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I think it is best to split this from the main discussion about MDscripting.
[quote]Kafuuka, you raise a very important point. The cleanup is sorely lacking for both keys and storage. Yes, the empty storage removes itself but things like "tests" with data in them stay behind, I think a storage list which shows the names of your storages would be useful (even if you just get them in an array)[/quote]
The problem is simple. Every time a new variable or key is created, it increases the server load a tinsy bit. Memory/harddisk space and possibly processor time are eaten. cpu time? Imagine a query on all keys a player has. I have only one reason I can think of to make such a query, but that is one too many.
Quests can be forgotten by players and creators alike, but the server will only delete the keys if the creator asks it. This is also true for scripts themselves.
Ideally all creators are excellent, motivated programmers and take the effort necessary to minimize this. In practice most of us are liable to be happy if our scripts work regardless of efficiency. There a couple of guidelines which are valid for every programming language that has to deal with memory:
-For every line of code that creates a new variable, there should be a line of code to delete that variable.
-Use good names for your variables. Compare 'x143' and 'number_of_attempts'.
Both of these guidelines are problematic. Only keys can be named. Quests are often one time only, thus requiring an end key to be stored as long as the quest exists. This implies that cleaning up quest scripts can only be done if you also clean the keys which then become redundant. If your script is spread over a dozen clickies, this isn't fun work and actually a process which can be standardized:
if scripts can be labeled, then it becomes a straightforward idea to delete all scripts with the same tag. Deleting the endkeys (and others if necessary) requires a query over all players but is also programmable. Both of these are not doable in MD script afaik, but should be implemented asap to counter bloated code. In one step I would force labeling to be mandatory for scripts and keys. It is more work for Mur now, and more work every time you make a new key/script, but the maintenance will go down a lot. -
I haven't yet looked at MDscript, but I did something similar for one of my quests, using php. For MDscript I would do something like:
when starting the quest, give the player two new keys [i]Kafuuka_questx_started[/i] and [i]Kafuuka_questx_stage0[/i]
whenever players advance the quest, delete the key [i] Kafuuka_questx_stagen[/i] and make a new one [i]Kafuuka_questx_stagen+1[/i]
when it is finished, do not make a new stage n+1 key
The only checks you need to make are:
if the player is at the clicky to start the quest, see if s/he attempted it before.
if the player is at the n-th clicky, see if s/he has key n.
If there are different routes, you will have to make even longer keynames, eg. [i]Kafuuka_questx_stageA_pathB[/i]. If multiple paths/stages arrive at the same clicky, you'll have to check them one by one. It is impossible to have multiple checks to be true and this won't pose a problem. If you are paranoid and don't want people to guess your keynames, use something like [i]Kafuuka_bananas_questx_stagA_pathB[/i] but change "bananas" into a word that no one will guess.
For cleanup there is only one problem: people that got stuck in the quest will have both the [i]Kafuuka_questx_started[/i] and [i]Kafuuka_questx_stagen[/i] key and are trickier to erase when the quest has ended. -
[b][center]We, the Jury Members, proudly present you the winners of the second Paper Shaper contest.[/center][/b]
[b][size="3"]First place[/size] 179[/b]
Xavierson
++ bard songs (important for a bard/violinist)
+ interesting setup
+ good writing
o clean presentation
- distant past; more recent events?
[b][size="3"]Second place[/size] 165[/b]
Yoshi
+ Good roleplay
+ Integration into MD, balanced
o simple formatting
o story mode is not new, other elements are interesting
[b][size="3"]Third place[/size] 160[/b]
*Indiria Serenias*
+ Very emotional
+ consistent poetry and pictures
+ interesting story and possibilities
- future plans?
Congratulations to the winners. Your prices will be distributed asap. People who want to know their scores and the full comments can pm, I will try and answer within 24h. The above comments are only a very short summary. Also note that there is no use in comparing the final scores with previous contest, since we changed the score system a little (this version has a maximum of 260, last one 88). Furthermore I apologize for the delay, we experienced some technical difficulties.
