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Maybe the default settings are too high

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Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#121

Post by bee_rider »

teekert wrote: post #103
Archelaos wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Slow reading of HN comments also has its benefits.

I guess this person sees the same mental image as me: Tents with wet floor, moisture sucked into everything inside. A tent that’s been in a lake sounds like a throwaway to me. But maybe what you see as a tent is different from what I see. For me the story was also a bit weird. “Just take the tents out of the water”. Ok…

Thanks for the attempt at a generous reading, but the truth of the matter is I just skimmed the comment and missed that bit. These things happen, no biggie.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#122

Post by teekert »

jibal wrote: post #117
teekert wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess this person sees the same mental image as me: Tents with wet floor, moisture sucked into everything inside. A tent that’s been in a lake sounds like a throwaway to me. But maybe what you see as a tent is different from what I see. For me the story was also a bit weird. “Just take the tents out of the water”. Ok…

Even if that were true (and it obviously isn't), what then would be the point of expending tremendous time and energy to "dam it off and keep it dry"? These are alternative ways to keep the tents dry ... which entails that they were never soaked in the first place. > A tent that’s been in a lake The tents were never in the lake. A few inches of the campsite was in the lake at high water. > sounds like a throwaway to…

I guess the term "tent" is pretty broad, this is what I see: [0], the cotton does not take being in water very well.

But I guess a synthetic ultra light tent will do better.

I also assumed the tents were already there when he arrived (complete assumption, but the term campsite conjures up a place with tents already there), and so must be of the more heavy more stationary kind.

Anyway, the point is, I also had this question: Where do you go when you mess up your tent like that? How can a dam in a layer of water make it dry? Don't you need a dam and then pump it dry.

This is going too far, I just wanted to defend the question. Maybe it's a cultural difference.

[0] https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=de+waard+tent&ia=images&iax...

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#124

Post by bigstrat2003 »

FridayoLeary wrote: post #49
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #21

One of the pleasures of reading literature is noticing how compressed they are. This is true for Tolkien, Turgenev, Hemingway or Pound. The amount of information per page—per word!—is incredibly high, which permits the conveyance of ideas which simply do not land when spoken more plainly. You don’t need to go to high literature to find this density, by the way. Political speeches from Republican Rome and America’s Fo…

It's interesting you mention that. Even Obamas detractors admit he spoke well. True, but i find JFKs speeches are on a different level from that. And it's not just him, but the contrast is particularly striking. Now in the UK all we get are monotonous robots or people who have clearly had intensive coaching in how to speak in a clear. Decisive. Direct. Way, to inspire confidence and project competence. The two qualit…

> Even Obamas detractors admit he spoke well. True, but i find JFKs speeches are on a different level from that. And it's not just him, but the contrast is particularly striking.

My off the cuff observation is that there is a lot less mastery of language than there used to be in America. I'm not really sure why, but compare the grand language used by the early political leaders to, say, Obama, and it's striking. And that's not saying Obama is a bad speaker! He has a ton of charisma and makes you want to like his ideas by the way he presents them. But he's never given something on the level of Lincoln's Gettysburg address (in my opinion at least).

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#125

Post by fkarg »

The base material needs to be of a minimum quality for that experience to be enjoyable, I presume. I totally see the value of that, which is one of the reasons to sometimes reduce playback speed below what my default would be. Writings from Tolkien are maybe some of the best suited for that, but I'm not 100% convinced it would work for what I'm reading currently, so I might just try it anyway - the Foundation series from Asimov.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#126

Post by satvikpendem »

retsibsi wrote: post #101
satvikpendem wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then just use 0.75 or 0.5x speed? I don't understand this question.

> Then just use 0.75 or 0.5x speed? I think this often sounds unsettling (like the reader is drunk or otherwise impaired), and anyway the listener doesn't need more time to recognise each individual word -- they want time to take in sentences and paragraphs.

Get a text to speech app and change the lengths between sentences while keeping the actual read aloud speed the same, I recall using something like that before.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#127

Post by jibal »

teekert wrote: post #122
jibal wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if that were true (and it obviously isn't), what then would be the point of expending tremendous time and energy to "dam it off and keep it dry"? These are alternative ways to keep the tents dry ... which entails that they were never soaked in the first place. > A tent that’s been in a lake The tents were never in the lake. A few inches of the campsite was in the lake at high water. > sounds like a throwaway to…

I guess the term "tent" is pretty broad, this is what I see: [0], the cotton does not take being in water very well. But I guess a synthetic ultra light tent will do better. I also assumed the tents were already there when he arrived (complete assumption, but the term campsite conjures up a place with tents already there), and so must be of the more heavy more stationary kind. Anyway, the point is, I also had this qu…

> the term campsite conjures up a place with tents already there

You've never been camping. Ok.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#128

Post by zem »

chilmers wrote: post #2

If you’re a fan of LOTR but don’t fancy reading it aloud yourself, I’d really recommend the new audio versions read by Andy Serkis. While I don’t vibe with every facet of his performance, overall it’s a tour-de-force, and really makes the prose come to life. Especially in those descriptive sections that it’s possible to glaze over when reading the text. Having an actor of the calibre of Serkis reading them to you bri…

for lotr in particular my last reread was slower paced because I kept this map[0] open and paused frequently to refer to it and see where everyone was. it was super enjoyable, I have literally read the book dozens of times before that and have never gotten so good a sense of the world's geography and the difficulty of various journeys.

[0] https://old.reddit.com/r/tolkienfans/comments/100n0y/maybe_t...

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#129

Post by underdeserver »

fgonzag wrote: post #84
chrisfosterelli wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I often do this in meetings and have gotten into the habit of saying "I'm thinking". It's not much but it gives both of us time to think and explicitly makes it clear I don't expect the person to say something. I think that helps.

I just blurt out "processing" when they start looking at me weird. People tend to take it well.

I read this at first as "I just blurt out "processing" and people look at me weird", which made me smile.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#130

Post by merelythere »

powvans wrote: post #11

I find walking can be a similar experience. It really crystalized for me this summer while walking the Camino de Santiago because of the effect of exploring another country. When you walk, you see everything. The world is huge. Everything is slower, higher fidelity, and for me, richer. You can spend an entire day walking from one town to another. Think of everything you will see! Compare this to driving. Driving is l…

Had the same feeling a while ago, I called it the teleportation effect. From the moment you reduce the time needed to go somewhere, you alter the experience to a point that it's not recognizable. Not to say that it's not nice to see the mountain from the sky for one hour but it is an other thing to go through them.

Something to break the teleportation is obviously to make breaks and enjoy where you are (a lake not too far on the road, any viewpoint...). Plan in advance, have a tent, be ready to not reach your target in one day and you will enjoy a much better a road trip than a train, a plane or even the highway.

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