Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Androgeos Exeunt on September 18, 2013, 10:24:15 am
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(http://www.mrbrown.com/.a/6a00d83451b52369e2019aff77f157970b-pi)
http://www.mrbrown.com/blog/2013/09/got-english-english-and-scientific-english-one-meh.html
As somebody who spends quite a bit of time keeping his proficiency in and literacy of English in check, this little local dispute caught my attention for (perhaps) the wrong reason.
The dispute here is regarding the interpretation of Statement D, which is "It gives off light energy only when an electric current passes through it."
Most students who answered this question chose option 4, and their interpretation of Statement D was, "It gives off light energy when there is an electric current passing through it. It does not give off light energy when there is no current."
The school's interpretation of the statement, however, was, "It gives off only light energy when an electric current passes through it." and hence the students who chose option 4 were marked wrong as this would be untrue (it also gives off heat energy, and if it also gives off sound energy, you might need a change of bulbs). The correct answer, according to the school, is option 2.
I'd like to know what other people here think about this and how they would interpret Statement D. As I understand it, there doesn't appear to be a "universal" standard for English, so the interpretation of Statement D may vary across countries that use English as a language of instrument. Personally, when I first saw that statement, I interpreted it in the same way as the kids.
On a related note, have any of you ever read a sentence or block of text that had an ambiguous meaning? The one above is the first incident I've seen in recent memory.
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Isn't statement 4 by definition false?
Without even seeing what is asked, it tells us that the three preceding sentences are true, but one of those (1) contradicts the other two, making it false.
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The student's interpretation would be the correct one, I think. It certainly is the immediately obvious one to me.
On a related note, have any of you ever read a sentence or block of text that had an ambiguous meaning? The one above is the first incident I've seen in recent memory.
Ambiguousness in the english language? Why, I never heard of such a thing!
Hint, in case it wasn't obvious: English is hilariously ambiguous even at the best of times.
Isn't statement 4 by definition false?
Without even seeing what is asked, it tells us that the three preceding sentences are true, but one of those (1) contradicts the other two, making it false.
No. None of the statements contradict each other.
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Isn't statement 4 by definition false?
Without even seeing what is asked, it tells us that the three preceding sentences are true, but one of those (1) contradicts the other two, making it false.
No. None of the statements contradict each other.
1 contradicts 2 and 3.
Saying that only D is correct contradicts saying any other apart from D is correct.
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"All of the above" is not "1 2 and 3 are correct", but "A B C and D are correct".
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Isn't statement 4 by definition false?
Without even seeing what is asked, it tells us that the three preceding sentences are true, but one of those (1) contradicts the other two, making it false.
Look at the picture again. The statements are labelled A to D. The options are labelled 1 to 4. The confusion here stems from Statement D.
Hint, in case it wasn't obvious: English is hilariously ambiguous even at the best of times.
This thread was only one reply in and Ghostavo is apparently confused by something else in the same picture. :lol:
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"All of the above" is not "1 2 and 3 are correct", but "A B C and D are correct".
All of the above is usually referring to the answers. (http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/all+of+the+above)
Isn't statement 4 by definition false?
Without even seeing what is asked, it tells us that the three preceding sentences are true, but one of those (1) contradicts the other two, making it false.
Look at the picture again. The statements are labelled A to D. The options are labelled 1 to 4. The confusion here stems from Statement D.
Although I agree with the thought process of the students, I'm saying they are still wrong in choosing statement 4.
I know that the discussion in the article is about statement D, not 4.
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All of the above is usually referring to the answers. (http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/all+of+the+above)
Ah, I see what you mean now. Indeed, more tasty ambiguousness!
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All of the above is usually referring to the answers. (http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/all+of+the+above)
Went to look it up myself. You're right about that one. This would explain why some papers give option 4 as "A, B, C and D" instead of "All of the above".
How does A contradict B and C? The three statements don't have to be true simultaneously.
