Important Philosophical Questions + POLLS

Bad habits referred to learning incorrect language patterns, because a lot of us are not native speakers (and therefor there is always a risk that some of our own language, in my case Dutch, will show when we write English).
Not really a problem, as long as we manage to understand each other.

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Well, sometimes we can pick up incorrect patterns because native speakers make mistakes. But yes, understanding each other and keeping in mind how many different languages are native in forum population is important.

OT

I was a subtitler somewhere, and we all worked in our individual languages with English as the base language. In my humble opinion, ā€œI should ofā€ is wrong, and ā€œI should’veā€ is right. But there was a riot about it, some native speakers said that indeed it is that way, some said it sounds that way and the mistake is so prevalent that it counts as right.

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Let us remember that language is not prescriptive; the rules of language are created by use and they evolve over time. Coming from a Spanish speaking country, I hope you have not been fooled by the silliness of RAE pretending to dictate what is and what isn’t. In truth, they have no more authority than those who say Ā«haigaĀ», Ā«keĀ» or Ā«aseĀ».

I believe it’s more enjoyable to appreciate the creativity that sometimes goes into speaking incorrectly. You may think that formal rules apply to everything, but even those everythings have exceptions.

EDIT: Oh, sorry, you say you’re Dutch, my bad. I was fooled by your username.

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Please explain for the uninitiated, thank you.

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Just common mistakes in colloquial Spanish (the first one spoken, the other two written) which are usually regarded as uncouth.

RAE is the Royal Spanish Academy of Language, which is an institution based in Spain that purportedly rules on what is proper Spanish and what isn’t. It is remarkably conservative, and for the most part fails miserably at its goal. That of course is not fact, it’s just my opinion.

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  • A
  • B

0 voters

Team A or B choose one.

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Took B to balance I don’t know what, a go habit I guess

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Important philosophical question is: Did anyone know this kind of Smart Learning pen existed???
I’m awed.


(timestamp at 7:48, no need to watch the whole thing)

I mean, I’m not ARMY and additionally I can’t buy it, but that pen is so unbelievably cool.

No seriously, has anyone seen anything like it?

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I saw something similar a few years back for helping kids learn to read. I don’t think it’s particularly new technology, but it is pretty cool.

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I’m behind my trends then, because I’m jealous like a schoolkid.

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I found a review for the one I saw. Looks like the review was posted in 2013.

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Are we ever too old for fun gadgets?

  • Yes
  • NO

0 voters

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@HHG has clearly never played with fun gadgets before :slight_smile:

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Voted yes because I don’t like obvious things

How long is the lifespan of a 30 floor building?

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Thanks although I wasn’t asking for skyscrapers.

30 floors is pretty close to a skyscraper. :wink:

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We need more debates!!!
Which animal would be the coolest if scaled to the size of an elephant or giraffe?
What would be the smartest? The scariest? Which one would be most likely to destroy the world?

I would love if those really friendly kinds of dogs were scaled up. If there was an elephant-sized praying mantis, we would probably… not do too well. A peregrine falcon goes like 100 metres/second, and it’s 18 inches on average. If we scaled that up to the size of an elephant, and preserved speeds… oh no. That means a peregrine falcon would go… 1300 metres/second, or 2900 miles per hour. Welp, at least that’s not happening anytime soon.

Please, PLEASE don’t get any ideas.

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A lot physical capabilities wouldn’t properly scale. It’s doubtful that a bird that large would even be able to fly, unless its physiology was drastically altered to adapt for it. The speed of a diving raptor is limited by drag. Starting from within the atmosphere, a freefall would reach terminal velocity and not get any faster. Even in Felix Baumgartner’s record breaking jump, which started from thinner air very high up, he only reached 843.6 mph.

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