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112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | From the perspective of a developer: NEVER tell anybody paying the bills that they can't have what they want. Instead, you may tell them they can't have it for that price, or that they can't have it exactly the way they originally conceived it.
To your "pointer" example; .NET, a managed-code environment, has pointers. They are critically necessary for a lot of interoperability with unmanaged code. However, "safe" use of them is tightly regulated, and if used in "unsafe" code, that code requires higher security permissions in the runtime. If you were developing a managed language that also required direct memory access via pointers, you could come up with a similar scheme of marshalling behind the scenes where you could, using read-only managed pointers where you couldn't automatically marshal, and allowing "true" pointers only in the most trusted areas of the codebase.
To your GUI examples: if you know that a new feature will "break" the current flow of code, then you can test for that and develop it more robustly to roll back any previous work done by the workflow. Your clients, and sometimes even your manager, usually have no clue or interest in the structure of the program; if something they want is difficult because of the way you structured the program, then by definition the structure is wrong because it does not allow you to do what the client wants.
In all cases, this new feature may increase the scope of work required beyond what the client had thought it would be. That will in turn require either an extension to the schedule, more money, and/or a reduction of other planned work.
However, if you know a way to achieve the same basic result in an easier or more logical way, then that can be suggested to the client. Although they definitely do exist, I fortunately have yet to see a client that refused categorically to listen to input from developers, especially in an Agile environment where there's a "product owner" whose sole job is to liase with development on various needed details such as these. | Most is already said, but there is one thing I would emphasize in my current work environment. I work for a company that is a contractor for other companies and out applications are business process related ( to a fair amount they drive sales and customer communication ).
Business processes along with the accompanying products can be ( at least if the company is big enough ) very complex. To a certain degree, if you are modelling a complex thing, the resulting application will have a relating complexity. As most individuals of the business people only see their part of the process the complete application/process builds on a greater complexity than what is visible to just one user.
My point is, that when a new business requirement arises, it will work for the business people, because it doesn't raise the complexity much higher, but may have a greater impact on the whole system. In my opinion this is not a reason to argue against that change. It is the right point to discuss the efforts ( and the expenses ) with the customer. It probably won't stop the customer to have that feature build, but by time they will gain a feeling for the applications and some discussions about "uuh, you're that expensive!" will be much less picky.
I do not know whether you are in a comparable situation, but I have learned that the stakeholder's situation doesn't necessarily has the same complexity raise imminent like the one that developers and architects of the IT system face. In that situation communication helps both sides. |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | You could tell the boss that while it's technically possible, it will cost *X* amount in time and money spent on effort on analysis, design, to rewrite existing code, testing, regression testing, ... And then ask if the feature is worth it. Sometimes the answer will be "yes! we must have this!", sometimes it will be "no, I guess not".
If the feature being asked for violates some core principle of the application (such as "Add a blue button!" to a UI that is spec'd and designed to only have red buttons as per the customer's request) then I think it is OK to ask "Why?" and mention that it goes against the pre-established design.
In the end, almost everything is a "can do" (it may not not hard from a *technical* point of view to add a red button to a blue-only UI), it's more a question of "should do?"
---
To answer your edited question, I think the answer should be #2, "Maybe", pending further investigation and analysis.
You don't want to answer #1 "Yes, unconditionally" because you could get stuck committing to something you're not capable of delivering in the given timeframe.
You don't want to answer #3 "No, it's too much work" because then it looks like you are being uncooperative and needlessly difficult. | Most is already said, but there is one thing I would emphasize in my current work environment. I work for a company that is a contractor for other companies and out applications are business process related ( to a fair amount they drive sales and customer communication ).
Business processes along with the accompanying products can be ( at least if the company is big enough ) very complex. To a certain degree, if you are modelling a complex thing, the resulting application will have a relating complexity. As most individuals of the business people only see their part of the process the complete application/process builds on a greater complexity than what is visible to just one user.
My point is, that when a new business requirement arises, it will work for the business people, because it doesn't raise the complexity much higher, but may have a greater impact on the whole system. In my opinion this is not a reason to argue against that change. It is the right point to discuss the efforts ( and the expenses ) with the customer. It probably won't stop the customer to have that feature build, but by time they will gain a feeling for the applications and some discussions about "uuh, you're that expensive!" will be much less picky.
I do not know whether you are in a comparable situation, but I have learned that the stakeholder's situation doesn't necessarily has the same complexity raise imminent like the one that developers and architects of the IT system face. In that situation communication helps both sides. |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | If I read you correctly, the real question is about unknown complexity. Initially I read your question as, "I see the extremely likely risk of excess complexity but the boss doesn't" But you're saying that the boss isn't a problem, so I take it you're not sure what the risks of adding unacceptable complexity are.
In that case, I'd recommend some sort of risk mitigating strategy. Image you're considering adding WCF/web services to your API, which could be awesome or a lot of complexity without reward:
* add the feature on a branch. If it works, merge it. If it turns into a rats nest, kill it.
* fire up a new one page project and do a proof of concept. If you can't do a proof of concept in a short time, then drop it. If the proof of concept works, make it bigger and integrate it with your
* scour the web for people griping about that feature or technology. Where there there is a lot of griping going on, a technology might be some real risks of excessive complexity. Java Beans and COM+ are probably, old, but good examples of features that really jacked up the complexity and may or may not have delivered on the benefits side of the equation | As a developer, you shouldn't really care which requirements are requested to be implemented.
However, you should explain if something is unrealistic and if there are better ways. |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | Most is already said, but there is one thing I would emphasize in my current work environment. I work for a company that is a contractor for other companies and out applications are business process related ( to a fair amount they drive sales and customer communication ).
Business processes along with the accompanying products can be ( at least if the company is big enough ) very complex. To a certain degree, if you are modelling a complex thing, the resulting application will have a relating complexity. As most individuals of the business people only see their part of the process the complete application/process builds on a greater complexity than what is visible to just one user.
My point is, that when a new business requirement arises, it will work for the business people, because it doesn't raise the complexity much higher, but may have a greater impact on the whole system. In my opinion this is not a reason to argue against that change. It is the right point to discuss the efforts ( and the expenses ) with the customer. It probably won't stop the customer to have that feature build, but by time they will gain a feeling for the applications and some discussions about "uuh, you're that expensive!" will be much less picky.
I do not know whether you are in a comparable situation, but I have learned that the stakeholder's situation doesn't necessarily has the same complexity raise imminent like the one that developers and architects of the IT system face. In that situation communication helps both sides. | Sometimes its actualy customer request (comming from customer internall politics). Then its hopeless and must be done (but management should also consider whether continue such project or whether should they renegotiate price.) |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | The problem I see is your use of the word argue.
You must bring up design issues and the reasoning behind them, but be wary because programmers have a tendency to get defensive about positions they have taken and argue points just for the sake of arguing (Sometimes). I have to stop myself from arguing quite a bit--and I don't always succeed. Also as I get older I find I'm wrong more often than I used to be--or worse I didn't recognize how often I used to be wrong :)
If you have clearly stated requirements (the language must be safe, we need pointers to access legacy routines) then you could present how the two requirements conflict and ask which is more important. Once you have the requirements and the reasons behind them you may even be able to come up with a completely different solution that supports both requirements (JNI--kinda).
If it doesn't, well perhaps it's a good time to codify them! | As a developer, you shouldn't really care which requirements are requested to be implemented.
However, you should explain if something is unrealistic and if there are better ways. |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | If your boss tells you to do stupid tasks, then you should (kindly) explain why it is stupid.
If he or she does not get the point, then you are obligated to do stupid things. That's it. He's the boss. In such case you can just do what he/she says, or talk to his/her boss or change the job. | Sometimes its actualy customer request (comming from customer internall politics). Then its hopeless and must be done (but management should also consider whether continue such project or whether should they renegotiate price.) |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | Best thing is to have a meeting and **lay out the pros and cons** as a group, and based on that discuss the best solution. If you have a team, get them to agree on solution. Once a team agrees on something, managers and "bosses" tend to go with the solution.
If your boss still does not agree, then you've done all you can do: you've gotten your team and managers together and covered the pros and cons and despite that your boss chose a potentially inferior solution.
The key to this is discussing the pros and cons as a group. By doing so you are discussing what the best solution is with your team, and at the same time are pointing out your boss's decision (before he makes it) without the political backlash of going around after the fact telling people why you think your bosses decision was the wrong one.
This is a tender situation involving work politics, but it can be handled amicably. | You could tell the boss that while it's technically possible, it will cost *X* amount in time and money spent on effort on analysis, design, to rewrite existing code, testing, regression testing, ... And then ask if the feature is worth it. Sometimes the answer will be "yes! we must have this!", sometimes it will be "no, I guess not".
If the feature being asked for violates some core principle of the application (such as "Add a blue button!" to a UI that is spec'd and designed to only have red buttons as per the customer's request) then I think it is OK to ask "Why?" and mention that it goes against the pre-established design.
In the end, almost everything is a "can do" (it may not not hard from a *technical* point of view to add a red button to a blue-only UI), it's more a question of "should do?"
---
To answer your edited question, I think the answer should be #2, "Maybe", pending further investigation and analysis.
You don't want to answer #1 "Yes, unconditionally" because you could get stuck committing to something you're not capable of delivering in the given timeframe.
You don't want to answer #3 "No, it's too much work" because then it looks like you are being uncooperative and needlessly difficult. |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | I believe in pushing back bad requirements. But I also believe that when you have given your best shot at explaining why they are bad and they still want them, then you agree and do your job.
For instance, I have had people who want requirements that were mutually exclusive of something the application already does. If I do that, then this will, 100% guaranteed, break. So I send the requirement back and tell them that this will break this other business rule we already have in place and do they want to change this rule too? Often the small group which comes up with a particular requirement doesn't have access to the bigger picture of what the rest of the application may do. Most of the time when I've sent one of these back, the customer has realized that the intial rule was more critical and decided that the change they wanted wasn't worth it. When they have decided to make the change they did it after consulting with the people who pushed the initial requirement.
Sometimes just asking clarification questions will make them see the issue is not as simple as they thought it was. Sometimes you want to ask why they want something and come to the real need that is driving the change. Once you understand that, it is often easier to see an alternatve solution that works for you as the developer and meets their need. If you can present that solution in terms of how it will better meet their need than the orginial suggestion, you have vastly improved your chances of having your change accepted.
Sometimes when a change is going to create havoc at a basic level in your design, just giving them the new estimate of hours the change will take is enough to get it turned off. If you combine that with a risk assessment that points out what critical functionality you might be introducing new bugs into with telling them it will take 6 weeks of dedicated effort by 3 people, suddenly it isn't so important any more.
But sometimes you tell them this isn't a good idea and why and they still say, "Too bad we need it." You win some and you lose some and sometimes the business needs genuinely have changed and the application must accomodate that. Once the decision has been finalized, it is no longer the time to question what you are doing and time to get on with doing it. If you have documented your objections, then you personally should still be in a good place when it goes over budget and causes new and more exciting bugs. And they might even be more willing to listen to you next time when you have built up a track record of being right on these sorts of things.
The key to winning many of these discussions (nobody wins all of them) is first to build up a track record for knowing what you are talking about. Next send a written document that states what concerns you have (many managers are risk adverse, they are more likely to not want someone to have a document that proves them wrong later, so they pay more attention to what you put in writing) and finally to make sure they understand all the costs (not just hours, but security risks, introducing new bugs, missing deadlines, etc.) of making the change. Change is not free and they need to understand that. The next key is to do this like an adult and not like a whining child ("but I don't wanna use ... because I don't like it"). Make a business case for not doing it and you will get a lot farther in pushing back a bad requirement. | If you are in the position to understand the cons of doing it (complexity, lack of usability, etc.), then it is in everyone's best interest for you to explain it to the best of your ability. Often non-developers do not understand the problems of adding new features. It's easy for them because they don't have to do anything or even think about it.
However, if the powers that be decide that the new feature is going to be added, then you should do the best job possible. It's a challenge.
And, if the new feature is too stupid or the working environment too crappy, then it's time to find another job. |
112,349 | What is a good attitude from developers when discussing new features, and namely, non critical/questionable features?
Say you are developing some sort of Java like language, and the boss says: "We need pointers so that developers could fiddle with object memory directly!"
Should the developer shoot down the idea because it adds unimaginable complexity and security vulnerabilities, or should he do what's asked?
This may not be a good example, but what about things that are more in a gray area, like adding buttons that break workflow, or goes against internal structure of the program, etc.?
What is the optimal "can do" vs. "can't do" distribution for a regular programmer?
EDIT: The question is not about a bad boss :D
I was more interested how do people approach new problems that add a noticeable amount of problems while maybe being marginally useful.
Should the general attitude be:
1. yes we'll do it, screw the complexity
2. maybe
3. no, the general rework, and implications don't justify the change
What should be the reaction of a good developer? | 2011/10/04 | [
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/112349",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com",
"https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/users/8029/"
] | If you spend many years programming for large applications, and think critically about it along the way, you will develop a finely tuned sense of when a feature is going to cause problems that outweigh its usefulness. Another word for this is *wisdom*, and just as is the case with other kinds of wisdom, it can be a challenge to make those without it see its value.
Other posters have argued that you should try to quantify the cost of the problem that will be introduced by a problematic feature, and that is a good idea when it is possible, but usually it is not. It is usually only possible to estimate immediate implementation costs. Even that is often difficult for larger features. As for the future costs, you are in a tough spot. You don't know with certainty what other features will be required, or how long the product will be under maintenance. The cost will usually be much higher than you could back up with an estimate based on hard facts.
The more competence you have demonstrated in the past, the more leeway you will have to simply declare a feature a bad idea. That can only come with time and a demonstrated record of success. That said, you should always express eagerness to fulfill the request, since it is what your client wants. You should express reservations based on your experience, and once you have, it becomes a non-issue in 90% of cases because you will start a conversation that gets to the root of the issue, which is: Why have they asked you to add this feature in the first place? At that point you can offer alternatives, or perhaps agree that although the requested feature will introduce problems, it is still necessary.
Of course it is also possible that you are just wrong. Isn't software engineering fun? | If you are in the position to understand the cons of doing it (complexity, lack of usability, etc.), then it is in everyone's best interest for you to explain it to the best of your ability. Often non-developers do not understand the problems of adding new features. It's easy for them because they don't have to do anything or even think about it.
However, if the powers that be decide that the new feature is going to be added, then you should do the best job possible. It's a challenge.
And, if the new feature is too stupid or the working environment too crappy, then it's time to find another job. |
76,226 | The title is quite self descriptive. I ask this question because I found contradicting information in the atmel web page. I need two external interrupts to control one rotary encoder. One interrupt control pulses from one pin (both rising and falling) and the other iterrupt the same for the other pin. So if I has only 1 it doesn't work for me.
* Visiting the product page at atmel I read that it has 6 Ext. Interrupts: <http://www.atmel.com/devices/attiny85.aspx>
* The datasheet I only see *int0* references (page 47) , and I don't quite understand the datasheet
<http://www.atmel.com/Images/Atmel-2586-AVR-8-bit-Microcontroller-ATtiny25-ATtiny45-ATtiny85_Datasheet.pdf> | 2013/07/17 | [
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/76226",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/users/26489/"
] | There's INT0, and then there's PCINT[0:5]. INT0 gets its own interrupt routine, and the PCINT has one routine for all the pins configured to be used by the interrupt. That means that one of the first thing the interrupt routine needs to do is figure out which pin(s) actually changed to trigger the interrupt. Should actually be more convenient to use this way for your encoder, as you really want any encoder change to trigger the same interrupt routine.
