Wednesday 22 August 2007

Rant 074 / Time Is Borrowed. The Clock Is Ticking. Everything Tastes Bland When Time Is Limited.




Kitty Frenzy Today




Quantum Physics is so hard! This is the first time, in the several months since I resumed my studies, that I'm actually unable to complete half a tutorial by myself!

On the other hand, I don't see anyone completing the tutorial in my tutorial group. I think just about everyone but me was copying down the model solutions since Question 1.

Should I feel happy or sad?

I feel frightened.

Whenever I'm the best in something positive, I'm positive that something is wrong.

This belief started after several years of playing Natural Selection. During those years, I noticed that despite having 200+ ping in servers where the norm is 10-100+, I do get to be the best player in terms of frag/death once in a while. And whenever that happens, rarely do my teams win.

I'm not that pro, especially with pings like that.

And I'm no genius.

So what does that say about the rest of the group?

I am so screwed.

At least I see hope for my precious A in this 4 AU Physics module. Woot!

My original aim was to be 5 tutorials ahead, but right now, I'm starting to lag by half a tutorial behind. How? Normally I should have done half of the next tutorial by now, a day past the tutorial class this week.

Right now, I still have trouble understanding and absorbing the half of the last tutorial that I didn't finish. This is very bad. I really need the A.

My grades, so far, have been average, ranging from B+ to C+. At least the B+ is for a 4 AU module. But still, there are 2 C's out of 4 modules! Half my grades are C's!

And what's worse is that I cannot have language courses for PE! I so wanted French 02 for my Humanities PE next semester. Now I will have to resort to studying some boring shit, unless I get lucky with some of the hotter modules.

So far French is pretty hard. The teacher isn't very clear in his explanation; I'm still confused about the pronunciation of 'r' in the French language. Is it always the sound you make from the throat, like the 'ch' in German? Pronouncing basic words like 'francais' would be harder than I thought!

And reading about French cheeses is not easy either. I was constantly hungry while reading about Brie, Comte and Beaufort cheeses on Wikipedia. Comte and Beaufort cheeses are the more common cheeses used in French cheese fondues. And I never knew that I need dry white wine to make a proper cheese fondue! Hmm...


Mmm...

Hungry...

And I'd need crusty bread! What's 'crusty', exactly? Do those baguettes count? Obviously sliced bread doesn't.

More hunger...

By the way, 'dry' wines are wines that have very little or no residual sugar, except in the case of sparkling wine, where dry means sweet. Eg Pinot blanc.

Rant 073 / Many Topics. One Rant.

It is very obvious how immature I am. In everything I say, I display a blatant lack of depth. It is amazing how anyone would read my rants and think I'm talking sense. I have no sense.

I am not a very logical person. I do things for no reasons. I say things without enough justifications. I elaborate on matters without adequate research. That's me.

Why do I do all these foolish things?

Why do I persist?

What is the meaning of this?

Why am I asking you this?

Am I asking myself all these questions?

Why do I ask myself at all?

Why me?



Did you feel annoyed at all those questions above?




The thing is, who cares? I can say anything and nothing, and no one really gives a damn.

Yes, this is the world. Its motto is "No one cares".

Not true?

The world is not what you think it is, but what you will it to be.

It bends. That is a very convenient trait of reality. It bends.

It bends to your will. What is real, can be made unreal. What is unreal, can be made real.






Notice the abrupt changes in topics so as to avoid the gritty details that, in normal circumstances, will make you fall asleep faster than your grandfather at 9pm?


I am simply not a great talker. I make a poor conversationalist. My roommate is almost a stranger to me, even though he did cuddle with his girlfriend last night right behind me.

How can he do that when we hardly know each other?!

I wish I can tell him to get a room, but I cannot risk doing anything that will hurt our relationship. We're going to live in the same room for a year after all.

Well, I hope I'm right to use the word "cuddle" because I don't know what it means exactly. Does sitting on the same chair in front of the com and talking softly to each other count??

You must be curious about what I did.

Simple. I had downloaded the video of the recent friendly Natural Selection matches between Europe and the U.S., so I put on my earphones and studied proper Fade handling techniques from the vids.

An educational night. I'm talking about the NS videos. As for them, I have no idea what they really did other than sit together and mumbling to themselves.

