I've been solo for all my life. One time, after finishing school I didn't go out of the house for 6 months and I was starting to become a bit crazy - that's when I realized that human contact isn't a desire, it's a necessity. Friends are ok, but they're still somewhat distant; it's nice to have someone that you can share your feelings with... Right now the only person I can really talk to is my mother - I think it would be nice to know that someone loves you for actual reasons (as opposed to unconditional love that you get from family). I used to enjoy being single, but that's only because I thought it was purely out of choice; now I realize that it wasn't really a choice, I was predisposed to being single and now that I'm trying to change, I'm finding it really difficult.

Actually my ancestors were slave owners who brought people from Africa to work on sugar cane and banana plantations in the Caribbeans back in the 1600s. I actually have a family tree which currently shows around 3000 of my distant relatives.

At 11/28/09 06:23 PM, Polderhoertje wrote: Well I've heard about evolution and what not but I figure if all these people talk about people evolving from monkeys, why are they still monkeys? Like, some monkeys got like human and others stayed monkeys? Seriously this does not make sense and I don't see how anyone didn't see this before.

We didn't exactly evolve from monkeys... They looked more like monkeys than humans physically, but they were not exactly monkeys. As far as we know monkeys as we know them today have evolved from this common ancestor in a different path. Something must be noted; not all species evolve at the same rate; some species evolve faster because they are more prone to certain mutations in the genes... Mutations may sound like a bad thing, but in the long term, it's the reason why humans are so different; there is a lot of variety amongst humans; which provides a better environment for natural selection to do its job.

Thanks to natural selection, populations which have huge genetic discrepancy evolve faster, because the best specimens are so great that everyone wants to breed with them and the bad specimens are so disgusting that no one will touch 'em... This accelarates natural selection a LOT.

Secondly, if the earth really is hundreds of millions of years old we would all be dead because there's now way the core of the earth can't cool off in HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF YEARS I mean come on that's a long long time/

The earth is very deep and gravity creates a lot of energy.

Maths was invented by thousands of people... It's a bit like the computer, there is no 'one' inventor; it was developed step-by-step over very large amounts of time and it's still being 'invented' as we speak.

Maths is very useful, I do agree though that the school system is really terrible at teaching maths... There are so many applications but they never tell you about them. I think they should teach us applications BEFORE they teach us the math; that way we would understand it better...

How can they expect us to apply math to real world settings when they teach it to us in such an abstract manner? How are we supposed to relate it to what we know?

Never and I'm 20. I've never even held a girls' hand. I guess I just don't have the right combo.
The best shot I have is to get rich and marry a gold-digger girlfriend - she probably won't love me, but if I get the prenup right, I probably won't know the difference. Lol.

I can't quite put my finger on what I'm doing wrong; I've been told that I'm above average looking, really smart, social, I have lots of friends, I'm ambitious, funny and I'm kind-hearted... I actually asked a girl out before but I was rejected on the spot. As of lately, I just gave up on relationships; it's not going to happen at the moment.

I'm working on a flash game and I got to do some seriously fun (but difficult) stuff.

I've made a few cool soft-body physics classes that I wanted to show off.

http://modset.net/physics.html
^ press any key to reset (the black thing doesn't move; it's just a very basic experiment)
You can change the force and the radius of effect... You can use negative force if you want.

Basically, it allows the user to fire a force-beam at the soft-body object.
The force beam has several variables like dissipation over distance and dissipation from the core of the beam... In the example above, the beam is very focused (only strong over a fairly narrow area...) and loses a lot of energy over distance (the target is hit with less much force when it's further away). It's extremely easy to modify the type of force-beam though.

The target is currently in 0-gravity mode with friction; so it moves around quite a bit ... Currently, the force beam doesn't dissipate energy from impact; only over distance so the motion isn't quite fully natural yet (it's a bit wavy because the points at the back move nearly as much as the ones at the front).

This is definitely one of the most mathematically demanding things I've done this year... I involves a lot of motion physics, elasticity, linear algebra (projection of vectors)... THE LOT!
I also made a small engine that allows me to physically draw my soft-objects in flash but its' really basic.

Lol I just had to share.

You killed it, therefore you must eat it.

At 11/26/09 11:08 AM, DrClay wrote: are you a robot

... Let me check my programming.

arrghhh, I got a segmentation fault...

