The Vent and Rant Thread - Page 1090

wyndslash · 03-09-2011, 02:51 AM

LOL. man, i remember. my brother in high school used to wear his pants like that. i wonder why it was ever trendy. it must be so uncomfortable!

pdurrant · 03-09-2011, 03:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

I'm still ticked off because we're now 11 years past 2,000 and still very few flying cars. In the old Tommy Tomorrow comics, everyone had a flying car.

I want my flying car!

xkcd: A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math and language.

pdurrant · 03-09-2011, 03:18 AM

Why, when converting from one measurement to another, do people use a ridiculous amount of precision?

The example that prompted this rant is a news report about the earthquake off Japan early this morning.

"The quake occurred about 8.8 miles below the earth's surface, the USGS said. The expected height of the tsunami was only expected to be 0.5 meters (19.6 inches)." link

Oh yes, I'm sure the USGS expect the tsumani to be 19.6 inches exactly. Why translate an obviously rounded estimate (half a metre) to a value exact to +/- 2 mm? Call it twenty inches, or even a foot and a half. 19.6 inches? Ridiculous!

wyndslash · 03-09-2011, 03:24 AM

well, when it comes to stuff like that, i do want them to be precise. i mean...well, it's sensitive stuff, and had they rounded it up, might have induced more panic? though really, most of japan's locals are already used to earthquakes.

pdurrant · 03-09-2011, 03:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wyndslash

well, when it comes to stuff like that, i do want them to be precise. i mean...well, it's sensitive stuff, and had they rounded it up, might have induced more panic? though really, most of japan's locals are already used to earthquakes.

Unless USGS really meant 0.50+/-0.002m, giving the conversion as 19.6 inches is ridiculous.

In fact checking the predictions, it's given as 0.5m, not 0.50m, so I think the precision is at best 0.5+/-0.05m, which translates to 20+/-2 inches.

As for rounding up or down to the nearest inch in the conversion - are people really going to panic about a 20" tsunami when they're fine with a 19" one?

In addition, in this case, giving the spurious precision may lead to a false sense of security.

wyndslash · 03-09-2011, 03:48 AM

well, it's not like we can control what kind of natural calamities we get

in any case, i've not yet experienced one, and hope i never will. our little island has been lucky thus far.

Mortis · 03-09-2011, 03:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Why, when converting from one measurement to another, do people use a ridiculous amount of precision?

The example that prompted this rant is a news report about the earthquake off Japan early this morning.

"The quake occurred about 8.8 miles below the earth's surface, the USGS said. The expected height of the tsunami was only expected to be 0.5 meters (19.6 inches)." link

Oh yes, I'm sure the USGS expect the tsumani to be 19.6 inches exactly. Why translate an obviously rounded estimate (half a metre) to a value exact to +/- 2 mm? Call it twenty inches, or even a foot and a half. 19.6 inches? Ridiculous!

I agree 100%, except I think this could be caused by someone not noticing it, sometimes I wonder if anyone proofs these things. Should we be worried some intern that's not payed or paying attention might move a decimal point? So 5.0 meters becomes .50 meters, that could be the difference between wet feet and another Phuket 2004.

GeoffC · 03-09-2011, 04:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Why, when converting from one measurement to another, do people use a ridiculous amount of precision?

The example that prompted this rant is a news report about the earthquake off Japan early this morning.

"The quake occurred about 8.8 miles below the earth's surface, the USGS said. The expected height of the tsunami was only expected to be 0.5 meters (19.6 inches)." link

Oh yes, I'm sure the USGS expect the tsumani to be 19.6 inches exactly. Why translate an obviously rounded estimate (half a metre) to a value exact to +/- 2 mm? Call it twenty inches, or even a foot and a half. 19.6 inches? Ridiculous!

I agree ...

Whilst I'd also want them to use metres ....

wyndslash · 03-09-2011, 04:42 AM

pft pft PFFFFFFFFT

GeoffC · 03-09-2011, 04:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wyndslash

pft pft PFFFFFFFFT

pfftttt !

Mortis · 03-09-2011, 05:22 AM

Metres is the correct spelling, I blame the misspelling on "Spell Check" the moto for Spell Check should be "Converting the world to American spelling on spell check at a time" :P

kennyc · 03-09-2011, 05:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pdurrant

xkcd: A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math and language.

Mortis · 03-09-2011, 05:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kennyc

Now what would we do with a flying car, hell people can't drive when we paint those nice lines on the road for them, can you imagine what would happen if they weren't there?

I live in Asia and this happens every day!

Please take it for what it is, humour!

