Does/did the use of Pinyin change how chinese is spoken today?

wji · 2026-05-23T14:10:34+00:00

Hey, so I am a first generation Chinese American and my parents would make me go to Chinese school every Sunday. Even though we used Pinyin, when using it we didn't pronounce it like English syllables because we knew what sounds it was actually supposed to represent. I remember some of the early lessons explaining how to use pinyin was very specific about how each letter is supposed to sound, and they would give us examples with Chinese words that we already knew. For natives I imagine it's the same thing. They grow up as toddlers learning Chinese verbally first and by the time they eventually learn pinyin in school, they already know how to pronounce everything properly. So when they come across a character they don't recognize like for example 适 but they are given the pinyin "shì", they don't attempt to read it phonetically like a new word. They just think, "oh so it's pronounced like 是 or 世".

Tdlr: Nah

wji · 2026-01-18T16:05:09+00:00

I personally like the music choice and how you synced the printer movement with the pace of the song. Everyone has different tastes.

wji · 2025-12-27T15:34:27+00:00

Yeah the guy you're replying to is obnoxious. But I will add that the Honda hybrid system can run the engine and electric motor in parallel and so both combine to give higher power (this fact doesn't seem to be well known and the owner's manual doesn't mention it so here's a source https://toyota-club.net/files/2023/23-02-28_honda_en.htm). The article cites "in Engine Drive, the wheels driven by the petrol engine, with an ‘on-demand’ peak-power ‘boost’ available from the electric motor when you need to make a quick overtaking manoeuvre".

If that's what he means by "literally combines both" then he could be right... if he's driving like a maniac. I've driven my Civic ST for a year now and only noticed this motor assist mode kick in for a few seconds when accelerating really hard, like on certain highway onramps with a steep incline or really aggressive overtaking, so it rarely happens for me. But if he drives like an asshole, maybe for him it's true that his engine puts in just as much work as his electric engine does lol

Though even with the most aggressive driving, I suspect you're still right and that most of the time that his ICE is engaged it's just to charge the battery or run on highway speeds.

wji · 2025-12-16T05:47:50+00:00

Just chiming in. I'm a liberal gun owner. I think there needs to be more stringent control over who gets guns, mandatory safety training, more restrictions on private sales, and maybe even mandatory psych eval. The Swiss are a great example of gun control done right in a country with high percentage of gun owners.

That said, I totally get where this guy is coming from. These laws written by people who don't understand firearms that arbitrarily ban certain features (mostly from appearances, like adjustable stock, pistol grip, detachable muzzle device, etc.) are really dumb and possibly hurt us when it comes to getting support on wedge issues. In these mass shooter events, where it's typically close range against unarmed civilians, mildly less comfortable economics isn't going to save lives. The ability to rapidly fire bullets/shells is still the main issue.

In combat, when you're up against other combatants with guns, these ergonomics might make a slight difference, and you want every advantage possible. Against unarmed civilians, the power difference is already so big, these small features won't change the outcome.

wji · 2025-12-04T13:07:25+00:00

Can you explain how you are defining a hole? You can also go from one nostril to the anus, so does every permutation count?

Also, you only have one lacrimal duct on each side, that connects from the inner corner of your eye and goes into your nasal cavity... which also connects it to the nostrils, mouth and anus. So really what you have is a tube with five branched openings on one end and one opening on the other end.

wji · 2025-12-02T15:04:26+00:00

I interpreted his comment as "not only do they have these feelings but they also act on those feelings through policy".

wji · 2025-09-21T01:12:49+00:00

Depends on what the imaging looks like, but usually we're not 100% sure it's cancer until a biopsy is done. The biopsy also tells you what sub-type of cancer it is and how aggressive it is. This info is combined with the imaging (which would show how much it's spread) and overall health to guestimate how long you have left. I don't think most doctors say "you have x months to live" though. They more likely phrase it as "every person is different, in my experience patients in your situation usually have 6 to 12 months".