I have no idea if all this is accessibile through the arduino platform, or if you need to program the controller yourself (as I'm not an Arduino user). | You can do this with a single interrupt if necessary by ORing the two pins into the one interrupt ("something changed"). You'll still need two digital inputs to read the encoder pins, and the ISR (or an exec-level helper routine) will have to take on the responsibility of figuring out which encoder pin(s) changed, but it's doable. |
15,933 | A couple of months ago, I was looking at a youtube video and there were some steps to make Tor secure. For example it was suggested that the users should check that pop up windows are blocked, choose never remember history, select the option warn me when sites try to install add-ons, select block reported attack sites and block reported web forgeries. Furthermore, it was suggested that the users deactivate from the No-script options Java, Adobe Flash, Microsoft Silverlight, other plugins, /, , and @font face.
Today I visited the website of Tor and looked at the security tips, <https://www.torproject.org/download/download.html.en#Warning>.
In the first tip it says " It is pre-configured to protect your privacy and anonymity on the web as long as you're browsing with Tor Browser itself. Almost any other web browser configuration is likely to be unsafe to use with Tor."
Does this mean that I don't have to apply any of the aforementioned changes? Is this because there was a recent update of Tor? Or the above changes do not make any difference?
Thank you very much | 2017/10/15 | [
"https://tor.stackexchange.com/questions/15933",
"https://tor.stackexchange.com",
"https://tor.stackexchange.com/users/19506/"
] | >
> Does this mean that I don't have to apply any of the aforementioned changes?
>
>
>
Correct, Tor Browser doesn't allow third party plugins, so Flash, Silverlight and other plugins won't be loaded. This sounds like they were trying to configure a non-Tor Browser browser to use Tor ([this is something the Tor Project explicitly recommends that you do not do](https://www.torproject.org/docs/faq.html.en#TBBOtherBrowser)).
Those changes (and many more improvements) are already included in Tor Browser by default.
>
> Is this because there was a recent update of Tor?
>
>
>
It's certainly not a recent change. For a good few years now (since they moved away from providing Tor Button as an addon, to producing the fully fledged Tor Browser) those changes haven't been required to be made.
>
> Or the above changes do not make any difference?
> They're (mostly) already there.
>
>
> "How to configure Tor (Browser) to run securely?"
>
>
>
What you can do is go to the Tor Button (Green Onion) menu and go to security settings, this will take you to a screen with a slider. The slider has 3 settings, Low, Medium and High. These settings incrementally disable potentially dangerous functionality at the expense of some more advanced web browsing features. Disabling Javascript, webfonts, JIT, SVG and more.
So, disregard the video guide you saw, it's either many years old and no longer relevant, or recommending something that the Tor Project suggests that you don't do (for good reason). Tor Browser already provides those settings and does so in a more robust way than the steps outlined in the guide. If you want to improve your security, you can use the Security Slider to set your settings to a level that's appropriate for you. | Similar to -> "**You can have peace. Or you can have freedom!**"
The same story about Tor Browser. **Security vs Anonymity.**
**Security**:
You would easily find tons of hate speeches of community with dev-team, where every one crying about **Enabled by Default Java-Script**. Really, it is a headache of large group of savvy hackers who doesn't producing TorBrowser but like to use something like that.
Moreover, every time when FBI cracks something in "DarkWeb", they reports about new 0-Day vulnerability in JavaScript machine inside TorBrowser, thereafter - release new "patched" version of this **Super-Dooper-Modified FireFox** and calms down like nothing happened.
**Anonymity:**
From the other side, when you will try to change something in such product like TorBrowser you will "mark" your Browser as a special one. And it is way to profile you from other crowd of TorBrowser-users. You might break the Idea lying in the background of TorBrowser's design.
When you are installing kind of "Plugin", or disabling "JavaScript", or disabling "Loading of Picture" - you becoming visible, discernible from millions "Default" users.
Finally,
When we talking about TorBrowser: "**You can't have Anonymity AND can't have Security... with TorBrowser Firefox-based with enabled Java-Script by default by st..id dev-team!!!!**"
Ghm...
sorry.. |
14,391 | I'm working on a browser add-on that has some novel usability ideas, and I'd like to test them out on some users. The add-on interacts with the user's password data and usage, and I'd like to collect some (non-identifying or exploitable) data. In particular, I'd like to keep track of how many passwords a user has, the average number of sites they're used on, the number of characters in each password, etc.
I realize that I'm treading on potentially shaky ground here. Where could I find users interested in testing such an add-on? How can I assure them that it's safe?
Other than open sourcing the code, which I'm already planning to do. | 2011/11/28 | [
"https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/14391",
"https://ux.stackexchange.com",
"https://ux.stackexchange.com/users/9860/"
] | "Where could I find users interested in testing such an add-on?"
Moms. Church secretaries. The pointy haired boss. Basically anyone that would be naive enough to install a browser plugin that tracks their passwords. These people are also a direct correlation to the people's machine's I need to wipe clean and reinstall the OS every holiday when I see them. ;)
And, realistically, I doubt those are your target demographic anyways. I think open source is the only viable way to go. Hopefully some security-aware developers or the like will trust the software enough to help out with testing. | Well an alternative approach would be to look at students who would be interested in keeping track of the numerous passwords they have .They are generally tech savvy and you would be able to get considerable user feedback about potential bugs or concerns |
594,203 | So, I heard of such cases from some countries in which people get murdered but due to influence from powerful people, it gets labeled as "suicide" in the media and similar sources even with cases that have proof that it in fact was a murder.
Is there any English word that summarizes this "made-up suicide" that may or may not be valid in the following example cases?
>
> They brutally [word]ed him.
>
>
>
>
> Yesterday, x got brutally [word]ed by y.
>
>
>
>
> I am certain that this is not a suicide, this is rather a [word].
>
>
>
>
> This begs the question, how can we prevent this inhumane spree of [word]s?
>
>
>
At the moment, I tried briefly searching it inside a PDF copy of the Oxford Dictionary 2018. I haven't really considered any word for this yet, I don't think any word that is currently in my vocabulary fits the definition, or I fail to remember it right now. I also don't have a "best word" criteria, so simply what matches my sample cases the most will be chosen. Non-compound words would certainly be highly preferred, but compound words are also allowed. | 2022/08/26 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/594203",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/444737/"
] | **Staged**
The word you are looking for is "staged".
[Practical homocide.com](http://www.practicalhomicide.com/articles/staging.htm)
>
> In "staged crime scenes," however, the presentation of the homicide victim and the manipulation of the crime scene by a clever offender could make the death appear to be a suicide. I have personally investigated many such cases and the truth of the matter is that initially, the cases did look like suicides.
>
>
>
**Answer**
>
> They brutally [murder]ed him.
>
>
>
>
> Yesterday, x got brutally [murder]ed by y.
>
>
>
>
> I am certain that this is not a suicide, this is rather a [staged suicide].
>
>
>
>
> This begs the question, how can we prevent this inhumane spree of [staged suicide]s?
>
>
> | The best that can be hoped is an expression.
* *murder covered up as (a) suicide*
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Reserved_For_Murder/ALvoDwAAQBAJ?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PT121&printsec=frontcover) And if we announce a murder covered up as a suicide, a lot of people will just think it's another death on the reserve and go on about their day.
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Murder_Through_Disabled_Access/uZt_5Spsy2MC?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PA126&printsec=frontcover)) Immediately Bruce is interested because it fits the pattern—a murder covered up as suicide and the connection to gay men.
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Chinese_Spies/rverDwAAQBAJ?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PA88&printsec=frontcover)) When the autopsy showed that she had been the victim of a murder covered up as suicide, |
594,203 | So, I heard of such cases from some countries in which people get murdered but due to influence from powerful people, it gets labeled as "suicide" in the media and similar sources even with cases that have proof that it in fact was a murder.
Is there any English word that summarizes this "made-up suicide" that may or may not be valid in the following example cases?
>
> They brutally [word]ed him.
>
>
>
>
> Yesterday, x got brutally [word]ed by y.
>
>
>
>
> I am certain that this is not a suicide, this is rather a [word].
>
>
>
>
> This begs the question, how can we prevent this inhumane spree of [word]s?
>
>
>
At the moment, I tried briefly searching it inside a PDF copy of the Oxford Dictionary 2018. I haven't really considered any word for this yet, I don't think any word that is currently in my vocabulary fits the definition, or I fail to remember it right now. I also don't have a "best word" criteria, so simply what matches my sample cases the most will be chosen. Non-compound words would certainly be highly preferred, but compound words are also allowed. | 2022/08/26 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/594203",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/444737/"
] | There is a transitive use of *suicide* as a verb that may be entering mainstream usage (see [this English.se question](https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/451191/transitive-use-of-suicide)). It can either mean "to drive to suicide" or "to kill [someone] and make their death appear to have been a suicide rather than a homicide" ([Wiktionary](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/suicide#Verb)).
In the second sense, it has apparently been used as far back as 1898, and would fit in either of your first two sentences. For the noun form, you would need either quotes to indicate that the word "suicide" is not to be taken literally, or a phrase that explains what's happening. | The best that can be hoped is an expression.
* *murder covered up as (a) suicide*
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Reserved_For_Murder/ALvoDwAAQBAJ?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PT121&printsec=frontcover) And if we announce a murder covered up as a suicide, a lot of people will just think it's another death on the reserve and go on about their day.
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Murder_Through_Disabled_Access/uZt_5Spsy2MC?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PA126&printsec=frontcover)) Immediately Bruce is interested because it fits the pattern—a murder covered up as suicide and the connection to gay men.
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Chinese_Spies/rverDwAAQBAJ?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PA88&printsec=frontcover)) When the autopsy showed that she had been the victim of a murder covered up as suicide, |
594,203 | So, I heard of such cases from some countries in which people get murdered but due to influence from powerful people, it gets labeled as "suicide" in the media and similar sources even with cases that have proof that it in fact was a murder.
Is there any English word that summarizes this "made-up suicide" that may or may not be valid in the following example cases?
>
> They brutally [word]ed him.
>
>
>
>
> Yesterday, x got brutally [word]ed by y.
>
>
>
>
> I am certain that this is not a suicide, this is rather a [word].
>
>
>
>
> This begs the question, how can we prevent this inhumane spree of [word]s?
>
>
>
At the moment, I tried briefly searching it inside a PDF copy of the Oxford Dictionary 2018. I haven't really considered any word for this yet, I don't think any word that is currently in my vocabulary fits the definition, or I fail to remember it right now. I also don't have a "best word" criteria, so simply what matches my sample cases the most will be chosen. Non-compound words would certainly be highly preferred, but compound words are also allowed. | 2022/08/26 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/594203",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/444737/"
] | The word is [suicided](https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/suicided) but it has to be used as a transitive verb in a way that indicates agency by another person. M-W in the above link lists it as a synonym for 'murdered', but of course it carries the connotation of a murder disguised as a suicide.
"Epstein didn't kill himself, he **was suicided**".
A similar usage is that of [disappeared](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disappear).
>
> He never showed up to meet either duty, which was unlike him,
> according to his sister, Grace Fernández. As the evening progressed,
> the grim reality that her brother **was disappeared** started to sink in.
>
>
> | The best that can be hoped is an expression.
* *murder covered up as (a) suicide*
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Reserved_For_Murder/ALvoDwAAQBAJ?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PT121&printsec=frontcover) And if we announce a murder covered up as a suicide, a lot of people will just think it's another death on the reserve and go on about their day.
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Murder_Through_Disabled_Access/uZt_5Spsy2MC?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PA126&printsec=frontcover)) Immediately Bruce is interested because it fits the pattern—a murder covered up as suicide and the connection to gay men.
([ref.](https://www.google.fr/books/edition/Chinese_Spies/rverDwAAQBAJ?hl=fr&gbpv=1&dq=%22murder+covered+up%22&pg=PA88&printsec=frontcover)) When the autopsy showed that she had been the victim of a murder covered up as suicide, |
662,131 | I was looking at the slave/pool modules and it seems similar to what I
want, but it also seems like I have a single point of failure in my
application (if the master node goes down).
The client has a list of gateways (for the sake of fallback - all do
the same thing) which accept connections, and one is chosen from
randomly by the client. When the client connects all nodes are
examined to see which has the least load and then the IP of the least-
loaded server is forwarded back to the client. The client then
connects to this server and everything is executed there.
In summary, I want all nodes to act as both gateways and to actually
process client requests. The load balancing is only done when the
client initially connects - all of the actual packets and processed on
the client's "home" node.
How would I do this? | 2009/03/19 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/662131",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/49018/"
] | I don't know if there is this modules implemented yet but what I can say, load balance is overrated. What I can argue is, random placing of jobs is best bet unless you know far more information how load will come in future and in most of cases you really doesn't. What you wrote:
>
> When the client connects all nodes are examined to see which has the least load and then the IP of the least- loaded server is forwarded back to the client.
>
>
>
How you know that all those least loaded node will not be highest loaded just in next ms? How you know that all those high loaded nodes which you will not include in list will not drop load just in next ms? You really can't know it unless you have very rare case.
Just measure (or compute) your node's performance and set node's probability be chosen depend of it. Choose node randomly regardless of current load. Use this as initial approach. When you set it up, then you can try make up some more sophisticated algorithm. I bet that it will be very hard work to beat this initial approach. Trust me, very hard.
**Edit**: To be more clear in one subtle detail, I strongly argue that you can't predict future load from current and historical load but you should use knowledge about tasks durations probability and current decomposition of task's lifetime. This work is so hard to try achieve. | The purpose of a supervision tree is to manage the processes not necessarily forward requests. There is no reason you couldn't use different code to send requests directly to members of the list of available processes. See the pool:get\_nodes or pool:get\_node() functions for one way to get those lists.
You can let the pool module handle the management of the processes (restarting, monitoring, and killing processing) and use some other module to transparently redirect requests to the pool of processes. Maybe you were looking for distributed pools though? It'll be hard to get away from the master process in erlang whithout going to distributed nodes. The whole running system is pretty much one large supervision tree. |
662,131 | I was looking at the slave/pool modules and it seems similar to what I
want, but it also seems like I have a single point of failure in my
application (if the master node goes down).
The client has a list of gateways (for the sake of fallback - all do
the same thing) which accept connections, and one is chosen from
randomly by the client. When the client connects all nodes are
examined to see which has the least load and then the IP of the least-
loaded server is forwarded back to the client. The client then
connects to this server and everything is executed there.
In summary, I want all nodes to act as both gateways and to actually
process client requests. The load balancing is only done when the
client initially connects - all of the actual packets and processed on
the client's "home" node.
How would I do this? | 2009/03/19 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/662131",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/49018/"
] | I don't know if there is this modules implemented yet but what I can say, load balance is overrated. What I can argue is, random placing of jobs is best bet unless you know far more information how load will come in future and in most of cases you really doesn't. What you wrote:
>
> When the client connects all nodes are examined to see which has the least load and then the IP of the least- loaded server is forwarded back to the client.
>
>
>
How you know that all those least loaded node will not be highest loaded just in next ms? How you know that all those high loaded nodes which you will not include in list will not drop load just in next ms? You really can't know it unless you have very rare case.
Just measure (or compute) your node's performance and set node's probability be chosen depend of it. Choose node randomly regardless of current load. Use this as initial approach. When you set it up, then you can try make up some more sophisticated algorithm. I bet that it will be very hard work to beat this initial approach. Trust me, very hard.
**Edit**: To be more clear in one subtle detail, I strongly argue that you can't predict future load from current and historical load but you should use knowledge about tasks durations probability and current decomposition of task's lifetime. This work is so hard to try achieve. | I recently remembered the pg module which allows you to setup process groups. messages sent to the group go to every process in the group. It might get you part way toward what you want. you would have to write the code to decide which process handles the request for real but you would get a pool without a master using it. |
662,131 | I was looking at the slave/pool modules and it seems similar to what I
want, but it also seems like I have a single point of failure in my
application (if the master node goes down).
