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| One pinout to fit them all - how can it be this hard?! |
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| Cerebus:
--- Quote from: nctnico on February 14, 2022, 08:35:46 am --- --- Quote from: tooki on February 14, 2022, 07:43:52 am ---Think of it like this: when children learn language, it’s basically programming a specialized DSP whose read-only programming fuses are blown at around age 12. After that, any language acquisition that happens is done in the CPU, which is much less efficient than the DSP. --- End quote --- Interesting. Reminds me of an article I read a long time ago that stated that demented people who migrated to a different country switched back to the language they learned as a child. --- End quote --- The man to initially read on the innate nature of language (as opposed to languages) is Noam Chomsky. Warning: Reading Chomsky may cause feelings of inadequacy. Chomsky is one of those people who, as one reads/listens, one gradually realises is terrifyingly intelligent and makes one realise that whatever one thought passed for intelligence in oneself is not that great after all. |
| tooki:
--- Quote from: nctnico on February 14, 2022, 08:35:46 am --- --- Quote from: tooki on February 14, 2022, 07:43:52 am ---Think of it like this: when children learn language, it’s basically programming a specialized DSP whose read-only programming fuses are blown at around age 12. After that, any language acquisition that happens is done in the CPU, which is much less efficient than the DSP. --- End quote --- Interesting. Reminds me of an article I read a long time ago that stated that demented people who migrated to a different country switched back to the language they learned as a child. --- End quote --- Yep! Here in Switzerland, where there are a lot of elderly immigrants from Italy, there are actually nursing homes that have floors just for the old Italians, because indeed many have lost the ability to communicate in German or French (and many more just prefer it*). *which I understand completely. Though I speak (and write) German at basically native level, it requires more cognitive effort for me than speaking and writing English, making it more tiring to use. |
| tooki:
--- Quote from: Cerebus on February 14, 2022, 01:14:23 pm --- --- Quote from: nctnico on February 14, 2022, 08:35:46 am --- --- Quote from: tooki on February 14, 2022, 07:43:52 am ---Think of it like this: when children learn language, it’s basically programming a specialized DSP whose read-only programming fuses are blown at around age 12. After that, any language acquisition that happens is done in the CPU, which is much less efficient than the DSP. --- End quote --- Interesting. Reminds me of an article I read a long time ago that stated that demented people who migrated to a different country switched back to the language they learned as a child. --- End quote --- The man to initially read on the innate nature of language (as opposed to languages) is Noam Chomsky. Warning: Reading Chomsky may cause feelings of inadequacy. Chomsky is one of those people who, as one reads/listens, one gradually realises is terrifyingly intelligent and makes one realise that whatever one thought passed for intelligence in oneself is not that great after all. --- End quote --- Having had a few Chomsky textbooks in my linguistics studies, I fully endorse this description! Reminds me of one of those classes. Each class session, a different student had to present a chapter of the Chomsky book. I did mine, explaining it how I understood it. The professor was skeptical and said he didn’t agree. Next week, we entered the classroom and on the chalkboard was written, “[tooki], you were right!” ;D |
| tooki:
--- Quote from: Cerebus on February 14, 2022, 01:12:07 pm --- --- Quote from: tooki on February 14, 2022, 07:43:52 am ---P.S. While babies aren’t born with a language, they are born with language as such, in that the childhood language acquisition part of the brain is literally made for that purpose. --- End quote --- Tsk, tsk, using "literally" for "metaphorically" a mere two lines after parading your qualifications in linguistics. Literally, the facility evolved, the brain parts themselves grew; neither were "made". :) --- End quote --- I’m pretty sure evolution is one way things are made. One meaning of “make” is “bring into existence”, and it doesn’t require human or divine intervention. So I said literally because I meant literally. ;) |
| T3sl4co1l:
--- Quote from: tooki on February 15, 2022, 09:47:35 am ---Reminds me of one of those classes. Each class session, a different student had to present a chapter of the Chomsky book. I did mine, explaining it how I understood it. The professor was skeptical and said he didn’t agree. Next week, we entered the classroom and on the chalkboard was written, “[tooki], you were right!” ;D --- End quote --- Heh, the one little case of that I have to my credit, was in the EE101 course I was obliged to take (I'd already transferred or tested out of the maximum number of credits :palm: ). There was a problem that was supposed to be a chain of Thevenin-Norton transformations, just grind grind grind and there's your result; I hadn't spotted the symmetry (the intended ladder of transformations) and used a different transformation, which the instructor initially marked down (partial credit). I brought it to his attention and on closer inspection, he realized I'd (more or less) independently discovered one of the more subtle transformations that ideal sources permit, namely that current sources can be split up and routed arbitrarily, so long as the node currents sum the same (i.e., a current source from A to B, can be split into one from A to C, and one from C to B, etc.; the sum into C, etc. is zero so the circuit is identical). Or, something like that, I think that was the transformation at least; it's been a while. :P So the next class, he spent some time explaining that, and crediting me +10 instead of -10 points on that test... Doing something roughly analogous but in a linguistics class, or of parsing and understanding Chomsky, is probably the more impressive feat, I admit! :o Tim |
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