10,000 Matching Annotations
  1. Oct 2018
    1. On the night of Thursday, March 17, 1955, the haze was aghostly yellowish white. Smoke from a tear-gas canister haddriven thousands of hockey fans into the streets

      Those poor fans, they went to a game to have a good time and ended up getting gassed.

    1. “When I’m hit, I get mad and I don’t know what I do,” he confided in one writer. “Before each game, I think about my temper and how I should control it, but as soon as I get on the ice I forget all that.”

      Its good to hear that he is aware of his temper issues

    2. Then Richard snatches a stick from the ice and swings it wildly at Laycoe.

      I was hit in the elbow playing a pickup game and it sliced me open with ease. I could only imagine how damaged the tender skin below the eye was after this.

    1. with recursive rnd_move(move) as ( select *, random() rnd from generate_series(1, 9) move ), winning_positions(a, b, c) as ( values (1, 2, 3), (4, 5, 6), (7, 8, 9), -- rows (1, 4, 7), (2, 5, 8), (3, 6, 9), -- cols (1, 5, 9), (3, 5, 7) -- diagonals ), game as ( select 'O' as who_next, ARRAY['.', '.', '.', '.', '.', '.', '.', '.', '.'] as board union ( select case when who_next = 'X' then 'O' else 'X' end as who_next, board[:move-1] || who_next || board[move+1:] from game, rnd_move where board[move] = '.' order by rnd limit 1 ) ), game_with_winner as ( select *, lag(a is not null) over () as finished, lag(who_next) over () as who from game left join winning_positions on board[a] != '.' and board[a] = board[b] and board[a] = board[c] ) select array_to_string(board[1:3] || chr(10) || board[4:6] || chr(10) || board[7:9] || chr(10), '') board, case when a is not null then who || ' wins' end as winner from game_with_winner where not finished;
    1. And the final point, essentially, is about everybody taking responsibility for this

      Playing the blame game should be avoided and we should share the blame in this issue. Nobody is 100% fair all the time.

    2. everybody taking responsibility for this

      this is something 'taking responsibility' that needs to be shown and addresses in education that helps students have accountability for their actions rather than playing the blame game

    1. ntor of the game. The game allegedly sprang from his fertile mind in the summer of 1839 while he was an instructor at a local military prep s

      so interesting that everything baseball is still huge in Cooperstown. It is where so many AAU tournaments are held

  2. Sep 2018
    1. meets the traveling man who does not appear normal dressed and is very short. It can be inferred by the description that this person is like an elf or perhaps a dwarf of the forest.

      But, at the end of the story, the townspeople know of the man because they say, "Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it is a common wish of all hen-pecked husbands in the neighborhood, when life hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting drought out of Rip Van Winkle's flagon" (70).

    1. we will need to face the vexing question of why we should even bother preferring real people to simulated versions.

      Contextual material: This has become a major issue in the past couple of years, especially in Japan. Japan's birth rates have been steadily declining as of late. Fewer young adults date, consumed in their work life or lack of interest in marriage. In 2018, it will be Japan's 37th year of attempting to offset the growing aging population resulting in failure. This year has been Japan's all-time low of children under 14 in the country, at 12.3% of the total country's population. Aside from economic and work/personal life ratio, many Japanese men have decided to step away from real people dating and into simulated women. A gamer, under the username "Sal9000," married his DS video game simulated girlfriend in 2009 at a video game convention with thousands of witnesses and a priest to marry them off. The simulated girlfriend was off a dating simulation game called LovePlus. (Source: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/video-games/6651021/Japanese-gamer-marries-Nintendo-DS-character.html) This has been an upward moving trend, with companies creating a holographic character to wake you up, control your lights, send you messages throughout the day, etc. It may not be out of reason for people to start preferring simulated women with the age of Virtual Reality and what not.

    1. Later, after losing a game, Williams smashed her racket, and Ramos docked her a point, as the rules require.

      This is not only unprofessional, but disrespectful as well especially considering that she is a well respected public figure.

    2. “She completely had the right message about women’s inequality, but it wasn’t the right time to bring it up.”

      Obviously Williams has dealt with gender inequality. It was brave of her to publicly acknowledge her opinions, however it was unprofessional to do it amidst the tennis courts during a game.

    1. Empirical (qualitative and quantitative) studies (both observational and experimental) and interpretative research, including single-subject case and larger scale sociological studies, would benefit from longer term comparative work exploring how game players do learn across home and school.

      While an interesting area of study, I am still questioning the relevance in a purely educational setting of the need to bring in a sociological persptective. Unless we are 'using' our educational system as a means of political change? I understand the research in a broad scope to analyze a holistic, cross-cultural effect of media and technology on individuals and society at large, but again, in the learning of reading, writing, and math -- improving the efficacy of the learning is the purpose of introducing technology.

    2. Gee suggests that learning to play the games themselves constitutes a demanding, rigorous (and exclusive) kind of literacy and should therefore in and of itself demand the serious attention of educationalists.

      And as the author wrote before, this is truly an area where we have a beginning we can chart. Interactive games are unlike any other medium we have. TV learning is passive and represents simply a different form of life -- even with cartoons -- animated text and nothing more. Interactive gaming and constructing entire worlds that can be manioulated and are - almost - entirely learner controlled is a complete game changer in education.

    3. Educational research on games thus inherited an idea that games "work," and a key research interest in early study revolved around the tricky, commonsense concept of "motivation" or "engagement." Put crudely, popu- lar (and commercially motivated) research has tended simply to celebrate playing games as a "better" motivator than learning in school.

      But this is what the literature continues to support -- 'games' are intrinsically motivating because they are chosen by the player. The player learns the game because interest is present. The player continues to play because of ongoing motivation to play through a reward system.

    4. A recent European comparative study, for example, suggested that young people 6-16 years old spent on average 32 minutes a day playing games, as compared with 136 minutes watching TV (Kirriemuir & McFarlane, 2003, p. 10).

      No surprise that in a 2017 report on media use reports that TV watching and game playing are running about neck and neck now. The full report is here: https://www.ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0020/108182/children-parents-media-use-attitudes-2017.pdf

    5. Only in the past 10 or so years have empirical studies of children and young people playing games begun to emerge (e.g., Beavis, 1997, 2001; Facer, Sutherland, Furlong, & Furlong, 2003; Nixon, Beavis, & Atkinson, 2003; Sefton-Green, 2004a), and theorization about both the pedagogy and the effect of game playing is still developing.

      There have been a lot of studies since 2005 in this area. Like the work of Mitra in India -- interesting though. Because this may just be the natural evolution of research. Once a baseline can be established in separate silos, the work can then be synthesized to further understanding and develop additional research questions in the 'how' space.

    1. IMF figures show that over the period 2014–2030 the BRICs are expected to grow so fast that their share of the world economy will rise from 19.4 per cent to 30.3 per cent, exceeding the economies of the US, the EU and Japan. In 2010, China overtook Japan as the second-largest economy in the world, after the US. With a projected 2030 GDP at 94 per cent of that of America, China’s economy will not be far behind the US.

      is this a zero sum game, where one country wins and another lose?

    1. It’s not that we aren’t bowling alone, I’d rather say that our culture has just shifted on to different sports like basketball and other sports that require team communication. And there are even e-sports (aka electronic sports) nowadays.

      Patrick I completely agree with you, we are constantly exploring new avenues for social interaction. The game may have changed but people are still playing and finding ways to connect with others.

    1. what becomes of us, the passion pushers, as we try to make something out of nothing every time our children show the slightest interest in an activity that does not involve a game console

      This isn't necessarily a bad thing. Our parents want us to pursue what we genuinely have an interest in. In order to determine what we actually like to do, we have to try many different things. They are trying to create opportunities for us to find real happiness, not just success.

    1. What other games, game forms and game elements do they draw on? What player skills from other games will transfer to this game? How exactly is the game played, with how many people, doing what sorts of things? Also, what programming language was the game written in, using what sort of development process? How many people were involved in designing and producing it, and what earlier code was directly incorporated or otherwise re-used? How does the game play with or against the platform on which it was implemented and the history of programming on that platform?

      Good starter questions for a platform-studies analysis.

    1. Workshop goals included introducing basic design processes, learning the features of different mobile game and story platforms (e.g., Scvngr, MITAR, ARIS), and exploring how these tools might be used to engage others in thinking about the contested issues and places under investi-gation

      Digital media is being introduced and used to conveniently give practical and interesting lessons to those who need them.

    2. FSFQMBZJOH<QMBDF‰CBTFE>HBNFTBOEEFTJHOJOHTPNFHBNFTUPP"OE*UIJOLUIBUJGPUIFSLJETHPUUPFYQFSJFODFUIBU JUXPVMEIFMQUIFNMFBSOBMJUUMFCJUCFUUFSCFDBVTFXFMFBSOXIJMFXFBSFCVJMEJOHUIFHBNFT4PXFBSFQVUUJOHJUUPHFUIFSBOEMFBSOJOHBUUIFTBNFUJNF*OTUFBEPGKVTUSFBEJOHJUPSKVTUMPPLJOHJUVQw

      Learning can come from many places and in many ways, it's not just withing formal education that people learn. In this example, the learning came from the building off a game instead of just reading about it or looking it up.

    1. his anxiety over telling which race is which may seem like the vestige of a prior era, yet even today most Americans are anxious to know each other’s race and remain unsettled until they discover the true identity of any racially ambiguous person

      Category 2: Multimedia Writing

      As a biracial person, I have experienced this kind of situation a lot. I am often asked "what are you?", by many people, including strangers. They seem to have this burning desire to place me in certain boxes to categorize who I am because of my ambiguous appearance. People also like to play this weird guessing game with me, throwing out identities they think I could be (i.e. "So you're Mexican, right?"). I think this video does a good job at showng the variety of thoughts and feelings mixed race people have regarding their own identity and how they navigate the world. For context, this is a follow-up interview with people who had their racial identities guessed by other people.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6fv7CqCjiJw

    1. BOOK 12 THE ARGUMENT The Angel Michael continues from the Flood to relate what shall succeed; then, in the mention of Abraham, comes by degrees to explain, who that Seed of the Woman shall be, which was promised Adam and Eve in the Fall; his Incarnation, Death, Resurrection, and Ascention; the state of the Church till his second Coming. Adam greatly satisfied and recomforted by these Relations and Promises descends the Hill with Michael; wakens Eve, who all this while had slept, but with gentle dreams compos'd to quietness of mind and submission. Michael in either hand leads them out of Paradise, the fiery Sword waving behind them, and the Cherubim taking thir Stations to guard the Place. AS one who in his journey bates at Noone, Though bent on speed, so heer the Archangel paus'd Betwixt the world destroy'd and world restor'd, If Adam aught perhaps might interpose; Then with transition sweet new Speech resumes. [ 5 ] Thus thou hast seen one World begin and end; And Man as from a second stock proceed. Much thou hast yet to see, but I perceave Thy mortal sight to faile; objects divine Must needs impaire and wearie human sense: [ 10 ] Henceforth what is to com I will relate, Thou therefore give due audience, and attend. This second sours of Men, while yet but few; And while the dread of judgement past remains Fresh in thir mindes, fearing the Deitie, [ 15 ] With some regard to what is just and right Shall lead thir lives and multiplie apace, Labouring the soile, and reaping plenteous crop, Corn wine and oyle; and from the herd or flock, Oft sacrificing Bullock, Lamb, or Kid, [ 20 ] With large Wine-offerings pour'd, and sacred Feast, Shal spend thir dayes in joy unblam'd, and dwell Long time in peace by Families and Tribes Under paternal rule; till one shall rise Of proud ambitious heart, who not content [ 25 ] With fair equalitie, fraternal state, Will arrogate Dominion undeserv'd Over his brethren, and quite dispossess Concord and law of Nature from the Earth, Hunting (and Men not Beasts shall be his game) [ 30 ] With Warr and hostile snare such as refuse Subjection to his Empire tyrannous: A mightie Hunter thence he shall be styl'd Before the Lord, as in despite of Heav'n, Or from Heav'n claming second Sovrantie; [ 35 ] And from Rebellion shall derive his name, Though of Rebellion others he accuse. Hee with a crew, whom like Ambition joyns With him or under him to tyrannize, Marching from Eden towards the West, shall finde [ 40 ] The Plain, wherein a black bituminous gurge Boiles out from under ground, the mouth of Hell; Of Brick, and of that stuff they cast to build A Citie and Towre, whose top may reach to Heav'n; And get themselves a name, least far disperst [ 45 ] In foraign Lands thir memorie be lost, Regardless whether good or evil fame. But God who oft descends to visit men Unseen, and through thir habitations walks To mark thir doings, them beholding soon, [ 50 ] Comes down to see thir Citie, ere the Tower Obstruct Heav'n Towrs, and in derision sets Upon thir Tongues a various Spirit to rase Quite out thir Native Language, and instead To sow a jangling noise of words unknown: [ 55 ] Forthwith a hideous gabble rises loud Among the Builders; each to other calls Not understood, till hoarse, and all in rage, As mockt they storm; great laughter was in Heav'n And looking down, to see the hubbub strange [ 60 ] And hear the din; thus was the building left Ridiculous, and the work Confusion nam'd. Whereto thus Adam fatherly displeas'd. O execrable Son so to aspire Above his Brethren, to himself assuming [ 65 ] Authoritie usurpt, from God not giv'n: He gave us onely over Beast, Fish, Fowl Dominion absolute; that right we hold By his donation; but Man over men He made not Lord; such title to himself [ 70 ] Reserving, human left from human free. But this Usurper his encroachment proud Stayes not on Man; to God his Tower intends Siege and defiance: Wretched man! what food Will he convey up thither to sustain [ 75 ] Himself and his rash Armie, where thin Aire Above the Clouds will pine his entrails gross, And famish him of Breath, if not of Bread? To whom thus Michael. Justly thou abhorr'st That Son, who on the quiet state of men [ 80 ] Such trouble brought, affecting to subdue Rational Libertie; yet know withall, Since thy original lapse, true Libertie Is lost, which alwayes with right Reason dwells Twinn'd, and from her hath no dividual being: [ 85 ] Reason in man obscur'd, or not obeyd, Immediately inordinate desires And upstart Passions catch the Government From Reason, and to servitude reduce Man till then free. Therefore since hee permits [ 90 ] Within himself unworthie Powers to reign Over free Reason, God in Judgement just Subjects him from without to violent Lords; Who oft as undeservedly enthrall

      Book XII: continues Michael's vision. Adam and Eve are comforted by hearing of the future redemption of their race. The poem ends as they wander forth out of Paradise and the door closes behind them.

    1. This colorful language – dominoes, a confidence game, an “iceberg,” a “storm” – artfully disguised reality

      These words are a propaganda technique, but the author can't act as if he isn't in on this game as well. Throughout this article, the author has used inflammatory and, most likely inaccurate, phrases.

    1. Electing a government and governing are two different businesses.

      I think this is something that a lot of the American public may not understand. On social media I notice a lot of people talk a big game about all these things that need to be changed in our current administration and how they would never make a decision like they did. I would like to see them walk in a government official's shoes, because our role as the governed is completely different than theirs as the governing.

    2. U.S. elected officials in many cases have very short terms of office and face the prospect of being defeated in primary elections and have to run for office more as individuals than as standard-bearers for their party and have continually to raise large sums of money in order to finance their own election campaigns.

      A lot of stuff to balance - especially with as short of terms as we have, which is noted a few paragraphs down. It is a constant, never-ending game of campaigning while also doing the job.