The client has a list of gateways (for the sake of fallback - all do
the same thing) which accept connections, and one is chosen from
randomly by the client. When the client connects all nodes are
examined to see which has the least load and then the IP of the least-
loaded server is forwarded back to the client. The client then
connects to this server and everything is executed there.
In summary, I want all nodes to act as both gateways and to actually
process client requests. The load balancing is only done when the
client initially connects - all of the actual packets and processed on
the client's "home" node.
How would I do this? | 2009/03/19 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/662131",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/49018/"
] | The purpose of a supervision tree is to manage the processes not necessarily forward requests. There is no reason you couldn't use different code to send requests directly to members of the list of available processes. See the pool:get\_nodes or pool:get\_node() functions for one way to get those lists.
You can let the pool module handle the management of the processes (restarting, monitoring, and killing processing) and use some other module to transparently redirect requests to the pool of processes. Maybe you were looking for distributed pools though? It'll be hard to get away from the master process in erlang whithout going to distributed nodes. The whole running system is pretty much one large supervision tree. | I recently remembered the pg module which allows you to setup process groups. messages sent to the group go to every process in the group. It might get you part way toward what you want. you would have to write the code to decide which process handles the request for real but you would get a pool without a master using it. |
65,431,988 | I'm new to from xamarin and I'm trying to publish my app xamarin ios, So when I [try to uploading it to the app store,](https://i.stack.imgur.com/1hDIX.png)
I got the following error. | 2020/12/23 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/65431988",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/14880733/"
] | The error is obvious. It said *Authentication Failed*.
You should sign in with an app-specific password. Create the password at <https://appleid.apple.com>. | Using Visual Studio to upload to the app store works great, if there are no errors. I tend to use [Transporter](https://apps.apple.com/us/app/transporter/id1450874784?mt=12) to check my package and upload instead. You can upload your artifact directly, or from Visual Studio, publish your artifact and save it instead of pushing it to the store. Then use Transporter to check your artifact. The error message will be much more readable ... if there is one. |
65,431,988 | I'm new to from xamarin and I'm trying to publish my app xamarin ios, So when I [try to uploading it to the app store,](https://i.stack.imgur.com/1hDIX.png)
I got the following error. | 2020/12/23 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/65431988",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/14880733/"
] | The error is obvious. It said *Authentication Failed*.
You should sign in with an app-specific password. Create the password at <https://appleid.apple.com>. | @Raptor's answer above worked for me with the following specifics:
I had to change my Apple account password. After changing my Apple account password, my app-specific password was gone from my Apple account. I needed to create a new app-specific password. The complete list of steps I needed to restore my ability to publish apps with Visual Studio (after changing my Apple account password) is as follows:
1. Open XCode > Preferences and re-sign into my account (XCode showed that my account login had expired). I signed in with my new password.
2. Open Visual Studio > Preferences > Apple Developer Accounts and remove and re-add the account (login with new password)
3. Visit <https://appleid.apple.com> and within the Security block, click the "Edit" button to confirm that your app-specific password is gone. Then click "Generate Password" and use the new app-specific password when publishing apps. |
8,072 | We have a 1997 ford f150. My husband replaced the thermostat, but it still reads cold and doesn't put out any heat. Any suggestions? We are in Ohio, it's December, and it's freeeezzzing - need heat! Thanks for any help. | 2013/12/16 | [
"https://mechanics.stackexchange.com/questions/8072",
"https://mechanics.stackexchange.com",
"https://mechanics.stackexchange.com/users/4169/"
] | Make sure the cooling system hoses aren't kinked and are routed properly.
Make sure the coolant levels are good. If the coolant level isn't proper, there could be an air bubble in the heater core which would prevent/hinder the heat.
Is it not blowing? If so, check the fuses - specifically the engine compartment fuse box, slot 6 (3rd from the front, left column). That's a 40A fuse that is for the blower motor. If the fuse blown there is a good chance you have some electrical issues. | The first checks are to check that the cooling system is full of coolant. The next thing to do is scan the AirCon/heater assembly for correct working of the heater flaps.
On You Tube you can find a three part video on just what it takes to repair the heater flaps on your system. The heater flaps break on a lot of occasions, and when broken will not allow air to pass through the heater radiator to be heated.
You Tube: "F150 Heater Core part 1". Also part 2 and part 3. Part 3 will show you the heater flaps and how they break. |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | "Nationality" is not the ethnic origin, it is largely the same as the citizenship (from the [dictionary](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/national), *someone who officially belongs to a particular country, a citizen of a particular country*). Discrimination by ethnic origin is not allowed. Discrimination by citizenship is allowed and obvious: citizens can enter the home country without visa, vote, work with much less restrictions and the like. Discrimination of foreign citizens against each other, based on they citizenship, is also widespread starting from the queue in the airport upon arrival ("EU nationals go left, all other nationals go right").
Ethnic origin and citizenship is not the same, and the national is a citizen (the definition sometimes extends to people who live for many generations in the country without citizenship). A sentient green spider originating from Andromeda galaxy would be an Estonian national if given a citizenship for some reason. All ethnic Russians with Estonian passport are Estonian nationals. They are **not** Russian nationals (dual citizenship in Estonia is not allowed).
P.S. There is an English translation of the constitution [here](https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015.pdf?lang=en). Who does not know Estonian anyway, could probably rather read the translation. | Discrimination may mean many things
-----------------------------------
Apart from the ambiguous use of term *nationality*, there is also the question of what kind of discrimination one is talking about.
Obviously, foreign nationals do not have some rights that citizens have - notably in terms of voting rights, access to the state territory, employment at certain jobs (e.g., jobs requiring security clearance, although many states also require giving preference to hiring citizens for all jobs.) However, this does not mean that any kind of discrimination against a foreign national is allowed.
As an example, one could cite [recent backlash by banks against Russians legally present in France in terms of blocking salaries, refusing bank transfers, and loans to Russians](https://www.francetvinfo.fr/monde/europe/manifestations-en-ukraine/temoignages-salaires-bloques-virements-impossibles-prets-refuses-des-ressortissants-russes-denoncent-le-zele-de-certaines-banques-francaises_5065240.html) complying with the French law on the sole basis that they are Russian nationals - this has resulted [in lawsuits for discrimination](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-9-2022-003036_EN.html).
Naturalized citizens, dual citizens, permanent residents
--------------------------------------------------------
There are many cases where a foreign national has acquired the rights of citizenship via naturalization. When doing this they might or might not have given up their other nationality. They thus may be discriminated because they were born in a different place or because they still have another nationality (even if legally). In some cases, this is still allowed - e.g., a foreign-born person cannot be elected as a US president. In France, there are also proposals to revoke the French nationality to persons who have committed serious crimes or engaged in terrorist activities (provided that they have another nationality.)
A separate case are *permanent residents* (aka *green card holders* in the US) - people who have legal right to reside in the country on a long-term basis, but who chose not to apply for the citizenship for various reasons (because it involves losing other nationality, because they are not interested in being involved in the political process, etc.)
Apartheid
---------
An obligatory mentioning here is the Apartheid in the South Africa, which involved division of the country in *Bantustans* - autonomous regions or independent states created along the racial lines, which was a way of legalizing the racial discrimination:
>
> The Pretoria government established ten Bantustans in South Africa, and ten in neighbouring South West Africa (then under South African administration), for the purpose of concentrating the members of designated ethnic groups, thus making each of those territories ethnically homogeneous as the basis for creating autonomous nation states for South Africa's different black ethnic groups. Under the Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act of 1970, the Government stripped black South Africans of their South African citizenship, depriving them of their few remaining political and civil rights in South Africa, and declared them to be citizens of these homelands.
>
>
> |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | "Nationality" is not the ethnic origin, it is largely the same as the citizenship (from the [dictionary](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/national), *someone who officially belongs to a particular country, a citizen of a particular country*). Discrimination by ethnic origin is not allowed. Discrimination by citizenship is allowed and obvious: citizens can enter the home country without visa, vote, work with much less restrictions and the like. Discrimination of foreign citizens against each other, based on they citizenship, is also widespread starting from the queue in the airport upon arrival ("EU nationals go left, all other nationals go right").
Ethnic origin and citizenship is not the same, and the national is a citizen (the definition sometimes extends to people who live for many generations in the country without citizenship). A sentient green spider originating from Andromeda galaxy would be an Estonian national if given a citizenship for some reason. All ethnic Russians with Estonian passport are Estonian nationals. They are **not** Russian nationals (dual citizenship in Estonia is not allowed).
P.S. There is an English translation of the constitution [here](https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015.pdf?lang=en). Who does not know Estonian anyway, could probably rather read the translation. | There is usually an exemption to these constitutional bans on discrimination. Under the *lex specialis* rule, any form of discrimination that is specifically prescribed by law is not allowed, and often even mandatory. Voting booths **must** discriminate on age.
This is often implicit, both in the constitution and the law that establishes the exception. This unclear wording is often justified by legal precedent, a lot of this discrimination predates the various constitutions and many lawmakers did not feel obliged to point out the obvious limits. E.g. the Dutch constitution has an explicit exemption for the Freedom of Speech, but an implicit exemption for discrimination. |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | "Nationality" is not the ethnic origin, it is largely the same as the citizenship (from the [dictionary](https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/national), *someone who officially belongs to a particular country, a citizen of a particular country*). Discrimination by ethnic origin is not allowed. Discrimination by citizenship is allowed and obvious: citizens can enter the home country without visa, vote, work with much less restrictions and the like. Discrimination of foreign citizens against each other, based on they citizenship, is also widespread starting from the queue in the airport upon arrival ("EU nationals go left, all other nationals go right").
Ethnic origin and citizenship is not the same, and the national is a citizen (the definition sometimes extends to people who live for many generations in the country without citizenship). A sentient green spider originating from Andromeda galaxy would be an Estonian national if given a citizenship for some reason. All ethnic Russians with Estonian passport are Estonian nationals. They are **not** Russian nationals (dual citizenship in Estonia is not allowed).
P.S. There is an English translation of the constitution [here](https://www.constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015.pdf?lang=en). Who does not know Estonian anyway, could probably rather read the translation. | I'll use the provided translation, which should be good enough for the purpose of this argument.
Here's article 142 with emphasis added:
>
> Article 142: If the Chancellor of Justice finds that legislation passed by the legislative or executive powers or by a local government is in conflict with the Constitution or a law, he or she shall propose to the body which passed the legislation to bring the legislation into conformity with *the Constitution* **or *the law*** within twenty days.
>
>
>
Where I'm getting at is this language suggests is that "the Constitution" isn't "the law", they are technically different. It could be a mistranslation or misinterpretation. However, I feel confident enough because that's a fairly common idea that constitutions and laws are different.
Examples of how laws are different from the Constitution include that laws can be initiated by "a member of the Riigikogu" ([art 103](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s457)) whereas constitutional amendements require "not less than one-fifth of the membership of the Riigikogu" or "the President of the Republic" ([art 161](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s694)). The Constitution cannot be amended during a "state of war", whereas no such restriction exist on laws.
So here's Article 12 again with emphasis added:
>
> Article 12: **Everyone is equal before *the law***. No one shall be discriminated against on the basis of nationality, race, color, sex, language, origin, religion, political or other opinion, property or social status, or on other grounds.
>
>
>
Note that it says "before the law", not "before the Constitution".
If we accept that the law and the Constitution are indeed different, and if we accept that article 12 puts a restriction on the law rather than the Constitution, then there is no contradiction.
If we don't accept that, then the Constitution taken as a whole still says "no discrimination, *and* also there is this one very specific and narrow case where discrimination is mandatory". You can view it as a contradiction, but it's better viewed as an exception.
What the Constitution says is by definition constitutional, so this one exception is constitutional. You can call it contradictory if you want, but at the end of the day it is what it is.
You could conceivably challenge the Constitution, and the process should be outlined in the Constitution or a document referenced in the Constitution. As far as I can tell, it involves bringing a case to the Riigikohus, the Supreme Court of Estonia, and ultimately that's where interpretation of the Constitution rests.
If no one has successfully challenged it and it's in the Constitution, chances are nobody objects to the common interpretation that article 57 is a slight and justified exception to article 12. |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | Someone who actually can speak Estonian should probably answer this, but on a quick look there is indeed a fair bit of problem with the most direct translation and how other passages by Estonian authorities use the term "rahvus".
The Estonian constitution in original says:
>
> Kõik on seaduse ees võrdsed. Kedagi ei tohi **diskrimineerida rahvuse**, rassi, nahavärvuse, soo, keele, päritolu, usutunnistuse, poliitiliste või muude veendumuste, samuti varalise ja sotsiaalse seisundi või muude asjaolude tõttu.
>
>
>
But in a quick google for that "rahvus" term, I also [found](https://volinik.ee/mis-on-rahvuse-parast-diskrimineerimine/) (seemingly on a page of the "Office of the Gender Equality and Equal Treatment Commissioner" of Estonia):
>
> Inimese rahvus on tunnus, mida ei ole võimalik muuta. Inimesed sünnivad ühte või teise rahvusesse. Seda, mis rahvusesse inimene sünnib, ei saa ta ise valida.
>
>
>
Google translates the latter as:
>
> A person's nationality is a characteristic that cannot be changed. People are born into one nationality or another. What nationality a person is born into, he cannot choose himself.
>
>
>
The first sentence of that clearly makes no sense in English with nationality = citizenship.
Wiktionary [says](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rahvus) for rahvus
>
> 1. ethnicity, nationality
> 2. nation
>
>
>
The Robert Schuman Centre also has [this](https://globalcit.eu/terminology/) to say about the (terminology) matter:
>
> In Estonia the term ‘nationality’ (rahvus) refers to ethnic origin only. There is no formal definition of this term in Estonian laws. In practice for most purposes ‘nationality’ of a person is based on his or her self-determination.
>
>
> The permanent legal link between the state and an individual is described by the term ‘citizenship’ (kodakondsus). Most of relevant issues are covered by the Citizenship Act.
>
>
> Furthermore, in Estonia the term ‘non-Estonians’ will refer to both citizens and non-citizens of minority ethnic origin. In general, in Estonia the terms ‘an Estonian’, ‘a Russian’ etc are the indication of a person’s ethnic origin.
>
>
>
Another [paper](https://www.academia.edu/2913635/Roles_and_visions_of_foundations_in_Estonia) (by a Finnish author) says:
>
> in Estonian statistics, “ethnicity/nationality” (rahvus) refers to self-reported ethnic belonging and is independent of both citizenship and mother tongue.
>
>
>
A 3rd [paper](https://ee.openlibhums.org/article/id/1903/) makes similar (albeit more critical remarks)
>
> the Estonian word for nationality (rahvus) is synonymous with ethnicity, referring to membership in a community of descent, and cultural diversity is predominantly conceived of in terms of ethnicity and national minorities. For example, the opening text of the “Cultural diversity” website operated by the Ministry of Culture states: “There are representatives of around 194 nationalities living in Estonia. Out of the total population, 69% are Estonians by nationality, 25% are Russians, 2% Ukrainians, 1% Belarusians, 0.8% Finns and many other smaller groups.” In the Soviet era, one’s personal nationality/ethnicity was listed in one’s passport. The sense or belief that one was born into a particular ethnic/national category persists, even if mixed family backgrounds or quotidian experiences in managing multiple belongings challenge this essentialist approach.
>
>
> | Discrimination may mean many things
-----------------------------------
Apart from the ambiguous use of term *nationality*, there is also the question of what kind of discrimination one is talking about.