Many thanks to our sponsor Grido (and Blackwood Forest), our inspiration Kriskah Arcanu, our fans and all participants! And also my fellow jury members; it has been a lot more chaotic than it should have been, but we got through it
Please keep in mind that this thread is meant for victory shouts, not comments on the organisation, use the meta thread for that. -
[quote name='I am Bored' date='29 October 2009 - 07:31 PM' timestamp='1256841074' post='46077']
i must request those who have voted to say what they voted, that way i know what votes should actually be included in the counting
[/quote]
You actually mean to try and calculate the mean and error of something that does not look like a t distribution at all? (student t looks similar to Bell).
But since you asked, I voted "I don't know"; never did an official test and I consider the online tests quite ridiculous. -
[quote name='Indyra' date='28 October 2009 - 09:12 PM' timestamp='1256760774' post='45975']
A 4 digit number divided by its inverted self equlas 6 and rest 933
[/quote]
I think you meant divided by it's mirror. The inverse of x is 1/x (in most contexts) and dividing x by it's inverse is equal to squaring x, which obviously wouldn't make sense in the context. -
Question about storeable variables: if I understood correct, keys are internally stored (using OO syntax) as boolean player.key and variables as var creator.player.var ? Is there a creator.var too? You could dump those in creator.creator.var probably, but that might make trial runs more difficult. All three types of variables have uses imo.
Cleanup and access are tricky subjects. It should be possible to keep track of when code was last executed and then assign a cleaning comity to review old code. Of course the comity would have less work if functions that are related to a single quest/feature are grouped as such even if the code is spread over different clickies.
Not all quest creators are good quest solvers and vice versa. One way to deal with this is to let aspiring creators seek out a master creator that trusts them and have the master introduce him into the quest creator circle. The aspirant then gets limited access and the senior members vote on his/her masterwork quest, after which the aspirant hopefully gets full access. I guess that everybody that has 100 AD should know at least one former RPC or someone else with quest creating abilities.
The above could perhaps be extended to RP use of clickies, or combined with a pay option. Although I wonder how people would use clickies for RP, I'd prefer to make a talking NPC bot... which I've been wanting to do for a long time and since it's a browser game I probably could, but botting is usually frowned upon due to exploitability and the way I have in mind is not really efficient for overhead and such
*edit* my php is a bit rusty, but if there are few programming people available, I'll see what I can do to help. I have no idea when inspiration will strike me though, so it might be a good idea to (in a separate thread) have people that can't program put requests for template functions? -
You should be very careful about deriving conclusions from this 'statistic'. There's no way to be certain people didn't lie. The amount of data is very small, you can't even be certain this is normally distributed and it is very unlikely it has the same deviation, 15. Even if you calculate all that, it doesn't change the fact that it is very well possible your iq lies on the left side of the curve.
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[quote name='Guybrush Threepwood' date='14 October 2009 - 06:05 PM' timestamp='1255539922' post='44669']
I think teaching people how to analyze an argument might work better first. I'd rather not have a bunch of people voting on something for some ridiculous and pointless reason learn how to BS their way to a reasonable score. Though, learning how to argue will help them analyze arguments I suppose.
Edit: Perhaps ethics in argument should be included as well? Though that will likely not stick.
[/quote]
You cannot explain the difference between a clean argument, a misleading argument, a persuasion and pure bullshit without giving examples of things that are not clean arguments. Besides, the more you know about persuasion, the better you can arm yourself against them.
As for ethics, in theory one should stick to arguments only. No hidden premises or other tricks. In practice people will always use everything they think they can get away with, so the only way to stop them from using tricks is to learn the tricks and warn other people. Which is once again the reason to teach people how to wrap bullshit with a nice colored ribbon. -
An interesting dilemma: do we remove useless and inappropriate remarks, perhaps punish the offenders? Or do we let them be, so that people can read and judge for themselves. What you write in another persons' log often tells more about yourself than about that person.
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IQ is highly overrated, as others have stated before. However, I do not think IQ is a bad concept, if you know what it is and what it is not.
