InstaNerd
instanerd.me
instanerd.me
Examples:
A brief explanation of A^2 * B^2 = C^2, followed by a link to the relevant Wikipedia page.
A formula for approximating the volume of a cylinder presented as an easy-to-remember mnemonic, like pi * z * z * a where z = radius and a = height.
These are primarily math-based examples, but anything that tells more about how the world works than which movie happens to be the highest grossing or which dinosaur happened to be the biggest would be more what I would expect.
And then what about street smarts? The ability to experience empathy, to detect emotions and subtle changes in the way people are acting? To be able to connect at a personal level?
Smarts that are applicable only to specific situations I find less "smart" than those skills which may be applied to your understanding of life and your interpersonal relationships. Skills which help you learn more things which are applicable to specific situations fall into the same boat for me.
These are very interesting, but they're like Snapple bottle caps to me.
He explains that you can't just say things, valid or not, but that you need to enable the cognitive tools and perceptions to see these things oneself. This is how people really learn, by practice, lessons, challenges, etc via some guiding teacher's hand. Writers call something similar to this, "Show, don't tell." Turns out we like to learn by solving puzzles. We just need to know the basics of how the puzzle works like its mechanics, how to start, and what being solved looks like.
I'm surprised to see this trivial quote generator on the top of HN. Its all the things we make fun of, like the word a day calender your friend owns and everyday uses an archaic word in an ill-fitting way to never use it again. Or how we mock the idiocy of the lazy didactic learner. Or the buzzword memorizer. We're supposed to be doers right? Coders, creators, etc.
I guess the facts are kinda cute, but some of these I've seen debunked in some way in the past or are written in a generalist 'know it all' way that doesn't apply to all examples of the thing explained. Everytime I encounter a person who has these memorized I know I'm not dealing with someone fascinated with nature or science or whatever. Just someone who found an easy way to not be so dull and can't really discuss these things past just quoting the 'fact.' The same way uninteresting young people pretend to have humor by memorizing Monty Python lines and repeating them ad nauseaum.
Unfortunately, this does create 'nerds.' The Python quoting kind I mentioned above. Not the kind up all night excited to play with their new arduino kit or with some new framework or language. I know the above sounds elitist, but the fact that they couldn't be bothered for sources really kills this for me. It just seems like a way to spread disinformation and heaven forbid you try to argue against someone parroting these lines in the future. Afterall, he learned it as fact from a fact site. It can't be wrong!
I've only read "The Book..." once, but you remind me that it's a book I seriously need to read again. Thanks for that reminder and taking the time to write out this comment.
On the topic of the bible, I know I need to read "The Book..." again because I'm drawing a blank on Watts' reasoning. Personally, when I was a kid, my Mom encouraged me to think critically about Christian scriptures and our Catholicism. In that sense, the bible was a teaching tool and my Mom played the role of the guiding teacher. In retrospect, I think this helped me, though likely not in the way she intended. :)
Simple design. Simple controls. I like how each fact is associated with a picture, which makes reading feel less rote and more of a pleasant experience.
For some pages, I would actually like to see the source. For example: http://instanerd.me/v/81. Was there a study performed that showed people act less irrationally when they see themselves in the mirror?
I'm not displeased with my sunk 10 minutes. Not bad.
It is possible to create a plant that
grows potatoes above the ground and
tomatoes below, by grafting a tomato
plat stem onto a potato plant stalk.
It's more than just wanting things that way; potatoes grown above the ground (and exposed to light) turn green and are poisonous to eat. I'm sure tomatoes grown underground would rot as well.
Came here exactly to post this mistake.
Early in my life my wife pretty much cured me of 'male answer syndrome' which occurs whenever a suitably attractive female asks a question, the male is compelled to respond with an answer, regardless of the depth of knowledge on the subject and present it as authoritative. Sometimes you can pull that off, but if the person you are trying to impress is smarter than you, it tends to backfire horribly :-)
That's when you turn on the charm, admit you have no idea what you're talking about, and openly work through the "problem" and try to figure it out on the spot.
Trying to charm me afterwords will not help. It is more like huge neon writing over your head: do not trust me.
Someone should create a koan collection in github to help properly answer "Do these jeans make my butt look fat?" and related topics.
(edited to emphasize WRT the above koan, no amount of deep real, or fake trivial, knowledge of spherical geometry will provide the correct answer. "I can provide a trivial proof that the interior angles of a triangle on the provided surface add up to far more than 180 degrees, and I like it that way" is never the correct answer. Nor is an engineering estimate "to one sig fig its circumference remains about two meters" won't work either, on several levels)
WWOOF is a international program that allows you to travel the world, with food/accommodations covered, in exchange for volunteer work.
Genius move if it was.
I mention this because some of these seem dubious, and I'd have loved sources. If they came from potentially unsourced Quora answers, the dubiousness just gets passed along.
Link: http://www.quora.com/Tips-and-Hacks-for-Everyday-Life/What-c...
One UX thing that I thought of when doing this: you may want to take a page out of Facebook's bag of tricks; they preload the next image (when browsing an album).
Just a thought. Love it!
"Beer can reduce the risk of heart disease, by slowing down the digestion and absorption of food and reducing cholesterol levels. A liter of beer contains an average of 20% of the recommended daily intake of fiber and some beers can provide up to 60%."
Guinness has 0 grams of fibre.
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/calories/guinness-draught-s...
Also: "Genghis Khan was the founder of the Mongol Empire. He was responsible for the death of so many people that the Earth's carbon level dropped by almost 700 million tons".
Really? I seriously doubt that -- including doubting the fact that it uses a meaningful metric.
Looking at the "highest recorded temperature": http://instanerd.me/v/97
The 1922 temperature record was recently judged to be most likely erroneous, which makes the Death Valley, CA reading the highest.
whoops
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I cross my arms because I have poor circulation and it keeps them warm. Not everything you read on the internet is true.
There are heuristic ways to get around the undecidability of the halting problem, and in this case we're in danger of an infinite loop
[[citation needed]]
Are those mutually exclusive? Can it not be an evolutionary trait AND be caused by some process?
Nice typography and highlight hue.