how ignorant are you?

[cowhead]

I know a little about alot of things.. but... then again.. yeah I'm with you on the microwaves, cars,simple math.. oh geez everything! funny thing that I've run across is that most people I've met online and actually get along with are all in the same boat. overactive underachivers... over read and undereducated (or the reverse a few times)

and you really ought to order a gyro, they're damn yummy! (uh, not just because I work in a greek resturaunt... for real greeks!)

[smoothmoniker]

Originally Posted by mrnoodle

re:sound -- when you are hearing two tones simultaneously, are the vibrations of each tone occupying the same space simultaneously? and if they are, why don't the vibrations interfere with each other and change the tones? How can the two frequencies coexist? If you drop a stone in the water, and then drop a bigger stone, the bigger vibration trumps the little one.

Kind of

When two waves of pressure occupy the same space, they combine additively. If you drop a small stone with a 1 inch wave, and then a large stone with a 2 foot wave, when the two of them occupy the same space, the wave will be 2'1" high. The same thing with sound frequencies in a space. When a large wave and a small wave occupy the same space, they combine additively.

The reason they don't all get mashed up is that our ears are very, very good at reversing the process. They can listen to an complex waveform and pick out the composing simple waves.

[lookout123]

our ears are very, very good at reversing the process.

until they are damaged from long periods of listening to the sounds you enjoy the most at high volumes... then the background noise of everyday life can be a real bitch.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by smoothmoniker

Kind of

When two waves of pressure occupy the same space, they combine additively. If you drop a small stone with a 1 inch wave, and then a large stone with a 2 foot wave, when the two of them occupy the same space, the wave will be 2'1" high. The same thing with sound frequencies in a space. When a large wave and a small wave occupy the same space, they combine additively.

The reason they don't all get mashed up is that our ears are very, very good at reversing the process. They can listen to an complex waveform and pick out the composing simple waves.

sm, perhaps and explanation of frequency versus amplitude would help here. Strictly speaking, two waves of equal frequency, each having an amplitued of 2'1", but one is from a pair of rocks like you described and the other from a single rock that makes that same wave would be indistinguishable from each other.

regarding the record player example, it's just like the speaker/microphone example. the physical movement of the needle in the wavy groove moves back and forth as it follows the sides of the groove on the record. As it swings left and right, it moves inside a coil of wire. This movement inside a coil of wire induces a current in the wire, which is then amplified, just like the other examples.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by smoothmoniker

Kind of

When two waves of pressure occupy the same space, they combine additively. If you drop a small stone with a 1 inch wave, and then a large stone with a 2 foot wave, when the two of them occupy the same space, the wave will be 2'1" high. The same thing with sound frequencies in a space. When a large wave and a small wave occupy the same space, they combine additively.

The reason they don't all get mashed up is that our ears are very, very good at reversing the process. They can listen to an complex waveform and pick out the composing simple waves.

sm, perhaps and explanation of frequency versus amplitude would help here. Strictly speaking, two waves of equal frequency, each having an amplitude of 2'1", but one is from a pair of rocks like you described and the other from a single rock that makes that same wave would be indistinguishable from each other.

regarding the record player example, it's just like the speaker/microphone example. the physical movement of the needle in the wavy groove moves back and forth as it follows the sides of the groove on the record. As it swings left and right, it moves inside a coil of wire. This movement inside a coil of wire induces a current in the wire, which is then amplified, just like the other examples.

[lookout123]

thought it was that important of point, didja/

[Tonchi]

Originally Posted by Catwoman

Tonchi do you have any deep-seated problems from discussing Ulysses at the age of 5?