+ It is cheap and quick to measure IQ.
+ Tests can be fairly accurate. Sadly online tests are quite crappy. Also a test is only accurate in a certain interval, mostly being [70,130], but this can be resolved by iterative testing.
+ IQ is easily interpreted. Most tests look at these things: vocabulary, pattern recognition and logic. These things are (should be) learned at basic school in all Western countries and I assume they are taught everywhere they have education.
- Scores might be influenced by stress and mood.
- They don't tell us much. Being good at logic is being good at logic. It doesn't imply you have knowledge of philosophy or maths or any area in which logic is useful. If you are good at logic AND you have read a hundred philosophy books, then you are probably a good philosopher.
On the other hand we have EQ.
+ Written tests are equally cheap and quick.
- Online tests are utter crap. For vocabulary tests there is a single right answer, while EQ tests have a 'which option suits you more?' approach. Some of them have 'none of the above' or want you to assign scores from 0 to 10, with 5 being no preference. However if half of the time you pick 'no preference', it'll be tough to interpret that.
- Interpretation? These tests are often a mix of self knowledge, knowledge of others and manipulation of others. How you need to treat others to get to a goal is dependent on your sociocultural background and the goal itself. Perhaps your morals prevent you from walking what you know to be the shortest path to your goal and an observer than concludes you took a less efficient strategy, thus you are 'emotionally stupid'. Perhaps having morals is indeed stupid.
Success and achievements. This would give us the most interesting information, but it is impossible to measure objectively.
As for MD playerbase, I think the average level of curiosity is high. We don't play this game because we want the game with the highest polygon count or the coolest moves. We play it because we want to find out what it is about, what will happen next, who we will meet next, how they will respond to those very same questions... It is my idea that this attitude has a positive correlation with intelligence and also the occasional death of a cat. -
Using my own secret approach to fuzzy logic to combine the advice of all judges, I can now announce the top 5 ranking of the torture device creation contest. Obviously those not mentioned will be disappointed. But they too can, for a while, enjoy the torture of the ranked players who will have to wait anxiously for their rewards. Also, I thought it would be funny to make this post as long as possible, so you have to read it all. Remember, all of this will be on the test!
[spoiler]Anonymously regarded as the worst entry: Grim Angel aka Ledah. If you want an explanation why we think so: just ***** google it. In fact, I had plans to make an example out of him (there was a miscommunication and I've been rather busy irl to notice it on time, but feel free to torture Ledah anyway) by using the following scheme:
[u]Sideshow Ledah:[/u]
Ladies and gentlemen, after careful deliberation we have found our first special victim! For the crime of being totally uncreative and blatantly googling, he will star in the special Sideshow Ledah feature of the engineering torture contest. For obvious reasons it is not called Sideshow Bob; that would be plagiarism!
The objective is simple: submit a picture of Grim Angel/Ledah crying and an explanation of how you got him into that state. Bonus points if you get him to say he loves Tree.[/spoiler]
Shocking, isn't it? Next up are the players that managed to somewhat impress all three of us. North Equilibrium and (Zl-eye-f)-nea. You guys beat your mediocre opponents to pulp. Druzik and Observer managed to get good marks from some of us, but Druzik aptly upset it by getting bad marks from n°3. Chad also managed to leave an impression. Dst made a nice comment about each of the participants:
[quote]
Udgard:Hmmm...trying to win me over hey?! Guess what? You're wrong! I'm not a masochist! I'm a sadist! So...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Z:Nice device but...what about the headless horseman? Or the ones that lost their heads over a girl or boy, woman or man? Tzk tzk tzk....you're not being fair! I am the only one allowed to discriminate! So...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD! Hmm...see? See? Exactly what I was talking about!
Lifeline: We asked for torturing devices not death sentences! All you did was signing your own death sentence! That's not cool! Or...ok...it will be cool when rigor mortise will take over your body but until then... You're suicidal man!
