bill drawn on Nature's Reality, and be presented there for payment, with the answer, No effects. Pity only that it often had so long a circulation: that the original forger were so seldom he who bore the final smart of it! Lies, and the burden of evil they bring, are passed on; shifted from back to back, and from rank to rank; and so land ultimately on the dumb lowest rank, who with spade and mattock, with sore heart and empty wallet, daily come in contact with reality, and can pass the cheat no further".

There's a pile of lovely Brazilian music using seven-string guitars. It's often used as a counterpoint to samba melodies and in the style known as 'choro'.

Yamandu Costa is worth a listen to hear how far a technically brilliant soloist can take the instrument.

It is possible that the resolution gained more votes because of the trade war.

In general, Members of the European Parliament have less understanding of business and trade than businesspeople and traders, and in my view[0] tend to follow their emotions more in those areas.

Some also have a streak of anti-Americanism, in varying degrees. As the heat increases, this sort of resolution may occur more frequently.

I'm sceptical of the notion that MEPs all voted according to their devotion to fundamental rights.

None of this means that I believe pursuing the resolution into legislation is a bad or a good idea. I'd have to see (and understand the consequences of) the proposed measure.

[0]This is an impression; I have no empirical data

Some of the questions necessarily involve a pen and paper. eg "copy this picture" and link the circled characters.

I get the impression from the article that they weren't expecting an anaerobic space: "Archaeologists lifted up a piece of concrete flooring while exploring the foundations of the fourth-century stone fortress. They were struck by a layer of black, sweet-smelling and perfectly preserved anaerobic soil in an area where it was completely unexpected".

They do appear as "Roman camp" on an OS at the right scale - try the website, where you can sign up for free for a week. Or the Heritage Gateway website mentioned by ascorbic.

There's a lot in the area that's still to be dug. It's a matter of finding the money to fund digs.

Just so. The reality for most people is that other people are the primary consumers of attention. So the problem is rather old.

I take issue with some of the statements on the front page.

1. "Children are motivated most when they discover the meaning behind a subject of their own accord."

Not in my experience. The most motivated children are motivated for a big bag of complex reasons, including desire to please, desire to pass exams, and a general will to solve problems and answer questions. They may also be intrinsically motivated by the meaning behind a subject, but that understanding can also be provoked from outside (eg by a teacher).

2. "Children develop grit through a self-directed curriculum." Again, not in my experience. A rather harsh truth is that children develop some of their grit by not having all their natural inclinations indulged. Numerous are the tales of successful people who excelled because they overcame difficult circumstances.

I think it's a new term for something very old.

People who needed to do serious work went to monasteries or lived in caves.

The biggest distraction for many people is other people. Solitude is the way to get real work done.

There's a lot of interesting stuff here: http://www.hermitary.com/articles/

Yes, sorry. I've corrected it.

"bills" = "invoices" in British English

(Edited for rightness)

This is wonderfully sly and humorous.

Sleet, snow, rain and even clouds of insects can reduce or confuse the signal.

Dissenters identified and exposed by an algorithm? I don't think this is a good or ethical idea to put into practice. But I admit it's interesting.

"What is the problem with the idea of an ID card?"

In my view, the problem is that it increases the government's power over citizens. Much government is useful and good, but it's an ineluctable law that powers are abused. ID cards extend the territory on which the abuse of power can play out.

I wear a tinfoil hat because governments have a history of abusing their powers. Although we live in steady and somewhat well-governed democracies, there's no guarantee that this will always be the case.

Indeed, and by coincidence Izabella Kaminska published an interesting piece on why that's true with reference to cryptocurencies yesterday:

http://ftalphaville.ft.com/2014/01/24/1750472/why-its-tough-...

Although the learning pyramid may be accurate, the research on which the figures is based has either gone missing or never existed.

The given source is the National Training Laboratories in Bethel, Maine. However, they happily admit that they're unsure how it came to have figures.

"Yes, we believe it to be accurate - but no, we no any longer have - nor can we find - the original research that supports the numbers. We get many inquiries every month about this - and many, many people have searched for the original research and have come up empty handed.”

http://www.virtuala.com.au/essays/learningpyramid.html

I've had some success with cold calls.

I'm uncomfortable with the scattergun approach, so I research the business before calling and use LinkedIn to see who I should be talking to. I use the call to ask them about pain points, and while talking try to figure out a solution tailored for that individual.

This takes much more time per prospect than cold emailing or phoning through a list, but figuring out something for each target already narrows the field down a lot and increases your chances.

No, you weren't the only one.

The only reality-based test mentioned in this review was whether Okies could get a "basic" job in a factory, and an assertion that this would require critical thinking skills (with the implication that such skills would be of the sort taught at school).

However, I think Ripley may give more in her book. An NYT review suggests she discusses how American school-leavers "lack the knowledge and skill to compete in the global economy". It's all a bit vague, I admit.

"Teaching children to think" is a much-used phrase. It could mean a great many things.