But then, after this incident, I realized that I will now have to learn to knock if I ever go back to my room late... :D

No, I didn't see them do anything improper unless they were doing it with their clothes on. I don't wear my glasses most of the time, so I cannot be sure of anything. But she was definitely embarrassed when I asked him right away if she was his girlfriend.

I think he grunted in reply. Meanwhile his girlfriend was laughing with her hand covering her mouth. How polite. Or was it there to wipe something off? Oh I'm so sorry if I'm giving you the wrong ideas.

He did call me, but my phone was switched to silent mode, as usual, and I was walking so fast that I didn't feel its vibrations. I blame the looseness of my pants.

Need to learn to knock. Before entering MY room. What the heck...



It was quite interesting to see what the NTU Toastmasters was all about. Apparently, toastmasters are not just what is defined at dictionary.com

toast·mas·ter [tohst-mas-ter, -mah-ster]
–noun
1.a person who presides at a dinner and introduces the after-dinner speakers.
2.a person who proposes or announces toasts.

In addition to all these, a toastmaster is also a trained speaker, able to talk smoothly to a large audience. By attending the Welcome Tea last night, I learnt that it is about talking to audiences without fear or hesitation.

The best part of the whole program I attended was the table topics session. It was a 30-minute segment where members of the audience were invited to speak on randomly chosen topics for 2 minutes. I didn't go, gutless as I am. But I thought it'd be useful if I learnt to talk like the President of the NTU Toastmasters.

If you think you can talk well to an audience, you are likely to be wrong. Imagine, or try to remember the last time you talked to an audience. Maybe it was a short presentation, or a sketch. Think about how you talk in such a situation. Then watch how Lee Hsien Loong gave the National Day Rally Speech.

Big diff. Really big.

Wednesday 15 August 2007

Rant 072 / Since Food Is Life ( In More Ways Than One), When Food Is Cheap, Life Is Cheap


This is madness!

Freud knows everything about your desires!



Suddenly, I wonder whether what we are hearing on our various media are the real propaganda, and what the media in rogue regimes are telling their people is true.

I must admit, I have no idea what they tell their people over in those countries. But then, we were never taught in school many examples of what "propaganda" really is! And by the way, the "propaganda" I'm using here means:

prop·a·gan·da [prop-uh-gan-duh]
–noun
1.information, ideas, or rumors deliberately spread widely to help or harm a person, group, movement, institution, nation, etc.
2.the deliberate spreading of such information, rumors, etc.
3.the particular doctrines or principles propagated by an organization or movement.

All I have ever seen so far to illustrate propaganda is a poster or two of Hitler and Mao Zedong. I still do not know what these "propaganda" they used in those days were like, and how to differentiate between this negative information and the good stuff.

Why?

Are we not supposed to be able to do so? Is it assumed that we can do it naturally? The latter must be false, else why did the media in Nazi Germany and the old Communist China succeed? They had to have succeed, or Hitler and Mao would never have been able to do what they did!

Therefore, the former is true. All my life, my education was rather biased against various types of government and power control, like Communists. Does this not fall under the FIRST definition of "propaganda"?

Aren't we, then, under the sway of such unfair information?

Right now, I still see Communism as a form of government too idealistic for the real world. But this is based on what I have seen and know so far. I have never been to Cuba or most of China. I have not truly seen Communism at work with my own two eyes. How can I assume that I know enough of Communism to judge it foolish?

But this is only an example. There are many other things I can talk about that also falls under the category of "propaganda", like the Taliban, or the situations in several parts of Africa.

The thing is, WE DON'T KNOW! We don't know much about the Taliban. We don't know much about why, exactly, the Muslim radicals do what they do. We don't know why people in China love their country so. We don't know why some Singapore transport companies want to raise their fares why they are already among the most PROFITABLE companies in Singapore.

Are such companies, which are among the basic necessities of a developed nation, need to be so wealthy? Are their objectives supposed to include HUGE PROFITS?

Therefore, all these support for raising the fares in our local media, are they propaganda under its first definition? Why is it there are so few letters of protest printed in the Straits Times? Why is it that for the past 10 years, we have never been informed of any instances when our government stopped any of our transport companies from raising fares?