Oh...and if you ever escape Akasha's and Amoran's punishment...you'll die by my hand! Worst possible death you can imagine!Oh almost forgot...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Aken:Man! You have a razor fetish! Also...no pics? Lazy lazy lazy! OFF WITH YOUR HEAD! ps:I'm going to call my mother to cook me a tomato soup
Cryxus:C'mon Cryxus! What happened to walk the plank and a bottle of rum? I was expecting a parrot and some crackers. I was expecting hooks and other piraty stuff (btw:does the word piraty exists?). Plucking an eye out? That's a surgeon's job not a pirate's one! Shish! What if a doctor would come and ask you to let him navigate your ship? Anyway...I have to agree...the amount of pain you can inflict using your method is quite disturbing. But that doesn't prevent me to shout: OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Kempiniukas: When I started reading about your device something sounded familliar...hot, cold, hot cold. At the middle you started to resemble the guy responsible with tortures in hell who got kicked out for being too sadistic. At the end I was sure: YOU ARE THAT GUY! The grabbing of the souls blew your cover! So all I can say is OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Laz:You're discriminating too!!! That's a torturing device for grinders! They are humans too, you know?!! Shish! So..OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Nex:hmmm...I bet a former girlfriend invented that and applied it to you. Hmm...actually...if I think better all women apply a similar torturing method by asking their husbands/boyfriends/etc tons of questions. The device is replaced by the frequency, amount and sometimes stupidity of questions. I can tell you that it is much more painful because with your device you can at least faint for a couple of seconds. And the public humiliation thingy that is stolen from the same source! How would you feel if youw were called in public "Puppy, little bear, etc etc" by your other half? I must agree...you changed a bit the buttons on the remote control. They usually do something else like: red button:throw plates on tyhe husband/boyfriend, yellow button:no cooked meals fro 2 weeks, blue button:sleeping on the sofa etc etc. Oh...nice addition with the raffle but still.. OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Ledah: you're lame! No imagination there! I am disappointed that's all you came up with! And you call yourself a tree hater! OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Aql:Nice but with a major flaw (same as Z's): what if the subject has no head?!!! Damn! Do I need to think at everything! OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Aeoshattr:Where are the pics, boy? Where are the pics? Anyway...helmet? Same as Z and Aql...table? yes, nice indeed. Torturing methods? Hmmm...i think you were doing your chemestry homework when you got the idea. They describe exactly how I felt when I had to make my chemistry homework:
-my bones were starting to break like twigs and kidneys were starting to stop (starting to stop- nice one hey? )functioning
-i was having hallucinations about getting a bad grade
-i was starting to snap my fingers and bite my nails
-I was having a drink to stop the hallucinations
-after the drink my hole body was paralyzed for some time
-since my paralysis usually happened in the kitchen imagine the cuts i was getting from all the broken dishes.
Oh yeah...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Shadowseeker:I am disappointed. I thought you were going to submit one of your quests. NOTHING can beat those as torturing devices! So...no no no...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Observer: I bet you have done this before.You're a suicidal type same as Lifeline. Actually no! You're worse! You picked on MB! Man! You're either a really courageous person or you're insane! Most likely the second part! Mad players lose their heads really fast in the game. And to prove that...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
druzik:Hmmm...I must confess...your idea is new, simple and even elegant I might say. But too spiritual for me. You must have been a priest in your former life and you cannot escape the...spirituality But I can help...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Totenkopf: Oh yeah! Internet-o-hoolic!You google to find where you left your glasses 5 minutes ago. And you also discriminate! (see pic.1b) Don't you all understand that I am the only one allowed to discriminate? Shish! Skittles? Hmmm...that might work...Torture manual??? Are you kidding me? A MANUAL?? A good tortionist doesn't need one!Nice moves with MD stats but...you RickRoll'D me! OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Death Bell: Ughhh...that looks just like one of my beauty saloon visits...strapping to a chair/bench/etc, nail rippers, hair pulling, pain, all sorts of powders and creams made of worst things then chilly. Hmmm...now I wonder...HOW DO YOU KNOW ALL OF THIS? Got you DB! So...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
North:Fun slide you said? You are right. This is fun! For a masochist! I would have done something else: I would have given the alcohol to the rats first then drop them in a box with the victim then do the wizard trick But that's just me. So...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD!
