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[...] When we have any function, whether it's language or vision or cognitive functions like memory, we aren't dealing with a straight line to the brain that says "This is what I do." The brain builds a network of connections, a network of neurons that have a particular role in that function. So when we have a new cognitive function, like literacy, it doesn't have a preset network. Rather, it makes new connections among older networks, and that whole collection of networks becomes a circuit. It's a connected scaffolding of parts.
The beauty of the circuit for functions like literacy is its plasticity. You can have one for each different language, like English or Chinese or Hebrew. And then something miraculous happens: the circuit builds upon itself. The first circuits are very basic — for decoding letters as we're learning to read — but everything we read builds upon itself.
So what's changing now with technology? How is that affecting our circuits?
The fact that a circuit is plastic is both its beautiful strength and its Achilles' heel. Reading reflects our medium. And to the extent that a digital medium is going to require us to process large amounts of information very quickly, it will diminish from the time we have for slower processing work.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday September 01 2018, @12:20AM (5 children)
I used to be a respected DARPA scientist. Then I started reading Breitbart, Infowars, and the Drudge Report. DARPA decided that those were not valid inputs to their AI, and kicked me to the curb. What starts here starts from the top, and Hillary is in charge of all DARPA.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday September 01 2018, @12:24AM (4 children)
EF thinks Hillary is in charge... whooooo.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @12:27AM
~~~~~~~~~~~
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @12:32AM
The man's - Yuipson's - eyes opened wide in shock. That was too fast. Sure, he knew how fragile these were, but still, that was much too fast. Frustrated, Yuipson grabbed the next one and began angrily pumping. This process of moving from one to the next was known as 'The Shuffling'. And shuffle he did.
The little girl's head slammed against the wall as Yuipson aggressively violated her from behind. What's more, the large man was slamming her back with one of his fists. It really couldn't be helped: The other little girl had died all too quickly from a mere slashed throat, angering the man profusely. It didn't take long for the man's anger to reach catastrophic levels; once that happened, it certainly did not take long for the brutalized little girl to slump to the ground lifelessly.
"Damnit!" Yuipson screeched. They just didn't make these things like they used to! So, he shuffled to the next one. Then, the next one. And then the next one. And then the next one. The Shuffling continued until all that remained in the room were Yuipson and a pile of lifeless puppets that just so happened to resemble children. Righteous fury indeed.
At this scene, Yuipson boldly declared, "The Shuffling will continue!" Yes, although there were no more left, but all he had to do was acquire more resources...
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Saturday September 01 2018, @12:40PM (1 child)
Former First Lady Hillary Clinton is still in charge in one way: The organizations she oversaw as Senator and then Secretary of State have institutional memory among civil service employees retained on the merit basis of the Pendleton Act 1883 [wikipedia.org] and its successors. This institutional memory, called the "deep state" by some in the right wing, adds a layer of inertia that allows government to continue to function across changes in top-level leadership. The alternative would be the spoils system [wikipedia.org], where an incoming president can bring everything to a halt by firing everyone not sufficiently loyal to the agenda of the month.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday September 01 2018, @03:36PM
By these measures, Jimmy Carter still has influence too. Hillary was more recent and highly placed but "her people" were never presidential level influence.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/24/7408365/
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @02:29AM (4 children)
First we had a "The Internet of Garbage" story, which featured The Verge and now another garbage which contains the phrase:
"English or Chinese or Hebrew."
Why the hell Hebrew, which is spoken by almost no one and the ones speaking it might die in a horrific war they start, so better use another language as an example. But being The Verge, garbage is bound to be thrown at its unfortunate readers.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @02:38AM (1 child)
Aww poor little troll got triggered out of his mind. So sad, much woe. Too bad for you your worldview is crumbling, that existential crisis is gonna be one hell of a ride when it finally hits you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @05:41AM
Modern Israel != the Jewish people
One is a political body. The other is a cultural/ethnic group.
The diaspora happened. Get over it. Stop trying to build a dangerous, far right-wing, fascist ethnostate. Third Impact is a fairy story, you prepubescent bitch. The consequences of atomic war are not.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @04:54AM
She wrote it in english, she is chinese and her boss is a jew?
You know, when you've got to write 50 of these to get paid off upwork.
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Saturday September 01 2018, @12:53PM
English, Chinese, and Hebrew represent variety because they are three languages whose names are recognizable to English-speaking readers but are thought to be unrelated (Indo-European, Sino-Tibetan, and Afroasiatic). Hebrew is also the language in which three-fourths of the Christian Bible was written, so it's more "us" than Arabic, which some on the right see as a distracting "them".
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday September 01 2018, @05:17AM (5 children)
Technically the media doesn't matter if it was digital or analog, what matters is bandwidth. I could trivially read and think faster than 300 baud using early 80s modems, 2400 baud was non-trivial to keep up with, once I went 14.4 and soon ISP instead of BBS, there was no way to keep up.
My point being that annoying hipsters signalling they're holier than thou for taking time away from their smartphones MIGHT pick up on this and demand the same app on their phone that eliminates blue light after dark or whatever witchcraft they're shilling now MIGHT brag about their 75 baud or 300 baud or 45.45 baud slower-downer for their twitter app scroller or similar. Sort of like how hipsters had a thing for "slow food" a while back, maybe they'd roll for "slow social media brainwashing propaganda" or whatevs.
Personally I think a nice 20 WPM morse code UI would be a useful moron filter for digital communications aside from whatever brain goodness. It seems to work for the hams. Even a mere easy couple WPM works wonders.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @06:54AM (4 children)
Try red light instead. It has a better effect after dark than blue light. The reasons for this have to do with the biology of sleep, if you're interested in learning about that kind of thing.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @06:56AM
Oops. Misread what I quoted! GP determined that biology is science too advanced for him and thus indistinguishable from witchcraft.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @01:55PM (2 children)
Eliminating red light or adding it? Do you have any good links?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @04:27PM (1 child)
redshift [github.com] for free software users. F.lux [wikipedia.org] is likely what VLM is talking about for Android users.
redshift can be started by specifying the location manually (also can use -o to set the display color temperature in one shot mode for the current position of the sun in the sky instead having redshift continually adjust display temperature):
or just tell it to set the night display temperature (according to the man page is 3700K) with one shot manual mode:
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday September 02 2018, @05:45PM
gnome has nightlight built in to the display settings gui, like gnod intended.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 01 2018, @06:16PM
it is curious how letters have survived the whole techno development from the, say 60s to now.
lots has changed but the letters are still the same as before.
one would assume, that with increase of "data consumption", that formatting of the letters would have made a leap or two.
ofc we now have many new fonts and lots of (useless) styling and even more "boxing of areas" on a web page, but
the letters (and sentences) have stayed the same and the changes have not contributed to a quicker understanding of the presented information.
it is curious that A.I. has not been trained on eye-movement and then allowed to fix color, spacing and size of
individual letters (and words) in a article for easier and faster "consumption of information".
i am pretty sure, that if a STANDARD for this type of formatting would take hold, like there are rules for every language,
then the brain would learn this too and would get "the gist" of printed information much faster?
the computer screen being much more flexible then a static book page, still only has "static" letters, for example.
maybe it will require another 100 years?