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I would have chosen 4, or 2 and 3 if possible. For me, D means that "It gives off light energy if and only if the current is flowing through it". And "All of the above" does indeed refer to answers in most cases, especially if placed last on the list. Makes sense, because when think of it, the things "above" it are other answers, not any sentences in the question. I suppose that a "general purpose" teacher wrote this test, physicists and especially mathematicians often strive to be as precise and unambiguous as possible.
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All of the above is usually referring to the answers. (http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/all+of+the+above)
Went to look it up myself. You're right about that one. This would explain why some papers give option 4 as "A, B, C and D" instead of "All of the above".
How does A contradict B and C? The three statements don't have to be true simultaneously.
1 contradicts 2 and 3.
Saying that only D is correct contradicts saying any other apart from D is correct.
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The school's interpretation is incorrect. The correct form of what the school is trying to claim would be "When an electric current passes through it, it gives off light energy only." Otherwise, the sentence is ambiguous which makes it improperly constructed, though it obeys the grammatical rules of English. As for the school's bull**** about it being 'scientific Emglish,' scientific writing is supposed to be clearly constructed to avoid ambiguity of meaning. They fail. I wish the blogger had named the school.
Regarding "All of the Above" - while I have seen this exact form of multiple choice previously, "All of the Above" is only supposed to be used when preceded by statements that can be either true or false, but not a combination thereof. The correct construction of the answers would be as follows (if they must use 'all of the above'):
A) D
B) A, B, C
C) All of the above.
D) B, C, and D only.
Which is still confusing and would be better said as:
A) D only.
B) A, B, and C
C) B, C, and D
D) A, B, C, and D.
However, having taken an astronomical number of multiple choice exams over the years, I can anecdotally confirm that the people writing the tests may be very knowledgeable about their subject areas, but they are not very knowledgeable at all about plain writing and test construction. I've taken a few MC exams where the real test was not the subject material, but interpreting the damned questions.
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A scholastic institution writing questions down in a moronic fashion? You don't say! :P [note: I hated this **** at the collegiate level.]
The real problem is that the word 'only' is in the wrong spot (imo) no matter which way you interpret it.
-"It gives off light energy only when an electric current passes through it."
Vs. either of the following:
-It only gives off light energy when an electric current passes through it.
-It gives off only light energy when an electric current passes through it.
And if you really want to be clear about it:
-It gives off light energy --and only light energy-- when an electric current passes through it.
That being said, based on the original wording, the students are correct in their interpretation based on SEAE guidelines.
Of course, I'm more bothered by the fact that they wrote 'light energy' on that there test than that their grammar sucks. :)
::EDIT::
@Title, technically this is an issue of syntax and not an issue of semantics.
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My English teacher in junior year of high school used to rage about how common the improper placement of "only" was (like in ever "It only happens once a year" sale advertisement), but I've never seen it absolutely destroy the meaning of a sentence quite like this. Wow.
What's weird is that I didn't even notice the "all of the above" bit until Ghostavo pointed it out. :p
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I may be wrong, but since when doesn't a light bulb give off light energy when there is no electric current passing through it? It has a cooldown I believe. I may be horribly wrong.
(yes I am aware that's not the case)
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You can also predict it will give light quite extensively if you heat it enough through other means.
I'd lose quite a long time on this particular question. Not only trying to understand the question, but also trying to understand how much was the questioner trying to troll me, zero, a little, a lot, etc. Or, IOW, trying to understand how little the questioner really understands physics at all and how much I value my own pride over grades.
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I would have picked 4. But one could also say
A. The brightness of the bulb also depends on other factors (like current), so it is not determined by Z.
B. "High" is a relative term. The melting point of tungsten is "high" but uh, I'll say it's medium for the sake of being contrary. :P
C. "Too much" is also relative. The power consumed could be too much for my wallet without the filament's warming up.
D. Sticking with the students' interpretation, it also radiates at room temperature, though not as much.
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Ugh..
I think I would have given up and given the test writer an F instead.