Chad:First of all:being blindfolded is not always such a bad thing!Second: screams are not always bad.Third: being tied is not always bad. Hmm...and your torturing device looks also a loot like my visits to beauty saloons (same as Death Bell's). Sometimes I think I experience worst things. And same as Death Bell...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD![/quote]
the list:
1. North Equillibrium
2. (Zl-eye-f)-nea
3. Observer
4. Chad
5. Druzik -
[quote name='druzik' date='19 October 2009 - 07:42 AM' timestamp='1255930940' post='45171']
when kafuuka will post results of contest?
[/quote]
When I feel you've all been tortured enough by not knowing, obviously.- (Zl-eye-f)-nea and Sparrhawk
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Seems like you'll get enough work when considering the Dutch people only.
Public transportation between Belgium and the Netherlands is expensive and time consuming; once the long awaited HST arrives it will be more expensive and slightly faster. And have you looked at a map of Germany recently? I doubt traveling from Berlin is going to be fast. And then there's the fact we'll need to bring our own beer... -
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It seems useful to have a historical perspective. I'm no historian and there have been lots of different rules. There is one system that comes to mind though. People gained citizenship by:
a. birth -> this is difficult in MD which features lots of outsiders (different plane, universe or what you call it?)
b. gift/pardon from a sovereign
c. living in a country for 5 years
You lost citizenship if you did not appear at your trial after an offense.
Loosing citizenship implied you were no longer protected by laws. ie. Someone could kill you in plain daylight and walk away, no questions asked.
Back in the day people didn't have any political rights, except the 'we stake our king on pitchforks if he raises taxes again' rights. Unless you put a trade ban on those giant forks, you can't take away those rights anyway. People also payed taxes, especially during war.
This seems quite like what's mentioned in these quotes:
[quote]
what about this:
- king can allow new citizens in based on their intention letter
- king can kick people out of the land (remove citizenship) only if they did something against the land. That allows people to be part of a land but also be against its leader and be immune to revenge on this reason, unless they do somethign wrong for the land itself (land image, military, treason, abuse, etc)
in other words, citizenship is gained by making the king accept you, but cant be removed same way
[/quote]
[quote]
There will always be people against the leadership.. ALWAYS.
There are two options that i can see:
1. To force by my rule the kings to accept within their lands also those opposed to them as long as they prove to be _LOYAL TO THE LAND_
2. To use No Mans Land as a outcast land for all those banished from their lands, basicaly an outpost for takeover attempts and political hits.
[/quote]
There are a couple of more complex things that could be added. People that had their citizenship removed could be labeled as such instead of 'no citizenship'. Those ex citizens should have the option of joining a rebel force or to request amnesty in another country or even be pardoned. Imo it makes more sense to overthrow kings with the support of the citizens and banished people. Not more nor less and without the ex citizen and free spirit distinction, that would be difficult to enforce. -
[quote name='Grido' date='18 October 2009 - 01:13 AM' timestamp='1255821209' post='44993']
*tries to remind certain LHO's where their loyalties are meant to [b]lay[/b]*
[/quote]
That definitely ain't right. -
[quote name='Death Bell' date='18 October 2009 - 04:47 PM' timestamp='1255877258' post='45080']
yeah i hope so... since i don't wanna be missing out on any quest
[/quote]
any quest that has a large reward?
I don't blame people for doing quests because of the rewards, but it gets a bit silly if you fear you might miss the big quests. People who make quests do so because they want as many people to be entertained/tortured as possible. If you manage to miss their quests you are either in a wrong timezone or not paying attention. Q page + 7 days listed in quest log, forum, chat spam... perhaps the hate list if no Q page is there. Or just ask people in chat where interesting quests can be found. -
Alas crossing a border is annoying even for small countries. The last times I traveled from Antwerp to Amsterdam by train I had an average delay of 1 hour on a 2 hour trip. And it costs 37.60€ (if you go back the same day). Which is expensive compared to what young people pay to get anywhere in Belgium.
