The Swamp

Because I’m busy: LISTS

October 28th, 2006 at 3:02 pm (Tales of the Swamp, Life Lessons, The Internet, Psychology & Cognitive Science, Cute Things)

Here are some fun things I’ve found in the last few months but never had the time to post a grand missive about them. I haven’t been very entertaining for the last few weeks/months, and I apologize; I almost never, NEVER feel stressed out about school, but I’m actually starting to let it get to me. I was on the verge of a fit, yesterday, so I knit a little bit and that made me feel more relaxed. Still lots of work left to do, so I shall have to construct this post entirely out of cut/paste. No time to think for blogging! My background processes are entirely devoted to backpropagation algorithms in LISP and fretting about how on earth I’m going to get my grad school applications in on time.

But first, brainbar. It is literally the coolest application of EEG in the whole wide world. There is too much I want to write and explore about this. “Brainbar is a mechanical bar that mixes drinks according to the visitor’s brainwaves. The bar reads the brain frequencies (EEG or electroencephalogram) in the alpha and beta wavelength. These wavelengths are generally considered to be synonymous with the states of relaxation and activity in the mind. Thus the BrainBar serves the drink most suited for you, at the moment of measurement. BrainBar can be seen as a mediator or manipulator designed to give a party its perfect state of enhanced socialising, carefully adjusting the drinks served so that every guest stays within acceptable parameters for a “good” behaviour or, if the settings allow, a “bad” behaviour. By the use of alcohol and medical herb essences, the bar can emotionally equalize or polarize the group of guests. This can be seen as a sociological experiment exploring how much a person is prepared to submit to external forces and how far the person can allow a machine to intrude on the body.”

• Wondermark by David Malki - In which a Plan comes together
• A Hydrogen Fuelled Racing Car
• Downsizing: or, Cannibalism in the Cars, by Mark Twain
• A Nation of Wimps
• The BBC has received a mixed reaction to a spoof documentary broadcast this evening about spaghetti crops in Switzerland.
• Spiral Highway. First, it acts as a massive traffic decongestion device… by adding significant mileage to the highway in the form of a spiral.
• Text Text Revolution | Flash Flash Revolution
• Dapper: The Data Mapper
• Morning Sunshine (cute games!)

I’m still working on GRE studying and lots of assignments coming up. Here are some good sites for word roots and verbal prep:

• Z250 - Word Roots A - C
• Prefixes, Greek and Latin Roots
• Know Your Roots
• Common Word Roots
• Greek and Latin Roots for GRE Preparation
• GRE Vocabulary Builder
• SLAC GRE Verbal Handouts (I mentioned this before, but I’m mentioning it again because it fits in here and it’s a great resource)

Here is my todo list for Sat-Tues, to cross off when it’s finished:

1. Read paper for PSYC 490 presentation
2. Write up 490 presentation outline
3. Testing and Analysis of backprop algorithm
4. Do GRE practice exams: [1 / 2]
5. Go over GRE essay prompts and think deeply about each one [50 / 100 / 150 / 200]
6. Decide on honours thesis
7. Work for research supervisor
8. Read papers for 490 research report
9. Write 490 research report
10. Read over and plan out 490 research report
11. Finish backpropagation algorithm
12. Read chapter 6 of PSYC 550 book
13. Find relevant references for 490 presentation
14. Download GRE book from the internet

Here are my percentile grades from GRE prepping I’ve done so far:

• Arithmetic - 96%
• Algebra - 92%
• Geometry - 87%
• Data Analysis - 63%
• Antonyms - 87%
• Analogies - 90%
• Sentence Completion - 82%
• Reading Passages - 56%

Still more work yet to be done.