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I believe that the students were correct in interpreting the question that way. To ask the question the way the school intended, the word "only" should be removed entirely; it's going to cause confusion no matter where in the sentence it is. The better word to use would be "alone", as in, "It gives off light energy alone when there is an electric current passing through it."
As for answer (4) All of the Above, Ghostavo is technically correct (the best kind of correct), but that can be excused. The best solution would be MP Ryan's of "(4) A, B, C, and D." Another solution would be "(4) 2 and 3 above" though that would be silly.
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i would argue #2 is correct. my problem is with statement D: just because there is current going through it, doesn't mean it will produce measurable light. the current must be sufficiently high before that happens, a couple miliamps probibly wont produce any visible light (perhaps infrared spectra at a point) but would still be considered a current. the only just makes it worse.
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you're confusing 'only when' with 'if'
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you must consult the lightbulb's datasheet for its complete operational profile
trollface.jpg
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This bull***** reminds me of high school. At least in my college, the professors can't get away with this because the student body can complain loud enough. Nobody takes high schoolers seriously though.
In this case, the decision that the school should make is to give everyone their points back or scrap the question. The department defending the test writer is outrageous.
*said bull**** never affected me directly.
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What's weird is that I didn't even notice the "all of the above" bit until Ghostavo pointed it out. :p
I didn't notice it either until he mentioned it and I went to do a cross-check with other online sources. I guess that when you're engrossed with the question that is given, you would think that the chosen option answers the question directly, in the sense of "Which statement(s) is/are correct? All of the above." as opposed to seeing "all of the above" in its original meaning, which is "All the different options given to answer the question are correct."
I may be wrong, but since when doesn't a light bulb give off light energy when there is no electric current passing through it? It has a cooldown I believe. I may be horribly wrong.
(yes I am aware that's not the case)
You can also predict it will give light quite extensively if you heat it enough through other means.
I'd lose quite a long time on this particular question. Not only trying to understand the question, but also trying to understand how much was the questioner trying to troll me, zero, a little, a lot, etc. Or, IOW, trying to understand how little the questioner really understands physics at all and how much I value my own pride over grades.
Uh, guys, at the risk of being turned inside out for stating the bleeding obvious or living up to my Custom Title, I'd like to point out that it's an elementary school question (Grade 6, to be exact). I don't think the examiner wrote that question expecting a 12-year-old to think so much about the various ways to illuminate a filament, or whether it still gives off light energy after the power supply generating the current that passes through it is shut off. :nervous:
Of course, I'm more bothered by the fact that they wrote 'light energy' on that there test than that their grammar sucks. :)
::EDIT::
@Title, technically this is an issue of syntax and not an issue of semantics.
What should it be then? Radiant energy? I got redirected to that when I tried searching "light energy" on Wikipedia. The national syllabus probably uses "light energy", so maybe that's why it was typewritten as such.
I would agree that this is an issue of syntax from a technical standpoint. However, the semantics issue was what caught my attention first.
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(http://www.mrbrown.com/.a/6a00d83451b52369e2019aff77f157970b-pi)
Statement A: False.
Statement B: True.
Statement C: True but problematic.
Statement D: False.
Now for the analysis:
Z is, apparently, the metal filament wire of the light bulb. The brightness of the bulb depends on two things: Surface area of the wire, and how hot it is (Stefan-Boltzmann law).
While the physical properties of the part Z are part of determining how bright the wire becomes, there is another, external factor on how hot it DOES become, and that's the current driven through the wire by the operating voltage of the bulb.
Obviously, the length, thickness, and material of the wire itself determine its resistance, but regardless that is not the only thing determining the "brightness" of the bulb. Since the current can be regulated by operating voltage, the bulb can be made dimmer or brighter regardless of the filament itself.
It could be argued that it determines the maximum potential brightness of the bulb because beyond certain temperature the filament disintegrates, but that's not really what statement A actually says.