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[quote name='Malaikat Maut' date='16 October 2009 - 06:13 PM' timestamp='1255709632' post='44858']
I don't know if you're addressing me or making a general observation. I hope I don't sound like that big a fallacious ass...
[/quote]
It is a general thing and was meant as a support for using classical physics, which also knows the problem that observation implies influence. Why make it more difficult for people to understand? -
There used to be a rule about that, but people got confused and we found a way to work around it.
Also, the judging has begun a while ago, it shouldn't take long anymore. So this topic should be closed, unless the mods don't like me opening a new topic to announce the winners. -
[quote name='Malaikat Maut' date='15 October 2009 - 07:30 PM' timestamp='1255627847' post='44750']
There are far more compelling arguments, all based on quantum mechanics. Are you familiar with the Feynman Double Slit Experiment and particle duality? It's considered that many quantum properties change as a function of human perception. I believe in objective reality because Christianity necessitates it.
[/quote]
I am quite familiar with Young's double slit experiment and particle-wave duality. And actually it is not required to look at quantum to state that observations influence what is being observed. Classical mechanics work perfectly fine too.
eg. an X-ray of a fractured bone. We send a lot of gamma rays through the flesh and bone, with the bone absorbing a higher amount of photons and thus the bone casts a shadow while the flesh around it does not. In observing the bone, we added a lot of gamma rays to it, hence influencing it. You can do the same at atomic level and with single photons, with the same results: you cannot observe the atom without changing it's impulse a tiny amount.
Furthermore quantum effects are seldom relevant when looking at a large scale. Quantum mechanics is probabilistic in nature and when applied to large quanta, statistics will converge to an equilibrium state. Entanglement and teleportation are interesting subjects, but it is extremely difficult to put two photons in a state of entanglement. I think it's less than a year since a new record for transporting a single pair of entangled photons a long distance away from each other was set, and while they did get across an entire desert, it does show the limits of quantum magic.
Years of watching Scifi shows have left me extremely skeptical when people mention quantum. 'We have no idea how it works, it is full of inconsistencies... it must be quantum mechanics! Have you heard about the particle wave duality? It is complicated and nobody understands it, and here we have something else no one understands so obviously that too is quantum.' And for people that think said Scifi approach is a good one, consider this: women often express duality, few men (if any) understand them... so women must be quantum physics. -
[quote name='Malaikat Maut' date='15 October 2009 - 04:15 PM' timestamp='1255616125' post='44739']
Have I won this contest yet?
[/quote]
Strange game. The only winning move is not to play.
[quote]
I've not heard anything of plant consciousness. I thought it was a logical assumption that an intelligent species of alien life would be familiar with the use and production of tools. Unless you'd like to add to your (already ridiculous) hypothetical that the aliens can teleport themselves at will and move objects telekinetically, they would have already been in need of some type of craft to be viewing Earth and a digging tool to be unearthing objects in the first place.
[/quote]
Consciousness is a dangerous subject. Most people consider adult humans to have a high level of consciousness, other mammals to have consciousness albeit a bit less. We know we are aware of ourselves. Some animals are self aware and capable of recognizing themselves in a mirror. Other animals clearly are capable of some thought or rely on instinct. We can easily imagine an animal that is capable of only three kinds of thoughts: food, danger and procreation. Are those consciousness or reflexes? What about plants? All plants grow towards the light (food), some have sophisticated defense systems which activate when being gnawed upon (danger). They don't have a central nerve system, but neither do insects, which are capable of more complex feats. And then the fun part: what about babies? At which point from -9 months to 21+ years does a human develop consciousness?
Imagine all the aliens are Zleiphneir clones and have similar thought patterns. They are capable of building tools and use them, but they do wonder if the tools aren't secretly using the Z aliens to replicate. You now have an alien race that is surprisingly similar to humans, whilst meeting the necessary criteria.