And the fact that our country has been ruled by one single party since its independence says something about our democracy. Is it still called "democracy" when we have never needed to vote for our Presidents?

Or is it better defined with the word "totalitarian"?

to·tal·i·tar·i·an [toh-tal-i-tair-ee-uhn]
–adjective
1.of or pertaining to a centralized government that does not tolerate parties of differing opinion and that exercises dictatorial control over many aspects of life.
2.exercising control over the freedom, will, or thought of others; authoritarian; autocratic.
–noun
3.an adherent of totalitarianism.

The part about "dictatorial control" may be debatable. But then, when LKY told Singaporeans to have more babies, everyone started having more unprotected sex. When our ministers have salaries that are more than twice as much as their counterparts in various countries, notably the U.S., no one seriously called for a change.

If no one challenges the government even over such an absurd fact has been announced, is this not because of the second definition? Because our government explains this obscene amount of money entering the accounts of our ministers with the reason that they are so good that they're worth their pay, no one in our country rises up in protest.

To believe that this explanation is totally logical is idiocy. The U.S. counterparts of our amazing ministers have duties that include hundreds of times more things than what our Singaporean ministers are in charge of. Take, for example, our Minister of Transport, and compare with his counterpart in the U.S. government. Are the inherent differences not obvious?

Given that the first definition of the word "totalitarian" is not technically true, the second definition still stands, making this word true. When an unreasonable explanation is accepted by the general masses, isn't it obvious something else must be affecting their mindset to make them accept it?

2.exercising control over the freedom, will, or thought of others; authoritarian; autocratic.


No?


There is another implication in the announcement of the high salaries. We all know that when the government wants something to be out of our mind, like the imprisonment of an important opposition leader like CSJ (not that I like him anyway), whatever it is will never appear on the local media.

So why this?

Because our government wants us to know they're getting their freakishly high salaries? Right from us taxpayers' pockets? For performing duties that is only a fraction that of their U.S. counterparts?

Is this not similar to the infamous "IN YOUR FACE!!!" attitude?

Does this imply a complete lack of respect for the general masses of Singapore in our government?

Has it come to this, only after a mere 50 years?

Does the PAP realize that the longer they stay in power while calling our government a"democracy", the harder they will fall when the times of change finally arrive? It will be difficult in the extreme for them to return to their present status, because everyone will be reminding themselves of their absolute dominance in the local politics for the past decades.

This is definitely not a threat or whatever negative stuff you wish to call it. This is a logical conclusion that anyone can come to, assuming they do not give up their power willingly to any opposition parties in the future.

As anyone knows, PAP is losing support slowly, but surely as time goes by. By simple extrapolation, we all know that they will lose their power in the near future unless something dramatic is done; something so powerful that it overshadows the fact that they have been in power for 50 years.

Do we want the political chaos we see in Taiwan, in our lovely and peaceful country?

Why do we always compare a future without PAP in power with the present political scene in Taiwan? Taiwan is an extreme case, but not the only case!

Why not compare ourselves with European countries? Like Germany, with their female Chancellor. Or Finland, and maybe, someday, we can have a FEMALE president like they do over there.

Heck, it'd sure make our school halls' walls look better. No offense, but it gets kind of boring staring at a guy's face all the time while in the school hall during my primary and secondary and JC days.

Most politicians are not ugly. They are usually decent looking in photos. So our President's face isn't ruining the walls, which may be implied from my words above. What I really mean is exactly what I said in this line,"No offense, but it gets kind of boring staring at a guy's face all the time while in the school hall during my primary and secondary and JC days."

And don't we want the younger generation to be interested in politics? So shouldn't we learn from European countries, which are generally wealthier and cooler than Taiwan? I want to see a Singapore President's picture hanging beside the picture of her First Gentleman( 'cos there's the First Lady). Or maybe not: Singapore doesn't have a First family.




So now back to the first topic. How can I be so sure that what we see today in our local media, or even in the overseas media like CNN, isn't biased?

I can only tell, if I can see what this horrible sounding "propaganda" is telling the people in Communist countries, and compare them with our media.

Why are there so few available media from the "rogue regimes"? If what they say are very biased or false, we'd just read them and have a good laugh, dismissing them as stupidity or crap.