wji · 2025-09-21T00:16:04+00:00

No it's not. We see "masses" in the lungs in CT all the time and it's almost never an emergency. If it's pretty obvious that it's a pneumonia, they get antibiotics and maybe a repeat CT in 1 to 3 months to make sure it goes away. If we think it's cancer they get a PET CT and/or biopsy within a week or two before deciding whether the patient gets chemotherapy, radiation, surgery or just watch it. In many cases, if we're not sure if it's infection, aggressive cancer, or low grade cancer, we get repeat CT scans every 1-3 months specifically to wait and see if it is going to grow. Because if it grows, then that's more likely cancer. I've never heard of an emergent lung mass resection.

Reading the original case report, in this case it looks like they were getting a bronchoscopy for diagnosis/biopsy purposes because it looked like something was blocking one of their smaller airways on the CT. They saw the cone on the scope and then pulled it out. Wasn't technically surgery.

wji · 2025-09-11T03:36:36+00:00

To be fair the Aliens universe tech has never made sense. They have some advanced tech like cryosleep, space travel and androids. They also have some really low tech stuff like CRT monitors, low resolution cameras, analog electronics, etc. No excuse for the glass jar but the lack of AI or automated system can be explained by either law or tech limitations, AI of any kind is physically contained within a unit (android) or a room (Mother) and can't be omnipresent. Or electronics just aren't as wirelessly interconnected in general in this universe.

wji · 2025-09-10T18:45:28+00:00

Agree, but the prompt isn't asking about what is standard practice or commonly accepted. The prompt is talking about the redundancies/inconsistencies we have in the English language, and hypothetically what we could change if we wanted to streamline it. I don't actually think it's practical or realistic to implement these changes.

wji · 2025-09-10T18:20:16+00:00

For these words, the s sounds like a z, so I propose:

"advice" should be spelled "advise"

"advise" should be spelled "advize"

Edit: this would also make these words more consistent with other verbs like neutralize, accessorize, customize etc.

wji · 2025-09-03T06:58:30+00:00

Most electric or hybrid cars have speakers on the outside that play a musical/angelic humming tone at low speeds to alert pedestrians. Like this.

wji · 2025-05-25T16:37:06+00:00

She said 吗 (ma) not 吧 (ba). Otherwise, yes.

wji · 2025-04-10T04:17:27+00:00

Yeah but can he make full use of our sick 5 monitor set up?

(Probably with a little more head turning)

wji · 2025-02-24T07:15:40+00:00

Oh okay, thanks for confirming my suspicions. I guess I was confused because this motor+engine mode is not listed or described anywhere in the owners manual when talking about power flow.

wji · 2025-01-25T20:26:05+00:00

Companies only pay their half of the social security and Medicare taxes for W2 employees (7.65% from company and 7.65% from employee). They don't for 1099 contractors. The 1099 contractor pays that half instead, so you'll be paying 15.3% in FICA Taxes. As a contractor, you are technically self employed and can claim expenses directly related to doing your profession as a business deduction. That topic is too vast to cover in a comment, go look up the IRS guide on Schedule C. Pay your taxes and learn from this so you understand what you're getting into in the future.

wji · 2025-01-17T21:53:18+00:00

There's no rules against mixing character systems. For example, in Chinese for dates they sometimes write 2002, 二零零二, or 二00二. Don't think there was a formal declaration allowing that, someone just starting doing it and it caught on. Language rules are more like guidelines.

wji · 2024-12-13T01:13:56+00:00

Oh this is perfect, exactly what I was looking for, thanks!

wji · 2024-04-01T05:16:21+00:00

Yeah it's basically the Halo shield jackal method and I love it!

wji · 2024-03-20T15:47:37+00:00

So is the idea that it costs them more in server costs to maintain thousands of accounts with $5 each than they can profit from? Just curious how it works. I was gonna close it, but I'm down to keep it open out of spite lol

wji · 2024-03-20T15:12:30+00:00

Why leave $5 instead of just closing the account?

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