    1. What if we design our games to be more socially meaningful?

      Even better; Why don't we design our social networks to be more socially meaningful? But first we need to consider deconstruction and re-engineering them as robust against the predatory environment of corporate and political exploitation.

      There is sooooo much going wanting in the areas of privacy, autonomy anti-fragility and economic rationalization and yes... user relevance and psycho/socio-ergonomics would fall into line in and around all that, but I do wish we could see the priority of undermining the existing tyranny of greed and power requires restructuring and winding back the entrenched dependencies on existing infrastructure and modalities. Walled gardens, phishing scams, Non-hierarchical network topology held captive and dependent upon on DNS and such hierarchical protocols and network topologies. Websites are forever usurping desktops and re-inventing the center and now apps all vying to be the new centrist portal/platform and gateway to corner a market if not a monopoly.

      If these fundamentals are not addressed there seems little point in meddling with top down procedural micro-management strategies designed to preempt the behavioral dynamics of players and bloat the front end interface codebase with more to manage in the eminent transition. I think we are over due for universal back-end overhaul and time to dial back the development of interface and the codebases of existing infrastructure dependency is somewhere from imminent to well over due.

      There may be many futile efforts put into redundancies far too late in the day. Cutting of losses and looking for the efficiency in fundamentals, may call for broad depreciation of 'legacy' code still in service. A couple to a few years down the track the dawning of a new paradigm will reward us and pay back our sacrifice.

      Having said that, I do actually like these ideas and not just for the game environment but for the plethora of dis jointed incompatible social apps/networks that avoid cross pollination and standardization of integration (compatibility/interoperability/profile-portability) and devour user contribution and conscription of their extended contact base as a commodity to exploit them with, rather than a commodity they should be rewarded for providing the platform.

      Open platforms of interoperable networking could be made to usurp the walled garden or to force them to segregate their platform and account code from the profile/user data base which they could hold in an encrypted and non-permanent form. Revoke their key and destroy their record of the user profile. Now they will play as responsible competitive providers for independent users with rewards to trade/revoke conditional. Now all these transaction provisions to describe the environment become relevant to the developers and the need to be feature and compatibility relevant cross-platform and retain profile agnostic interoperability, would drive an arms race in this customer centrist marketplace and a social experience of true value might rise from the source that matters.

    2. Let’s instead design games that help strangers form positive pro-social relationships.

      Er... I do believe there are quite a few people who have been doing that very thing, and filming the action for education and entertainment purposes, or so that non-geeks can also have a primary motive for demanding high speed internet. LOL!

    3. We can’t force two people to become friends, nor should we want to.

      How many social engineers does it take to change a light bulb? An infinite number. That's why they leave you in the dark till you become the change you seek and make your own light to live by.

      If you cant force two people to become friends, then how do 'diplomats' (political manipulators?) profess to do the same thing with entire nations? Especially while so often, using the other hand to deal the deck for other players, in a game of "let's you and him fight"; or just being bloody mercenaries with sheer might is right political ethos installed under various euphemistic credos. 'My country right or wrong' or 'Mitt Got Uns' or ...to discover weapons of mass destruction...etc.

      So much for politics and social engineering, but maybe we can just be content with not so much forcing two people to be friends, as forcing them to have sex while we're filming them, so we can create more online amateur porn content. LOL ;)

    1. ran Khan, sworn in two weeks ago, could be a game changer. Khan, an ethnic Pashtun like most Taliban, is a fierce critic of the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan and has long advocated for negotiating with the Pakistani Taliban, e

      although he could persuade the Taliban to negotiate, it seems that he is in favor of the Taliban and is unhappy with choices made by the U.S.

    1. technological developments

      Unfortunately the technological progression of video games is what allowed for this in the first place. When games couldn't rely on constant internet access, there was no way to have smaller in game purchases. It also wouldn't be possible to monitor your players for the purposes of figuring out how to exploit them most effectively either.

    2. ‘something of value’

      Funnily enough, another reason is that players don't technically "own" virtual items. The most basic form is that when a game finally shuts down, the players have no rights to the items they purchased, but there are some other effects of this. If a company removes an in-game item which someone paid for, there isn't really anything the player can do.

    3. collection and use of individual player data

      I've read a great article from someone who is supposedly a former free to play developer, who talked about this exact thing. There are a lot of tricks that they can use to weasel information out of you, such as having you link social media accounts to the game, which they can then scan for information, and learn more than you would expect.

      Heres the link: https://toucharcade.com/2015/09/16/we-own-you-confessions-of-a-free-to-play-producer/

    4. Predatory monetization schemes typically involve in‐game purchasing systems that disguise or withhold the true long‐term cost of the activity until players are already financially and psychologically committed.

      I really enjoy this definition of what is considered a predatory practice. I've had trouble articulating what exactly I find to be predatory, despite being able to notice these practices easily enough. It really is just something that tricks the player long enough to catch them it their snare, where its much harder to escape.

    1. Free Culture Game by Molle Industria. CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 A game to help understand the concept of free culture http://www.molleindustria.org/en/freeculturegame/

      This should probably not be 3 different bullet points as it is all one resource. Also, quick question, how does this illustrate 'other' open movements as it seems to be about what free culture is.

    1. In terms of “ethos,” the ontology of practices like blogging, writing fanfiction and collaborating in Wikipedia celebrate free support and advice, building the practice, collective benefit, co-operation before competition, everyone a winner rather than a zero-sum game, and transparent rules and procedures.

      Students will love to collaborate and work together online. Very interesting!!

    1. This takes place in an unpredictable policy-making environment in which attention can lurch from issue to issue, policy is made routinely in networks, and the “rules of the game” take time to learn

      Policy doesn't exist in a vacuum. It's not an exact science.

      The 'rules of the game' - could this include power dynamics?

    1. She’d been traded back and forth between different Minitari braves apparently, before she was won by Charbonneau in a gamble, in a game, in a gamble really. He won her from, to, from another, he won her from another Minitari brave in the, in this gamble and, and he also at that time, when he had, when he won her, he’d already had another wife, so I think she was his second common-law wife. And she was fourteen. Within a few months she was pregnant.

      This is something that seems under-emphasized and should be brought to more light. This is an unspeakable crime today and completed ignored then.

  3. www.samsung.com www.samsung.com
    1. Playing a video game or watching an amusing video on the internet causes roughly about as much dopamine to be released in your brain as eating a slice of pizza.

      Logos

    1. we will see that virtue may be in conflict with duty, particularlyin business ethics

      I think this is still common today. It's easy to sit in a classroom and judge decisions using these frameworks. It's a whole other ball game, to be in the thick of things and making the decision with the pressure on you.

    Annotators

    1. In August 1805, the Lemhi Shoshones were living in the mountains, sustained only by roots, berries and, infrequently, fish and small game. They were preparing for another buffalo-hunting venture to the plains.

      This would be a large risk for them.

    1. Finding little game and exposed to the fierce winter storms blowing in from the ocean on the north shore, the party elected to cross the river, where local Indians advised that deer and elk were plentiful. An actual vote of the members was recorded; it included the vote of a woman, Sacagawea, and a black man, York.

      This is pretty interesting that they gave a slave a vote. It does say something about the nature of the relationship between York and Clark.

    1. How to PlayWe don’t need to play every second of the day to enjoy play’s benefits. In his book, Brown calls play a catalyst. A little bit of play, he writes, can go a long way toward boosting our productivity and happiness. So how can you add play into your life? Here are a few tips from the experts:Change how you think about play. Remember that play is important for all aspects of our lives, including creativity and relationships. Give yourself permission to play every day. For instance, play can mean talking to your dog. “I[‘d] ask my dog Charlie, regularly, his opinion of the presidential candidates. He respond[ed] with a lifted ear and an upturning vocalization that goes ‘haruum?’” Eberle said.Play can be reading aloud to your partner, he said. “Some playful writers are made to be read aloud: Dylan Thomas, Art Buchwald, Carl Hiaasen, S.J. Perelman, Richard Feynman, Frank McCourt.”Take a play history. In his book Brown includes a primer to help readers reconnect with play. He suggests readers mine their past for play memories. What did you do as a child that excited you? Did you engage in those activities alone or with others? Or both? How can you recreate that today?Surround yourself with playful people. Both Brown and White stressed the importance of selecting friends who are playful – and of playing with your loved ones.Play with little ones. Playing with kids helps us experience the magic of play through their perspective. White and Brown both talked about playing around with their grandkids.Any time you think play is a waste, remember that it offers some serious benefits for both you and others. As Brown says in his book, “Play is the purest expression of love.”
    1. Dylan left the prison moved to write a song. In “Hurricane,” released on his 1976 album Desire, he narrates Carter’s tale of inequity in eleven linear verses: How can the life of such a manbe in the palm of some fool’s hand?To see him obviously framedcouldn’t help but make me feel ashamed to live in a landwhere justice is a game.

      This is pathos because the author articulates a powerful and heartbreaking story about a man whose life was ruined by a flawed justice system.

      In TYFA, Heinrich argues pathos relies on simplicity. The song lyrics are elementary and everyone can connect to them.

    1. In some cases, though, great amounts of time playing video games (or doing any other single thing) can be evidence of something missing in a person's life. In some cases people engage in an activity not just because of their enjoyment of it, but also because it is an escape from something painful in their lives or is the only route available to them to satisfy basic psychological needs. This can occur for adults as well as children. The activity that seems to become obsessive might be video gaming, or it might be something else. For instance, some adults devote far more time to their careers than they otherwise might, because that allows them to avoid an unpleasant family environment. Some kids say they play video games at least partly as a means of escape, and some say they do so because it is the only realm of activity in which they feel free.[5] In an age in which children are often not allowed to play freely outdoors, and in which they are more or less constantly directed by adults, the virtual world of video games is for some the only realm where they are allowed to roam free and explore. If they were allowed more autonomy in the real world, many of them would spend less time at video games. As illustration of this idea, British gaming researcher Richard Wood gives some case examples.[6] One case is that of Martin, an 11-year-old boy whose mother became concerned about the huge amounts of time he was devoting to World of Warcraft and therefore forbade him from playing it or other video games, which made things only worse for Martin. It turned out, according to Wood, that Martin was an only child who was being bullied at school and hated going there, and who was afraid of going outside at home because of repeated bullying. The online video game was his only source of free expression and his only satisfying contact with other people. When this was taken away from him, he was understandably distraught. Another example is that of Helen, a 32-year-old MD who worked in a temporary research position and spent most of her spare time playing the MMORPG Final Fantasy alone in her apartment. It turned out that Helen had recently experienced a bad breakup with a long-term partner, was unhappy with her job, and was severely depressed. Playing Final Fantasy was not cause of her depression, but was her way of coping with it during this difficult time in her life. The online game provided social connections and pleasure at a time when nothing else did. In a study of more than 1300 adult video gamers (age 18 to 43), Andrew Przybylski and his colleagues at the University of Rochester found that a small percentage of them, who played many hours per day, described themselves as obsessively engaged--they felt that they didn't just "want" to play, but "needed" to play.[7] These players, when they stopped a session of playing, did not feel refreshed and energized as other players did, but felt tense and unhappy. The extensive questionnaires used in this study also revealed that these "obsessed" player were, in general, those whose basic psychological needs--their needs for freedom, competence, and social relationships--were not being met in real life. So, if your child or another loved one seems obsessed about video games and unhappy outside of the games, don't jump to the conclusion that the games are cause of the unhappiness. Instead, talk with your loved one and try to find out what might be missing or wrong in other aspects of his or her life and whether or not you can help to solve that problem.
    2. To counteract the stereotype, Langlois points out that video gaming is hard fun, not easy fun. In his words: "This hard fun would not be possible if gamers were truly lazy or apathetic. And the level of detail that many gamers pay attention to is staggering, whether it be leveling a profession to 525 in WoW, unlocking every achievement in Halo 3, or mapping out every detail in the EVE universe. This is not apathy, this is meticulousness." So, Langlois helps gamers by helping them feel good about their gaming rather than bad about it. There is no reason why a dedicated video gamer should feel any worse about his or her hobby than a dedicated chess player or skier. Still, of course, some people let their dedication to video gaming--or to chess, or to skiing, or to anything else--interfere with other aspects of their life, and that can be a problem. Lots of us need to learn time management, especially as we reach adulthood, in order to do what we want to do and still fulfill our obligations to others. My loved ones sometimes remind me that it's not fair for me to spend all of my time reading and writing or going off alone bicycling or skiing. But, let's not stigmatize any of this by calling it an addiction. Let's just call it a time management problem and figure out constructive ways to deal with it.
    1. Video-game designers have also mastered another trick to encourage more play: requiring an unpredictable number of actions in order to earn a reward. Giving one at regular intervals means that a player, having received a reward, will be less motivated to play on knowing that another is a long time coming. In Diablo, Dr Hilgard explains, a player may find a powerful weapon either after the very next monster that is slain, or not until a thousand monsters later. This schedule fosters more frequent engagement. Therefore the structure of reward patterns in different games may cause certain ones to be more addictive (particularly to gamers who are motivated by the prospect of completing goals and accumulating rare items).
    2. Another risk factor is found in players with strong social motivation. Some games involve social obligations, where players have to work together. This can mean a player feels obliged to play along as the rest of the group wants to play. Farmville strives to ensure participation at regular intervals by making gamers dependent on each other for daily allotments of fantasy resources, says Joseph Hilgard, at the University of Missouri-Columbia, and colleagues in a recent paper in Frontiers in Psychology. Putting together role play and social use in one game should yield a highly compelling game. World of Warcraft, a massive multiplayer online role-playing game, fits this description and is, anecdotally, pretty addictive. 
    3. Players are motivated by the extent to which different games fulfill their basic psychological needs; but some factors, more than others, are found in addiction. One risk factor is found in players who are trying to "escape" through fantasy immersion or role play. Indeed, their game use may be a symptom of some other underlying problem, say social phobia or depression. Playing can then generate a vicious cycle that is hard to treat if the game is a way of self-medicating. For example, a child who is unpopular in school, or being bullied, may be important and powerful in a video game. Real life may struggle to compete. 
    4. Human psychology tells us that players should enjoy a game that satisfies the need for control, bestows a sense of one's progress, and fosters relationships with friends and others encountered. Yet gamers differ in their individual needs. Each person has their own "player personality" and this variation has spawned a vast industry designed to meet different motivations. Some may want to release aggression (Call of Duty), escape reality (World of Warcraft) or oversee building projects (Minecraft). Others are more motivated by in-game rewards, or have a high "loss aversion" and so find a challenging game unfair or frustrating (while others find it thrilling). A game like Flappy Birds, will most appeal to those who are attracted by repetitive actions, difficulty and have a low loss aversion. Those who have a high loss aversion, however, will find it infuriating. 
    1. Hon. Mr. TILLEY made this representation in a speech which he delivered on the 17th November last :— So close is the contest between parties in the Canadian Legislature, that even the five Prince Edward Island members by their vote could turn victory on whatever side they chose, and have the game entirely in their own hands. Suppose that Upper Canada should attempt to carry out schemes for her own aggrandizement in the west, could she, with her eighty-two representatives, successfully oppose the sixty-five of Lower Canada and the forty-seven of the Lower Provinces, whose interests would be identical ? Certainly not ; and she would not attempt it. MR. H. MACKENZIE—What has that to do with representation by population ? MR. M. C. CAMERON—” What has that to do with representation by population ?” asks the hon. gentleman. Representation by population was agitated, so far as Upper Canada is concerned, because we are paying so large a proportion of the revenue of the country ; and should the Lower Provinces have a corresponding voice, we should still pay the same proportion of revenue—instead, in fact, of standing on an equality, we would have thirty voices more to contend against. (Hear, hear.) Now, let us see whether, in another point of view, it is going to benefit us. It is represented by this same gentleman in the Lower Provinces that, when this change takes place, they will be relieved from the burdens they now bear

      §.51 of the Constitution Act, 1867.