Obviously, foreign nationals do not have some rights that citizens have - notably in terms of voting rights, access to the state territory, employment at certain jobs (e.g., jobs requiring security clearance, although many states also require giving preference to hiring citizens for all jobs.) However, this does not mean that any kind of discrimination against a foreign national is allowed.
As an example, one could cite [recent backlash by banks against Russians legally present in France in terms of blocking salaries, refusing bank transfers, and loans to Russians](https://www.francetvinfo.fr/monde/europe/manifestations-en-ukraine/temoignages-salaires-bloques-virements-impossibles-prets-refuses-des-ressortissants-russes-denoncent-le-zele-de-certaines-banques-francaises_5065240.html) complying with the French law on the sole basis that they are Russian nationals - this has resulted [in lawsuits for discrimination](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-9-2022-003036_EN.html).
Naturalized citizens, dual citizens, permanent residents
--------------------------------------------------------
There are many cases where a foreign national has acquired the rights of citizenship via naturalization. When doing this they might or might not have given up their other nationality. They thus may be discriminated because they were born in a different place or because they still have another nationality (even if legally). In some cases, this is still allowed - e.g., a foreign-born person cannot be elected as a US president. In France, there are also proposals to revoke the French nationality to persons who have committed serious crimes or engaged in terrorist activities (provided that they have another nationality.)
A separate case are *permanent residents* (aka *green card holders* in the US) - people who have legal right to reside in the country on a long-term basis, but who chose not to apply for the citizenship for various reasons (because it involves losing other nationality, because they are not interested in being involved in the political process, etc.)
Apartheid
---------
An obligatory mentioning here is the Apartheid in the South Africa, which involved division of the country in *Bantustans* - autonomous regions or independent states created along the racial lines, which was a way of legalizing the racial discrimination:
>
> The Pretoria government established ten Bantustans in South Africa, and ten in neighbouring South West Africa (then under South African administration), for the purpose of concentrating the members of designated ethnic groups, thus making each of those territories ethnically homogeneous as the basis for creating autonomous nation states for South Africa's different black ethnic groups. Under the Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act of 1970, the Government stripped black South Africans of their South African citizenship, depriving them of their few remaining political and civil rights in South Africa, and declared them to be citizens of these homelands.
>
>
> |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | Someone who actually can speak Estonian should probably answer this, but on a quick look there is indeed a fair bit of problem with the most direct translation and how other passages by Estonian authorities use the term "rahvus".
The Estonian constitution in original says:
>
> Kõik on seaduse ees võrdsed. Kedagi ei tohi **diskrimineerida rahvuse**, rassi, nahavärvuse, soo, keele, päritolu, usutunnistuse, poliitiliste või muude veendumuste, samuti varalise ja sotsiaalse seisundi või muude asjaolude tõttu.
>
>
>
But in a quick google for that "rahvus" term, I also [found](https://volinik.ee/mis-on-rahvuse-parast-diskrimineerimine/) (seemingly on a page of the "Office of the Gender Equality and Equal Treatment Commissioner" of Estonia):
>
> Inimese rahvus on tunnus, mida ei ole võimalik muuta. Inimesed sünnivad ühte või teise rahvusesse. Seda, mis rahvusesse inimene sünnib, ei saa ta ise valida.
>
>
>
Google translates the latter as:
>
> A person's nationality is a characteristic that cannot be changed. People are born into one nationality or another. What nationality a person is born into, he cannot choose himself.
>
>
>
The first sentence of that clearly makes no sense in English with nationality = citizenship.
Wiktionary [says](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rahvus) for rahvus
>
> 1. ethnicity, nationality
> 2. nation
>
>
>
The Robert Schuman Centre also has [this](https://globalcit.eu/terminology/) to say about the (terminology) matter:
>
> In Estonia the term ‘nationality’ (rahvus) refers to ethnic origin only. There is no formal definition of this term in Estonian laws. In practice for most purposes ‘nationality’ of a person is based on his or her self-determination.
>
>
> The permanent legal link between the state and an individual is described by the term ‘citizenship’ (kodakondsus). Most of relevant issues are covered by the Citizenship Act.
>
>
> Furthermore, in Estonia the term ‘non-Estonians’ will refer to both citizens and non-citizens of minority ethnic origin. In general, in Estonia the terms ‘an Estonian’, ‘a Russian’ etc are the indication of a person’s ethnic origin.
>
>
>
Another [paper](https://www.academia.edu/2913635/Roles_and_visions_of_foundations_in_Estonia) (by a Finnish author) says:
>
> in Estonian statistics, “ethnicity/nationality” (rahvus) refers to self-reported ethnic belonging and is independent of both citizenship and mother tongue.
>
>
>
A 3rd [paper](https://ee.openlibhums.org/article/id/1903/) makes similar (albeit more critical remarks)
>
> the Estonian word for nationality (rahvus) is synonymous with ethnicity, referring to membership in a community of descent, and cultural diversity is predominantly conceived of in terms of ethnicity and national minorities. For example, the opening text of the “Cultural diversity” website operated by the Ministry of Culture states: “There are representatives of around 194 nationalities living in Estonia. Out of the total population, 69% are Estonians by nationality, 25% are Russians, 2% Ukrainians, 1% Belarusians, 0.8% Finns and many other smaller groups.” In the Soviet era, one’s personal nationality/ethnicity was listed in one’s passport. The sense or belief that one was born into a particular ethnic/national category persists, even if mixed family backgrounds or quotidian experiences in managing multiple belongings challenge this essentialist approach.
>
>
> | There is usually an exemption to these constitutional bans on discrimination. Under the *lex specialis* rule, any form of discrimination that is specifically prescribed by law is not allowed, and often even mandatory. Voting booths **must** discriminate on age.
This is often implicit, both in the constitution and the law that establishes the exception. This unclear wording is often justified by legal precedent, a lot of this discrimination predates the various constitutions and many lawmakers did not feel obliged to point out the obvious limits. E.g. the Dutch constitution has an explicit exemption for the Freedom of Speech, but an implicit exemption for discrimination. |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | Someone who actually can speak Estonian should probably answer this, but on a quick look there is indeed a fair bit of problem with the most direct translation and how other passages by Estonian authorities use the term "rahvus".
The Estonian constitution in original says:
>
> Kõik on seaduse ees võrdsed. Kedagi ei tohi **diskrimineerida rahvuse**, rassi, nahavärvuse, soo, keele, päritolu, usutunnistuse, poliitiliste või muude veendumuste, samuti varalise ja sotsiaalse seisundi või muude asjaolude tõttu.
>
>
>
But in a quick google for that "rahvus" term, I also [found](https://volinik.ee/mis-on-rahvuse-parast-diskrimineerimine/) (seemingly on a page of the "Office of the Gender Equality and Equal Treatment Commissioner" of Estonia):
>
> Inimese rahvus on tunnus, mida ei ole võimalik muuta. Inimesed sünnivad ühte või teise rahvusesse. Seda, mis rahvusesse inimene sünnib, ei saa ta ise valida.
>
>
>
Google translates the latter as:
>
> A person's nationality is a characteristic that cannot be changed. People are born into one nationality or another. What nationality a person is born into, he cannot choose himself.
>
>
>
The first sentence of that clearly makes no sense in English with nationality = citizenship.
Wiktionary [says](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rahvus) for rahvus
>
> 1. ethnicity, nationality
> 2. nation
>
>
>
The Robert Schuman Centre also has [this](https://globalcit.eu/terminology/) to say about the (terminology) matter:
>
> In Estonia the term ‘nationality’ (rahvus) refers to ethnic origin only. There is no formal definition of this term in Estonian laws. In practice for most purposes ‘nationality’ of a person is based on his or her self-determination.
>
>
> The permanent legal link between the state and an individual is described by the term ‘citizenship’ (kodakondsus). Most of relevant issues are covered by the Citizenship Act.
>
>
> Furthermore, in Estonia the term ‘non-Estonians’ will refer to both citizens and non-citizens of minority ethnic origin. In general, in Estonia the terms ‘an Estonian’, ‘a Russian’ etc are the indication of a person’s ethnic origin.
>
>
>
Another [paper](https://www.academia.edu/2913635/Roles_and_visions_of_foundations_in_Estonia) (by a Finnish author) says:
>
> in Estonian statistics, “ethnicity/nationality” (rahvus) refers to self-reported ethnic belonging and is independent of both citizenship and mother tongue.
>
>
>
A 3rd [paper](https://ee.openlibhums.org/article/id/1903/) makes similar (albeit more critical remarks)
>
> the Estonian word for nationality (rahvus) is synonymous with ethnicity, referring to membership in a community of descent, and cultural diversity is predominantly conceived of in terms of ethnicity and national minorities. For example, the opening text of the “Cultural diversity” website operated by the Ministry of Culture states: “There are representatives of around 194 nationalities living in Estonia. Out of the total population, 69% are Estonians by nationality, 25% are Russians, 2% Ukrainians, 1% Belarusians, 0.8% Finns and many other smaller groups.” In the Soviet era, one’s personal nationality/ethnicity was listed in one’s passport. The sense or belief that one was born into a particular ethnic/national category persists, even if mixed family backgrounds or quotidian experiences in managing multiple belongings challenge this essentialist approach.
>
>
> | I'll use the provided translation, which should be good enough for the purpose of this argument.
Here's article 142 with emphasis added:
>
> Article 142: If the Chancellor of Justice finds that legislation passed by the legislative or executive powers or by a local government is in conflict with the Constitution or a law, he or she shall propose to the body which passed the legislation to bring the legislation into conformity with *the Constitution* **or *the law*** within twenty days.
>
>
>
Where I'm getting at is this language suggests is that "the Constitution" isn't "the law", they are technically different. It could be a mistranslation or misinterpretation. However, I feel confident enough because that's a fairly common idea that constitutions and laws are different.
Examples of how laws are different from the Constitution include that laws can be initiated by "a member of the Riigikogu" ([art 103](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s457)) whereas constitutional amendements require "not less than one-fifth of the membership of the Riigikogu" or "the President of the Republic" ([art 161](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s694)). The Constitution cannot be amended during a "state of war", whereas no such restriction exist on laws.
So here's Article 12 again with emphasis added:
>
> Article 12: **Everyone is equal before *the law***. No one shall be discriminated against on the basis of nationality, race, color, sex, language, origin, religion, political or other opinion, property or social status, or on other grounds.
>
>
>
Note that it says "before the law", not "before the Constitution".
If we accept that the law and the Constitution are indeed different, and if we accept that article 12 puts a restriction on the law rather than the Constitution, then there is no contradiction.
If we don't accept that, then the Constitution taken as a whole still says "no discrimination, *and* also there is this one very specific and narrow case where discrimination is mandatory". You can view it as a contradiction, but it's better viewed as an exception.
What the Constitution says is by definition constitutional, so this one exception is constitutional. You can call it contradictory if you want, but at the end of the day it is what it is.
You could conceivably challenge the Constitution, and the process should be outlined in the Constitution or a document referenced in the Constitution. As far as I can tell, it involves bringing a case to the Riigikohus, the Supreme Court of Estonia, and ultimately that's where interpretation of the Constitution rests.
If no one has successfully challenged it and it's in the Constitution, chances are nobody objects to the common interpretation that article 57 is a slight and justified exception to article 12. |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | Discrimination may mean many things
-----------------------------------
Apart from the ambiguous use of term *nationality*, there is also the question of what kind of discrimination one is talking about.
Obviously, foreign nationals do not have some rights that citizens have - notably in terms of voting rights, access to the state territory, employment at certain jobs (e.g., jobs requiring security clearance, although many states also require giving preference to hiring citizens for all jobs.) However, this does not mean that any kind of discrimination against a foreign national is allowed.
As an example, one could cite [recent backlash by banks against Russians legally present in France in terms of blocking salaries, refusing bank transfers, and loans to Russians](https://www.francetvinfo.fr/monde/europe/manifestations-en-ukraine/temoignages-salaires-bloques-virements-impossibles-prets-refuses-des-ressortissants-russes-denoncent-le-zele-de-certaines-banques-francaises_5065240.html) complying with the French law on the sole basis that they are Russian nationals - this has resulted [in lawsuits for discrimination](https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-9-2022-003036_EN.html).
Naturalized citizens, dual citizens, permanent residents
--------------------------------------------------------
There are many cases where a foreign national has acquired the rights of citizenship via naturalization. When doing this they might or might not have given up their other nationality. They thus may be discriminated because they were born in a different place or because they still have another nationality (even if legally). In some cases, this is still allowed - e.g., a foreign-born person cannot be elected as a US president. In France, there are also proposals to revoke the French nationality to persons who have committed serious crimes or engaged in terrorist activities (provided that they have another nationality.)
A separate case are *permanent residents* (aka *green card holders* in the US) - people who have legal right to reside in the country on a long-term basis, but who chose not to apply for the citizenship for various reasons (because it involves losing other nationality, because they are not interested in being involved in the political process, etc.)
Apartheid
---------
An obligatory mentioning here is the Apartheid in the South Africa, which involved division of the country in *Bantustans* - autonomous regions or independent states created along the racial lines, which was a way of legalizing the racial discrimination:
>
> The Pretoria government established ten Bantustans in South Africa, and ten in neighbouring South West Africa (then under South African administration), for the purpose of concentrating the members of designated ethnic groups, thus making each of those territories ethnically homogeneous as the basis for creating autonomous nation states for South Africa's different black ethnic groups. Under the Bantu Homelands Citizenship Act of 1970, the Government stripped black South Africans of their South African citizenship, depriving them of their few remaining political and civil rights in South Africa, and declared them to be citizens of these homelands.
>
>
> | There is usually an exemption to these constitutional bans on discrimination. Under the *lex specialis* rule, any form of discrimination that is specifically prescribed by law is not allowed, and often even mandatory. Voting booths **must** discriminate on age.
This is often implicit, both in the constitution and the law that establishes the exception. This unclear wording is often justified by legal precedent, a lot of this discrimination predates the various constitutions and many lawmakers did not feel obliged to point out the obvious limits. E.g. the Dutch constitution has an explicit exemption for the Freedom of Speech, but an implicit exemption for discrimination. |
75,661 | Many countries have constitutional provisions which prohibit discrimination based on certain characteristics (i.e. age, nationality, etc) while also - within the same constitution - having restrictions on voting right based on the very same characteristics.
For example, in the Estonian constitution, [Section 12](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s40) states no one should be discriminated based on "nationality", "origin", or "other grounds". But later in [Section 57](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s201), it restricts voting right to citizens of age 18 or older - this seems to constitute discrimination based on "nationality" and age (covered by the catch-all "other grounds").
Does this mean these constitutions are contradicting themselves? How do legal scholars reconcile these seemingly paradoxical provisions within their respective constitutions? | 2022/09/22 | [
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/questions/75661",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com",
"https://politics.stackexchange.com/users/28067/"
] | I'll use the provided translation, which should be good enough for the purpose of this argument.
Here's article 142 with emphasis added:
>
> Article 142: If the Chancellor of Justice finds that legislation passed by the legislative or executive powers or by a local government is in conflict with the Constitution or a law, he or she shall propose to the body which passed the legislation to bring the legislation into conformity with *the Constitution* **or *the law*** within twenty days.
>
>
>
Where I'm getting at is this language suggests is that "the Constitution" isn't "the law", they are technically different. It could be a mistranslation or misinterpretation. However, I feel confident enough because that's a fairly common idea that constitutions and laws are different.
Examples of how laws are different from the Constitution include that laws can be initiated by "a member of the Riigikogu" ([art 103](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s457)) whereas constitutional amendements require "not less than one-fifth of the membership of the Riigikogu" or "the President of the Republic" ([art 161](https://constituteproject.org/constitution/Estonia_2015?lang=en#s694)). The Constitution cannot be amended during a "state of war", whereas no such restriction exist on laws.
