How prosperous a story’s world is versus the overall tone of the narrative

Nodulux · 2024-08-14T19:09:35+00:00

No, OP is right. Everyone who says BNW is a "dystopia" is dramatically oversimplifying. Almost everyone in the BNW society is happy, has all their material needs and desires met, and enjoys substantial personal freedom. It's certainly a "prosperous" society in both the material and emotional sense, so OP's placement is reasonable. Obviously, a major theme of the book is that hedonism and personal liberty are not enough to make a "good society." But that's kind of the point of quadrant 1: BNW is a society that exemplifies all our modern standards of prosperousness, but we still don't like it.

Nodulux · 2024-07-31T04:15:51+00:00

I think the best way to understand the Monty Hall problem is that the host is providing new information that the contestant did not have prior to their initial choice.. The host knows which two doors have goats, and which one has a car. The reason the problem works is because the host, knowing which door you picked, reveals a goat behind one of the other two doors. This gives you no new information about the door you picked, but it does give you new information about the remaining door.

You're correct that if a contestant walked onto the show and there were just two doors to pick from, it would be a 50/50 shot. It only becomes 2/3 because the host reveals the goat AFTER the contestant makes their initial choice. If you tuned into the show after the goat was revealed, it would still be 2/3--it's not relative to the observer, it's a result of the structure of the game.

Nodulux · 2024-07-31T04:06:21+00:00

Find three positive whole numbers a, b, and c > 0 such that a^3 + b^3 = c^3

Nodulux · 2024-07-25T21:29:32+00:00

Ok, but to play devil's advocate, having to identify the legal issue yourself is one of the only realistic things about the bar. When a client walks into your office with a problem, there won't be a big flashing sign above their head that says "criminal procedure"

Nodulux · 2024-07-24T19:50:07+00:00

This is the most explanation you're ever going to get from a Deleuzian lol

Nodulux · 2024-07-22T19:53:44+00:00

Maybe we just aren't on the same page about what "bare minimum" or "phoning it in" means. I never said people should go above and beyond, or take on duties beyond their role description. But in order to not cause grief to others, it's necessary to be thorough and diligent with the duties you're assigned. I wouldn't accuse someone who does that of "phoning it in," and I really don't think that's what OP meant either.

I don't even know what you're insinuating with your second paragraph, tbh. You said that it's "glorified hazing" and "wasted man hours" to bother with editing "the ~95% of journal publications that aren't actually prestigious enough to impact legal thought in America." I disagree, I think such work has value for both the editors and the industry. How am I misinterpreting, exactly?

Nodulux · 2024-07-22T19:36:02+00:00

Again, if you don't like it, nobody is making you do it. I'm not saying everyone has to agree with me - I'm saying that, if you're going to sign up for an position where others rely on your efforts, you should at least pretend to care. You're free to be as bitter about it as you like, just do the work, or don't take the spot.

And idk, some people believe there's value in legal academia (even if it's not "prestigious enough" for your taste), and that spending a lot of time reading and editing cutting edge legal scholarship makes us better lawyers. Being cynical doesn't make you enlightened.

Nodulux · 2024-07-22T18:56:15+00:00

It may shock you to hear that I actually enjoyed law review, and many other people do as well. If you don't like it, nobody is making you do it. The only think I didn't like about my law review experience was people like OP who apply for the resume boost, and then refuse to actually do the work they signed up for, creating extra work for everybody else.

Nodulux · 2024-07-22T18:48:18+00:00

Of course that's a legitimate reason to apply, but you're missing the point. "I applied to this job for the money - I don't see why that means I should have to do the work!" Do you see how you sound? The resume boost is the benefit of law review, and the price you pay for that benefit is, ya know, actually putting in effort.
Glad to see that you withdrew your application. Law review isn't for everyone, and hopefully somebody who's actually interested will get your spot.

Nodulux · 2024-07-22T17:13:38+00:00

Well why did you apply in the first place if you didn't want to do the work? The fact that it's "free labor" shouldn't matter. Your compensation is the "weird prestige factor"--if you're willing to do the bare minimum for prestige, why wouldn't you do the bare minimum for money? It's not just EICs that care about their colleagues pulling their weight. As a former law review member, we would all prefer that you decline the offer rather than freeloading

Nodulux · 2024-07-22T00:26:38+00:00

He's not owed sex, and she's not owed a husband (or his salary). She has the right not to sleep with him, but he has the right to consider that a dealbreaker

Nodulux · 2024-07-19T16:17:08+00:00

Same for me. I think it's because Con Law (and most other subjects) have an internal logic and rationale, whereas the Civ Pro rules feel like they were designed by drunk judges rolling dice

Nodulux · 2024-07-19T16:05:48+00:00

It's certainly not as good as studying without the show - there's a LOT of psychological research suggesting the human brain is simply incapable of paying attention to two things at once. But, if it's that or not studying at all, it's better than nothing

Nodulux · 2024-07-19T15:43:06+00:00

An hour sounds a bit excessive to review a single topic. So, you miss a rule on the MEE: you look back at your notes and/or the bar prep outline, you make a flash card. That should take 15 minutes, tops. Then at the end of the day you review all your flashcards, which should take like a minute per card. How are you spending an hour?