    1. We did say in this case -- well, I think you stipulated that this school has a nondiscriminatory admissions policy. But suppose it didn't.

      I believe, like Sotomayor, Ginsburg has made this personal and is no longer unbiased. She acknowledges that the school claims to have a nondiscriminatory admission policy, but then continues on to play a 'what if' game. By continuing to argue against something Cortman has already answered I believe she made it clear that she would dissent.

    1. hey prescribe for one a dog feast; for another, that a game of crosse or dish should be played; for another, sleep on such and such a skin,

      This is terrible!

    1. The evidence is mounting that baby girls are a strong investment. “An important future indicator for a developing economy is its treatment of women,” says Sheryl WuDunn, coauthor with husband Nicholas Kristof of Half the Sky, a best seller turned PBS series turned online game that dubs girl power “the best way to fight poverty and extremism.

      This stylistic twist allows the writer to emphasize on the value of women in our growing society, and on her expectations of changes from the society with regard to the women.

    1. Everything was done as before, and when they killed the animals for food they were always careful to pray to their father as before. As they again asked Tsichtinako what remained in their baskets, Tsichtinako said, “You have images of the still bigger game. You will find deer, elk, mountain sheep, and bison.”

      Must first use animals to help design world and plants, then bigger game to be used for food.

    1. long-term memory or with instructional design, the topic that provided the initial source of that knowl edge may appear bizarre—the game of chess

      I find this example interesting. It stated previously that humans are not directly conscious of long term memory. So by relating this to chess, a game not many people understand, reiterates the fact that we don't know a lot about long term memory.

    2. . If more and less able players were shown a board configuration taken from a real game for about five seconds and then were asked to reproduce that configuration from memory, grand masters could correctly place most of those pieces, whereas less able players were only able to correctly place far fewer piec

      I connect this directly with math. It is important to remember the steps of how you got to the answer. By remembering the steps it is easier to come back to similar problems and work them out. If you only remember the solution, you don't know the problem as in-depthly

    1. hand holding the gun — and nobody notices because they’re too busy staring down at their smart phones and tablet computers. We’re talking about a train crowded with commuters and this guy is waving a gun around but nobody sees him, so engrossed are they in texting, tweeting and playing Angry Birds.

      The author is referencing popular pop culture ideas such as tweeting and a famous game, Angry BIrds, and setting his claim that people aren't vigilant of whats happening around.

    1. So I asked Berry directly: “Do you really think this will make a difference?” “I don’t know if it will make a difference,” he said. “But that is the wrong question. The right question is: Is it the right thing to do? I know it is the right thing to do.”

      I believe that insight is everything because it is a game change. Once I change the focus from what the others will do or react? to what is really important to me and what is the right thing to do? It makes total difference, and also makes me feel stronger.

  4. inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net inst-fs-iad-prod.inscloudgate.net
    1. Someone who lies and someonewho tells the truth are playing on opposite sides, so to speak, inthe same game. Each responds to the facts as he understandsthem, although the response of the one is guided by the authorityof the truth, while the response of the other defies that authorityand refuses to meet its demands. The bullshitter ignores thesedemands altogether.

      It's a game in which truth-tellers and liars are diametrically opposed; and in which the bullshitter is cheating. Or, at the very least, isn't following the same rules to.

      The bullshitter doesn't care about the rules, because the rules are related to the truth and the truth doesn't matter - winning matters.

    2. reader

      Lying is the intent to deceive, meanwhile, I've heard a lot of bullshit that believed it was truth, which doesn't always make it a personal affront. Or perhaps they're still trying to play with some of the rules of the game, instead of just refuting them the way lying does?

    1. Atari's Gotcha (1973) had caused a bit of a kerfuffle several years earlier owing to its pair of round pink rubber controllers which looked a bit too much like breasts for the comfort of some critics – especially since the controllers had to be squeezed to operate the game.

      wtf

    1. The increasing prevalence of digital media has led to growing public concerns about potential detrimental effects, including the possibility that video game play may be “addicting.”

      Through becoming an RA, I got the chance to meet several residents that, for all intents and purposes, were addicted to video games. Sometimes I would not see them come out of their rooms for hours upon hours, even days if a new game or update had just been released. I looked out for all of my residents but especially my few residents who I knew had a gaming addiction.

    2. DSM-5 suggests that IGD may be identified by 5 or more of 9 criteria within a 12-month period. These criteria include:Preoccupation with games: The individual thinks about previous gaming activity or anticipates playing the next game; gaming becomes the dominant activity in daily life;Withdrawal symptoms when gaming is taken away: These symptoms are typically described as irritability, anxiety, or sadness;Tolerance: The need to spend increasing amounts of time engaged in games;Unsuccessful attempts to control or reduce participation in games;Loss of interest in real-life relationships, previous hobbies, and other entertainment as a result of, and with the exception of, games;Continued excessive use of games despite knowledge of psychosocial problems;Has deceived family members, therapists, or others regarding the amount of gaming;Use of games to escape or relieve a negative mood (eg, feelings of helplessness, guilt, or anxiety); andHas jeopardized or lost a significant relationship, job, or educational or career opportunity because of participation in games.

      Having these items listed was really weird to read. It made me realize that I can see a few of them in myself with how much I rely on my cellphone. I have definitely also seen them with younger children that i've babysat for.

    1. Adolescents may seek digital distraction from emerging anxiety or distress emotions, creating a reinforced behavioral avoidance of emotional experiences.

      The thought of a child using digital distractions as a coping mechanism for anxiety or distress is a very scary thought. When I was growing up, if I was upset I would simply go outside and play with my friends or read a book. My parents did not always allow me the opportunity to play a video game or get on the computer. My screentime was extremely limited. The fact that today's children are using digital distractions to cope with anxiety is only going to FURTHER damage them psychologically. Although it is easy to sit an upset child in front of a television, parents should encourage their child to seek healthier ways to deal with distress.

    2. anxiety resulting from lack of emotion-regulation skills because of substituted digital media use

      This is becoming an ever-increasingly important discussion in regards to today's youth. My aunt, who has been an public elementary school teacher for over 30 years now, told me that she has seen students come through her classroom that literally do not know how to socialize with their peers. She blames the social media and video game culture for keeping kids indoors and not engaged in outdoor or even indoor play with one another. She feared that her students that were lacking emotion-regulation skills went home each afternoon and spent the entire night playing video games.

    1. humans create fictions (a term that for Kermode includes history, myth, and literature) concerning the end of the world.

      Humans create fictions concerning the end of the world is a great way to look at UDA lit in general- from the downfall to the rebuild, it's an imagining that stems from human condition, human fears and human resiliency. Creating fiction feels almost trite; it's really creating a game plan for a possible scenario, based on the limits, wants, goals and aspirations of human beings (among other things). this 'fiction' really explores what it means to be human in a very complex, interesting (and creative) way.

    1. The ways people are finding love has changed with the advent of the Internet.

      I personally do not think online dating is bad but I would not do it. I do know people that have met, started dating, and are either married or getting married and that is great. You have to just be extremely careful and be aware of what you are doing. You never know who the other person is and watch out for sketchy things. The internet is definitely a game changer for a lot of people!

    1. Its root cause is that universities with powerhouse sports teams like U.C.L.A., Ohio State and Texas receive nearly $20 million a year from brands like Adidas or Nike, while the athletes wearing the Adidas or Nike apparel are expected to compete purely for the love of the game.

      Why don't athletes get a athletes.

    1. The Iliad probably had been recited for years before it w as w ritten dow n

      The Iliad that is heard today is probably different from what was originally told. This reminds me of a game that my campers and I played called 'telephone' where you would whisper something into the persons ear next to you and then that person would pass it on to the person next to them and so on. When the message would get passed on to the last person it would usually be different from what the person that started the message said. Sometimes it would be completely different and sometimes it would be the same or similar.

    1. Violence in screen entertainment media (ie, television, film, video games, and the Internet), defined as depictions of characters (or players) trying to physically harm other characters (or players), is ubiquitous.

      Violence is seen everywhere in multiple domains of media. I watch a video/movie or play a game before or with my daughter prior to allowing her to by herself to ensure it's developmentally appropriate.

    1. Active mediation refers to parent-child conversations about media, including parental attempts to provide children with critical viewing skills regarding media. For example, a parent might discuss themes of bullying after the child views a television program containing aggressive behavior.9 Finally, co-viewing is when parents view, use, or consume media with their children but do not necessarily discuss the content with them

      I was not surprised by Sara Dewitt's findings discussed during her ted talk. Children benefited the most when watching a television show or playing a game and talking about the content with their parents, I use active mediation and restrictive mediation with my daughter. I try to talk to her about the content she plays or watches and I also restrict her from playing or watching anything inappropriate. I also like the idea of co-viewing but still discussing the content with them.

    2. A recent meta-analysis revealed that both restrictive and active mediation can reduce negative media effects, such as the learning of aggressive behavior, substance use, and sexual behavior, whereas co-viewing (without discussion) tends to enhance or facilitate media effects

      This topic was also lightly discussed in the TED Talk by Sara DeWitt. If parents took the time to discuss what kids did with screen time, such as what they watched or what video game they played, then they can both gain more insight and knowledge from it. Active participation by both parties can lead to more conversations and more understanding of each others lives. My mom would always talk to me about what I was doing, watching, or reading which lead to us having a deeper insight into the others day to day life. If she found something she didn't like within what I was viewing, we would discuss it and it would be over with. There were never any negative effects because we discussed things such as consequences, life experiences she had, and why such things were a bad idea. A lot of parents complain and say technology takes their kids away from them or allows them to get away with breaking rules, but if they would inject themselves into the child's interactions with technology they problem wouldn't be present.

    1. This suggests that displacement of physical activity may not be a strong link between screen time and obesity.

      This was very interesting to read and I am going to have to say I disagree with this statement. Like stated in the article, there are difficulties when it comes to measuring screen media exposure and physical activity. Based off of experience such as babysitting, once the kids are glued in to a show or game, there is no way I am getting them to go outside. A 3 year old that I babysat threw a tantrum when I told him we were done watching TV and it was time to go on a walk. I think physical activity and screen time directly correlates with obesity.

    2. Current evidence suggests that screen media exposure leads to obesity in children and adolescents through increased eating while viewing; exposure to high-calorie, low-nutrient food and beverage marketing that influences children’s preferences, purchase requests, consumption habits; and reduced sleep duration

      I also think screen media exposure becomes addicting and kids are no longer interested in going outside to play with their friends anymore. Why play outside when you both can be playing the same game and communicate through it?

    3. Over the 7 months of the trial, children in the school that received the screen-time reduction curriculum significantly reduced their television viewing, video game use, and number of meals eaten in front of the television

      This is a reason to reduce technology use in schools.

    1. Or shall the Adversarie thus obtain His end, and frustrate thine, shall he fulfill His malice, and thy goodness bring to naught,

      Is this just a game of no serious consequence that God can abolish if he feels like it?

    1. For example, some students have called for warnings that Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart describes racial violence and that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby portrays misogyny and physical abuse, so that students who have been previously victimized by racism or domestic violence can choose to avoid these works, which they believe might “trigger” a recurrence of past trauma.

      I think there is some unfairness in portraying this particular type of behavior as exclusive as that of college students. My perception is that, in general, american society seems to think of itself entitled to the world never challenging their comfort. It may be a byproduct of development and/or wealth, but where college students are "offended" or "triggered" by The Great Gatsby, baby boomers and Xrs are "triggered" by sagging pants in youth, body posture during some song before a football game or other meaningless behavior of the kind. College students and millennials are easy targets, but often used as a diversion from the fact that everyone seems to think they're entitled to demand certain behaviors from other people.

    1. Technology may be used to strengthen relationships among parents, families, early educators, and young children.

      I can see this being a big thing I would have my families do in the evenings with their children, have the students all do a nightly game on an app that works on what they are learning that week in school, they can have their family help them on doing the game and it would be a good example of how to use the technology for the better.

    1. There has been considerable concern that television may negatively influence young children’s executive function, especially the ability to focus and sustain attention in task situations.

      I feel like technology in general has positive and negative aspects just like anything else. I believe that it is important for children to have a balance with technology. I think I grew up at a nice time because I know how to use technology, but it was not as dominant. I played outside and created special bonds with people, but also got a Game Boy and electronics for birthdays and special occasions. I think society today is a lot more dependent on technology I know from high school until now I have became a lot more attached. I think moderation is the biggest thing we should focus on when it comes to technology.

    2. Such claims include the potential of electronic games and other interactive technologies (eg, educational apps for tablets and smartphones) to support learning in formal educational contexts.1

      When reading this, I thought about games such as Kahoot, which allows students to interactively participate in a question and answer game on their phones or tablets.

    1. educators need to use technology effectively

      This statement is crucial when talking about using technology in our future classrooms. Technology can often be used as a lazy or quick route. When teaching, the students need to be learning from us, rather than us giving them a game to play. Technology can be an amazing tool in the classroom, but we must ensure it wont become a distraction from learning.

    1. Detective stories typically begin this way. The private eye, always a bit of a cul-tural maverick and usually a loner, meets someone who has a problem. The problem is explained, a fee is worked out, the private eye takes the case. The game is afoot

      Is there danger in framing an academic study (ethnography) in this way? Can the frame impact the contents -- e.g. the researcher starts to imagine himself as a detective, which can distort the narrative and cause them to insert elements that aren't really there?

    1. Discursive and normative uncertainties mean that, for instance, “digital learning” is open to different interpretations, ranging from an instrumental concern with employability and growth to more idealist concerns for social mobility, social justice, and empowerment. In addition, given the huge inequalities in region, income, culture, sex, and so forth, efforts to promote digital opportunities can also become, inadvertently, the means by which inequalities are reproduced or new risks are encountered.

      "digital learning" can be a variety of things. I see digital learning as learning from anything media related. Children do learn best when they dont even know they are learning. (TV, game)

    1. There was the ongoing effort to present fuller and fuller portraits of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the two young men who masterminded the slaughter: they were outsiders, video-game enthusi-asts, members of the Trench Coat Mafia, neo-Nazis, two boys who couldn't tell their alcohol-fueled dreams from reality, a leader and a follower, a smart kid and a loser, specimens of a middle-class value system in crisis, proof of the need for stricter gun-control laws. And finally; there were the funerals, the white caskets covered in writing from those left behind, the doves released into the air, and all those inspirational speeches about healing and hope.

      Stylistically, the author sure does enjoy using lengthy sentences and adjectives that spark the imagination. What I found odd was his transition from describing the murderers as outsiders, losers, and specimens to immediately discussing how inspirational and beautiful the funerals of the victims were. He kind of walks into the sentence not even acknowledging the insults he threw out previously.

    2. McCandless died in the woods not because he couldn't find enough food to survive, but because he ate seeds that no one knew to be poisonous. Relying on Tanaina Plant-lore to guide his gatherings in the wild, McCandless trusted its author completely As he grew weaker and as game grew scarcer, McCandless began to eat the roots of a species of wild potato that the book identified as nontoxic.

      His death was because he was too naive and believed in what the book said

    1. .

      I find this point interesting because I myself will do this a lot. For example in sports if you do not like or support a certain player or team then you will find them more likely to lose a game because you do not like them.

  5. www.ncte.org.libproxy.plymouth.edu www.ncte.org.libproxy.plymouth.edu
    1. "the Indian world" and how to understand it.