So here's Article 12 again with emphasis added:
>
> Article 12: **Everyone is equal before *the law***. No one shall be discriminated against on the basis of nationality, race, color, sex, language, origin, religion, political or other opinion, property or social status, or on other grounds.
>
>
>
Note that it says "before the law", not "before the Constitution".
If we accept that the law and the Constitution are indeed different, and if we accept that article 12 puts a restriction on the law rather than the Constitution, then there is no contradiction.
If we don't accept that, then the Constitution taken as a whole still says "no discrimination, *and* also there is this one very specific and narrow case where discrimination is mandatory". You can view it as a contradiction, but it's better viewed as an exception.
What the Constitution says is by definition constitutional, so this one exception is constitutional. You can call it contradictory if you want, but at the end of the day it is what it is.
You could conceivably challenge the Constitution, and the process should be outlined in the Constitution or a document referenced in the Constitution. As far as I can tell, it involves bringing a case to the Riigikohus, the Supreme Court of Estonia, and ultimately that's where interpretation of the Constitution rests.
If no one has successfully challenged it and it's in the Constitution, chances are nobody objects to the common interpretation that article 57 is a slight and justified exception to article 12. | There is usually an exemption to these constitutional bans on discrimination. Under the *lex specialis* rule, any form of discrimination that is specifically prescribed by law is not allowed, and often even mandatory. Voting booths **must** discriminate on age.
This is often implicit, both in the constitution and the law that establishes the exception. This unclear wording is often justified by legal precedent, a lot of this discrimination predates the various constitutions and many lawmakers did not feel obliged to point out the obvious limits. E.g. the Dutch constitution has an explicit exemption for the Freedom of Speech, but an implicit exemption for discrimination. |
182 | Why is it that whenever witnesses are required in Islam, two women are required to take the place of only one man?
The Quran in Sura 2:282 says:
>
> And let two men from among you bear witness to all such documents
> [contracts of loans without interest]. But if two men be not
> available, there should be one man and two women to bear witness so
> that if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her.
>
>
> | 2012/06/20 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/182",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/32/"
] | Quran itself states the reason clearly: "if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her". This is about the way human mind works. Men keep the event in more details. This is about nature and something like a man being physically stronger than a woman. Allah that created human knows it better than any authority. So Quran have to be obeyed and a Muslim should not put questions on words of Allah. Interpretation of all cases is not so simple. We can not disobey a command while we could not find a reason for it. | The reason why Quran 2:82 prescribed two female witnesses to one male witness is for multiple reasons.
TL;DR
-----
The reason for this witness ruling, which is 2 female witnesses to 1 male witness for commercial transactions is because women at the time and throughout much of history and even in many areas present-day were more familiar with domestic/private sphere of society while men were more familiar with the public/business sphere of society, meaning men were more financially aware. And it should be taken into consideration that a man has the financial burden to provide for his wife and daughters while women have no financial responsibility in Islam. But as we can see in modern times, many women work in the public sphere and are financially aware so they should suffice, alone, in place of one male witness with similar qualifications.
This ruling also protected female witnesses from possible bullying or manipulation. And with many of these contracts lasting for lengthy amounts of time, a female witness, possibly, would not always be available, if there might be a need to review the contract for whatever reason, since they could be busy with taking care of their kids, pregnancy, etc.
In no way does this ayah says or even infers that this witness ruling is because of the false belief that a female is more deficient in reason and intellect than a male.
The Context of Quran 2:82
-------------------------
Quran 2:82 is the longest Ayah in the Quran. One must read it entirely to understand why the witness ruling was designed this way.
This ayah is said to have been
revealed in connection with agricultural forward sales, but is generally
applicable to all agreements, including loans (Ṭ), where payment and delivery
do not take place simultaneously (IK, Q).
Among the variety of interpretations concerning the stipulation that, if one
cannot find two men to serve as witnesses, one may call two women and one
man, it is acknowledged that this provision is peculiar to the commercial
transactions mentioned in this verse (IK, Q, R, Ṭ) and differs from other kinds of
testimony. **Other verses explicitly equate male and female testimony, such as
24:6–9, where accusations of adultery are given equal consideration whether
they are made by the husband or the wife.** In the classical Islamic legal tradition,
women were generally excluded from bearing witness in cases involving
corporal punishments and qiṣāṣ (see 2:178c), but even in such cases it seems to
be a question of preference, since in the absence of a male witness, women’s
testimony would be accepted (Q). Such preferences likely reflect a general social
aversion to involving women in such matters. Moreover, since cases are
adjudicated by a judge, it is impossible, strictly speaking, to quantify the value of
testimony, and a judge simply needs all the relevant evidence to come to a
decision.
*If one of the two errs, the other can remind her*: “to err” means to forget
some aspect of the contract (Q, R, Ṭ). The commentators have generally hewed
close to two interpretations of this phrase: that by being reminded the erring
woman would become equal, legally, to the man; or that the two women together
were equal, legally, to the man. The latter was more widely accepted. **It is also
true that some commentators, but not all, understood this verse to indicate an
essential inferiority in women’s ability to judge objectively and hence the
intrinsic unreliability of their testimony. Nothing in the verse demands such a
reading, however, and indeed the very structure of the transaction described
indicates otherwise.** This verse could easily describe a situation in which two
female parties arrange a forward sale and bring in two men as witnesses. In
Islamic Law women, like men, can transact any sale or loan on their own behalf,
including any number of transactions where witnesses are not necessary; **thus the
provision for two women to act as witnesses in place of a single man in forward
sales or debts must reflect a different purpose**.
There are no rules about individual women entering into such contracts, but
**since the women of the time, as a general rule, would have been inexperienced
with the particulars of potentially complex financial arrangements, accepting two
women in the place of one man would have been more practical, since the
purpose of such testimony was to ensure the proper observance of the particulars
of the loan or sale. Considering the social conditions of the time, for women to
participate in this way at all would have been itself a major change, and to
require two of them in such transactions can be understood as providing a
measure of protection for them against bullying or manipulation, rather than as
an indictment of their testimony.** Indeed, jurists such as Abū Bakr ibn ʿArabī, in
Aḥkām al-Qur’ān, wondered why a man could not remind one woman if she
erred, and he could not arrive at an answer.
**If one reads this provision for women’s testimony in light of the legally
established principle upholding women’s competence to own property and carry
out economic transactions, it suggests that the stipulation regarding women’s
testimony in the present verse is particular to this circumstance and is meant to
address certain social or communal difficulties a woman might face when
witnessing in such a case.** Unlike spot sales, which require no witnesses or
written contracts, a forward contract involved items requiring a certain level of
expertise to understand. **Indeed, from among those whom you approve as
witnesses suggests that it is a matter of competence in a specific area, and such
transactions would not have been widely carried out by women of the time.
Moreover, such arrangements could extend over years, and women would not
necessarily be as available to act as male witnesses, from a strictly social point
of view, over a long period of time.** The trade of present goods refers to a
transaction where delivery is made at the time of payment and is thus concluded
instantaneously, obviating the need to write a formal contract.
Source: [The Study Quran](https://ia904603.us.archive.org/25/items/the-study-quran_202111/The%20Study%20Quran.pdf) p. 315-318
Extra Links to check out:
* [Women in Islamic Law: Examining Five Prevalent Myths](https://yaqeeninstitute.org/read/paper/women-in-islamic-law-examining-five-prevalent-myths) (Myth 3)
* [Two Minds, The cognitive differences between men and women](https://stanmed.stanford.edu/how-mens-and-womens-brains-are-different)
* [In Islam why are two women witnesses equal to one man’s witness answered by Dr Zakir Naik](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apYGWVRWni8) |
182 | Why is it that whenever witnesses are required in Islam, two women are required to take the place of only one man?
The Quran in Sura 2:282 says:
>
> And let two men from among you bear witness to all such documents
> [contracts of loans without interest]. But if two men be not
> available, there should be one man and two women to bear witness so
> that if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her.
>
>
> | 2012/06/20 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/182",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/32/"
] | In Sunni point of view, Women have deficiency in reason and in religion. That is why a woman's testimony is accepted if it is supported by another woman.
>
> "I have not seen anyone more deficient in ability to reason and deen
> than you. A cautious sensible man can be led astray by some of you.”
> It was said: “O Allah’s Messenger (peace be upon him)! What is the
> deficiency in our reasoning and deen?” He said: “Is not the testimony
> of two women equal to the witness of one man?” It was said: "What is
> deficient in her deen?" The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: "Is not
> it true that a woman can neither pray nor fast during her menses?”
> [Al-Bukhari]
>
>
> The Prophet (peace be upon him) explained that the deficiency in
> woman's reasoning means their weak memory. Therefore, their testimony
> must be verified and supported by another woman to confirm their
> testimony, because they may forget and thus add or omit some of the
> testimony.
>
>
> As for the deficiency of their religion it means they abandon Salah
> (prayer) and Sawm (fasting) during their menses and post-partum
> period. They are not commanded to repeat Salah (prayer). This is the
> meaning of their being lacking in deen. They will not be called to
> account for this shortcoming, because it is the will of Allah
> (Glorified and Exalted be He) Who legislated this for their comfort.
> If they were to observe Sawm during their menses and postpartum
> period, it would be difficult for them. Therefore, Allah commands them
> to abandon Sawm during their menses and post-partum period, and make
> up for it later. As for Salah, there is something which prevents them
> from ceremonial purity. Therefore, it is out of the Mercy of Allah
> (Glorified and Exalted be He) that He commands them to abandon Salah
> during their menses and postpartum period.
>
>
> This deficiency does not mean that we cannot rely on her in narration
> or testimony, if she is supported by another woman. Men being better
> than women in reasoning and memory is general. Some women may excel
> men. There are many women whose reason is better than men, and are
> stronger in deen (Religion) and memorization. The report of the
> Prophet (peace be upon him) only indicates that the male gender is
> generally better in reasoning and religion than the female gender in
> the two aspects specified by the Prophet (peace be upon him). Women
> may perform more righteous deeds than men, their piety may be more
> than men, and thus their rank in the Hereafter may be better than the
> rank of men. [1](http://www.alifta.com/Fatawa/FatawaChapters.aspx?View=Page&PageID=361&PageNo=1&BookID=14)
>
>
>
This is the explanation of the Scholars : [Deficiency of women in Deen and reason](http://www.alifta.com/Fatawa/FatawaChapters.aspx?View=Page&PageID=361&PageNo=1&BookID=14)
In fact, one of the scholars of Islam and second most highest narrator of hadeeths was Aisha (Radiallahu anha), who was a woman.
Now, most non-Muslims might think of this as a backward view. So, I want to give some logical and medical reports to support this view. So, I request them to give a patient reading with open mind and prevent emotions come in the way of their reasoning.
Please read this article which cites some medical reports and provides some reasoning :
[Why two witnesses?](http://www.sunnahonline.com/ilm/dawah/0030.htm)
Thank you. | Firstly this is only, as the Quran points out, in the area of business contracts. Where if two men are not brought then 1 man and two women. The Quran also points out that this is in regards to the issue of forgetfulness, because the business world isn't the natural place for a women, the women's responsibility lies in taking care of her children and her home, where it is them man's job to go out and work to support the family. Furthermore as already mentioned two women in regards to business contracts, where if a women in an area of her expertise is to give witness then that witness is sufficient. |
182 | Why is it that whenever witnesses are required in Islam, two women are required to take the place of only one man?
The Quran in Sura 2:282 says:
>
> And let two men from among you bear witness to all such documents
> [contracts of loans without interest]. But if two men be not
> available, there should be one man and two women to bear witness so
> that if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her.
>
>
> | 2012/06/20 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/182",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/32/"
] | Firstly this is only, as the Quran points out, in the area of business contracts. Where if two men are not brought then 1 man and two women. The Quran also points out that this is in regards to the issue of forgetfulness, because the business world isn't the natural place for a women, the women's responsibility lies in taking care of her children and her home, where it is them man's job to go out and work to support the family. Furthermore as already mentioned two women in regards to business contracts, where if a women in an area of her expertise is to give witness then that witness is sufficient. | I think this area is heavily disputed (on witnesses in general). While the Qu'arn is very clear in your example, it does not explicitly extend that beyond financial matters.
The most commonly accepted reason that I have seen is that financial matters are generally not in the women's sphere of expertise or interests. On the contrary, many scholars say that a woman's testimony alone is fine on matters that deal with womanly areas, such as child birth. The number of women can be different depending on the scholar though.
Also, as a wrench in the system, in cases where a husband accuses his wife of unchastity, her testimony will invalidate his. |
182 | Why is it that whenever witnesses are required in Islam, two women are required to take the place of only one man?
The Quran in Sura 2:282 says:
>
> And let two men from among you bear witness to all such documents
> [contracts of loans without interest]. But if two men be not
> available, there should be one man and two women to bear witness so
> that if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her.
>
>
> | 2012/06/20 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/182",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/32/"
] | In Sunni point of view, Women have deficiency in reason and in religion. That is why a woman's testimony is accepted if it is supported by another woman.
>
> "I have not seen anyone more deficient in ability to reason and deen
> than you. A cautious sensible man can be led astray by some of you.”
> It was said: “O Allah’s Messenger (peace be upon him)! What is the
> deficiency in our reasoning and deen?” He said: “Is not the testimony
> of two women equal to the witness of one man?” It was said: "What is
> deficient in her deen?" The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: "Is not
> it true that a woman can neither pray nor fast during her menses?”
> [Al-Bukhari]
>
>
> The Prophet (peace be upon him) explained that the deficiency in
> woman's reasoning means their weak memory. Therefore, their testimony
> must be verified and supported by another woman to confirm their
> testimony, because they may forget and thus add or omit some of the
> testimony.
>
>
> As for the deficiency of their religion it means they abandon Salah
> (prayer) and Sawm (fasting) during their menses and post-partum
> period. They are not commanded to repeat Salah (prayer). This is the
> meaning of their being lacking in deen. They will not be called to
> account for this shortcoming, because it is the will of Allah
> (Glorified and Exalted be He) Who legislated this for their comfort.
> If they were to observe Sawm during their menses and postpartum
> period, it would be difficult for them. Therefore, Allah commands them
> to abandon Sawm during their menses and post-partum period, and make
> up for it later. As for Salah, there is something which prevents them
> from ceremonial purity. Therefore, it is out of the Mercy of Allah
> (Glorified and Exalted be He) that He commands them to abandon Salah
> during their menses and postpartum period.
>
>
> This deficiency does not mean that we cannot rely on her in narration
> or testimony, if she is supported by another woman. Men being better
> than women in reasoning and memory is general. Some women may excel
> men. There are many women whose reason is better than men, and are
> stronger in deen (Religion) and memorization. The report of the
> Prophet (peace be upon him) only indicates that the male gender is
> generally better in reasoning and religion than the female gender in
> the two aspects specified by the Prophet (peace be upon him). Women
> may perform more righteous deeds than men, their piety may be more
> than men, and thus their rank in the Hereafter may be better than the
> rank of men. [1](http://www.alifta.com/Fatawa/FatawaChapters.aspx?View=Page&PageID=361&PageNo=1&BookID=14)
>
>
>
This is the explanation of the Scholars : [Deficiency of women in Deen and reason](http://www.alifta.com/Fatawa/FatawaChapters.aspx?View=Page&PageID=361&PageNo=1&BookID=14)
In fact, one of the scholars of Islam and second most highest narrator of hadeeths was Aisha (Radiallahu anha), who was a woman.
Now, most non-Muslims might think of this as a backward view. So, I want to give some logical and medical reports to support this view. So, I request them to give a patient reading with open mind and prevent emotions come in the way of their reasoning.