Why aren't we allowed to see examples of modern propaganda from North Korea, other than a few excerpts quoted from North Korean media? We all know that reading only a line or two, or even just a summary, may not give the exact same information or idea as reading the actual articles.

We don't know enough, yet we judge everything. Half-truths and mass idiocy can push our mindsets according to the direction of everyone else.

Once you start asking questions about everything like a kid, things start to appear darker than they once were.

Saturday 11 August 2007

Rant 71 / Everyone Else Is Generally Regarded As The Largest And Most Diverse Ethnic Group In The World

And thus my long term cool turkey treatment begins.

The latency in my room, like any other rooms in the hostels there, is like shit. I have tried 5-7 times over a period of 4 days, playing Natural Selection, which also allows me to see my ping in real time.

The problem is not the overall speed, but the consistency. Downloading, thus, is completely fine. When my ping can jump from 200+ to 600+ to 900+ to 2000+ in 5seconds all the time, there aren't many online games for me to choose from anymore.

It is said that within the campus the whole network uses optical fibres, making the latency between computers in the campus negligible. It doesn't make any difference for me though, since I do not play DoTA, which is the game that everyone in Singapore plays when it comes to LAN gaming.

This simply makes my quitting games an easier task. Easier, but not easy. Even though I cannot play online games, I can still play single-player games like Civilization IV, Elder Scrolls IV and Chrono Cross. Now this may sound like there's no difference, but I can safely say the levels of boredom between multi-player gaming and going solo have an immense difference. Unless it's PS2 games.





After today's experience, I find incredible what XL can laugh at. My comments, which are rarely laughed at by the rest of the gang, seem to be so humorous to her. I find that I no longer understand females anymore. Her constant laughter was such a revelation to me.

At first, I was thinking what you're probably thinking right now, that she was only being polite. Now, it cannot be false, polite laughter if you have to wipe your eyes while laughing, can it?

So, the problem here is, how far can I go? I simply don't know. When I talk to guys, I know the different limits of the different types of guys. I know the different levels of vocabulary between the many types of guys, and this helps to limit my words to those that they can understand.

After all, if you have to explain a joke, it loses its flavour right away.

For certain groups of guys, there is no limit. Anything is fine, and nothing is offensive. For the more studious types, joking about anything that have sexual connotations will only leave them confused.

But this is wrong. The fact that she laughs that hard makes me believe that she doesn't have much contact with my brand of "only occasionally funny" humour. This implies that she doesn't have much contact with many guys ( may not be true to your standards though), and it may be that she was desperate for love, and he was the first to ask her out.

I do all I can do prevent that from happening to myself, but it's easier said than done.

Every man has a different standard, and no one can truly say another's is inferior to his.





I am totally horrified that Sgt Bala (a nickname of a player in Natural Selection) is now in charge of training the Singapore NS players. For goodness' sake, all he can really do well is shoot! So far the strategies he has spoken of, and those he has used are so basic! The local players should really spend some time playing with bad pings over at the US servers! Those guys are pro compared to them, and the US players aren't even competitive.

But then, with the sort of players we have here, any strategy we use will encounter severe limitations.

I guess Sgt Bala is the best we can come up with, but I hope someday they will learn to stop ramboing and ninja something. The Jer's Public Server is pretty bad too. Twice I built a ninja phase gate next to a hive without getting killed, only to find that the comm wasn't looking at us.

It was until I typed "PHASE!" into team chat that he finally beaconed everyone back to base and made everyone phase in. But it was already too late and the aliens were already there waiting for us.

Dreadful.

The aliens in Jer's are completely shit. Whenever I play as an alien, I MUST secure a hive or else no one will, and after 5 mins, they will start saying "gg" because we have no 2nd hive. Basically, even if I do that, the aliens there never win, unless some of those better HK players are in the team.

Wherever did the good HK players go?

The amazing thing is, even though the US public servers are so pro compared to the local NS scene, the competitive players are godlike compared to them.

Competitive NS is a whole new world compared to public games. Marines trying to block escaping fades is the norm. Hiving in 4 mins is the norm. Cooperating skulks is the norm.

In public servers, marines running from fades is the norm. Hiving in 5mins is the norm. Solo skulk feeders is the norm.