      I feel like this initiates a game of cultural telephone- a bit of understanding is lost every time the information is passed.

    1. I think this is a valid point, as in relationships (not even romantic) we see people "play games" with each other, in different sorts of ways. Just because it's termed a "game" doesn't make it any less serious.

    2. if I cheated or wanted to cheat, thatwould mean that I was not serious about the things wetalk about. It would mean that I was only playing a gamewith you.

      Cheating takes away the validity of a relationship, it takes away the satisfaction of completing a task and it doesn't allow you to feel the full effect of the reward. Cheating is playing a "game" within the actual game.

  6. Aug 2018
    1. they were outsiders, video-game enthusi-asts, members of the Trench Coat Mafia, neo-Nazis, two boys who couldn't tell their alcohol-fueled dreams from reality, a leader and a follower, a smart kid and a loser, specimens of a middle-class value system in crisis, proof of the need for stricter gun-control laws

      Sparked the whole gun violence issues and made the government want to crack down on gun laws.

    1. pretty mundane like sharing photos with friends, using a search engine to find a place to eat, or acquiring the 'magical power' that we need to reach the next level in an online game

      I don't feel that mundane accurately describes the activities that others may find important such as the sharing of photos or engaging in online games. Many people share photographs as a way to have a memory saved, and for some people, video games can be a way to relieve stress, meet new people, and even acquire an income.

    1. The evaluation of an expression produces a value, which is why expressions can appear on the right hand side of assignment statements. A value all by itself is a simple expression, and so is a variable. Evaluating a variable gives the value that the variable refers to.

      A friend of mine tried to annoy me with bird puns, but I soon realized that toucan play at that game.

    1. Many computer games are now built with the intention that they will be modified by enthusiastic users. Says consumer behaviour expert, Francine Gardin. “They’re actually participating in the design of the game. These consumers are really passionate about the game – it’s almost like a cult. They have an incredible sense of loyalty and ownership of that brand. Instead of complaining, they fix the product.”2

      They know they will be heavy, early users, so they have an interest in the product being up and running ASAP, so they participate in making that happen.

    1. was then transcribed and titled, retranscribed and edited, translated and adapted, interpreted and taught, until it has become an acknowledged classic.

      The text was heavily changed from its original state, and may be vastly different than the original story. It is a thousand year old game of telephone to try and decipher what ancient historians meant

    1. "Don't talk rot, Whitney," said Rainsford. "You're a big-game hunter

      This is part of the Exposition because it introduces rainsford, and says he's a big time hunter.

    2. "Tonight," said the general, "we will hunt--you and I."Rainsford shook his head. "No, general," he said. "I will not hunt."The general shrugged his shoulders and delicately ate a hothouse grape. "As you wish, my friend," he said. "The choice rests entirely with you. But may I not venture to suggest that you will find my idea of sport more diverting than Ivan's?"

      This is a Man vs. Self conflict becuast Rainsford is giving the choice to either be given to Ivan to be taken care of or to go against the general in a hunting game and it is a dicision he has to make himself.

    1. 6. Ideally, each individual episode must be accessible on its own terms even as it makes a unique contribution to the narrative system as a whole.

      This is an interesting topic of conversation. Before on-demand television, I think it was more important to have a stand-alone story that first-time viewers could access. I think Star Trek Deep Space Nine did that really well, especially in Season 5. Each episode stood on its own but also contributed to the overall story arc. Today, programs like Game of Thrones are so dense with information that it's difficult to even miss an episode, never mind trying to jump in at the middle. Fortunately on demand fills that need to see every episode.

    1. in the right way

      It does seem that there's a "right way" to answer questions in these sorts of situations. Much of the time, it's about playing the game and using the right terminology.

    1. Young reading brains are evolving without a ripple of concern from most people, even though more and more of our youths are not reading other than what is required, and often not even that: “tl; dr” (too long; didn’t read).

      And how often are they finding that what little reading they have done, is a game hardly worth the candle. Digital crowds out analog. Why?

    1. Three Teacher’s Dilemma games

      Here's a document I wrote when I was working on peer-to-peer learning games in 2008.

      The figures in this section show off a variety of games structured to motivate peer-tutors to find the ZPD of their tutees, and picks appropriate challenges accordingly. The first is based on question difficulty and response accuracy, the second adds expectations about accuracy into the mix, and the third incorporates observed learning gains into the game.

    1. Do we really believe that one bellowing fan in a crowd of 85,000 at the MCG can completely change the course of a game?

      Firstly, about 100% of the increase is caused by human activity, because nature is otherwise very close to balanced. That's why atmospheric carbon dioxide is now almost a third higher than any level found in old trapped air in million year old ice cores.

      The argument here is that something small doesn't matter. Following its logic, then it must be safe to eat around 28 g (1 Oz) of hydrogen cyanide. Even though research has found that this is enough to kill dozens of people, the article's logic says that there is no way something small can cause harm so eating hydrogen cyanide is fine.

    2. Do we really believe that one bellowing fan in a crowd of 85,000 at the MCG can completely change the course of a game?

      Do we really believe that one player in a stadium with an audience of 85,000 can make a difference?

      Naturally also small concentration can matter. Many substances are, for example, poisonous at much smaller concentrations.

      What matters is the amount of CO2. That there are also inert molecules in the atmosphere does not change the radiative influence of CO2.

      It is pretty amazing that Plimmer states in this same article that " Over the past 30 years, planet Earth has greened due to a slight increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide." Suddenly it is no problem that CO2 is a trace gas.

  7. course-computational-literary-analysis.netlify.com course-computational-literary-analysis.netlify.com
    1. The piano had stopped; Villona must have gone up on deck. It was a terrible game. They stopped just before the end of it to drink for luck. Jimmy understood that the game lay between Routh and Segouin. What excitement! Jimmy was excited too; he would lose, of course. How much had he written away? The men rose to their feet to play the last tricks. talking and gesticulating. Routh won. The cabin shook with the young men’s cheering and the cards were bundled together. They began then to gather in what they had won. Farley and Jimmy were the heaviest losers.

      Although Jammy is happy that he is allowed to play with the rich, he cannot afford their expenses. What's worse, he loses a lot of money through gambling. Jammy feel unconfident and inferior due to his nationality. I guess that the writer wants to reveal the facts that the inequality in the international world will cause inequality between people from different country.

    2. She felt a soft wet substance with her fingers and was surprised that nobody spoke or took off her bandage.

      The author didn't mention what did Maria got in the game, the author only described this event as a joke to Maria. At the end Maria got a prayer book. I think the author wanted to use the girl Maria to be similar to the Maria in Catholic.

    3. They led her up to the table amid laughing and joking and she put her hand out in the air as she was told to do. She moved her hand about here and there in the air and descended on one of the saucers. She felt a soft wet substance with her fingers and was surprised that nobody spoke or took off her bandage. There was a pause for a few seconds; and then a great deal of scuffling and whispering. Somebody said something about the garden, and at last Mrs. Donnelly said something very cross to one of the next-door girls and told her to throw it out at once: that was no play. Maria understood that it was wrong that time and so she had to do it over again: and this time she got the prayer-book.

      Some background information: Hallow Eve games is an Irish tradition. In the game "players are led blindfolded to a table where saucers have been arranged. If the blindfolded participant chooses the prayerbook, he or she is supposed to join the priesthood or become a nun within the year. If the ring is chosen, marriage is foretold. Water means a long life, while clay means death". So now we see what is "a soft wet substance" and how Maria connects to the title. I have two hypothesis about the title: a) "Clay" is a metaphorical death of Maria's life since it has been so dull and unexcited, thus corresponds to the motif "paralysis" of the whole book. b) "Clay" symbolises the compliant and submissive characteristics of Maria, just like clay.

  8. Jul 2018
  9. course-computational-literary-analysis.netlify.com course-computational-literary-analysis.netlify.com
    1. Mahony began to play the Indian as soon as we were out of public sight. He chased a crowd of ragged girls, brandishing his unloaded catapult and

      I don't really know why Mahony, the friend of "I", play the Indian as a bully and this game seems popular in the school. I'd better search for some intro to the history during the period.

    1. if you want students to slow down and think about the questions, especially since you can completely turn off the timer

      Seems like a reasonable thing to want from students occasionally.

    1. The extra-textual application helped Colin to understand the characterization in the sto- ry. The father in the story played a teasing word game with his daughter. Colin first thought the story was strange, but after he made the connec- tion to a life experience, he responded with a broad- er view of the text, stating, "I see, he is like my Dad, tryin' to be funny and the joke is on him 'cuz we ain't laughing

      Students want to learn when they are able to connect to the information or the book.

    1. Away Laura flew, still holding her piece of bread-and-butter. It’s so delicious to have an excuse for eating out of doors, and besides, she loved having to arrange things; she always felt she could do it so much better than anybody else.

      It is shown that the Laura is a independent , childish, willful, lovely girl. She just put holding the party as a easy game. She wanted to arrange workers, which shew that she really enjoyed the feeling of being in a high level.

    1. The real danger is in ignoring content: if content has indeed changed the rhetorical game, composers who ignore it risk failing in their rhetorical attempts, and a field that ignores it risks marginalization and missed opportunities for growth.

      Exigence for the argument.

    1. onnected Camps is a benefit corporation that offers virtual summer camps and afterschool programs in the game of Minecraft. High school and college Minecraft experts are trained to teach younger kids coding, engineering, game design, and digital citizenship. The programs mine the enthusiasm that kids have for the most popular game of all time, by building connections with mentors who share their interest and help them level up in high-tech skills. http://connectedcamps.com/

      This is awesome-- I think this would be a great option for my stepsons to engage them in a new way!

    2. Quest to Learn is a unique middle and high school in New York City that was founded by game designers and educators and embodies a game-based approach to teaching and learning. Quest to Learn connects young people’s interests in gaming to academic achievement through collaborative challenges and problem solving. http://www.q2l.org/

      Whoa! How cool!

  10. rejuvenation.attckstaging.com rejuvenation.attckstaging.com
    1. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Praesentium, similique.

      Browse our wide range of aesthetic skincare services, as well as a game-changing technology in maintaining healthy, youthful skin.

    1. I am generous with what I have—I choose to be generous with what I have—precisely because we are no longer committed to one another as members of a shared social structure. Instead, the shift of responsibility for the public welfare toward private entities displaces our obligations to one another in favor of individual liberties and, I think, leaves us queasy about the notion of obligation altogether.

      The game theory of things tends to pull the society apart, particularly when it is easier to see who is paying what. If the richer end feels they're paying more than their fair share, this can tend to break things down.

      I suspect that Francis Fukuyama has a bit to say about this in how democratic societies built themselves up over time. Similarly one of his adherents Jonah Goldberg provides some related arguments about tribalism tending to tear democracies down when we revert back to a more primitive viewpoint instead of being able to trust the larger governmental structures of a democracy.

    1. We’ve made an annual thing out of doing it every year over the Super Bowl. We have an event called Break the Super Bowl, where kids are looking at Super Bowl ads and then remixing them. Then we throw them back up online, if they’re fair use, in real time. We get a bunch of kids together for the Super Bowl and it looks like a regular Super party. We’ve got pizza, and Doritos, and wings, and soda, and all the junk food. But then they’re all working in teams on laptops, and they’re remixing the actual ads from the Super Bowl that go up that night. We have the game playing on a larger screen so that it has a fun party atmosphere, but they’re actually doing something.

      This feels like a great example for anecdote / color / something creative in the final report.

      A "Hive highlight reel" of activities / lesson plans / creative jams. "20 things to do w. your kid on a rainy day." etc.

    2. We’ve made an annual thing out of doing it every year over the Super Bowl. We have an event called Break the Super Bowl, where kids are looking at Super Bowl ads and then remixing them. Then we throw them back up online, if they’re fair use, in real time. We get a bunch of kids together for the Super Bowl and it looks like a regular Super party. We’ve got pizza, and Doritos, and wings, and soda, and all the junk food. But then they’re all working in teams on laptops, and they’re remixing the actual ads from the Super Bowl that go up that night. We have the game playing on a larger screen so that it has a fun party atmosphere, but they’re actually doing something.

      This feels like a great example for anecdote / color / something creative in the final report

    1. If two friendly players want to play together, they may not be able to because either the newbie is so weak as to be useless to the higher level player or the higher level player gets so little reward from helping out the newbie that the friendship is the waste of their time.

      This has discouraged me from participating in online play in the past.

    2. In many online multiplayer games, players enter as strangers and remain strangers. Due to a variety of unquestioned logistics, economic and social signalling choices, other human beings end up being treated as interchangeable, disposable or abusable. We can do better.

      Interesting concept!

    1. In Testosterone Rex, Fine cites a 10-year US study targeting boys at high risk of behaving antisocially later in their lives. Some of them were given coaching to improve their emotional resilience, relationships and educational performance, while their parents were trained to manage their children’s behaviour. The goal was to enable the boys “to respond more calmly and less vociferously to provocation”. Years later, when the participants had reached their mid-20s, about 70 were deliberately provoked by someone stealing points from them in a game. Not only were the group who had been given coaching as boys less likely to retaliate; their testosterone levels rose less. AdvertisementAnother way, according to Ryan, is to do more childcare. T

      This is wonderful.

    1. . Vision is not generally held by committees, and it has to be someone’s job to hold the vision.

      just as there is one person in the committee who matters

    2. hey are therefore a bit of a visual artist, a bit of a programmer, a bit of a logician and a bit of a philosopher, a bit of a psychologist and a bit of a manipulator.

      traits of a game designer

    3. Explain why they disliked a film without being in the slightest capable of making one.

      What makes critiquing anything possible, even if we do not posses that skill to produce what is being criticised?

    1. Our lives are full of ways that we connect with other people—the food we serve and share, the rings and gifts we exchange—and we understand these objects primarily from the point at which they arrive in our lives.

      Phones give us such joy and make our lives so much easier, but the phone game taught us how difficult we are making the lives of slaves in the Congo. It sucks to think that my need for a phone is more important then their need for freedom, because I don't think that it is.

    2. Yet children stood a few feet from the soldiers, complaining about the disruption to their soccer game.

      This is extremely sad, show how use to this they are, it did not even phase them.

    1. I’m thinking about video games, and how I learn playing them.

      Important anecdote for thinking about "gamification". The idea that games produce their own learning, without social structures or personal reflection processes, is over-simplistic.

      (Sidebar: a colleague once said to me "Gamification means making a (crummy) game. I want to make good games with my students.")

    1. Week after week, worker after worker has been climbing all the way up to the tops of these enormous buildings, and then throwing themselves off, killing themselves in a brutal and public manner, not thinking very much about just how bad this makes Foxconn look. Foxconn's response to month after month of suicides has been to put up these nets.

      This is quite reminiscent of the "Phone Story" game we played just yesterday...it is rather horrifying to think about.

    1. Perelman says his Babel Generator also proves how easy it is to game the system. While students are not going to walk into a standardized test with a Babel Generator in their back pocket, he says, they will quickly learn they can fool the algorithm by using lots of big words, complex sentences, and some key phrases - that make some English teachers cringe. "For example, you will get a higher score just by [writing] "in conclusion,'" he says.
    1. On 2013 Oct 27, David Basanta commented:

      In a way I am just testing the Pubmed commons system but this paper is the first one I am aware of that explore the idea of using game theory in order to understand the dynamics between different subpopulations of tumour cells. A couple of very simple game theoretical models highlight how even a very simple mathematical formulation can shed light on the evolutionary mechanisms behind tumour progression toward increasingly more malignant phenotypes.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2017 May 22, Lydia Maniatis commented:

      Part 1 This publication is burdened with an unproductive theoretical approach as well as methodological problems (including intractable sampling problems). Conclusions range from trivial to doubtful.