Statement B is the simplest of the four and analyzing it is simplest. The only flaw is that the wire only needs high melting point if you want the bulb to work as a light source. But since that's usually the most common purpose for a light bulb as this, and I'm feeling generous, I'll take this for granted.
Statement C is troublesome because it is ambiguous. Electrical current is responsible for heating up the wire, true. And when the wire overheats, it stops working. But, it isn't always quite as simple as saying that the wire melts. It can also be vapourized, and this in fact happens slowly throughout the life cycle of a tungsten wire filament bulb, even though glass bulbs are typically filled with inert gas that slows down the vapourization of the metal. The ejected tungsten atoms accumulate on the inside of the glass bulb, which causes the typical darkening of light bulbs in use.
Statement D is unilaterally wrong, from basic physical perspective as well as linguistical.
The part Z does never "give off" energy of any kind. Much less "Light energy" which is not even a thing in the context of the school's interpretation of the statement.
First, to "give off" energy would mean that we could actually produce net energy gain by driving current through metal wire, which would act as a catalyst or something, and then the wire would magically produce energy. Obviously, this is not the case - the current requires a voltage, and the power of the radiation given by the wire is characterized by the voltage drop over the wire - or, depends on how much voltage is required to drive a current A through the wire, however you look at it it's an energy conversion process rather than the wire "giving off" energy.
Secondly, while light does have energy, what that actually is is energy of electromagnetic wave motion. Calling it "light energy" is bad use of scientific terminology, because fundamentally there's no difference between visible light, thermal radiation, microwave radiation and ultraviolet radiation.
The lamp's doing one thing - it heats up with electric current and produces a continuous spectrum of electromagnetic radiation based on its temperature. Most of the radiation is thermal radiation (longer wavelengths than visible light), part is visible light, and some parts are ultraviolet wavelengths. Fundamentally, all of these are same form of energy and it is profoundly misleading to separate them into "light energy", "heat energy", and... what, ultraviolet energy? Microwave energy? What nonsense.
Which leads us to the interpretation of the statement's wording. The question whether the "only" refers to "only when an electric current" or "light energy only" is something that really shouldn't even be asked, so we can probably agree that whichever was the writer's intention, the execution is lacking in clarity.
To me, it would be obvious that the "only" refers to the following part of the sentence.
As shown above, though, the statement has deeper problems than that.
If we assume that it should mean "only light energy", the statement could be construed as false because there's no such thing as "light energy", or true because all electromagnetic wave motion could be understood to be "light" depending on student interpretation.
In this case, the statement should actually be "It gives off only visible light when an electric current passes through it."
On the other hand the more natural assumption of "only when" would mean that the wire produces light only when electric current passes through it.
This is strictly speaking not true. Several counter-examples can be used to show this: Physically speaking, the wire will produce light when it's hot enough to do so. It can be heated with electric current going through it, or by lasers, or it could act as an antenna and driven to oscillate by suitable frequency of radio waves. Or, the simplest case - residual heat... The lamp will continue to glow, albeit for a short time, after current has been disconnected. In fact, in the case of bulb being operated with alternating current, this is the only reason why the bulb produces continuous light despite being driven by current that essentially turns on and off 50 times a second.
The writer of this exam question should be deeply ashamed regardless of their ability with English language.
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I can't help but feel that you've overthought this to a ridiculous degree, jumping on linguistic nuances to disregard the intent of what was written in favour of a very literal interpretation of what was written.
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I can't help but feel that you've overthought this to a ridiculous degree, jumping on linguistic nuances to disregard the intent of what was written in favour of a very literal interpretation of what was written.
You should have seen him with the Prisoner's dilemma
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I just happen to think that even at lower educational levels, exam questions shouldn't have conceptual errors embedded in them.
What level of education is this anyway? It seems like, if the errors were corrected, the question would be suitable for elementary school level, I guess.
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I just happen to think that even at lower educational levels, exam questions shouldn't have conceptual errors embedded in them.
