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Maybe the default settings are too high

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Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#41

Post by sublinear »

loloquwowndueo wrote: post #27
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…

Noooo. Audio books feed you the content at someone else’s pace, not at your (slow) pace, which is exactly what TFA advocates. Or, what are you going to do? Hit Pause after each sentence so you can fully digest and savor it?

I hate audiobooks because they're way too slow and full of moods/tones that often contradict how I would have read it. I can't be the only one who thinks they're overindulgent and annoying.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#42

Post by neutronicus »

xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #39

> I’ve found reading aloud helpful for staying engaged — limiting myself to mouth-speed rather than eye-speed means I won’t rush, miss important details, and then lose interest, which has always been a problem for me. This worked for me... for a time. And then what happened surprised me (but maybe shouldn't have): I started zoning out and thinking about other things, missing important details, while reading aloud. Wi…

It's a capability with which having children will make you intimately familiar

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#44

Post by colmmacc »

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…

There is a great meditation in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance about the differences between riding and driving. Being open to the elements, in and a part of nature, is visceral. Bubbled in a car, our surroundings are observed more than experienced. That's always resonated for me.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#45

Post by xeonmc »

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…

And presumably political speeches from Republican America combines the best of those two?

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#46

Post by UltraSane »

loloquwowndueo wrote: post #27
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…

Noooo. Audio books feed you the content at someone else’s pace, not at your (slow) pace, which is exactly what TFA advocates. Or, what are you going to do? Hit Pause after each sentence so you can fully digest and savor it?

Audible and most audiobook player apps let you control the speed. I usually listen at 1.25 to 1.5

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#48

Post by bell-cot »

neutronicus wrote: post #42
xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #39

> I’ve found reading aloud helpful for staying engaged — limiting myself to mouth-speed rather than eye-speed means I won’t rush, miss important details, and then lose interest, which has always been a problem for me. This worked for me... for a time. And then what happened surprised me (but maybe shouldn't have): I started zoning out and thinking about other things, missing important details, while reading aloud. Wi…

It's a capability with which having children will make you intimately familiar

By the 3rd week of Goodnight Moon at bedtime, are you still reading the printed words?

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#49

Post by FridayoLeary »

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 qualities entirely absent in most of our politicians.

The less said about the other side of the pond the better.

Re: Maybe the default settings are too high

#50

Post by nabbed »

This can work with the way you think as well.

Many years ago, I had a technical manager who never felt any pressure to be the first to come up with the answer to a question or the solution to some problem. If I was having a technical conversation with him, and we arrived at a particularly subtle or complex issue, he could go completely silent, just staring straight ahead with his fingers to his lips. I would find it very uncomfortable, and I would start blurting out half-baked ideas to fill the silence, but he would either raise his finger or (usually) just ignore me. This could go on for 30-60 seconds, at which point he might shrug and say "I don't know" or, more likely, have a pretty well formed idea of how to move ahead.

I used to joke to my co-workers that during those silent interludes, he was swapping in the solution from a remote disk.

This manager also typed with one or two fingers, and pretty slowly too. But he wrote a lot of good code.

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