      Contemporary vision science seems determined to take organization of the retinal stimulation out of the picture, and replace it with raw numbers, whether neural firing rates or statistics. This is a fundamental error. A statistical heuristic strategy doesn’t work in any discipline, including physics. For example, a histogram of the relative heights of all the point masses in a particular patch of the world wouldn’t tell anything about the mechanical properties of the objects in that scene, because it would not tell us about distribution and cohesiveness of masses. (Would it tell us anything of interest?)

      In perception, it is more than well established that the appearance of any point in the visual field –with respect to lightness, color, shape, etc - is intimately dependent on the intensities/spectral compositions of the points in the surrounding (the entire) field (specifically their effects on the retina) and on the principles of organization that the visual process effectively applies to the stimulation. Thus, a compilation of, for example, the spectral statistics of Purves’ colored cube would not allow us either to explain or predict the appearance of colored illumination or transparent overlays. Or, rather, it wouldn’t allow us to predict these things unless we employed a very special sample of images, all of which produced such impressions of colored illumination. Then we might get a relatively weak correlation. This is because, within this sample, a preponderance of certain wavelengths would tend to correlate with e.g. a yellow, illumination impression, rather than being due, as might be true for the general case, to the presence of a number of unified apparently yellow and opaque surfaces. Thus, we see how improper sampling can allow us to make better (and, I would add, predictable) predictions without implying explanatory power. In perception, explanatory power strictly requires we take into account principles of organization.

      In contrast, the authors here take the statistics route. They want to show, or rather, don’t completely fail to corroborate the observation that when surfaces are wet, their look colors are deeper and more vivid, and also to corroborate the fact that changes in perception are linked to changes in the retinal stimulation. Using a set of ready-made images (criteria for the selection of which are not provided), they apply to them a manipulation (among others) that has the general effect of increasing the saturation of the colors perceived. One way to ascertain whether this manipulation causes a surface to appear wet would be to simply ask observers to describe the surface, without any clues to what was expected. Would the surface be spontaneously be described as “wet” or “moist”? This would be the more challenging test, but is not the approach taken.

      Instead, observers are first trained on images (examples of which are not provided - I have requested examples) that we are told appear very wet (and the dry versions), and include shape-based cues, such as drops of water or puddles. They are told to use these as a guide to what counts as very wet, or a rating of 5. They are then shown a series of images containing both original and manipulated images (with more saturated colors, but lacking any shape-based cues), and asked to rate wetness from 1 to 5.

      The results are messy, with some transformed images getting higher ratings than the originals and others not, though on average they are more highly rated. But the ratings for all the images are relatively low; and we have to ask, how have the observers understood their task? Are they reporting an authentic perception of wetness or moistness, or do they believe are they trying to guess at how wet a surface actually is, based on a rule of thumb adopted during the training phase, in which, presumably, the wet images were also more color-saturated? (In other words, is the task authentically perceptual, or is it more cognitive guesswork?) What does it mean to rate the wetness of a surface at e.g. the “2” level?

      The cost of ignoring the factor of shape/structure is evident in the authors’ attempt to explain why the ratings for all images were so low, reaching 4 in only one case. They explain that it may be because their manipulation didn’t include areas that looked like drops or puddles. Does this mean that the presence of drops or puddles actually changes the appearance of the surrounding areas, and/or that perhaps those very different training images included other organized features that were overlooked and that affected perception? Did the training teach observers to apply a cue in practice that by itself produces somewhat different perceptual outcomes? I suppose we could ask the observers about their strategy, but this would muddy the facade of quantitative purity.

      At any rate, the manipulation (like most ad hoc assumptions) fails as a tool for prediction, leading the authors to acknowledge that “The image transformation greatly increased the wetness rating for some images but not for others…” (Again, it isn’t clear that “wetness rating” correlates with an authentically perceptual scale). Thus, relative success or failure of the transformation is image-specific, and thus sample-specific; some samples and sample sets would very likely not reach statistical significance. Thus the decision to investigate further (Experiment 1b) using (if I’m reading this correctly) only a single custom-made image that was not part of the original set (on what basis was this chosen?) seems unwise. (This might seem to worsen the sampling problem, but the problem is intractable anyway. As there is no possible sample that would allow the researchers to generate reliable statistics-based predictions for the individual case, any generalization would be instantly falsifiable, and thus lack explanatory power).

      The degree to which any conclusions are tied to the specific (and unrationalized) sample is illustrated by the fact that the technical manipulations were tailored to it (from Experiment 1a): “In deciding [the] parameters of the WET transformation, we preliminarily explored a range of parameters and chose ones that did not disturb the apparent naturalness of all the images used in Experiment 1a.” Note the lack of objective criteria for “naturalness.”). (We’re not told on what basis the parameters in Experiment 1b were chosen). In short, I don’t think this numbers game can tell us anything more from a theoretical point of view than casual observation and e.g., trial and error by artists, already have.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2016 Sep 19, Prashant Sharma, MD, DM commented:

      Very interesting... This would certainly upgrade more than a few cases. Hopefully the WHO is listening, and other large centres are reanalyzing their marrow differentials for confirming/refuting this "game-changing" paper.

      What about the blast% in remission status marrows from acute leukemia patients? Its currently mostly done from TNCs, but based on this study is it possible that calculating it from NECs would provide better prognostication?

      • Prashant Sharma, Assoc. Prof. of Hematology, PGIMER, Chandigarh, India


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2016 May 22, Lydia Maniatis commented:

      It would be great if vision articles stopped using the straw man of "border contrast" or lateral inhibition to frame cosmetic debates. Here, for example, we learn in the abstract that "The competing accounts for perceptual constancy of surface lightness fall into two classes of model: One derives lightness estimates from border contrasts, and another explicitly infers [meaning?] surface reflectance."

      The former "model" of lightness perception hasn't been credible for almost one hundred years. The reason it hasn't been viable is that it has been falsified. The reason that these "debates" still persist is that in the current culture, ad hoc accounts are given a free pass while falsifications merely indicate need for "more research." Oikonnen et al (2016) know (or should know) that half of the argument is a straw man:

      "Although this framework is attractive in its simplicity, it fails to explain some well-known lightness phenomena, such as the effect of spatial configuration on perceived lightness (e.g., Adelson, 1993; Anderson & Winawer, 2008; Bloj & Hurlbert, 2002; Gilchrist, 1977; Hillis & Brainard, 2007b; Knill & Kersten, 1991; Purves, Shimpi, & Lotto, 1999; Schirillo, Reeves, & Arend, 1990)."

      Thus, Oikonen et al (2016) propose to "adjudicate" between two "frameworks," one of which has already failed. What is gained by beating a dead horse? Until and unless the proponents of the failed models resolve the difficulties by redeeming the failures on a theoretical basis, their account is not in the game.

      Short version: Ad hoc "successes" don't outweigh falsifications, so there's no need to keep falsifying over and over. It's just redundant.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. Schools select for each successive level those who have, at earlier stages in the game, proved themselves good risks for the established order

      And how often have these standards changed over time?

    1. On 2016 May 17, Lydia Maniatis commented:

      (My two PubPeer comments)

      Here's the funny thing about vision science these days.

      We are told about a prolific area of research - 'visual averaging': “New research tools and imaging techniques coupled with solid psychophysical work have added substantially to the large base of work done in the 20th century.”

      Then we learn (caps mine) that: “Some lively debates regarding the scope of the putative sampler/averager and EVEN ITS EXISTENCE have sharpened the questions being asked and reminded researchers to consider scaling issues, experimenter and observer bias, and the multidimensional nature of stimuli and ensembles.”

      It is the nature of a dogma and the school that collects around it to act on the basis of assumptions that are never challenged. Research projects are designed so that they cannot challenge the dogma, but only answer questions in its terms. (That something like this is going on here is evidenced by the author's concession that claims of possible non-existence of “averagers” remain viable despite decades of research activity.) It's the nature of science to test its fundamental assumptions before proceeding to elaborate on them. If a claim is falsifiable, in a healthy research environment it will be quickly falsified. (If it cannot be tested even in principle, then it's outside the game of science and cannot constitute a legitimate field of empirical investigation). In the type of environment we have now, it will remain in good standing for the foreseeable future. (This is the case, for example, with the bizarre notion of “spatial frequency filters.”)

      On some of the absurdities coming out of “averaging” proponents, see comments here: https://pubpeer.com/publications/90941136CC181AFE4896477BF5BB44 and here:

      https://pubpeer.com/publications/26067519

      The faith-based tendency to accumulate evidence (supposedly) in favour of the dogma is related to this field's (invalid) adoption of inductive procedures rather than hypothesis-testing. If we just keep measuring things and fitting algorithms to the data, the truth will naturally emerge:

      "The psychophysical function and the environmental information on which it is based should be allowed to emerge without predilection, lest the true mental algorithm be obscured by expectation (Anderson, 1968; Levin, 1975).... It is well known that psychological measurement is not impervious to the effects of context, scaling, measurement error, and other issues that can hinder the revelation of the true psychophysical relationship." Expectations, aka hypotheses, should stay well away lest they interfere with revelation.

      Despite decades of patient effort and mountains of "evidence," we're still waiting for the true psychophysical function to be revealed. What if it doesn't exist? What if it can never be spotted amongst the confounds, known and unknown?

      As we wait, we might ask what it means that "perceptual averages" have never been perceived? In what sense is an unperceived percept perceptible? (If averages were perceptible, there would be no question of their existence; we would be trying to explain perceptual facts rather than waiting for these facts to be revealed.)


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2015 Oct 08, Jaime A. Teixeira da Silva commented:

      Mike, once again, thank you for taking the time to respond. I guess you never imagined what a response your editorial would bring. Again, you should be praised for bringing the topics of anonymity and post-publication peer review or PPPR to the table among more respectable plant scientists. As you now know well, I have been struggling for years to convince plant scientists (and I have been in contact with several tens of thousands already) that there are very serious problems with the publishing process like traditional peer review, with what I perceive to be pseudo-ethics by some of the mainstream STM publishers, or at least double standards, and problems that range from small to serious in a wide range of plant science journals. I have even seen some comments critiquing Plant Physiology papers. This then tells me, as you have already confirmed, that there are some very fundamental problems. And one of the reasons why some of the most basic problems do not appear to be resolved is because of what I call an "editorial firewall". In other words, editors and publishers who are actively resisting correcting the literature for sometimes some very valid reasons, such as no pay, no time, or too much stress. Their excuses are sometimes valid, but the truth of the matter is that the problems remain and the issues don't get resolved. And this is ultimately their responsibility. Editors benefit from the glory of their positions, journals benefit from gambling the impact factor, which brings with it tremendous economic benefits since the IF is literally used as a form of currency in some countries. That is why individuals like me stand up against what we perceive to be hypocrisy, failure in leadership, double standards, lack of editorial ethics, common sense and professionalism, and cronyism.

      I know, like you, that those who hold a position in academia have much to lose, including their position, salary, benefits, travel funding and of course research funding and grants. So, the vast majority most likely do not see any benefit in getting involved with PPPR, because it does not benefit them. This is the true sad part about the plant science community: it’s ultimately selfish. Indeed, some will argue ferociously about this claim, but think about it, for whose good exactly are you serving when you are serving as the EIC of Plant Physiology? What is the end game and final objective? Actually, I suspect that in your particular case, the objective is noble and the means to achieve it are thorough. So, it is not individuals like you whose integrity I am questioning. I am questioning the integrity of editors who have abused their power and positions, as I have documented abundantly about Elsevier’s Scientia Horticulturae and some editors in Taylor and Francis journals. Revelations about other editors in other publishers’ journals are likely going to surface as this “ban Jaime” trend expands.

      But we will expand on these issues in more detail later on because they are intricately linked with your editorial.

      To answer your question: yes, I am a science vigilante. When searching for the term vigilante online, it tends to result in a definition that is associated with anti-governance, anti-law, anti-establishment and, most importantly, using criminal methods. At least that is the predominant definition in the Anglo-Saxonic literature, and thus based upon which your editorial’s title has been based. Yet, in Latino cultures, the term “vigilante” means to be vigilant, or aware, or conscious. And it is within this framework that I would like to consider myself as a vigilante, as one who is aware of the issues, is concerned with them, and who is taking a pro-active stance to resolve them. Yet, I use no illegal methods or weapons, even though I have often described the state we are in in science and science publishing as a war. So, those who criticize my methods of criticism, who emphasize tone over facts and who prefer to point out politically-insensitive language over academically unsound literature are, very unfortunately, those who are in power. In editor boards, serving as the front-line of academic defense (actually farce) for publishers, and serving as PR managers for the publishers’ share-holders. I get it know. They really don’t like my voice. But they do lke to make profit from my intellect… do you understand what I’m getting at, Mike?

      If in fact you did manage to see the move I pointed to, you will see a common thread between the grass-roots struggle. That is why I believe that the anonymous voice must never be removed, despite its darker side, because it serves to balance the scales of excessive and abusive power and injustice. It is this powerful elite that is hoping to expand, as Pope Francis so eloquently describes as the “globalization of indifference”. Have a good day Mike. Hope to continue this conversation at PMC.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2014 Nov 20, Bernard Carroll commented:

      This report breaks some new ground in design – the between-site train-and test exercise and the cross-validation of case assignment to unipolar or bipolar groups. As the authors stated, the data are not sufficiently strong for clinical use. My comments are intended to improve the quality of reporting of this and similar studies.

      1. There is selective highlighting of some results and a failure to present all the important findings clearly. In particular, the performance of the classification algorithms in distinguishing patients from normal control subjects was relegated to the Supplementary Material. It can be calculated from eTable 7 that between 27.5% and 38% of controls would be misclassified in the 1-way comparison with unipolar depressed cases. The corresponding Kappa coefficients of concordance would be fair at 0.48 for the SVM method and poor at 0.28 for the GPC method. Results for the bipolar contrast with control subjects were similarly weak. If the method cannot do better than this with normal subjects then clinical use is a very long way away. These sobering data properly belong in the main body of the paper.

      2. The cross-site training - testing results for the algorithms were described as “highly significant” (page 1226). Actually, for the train (Munster) and test (Pittsburgh) exercise the Kappa values that can be calculated from Table 3 were weak at 0.28 for SVM and 0.24 for GPC methods. They were only slightly better for the Pittsburgh – Munster exercise (Kappas each 0.38).

      3. P-values were given in Table 3 and in eTables 5,6,7 – but there is no statement of what statistical analyses generated these P-values. Were they Goodness of Fit Chi-squared tests? Standard tradecraft requires that such analyses be clearly described.

      4. No correction of P-values was made for multiple comparisons. That is another aspect of standard tradecraft.

      5. No data were shown for test-retest reliability of the algorithm-derived group assignments.

      6. All the analyses were predicated on the untenable assumption that the clinical diagnoses were 100% accurate. As the DSM-5 field trials taught us, that is far from the case in the real world of clinical assessment – the Kappa value for major depressive disorder diagnoses averaged over 4 sites was poor at 0.28 (Regier et al 2013). The authors failed to consider whether this confound degraded the strength of their findings (see a discussion of this issue in Carroll BJ 1989). At the very least, a statement of diagnostic reliability for the cases in this study is needed.

      References

      Carroll BJ. Diagnostic validity and laboratory studies. Rules of the game.<br> In: The Validity of Psychiatric Diagnosis, eds., L.N. Robins and J.E. Barrett, Raven Press, New York, 1989, pp. 229-245.