I'll never touch competitive NS.








Talking is hard work.

Friday 3 August 2007

Rant 70 / I Suck At Life So Much, Death Runs Away From Me!

School starts next week. The real thing, not the dry all-guys-only sort that I've been having the last few months. I foresee many problems, worries and much anxiety waiting for me in the near future.

The problems are already starting. I had forgotten that it's Friday today, until my bro came back this evening. I was planning to check in to my hostel room on Friday, pack up on Sat evening and stay there on Sunday night. But no, by the time I realized it is Friday today, it was already 5.45pm, and the hall office closes at 5.15pm.

How's that for a good start?

Found an interesting article on wikipedia today that'd make a good conversation starter:

You are to choose between 2 identical envelopes, and after choosing, you're to be given a chance to change your choice until you're satisfied. One envelope contains twice as much money as the other, and you are allowed to keep the money in the envelope you choose.


If you have read the previous rant, you should be thinking that it will probably be better to switch.


But the problem isn't in whether switching is a good move.

Let's put it this way: here's the average expected value of the other envelope, taking what you're holding to be $A. There is a 50% chance of there being $2A in the other envelope, and 50% chance of it having $0.5A.

0.5 X 2A + 0.5 X 0.5A = A + 0.25A = (5/4)A

So it will definitely be better to switch.

And after switching, wouldn't the logical step be switching to the first envelope again, since what you're holding is now the $A?

And wouldn't it be perfectly right to switch envelopes indefintely, or till your fingers grow numb, whichever occurs first?



So the real problem is: which step is the wrong step that causes this paradox?



Stop here and think a little before scrolling down. Spoils the fun if you don't.









The mistake lies in the calculation of the average expected value. These 2 values, 2A and 0.5A, are not constants and are from 2 different situations and should not be used in the same equation. A is smaller in the first situation and larger in the second.





It is possible to make things even harder by allowing the player to see the contents of the envelope of his choice before switching one last time.

Now that the value of A is a constant, what now?














Just finished Shin Megami Tensei (SHT): Devil Summoner. I'm now able to play Devil Mode, which is harder. The game was not exactly easy to beat, but the story was interesting enough to keep me going. There isn't any good incentive to get the secrets, so I didn't bother to get the most fantastic monster in the game.

It was an interesting experience to see all the monsters, some of them old, many of them new. This is unlike the last 3 games( Nocturne, Digital Devil Saga 1 and 2) in the series which many have criticized their overuse of the same models for most monsters. For example, Ganesha never changed from its blue unarmed elephant model in the last 3 games, but in this game, they use its Buddhist counterpart named Shouten, which is a mace-wielding beige elephant.

The one thing I dislike was the lack of emotions in the story compared to DDS 1 and 2. As always, the main protagonist is an unemotional mute, but in the DDS 1 and 2 the supporting characters are full of emotions that differ from each other ( one is a humanist, another is a merciless man full of fury, and another is the unfeeling logical type and etc). Over here, the only memorable emotion from the supporting casts is when they express their support for you.

Another thing is that the designers didn't explain everything about the story.

One question I still have is: which generation of Raido was the last boss?

Another question is: Why exactly did they send Rasputin to this age?


Overall, it was a fine game, good graphics and music, but its storyline makes it inferior stuff compared to the 2 DDS.

The ending is cliché too.






Now I'm finally back to Wild Arms 4. After 2 discouraging experiences using the last 2 faulty copies I bought, I have finally got my hands on a copy that's guaranteed to work. Woot!

The graphics are decent, considering that it isn't all that new. But after playing in real-time combat in Devil Summoner so intensively for the last few weeks, the turn-based combat here feels rather slow. And puzzle! The Wild Arms series always include puzzles, unlike the SHT series where everything is straight forward. At least the combat comes at a more relaxed pace, unlike in SHT where there's combat every 5 steps or so.

I don't see any way for me to finish this game before school starts, and after school starts I will need to remove my interest for gaming. It is probable that I will never finish this game, though I wish otherwise.

Thursday 2 August 2007

Rant 069 / A Bile Colour For The Colourful Threat Level System Will Be Useful When The Guys At The Top Have "Gut Feelings" About The Current Risks

It is interesting to note how we tend to persuade ourselves that we can affect the future in situations that we have no control over.