See? You're assuming immediately that Ulysses means the Joyce novel, you ADULT you

For me at that age, it was an exciting epic of the Trojan war, where guys ran around in really cool costumes, like Brad Pitt recently brought to our attention, and all this beautiful stuff was still buried in the sand out there somewhere and when I grew up I wanted to go discover it. I still remember vividly when Life Magazine released the first photos of the excavation of the (assumed) Tomb of Midas. But discussing it with anybody else was impossible, so I just read and read and read. When I wrote my Senior Thesis in High School it was about Cliff Dwellers of the American Southwest. I'll never forget the look on my teacher's face, she was considered one of the most refined and educated people in our town (and a bona fide Southern Belle) and all she could say was "I never even knew this existed. However did you get interested in THAT?" That's why I loved college. When you keep climbing up the educational ladder, all of a sudden people who have the same interests as you do show up, rising from the stew of "normal" people that you were all lost in before.

OK, but about the novel, I never knew how the name was correctly pronounced until I was 18. The book was gibberish, a total waste of the time it took to read it. Then last year there was an article in one of my magazines, I think it was Smithsonian, that Ulysses is a masterpiece of language containing puns and codes which would do the Kabbalah proud. But even so, I'm not interested in reading it again (got enough from Ulysses for Dummies on the web)

[Clodfobble]

Ulysses is nothing compared to Finnegan's Wake.

[BrianR]

Here are a few links that will help you understand VCRs, Tape players and such work. HowStuffWorks is a marvel!

http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/vcr.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/tv.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/cassette.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/video-format.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/cd.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/dvd.htm
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/speaker.htm


That should get you started in the right direction.

Brian

[wolf]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Ulysses is nothing compared to Finnegan's Wake.

Never really read either (I had Joyce's Ulysses out of the library once when I was in high school, paged through it a bit and decided it was uninteresting), but I did make a half hearted attempt at Gravity's Rainbow once. I haven't made that mistake again in a while though. But it still lurks there in the unread pile.

[wolf]

Just a thought, but maybe a separate thread for dispelling the darkness of ignorance would be appropriate?

[Tonchi]

Originally Posted by wolf

Just a thought, but maybe a separate thread for dispelling the darkness of ignorance would be appropriate?

You can find that on the Harry Potter forum

As for Ulysses the novel, I suppose you have to be drunk or Irish or both to get through it. Not because you will understand it better but rather because you won't CARE.

[Catwoman]

Thanks to all that have posted answers to the CD/tape thing.

I am now (yawn) going to take a week off to try and sort through this vast wealth of knowledge and really try to understand it.

You must appreciate this is as easy for me to understand as... the international statutes surrounding pharmacy law. It may take some time...

[staceyv]

I am completely ingnorant about all sports. I couldn't tell you how many players are in a baseball game, basketball game, or football.

I have no idea what a linebacker is, or any of those other names they give themselves.

The only sports people I know are : Larry Bird, Kevin Mckale (sp?) (My uncle liked them when I was little), Michael Jordan, and Tiger Woods (From TV commercials, I guess.)

I don't know how they make points or how many points they need to win.
I don't understand why a minute in sports is actually 3-10 minutes in real time, either.

I don't get any of it. If I am forced to sit in front of it, I space out and look at the guys' butts or wonder how much money they make, or I'll look at the fans and wonder why they are so excited and why they even care.

Then I'll get mad when people all start yelling at the TV, because it scares me. I'll just be sitting there calmly, deep in my own thoughts, and all of a sudden- "WAAAAAHHH, YEAAAAAH, NIIICE! WOOOH HOOO!". It makes me jump like I'm gonna have a heart attack. What the hell is the big deal?

By the way, I also don't get why everybody puts all these spaces in their posts, and I only do it because someone asked me to, and it's easy to do, so if it makes you happy, fine.

But, what do you do if you're reading a book? They don't have double spaces between each new thought. Neither do business letters or other standard formats for writing. They have indented paragraphs, but they don't separate different ideas within the paragraph.
My post about sports should technically be all in one paragraph, at least if I remember correctly from school.

[mrnoodle]

Originally Posted by staceyv

My post about sports should technically be all in one paragraph, at least if I remember correctly from school.

You don't