      Regier DA et al. DSM-5 Field Trials in the United States and Canada, Part II: Test-Retest Reliability of Selected Categorical Diagnoses. Amer J Psychiatry 2013; 170: 59-70.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2014 Aug 22, Hilda Bastian commented:

      It's great to see such a thorough and rigorous body of work on this subject. This group provides a good overview of the portion downsizing issue, and the limited evidence base on interventions, at Vermeer WM, 2014.

      A key part of the intervention in this trial (Poelman MP, 2015) is the interactive web-based PortionSize@warenessTool. Its development and trialing is described at Poelman MP, 2013, with these elements: background reading, an interactive flash game with photos of popular food products in the Netherlands, a flash game where you can upsize/downsize portions on screen, self-test score, information on portions for children and more.

      It would be helpful if details about the availability of this intervention could be provided (e.g. where it can be viewed, if the code is open source, and if the license allows translation). The TIDieR checklist (Hoffmann TC, 2014) - the template for intervention description and replication - is a good framework for this. More details on the components of interventions is important for enabling better practice (Glasziou P, 2010).


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2014 Aug 22, Serge Ahmed commented:

      This study is interesting and also quite embarrassing. It is interesting because of the important questions that it asks. It is embarrassing because it shows that when given a choice, most rats prefer cocaine over sweet water – a finding that is strictly the opposite of what we and others have found over the past few years. Of course, contradiction and refutation are the “game of science”. We should not be embarrassed by them and instead welcome them.

      My embarrassment comes from the fact that these opposite outcomes were obtained by a former master student of mine – Nathalie Vanhille who is the first author of this study – using a choice protocol initially developed in our lab. When Nathalie was working in our lab using this protocol, she observed that most rats preferred sweet water over cocaine – the opposite of what she now reports in this study despite the use of an identical choice protocol.

      But were the choice protocols really identical? Of course not! Like always, the devil lurks into the details and details can sometimes matter a lot! Apparently, this study differs from our previous choice studies in the way rats were given access to sweet water. In our study, access to sweet water was pretty straightforward. Rats had to press a lever to fill a nearby receptacle with sweet water. Then they could obtain additional volumes of sweet water during 20s by continually licking the receptacle. In this study, however, access to sweet water was really contrived for reasons that remain unclear until one reaches the middle of the Discussion. In fact, despite my best efforts and those of other members of the team, we were unable to get a clear final picture of how rats get access to sweet water in this study.

      So here is my challenge for the interested readers and researchers: I would really appreciate if someone could help me figure out how exactly rats get access to sweet water in this study.

      Thank you!


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2014 Apr 02, Daniel J Simons commented:

      I wrote an extensive post-publication "HI-BAR" review of this paper on my blog (stands for Had I Been A Reviewer). You can access it at http://blog.dansimons.com/2014/04/hi-bar-benefits-of-lumosity-training.html

      I posted a list of my concerns about the paper as a comment on the article at PLoS, and I've duplicated that list below. The blog post gives a more detailed discussion and explanation of each point. If the authors respond on PLoS, I'll update my comment and add a link to their response here as well.

      In short, I do not think the paper permits the conclusion that game training produced any reliable benefits on the reported outcome measure.

      List of questions and concerns:

      1) The sample size of 15 in the training group and 12 in the control group is problematically small, especially for correlational analysis, but also for the primary analyses.

      2) The "limited-contact" control group does not permit an inference that anything specific to the training led to the transfer effects. See http://pps.sagepub.com/content/8/4/445.full

      3) The paper includes no corrections for multiple tests, and the core findings likely would not be significant with correction.

      4) The paper does not report the means and variability for the accuracy data, leaving open the possibility of a speed-accuracy tradeoff.

      5) The choice of response time cutoffs and exclusions were somewhat arbitrary, so it's not clear how robust these effects would be to other cutoffs.

      6) The contrasts used to measure alertness and distraction were not defined. Which conditions were compared?

      7) The alertness and distraction tests do not include a test of the difference between the training and control group. The fact that the training group difference was significant (but see below) and the control group difference was not does not mean that the difference between the groups was significant.

      8) The training improvements for the alertness and distraction outcome measures were reported to be p=.05 and p=.04. But, they were truncated from p=.0565 and p=.0451. The first was not significant, and truncating the p-values is inappropriate. (Note that neither would be significant after correcting for multiple tests.)

      9) The paper reports 20 correlations (each outcome measure with each of the 10 games in the training condition), but does not correct for multiple tests. And, correlations based on N=15 are of questionable reliability anyway. Moreover, correlations between training improvements and improvements on an outcome measure do not provide evidence for the efficacy of training.

      10) The conclusion claims support for the idea that training improved "attention filtering," but the study does not test the mechanism that improved (and, the evidence that anything improved is uncertain).

      11) The clinicaltrials.gov registration linked from the paper was posted after the paper was first submitted for publication. It is not a pre-registration.

      12) The clinicaltrials.gov registration mentions a number of outcome measures that were not reported in the paper and were not mentioned on the PLoS Protocol and Consort Checklist (in the supplementary materials). If these measures were collected, they should be reported in the paper and in the supplemental materials. It is unclear whether these outcome measures just were not significant or were withheld for other reasons. In either case, the presence of unreported outcome measures makes it impossible to interpret the p-values for the one outcome measure reported in the paper.

      13) The clinicaltrials.gov registration also lists a 24-week testing session that wasn't mentioned in the paper. Was the reported testing session an interim one?


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2015 Apr 14, Björn Brembs commented:

      “Standing on the shoulders of giants” is what scientists say to acknowledge the work they are building on. It is a statement of humility and mostly accompanied by citations to the primary literature preceding the current work. In today’s competitive scientific enterprise, however, such humility appears completely misplaced. Instead, what many assume to be required in the struggle to survive is to convince everyone that they are the giant, the genius, the prodigy who is deserving of the research funds, the next position, tenure.

      The Nature Neuroscience article “Temporal structure of motor variability is dynamically regulated and predicts motor learning ability” by Wu et al. with its accompanying news-type article “Motor variability is not noise, but grist for the learning mill” by Herzfeld and Shadmehr (linked above) can only be described as over-hyping an otherwise very interesting discovery. Both articles claim that the researchers have made the game-changing discovery that something long thought to be a bug in our movement system is actually a spectacular feature. It is argued that this discovery is such a huge surprise, because nobody in their right mind would have ever thought this “unwanted characteristic” to actually serve some purpose.

      The problem with this line of argument is that probably most people in the field thought it should be obvious, even to be expected – and not surprising at all. Skinner is largely credited with the analogy of operant conditioning and evolution. This analogy entails that reward and punishment act on behaviors like selection is acting on mutations in evolution: an animal behaves variably and encounters a reward after it initiated a particular action. This reward will make the action now more likely to occur in the future, just as selection will make certain alleles more frequent in a population. Already in 1981, Skinner called this “Selection by Consequences“ (Science Vol. 213 no. 4507 pp. 501-504, DOI: 10.1126/science.7244649). Skinner’s analogy sparked wide interest, e.g. an entire journal issue (Behavioral and Brain Sciences 7(04), 1984), which later appeared in book form (The Selection of Behavior: The Operant Behaviorism of B. F. Skinner: Comments and Consequences. A. Charles Catania, Stevan R. Harnad, Cambridge University Press). Clearly, the idea that reinforcement selects from a variation of different behaviors is not a novel concept at all, but more than three decades old and rather prominent. This analogy cannot have escaped anybody working on any kind of operant/motor learning, except those seriously neglecting the most relevant literature. This interaction of variability and selection is a well-known and not overly complicated concept, based in evolutionary biology and psychology/neuroscience. Consequently, numerous laboratories have been studying various aspects of this interaction for a long time. Skinner’s projection was that increased behavioral variability leads to increased operant learning rates, just like increased mutations rates lead to increased rates of evolutionary change. More than a dozen years ago, Allen Neuringer showed this to be the case in rats (Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 2002, 9 (2), 250-258, doi: 10.3758/BF03196279), but there are studies in humans as well (Shea, J. B., & Morgan, R. B. (1979). Contextual interference effects on the acquisition, retention, and transfer of a motor skill. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Learning and Memory, 5, 179–187). That such variability is beneficial, rather than detrimental has been shown even in situations where the variability is so high, that the acquisition rate is reduced, but post-training performance is enhanced (Schmidt RA, Bjork RA (1992): New conceptualizations of practice: Common Principles in Three Paradigms Suggest New Concepts for training. Psychological Science, 3(4): 207-217).

      Wu et al. confirm both Skinner’s conjecture as well as previously published reports (some cited above) that indeed the rate of learning in operant conditioning is increased in subjects where the initial variability in the behavior is higher. This is an important and relevant finding. However, instead of citing the wealth of earlier work, Wu et al. claim that their results were surprising: “Surprisingly, we found that higher levels of task-relevant motor variability predicted faster learning”. Herzfeld and Shadmehr were similarly stunned: “These results provide intriguing evidence that some of the motor variability commonly attributed to unwanted noise is in fact exploration in motor command space.”

      I regard it as highly unlikely that none of the seven authors in total should have never heard of Skinner or the work over the last four decades by many human movement scientists that have explored the temporal structure of human movement variability and its relationship with motor learning. The work by senior scientists such as Karl Newell, Michael Turvey, Richard Schmidt, and their students published in books and hundreds of journal articles is completely ignored, just as the work by several younger mid-career scientists such as Nick Stergiou, Jeff Hausdorff, Thurmon Lockhart, Didier Dilignieres, and many others. After a thorough review of this literature the authors may realize that some of their results are neither new nor novel. If indeed the authors were unaware of this entire section of literature so relevant to their own research, it would be an indictment in its own right.

      It needs to be emphasized explicitly, that the above does not call into question the validity of the research results, nor does it imply that the described results do not merit publication. Clearly, the research described in Wu et al. is relevant, interesting and it was absolutely correct to publish it in its entirety. What ought to have happened, however, is to encourage the authors to include the relevant references in the appropriate sections of their articles.

      (Much of this comment was drafted together with Dr. Nick Stergiou)


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2013 Oct 05, Daniel J Simons commented:

      The paper implies that game training allows adults to perform as well as 20 year olds when multitasking. What it actually shows is that after training on the game, older adults perform as well as younger adults who are playing that same game for the first time. It does not show that training allows the older adults can multitask as well as the younger subjects in any other context. For example, the training did not lead to differential improvements on an a dual-task outcome measure.

      The study had a small sample size (about 15/condition), and the analysis did not correct for multiple tests, meaning that it is not clear whether training led to any reliable improvements on the outcome measures.

      The paper also did not control for expectations in the training and control group, meaning that any differential improvements upon re-testing could be due to differential placebo effects.

      I have posted an extensive post-publication review of the paper here: http://blog.dansimons.com/2013/09/19-questions-about-video-games.html


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2014 Jan 03, Ian Lyons commented:

      In this paper, Park and Brannon showed that training adult subjects on an approximate, nonsymbolic arithmetic task (adding and subtracting estimates of the number of dots in various dot arrays) led to improvement on a symbolic arithmetic task (i.e., using Indo-Arabic numerals). The authors suggest this result points to a causal role for the ‘approximate number system’ (ANS) in more complex, symbolic math processing and may thus inform the development of interventions designed to improve mathematical competence in children and adults. We believe the authors’ work takes an important step forward in terms of understanding the building blocks of mathematical performance, and, using their work as a jumping board, we offer several points of reflection concerning (1) the nature of the ANS, and (2) what it means to train performance on a task versus the process it is meant to measure.

      Park and Brannon’s crucial experimental condition trained participants using approximate, nonsymbolic addition. This differs from tasks used more commonly in the literature to measure individual differences in the ANS – adaptation and comparison – which involve simply distinguishing between two approximate quantities (e.g., in comparison tasks, one typically decides which of two arrays contains more dots). The difference in tasks is significant because previous attempts to train participants on just a nonsymbolic comparison task failed to show significant improvement in individuals’ symbolic math performance [Wilson et al., 2006 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16734906); DeWind & Brannon, 2012 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22529786)]. Why, then, does training on nonsymbolic arithmetic lead to improvement in symbolic arithmetic skills, but training on nonsymbolic comparison does not, even though both have been shown to correlate with symbolic arithmetic [e.g., Gilmore et al., 2010 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20347435); Halberda et al., 2012 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22733748)]? One possible conclusion is that it is not enough simply to tap the ANS; instead, accessing the ANS must be structured in a manner that more directly parallels the target skill – symbolic arithmetic. From a broader perspective, such a conclusion suggests that it is time to take a deeper look at what exactly we mean by an ‘approximate number system’, as Park and Brannon’s results may in fact point to an important division between approximate quantity representation and manipulation within the ANS. The view that the ANS is not a unitary construct is also leant support by the fact that performance on nonsymbolic quantity comparison and nonsymbolic arithmetic tasks are uncorrelated [Gilmore et al., 2011 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21846265)].

      That nonsymbolic arithmetic (but not nonsymbolic comparison) training leads to improved symbolic arithmetic brings us to a second point: It is crucial to make a distinction between a task meant to measure or be an index of some underlying process, and the process itself. To cure a fever, one does not build a more precise thermometer; and by extension, if one demonstrated that using a more precise thermometer indeed failed to reduce one’s fever, it would be rather rash to conclude ambient bodily temperature is irrelevant to one’s health. A nonsymbolic number comparison task may act like a thermometer, where the underlying process it indexes is ANS acuity. Training on nonsymbolic comparison tasks does not improve math skills (Wilson et al., 2006; DeWind & Brannon, 2012), but this does not mean that the ANS is irrelevant for math. By training on nonsymbolic arithmetic instead of nonsymbolic comparison, Park and Brannon showed that one’s training regimen simply needs to tap the ANS in a way that better parallels the types of cognitive operations used in symbolic arithmetic.

      One sees a similar distinction between tasks that index versus train an underlying process elsewhere in the numerical domain: when a person is asked to mark the location of a number on a number line, the linearity of their estimates predicts math achievement [Booth & Siegler, 2006 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16420128), 2008 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18717904)]; but rather than train on this task per se, researchers found success using a board game that trained children to linearize their visuo-spatial representations of symbolic numbers – i.e., the underlying process that was presumably being measured by the number line task. Training on the board game improved performance on both the numberline task as well as math achievement [Siegler & Ramani, 2009 (http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/edu/101/3/545/)].

      Further, we believe that Park and Brannon’s own dataset provides yet another example illustrating the distinction between a task meant to measure or be an index of some underlying process, and the process itself. The authors show a correlation between numerical ordering ability and symbolic math ability, replicating our previous work [Lyons & Beilock, 2011 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21855058)]. Nevertheless, training on the ordering task did not lead to improvement in symbolic math beyond what was seen for vocabulary training. If one concludes from this result that understanding ordinality is irrelevant for developing math skills, one is in danger of mistaking a means of measurement for the thing being measured – much as one might have done with the dot comparison or number-line tasks discussed above.

      In conclusion, Park and Brannon’s recent paper showing a causal relation between nonsymbolic and symbolic arithmetic, represents a step toward understanding the building blocks of complex arithmetic. Perhaps missed in the excitement, though, is that this work underscores the need for researchers – especially those interested in educational applications – to carefully consider what their tasks and paradigms truly mean with respect to the processes and representations they aim to investigate. Failing to do so risks conflating the means of measurement with what is being measured, and may in turn lead to recommendations for educators to train the wrong thing.