Seriously, I have way too many inhibitions. I'm losing my ability to convey emotion because now I have to physically force myself to 'act out' my feelings because my body doesn't react to them naturally. Things like putting my hand on someone's shoulder, patting them on the back, hugging, shaking hands or kissing are incredibly difficult for me to do because my emotions don't set the tempo for me...

It's like if you had to coordinate your breathing or your handwriting; no one really thinks about it, it comes naturally; if you do have to think about it, then it usually doesn't turn-out well.

In face-to-face communication, the only emotions that I can convey properly are amusement and empathy - I suck at showing signs of attraction, surprise, sadness and especially anger. I haven't been angry at all for the past 4 years or so.

Approaching random people for the purposes of making 'friendly conversation' is very difficult for me; whereas I have no trouble at all if I am approaching them to talk about work-related subjects or other important matters.

I'm trying to work through my inhibitions, but it's really hard. One of my friends suggested that I purposefully get myself publicly humiliated; that way I'll see that messing up isn't that bad... It sounds like a good theory, but I wouldn't know where to start.

Meh.

I think I might be unipolar - I'm always manic.

At 11/26/09 09:41 AM, Detached wrote: Is my life still worth living?

If you can't enjoy your life, dedicate it to something greater than you.

I have grown to hate the media. The fact is that not everyone can fit into the image that the media is projecting; and we shouldn't feel bad for it. We can't all be rich, talented, have a super-model girlfriend and an awesome 8-pack but that doesn't mean our life is any less important than all those people who do have everything.

Personally, I always thought to myself; if I ever feel like ending my life, I'm going to go to some jungle somewhere and live there for the rest of my life as a wild man - that would be a good exercise of my free will and I'll get a good laugh out of it... Until I get mauled to death by a troupe of wild baboons.

At 11/21/09 08:28 PM, Gian wrote: Dear Gian

Remember to wear a condom

Sincerelly, Gian & son.

As if your son would sign that!

Dear me,

While you're at school, work more on your math, take physics AND chemistry, dump all your ridiculous time-consuming subjects that don't teach you anything. Go outside more often (sunlight plz) and try to socialize more. Also, get a girlfriend now while you still have feelings.
Keep working on your programming but don't play any video games or watch TV; they're a complete waste of time; go outside instead.

Cheers,
Your future self

Personally I'm only attracted to successful/ambitious women. My ideal relationship would be one where my partner will be both my best friend and my business partner. I want to be able to work together as a team to achieve success.

I don't want a women who thinks that she is inferior to me or who doesn't really want to achieve anything out of life. Life is a game and if I can only have one team-mate, I might as well pick a winner.

Seriously, I have had crushes on almost every single one of my female university lecturers... Some of them must have been like 35 years old. One of my math lecturers must have been like 25 and I was madly infatuated by her; she wasn't even good looking - she just had a PhD.

The internet isn't yet reliable or fast enough for such an OS. It would be unpractical to have to wait for 5 gigs of data to load every time you want to open a video editing project or anything that involves large amounts of data. What will you do if your router is playing up? Also, I don't want to see my internet bill after using this OS lol.

I think we need at least 5 to 10 more years before it becomes worthwhile.

I want to invent artificial intelligence to take over the earth.
I don't want them to kill us though; just enslave us.

Wow, that logo is awesome. I thought it was some sort of new bar-code when I first saw it.

If I drop 5 cent coins, I must leave at least one of them on the ground.
When I sit in an exam, I need to have all my pens and pencils aligned together and in the correct groups.

The mind is a powerful device. It should only be used for calculation and self-improvement.
What you're doing here is just nonconstructive reflection. Your mind is designed simply to ensure your survival as a human specimen; obviously you're not using it right.

Stop thinking about this sort of stuff and focus on living your life. In the end, thoughts mean shit... What is what isn't? Who gives a crap?! Life is ridiculously simple; grow, seek pleasure, procreate, protect your offsprings, retire and die. If your mind makes you do anything that doesn't help in any of the previous categories then you're not using it properly.

My method of learning is by reading. I need to see it on paper.
Also, I need to understand the purpose of things in order to remember them. If it doesn't have a purpose, then my brain is going to try to get rid of it very quickly.

"Jack of all trades, master of none"

Being good at everything is useless. In my life, I want to be exceptional at one thing. I don't care if I suck at everything else. My grades reflect this.

