Yeah, it was in the middle of a very long business trip (1 week in Helsinki, 1 week in UK with visits to London, Loughborough, Sheffield and Reading), 1 week in Spain and 10 days in Erice.
Erice was nice but I doubt it is typical Sicily. It is a small tourist town at the top of a mountain with little transportation down to the coast. There is an institute which hosts summer schools and that is why I was there. It had it's charm and would be nice to visit for a day or two, but 10 days was way too many. We were trapped without much to do other than listen to lectures.
I have to admit that when I applied to college, and to grad school for that matter, I pretty much limited myself to the west coast, having an innate west coast bias. I would imagine some of that happens for people on the east as well. Of my friends, though, a number went to the east coast.
I also wonder if, in connection with your comment about the age of schools, if the east coast schools just tend to have better reputations. I could imagine that as well.
Hi AJ, I too wish you luck on your college search.
I have a question, though, for you and the rest of listology. I noticed that most (all?) of the schools you applied to are east coast or at most mid-west. I'm assuming, maybe incorrectly, that you are from the east.
Is this common, that people from the east don't tend to look at west coast schools? I know lots of people from the west who applied to and went to east coast schools, but is the converse not so common?
The only one I've read is The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay and I would have to agree that it is very well written with a very good story behind it. I would highly recommend it.
Thanks lbangs. I had tried to search the net but didn't find this FAQ. I appreciate your help. Unfortunately, it means I likely can't play these DVDs :(
That helps some. So, with DVDs, there is no issue of PAL vs NTSC, just the region encoding. Is that correct? I'm not looking to modify my DVD player, as if I screwed up my wife would kill me :) but I'm hoping that some DVDs I want to get from Spain are region 0. Someone mentioned to me that I need to worry about PAL vs other formats, and that's what I wanted to make sure of.
Thanks for your thoughts Jim. In the end, I guess, for me, it comes down to if the violence is supporting some story or if the story is the violence. I felt that way here, but thought in, for example, Reservoir Dogs, the violence supported the story.
Maybe that was my problem with Kill Bill. If the whole point of the movie is the violence, then it wasn't that interesting to me. In his other movies, the violence supported a story, here it didn't. As lbangs said, the movie is the violence and vice versa. Maybe that is what I mean by gratuitous. The whole movie reminded me of the knight scene in The Holy Grail.
I have to say that I didn't find Kill Bill all that interesting. I've liked his other films, but it seems to me that in his previous films, the violence was central and necessary to the story. In this one, I didn't feel that way. I felt it was gratuitous and there just for it's own sake, not because it added to the story. I might be missing something, but this film really didn't do much for me.
I was lucky enough to find a book of his complete etchings the last time I was at Powell's in Portland. There is some dark stuff in there. But, very good too.
I don't think there are any commercial companies that produce these things any more, but there is a large group of people that write these games as hobbies. If you are interested, one site is:
Thanks Jim. I thought it was a very good book. It basically summarizes what he has said in his previous books, as well as other research on human nature, and then discusses the implications of our current understanding about human nature on politics, ethics, and public policy. In particular, he stresses the danger of basing policy and ethics on incorrect assumptions of human nature, for example, that all humans are born with a "blank slate", that is, no innate personality or nature, all with the exact same potential. He discusses why political movements based on this, and other, false assumptions on human nature might run into trouble (if you base the arguments for equal rights on the assumption that all humans are born identically, and that assumption is found to be incorrect, do you have to throw out equal rights?). He isn't saying that you should throw out equal rights, for example, but rather that the argument for having equal rights, or any other policy based upon human nature, should be based on ethical choices, not assumptions on how humans behave that might prove false.
I found it a fascinating book and would definitely recommend it.
Thanks Jim. I'll try to be more visible than in the recent past. :)
Yeah, it was in the middle of a very long business trip (1 week in Helsinki, 1 week in UK with visits to London, Loughborough, Sheffield and Reading), 1 week in Spain and 10 days in Erice.
