things I just don't understand, pleae help.

[robbidobbs]

Gosh thanks Jovankat. I look forward to the next M&G.
Yesterday I needed hugs. I'm feeling a bit better today. It's folks here that have kept me going on countless occasions.
Stepping back, Figjams right, 5 people on a BM hating site does not a consensus make.

It's going to be a rough 3 weeks for me here at Defaultia.
Please bear with. I'll be under the NEB sometimes, and on bullhorn other times. I'll try to refrain from drunk posting, that shit doesn't seem to work for me how intended.

True creativity comes thru solitude. I read that somewhere.

[mooserider]

It was the word shrill that hurt the most.
Struck me as sexist and hurtful.

Uh, a merely technical observation. Were you overloading your bullhorn? When an audio amplifier clips, it creates odd harmonics of all the signals going through it. For example, if you were singing on middle C too loud, the clipping would create the 3rd harmonic on the G an octave above your tone, plus additional harmonics at even higher pitches. So, distorting your voice by overloading the bullhorn's amplifier would add a lot of high pitches (and not all at pleasant musical intervals, due to another electrical effect called intermodulation). You mentioned you were using a cheap bullhorn, which means probably a low-quality and low-power (i.e., easy to overload) amplifier to begin with. You might want to get a mobile PA amp (which would have more "headroom" before clipping) with speakers and a hand-held microphone. After all, if the DJ'd art cars can do it, why not you?

[robbidobbs]

It was cheap to begin with, and sucked a lot of dirt. It got thru 2 burns before I got it replaced with a professional bullhorn, so sound quality probably played a factor in the complaint.
Also, it did take me some practice to not overload it just because I wasn't use to NOT yelling.

I'd like it if I could get lower harmonics better, would sound richer. The PA has good lower range. Ibought a backup bullhorn for this year in case my good one fails. The hand mic keeps cutting out, and I don't know enough about electronics to diagnose it. Worrisome.
The backup has the power button right next to the siren button, both small. Bad design. I do know enough about electronics to disable that siren shit.

[FIGJAM]

Loud bullhorn+ sultry whispers= saving your voice and "god damn I could listen to that shit all day" audience!!!!!!!!!

[MyDearFriend]

(((Robbi))) please continue to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

Yggy I hear what you are saying about not knowing what to believe. I wish more people in our public education system would spend some energy teaching people how to think instead of what to think.

The current trend in reporting is to build every story around a conflict and to present opposing statements AS IF every person's position is equally supported in all situations.

It is true that every person is entitled to his or her opinion. But some persons are more qualified than others to make judgments or give advice on specific topics. Any many people are biased in ways that are easy to uncover with a little attention.

The plethora of information available to us today can be a blessing. But a lot of it is just wrong.

When faced with a statement I like to ask myself:

Who said that?

Why did he/she/they say that? why now? why here?

Can this be tested? Has this been tested? Is this congruent with the results of other tests?

Think about what you are told before you decide whether or not to believe it.

And please please please remember that big-picture predictions are not invalidated by small-picture exceptions. Think about that. For example, the weather forecast today for my city is rain. Currently at this moment it is not raining where I am. But it is a rainy day here in DC, nonetheless, and I will dress accordingly.

[robbidobbs]

Thanks MDF! Hugging you back!

[BoyScoutGirl]

...Yggy I hear what you are saying about not knowing what to believe. I wish more people in our public education system would spend some energy teaching people how to think instead of what to think. ...

One greenhorn science teacher reporting for duty! It's tough to fight "the system" that is so effective at rewarding students for regurgitating memorized information, but please know that it's a fight most educators agree is well worth the effort.

Now I'm going to quote what MDF said because it's very accurate and is worth repeating. In fact, it's pretty much exactly what I teach my students the first week of every science course.

...
The current trend in reporting is to build every story around a conflict and to present opposing statements AS IF every person's position is equally supported in all situations.

It is true that every person is entitled to his or her opinion. But some persons are more qualified than others to make judgments or give advice on specific topics. Any many people are biased in ways that are easy to uncover with a little attention.

The plethora of information available to us today can be a blessing. But a lot of it is just wrong.

When faced with a statement I like to ask myself:

Who said that?

Why did he/she/they say that? why now? why here?

Can this be tested? Has this been tested? Is this congruent with the results of other tests?

Think about what you are told before you decide whether or not to believe it.

And please please please remember that big-picture predictions are not invalidated by small-picture exceptions. Think about that. For example, the weather forecast today for my city is rain. Currently at this moment it is not raining where I am. But it is a rainy day here in DC, nonetheless, and I will dress accordingly.

"An unexamined life is not worth living," and an unexamined scientific claim is likewise worthless. It is the nature of scientific investigation to continually strive to refine our understanding. That involves making guesses, testing them repeatedly, and often throwing them out when they are inconsistent with reality. Like your beautiful stonework, Ygmir, you have to rough in the basic shape before refining the details.

Occasionally revolutions and big discoveries occur, but any such extraordinary claim requires evidence to withstand scrutiny. And it takes a long time and a lot of effort to build up multiple lines of evidence. This is where the impatient media, politicians, and confused public want a "factual" explanation when any scientist worth their salt will say "we're not certain but we think this is how it works..." A great recent example is plate tectonics, proposed in 1912 but largely denied by geologists until as late as the 1950s and 60s.

It may take a while and include many a poorly-conceived explanation later refuted, but science will get us to a better understanding. In fact, I believe it's the only thing that will get us there.

[MyDearFriend]

It may take a while and include many a poorly-conceived explanation later refuted, but science will get us to a better understanding. In fact, I believe it's the only thing that will get us there.

Even if some of us have to be dragged there backwards!

No I believe science works and really is helping. We are a lot better at surviving than our ancestors were, stronger and more diverse, though folks will always kick & scream about how great things were in the good old days...

Going downhill is the natural way,
For the old folks work and the young folks play,
And the pioneer morals universally decay...

...and our food is all ingredients, yup...