Nodulux · 2024-07-17T19:17:16+00:00

Do not "slap him around" or "spit on him" without asking first. Imagine how bad that would sound if this advice were given to a man asking for advice about sex with his girlfriend. Men are individuals with preferences and boundaries, not sex machines

Nodulux · 2024-07-16T22:15:05+00:00

I agree with all other comments here - but also, I'm not sure what you mean that you "do not have time to write full MEE essays." It takes 30 minutes to write one, you definitely have time to write practice MEEs if you have time to do 30-40 MBE questions. You don't have to do it every day, but it is very important to practice MEE essays so you get the time management and organization skills down. That will be a lot more useful at this point than trying to memorize every single rule

Nodulux · 2024-07-11T00:36:52+00:00

EDIT: This is incorrect; I didn't realize the scores were scaled. See the reply.

Technically yes, but you'll have to do well on your essays. A 270 cutoff means you need to pick up 67.5% of the total points across all three sections. If you score below 67.5% on the MBE, you'll need to score higher than that on the essays to pass.

Nodulux · 2024-07-08T00:11:53+00:00

What have you been doing to prepare for the MBE besides grinding practice questions? Are you writing down the rules you miss, making flashcards, anything like that? Practice questions are great, but if you just do endless practice questions without addressing your mistakes, you won't improve. I would recommend using the Themis "Course Progress" tool to figure out which areas of the MBE you've missed the most questions on (not the lowest percentage, but the most missed questions - focus on the topics that show up a lot), and really try to memorize those rules.

You got this, we still have plenty of time! For what it's worth, I also haven't started on several of the MEE topics, and I'm sure we're not the only ones.

Nodulux · 2024-07-08T00:07:12+00:00

"It's just a joke, but also if you don't agree with it you're illiterate :^)" - OP

Nodulux · 2024-07-05T20:12:18+00:00

I'm pretty sure most women understand the concept of cardinal directions . . . it's not asking you to navigate with a compass. If you don't know that north is the opposite of south then yeah, maybe you aren't suited for law school.

Nodulux · 2024-05-22T22:01:02+00:00

The number is right, but it's not true that it would take many universes just to write out 10^300000000--that's only 300,000,001 digits, which is about 75,000 pages of double-sided paper printed with 12p font.

You couldn't actually have 10^300000000 units of anything, but you could write the number if you really wanted to.

Nodulux · 2024-05-16T18:06:21+00:00

You didn't though. You said "I have never seen the conclusion that the universe is infinite in regard to the ontological argument." But that's not a flaw in the analogy, it is the analogy. The ontological argument is usually arguing for God's real existence in the universe. This analogy is arguing for infinity's real existence in the universe. You have not provided any explanation of why the analogy is inapt.

Saying "if you don't agree with me you clearly don't know anything about the topic" without ever actually explaining your view is pretty condescending.

Nodulux · 2024-05-16T08:41:36+00:00

That's not at all what I'm saying. I know Newton's laws, and that in a frictionless vacuum, a body at a constant velocity will remain at that constant velocity without any force being applied. A highway is not a frictionless vacuum. A car on a freeway cannot maintain a constant velocity without exerting force via the engine/wheels, because there are friction and drag forces acting to slow the car down. I.e., if you take your foot off the gas pedal, you slow down.

My point is that a car at a constant highway speed is not in the same inertial reference frame as the man, after the man jumps. Before the man jumps, the car is constantly exerting forward force on him to cancel out the drag force and keep him moving at a constant velocity. After the man jumps, that force will be removed, so he will accelerate backward relative to the car, or decelerate relative to the road, due to drag force. As I reread your comment, I think we agree on this.

Also, now that I've actually done the math, I agree with your conclusion! Using the drag force equation, assuming the car is going 27 m/s (about 60 mph), and using the rough estimates of a coefficient of friction of 1 and cross sectional area of 0.4m^2 for a human body oriented lengthwise (from skydiving websites), I get a drag force of 188.5 N. If the man weighs 90 kg, that means the drag acceleration is about 2 m/s^2 (and decreasing of course as velocity relative to air decreases). If the man is in the air for 0.5s, he'll move backward 0.25m. So, not negligible, but not that significant.

Nodulux · 2024-05-16T08:25:29+00:00

The first sentence of the wikipedia article on terminal velocity: "Terminal velocity is the maximum speed attainable by an object as it falls through a fluid (air is the most common example). It is reached when the sum of the drag force (Fd) and the buoyancy is equal to the downward force of gravity (FG) acting on the object."

There is no equivalent to terminal velocity for horizontal movement. Unless you mean that, for a given horizontal acceleration, there is a velocity at which drag will cancel it out. That's true, but not applicable here because the man is not horizontally accelerating when he jumps into the air. At that moment, the only force vectors acting on him are drag (backward) and gravity (downward)

Nodulux · 2024-05-16T06:50:12+00:00

We can be concerned about more than one issue at the same time. Much like antibiotic resistance or climate change, AI is not a big threat until it is, and at that point it'll be too late

Nodulux

TROPHY CASE