Erice was nice but I doubt it is typical Sicily. It is a small tourist town at the top of a mountain with little transportation down to the coast. There is an institute which hosts summer schools and that is why I was there. It had it's charm and would be nice to visit for a day or two, but 10 days was way too many. We were trapped without much to do other than listen to lectures.
I have to admit that when I applied to college, and to grad school for that matter, I pretty much limited myself to the west coast, having an innate west coast bias. I would imagine some of that happens for people on the east as well. Of my friends, though, a number went to the east coast.
I also wonder if, in connection with your comment about the age of schools, if the east coast schools just tend to have better reputations. I could imagine that as well.
Hi AJ, I too wish you luck on your college search.
I have a question, though, for you and the rest of listology. I noticed that most (all?) of the schools you applied to are east coast or at most mid-west. I'm assuming, maybe incorrectly, that you are from the east.
Is this common, that people from the east don't tend to look at west coast schools? I know lots of people from the west who applied to and went to east coast schools, but is the converse not so common?
Just curious,
Blas
The only one I've read is The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay and I would have to agree that it is very well written with a very good story behind it. I would highly recommend it.
As a follow-up to this, is there a DVD player anyone would recommend that is both multi-region and can play both NTSC and PAL formats?
Thanks lbangs. I had tried to search the net but didn't find this FAQ. I appreciate your help. Unfortunately, it means I likely can't play these DVDs :(
A friend of mine in Spain happens to have a copy of one of the DVDs I'm interested in. He just wrote me a note, and on the DVD jacket it says:
"All PAL", "DVD 9"
What do these mean? It seems to suggest it's in the PAL format, but then it says All, so I'm completely confused.
That helps some. So, with DVDs, there is no issue of PAL vs NTSC, just the region encoding. Is that correct? I'm not looking to modify my DVD player, as if I screwed up my wife would kill me :) but I'm hoping that some DVDs I want to get from Spain are region 0. Someone mentioned to me that I need to worry about PAL vs other formats, and that's what I wanted to make sure of.
Thanks for the help, lbangs.
Thanks for your thoughts Jim. In the end, I guess, for me, it comes down to if the violence is supporting some story or if the story is the violence. I felt that way here, but thought in, for example, Reservoir Dogs, the violence supported the story.
I'd be interested as well.
Maybe that was my problem with Kill Bill. If the whole point of the movie is the violence, then it wasn't that interesting to me. In his other movies, the violence supported a story, here it didn't. As lbangs said, the movie is the violence and vice versa. Maybe that is what I mean by gratuitous. The whole movie reminded me of the knight scene in The Holy Grail.
I have to say that I didn't find Kill Bill all that interesting. I've liked his other films, but it seems to me that in his previous films, the violence was central and necessary to the story. In this one, I didn't feel that way. I felt it was gratuitous and there just for it's own sake, not because it added to the story. I might be missing something, but this film really didn't do much for me.
I was lucky enough to find a book of his complete etchings the last time I was at Powell's in Portland. There is some dark stuff in there. But, very good too.
I don't think there are any commercial companies that produce these things any more, but there is a large group of people that write these games as hobbies. If you are interested, one site is:
http://www.ifarchive.org/
Thanks Jim. I thought it was a very good book. It basically summarizes what he has said in his previous books, as well as other research on human nature, and then discusses the implications of our current understanding about human nature on politics, ethics, and public policy. In particular, he stresses the danger of basing policy and ethics on incorrect assumptions of human nature, for example, that all humans are born with a "blank slate", that is, no innate personality or nature, all with the exact same potential. He discusses why political movements based on this, and other, false assumptions on human nature might run into trouble (if you base the arguments for equal rights on the assumption that all humans are born identically, and that assumption is found to be incorrect, do you have to throw out equal rights?). He isn't saying that you should throw out equal rights, for example, but rather that the argument for having equal rights, or any other policy based upon human nature, should be based on ethical choices, not assumptions on how humans behave that might prove false.
I found it a fascinating book and would definitely recommend it.