An obvious example is in gambling. Gamblers often have this habit of finding illogical ways to improve their future (in terms of winning probabilities), which can often also be pure superstition, like avoiding being touched on the shoulders, or avoiding books, or somehow having lucky numbers somewhere in their possessions.

There is absolutely no link between having 8 lucky charms in your 8 pockets and the probability of winning in a game of roulette. Even so, it is fascinating to learn about the ways with which people try to improve their luck.

A more counterintuitive example would be trying to play on the slot machine that has not any winner for the longest time among the machines in a casino. Indeed, it is a seductive notion that such a machine would provide the greatest chance of a jackpot, or at least, a win.

This is wrong, because of 2 reasons.

First, such an improvement would be significant only when a large number of tries is involved. For player with a limited budget like mine, the number of tries will not exceed 100. This is not a large number. Even if it does exceed 100, it is very likely that the credits in that machine is very cheap, maybe 1 credit per cent. In this case, the payout will be very low.

Of course, if one was able to afford it, one could search for such a lot machine, and spend a whole day pressing the "Go!" button continuously. Ouch!


Second, even if previous players have been losing on a particular machine for 10000 consecutive rounds, the chance of hitting a jackpot for the 10001th round will still be the same.

At times, one may find that this second reason seems to be wrong. For example, you leave a machine after a long losing streak. Another player takes your seat in front of that machine and hits the jackpot. You think that you have just missed your chance, but that is not so.

Modern slot machines rely on a random number generator that produced a different combinations every second. What truly matters is the moment you play it. Therefore in this case, even if you had stayed for another round, the moment you press the button may not be the same as the one the winner used.

Poorly programmed machines have a tendency to repeat their combinations, but this a rare since it is easy to program a generator with periods that can last the whole lifetime of the Universe.


Like in coin-flipping, just because the last 4 flips have been heads doesn't make the 5th flip more likely to be tails.






Here's an extremely fascinating problem I found on wikipedia.

A thoroughly honest game-show host has placed a car behind one of three doors. There is a goat behind each of the other doors. You have no prior knowledge that allows you to distinguish among the doors. "First you point toward a door," he says. "Then I'll open one of the other doors to reveal a goat. After I've shown you the goat, you make your final choice whether to stick with your initial choice of doors, or to switch to the remaining door. You win whatever is behind the door." You begin by pointing to door number 1. The host shows you that door number 3 has a goat.

Do the player's chances of getting the car increase by switching to Door 2?


Everyone knows that in the circumstances described above, the chance of getting the car is 50/50, so changing doesn't matter.



Unfortunately, everyone's wrong here.



The fact is that a player doubles his chance of winning a car when he switches his choice, ie, by switching, his chance of opening the right door becomes 2/3.


Incredibly counterintuitive! The explanation is in the article, but I figured that if you're reading this you are probably are too lazy to click that link anyway.



The reason is simple. Here, we assume that the player will definitely switch his choice, and the host will definitely open a door that has a goat ( obviously he won't open the door with the car and still ask if the player wants to switch his choice of goat - "So will it be this old goat with the white hair or that old goat with the brown hair for you, sir?").


Scene 1: Man chooses A (Car), B (goat) opened, final choice is C (goat)

Scene 2: Man chooses A (Car), C (goat) opened, final choice is B (goat)

Scene 3: Man chooses B (goat), C (goat) opened, final choice is A (car)

Scene 4: Man chooses C (goat), B (goat) opened, final choice is A (car)

Scene 5: Man chooses B (goat), C (goat) opened, final choice is A (car)

Scene 6: Man chooses C (goat), B (goat) opened, final choice is A (car)

3 is identical to 5, ditto for 4 and 6, because each door has an equal chance of being chosen at first by the player.

Amazing how things aren't always what they seem to be, isn't it?



In a casino, it is possible to win in the short term, but the odds in the long term are always in favour of the house. "House's advantage" isn't called that for nothing.


Another fascinating observation is how the dealers can do what they do ( dealing, counting, paying, etc) perfectly and never make a mistake. Do they have shifts with frequent breaks, or are these people really androids?