Please read this article which cites some medical reports and provides some reasoning :
[Why two witnesses?](http://www.sunnahonline.com/ilm/dawah/0030.htm)
Thank you. | The reason why Quran 2:82 prescribed two female witnesses to one male witness is for multiple reasons.
TL;DR
-----
The reason for this witness ruling, which is 2 female witnesses to 1 male witness for commercial transactions is because women at the time and throughout much of history and even in many areas present-day were more familiar with domestic/private sphere of society while men were more familiar with the public/business sphere of society, meaning men were more financially aware. And it should be taken into consideration that a man has the financial burden to provide for his wife and daughters while women have no financial responsibility in Islam. But as we can see in modern times, many women work in the public sphere and are financially aware so they should suffice, alone, in place of one male witness with similar qualifications.
This ruling also protected female witnesses from possible bullying or manipulation. And with many of these contracts lasting for lengthy amounts of time, a female witness, possibly, would not always be available, if there might be a need to review the contract for whatever reason, since they could be busy with taking care of their kids, pregnancy, etc.
In no way does this ayah says or even infers that this witness ruling is because of the false belief that a female is more deficient in reason and intellect than a male.
The Context of Quran 2:82
-------------------------
Quran 2:82 is the longest Ayah in the Quran. One must read it entirely to understand why the witness ruling was designed this way.
This ayah is said to have been
revealed in connection with agricultural forward sales, but is generally
applicable to all agreements, including loans (Ṭ), where payment and delivery
do not take place simultaneously (IK, Q).
Among the variety of interpretations concerning the stipulation that, if one
cannot find two men to serve as witnesses, one may call two women and one
man, it is acknowledged that this provision is peculiar to the commercial
transactions mentioned in this verse (IK, Q, R, Ṭ) and differs from other kinds of
testimony. **Other verses explicitly equate male and female testimony, such as
24:6–9, where accusations of adultery are given equal consideration whether
they are made by the husband or the wife.** In the classical Islamic legal tradition,
women were generally excluded from bearing witness in cases involving
corporal punishments and qiṣāṣ (see 2:178c), but even in such cases it seems to
be a question of preference, since in the absence of a male witness, women’s
testimony would be accepted (Q). Such preferences likely reflect a general social
aversion to involving women in such matters. Moreover, since cases are
adjudicated by a judge, it is impossible, strictly speaking, to quantify the value of
testimony, and a judge simply needs all the relevant evidence to come to a
decision.
*If one of the two errs, the other can remind her*: “to err” means to forget
some aspect of the contract (Q, R, Ṭ). The commentators have generally hewed
close to two interpretations of this phrase: that by being reminded the erring
woman would become equal, legally, to the man; or that the two women together
were equal, legally, to the man. The latter was more widely accepted. **It is also
true that some commentators, but not all, understood this verse to indicate an
essential inferiority in women’s ability to judge objectively and hence the
intrinsic unreliability of their testimony. Nothing in the verse demands such a
reading, however, and indeed the very structure of the transaction described
indicates otherwise.** This verse could easily describe a situation in which two
female parties arrange a forward sale and bring in two men as witnesses. In
Islamic Law women, like men, can transact any sale or loan on their own behalf,
including any number of transactions where witnesses are not necessary; **thus the
provision for two women to act as witnesses in place of a single man in forward
sales or debts must reflect a different purpose**.
There are no rules about individual women entering into such contracts, but
**since the women of the time, as a general rule, would have been inexperienced
with the particulars of potentially complex financial arrangements, accepting two
women in the place of one man would have been more practical, since the
purpose of such testimony was to ensure the proper observance of the particulars
of the loan or sale. Considering the social conditions of the time, for women to
participate in this way at all would have been itself a major change, and to
require two of them in such transactions can be understood as providing a
measure of protection for them against bullying or manipulation, rather than as
an indictment of their testimony.** Indeed, jurists such as Abū Bakr ibn ʿArabī, in
Aḥkām al-Qur’ān, wondered why a man could not remind one woman if she
erred, and he could not arrive at an answer.
**If one reads this provision for women’s testimony in light of the legally
established principle upholding women’s competence to own property and carry
out economic transactions, it suggests that the stipulation regarding women’s
testimony in the present verse is particular to this circumstance and is meant to
address certain social or communal difficulties a woman might face when
witnessing in such a case.** Unlike spot sales, which require no witnesses or
written contracts, a forward contract involved items requiring a certain level of
expertise to understand. **Indeed, from among those whom you approve as
witnesses suggests that it is a matter of competence in a specific area, and such
transactions would not have been widely carried out by women of the time.
Moreover, such arrangements could extend over years, and women would not
necessarily be as available to act as male witnesses, from a strictly social point
of view, over a long period of time.** The trade of present goods refers to a
transaction where delivery is made at the time of payment and is thus concluded
instantaneously, obviating the need to write a formal contract.
Source: [The Study Quran](https://ia904603.us.archive.org/25/items/the-study-quran_202111/The%20Study%20Quran.pdf) p. 315-318
Extra Links to check out:
* [Women in Islamic Law: Examining Five Prevalent Myths](https://yaqeeninstitute.org/read/paper/women-in-islamic-law-examining-five-prevalent-myths) (Myth 3)
* [Two Minds, The cognitive differences between men and women](https://stanmed.stanford.edu/how-mens-and-womens-brains-are-different)
* [In Islam why are two women witnesses equal to one man’s witness answered by Dr Zakir Naik](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apYGWVRWni8) |
182 | Why is it that whenever witnesses are required in Islam, two women are required to take the place of only one man?
The Quran in Sura 2:282 says:
>
> And let two men from among you bear witness to all such documents
> [contracts of loans without interest]. But if two men be not
> available, there should be one man and two women to bear witness so
> that if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her.
>
>
> | 2012/06/20 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/182",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/32/"
] | Quran itself states the reason clearly: "if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her". This is about the way human mind works. Men keep the event in more details. This is about nature and something like a man being physically stronger than a woman. Allah that created human knows it better than any authority. So Quran have to be obeyed and a Muslim should not put questions on words of Allah. Interpretation of all cases is not so simple. We can not disobey a command while we could not find a reason for it. | I think this area is heavily disputed (on witnesses in general). While the Qu'arn is very clear in your example, it does not explicitly extend that beyond financial matters.
The most commonly accepted reason that I have seen is that financial matters are generally not in the women's sphere of expertise or interests. On the contrary, many scholars say that a woman's testimony alone is fine on matters that deal with womanly areas, such as child birth. The number of women can be different depending on the scholar though.
Also, as a wrench in the system, in cases where a husband accuses his wife of unchastity, her testimony will invalidate his. |
182 | Why is it that whenever witnesses are required in Islam, two women are required to take the place of only one man?
The Quran in Sura 2:282 says:
>
> And let two men from among you bear witness to all such documents
> [contracts of loans without interest]. But if two men be not
> available, there should be one man and two women to bear witness so
> that if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her.
>
>
> | 2012/06/20 | [
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/questions/182",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com",
"https://islam.stackexchange.com/users/32/"
] | Firstly this is only, as the Quran points out, in the area of business contracts. Where if two men are not brought then 1 man and two women. The Quran also points out that this is in regards to the issue of forgetfulness, because the business world isn't the natural place for a women, the women's responsibility lies in taking care of her children and her home, where it is them man's job to go out and work to support the family. Furthermore as already mentioned two women in regards to business contracts, where if a women in an area of her expertise is to give witness then that witness is sufficient. | Quran itself states the reason clearly: "if one of the women forgets (anything), the other may remind her". This is about the way human mind works. Men keep the event in more details. This is about nature and something like a man being physically stronger than a woman. Allah that created human knows it better than any authority. So Quran have to be obeyed and a Muslim should not put questions on words of Allah. Interpretation of all cases is not so simple. We can not disobey a command while we could not find a reason for it. |
171,772 | Can the rms AC voltage change with frequency?
I have connected a DSO to the audio oscillator(having 10V p-p). Peak to peak voltage remains constant on changing frequency(10 Hz to 100KHz) but on measuring the rms voltage with a multimeter, the voltage varies drastically(falls off from 3.4V at 500Hz to 0.5V at 50KHz).
Is something wrong with the oscillator/multimeter? **Can AC rms voltage vary even when peak to peak value remains constant?** | 2015/05/22 | [
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/171772",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/users/77076/"
] | Most multimeters aren't designed for the frequencies you are using. They are generally intended to be used at around line frequency (50hz or 60Hz.) Some will also work at higher frequencies, some won't. Around 10Hz you aren't too far from what the meter expects, so it works OK. At higher frequencies, it won't work so good.
The multimeter will have filters on its input that limit the frequency range of the input signal. Check the specifications of your meter to see what range it is guaranteed to work in. You may find that it is only specified for, say, under 200Hz or maybe just at 60Hz or just at 50Hz.
[Here is a good multimeter,](http://rads.stackoverflow.com/amzn/click/B002X9IPB2) and it only goes upto 30kHz.
---
In response to comment:
[Your Fluke 115](http://en-us.fluke.com/products/digital-multimeters/fluke-115-digital-multimeter.html#techspecs) is only specified for up to 1kHz when measuring AC RMS voltage. Above that, anything goes. So, your meter is misleading you. | If the measured signal is a pure sinusoid then RMS should remain the same.
So chances are:
* the multimeter is not measuring the real RMS
* the shape of the output changes ( maybe more noise or higher frequency harmonics ) |
126,057 | When looking at old games like Mario64 or DukeNukem3D, all the mirrors in the game are essentially just holes in the wall with a mirrored copy of the geometry in front of the mirror put behind them. In the case of DukeNukem3D one can even activate no-clip and walk into that mirrored room.
In contrast modern games use a render-to-texture approach for mirrors. This leads to the mirrors getting noticeably pixelated when getting to close to them. One of the first games I noticed this approach was Luigi's Mansion, but it seems to be used in almost all modern games.
What change in the hardware or engines made the second approach become so dominant these days and what are the benefits to it? In terms of pure visuals the first approach seems superior, as it doesn't suffer from pixelation issues. | 2016/07/25 | [
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/126057",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/users/13807/"
] | 1. Using RTT (render-to-texture) allows to easily scale rendering quality (resolution, LOD, lighting complexity) for adjustable performance. RTT also makes it easier to replace the surface with a cubemap at a certain distance where it's hard to see the reflection exactly.
2. Since the output is a texture, there are more options regarding what can be done with it afterwards (lighting, shading, blending, distortion etc.).
3. If a mirrored version of geometry is placed in the scene, it would require more complicated culling when it intersects with real geometry and could be seen behind the corner. In older games, levels were designed to avoid this. Not to mention that somebody has to do the actual mirroring.
4. If geometry is not manually mirrored, rendering must be done by changing the view matrix and culling mode (to compensate for the space inversion in the matrix), and using the stencil buffer to cut out the mirror. Modern engines prefer to create all render states in advance, so there would be a minor issue with making copies of every scene render state with the required changes for mirror rendering.
So basically using RTT gives more freedom to everyone. | RTT would have been used if it was possible but the hardware rendering pipeline was one way.
Older hardware also had limitations that prevented render to texture. Writing to RAM means it can not be read at the same time. To improve rendering performance the destination buffer was locked to write only, only the display hardware could read from it. You could request reading, but that locked the RAM and the render had to wait for the lock to clear before it could start the next frame. RTT would cause a major bottleneck to the pipeline and thus other solutions were used.
You will find that befor Hardware rendering pipelines were the norm RTT was used as it provided a way to reduce the rendering load. 3D rendered to sprites to provide pseudo 3D content. Texture rendering was way too costly (CPU) to be used back then, apart from specialised machines that were outside the general consumer market. |
126,057 | When looking at old games like Mario64 or DukeNukem3D, all the mirrors in the game are essentially just holes in the wall with a mirrored copy of the geometry in front of the mirror put behind them. In the case of DukeNukem3D one can even activate no-clip and walk into that mirrored room.
In contrast modern games use a render-to-texture approach for mirrors. This leads to the mirrors getting noticeably pixelated when getting to close to them. One of the first games I noticed this approach was Luigi's Mansion, but it seems to be used in almost all modern games.
What change in the hardware or engines made the second approach become so dominant these days and what are the benefits to it? In terms of pure visuals the first approach seems superior, as it doesn't suffer from pixelation issues. | 2016/07/25 | [
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/126057",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/users/13807/"
] | 1. Using RTT (render-to-texture) allows to easily scale rendering quality (resolution, LOD, lighting complexity) for adjustable performance. RTT also makes it easier to replace the surface with a cubemap at a certain distance where it's hard to see the reflection exactly.
2. Since the output is a texture, there are more options regarding what can be done with it afterwards (lighting, shading, blending, distortion etc.).
3. If a mirrored version of geometry is placed in the scene, it would require more complicated culling when it intersects with real geometry and could be seen behind the corner. In older games, levels were designed to avoid this. Not to mention that somebody has to do the actual mirroring.
4. If geometry is not manually mirrored, rendering must be done by changing the view matrix and culling mode (to compensate for the space inversion in the matrix), and using the stencil buffer to cut out the mirror. Modern engines prefer to create all render states in advance, so there would be a minor issue with making copies of every scene render state with the required changes for mirror rendering.
So basically using RTT gives more freedom to everyone. | Duke Nukem handle that by re-rendering the geometry behind the mirror, the other answers are partially correct. There are areas behind mirrors that actually contains no geometry (in game data files), the geometry is re-rendered at run time infact, the reason for those areas to exist is to avoid to place accidentally a piece of level there when editing the level:
since theres' an area marked you will not place accidentally any geometry in there. |
126,057 | When looking at old games like Mario64 or DukeNukem3D, all the mirrors in the game are essentially just holes in the wall with a mirrored copy of the geometry in front of the mirror put behind them. In the case of DukeNukem3D one can even activate no-clip and walk into that mirrored room.
In contrast modern games use a render-to-texture approach for mirrors. This leads to the mirrors getting noticeably pixelated when getting to close to them. One of the first games I noticed this approach was Luigi's Mansion, but it seems to be used in almost all modern games.
What change in the hardware or engines made the second approach become so dominant these days and what are the benefits to it? In terms of pure visuals the first approach seems superior, as it doesn't suffer from pixelation issues. | 2016/07/25 | [
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/126057",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/users/13807/"
] | No, you are wrong - that's not how Duke Nukem 3D's mirrors worked at all.
DN3D used a *portal engine*. A joint between any two sectors was arbitrary to an extent, and when the rendering engine came to a portal, it knew that it has to start rendering another sector in that. The sector behind the mirror was basically a place holder to deal with a quirk in the engine - the only point of the sector was to be bigger than whatever you needed "reflected". It didn't contain any real geometry. In fact, it worked pretty much the same way "portals" work in Portal - except that Portal (itself being based on a portal engine) creates the portals at runtime, and has a limit to how many times the portals can recurse (i.e. A -> B -> A -> B -> A ...), while Build (DN3D) would simply crash as its stack overflowed if you pointed a mirror at another mirror.
It's obvious how simple it is to implement a mirror with that - make a portal that points *back* into the room. This meant that rendering the mirror would cost exactly as much as rendering the room itself, giving great performance and consistency. As long as you didn't point a mirror at another mirror, that is. If you look through the Build engine source code, you'll see there's no code handling mirrors at all - there doesn't have to be one, because that's how portals work *NOTE: actually, there is code to flip the rendered pixels - it just doesn't flip the geometry and all the various sprites and effects*. The editor had to be able to make these "fake" portals, though - looking back on itself. If you want to know more about the quite smart Build engine, there's a great analysis by Fabien Sanglard at [Build engine internals](http://fabiensanglard.net/duke3d/build_engine_internals.php). The whole engine has been open sourced and ported to modern platforms as well, though the old one still works flawlessly on Windows 10 (tested for you :P). Many of the games based on Build have also been open sourced and/or remade.