But are there conceptual errors? None of the statements (No, not even D!) is actually wrong. They're not giving the complete picture, but the question is, do they have to?
If this was something given out for students just starting off with physics, wouldn't a slightly more accessible definition of certain things be more helpful in establishing things than starting off with the full, complete definition from the textbooks?
A statement like D, which you described as wrong on every level, is true enough for elementary school use, where getting kids to think about things in a certain way (like cause/effect relationships) is more important than giving the full picture.
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I can't help but feel that you've overthought this to a ridiculous degree, jumping on linguistic nuances to disregard the intent of what was written in favour of a very literal interpretation of what was written.
Precisely my thoughts, although I do appreciate his take on "light energy". That bit also made me laugh a bit when I first read it, although I read it differently than Herra. I read it as saying "It gives light... which we also know wink wink it's energy.... so I'll call it "light energy"", which is cringeworthy material at any rate. Anyways by "giving light" it is necessarily giving "light energy", if I take their wording in the most charitable way... obviously Herra's wording should be followed ("It gives off only visible light when an electric current passes through it.").
Slow day at HLP I guess :D
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I just happen to think that even at lower educational levels, exam questions shouldn't have conceptual errors embedded in them.
But are there conceptual errors? None of the statements (No, not even D!) is actually wrong. They're not giving the complete picture, but the question is, do they have to?
There are a few things that I see as misleading at best, and conceptual errors at worst.
Conceptual problems included here:
1. Wire makes light (statement A)
2. "Too much" electric current makes wire melt (statements B&C)
3. Electric current through a wire produces light and other things (statement D, school's interpretation)
4. Electric current through a wire produces light only if current is going through it (statement D, correct English interpretation)
The problem here is that these might not be "wrong" per se, however they are an example of leaping straight from visible cause to visible effect, and in the process leaping over a few quite important things.
Here's an equivalent explanation for rain:
-the Sun shines
-water evaporates from oceans and lakes
-water is transported in atmosphere by wind currents
-when air temperature drops low enough, water condenses into droplets and forms clouds
-if droplets become big enough, water falls all the way to ground
-it rains
So, while saying that it rains because the Sun shines is correct, not explaining the steps between is rather questionable.
With missing information it's common for children to form erroneous concepts of what's happening.
For example, I could easily see a child thinking that electricity goes into lamp and comes out as light, which will later be a problem when they go through DC circuit and see that the same current flows through all the lamps in series.
It could also make them think that the light produced by electricity makes the wire hot.
Another conceptual error that could come from this is that "light" and "heat" coming off the wire are somehow different, when in fact they are the same thing (only differentiated by our perception), and when they start dealing with the concept of "heat" in thermophysics, they'll find that it's completely different than the "heat" produced by a lamp...
The missing steps here are that the electricity itself doesn't cause the light, but it heats the wire (which can cause it to melt if it becomes too hot) and the hot wire then radiates. At this level the students don't need to know about Stefan-Boltzmann law or how the temperature affects spectral distribution of radiation, but I do think it's a bad idea to make it look like the electric current "causes" light, when it doesn't. The light is a secondary effect of the wire heating up.
If this was something given out for students just starting off with physics, wouldn't a slightly more accessible definition of certain things be more helpful in establishing things than starting off with the full, complete definition from the textbooks?
A statement like D, which you described as wrong on every level, is true enough for elementary school use, where getting kids to think about things in a certain way (like cause/effect relationships) is more important than giving the full picture.
Yes, but cause/effect relationships need to make sense. I'll agree that this situation is not quite as bad as the one I gave with the rain being caused by sun; however it's still too prone for misconceptions for my tastes.
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In the end, what we pull away from this is that theoretical education is less useful than practical education
How does knowing what the filament of the bulb does help you in being able to replace the bulb?