[quote]
I feel that the assertion you're making necessitates that we be entirely stripped of our conscious will. You're trying to say that we build roads out of rebar, concrete, and tar because those items desire for us to do so and not because it's practical for human usage. Why don't we construct roadways out of sticks of wood, nougat, and tree sap? What if those objects or elements desired to become a road? There's just too many assumptions or "logical leaps" being made to justify that objects have any capacity to influence human consciousness.
[/quote]
Wood has been used for roads by the Celts actually. You don't see much of it now, since wood is less likely to be dug up, but it has been found.
To further the analogy with commercials? Why do you buy product X and not product Y? Because some commercials are better than others, or because some products aren't appealing by nature. -
This should be interesting, both to teach and to learn. I consider myself well versed in logic, but you cannot teach debate without explaining the difference between a logical argument and a persuasion.
As an example, I'll dissect a part of a post I once made in the central market debate:
[quote]
5. banking
I thought MD was going to have a primitive economy? What's next, stock options in Kafuuka Milling Inc? Does anyone want to start selling those and give me the proceeds?
[/quote]
The first sentence contains half the argument, which if you write it out goes:
- premise 1. MD is supposed to have a primitive economy.
- premise 2. A primitive economy does not include banks.
=> MD should not include banks.
The other two sentences are humor, but contain a lot of persuasive power.
- premise 3. Stock options in Kafuuka Milling Inc are silly.
- premise 4. If people are silly enough to buy stock options, Kafuuka will get rich sleeping.
- premise 5. Getting rich while sleeping is a bug or an exploit; it is not supposed to be possible.
=> There should be no stock market in MD.
This does not say anything about banks at all... however, most people will read one more premise.
- premise 6. Banks increase the chance stock markets are found from X to Y.
The persuasive power lies in people thinking that X is 0% and Y is 100%. In reality X and Y are something like 0.0000001 and 0.0000002. Even if you get the numbers right, it is stated in humorous way, so you cannot attack this argument.
Note: I'm not saying I expected you to fall for the persuasion, but certain target audiences would, depending on culture, education, exposure to commercials etc. -
[quote name='Malaikat Maut' date='13 October 2009 - 09:29 PM' timestamp='1255462196' post='44588']
If you break humans down, we are nothing but cells/genes/atoms/quarks anyway, so the concept of identity becomes muddied if you really want to be literal. Your analogy may be correct that genes merely use us to multiply themselves, but in a way both entities are synonymous. It reminds me of a common philosophical quandary called the Ship of Theseus [url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus"]linky[/url].[/quote]
Which is the point. The difference between a gene (an object) and a human is made fuzzy.
Personally I like the related topic of vagueness and the example:
a small number + 1 is still a small number
1 is a small number -> 1 + 1 is a small number
induction -> every positive integer is a small number
Somewhere along the way induction failed. We can't say where, but 1 billion is usually not considered a small number. Also in biology the term emergence is often used: phenomena that occur when looking at the large picture but cannot be explained while looking only at the parts. All of these concepts contribute to doubting the difference between humans and objects.
[quote]The problem is that you're attributing intelligence or even instinctual behavior to items that possess none. Also, social evolution such as memes ties back in to my original post about ideological paradigms. Their progressions are brought about by our thoughts and actions within culture or through discoveries and innovations. They are all necessitated by human consciousness.[/quote]
Intelligence has many guises. eg Look at parasites. They have a very complex way of life, doing amazing things, like changing the color of an ant from black to bright red, so that birds will be more prone to spot and eat them. Thus ingesting the parasite and spreading it's offspring. That is a very intelligent scheme. However, it is not the parasite that thinks 'hej, what if I make my ant host change color so birds can see her better?'. So is it necessary for an object to think?
Furthermore, at some point in evolution consciousness and thought must have started. It might be extremely unlikely such an event happens again, but it is possible.
Tzk tzk tzk....you're not being fair! I am the only one allowed to discriminate! So...OFF WITH YOUR HEAD! Hmm...see? See? Exactly what I was talking about!
King/queen Pages
in New Ideas
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Alts make this very redundant: everybody that wants to go through the trouble can read all the info.