Why is this no longer used? Well, some engines no longer prefer portals, for one. It's tricky to apply a lot of graphics hacks and optimizations - I can't point you to anything specific, but a lot of post-processing depends on hacks that wouldn't work in a true portal engine (they make a lot of assumptions that no longer hold). This is basically the same kind of issue these games have with stereoscopic imagery - the hacks no longer work.
Most importantly, mirrors got more complicated. They can have complex shapes, textures, they may be on the ground (also known as "water") etc. While all of those problems are solvable in a portal engine, RTT becomes the simpler choice at some point, and GPUs are fast enough to handle it.
However, even with all that, there are plenty of games with hardware 3D acceleration that do things "real". Of the older games, Quake 3 or Alien vs. Predator, for example. As far as I know, Source engine games still use "real" mirrors. If you expect that people are going to get close to the mirror, and you can guarantee that there's not too many reflective surfaces at the same time (e.g. through level design), portal mirrors are still very attractive. | RTT would have been used if it was possible but the hardware rendering pipeline was one way.
Older hardware also had limitations that prevented render to texture. Writing to RAM means it can not be read at the same time. To improve rendering performance the destination buffer was locked to write only, only the display hardware could read from it. You could request reading, but that locked the RAM and the render had to wait for the lock to clear before it could start the next frame. RTT would cause a major bottleneck to the pipeline and thus other solutions were used.
You will find that befor Hardware rendering pipelines were the norm RTT was used as it provided a way to reduce the rendering load. 3D rendered to sprites to provide pseudo 3D content. Texture rendering was way too costly (CPU) to be used back then, apart from specialised machines that were outside the general consumer market. |
126,057 | When looking at old games like Mario64 or DukeNukem3D, all the mirrors in the game are essentially just holes in the wall with a mirrored copy of the geometry in front of the mirror put behind them. In the case of DukeNukem3D one can even activate no-clip and walk into that mirrored room.
In contrast modern games use a render-to-texture approach for mirrors. This leads to the mirrors getting noticeably pixelated when getting to close to them. One of the first games I noticed this approach was Luigi's Mansion, but it seems to be used in almost all modern games.
What change in the hardware or engines made the second approach become so dominant these days and what are the benefits to it? In terms of pure visuals the first approach seems superior, as it doesn't suffer from pixelation issues. | 2016/07/25 | [
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/126057",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/users/13807/"
] | RTT would have been used if it was possible but the hardware rendering pipeline was one way.
Older hardware also had limitations that prevented render to texture. Writing to RAM means it can not be read at the same time. To improve rendering performance the destination buffer was locked to write only, only the display hardware could read from it. You could request reading, but that locked the RAM and the render had to wait for the lock to clear before it could start the next frame. RTT would cause a major bottleneck to the pipeline and thus other solutions were used.
You will find that befor Hardware rendering pipelines were the norm RTT was used as it provided a way to reduce the rendering load. 3D rendered to sprites to provide pseudo 3D content. Texture rendering was way too costly (CPU) to be used back then, apart from specialised machines that were outside the general consumer market. | Duke Nukem handle that by re-rendering the geometry behind the mirror, the other answers are partially correct. There are areas behind mirrors that actually contains no geometry (in game data files), the geometry is re-rendered at run time infact, the reason for those areas to exist is to avoid to place accidentally a piece of level there when editing the level:
since theres' an area marked you will not place accidentally any geometry in there. |
126,057 | When looking at old games like Mario64 or DukeNukem3D, all the mirrors in the game are essentially just holes in the wall with a mirrored copy of the geometry in front of the mirror put behind them. In the case of DukeNukem3D one can even activate no-clip and walk into that mirrored room.
In contrast modern games use a render-to-texture approach for mirrors. This leads to the mirrors getting noticeably pixelated when getting to close to them. One of the first games I noticed this approach was Luigi's Mansion, but it seems to be used in almost all modern games.
What change in the hardware or engines made the second approach become so dominant these days and what are the benefits to it? In terms of pure visuals the first approach seems superior, as it doesn't suffer from pixelation issues. | 2016/07/25 | [
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/questions/126057",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com",
"https://gamedev.stackexchange.com/users/13807/"
] | No, you are wrong - that's not how Duke Nukem 3D's mirrors worked at all.
DN3D used a *portal engine*. A joint between any two sectors was arbitrary to an extent, and when the rendering engine came to a portal, it knew that it has to start rendering another sector in that. The sector behind the mirror was basically a place holder to deal with a quirk in the engine - the only point of the sector was to be bigger than whatever you needed "reflected". It didn't contain any real geometry. In fact, it worked pretty much the same way "portals" work in Portal - except that Portal (itself being based on a portal engine) creates the portals at runtime, and has a limit to how many times the portals can recurse (i.e. A -> B -> A -> B -> A ...), while Build (DN3D) would simply crash as its stack overflowed if you pointed a mirror at another mirror.
It's obvious how simple it is to implement a mirror with that - make a portal that points *back* into the room. This meant that rendering the mirror would cost exactly as much as rendering the room itself, giving great performance and consistency. As long as you didn't point a mirror at another mirror, that is. If you look through the Build engine source code, you'll see there's no code handling mirrors at all - there doesn't have to be one, because that's how portals work *NOTE: actually, there is code to flip the rendered pixels - it just doesn't flip the geometry and all the various sprites and effects*. The editor had to be able to make these "fake" portals, though - looking back on itself. If you want to know more about the quite smart Build engine, there's a great analysis by Fabien Sanglard at [Build engine internals](http://fabiensanglard.net/duke3d/build_engine_internals.php). The whole engine has been open sourced and ported to modern platforms as well, though the old one still works flawlessly on Windows 10 (tested for you :P). Many of the games based on Build have also been open sourced and/or remade.
Why is this no longer used? Well, some engines no longer prefer portals, for one. It's tricky to apply a lot of graphics hacks and optimizations - I can't point you to anything specific, but a lot of post-processing depends on hacks that wouldn't work in a true portal engine (they make a lot of assumptions that no longer hold). This is basically the same kind of issue these games have with stereoscopic imagery - the hacks no longer work.
Most importantly, mirrors got more complicated. They can have complex shapes, textures, they may be on the ground (also known as "water") etc. While all of those problems are solvable in a portal engine, RTT becomes the simpler choice at some point, and GPUs are fast enough to handle it.
However, even with all that, there are plenty of games with hardware 3D acceleration that do things "real". Of the older games, Quake 3 or Alien vs. Predator, for example. As far as I know, Source engine games still use "real" mirrors. If you expect that people are going to get close to the mirror, and you can guarantee that there's not too many reflective surfaces at the same time (e.g. through level design), portal mirrors are still very attractive. | Duke Nukem handle that by re-rendering the geometry behind the mirror, the other answers are partially correct. There are areas behind mirrors that actually contains no geometry (in game data files), the geometry is re-rendered at run time infact, the reason for those areas to exist is to avoid to place accidentally a piece of level there when editing the level:
since theres' an area marked you will not place accidentally any geometry in there. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | Just do it as normal all the time.
They pick up everything all the time.
That is how children learn by seeing, hearing and experiencing things. | We started toilet training our child from roughly day 5, almost by accident. By month 2 or 3, it became clear that the lack of communication was the biggest impediment to success (the baby can't take off their own diaper or climb onto the potty) and it took my dumb brain a few months to come up with sign language. We (the parents) use about 10 signs (of the 25 plus letters that we know - we're very green) as we talk and the baby is currently signing 'milk' to communicate a need (maybe milk). Their verbal communication is still likely months away from catching up based on what I've read. The gross motor stuff is just easier to learn than coordinating the fine motor, breathing and vocalization needed for talking.
The baby made their first poop joke at about 5 months (it wasn't very good, but 5 months!) and it seems clear that babies have a lot going on that they can't express. Right now, our limited vocabulary feels like a missed opportunity. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | Unless he/she has a hearing impairment just to talk to them. Of course point at the things at the same time, to show what you mean ("You want water?" and point at the bottle) but don't replace talking with signing.
Believe me you'll understand their babbling and they will understand you like any other baby did in the past even without sign language attempts.
Anecdotal evidence: a friend of ours is doing this signing thing with her toddler boy. First of all it looks really odd, like why is she flailing hands when she can simply tell him what she wants? And second the boy is now quite behind with speech development because he can comfortably communicate with his parents using signing and has no need to develop a spoken language.
Trust me your baby will be just fine if you just speak to him/her. All the best.
**Updates based on the comments:**
1. I'd suspect that most parents don't know or use the official, true sign language when "signing" with their babies. The name is misleading, it should be called "baby-level hand gestures" as that's what it is. Calling what they do a "sign language" leads to a confusion like we have seen here and it is indeed demeaning to the official, proper sign languages.
In other words I'm *not* dismissing American Sign Language, British Sign Language, or any other sign language of any country.
2. That misunderstanding also led to some accusations of ableism in the comments. There was *zero* mention of any impairments in the OP's baby or their family, in other words the assumption is that they *are able* to learn to communicate verbally. If it wasn't the case it would certainly be pointed out in the original question. That makes me assume that the OP doesn't have a real need to sign with her baby and is only considering it because it's trendy in some circles.
This answer is obviously not relevant in a situation where the baby or the family *need* to use a *proper* sign language. However to my understanding this is not the OP's case. | We started toilet training our child from roughly day 5, almost by accident. By month 2 or 3, it became clear that the lack of communication was the biggest impediment to success (the baby can't take off their own diaper or climb onto the potty) and it took my dumb brain a few months to come up with sign language. We (the parents) use about 10 signs (of the 25 plus letters that we know - we're very green) as we talk and the baby is currently signing 'milk' to communicate a need (maybe milk). Their verbal communication is still likely months away from catching up based on what I've read. The gross motor stuff is just easier to learn than coordinating the fine motor, breathing and vocalization needed for talking.
The baby made their first poop joke at about 5 months (it wasn't very good, but 5 months!) and it seems clear that babies have a lot going on that they can't express. Right now, our limited vocabulary feels like a missed opportunity. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | Just do it as normal all the time.
They pick up everything all the time.
That is how children learn by seeing, hearing and experiencing things. | Unless he/she has a hearing impairment just to talk to them. Of course point at the things at the same time, to show what you mean ("You want water?" and point at the bottle) but don't replace talking with signing.
Believe me you'll understand their babbling and they will understand you like any other baby did in the past even without sign language attempts.
Anecdotal evidence: a friend of ours is doing this signing thing with her toddler boy. First of all it looks really odd, like why is she flailing hands when she can simply tell him what she wants? And second the boy is now quite behind with speech development because he can comfortably communicate with his parents using signing and has no need to develop a spoken language.
Trust me your baby will be just fine if you just speak to him/her. All the best.
**Updates based on the comments:**
1. I'd suspect that most parents don't know or use the official, true sign language when "signing" with their babies. The name is misleading, it should be called "baby-level hand gestures" as that's what it is. Calling what they do a "sign language" leads to a confusion like we have seen here and it is indeed demeaning to the official, proper sign languages.
In other words I'm *not* dismissing American Sign Language, British Sign Language, or any other sign language of any country.
2. That misunderstanding also led to some accusations of ableism in the comments. There was *zero* mention of any impairments in the OP's baby or their family, in other words the assumption is that they *are able* to learn to communicate verbally. If it wasn't the case it would certainly be pointed out in the original question. That makes me assume that the OP doesn't have a real need to sign with her baby and is only considering it because it's trendy in some circles.
This answer is obviously not relevant in a situation where the baby or the family *need* to use a *proper* sign language. However to my understanding this is not the OP's case. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | Just do it as normal all the time.
They pick up everything all the time.
That is how children learn by seeing, hearing and experiencing things. | What if a baby is born deaf? Once parents learn their baby is profoundly deaf, sign language begins, presumably with a baby that can see. Try imagining (as a hearing person with ear plugs on in a very noisy environment) and attempt to listen to someone talking to you. If you can't hear them, you're deaf and relying on your eyes to see their lips move. Lip reading becomes automatic for a deaf baby and sign language a 'normal' skill learned no differently from learning to speak. A deaf baby immediately focuses their eyes, as all babies do, to the person in direct contact. Signing begins immediately. Sign language is the deaf's way of speaking until old enough to learn speech from professionals in deaf schools. Remember, as a deaf person, if you never heard a sound since birth then how do you know how to create sounds into speech since you're deaf from birth? I'm one of several siblings to an older brother born deaf. Mother, father and the rest of us have normal hearing. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | Just do it as normal all the time.
They pick up everything all the time.
That is how children learn by seeing, hearing and experiencing things. | You might as well start early to grow your own vocabulary, and to build the habit for yourself. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | We incorporated basic signs with our children pretty much right after they started opening their eyes (i.e. around 1 month) and coupled it with words. We are not proficient in sign language, we limited ourselves to 'eat', 'drink', and 'more' and was done with a deliberate goal towards the long game and had demonstrable benefits for us.
Our kids are now 3 & 5 and are 3 year old will sometimes fall back on his sign language when he's extremely upset and that's where the benefits really show. Temper tantrums can make forming his thoughts into words all the more difficult, so having a few signs to help him say what he wants can be very helpful for him to convey his desires without words.
He even uses it at bedtime as his way to say, "I love you," and it is the cutest thing ever.
So to summarize, anytime is fine, but I will say there are benefits to be had. It probably won't prevent temper tantrums from occurring, but it will make them a little easier to handle. | You might as well start early to grow your own vocabulary, and to build the habit for yourself. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | We incorporated basic signs with our children pretty much right after they started opening their eyes (i.e. around 1 month) and coupled it with words. We are not proficient in sign language, we limited ourselves to 'eat', 'drink', and 'more' and was done with a deliberate goal towards the long game and had demonstrable benefits for us.
Our kids are now 3 & 5 and are 3 year old will sometimes fall back on his sign language when he's extremely upset and that's where the benefits really show. Temper tantrums can make forming his thoughts into words all the more difficult, so having a few signs to help him say what he wants can be very helpful for him to convey his desires without words.
He even uses it at bedtime as his way to say, "I love you," and it is the cutest thing ever.
So to summarize, anytime is fine, but I will say there are benefits to be had. It probably won't prevent temper tantrums from occurring, but it will make them a little easier to handle. | We started toilet training our child from roughly day 5, almost by accident. By month 2 or 3, it became clear that the lack of communication was the biggest impediment to success (the baby can't take off their own diaper or climb onto the potty) and it took my dumb brain a few months to come up with sign language. We (the parents) use about 10 signs (of the 25 plus letters that we know - we're very green) as we talk and the baby is currently signing 'milk' to communicate a need (maybe milk). Their verbal communication is still likely months away from catching up based on what I've read. The gross motor stuff is just easier to learn than coordinating the fine motor, breathing and vocalization needed for talking.
The baby made their first poop joke at about 5 months (it wasn't very good, but 5 months!) and it seems clear that babies have a lot going on that they can't express. Right now, our limited vocabulary feels like a missed opportunity. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | You might as well start early to grow your own vocabulary, and to build the habit for yourself. | What if a baby is born deaf? Once parents learn their baby is profoundly deaf, sign language begins, presumably with a baby that can see. Try imagining (as a hearing person with ear plugs on in a very noisy environment) and attempt to listen to someone talking to you. If you can't hear them, you're deaf and relying on your eyes to see their lips move. Lip reading becomes automatic for a deaf baby and sign language a 'normal' skill learned no differently from learning to speak. A deaf baby immediately focuses their eyes, as all babies do, to the person in direct contact. Signing begins immediately. Sign language is the deaf's way of speaking until old enough to learn speech from professionals in deaf schools. Remember, as a deaf person, if you never heard a sound since birth then how do you know how to create sounds into speech since you're deaf from birth? I'm one of several siblings to an older brother born deaf. Mother, father and the rest of us have normal hearing. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | We incorporated basic signs with our children pretty much right after they started opening their eyes (i.e. around 1 month) and coupled it with words. We are not proficient in sign language, we limited ourselves to 'eat', 'drink', and 'more' and was done with a deliberate goal towards the long game and had demonstrable benefits for us.
