Tuesday, February 22, 2005
Saturday, February 12, 2005
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Here are some facts about why things are the way they are:
1. Most of the energy in the frequency spectrum of a natural signal (noise, image, etc.) is at the low frequencies, and it drops off as a function of 1/f. This is because a big thing can have smaller things on it (like a field can have grass and rocks on it) but a small thing can't have bigger things on it. And also, as something gets smaller by x amount (i.e. * it by 1/x), its surface area gets another 1/x smaller (i.e. * it by 1/x squared). So the first 1/x is scaling wavelength, the inverse of frequency, and the second 1/x is like the potential energy at x (yes, at itself). Amazing!
So things have to be that way.
2. Most of the energy in natural scenes is at horizontal, and then vertical, orientations. This is because of gravity. Gravity makes things flat, causing horizons and other horizontal contours, and also vertical contours if you're up close and looking down on it. Living things, for one, contribute a lot to vertical energy. Otherwise (if they were dead) they'd be flat. So, on earth at least, you have tons of vertical symmetry, because they proper way for a thing to be is upright. Trees are vertical, people are vertical, cats are vertical, etc. So things also have to be that way.
3. Your brain already knows these things, even if you didn't know it knew. It's ready to process things in the environment according to regularities that it expects to find all over the place. This saves you time and energy, so you can expend it getting better at playing video games.
Now you've learned something! Tell everyone you know! But not engineers, they'll get picky on you. I hope no engineers are reading this.
1. Most of the energy in the frequency spectrum of a natural signal (noise, image, etc.) is at the low frequencies, and it drops off as a function of 1/f. This is because a big thing can have smaller things on it (like a field can have grass and rocks on it) but a small thing can't have bigger things on it. And also, as something gets smaller by x amount (i.e. * it by 1/x), its surface area gets another 1/x smaller (i.e. * it by 1/x squared). So the first 1/x is scaling wavelength, the inverse of frequency, and the second 1/x is like the potential energy at x (yes, at itself). Amazing!
So things have to be that way.
2. Most of the energy in natural scenes is at horizontal, and then vertical, orientations. This is because of gravity. Gravity makes things flat, causing horizons and other horizontal contours, and also vertical contours if you're up close and looking down on it. Living things, for one, contribute a lot to vertical energy. Otherwise (if they were dead) they'd be flat. So, on earth at least, you have tons of vertical symmetry, because they proper way for a thing to be is upright. Trees are vertical, people are vertical, cats are vertical, etc. So things also have to be that way.
3. Your brain already knows these things, even if you didn't know it knew. It's ready to process things in the environment according to regularities that it expects to find all over the place. This saves you time and energy, so you can expend it getting better at playing video games.
Now you've learned something! Tell everyone you know! But not engineers, they'll get picky on you. I hope no engineers are reading this.
Thursday, February 03, 2005
Friday, January 28, 2005
Assuming you were born and lived your entire life in the year 1996 (that's where these deathrates are from, USA), here's the likelihood that you'd make it to the end of each of these age groups:
AGE:______DEATHRATE: PERSONS: INTEGER PERSONS:
BORN______?????______100.00______100
00-01_____0.75%_______99.25______99
01-04_____0.04%_______99.09______98
05-14_____0.02%_______98.88______97
15-24_____0.09%_______97.98______96
25-34_____0.13%_______96.73______94
35-44_____0.22%_______94.57______91
45-54_____0.45%_______90.34______86
55-64_____1.10%_______80.40______76
65-74_____2.55%_______59.89______56
75-84_____5.82%_______25.04______23
85+______15.33%_______21.20______19
Obviously I didn't include the likelihood that you were aborted right off, as I give you a 100% chance of being born. I have a feeling that figures I'd find on that matter would be controversial. I'm not trying to be controversial, I'm trying to make you feel better! But I don't think it would take but a percentage point or so off. Your chances don't start to really hurt until you get into the 30's (or the 50's if you're an optimist). Also, you see that if you don't allow for being a partial person (i.e. rounding down), your chances suffer.
I'm not too impressed with myself at seeing this chart, as I have around a 96% chance of having made it so far, and less than a 1% chance of screwing it up in the next 10 years. Easy!
AGE:______DEATHRATE: PERSONS: INTEGER PERSONS:
BORN______?????______100.00______100
00-01_____0.75%_______99.25______99
01-04_____0.04%_______99.09______98
05-14_____0.02%_______98.88______97
15-24_____0.09%_______97.98______96
25-34_____0.13%_______96.73______94
35-44_____0.22%_______94.57______91
45-54_____0.45%_______90.34______86
55-64_____1.10%_______80.40______76
65-74_____2.55%_______59.89______56
75-84_____5.82%_______25.04______23
85+______15.33%_______21.20______19
Obviously I didn't include the likelihood that you were aborted right off, as I give you a 100% chance of being born. I have a feeling that figures I'd find on that matter would be controversial. I'm not trying to be controversial, I'm trying to make you feel better! But I don't think it would take but a percentage point or so off. Your chances don't start to really hurt until you get into the 30's (or the 50's if you're an optimist). Also, you see that if you don't allow for being a partial person (i.e. rounding down), your chances suffer.
I'm not too impressed with myself at seeing this chart, as I have around a 96% chance of having made it so far, and less than a 1% chance of screwing it up in the next 10 years. Easy!
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