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Thready

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  1. I feel like I should reach out and post about a point Linus and Luke made on Wan show about education. This is not an argument or rebuttal. I just want to say my piece and ask for any constructive input from the community since this is a forum. I have a master's in educational psychology and a master's in educational technology. I dropped out of high school at 17, only to come back and finish a year late. I spent 6 years in college getting a 4 year degree after suffering setbacks from undiagnosed mental illness. I worked in special education for a few months, but became disillusioned with the American school system for some of the same reasons Linus and Luke talked about. I also have serious reservations about American schooling to the point where I decided not to pursue a PhD in school psychology, but instead a PhD in science education. I'll just get into it: Linus and Luke talked about streamlined learning, specifically how to maximize learning in a student's interests and eliminate learning in areas that they believe will never be relevant to a student's future. They both brought up an interesting point. Learning needs to be interesting, relevant, and relatable. Students need to know that what they learn actually matters, and they need to be able to know the real-world application of what they are learning. In many US schools, learning is done in a vacuum, in isolation from reality. There's a joke that goes, "I didn't learn how to do my taxes, but I know that the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell." That reflects how schools don't actually help children understand the broader applications and implications of what they learn. The problem with that joke is this, and this is where I would like Linus's and Luke's opinion: Learning that the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell is necessary for us to have a basic understanding of our biology. Learning about molar mass early is how we bring a kid from complete ignorance about physics to possibly becoming interested in it. Kids don't need to dive into the details, but they need an exposure to these subjects. Without children learning about biology, we won't have adequate doctors. If you never learned about biology in middle school and high school, chances are you won't be interested in medical school. There are actually studies of doctors who say that their interest in biology started in middle school and high school. If they weren't "forced" to study biology in school, they might have never gone into medicine. I don't think children in school should be learning how to do taxes. That sentiment is brought up a lot online and it bothers me because learning how to do taxes, in my opinion, will put kids to sleep so fast. If you want to turn a mind off to the wonders of the universe, then you eliminate the arts and sciences and replace them with... taxes. Sure, there should be a class in high school, but taxes should not be core curriculum, IMO. I think we should learn civics, and thus the reason why we pay taxes, rather than the mechanics of paying taxes. Isaac Asimov, Carl Sagan, and Albert Einstein are three of my heroes and I always think of them when it comes to pedagogic education. According to them, children should learn about how the universe functions in a way that can relate to their lives. But what is relatable is the question. Yes, taxes are relatable, but so is how the human body and the universe work. How do we judge which topic is more relevant to growing minds? If we leave it up to non-experts (school boards which are the bane of my existence) to guide what children learn, that's not ok with me personally because non-experts don't have the perspective of these topics. Someone with a law degree shouldn't be in charge of the science curriculum, but that's how things function partly in the USA. It's not that learning physics doesn't matter, it's that it's taught in such a way that children will never understand its relevance to their lives. Does anyone have any thoughts? I feel like someone is going to attack me for this since this is the internet after all and I'm somewhat agreeing/disagreeing at the same time with something Linus talked about. EDIT: Also, aptitude tests in middle school and high school are horribly flawed, to the point where their validity has been questioned on the same level that IQ tests have been questioned. I scored low on all aptitude tests in school because I was undiagnosed autistic and ADHD. I'm now about to enter a PhD program AND an MFA in creative writing.
  2. Is there any good front-end UI to make my retropie games list look less homebrew? Like on the Switch's NES and SNES apps it has a nice UI, info about the games and their history, grid layout, etc. I saw a video about some front-end UI for ROMs but I can't find anything. I have my retropie in a Raspberry pi 3 on a USB stick. I'm giving this to my 10 year old nephew and I'd like to impress him with it.
  3. It's only $11 so I might as well see if it works
  4. Thanks. I might just cut some bed sheets to fit it. I mean, I wash, but I plan on using this chair for at least 3 years, so I don't want any accumulation.
  5. I use Quest 2 with and without cable. I've seen the Rift in action. I choose Quest 2 because it's the mainline one that will have more support, and it's basically as good as the Rift. I wouldn't spend the extra on the Rift because it's not $100 BETTER than Quest. They're basically 90% the same thing. The reason why Quest is cheaper is because Facebook is trying to get these into as many hands as possible to get you into their ecosystem. It's why you can buy thousand dollar phone technology for $500, Samsung wants you to use their stuff. Same story with Quest. They're willing to take the hardware price hit to sell you their software. Quest 2 will serve you just as well as Rift.
  6. I just dropped $350 on a big and tall office chair for my basement and I would like to keep it from smelling like... me. Do they make covers to protect office chairs from body stuff like sweat? EDIT: I do look this stuff up but I don't know if the stuff I'm looking at is for my chair. Like they make water repellent covers for furniture but I don't know if those fit on office chairs.
  7. I'm actually interested in this question as well because I hate compressed air too. How much would you guys suggest spending on one? They go from $20 to $160 online. I assume the $160 is the best, but is the best necessary just for a normal use desktop in a dry basement?
  8. I should add that I only connect my PC (with a 650W PSU), 2 monitors, and internet modem and router to the (surge + battery) outlets. The demand is relatively low. We don't have long blackouts where I live. I live in tornado alley but in a 30 year old home with a modern circuit breaker, built in 1990, and our power lines run below ground. We've only had 1 surge to the home that I remember. The vast majority of our power outages are about a second long, so I'm not worried about the performance decreasing, I'm just concerned if the battery actually kicks in when it's supposed to and about the fluctuation going from full power, to zero, back to full in a second, but multiple times a night in a storm. If the power outage lasts more than a second, which is maybe once a year in a bad storm, it's usually less than 10 minutes. If it completely shuts things down for the night that's ok with me. It's just the fluctuation from off-on-off-on multiple times a night I'm concerned about. So I guess I'm trying to say I don't need a perfect battery, just one that will kick in for a few seconds at a time.
  9. I kept an APC Pro 1000 S in storage for a year, and tonight I decided to get it out and replace my surge protector. It showed up as full battery and it's working fine. What did that year of no activity do to the battery? It's a lead acid battery, I guess like a car battery?
  10. It's mostly blended but it has a few chunks in it, like the potatoes
  11. That's what I didn't do. I bought already cooked pieces from the grocery store in one of their soup ingredient packs in the produce aisle and then I just simmered them in the soup for 30 minutes. I didn't boil them beyond that. Next round I'll actually boil them for 10 minutes before putting them in the soup to simmer for 30.
  12. I used a lot of broccoli because I tripled everything to cook 3x the recipe. But I also chopped the broccoli down into tiny pieces
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