      Signed, Ian Lyons and Sian Beilock


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2015 May 04, Peter Good commented:

      I asked Dr. Cynober whether oral arginine, citrulline, or glutamine would be the best source of arginine for brain nitric oxide and creatine in ASD children. He replied it was controversial whether oral arginine or glutamine produces more citrulline in the intestines. Citrulline enters the brain, he said, but whether it generates creatine there, and the balance between production of nitric oxide (NO) and creatine from citrulline-derived arginine, is unclear.[personal communication 2015]

      Their 2010 paper [Cynober L, 2010] presented much evidence critical to autistic disorders (ASD). Citrulline (CIT) is not normally present in protein; its usual sources are arginine (ARG) and glutamine in dietary proteins, which produce CIT in the intestines: “CIT is almost absent from natural foods, watermelon being a notable exception.” CIT bypasses the liver and forms ARG in the kidneys, which limits wasting of nitrogen as urea, and provides ARG to many other tissues, including the brain.

      “[D]irect supplementation of CIT should be more useful than ARG supplementation, leaving the kidney to convert CIT into ARG, so avoiding heavy first-pass splanchnic extraction of the ARG and the possible harmful effects of an excessive ARG [therefore NO] supply. . . . CIT is able to sustain NO production through eNOS but not iNOS. . . . CIT could also be a safe way to deliver ARG to endothelial and immune cells, and can certainly prevent excessive uncontrolled nitric oxide production. . . . [A]ntioxidant properties, together with the ability to generate NO, make CIT an excellent candidate for the treatment of pathological situations characterized by oxidative stress and decreased arginine availability . . . .”

      Because CIT stimulates protein synthesis when dietary proteins (i.e. ARG and glutamine) are low, it should be given in the postabsorptive state (3–5 hrs after meals) or fasted state (before breakfast). 10–15g/day of oral citrulline in healthy adults showed high bioavailability and no adverse effects. Because CIT is synthesized almost exclusively in the intestines, it may also be a useful biomarker of functional gut tissue.[Cynober L, 2010]

      In their 2005 paper [Curis E, 2005] Cynober and colleagues discussed other aspects of citrulline metabolism: “Citrulline presents the common reactivity of the α-amino acid family. In particular, it can form peptide bonds; hence it can therefore be present in proteins. However, since there is no known codon in the genetic table for this amino acid, its presence in a protein must always result from a post-translational modification of the protein. . . .

      “The main reason for this citrulline metabolism split between two organs [gut and kidney] is related to the efficacy of the capture of arginine by the liver. In fact, without metabolic adaptation, almost all the arginine coming from food supply would be withdrawn from the portal blood by the liver, leaving only very low amounts of available arginine for other organs. . . .

      “[M]any cell types which are able to metabolize arginine into NO are able to uptake circulating citrulline, which explains why citrulline induces certain of the NO effects . . . . The figure seems to be even more complex in the brain, since the recycling of citrulline into arginine is split between various cell types, defining a unique inter-cell-type cycle. Indeed, the brain neurones producing NO are not able to reconvert citrulline into arginine since they do not express the [necessary] enzymes. Hence, citrulline is released from the neurons and taken up by surrounding neural cells where return-conversion to arginine is performed.”[Curis E, 2005]

      Romero and colleagues presented other valuable information about citrulline [Romero MJ, 2006]: “With development, intestinal synthesis of L-arginine from glutamine decreases and the small intestine gradually becomes the major site of net L-citrulline production. . . . L-citrulline is largely taken up and metabolized by the kidney, which in turn releases arginine equivalent to ~75% of the L-citrulline taken up. Thus, much of the L-citrulline produced by enterocytes reaches the systemic circulation as L-arginine. This L-arginine/L-citrulline homeostasis allows a proper supply of L-arginine for the whole body. About 60% of dietary L-arginine makes it into the hepatic portal circulation, while the rest is metabolized in the intestine. . . . L-citrulline synthesis in many tissues also occurs as a byproduct of NOS activity. . . . Although NOS is widely distributed throughout the body, its activity does not contribute substantially to whole body L-citrulline flux under normal conditions. . . .

      “[A]cute oral administration of L-citrulline appears to be considerably more efficient raising plasma levels of L-arginine than L-arginine itself. Additionally, a recent study in children and young adults showed that five oral doses of L-citrulline every 12 hours (1.9 g/m2/dose) for a total dose of 9.5 g/m2 resulted in 57 and 85% increases in mean plasma levels of L-arginine and L-citrulline, respectively. . . . L-citrulline is generally recognized as safe for oral consumption. In fact, L-citrulline can prevent some of the untoward effects of L-arginine supplementation. . . . L-citrulline is a natural and apparently safe means of providing L-arginine for constitutive NOS production of NO.”[my emphasis] [Romero MJ, 2006]

      Deutz also presented important observations about plasma concentrations and interorgan transport of glutamine, citrulline, and arginine [Deutz NE, 2008]: “In daily practice, the plasma concentration is usually viewed as a parameter of production. This is not always correct as the plasma concentration can be high due to an increased production of the substrate and/or a reduced capacity of the body to dispose [of] this substrate. This means that the level of plasma concentration can be misleading and does not always give reliable information whether there is actually an intracellular deficiency of a certain substrate. . . .

      “The quantitative main production site [of glutamine] in the body is muscle and the main consumption sites are the gut, liver and the kidney. Liver plays a dual role as it can both produce and consume glutamine, depending on the metabolic state (fasting/fed). . . . [A]bout 80–90% of the citrulline is derived from the gut glutamine to citrulline conversion. Therefore, whole body citrulline production is related to the quantity of gut glutamine conversion to citrulline, and is most likely influenced by the amount of active gut tissue.”

      Most important conclusions for ASD: (1) oral citrulline bypasses the liver and becomes arginine in the kidneys, making arginine more available to other tissues, including the brain; (2) oral citrulline supports production of constitutive nitric oxide but not inducible nitric oxide; (3) in light of the benefit of casein-free/gluten-free diets in ASD children, citrulline’s stimulation of protein synthesis when dietary protein is low may be invaluable; (4) citrulline synthesis may be a useful marker of functional gut tissue in these children; (5) oral citrulline is safer than oral arginine. The evidence speaks for itself.

      Peter Good Autism Studies www.autismstudies.net autismstudies1@gmail.com

      Curis E, Nicolis I, Moinard C, et al. Almost all about citrulline in mammals. Amino Acids 2005;29:177–205.

      Cynober L, Moinard C, De Bandt J-P. The 2009 ESPEN Sir David Cuthbertson. Citrulline: A new major signaling molecule or just another player in the pharmaconutrition game? Clin Nutrit 2010;29:545–551.

      Deutz NEP. The 2007 ESPEN Sir David Cuthbertson Lecture: Amino acids between and within organs. The glutamate-glutamine-citrulline-arginine pathway. Clin Nutrit 2008;27:321–327.

      Romero MJ, Platt DH, Caldwell RB, Caldwell RW. Therapeutic use of citrulline in cardiovascular disease. Cardiovasc Drug Rev 2006;24:275–290.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    2. On 2015 Apr 06, Peter Good commented:

      To PubMed Commons: comment to Frye RE, 2013.<br> Frye et al. [2010] previously reported that sapropterin, a synthetic form of tetrahydrobiopterin (BH4), improved behavior in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) [Frye RE, 2010]. Their 2013 study [Frye RE, 2013] was intended to test whether sapropterin’s benefit was due to BH4’s role as cofactor for synthesis of the monoamine neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin (as previous investigators suspected), or BH4’s role as cofactor for nitric oxide synthase (NOS), which produces the critical gaseous molecule nitric oxide (NO). Frye et al. concluded that improvements in communicative language in these children from sapropterin were due to restoration of NOS “coupling” disrupted by lack of BH4, which dysregulated nitric oxide metabolism. In support of their conclusion they cited evidence by Sweeten et al. [Sweeten TL, 2004] and others of high levels of nitric oxide metabolites nitrite and nitrate in blood of ASD children. In their previous study Frye et al. concluded: “[I]t is possible that BH4 in ASD could be depleted by the overactivation of the immune system and inflammatory processes during an excessive production of nitric oxide.” [Frye RE, 2010]

      There may, however, be more to this story. A few months after publication of Frye et al. 2013, Stanhewicz et al. reported sapropterin increased reflex vasodilation in aging human skin by increasing release of nitric oxide by endothelial and neuronal nitric oxide synthases [Stanhewicz AE, 2013]. Nitric oxide, the primary dilator of blood vessels in the body, is produced by three different forms of nitric oxide synthase – two constitutive forms present in blood vessel endothelial cells (eNOS) and neurons (nNOS), and a third form (iNOS) induced in brain microglia and other cells of the immune system in response to infections and other agencies. Endothelial nitric oxide maintains the vasodilator tone of blood vessels. Neuronal nitric oxide may be largely responsible for neurovascular coupling – dilation of nearby blood vessels when brain neurons fire. Faraci & Brian: “. . . NO appears to mediate cerebral vasodilatation in response to local neuronal activation.” [Faraci FM, 1994]. Koehler et al.: “. . . NO is required as a mediator of neurovascular coupling in the cerebellum, whereas NO acts as a modulator in the cerebral cortex.” [Koehler RC, 2009]. Inducible nitric oxide is released in large quantities to flush infective agents and toxins, and kill damaged cells.

      If nitric oxide is too high in autistic disorders, inducible nitric oxide is the form likely responsible, Frye et al. concluded. Sweeten et al. concluded likewise: “[I]t is reasonable to hypothesize that iNOS is involved in the elevated NO production in autism.” [Sweeten TL, 2004]. Yet inducible nitric oxide is often released to compensate deficiencies of constitutive nitric oxide [Hecker M, 1999;Kubes P, 2000]. One indication neuronal nitric oxide is deficient in children with autistic disorders is their failure of neurovascular coupling – their brains are often hyperexcitable, yet brain blood flow is consistently low [e.g. Ohnishi T, 2000]. Nitrite and nitrate also serve as reservoir forms to deliver nitric oxide elsewhere [Dejam A, 2005]. Lundberg & Weitzberg: “[N]itrate and nitrite should probably be viewed as storage pools for NO rather than inert waste products.” [Lundberg JO, 2005].

      Did sapropterin increase endothelial and neuronal nitric oxide in the brains of ASD children in Frye et al. 2013? Why would endothelial and neuronal nitric oxide be deficient in these children? One explanation is deficiency of BH4. Another is deficiency of the amino acid arginine – only substrate for nitric oxide [Wiesinger H, 2001]. Frye et al. found higher baseline levels of blood arginine in these children, and higher ratios of arginine to citrulline, were associated with greater improvements in language from sapropterin. They noted blood arginine and the arginine/citrulline ratio did not change significantly during sapropterin treatment – but also stated improvements in language were greater in children with “an attenuated increase in arginine.” [Frye RE, 2013]

      Considerable evidence argues that arginine is deficient in ASD children: (a) high levels of inducible nitric oxide; (b) consistently low brain creatine (arginine + glycine) [Friedman SD, 2003]; (c) frequent high blood ammonia [Filipek PA, 2004] which requires arginine to detoxify to urea; and (d) high levels of arginine vasopressin in autistic boys [Carter CS, 2007; Momeni N, 2005]. Furthermore, NOS produces harmful oxidants superoxide and peroxynitrite when NOS “uncouples” from lack of BH4 – or when arginine is deficient [Xia Y, 1996]. Because most supplemental arginine is taken up by the liver (thus unavailable to other tissues), citrulline (arginine’s precursor) or glutamine (citrulline’s precursor) may be better sources of arginine for NOS [Cynober L, 2010]. The evidence speaks for itself.

      Peter Good Autism Studies La Pine, OR www.autismstudies.net autismstudies1@gmail.com

      Carter CS. Sex differences in oxytocin and vasopressin: implications for autism spectrum disorders? Behav Brain Res 2007;176:170–186.

      Cynober L, Moinard C, De Bandt J. The 2009 ESPEN Sir David Cuthbertson. Citrulline: A new major signaling molecule or just another player in the pharmaconutrition game? Clinical Nutrition 2010;29:545–551.

      Dejam A, Hunter CJ, Pelletier MM, et al. Erythrocytes are the major intravascular storage sites of nitrite in human blood. Blood 2005;106:734–739.

      Faraci FM, Brian Jr. JE. Nitric oxide and the cerebral circulation. Stroke 1994;25:692–703.

      Filipek PA, Juranek J, Nguyen MT, et al. Relative carnitine deficiency in autism. J Autism Dev Disord 2004;34:615–623.

      Friedman SD, Shaw DW, Artru AA, et al. Regional brain chemical alterations in young children with autism spectrum disorder. Neurology 2003;60:100–107.

      Frye RE, Huffman LC, Elliott GR. Tetrahydrobiopterin as a novel therapeutic intervention for autism. Neurotherapeutics. 2010;7(3):241–249.

      Hecker M, Cattaruzza M, Wagner AH. Regulation of inducible nitric oxide synthase gene expression in vascular smooth muscle cells. Gen Pharmacol 1999;32:9–16.

      Koehler RC, Roman RJ, Harder DR. Astrocytes and the regulation of cerebral blood flow. TINS 2009;32(3):160–169.

      Kubes P. Inducible nitric oxide synthase – a little bit of good in all of us. Glia 2000;47:6–9.

      Lundberg JO, Weitzberg E. NO generation from nitrite and its role in vascular control. Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol 2005;25:915–922.

      Momeni N, Nordström BM, Horstmann V, et al. Alterations of prolyl endopeptidase activity in the plasma of children with autistic spectrum disorders. BMC Psychiatry 2005;5:27–32.

      Ohnishi T, Matsuda H, Hashimoto T, et al. Abnormal regional cerebral blood flow in childhood autism. Brain 2000;123(Pt. 9):1838–1844.

      Stanhewicz AE, Alexander LM, Kenney WL. Oral sapropterin acutely augments reflex vasodilation in aged human skin through nitric oxide-dependent mechanisms. J Appl Physiol 2013:115:972–978.

      Sweeten TL, Posey DJ, Shankar S, McDougle CJ. High nitric oxide production in autistic disorder: a possible role for interferon-gamma. Biol Psychiatry 2004;55(4):434–437.

      Wiesinger H. Arginine metabolism and the synthesis of nitric oxide in the nervous system. Prog Neurobiol 2001;64(4):365–391.

      Xia Y, Dawson VL, Dawson TM, et al. Nitric oxide synthase generates superoxide and nitric oxide in arginine-depleted cells leading to peroxynitrite-mediated cellular injury. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 1996;93:6770–6774.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2014 May 06, Madhusudana Girija Sanal commented:

      Dr. Norman is picturing the great progress in education as a result of the information distribution revolution as if it is an ‘unavoidable evil’! Probably, many of his generation expresses high inertia, still consider, 'physical' universities, libraries, books, lecture halls etc. very much essential! I understand their nostalgia! You know what this means for humanity? Rich countries such as USA hold only a small fraction of the world’s population. Through virtual universities more and more people across the world, irrespective of rich and poor, would be able to attend the best schools and courses. They would be able to take the same exams and get ranked along with the most privileged, rich or intelligent. This would be great! This is 'new' justice! (Although I believe “Justice is ‘man made’ or artificial”). All we want is better tools to evaluate human intellectual qualities, online. I do not think face to face lectures will be better than online recorded, interactive lectures, may be multidimensional (3D-4D-5D) lectures by several professors of the learner’s choice. Lectures will be ranked and paid by based on their quality by student communities and not by bureaucrats or by administrators and politicians. This system is great especially when I consider the advantages! On demand, personalized lectures would be "ready-made" for commonly observed (student) personality traits -say there are 100 personality subtypes and intellectual levels! Custom lectures are available for them all because there are much more people to teach online-lectures need not be real time. You can learn from a "personality" who matches your rare personality, perhaps, one who lived 10 years back. His lectures had to wait for ten years for a student like you! Is not this a very exciting possibility? However, I do agree that face to face lectures can be more individualized and beneficial (for the rich, because they only have money to ‘buy’ good teachers!) Nevertheless, I do not think there is a huge benefit for extreme personalization except for exceptional children who are extremely out-of-the-box in a positive or negative way. It may be, however, noted that overall poor but brilliant students have a better opportunity to come out and stand before the world. This global free learning system will benefit specially those brilliant minds in less privileged countries. Do Dr. Norman has any evidence to support his statements in the editorial? I do not know what Dr. Norman will write if tomorrow we find a new technology which allows direct transmission of knowledge to brains! Then what will happen? Think! Everyone will have equal opportunity to accumulate the same amount of information if he or she wants. Now who will win this game? Those who have money? Probably not! Those fractions of the society who are blessed with right genome, epigenome and the best neural connections!


