tnecniv (u/tnecniv) - Readit News

tnecniv commented on I taught the Iliad to Chinese teenagers (2021) scholars-stage.org/how-i-... · Posted by u/StefanBatory

Cthulhu_ · 2 years ago

Nah, a generation grew up with the MCU films, they will remain in their minds for the rest of their lives. The films you mentioned are probably the ones you grew up with and the ones that you use as benchmarks. The generation before that was Star Wars, before that it was historical epics, etc etc etc.

Just like with music, "the best" is often the things you experience in your mid-teens to mid-twenties. And when you grow up you'll develop some more critical thinking and may appreciate older or newer things.

tnecniv · 2 years ago

Maybe that’s true but I don’t think it is. Star Wars was before my time but I still enjoyed those movies. I was a little too young for the Matrix when it came out, and when I saw it as an adult I really liked it.

Not all summer blockbusters are created equal.

tnecniv commented on I taught the Iliad to Chinese teenagers (2021) scholars-stage.org/how-i-... · Posted by u/StefanBatory

B1FF_PSUVM · 2 years ago

> I liked the Odyssey

You can get quite a few good bedtime stories out of it, if you tone down the gore so the kids don't get nightmares - Circe, Polyphemus, Aeolus, Scylla and Charybdis, the sirens, the Trojan horse ...

tnecniv · 2 years ago

There’s a picture book of Greek myths my dad would read to me from when I was a kid. It toned down the gore and rape stuff (it was still there just implied so a kid won’t get it), and made for great listening as a kid before bed.

20 years later I’m in grad school and I meet some classicists. It seems basically every one of them had that book as a kid. Maybe I missed my calling

tnecniv commented on I taught the Iliad to Chinese teenagers (2021) scholars-stage.org/how-i-... · Posted by u/StefanBatory

YeGoblynQueenne · 2 years ago

You're accusing Odysseus of being a bloodthirsty asshole because he "stood by" while someone else killed a bunch of sleeping soldiers and because he, himself, killed the suitors who ganged up against him yelling "he's just one man, guys, let's get him" (liberally translated)? Clearly, we do not have the same definition of "bloodthirsty".

Which of the warriors were not bloodthirsty? Ajax, for example, was not bloodthirsty, who stood strong with his shield and without the help of the gods, a defensive bullwark for the Acheans. Hector, was not bloodthristy, who was just trying to defend his city and his people from the calamity brought on by his idiot brother who couldn't keep it in his pants. Aeneas was not bloodthirsty, who escaped the burning Troy to found Rome. Patroklus was not bloodthirsty but was just trying to save his friend's honour (by killing people, no doubt, but in the middle of a war).

Achilles killed Hector and dragged his dead body behind his chariot to desecrate it. He refused to hand it over to Priam, Hector's father, the king of Troy, when he, an old man, came begging on his knees in grief asking for Achilles to do the right thing by the gods. Achilles was an asshole. It is a disgrace that an entire epic poem was written for his "rage". Screw his rage.

Edit: remember also that Achilles was the only one of the Achean lords that didn't have to fight, because he hadn't taken the oath at Menelaus' and Helen's wedding (he was living as a girl at the time). He accepted the invitation to go to the war for glory- the glory of killing men. What a glory. Unlike the rest, he did not leave behind wife and children, and loyal dogs and slaves, because he had none to leave (though he did have a wife, I think). Not to mention: he was invulnerable (mostly) so he could cover himself in guts and glory without fear. Yeah, what a great hero.

tnecniv · 2 years ago

On Achilles, wasn’t he told he a god / oracle that he can choose between going and having his name remembered as a hero for all time at the cost of dying young or staying home, living a happy life, and nobody remembering him after he passed in old age?

tnecniv commented on Tubi Is Reviving a Lost Joy: Watching Bad Movies nytimes.com/2024/02/14/ma... · Posted by u/bookofjoe

tromp · 2 years ago

> But boy are they fun to watch — so deliriously bad they’re good.

I recently saw the ultimate condemnation in a movie review:

> this movie is bad, but not so bad that it's good.

tnecniv · 2 years ago

I’ve given that as a review to friends about movies before.

The ultimate sin is not being bad but being boring.

tnecniv commented on Everything is a linear model danielroelfs.com/blog/eve... · Posted by u/nopipeline

btdmaster · 2 years ago

I thought nonlinearity was very important to be able to make a larger model better than a smaller one? Like so important that tom7 made a half-joke demo with it: https://yewtu.be/watch?v=Ae9EKCyI1xU

tnecniv · 2 years ago

Nonlinear things start looking like linear things again in very high dimensions

tnecniv commented on Niagara Launcher niagaralauncher.app/... · Posted by u/unstuck3958

tnecniv · 2 years ago

I used Android for a long time before switching back to an iPhone. While mostly I’m happy with my iPhone, I do miss some of the UI customization features like being able to switch graphical shells like this

tnecniv commented on Daunting papers/books and how to read them mathoverflow.net/question... · Posted by u/todsacerdoti

billconan · 2 years ago

why do they have to write papers in a way that the readers have to chewing on them.

tnecniv · 2 years ago

They shouldn’t. It makes papers less accessible which means they’re less impactful. That said, a lot of academics are good at their discipline and bad at writing.

tnecniv commented on Predictability, Home Advantage, and Fairness in Team Sports michelecoscia.com/?p=2311... · Posted by u/mikk14

ebiester · 2 years ago

Salary caps don’t quite mean what they seem.

Labor is guaranteed a percentage of revenue by the league. Caps are normalized against the total percentage. Salaries past minimums are estimates.

So, not quite socialist but closer than the European model.

tnecniv · 2 years ago

The issue is it turns player wages into a zero sum game. In the NFL, quarterbacks have been taking up a bigger and bigger percentage of the cap, while players in positions that don’t last as long (due to injuries or just aging out) make less as a result. Now, on one hand, it makes sense because QBs have been more impactful to teams over the last 25 years, but at some level, you have to respect players like RBs who take more hits, have shorter careers, and more medical issues after retirement are getting shafted.

tnecniv commented on Comcast reluctantly agrees to stop its misleading "10G Network" claims arstechnica.com/tech-poli... · Posted by u/thunderbong

cyral · 2 years ago

Comcast was the only available provider at a home I rented years ago. The router arrived and I set it up, only to find that the WiFi range was (literally) a couple of feet a most. The antenna must not have been connected right internally.

Comcast Support's response? This must be because I am not on their higher priced plan. You can get faster speeds and longer range if you upgrade! The guy on the phone refused to believe that something could be wrong with this particular router.

Ended up going to a local store where the person said it happens a lot, and gave me the "upgraded" router instead.

tnecniv · 2 years ago

I moved into an apartment and kept the plan the previous resident had. They also sold us the non-xfinity router they had st a discount.

My roommate and I had spotty internet at various times of day. We measured it and it was way below what our plan claimed. The previous tenants had no such issue. Comcast refused to believe the problem was on their end and claimed my router was too old. This went on until I bought a new router just to prove a point (new router did nothing).

They finally send a repair guy out. He’s there for 5 minutes before diagnosing the problem: the cables were water logged to hell and back. He fixed it in 20 minutes and was gone.