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... this is the only reason why the bulb produces continuous light despite being driven by current that essentially turns on and off 50 times a second.
this is incorrect unless you are getting your power from a shoddy inverter, and even then its wrong. at 50hz (or 60 in my case), or any frequency for that matter, you have half the waveform being in the positive and the other half in the negative, you actually have 2 points where the voltage passes through 0v each cycle, at 0 and 180 degrees of phase. so the bulb will be at 0v 100 times a second (or 120 here in the us). its also not really turning on and off, so much as ramping up and down, ideally using the sin function. back to that shoddy inverter which probibly uses pwm to fake a sine wave by switching at a higher frequency and varying the duty cycle from 0% to 100% for the first quarter of the wave, then going back to 0% by 180, and then do the same thing with a negative voltage for the other 180 degrees of phase.
im on a roll, im gonna wait for a meteorologist troll to dissect your statements about rain.
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I can't help but feel that you've overthought this to a ridiculous degree, jumping on linguistic nuances to disregard the intent of what was written in favour of a very literal interpretation of what was written.
And I think that's a very good thing. The fact is, semantics (and syntax) are an extremely important part of communication, especially with the modern focus on textual communication. A very large amount of disagreements and resulting discussions I see are due to a misinterpretation on the part of one or more parties (is "I see" referring to first or latter half of that sentence? (What do I mean by half? (Was that a rhetorical question? (Did I only say that so I could spam parentheses?)))). A huge amount of drama in the world could be avoided by people understanding each other. So it is important, every now and then, for you to be reminded of what the literal interpretation of your words are and how someone could easily be confused by no fault of their own. English, and I believe every language (despite only having experience in one), are limited, and you have to know that those limitations exist.
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That's amateurish at best. You have failed to incorporate all the subatomic phenomena regarding Quantum Mechanics that are at work here. Even still, we should always maintain the caveat "As far as we know", which as Socrates has taught us, is pretty much zero.
A very large amount of disagreements and resulting discussions I see are due to a misinterpretation on the part of one or more parties (is "I see" referring to first or latter half of that sentence? (What do I mean by half? (Was that a rhetorical question? (Did I only say that so I could spam parentheses?)))). A huge amount of drama in the world could be avoided by people understanding each other.
I have a sudden urge to quote Douglas Adams on his Babel Fish sketch.
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... this is the only reason why the bulb produces continuous light despite being driven by current that essentially turns on and off 50 times a second.
this is incorrect unless you are getting your power from a shoddy inverter, and even then its wrong. at 50hz (or 60 in my case), or any frequency for that matter, you have half the waveform being in the positive and the other half in the negative, you actually have 2 points where the voltage passes through 0v each cycle, at 0 and 180 degrees of phase. so the bulb will be at 0v 100 times a second (or 120 here in the us). its also not really turning on and off, so much as ramping up and down, ideally using the sin function. back to that shoddy inverter which probibly uses pwm to fake a sine wave by switching at a higher frequency and varying the duty cycle from 0% to 100% for the first quarter of the wave, then going back to 0% by 180, and then do the same thing with a negative voltage for the other 180 degrees of phase.
I could say I was talking about 25Hz AC... :p
...but actually I was just being lazy about it and didn't think it through.
im on a roll, im gonna wait for a meteorologist troll to dissect your statements about rain.
Well it's definitely simplified. I dropped all the aerosol physics that are required to even start explaining cloud formation (droplet nucleation), didn't explain what causes the winds, and strictly speaking it's not necessary for Sun to shine directly on water for it to evaporate... but Sun is the source of energy in the system, and that's still causing the rain to occur. Point was that it's an inadequate explanation, and inadequate explanations are prone to people filling the gaps with their own ideas.
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Problem with complete explanations being that they distract from the point you actually wanted to make though. In this particular instance, I felt that your response was too pedantic, too much focussed on what is right. Yes, giving full explanations is a good thing, but sometimes, brevity is needed. Explaining why a light bulb lights up when you hit the switch should not require excursions into quantum interactions.
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pffft. Anything that doesn't refer to strings and branes is outrageously incomplete.
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Oi. There's a difference between inaccurate explanation and insufficient one.