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2017 Apr 12, Antony J. Williams commented:

      Egon, Unfortunately I am no longer involved with either ChemSpider or the Spectral Game. The spectral game was picked up by Andy Lang for maintenance purposes and while there have been a lot more data added to ChemSpider I am not aware of anyone there engaging with Andy to provide an update to the data. The intention was always to provide access to the data via service based calls so that updates could be ongoing but I am not aware that this was implemented and made available to serve the game. I will follow up with people at RSC and make them aware of this discussion and encourage them to work with Andy Lang if they see it to be of value. In terms of a new spectral viewer to replace the applet the Javascript viewer from Bob Hanson via the JMol approach would be most appropriate I think. Cheers


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2013 Oct 29, Michael Eisen commented:

      According to recent Frontline documentary "League of Denial" http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/league-of-denial/ this paper was the first step in a chain of events that has finally led to the NFL acknowledging that repeated head trauma can potentially cause long term problems for professional football players, and to a series of changes in the game designed to reduce head injuries.

      Note that, according to Frontline, the NFL originally disputed the finding and attacked the work and its author - see Casson IR, 2006.


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

    1. On 2016 May 22, Lydia Maniatis commented:

      (Third comment) Arbitrary methodological choices, data presentation

      The title of the paper is “Seeing sets,” and question of interest is said to be “to determine what observers know about the members of a set and what they know about the statistical properties of the set (mean and distribution)” and that “sets of objects could be represented in a qualitatively different way than single items.”

      These are quite broad objectives, and don't imply any particular methodology.

      The author uses a very specific methodology that places demands on subjects that go beyond straightforward perception, and imposes conditions that compromise straightforward perception.

      He uses brief presentation times, 500ms for the first figure and 500s for the comparison figure, with no blank space in between.

      This means that there is time for about two saccades and fixations (barely), and involves potential masking effects. How did he choose these parameters? Do they matter? Would we expect the same results with longer presentation times? With a blank interval? Also, the circles increase in size geometrically, not linearly and the mean that we are talking about is the geometric, not the arithmetic mean. Why not a linear progression and an arithmetic mean?

      It's been understood for a long time that by adjusting experimental conditions we can get pretty much any result we want, which is why such conditions should come with a theoretical rationale attached. Because the author's choices here seemingly make the task much more difficult than it should be given the goal, they need to be explained, not just flatly asserted.

      Another blank check is to be found in a footnote referring to a “small study” which was the basis for selecting/describing one of the parameters in the reported study (“members differed in size from non-members by at least 18%, about three times the size-discrimination threshold for sets of same-size spots [as determined in the “small study”].” In a personal communication, Ariely told me that this study used about ten subjects, and was mostly about studying “within-subject variation.” Such a study could also have given an indication of between-subject variation. Given the link between the two studies, and the oddity of using only two observers (why only two?), some more specific info on results/methods of this "small study" would seems called for.

      The presentation of the data is also rather weird. For the mean-discrimination experiment, we aren't given information on the proportions of correct answers the two observers achieved. Maybe this information is hidden in the opaque measure that is provided (and which assumes normality in the data without any justification - isn't that a problem?). This measure is the "mean-discrimination threshold" derived using "a standard profit analysis (Finney, 1971) ...to determine the mean-discrimination threshold (the standard deviation of the best-fitting cumulative normal distribution." Is best-fitting the same thing as "well-fitting"?

      Given the method, and assuming that it really is the case that subjects were better at guessing the mean rather than the size of individual members, I could speculate on why that might be. First of all, observers never had to play the "yes-no" game with means (why not?). All they had to do was say "larger-smaller." This seems like an inherently easier task. Further, given the time constraint, there wasn't enough time to inspect each of the four different circle sizes individually. Observers only had time for one or two. So for half of each set, at least, they were out of luck on each trial in the individual member task. For the mean estimation, if they could learn to target the middle two on each trial - not the largest, not the smallest - then they could ballpark the mean. Who knows? The situation is as Runeson (1995) has described for a different type of vision study:

      "For perception and cognition research in general, it is noteworthy that the cue-based style of theorising exhibits a certain lack of inherent correctives for ineffectual experiments because of its emphasis on weak and irregular performance. Thus, an experiment that is unsuitable in design or procedure could easily provide supportive-looking data at least as long as cues, salience limits, and trade-off functions are not specified in detail....data that represent suboptimal observer performance seem to have provided spurious support for untenable theoretical commitments,... "


      This comment, imported by Hypothesis from PubMed Commons, is licensed under CC BY.

  11. Jun 2018
    1. WHERE TO FIND FLOWFlow tends to occur when a person faces a clear set of goals that require appropriate responses. It is easy to enter flow in games such as chess, tennis, or poker, because they have goals and rules that make it possible for the player to act without questioning what should be done, and how. For the duration of the game the player lives in a self-contained universe where everything is black and white. The same clarity of goals is present if you perform a religious ritual, play a musical piece, weave a rug, write a computer program, climb a mountain, or perform surgery. In contrast to normal life, these "flow activities" allow a person to focus on goals that are clear and compatible, and provide immediate feedback.article continues after advertisementgoogletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1404853927369-9'); });Flow also happens when a person's skills are fully involved in overcoming a challenge that is just about manageable, so it acts as a magnet for learning new skills and increasing challenges. If challenges are too low, one gets back to flow by increasing them. If challenges are too great, one can return to the flow state by learning new skills.How often do people experience flow? If you ask a sample of typical Americans, "Do you ever get involved in something so deeply that nothing else seems to matter and you lose track of time?" roughly one in five will say that this happens to them as much as several times a day, whereas about 15 percent will say that this never happens to them. These frequencies seem to he quite stable and universal. For instance, in a recent survey of 6,469 Germans, the same question was answered in the following way: Often, 23 percent; Sometimes, 40 percent; Rarely, 25 percent; Never or Don't Know, 12 percent.A more precise way to study flow is the Experience Sampling Method, or ESM, which I developed at the University of Chicago in the early 1970s. This method provides a virtual filmstrip of a person's daily activities and experiences. At the signal of a pager or watch, which goes off at random times within each two-hour segment of the day, a person writes down in a booklet where she is, what she is doing, what she is thinking about, and whom she is with, then she rates her state of consciousness on various numerical scales. At our Chicago laboratory, we have collected over the years a total of 70,000 pages from about 2,300 respondents. Investigators in other parts of the world have more than tripled these figures.article continues after advertisementgoogletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1456244145486-0'); });The ESM has found that flow generally occurs when a person is doing his or her favorite activity--gardening, listening to music, bowling, cooking a good meal. It also occurs when driving, talking to friends, and surprisingly often at work. Very rarely do people report flow in passive leisure activities, such as watching television or relaxing.Almost any activity can produce flow provided the relevant elements are present, so it is possible to improve the quality of life by making sure that the conditions of flow are a constant part of everyday life.FLOW AT WORKAlthough adults tend to be less happy than average while working, and their motivation is considerably below normal, ESM studies find more occasions of flow on the job than in free time. This finding is not that surprising: Work is much more like a game than most other things we do during the day. It usually has clear goals and rules of performance. It provides feedback either in the form of knowing that one has finished a job well done, in terms of measurable sales or through an evaluation by one's supervisor. A job tends to encourage concentration and prevent distractions, and ideally, its difficulties match the worker's skills.Nevertheless, if we had the chance most of us would like to work less. One reason is the historical disrepute of work, which each of us learn as we grow up.Yet we can't blame family, society, or history if our work is meaningless, dull, or stressful. Admittedly, there are few options when we realize that our job is useless or actually harmful. Perhaps the only choice is to quit as quickly as possible, even at the cost of severe financial hardship. In terms of the bottom line of one's life, it is always better to do something one feels good about than something that may make us materially comfortable but emotionally miserable. Such decisions are notoriously difficult and require great honesty with oneself.article continues after advertisementgoogletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('div-gpt-ad-1468856734952-0'); });Short of making such a dramatic switch, there are many ways to make one's job produce flow. A supermarket clerk who pays genuine attention to customers, a physician concerned about the total well-being of patients, or a news reporter who considers truth at least as important as sensational interest when writing a story, can transform a routine job into one that makes a difference. Turning a dull jot into one that satisfies our need for novelty and achievement involves paying close attention to each step involved, and then asking: Is this step necessary? Can it be done better, faster, more efficiently? What additional steps could make my contribution more valuable? If, instead of spending a lot of effort trying to cut corners, one spent the same amount of attention trying to find ways to accomplish more on the job, one would enjoy working--more and probably be more successful. When approached without too many cultural prejudices and with a determination to make it personally meaningful, even the most mundane job can produce flow.The same type of approach is needed for solving the problem of stress at work. First, establish priorities among the demands that crowd into consciousness. Successful people often make lists or flowcharts of all the things they have to do, and quickly decide which tasks they can delegate or forget, and which ones they have to tackle personally, and in what order. The next step is to match one's skills with whatever challenges have been identified. There will be tasks we feel incompetent to deal with. Can you learn the skills required in time? Can you get help? Can the task be transformed, or broken into simpler parts? Usually the answer to one of these questions will provide a solution;that transforms a potentially stressful situation into a flow experience.
    1. They may gain short-term goals (a seat at a prestigious school) but they lose the long game of acquiring more seats for everyone:

      Do people care about acquiring more seats for everyone? Or has everyone in the US bought into the idea that the individual is more important than the collective?

    1. The archival community needs game changers and iconoclasts. In some areas we need to directly challenge the established order and refuse to accept some practices and institutions as they currently stand. We need to show a willingness to adopt a DIY approach based on necessity; and we need to push ourselves forward, so we are seen and heard standing up for what we believe in (even those of us who consider ourselves introverts). Bring in the Clash or the Dead Kennedys and you get a strong sense of political and social justice. With Patti Smith comes a fusion of genres. With the Ramones at their best comes a stripped back, short, sharp shock. With riot grrrl comes a refusal to accept oppression based on gender, sexuality or class.

      This contains a some pretty good ideas around what 'a hacker in the archives' or 'archive hacking' might be.

    1. Why can’t Statler and Waldorf annotate?

      I love it! What a great idea! It's groundbreaking! Well, it's new anyway. Eh, not that new, we're from the '70s. It'll never work. It's too much work! Boo! Get off the stage you crazy bear... er, dog.

      ;-)

      (Serious comment - I do like this idea. But I think "heckling" only works on websites where people know they're playing a game. Statler and Waldorf stay in their box for a reason. A more alchemical approach might work, though, if there were a game culture of the characters being relatively respectful to the original writer.)

    1. Mechanism design studies solution concepts for a class of private-information games. Leonid Hurwicz explains that 'in a design problem, the goal function is the main "given", while the mechanism is the unknown. Therefore, the design problem is the "inverse" of traditional economic theory, which is typically devoted to the analysis of the performance of a given mechanism.'[1] So, two distinguishing features of these games are: that a game "designer" chooses the game structure rather than inheriting one that the designer is interested in the game's outcome

      Advantages over traditional game theory for token econimics:

      • a game "designer" chooses the game structure rather than inheriting one
      • that the designer is interested in the game's outcome
    1. In Genesis, once Adam has eaten the fruit of the tree of knowledge, he covers his nudity and is sentenced to a life of cultivating food by harsh labor. This is the cost of divine knowledge. In Gilgamesh, when Enkidu becomes estranged from the animals, Shamhat tells him that he has become “like a god.” Later, on his deathbed, Enkidu laments his removal from a state of nature, only to be reminded by the god Shamash that while civilized life is more fraught with difficulty and the knowledge of one’s own mortality, it is a worthwhile price for cultural knowledge and awareness.

      I think it is amusing that the main thing that differentiates us from other animals is the fact that we wear clothes. Note that I used the phrase “other animals.” Sure, we don’t walk around naked and we have essentially removed ourselves from nature. That aside, homo sapiens are still animals. Our intelligence makes us constantly search for reason and meaning behind everything, including our origins. That is where religious texts come in. I don’t think we have divine knowledge. “How did we get here?” is a great question, and everybody has a lot of guesses, but I think the truth is that we just don’t know yet. Perhaps the stories are similar because those events really did happen, and they have been passed down and changed slightly like in a game of telephone. Or perhaps they are just stories. That’s why our intelligence is a blessing and a curse. I highly doubt my cat lays on the windowsill and ponders the meaning of life.

    1. Chess masters perceive chunks of meaningful information, which affects their memory for what they see. Chess masters are able to chunk together several chess pieces in a configuration that is governed by some strategic component of the game.

      Chunking content into categories is critical for memory, but I also think that it is important to fit content into multiple categories to allow the content to be accessed from may different angles.

    1. Students were asked toset particular types of goals for themselves, suchas completing of a certain number of math home-work problems, and to self-record their effectivenessin achieving these goals.

      What happens when the student sets their goals too low? Don't we rely on the subject expert (teacher) to identify how many and which problems need to be solved in order to develop skills? Or are these students setting "sub goals" - e.g. I'll do 5 problems and then play a video game for 15 minutes, then do 5 more problems until I finish my homework?

    1. historically accumulated and culturallydeveloped bod[ies] of knowledge and skills essential for household or individual functioning andwell-being

      What is the meme version of of historically accumulated. Clearly memes are deeply influenced by funds of knowledge as evident by Black Twitter yet they are more temporal and draw heavily on pop culture. At the same time having a deep meme game also signifies status in digital culture.

    1. by going to the local source we can start with a cleaner version of the facts

      This is like a game of telephone, where a phrase, or story is shared along a line of people. It is often very different by the time it gets to the end of the line. The only way to know what the original source said is to go back to it.

    1. It’s all part of an elaborate video game that allows paying customers to watch real people slaughtered according to the horror of choice

      This is the second Reed review I've clicked out of curiosity why he gave such abysmally low scores to popular movies, and the second in which he's said things where he says things in his review that betray that he didn't watch the movie. "Allows paying customers to watch real people slaughtered ... the game ends only if the virgin survives"? What movie is he talking about? That isn't in Cabin In The Woods, yet he spends several sentences on it here. Once again it looks like Reed hasn't actually watched a movie he gave an abysmally low score to, or at least, didn't watch it closely enough to detect major plot points. Did he nod off while watching it?

    1. This may, and often will, involve some degree of gaming or game-like activities in classrooms not because they are games and many kids happen to like games, nor because it is a fun way to get some content across, but, rather, because the learning principles that games encapsulate can be leveraged for educational

      I read a book about this called Reality is Broken Great analysis of games and their educational value.