Rumpelteazer · 03-09-2011, 08:24 AM

Fighting with Wordpress and/or Firefox.
In Firefox I cannot use the post preview option, I get an error. I first thought I messed up either moving to a new host or moving it to the root folder but preview is working fine in both IE and Chrome.

Tried searching both the WP forum and Google and the only thing I can find is that Google Gears causes similar problems. But I haven't got that installed. At the moment I'm thinking it's an compatibility problem and if I'm posting something I need to preview I have to use another browser.

WT Sharpe · 03-09-2011, 10:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mortis

I was in a mall years ago with my father and a younger cousin who thought he was gangsta and wore the crotch of his jeans down around his knees. While we were shopping my father was kidding my cousin saying that if he didn't pull up his pants my father would.
So we are at the mall for a couple of hours and my father decides to make good on his promise, he sees my cousin looking at more crotch dragging jeans and quietly walks up behind him and lifts my cousin off his feet pulling the pants up, unfortunately my cousin was behind my father and was laughing at the look of utter disbelief on the kids face who seconds ago had his jeans forcefully pulled up. Luckily my father is a rather big fellow who would stare down a grizzly, while praying it wouldn't attack and being ready to run like hell. The young fellow who's pants were so unceremoniously yanked up around his ears just backed away and decided the best course would be to let it go, my father was actually quite apologetic about the whole thing.

Now when ever I see one of these kids I want to help pull their pants up as well

I don't actually do it, sheesh that could be dangerous

I wish I could find the old Mad Magazine cartoon about why grandsons and grandfathers got along so well. It depicted a young man with his pants hanging below his underwear walking with an older gent whose pants were pulled up just below his chest; both merrily oblivious to what others had to say about them. But this will have to do in it's place:

03-09-2011, 03:18 AM	#16338
pdurrant The Grand Mouse 高貴的老鼠 Posts: 74,109 Karma: 315558332 Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Norfolk, England Device: Kindle Oasis	Overly precise conversions Why, when converting from one measurement to another, do people use a ridiculous amount of precision? The example that prompted this rant is a news report about the earthquake off Japan early this morning. "The quake occurred about 8.8 miles below the earth's surface, the USGS said. The expected height of the tsunami was only expected to be 0.5 meters (19.6 inches)." link Oh yes, I'm sure the USGS expect the tsumani to be 19.6 inches exactly. Why translate an obviously rounded estimate (half a metre) to a value exact to +/- 2 mm? Call it twenty inches, or even a foot and a half. 19.6 inches? Ridiculous!

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03-09-2011, 02:51 AM	#16336
wyndslash Wizard Posts: 2,951 Karma: 3000001 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kindle 3 wifi, Kindle Fire	LOL. man, i remember. my brother in high school used to wear his pants like that. i wonder why it was ever trendy. it must be so uncomfortable!

03-09-2011, 03:24 AM	#16339
wyndslash Wizard Posts: 2,951 Karma: 3000001 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kindle 3 wifi, Kindle Fire	well, when it comes to stuff like that, i do want them to be precise. i mean...well, it's sensitive stuff, and had they rounded it up, might have induced more panic? though really, most of japan's locals are already used to earthquakes.

03-09-2011, 03:48 AM	#16341
wyndslash Wizard Posts: 2,951 Karma: 3000001 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kindle 3 wifi, Kindle Fire	well, it's not like we can control what kind of natural calamities we get in any case, i've not yet experienced one, and hope i never will. our little island has been lucky thus far.

03-09-2011, 04:42 AM	#16344
wyndslash Wizard Posts: 2,951 Karma: 3000001 Join Date: Feb 2011 Device: Kindle 3 wifi, Kindle Fire	pft pft PFFFFFFFFT

03-09-2011, 05:22 AM	#16346
Mortis Canucklehead in Malaysia Posts: 1,633 Karma: 3127774 Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Device: iPhone, Kindle	Metres is the correct spelling, I blame the misspelling on "Spell Check" the moto for Spell Check should be "Converting the world to American spelling on spell check at a time" :P

03-09-2011, 08:24 AM	#16349
Rumpelteazer Grand Sorcerer Posts: 5,349 Karma: 27919658 Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: Utrecht, the Netherlands Device: Kindle Paperwhite Signature Edition	Fighting with Wordpress and/or Firefox. In Firefox I cannot use the post preview option, I get an error. I first thought I messed up either moving to a new host or moving it to the root folder but preview is working fine in both IE and Chrome. Tried searching both the WP forum and Google and the only thing I can find is that Google Gears causes similar problems. But I haven't got that installed. At the moment I'm thinking it's an compatibility problem and if I'm posting something I need to preview I have to use another browser.