"Freedom is slavery%uFEFF for those who can't abstain."

You have to keep your feelings under control otherwise you become a slave to them; it becomes an addiction that you have to consistently feed.

Oh no! She's quitting the only thing that she's actually good at.

Yeah, you need to retaliate with words.
You need to remember that these bullies are just doing what they do to build-up their self-confidence. Most of them attack you because they know that you're not going to fight back; you're basically good practice... The others (who are confident) are just pushing your buttons to see how far they can go.

The only way to get them to stop is to fight back. Insult their intelligence and their motives. You could say anything really so long as you say it loud and clear and you believe in it.

Personally, I don't really get bullied but when someone makes a derogatory comment I usually just ignore it because I don't know how to respond.
One time though (a while back) I was was forced to play soccer at school as part of the school curriculum and I didn't like it so I gave minimal effort and I would only kick the ball if it was directly at my feet. This kid was like a year older than me and he got really pissed at me and he started to be really aggressive; he told me that he was going to "kick the crap out of me" if I didn't participate.
I decided that I was going to push his buttons and so I purposefully let the ball pass by me and I just stood there; then he got really pissed off and he grabbed me by the shirt with both his hands and I lifted my right arm and I smacked it down on top of his arms (to make him let go) and walked off the field.

As for advice on web design... The trick is to browse!
Browse through the internet for nice-looking sites and take notes of why certain design features work for certain websites. Type "web design awards" in Google.

While there aren't many rules for web design, there are guidelines that you should follow. In my opinion great websites are those that generally follow the trends and then deviate from that trend very slightly by adding some concepts of its own.
An effect that has become quite popular over time is the use of overlapping graphics; this is when there is a photo of something in a banner and then part of the photo (like a person's head) literally sticks out from the boundary of the banner onto part of the page (without obstructing text) - when I first saw this I just thought OMG brilliant!

Not really.
Design can involve both aesthetics and functionality.
A graphic designer is essentially someone who tries to evoke emotion through the composition of graphics and photographs. A web designer COULD be graphic designer as well, but the two roles are separate; maybe they just do the coding.
After all, there is such a thing as "software design" - and the only graphics used here are UML diagrams; and they have little artistic value; it's all about functionality.

At 11/17/09 10:43 PM, Endless-Psychoticism wrote: Yep, you read right. I don't give two shits about getting a higher education.

Oh you urban scum!

Jk, lol, you don't have to go to college, so long as you do something with your life that makes you happy and doesn't interfere with other people's freedom, then it's hats off.

Also, it's better to not go to college at all then do 2 years and then decide that you don't like the degree.

The US is backwards when it comes to measurements... Seriously, you guys are still using miles and degrees Fahrenheit. Every other country in the world switched out of the imperial system, but the US didn't.
I think that Americans are scared of change... Look at Europe; the metric system came along; it's obviously better and so they made the switch! They wanted a system of currency that would allow better exchange between European countries and BAM! They switched to the Euro!
Americans are too lazy to switch; I bet your scientists are pissed off because they have to use the metric system in the workplace and then they have to switch back to 'stupid mode' when they go back home.

Just to point out how ridiculous the imperial system is; there are 12 feet in an inch and 5280 in a mile WTF? These look like random numbers.
I don't even want to know how to work quickly with squared and cubed units (for surface areas and volumes).

Also, the Fahrenheit scale is just embarrassingly stupid.
Get this; in degrees Celsius; 0 is the temperature of freezing water and 100 is the temperature of boiling water (clever right?); it's very intuitive because everyone has a good idea about what freezing water feels like and how hot boiling water is.

Fahrenheit on the other hand, decided that zero should be the coldest temperature that he was able to achieve in his lab (what an arrogant prick; he actually thought that he had achieved the coldest temperature possible). Anyways, so in Fahrenheit, water freezes at 32 degrees?!?! That means that he was only able to achieve -32 degrees in his lab!! (that wouldn't be very difficult, just build your lab in the north pole and then you can reach -60 without even setting up any appartus)!
Just to prove how wrong he was; today's scientists have been able to achieve about -273.15 Celsius (extremely close to absolute 0 - which is the coldest temperature possible).

So yeah, the American systems of measurements, much like your economy and politics are based on lies and misinformation.

I like your header.
But yeah, just do what Jessii said. That's how the pros do it ;p

I thought this one would make a good ad for adidas

Tropical island