An explanation to how a light bulb works can be sufficient on qualitative level without involving any talk of quantum mechanics (much less the hypothetical candidates for unified field theories).
Even on qualitative level of understanding, classical electromagnetics is actually sufficient for understanding the basic mechanism of how the hot wire produces light, although you do need some quantum mechanics (Planck's law of black-body radiation, or a special case called Wien's displacement law) to understand why the temperature affects the quality of light being produced (spectral distribution).
Moreover, even an inaccurate explanation of some natural phenomenon can be accurate enough to be useful (see Newton's laws of motion and gravity). Insufficient models on the other hand only cause confusion.
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pffft. Anything that doesn't refer to strings and branes is outrageously incomplete.
To Quote Leonard Hofstader "I prefer my universe stringy, not loopy"
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How many HLP nerds does it take to screw in a light bulb?
No one knows, because they're still arguing about how rain works.
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we created a race of robots to change lightbulbs for us.
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Oi. There's a difference between inaccurate explanation and insufficient one.
An explanation to how a light bulb works can be sufficient on qualitative level without involving any talk of quantum mechanics (much less the hypothetical candidates for unified field theories).
Even on qualitative level of understanding, classical electromagnetics is actually sufficient for understanding the basic mechanism of how the hot wire produces light, although you do need some quantum mechanics (Planck's law of black-body radiation, or a special case called Wien's displacement law) to understand why the temperature affects the quality of light being produced (spectral distribution).
Moreover, even an inaccurate explanation of some natural phenomenon can be accurate enough to be useful (see Newton's laws of motion and gravity). Insufficient models on the other hand only cause confusion.
You do realise of the glaring contradiction between your first and last paragraph? This mess you made with the english semantics here is unexcusable and an insult to education in all parts of the world!!! I hereby protest vehemently against this clear abuse of the Geneva Convention and request an immediate judging on the matter in the Hague tribunal. Either that or we will launch preemptive humanitarian missiles, you know the "saving lifes" version.
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How many HLP nerds does it take to screw in a light bulb?
No one knows, because they're still arguing about how rain works.
Someone frakking siggify this.
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You do realise of the glaring contradiction between your first and last paragraph? This mess you made with the english semantics here is unexcusable and an insult to education in all parts of the world!!! I hereby protest vehemently against this clear abuse of the Geneva Convention and request an immediate judging on the matter in the Hague tribunal. Either that or we will launch preemptive humanitarian missiles, you know the "saving lifes" version.
Inexcusable :p
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English is such a ****ty language.
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English is such a ****ty language.
Indeed - well, to learn at any rate. Unfortunately it's also the closest thing to a truly international language we've got, at least until the Chinese [economically] conquer the planet.
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I don't see myself learning Mandarin.
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English is indeed mandatory if one is interested in any international conversation. It's still ****ty! :)
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Don't worry, no one in the advertising and teaching world gives a damn about English standards anymore. The language will probably either fall out of popular use or be radically transformed within the next hundred years.
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I highly doubt something like the English language will drop out of popular use
It'd take assimilation and a hostile takeover of North America for that to ever happen
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to consider a particular language a static entity is somewhat folly. a few hundred years is more than enough time for a language to mutate into something drastically different.
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to consider a particular language a static entity is somewhat folly. a few hundred years is more than enough time for a language to mutate into something drastically different.
On the other hand, we have so much written/recorded data in English that the language will probably remain at least understandable as-is for another several hundred years, even as words change meaning and new words get added.
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the difference nowadays is that languages are no longer being spoken in isolated pockets, but instead at a global scale. this will slow the rate of divergence away from what we would consider normal use of the language.
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We already have significant examples of this. There is a much greater difference in English writing between the year 1700 and 1850 than between 1850 and today. If anything, we're seeing small dialect pockets of English emerge, but the core rules have remained much the same for the last 150 years.
Read the original text of Gulliver's Travels if you don't believe me =)