Our kids are now 3 & 5 and are 3 year old will sometimes fall back on his sign language when he's extremely upset and that's where the benefits really show. Temper tantrums can make forming his thoughts into words all the more difficult, so having a few signs to help him say what he wants can be very helpful for him to convey his desires without words.
He even uses it at bedtime as his way to say, "I love you," and it is the cutest thing ever.
So to summarize, anytime is fine, but I will say there are benefits to be had. It probably won't prevent temper tantrums from occurring, but it will make them a little easier to handle. | What if a baby is born deaf? Once parents learn their baby is profoundly deaf, sign language begins, presumably with a baby that can see. Try imagining (as a hearing person with ear plugs on in a very noisy environment) and attempt to listen to someone talking to you. If you can't hear them, you're deaf and relying on your eyes to see their lips move. Lip reading becomes automatic for a deaf baby and sign language a 'normal' skill learned no differently from learning to speak. A deaf baby immediately focuses their eyes, as all babies do, to the person in direct contact. Signing begins immediately. Sign language is the deaf's way of speaking until old enough to learn speech from professionals in deaf schools. Remember, as a deaf person, if you never heard a sound since birth then how do you know how to create sounds into speech since you're deaf from birth? I'm one of several siblings to an older brother born deaf. Mother, father and the rest of us have normal hearing. |
42,987 | I would like to know when is a good time to start teaching your baby sign language. I heard they won't start signing back to you before 6-7 months so starting before 3 months might be pointless. Any thoughts on when you think would be a good time to start for your sake as well as your baby's? | 2022/10/27 | [
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/questions/42987",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com",
"https://parenting.stackexchange.com/users/43628/"
] | Just do it as normal all the time.
They pick up everything all the time.
That is how children learn by seeing, hearing and experiencing things. | We incorporated basic signs with our children pretty much right after they started opening their eyes (i.e. around 1 month) and coupled it with words. We are not proficient in sign language, we limited ourselves to 'eat', 'drink', and 'more' and was done with a deliberate goal towards the long game and had demonstrable benefits for us.
Our kids are now 3 & 5 and are 3 year old will sometimes fall back on his sign language when he's extremely upset and that's where the benefits really show. Temper tantrums can make forming his thoughts into words all the more difficult, so having a few signs to help him say what he wants can be very helpful for him to convey his desires without words.
He even uses it at bedtime as his way to say, "I love you," and it is the cutest thing ever.
So to summarize, anytime is fine, but I will say there are benefits to be had. It probably won't prevent temper tantrums from occurring, but it will make them a little easier to handle. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Put a jar on your desk labeled "Nag Jar 25 cents" and insist that he drop in a quarter every time he mentions the swear jar. | Next time he mentions it...
Calmly, pull out your wallet, pull out a $10 or $20 bill, make a giant and flamboyant gesture of walking over to the jar. Make sure you get everyone's attention. Make sure everyone sees the denomination of the bill. Even hold the bill stretched out right up to his face. (Always smiling of course.)
When everyone is watching, slowly put the bill into the jar while announcing that you are pre-paying for every swear you will make till the end of your career.
Alternatively, as J.R. suggested, you could go about it in an understated way. You probably know what is appropriate and will work best between you and them.
Walk away and tell them to stop bothering you about it.
Get back to work. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Unfortunately, not participating in this is going to get you labeled as "not a team player", which is a CLM (career limiting move) of the first order. My advice to you would be to participate, since you don't curse often, it would do little harm. Your concern in being "that guy" is indeed founded.
**BUT**
if you insist, here is the proper way to do so without doing major damage to your career, go to that person and say...
>
> Look, I understand that the teams are participating in this, but I don't feel comfortable, so I am not. Please let this matter drop, the rest of the team has.
>
>
>
Then, if this person still persists...
>
> Look, we've already discussed this and I am not participating. If we need to get your supervisor involved, we can, but I would prefer not to.
>
>
>
Then let the matter drop. If he still persists then, and only then approach his supervisor with...
>
> Hi, I'm sorry to bother you with what might seem a petty matter, but I've had several conversations with Joe about letting the matter with the curse jar drop, and he won't. This is making me a bit uncomfortable, could you please talk to him?
>
>
>
Again, you don't want to make a huge issue of this, or you **WILL BE** "that guy" | Tell him you don’t carry change.
The last thing you want to do is play games - like bringing in your own “nag” jar. It only reinforces the confrontation.
Keep it professional, even if they don’t. Tell him you don’t have any change and you’re not playing his game. Then just stop responding, and get back to work.
Consider this: if you were to go to your manager over this, and asked him/her how to properly handle the issue, do you think he/she would say “Take it one step further. Bring in your own jar, label it ‘nag’, and set it on your desk.” Or would he/she say “just ignore them.” |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Unfortunately, not participating in this is going to get you labeled as "not a team player", which is a CLM (career limiting move) of the first order. My advice to you would be to participate, since you don't curse often, it would do little harm. Your concern in being "that guy" is indeed founded.
**BUT**
if you insist, here is the proper way to do so without doing major damage to your career, go to that person and say...
>
> Look, I understand that the teams are participating in this, but I don't feel comfortable, so I am not. Please let this matter drop, the rest of the team has.
>
>
>
Then, if this person still persists...
>
> Look, we've already discussed this and I am not participating. If we need to get your supervisor involved, we can, but I would prefer not to.
>
>
>
Then let the matter drop. If he still persists then, and only then approach his supervisor with...
>
> Hi, I'm sorry to bother you with what might seem a petty matter, but I've had several conversations with Joe about letting the matter with the curse jar drop, and he won't. This is making me a bit uncomfortable, could you please talk to him?
>
>
>
Again, you don't want to make a huge issue of this, or you **WILL BE** "that guy" | We're all being monitored whether we like it or not. You choose not to participate. That's your prerogative, but you should have anticipated some consequences.
Usually, people nag like this because the noticed that it bothers you. You showed him that this gets to you, so he keeps doing it. Taking other action could make it worse.
You decided to go this route, so I suggest you work very hard on ignoring this person and demonstrating to everyone else, in some other way, that you are a team player. Maybe you could suggest that a fine should be paid for any type of annoying behavior. Eventually, he'll look like a fool for his behavior especially in an open environment. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Put a jar on your desk labeled "Nag Jar 25 cents" and insist that he drop in a quarter every time he mentions the swear jar. | My suggestion (which has worked for me in analogous situations):
1. "I am allergic to collective coercion." [the first nag of each week]
2. "It's still a no, I am afraid." [after that, for a few times]
3. "It's still a no." [for the rest of the day]
4. "No." [for the rest of the week]
Always said in even and unperturbed voice, no matter how often it is repeated.
Don't even try to convince them to stop nagging. That's the key. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Unfortunately, not participating in this is going to get you labeled as "not a team player", which is a CLM (career limiting move) of the first order. My advice to you would be to participate, since you don't curse often, it would do little harm. Your concern in being "that guy" is indeed founded.
**BUT**
if you insist, here is the proper way to do so without doing major damage to your career, go to that person and say...
>
> Look, I understand that the teams are participating in this, but I don't feel comfortable, so I am not. Please let this matter drop, the rest of the team has.
>
>
>
Then, if this person still persists...
>
> Look, we've already discussed this and I am not participating. If we need to get your supervisor involved, we can, but I would prefer not to.
>
>
>
Then let the matter drop. If he still persists then, and only then approach his supervisor with...
>
> Hi, I'm sorry to bother you with what might seem a petty matter, but I've had several conversations with Joe about letting the matter with the curse jar drop, and he won't. This is making me a bit uncomfortable, could you please talk to him?
>
>
>
Again, you don't want to make a huge issue of this, or you **WILL BE** "that guy" | you need to escalate to your manager immediately.
"
To make it clear - I don't care about having a good relationship with that person anymore
"
the above is a very bad sign for team work, and your manager needs to know about it. it's better to stop things quickly before they fester into something worse.
Also, as an aside, next time it might be best to join in on team activities when everyone else is party to it. Doing otherwise reduces your social capital - is hard to get someone to follow your initiative if you are seen as an outsider |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Unfortunately, not participating in this is going to get you labeled as "not a team player", which is a CLM (career limiting move) of the first order. My advice to you would be to participate, since you don't curse often, it would do little harm. Your concern in being "that guy" is indeed founded.
**BUT**
if you insist, here is the proper way to do so without doing major damage to your career, go to that person and say...
>
> Look, I understand that the teams are participating in this, but I don't feel comfortable, so I am not. Please let this matter drop, the rest of the team has.
>
>
>
Then, if this person still persists...
>
> Look, we've already discussed this and I am not participating. If we need to get your supervisor involved, we can, but I would prefer not to.
>
>
>
Then let the matter drop. If he still persists then, and only then approach his supervisor with...
>
> Hi, I'm sorry to bother you with what might seem a petty matter, but I've had several conversations with Joe about letting the matter with the curse jar drop, and he won't. This is making me a bit uncomfortable, could you please talk to him?
>
>
>
Again, you don't want to make a huge issue of this, or you **WILL BE** "that guy" | Agree to join the swear jar on the condition that for every day you don't swear at all, you get to take a handful out of it. And quit swearing. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Next time he mentions it...
Calmly, pull out your wallet, pull out a $10 or $20 bill, make a giant and flamboyant gesture of walking over to the jar. Make sure you get everyone's attention. Make sure everyone sees the denomination of the bill. Even hold the bill stretched out right up to his face. (Always smiling of course.)
When everyone is watching, slowly put the bill into the jar while announcing that you are pre-paying for every swear you will make till the end of your career.
Alternatively, as J.R. suggested, you could go about it in an understated way. You probably know what is appropriate and will work best between you and them.
Walk away and tell them to stop bothering you about it.
Get back to work. | Next time he nags about it, just look at him in the eyes and say all the swear words that come through your mind.
More seriously, if you've already explicitly told him you didn't take part in the jar thingy (i.e. explicitly stated *"I don't do the swear jar. Please stop pestering me about it."*), having a talk with his team leader could be rather harmless if done correctly and defuse the situation rather than going straight to HR.
If you go to the team leader for this issue, be sure to expose the problem while trying not to make a big issue about it or throw blame on your coworker. Something in the line :
>
> Hey chief, you know I don't participate to the swear jar, right ? Could you have a quick word with Bob to tell him to avoid reminding me to contribute to it ?
>
>
>
If Bob takes it badly it could reflect on his behaviour toward you and may lead to him / the rest of the team putting you off as a negative nancy. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Tell him you don’t carry change.
The last thing you want to do is play games - like bringing in your own “nag” jar. It only reinforces the confrontation.
Keep it professional, even if they don’t. Tell him you don’t have any change and you’re not playing his game. Then just stop responding, and get back to work.
Consider this: if you were to go to your manager over this, and asked him/her how to properly handle the issue, do you think he/she would say “Take it one step further. Bring in your own jar, label it ‘nag’, and set it on your desk.” Or would he/she say “just ignore them.” | We're all being monitored whether we like it or not. You choose not to participate. That's your prerogative, but you should have anticipated some consequences.
Usually, people nag like this because the noticed that it bothers you. You showed him that this gets to you, so he keeps doing it. Taking other action could make it worse.
You decided to go this route, so I suggest you work very hard on ignoring this person and demonstrating to everyone else, in some other way, that you are a team player. Maybe you could suggest that a fine should be paid for any type of annoying behavior. Eventually, he'll look like a fool for his behavior especially in an open environment. |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Put a jar on your desk labeled "Nag Jar 25 cents" and insist that he drop in a quarter every time he mentions the swear jar. | Unfortunately, not participating in this is going to get you labeled as "not a team player", which is a CLM (career limiting move) of the first order. My advice to you would be to participate, since you don't curse often, it would do little harm. Your concern in being "that guy" is indeed founded.
**BUT**
if you insist, here is the proper way to do so without doing major damage to your career, go to that person and say...
>
> Look, I understand that the teams are participating in this, but I don't feel comfortable, so I am not. Please let this matter drop, the rest of the team has.
>
>
>
Then, if this person still persists...
>
> Look, we've already discussed this and I am not participating. If we need to get your supervisor involved, we can, but I would prefer not to.
>
>
>
Then let the matter drop. If he still persists then, and only then approach his supervisor with...
>
> Hi, I'm sorry to bother you with what might seem a petty matter, but I've had several conversations with Joe about letting the matter with the curse jar drop, and he won't. This is making me a bit uncomfortable, could you please talk to him?
>
>
>
Again, you don't want to make a huge issue of this, or you **WILL BE** "that guy" |
107,399 | In my open-space office our 5-man team, "A" sits next to 8-man team "B". About 3 weeks ago, a colleague from HR came and asked team "B" to mind their behaviour because they were rather loud and tended to swear quite a bit.
In order to accommodate quickly, they decided that for each curse one has to throw some change into a jar. Their method proved effective, as they control each other strictly.
About a week later, they suggested that our team join their "jar fund" and everyone except me agreed to do so. It is not a matter of the insignificant fine amount, but rather that I do not wish to be monitored in such a manner, despite the fact that I hardly ever swear (definitely the least of them all). I explained why I wouldn't take part and deemed this issue settled.
However, one team "B" member keeps nagging me about paying the fine for my grand total of 2 curses (something silly like "damn," no less) basically every day and completely ignores the fact that I'm not taking part. I clearly let him know multiple times that he's being annoying but he doesn't seem to care. At this point, I've definitely ran out of patience and will probably get very unpleasant very soon.
Generally, I would not hold back but I don't want to perform a full-fledged rant at work.
I could notify his superior, but I would rather deal with it personally. To make it clear: I no longer care about having a good relationship with that person, but I don't want to be "that guy" who reports others for generally insignificant reasons.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
**Update:**
So it turns out that the problem fixed itself as the nagging coworker received a notice due to multiple complaints from the client regarding his lack of commitment and work ethic and was allowed to leave immediately. | 2018/02/28 | [
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/questions/107399",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com",
"https://workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83398/"
] | Next time he mentions it...
Calmly, pull out your wallet, pull out a $10 or $20 bill, make a giant and flamboyant gesture of walking over to the jar. Make sure you get everyone's attention. Make sure everyone sees the denomination of the bill. Even hold the bill stretched out right up to his face. (Always smiling of course.)
When everyone is watching, slowly put the bill into the jar while announcing that you are pre-paying for every swear you will make till the end of your career.
Alternatively, as J.R. suggested, you could go about it in an understated way. You probably know what is appropriate and will work best between you and them.
Walk away and tell them to stop bothering you about it.
Get back to work. | Tell him you don’t carry change.
The last thing you want to do is play games - like bringing in your own “nag” jar. It only reinforces the confrontation.
Keep it professional, even if they don’t. Tell him you don’t have any change and you’re not playing his game. Then just stop responding, and get back to work.
Consider this: if you were to go to your manager over this, and asked him/her how to properly handle the issue, do you think he/she would say “Take it one step further. Bring in your own jar, label it ‘nag’, and set it on your desk.” Or would he/she say “just ignore them.” |
336 | When I was in high school, Homer's *Iliad*, Homer's *Odyssey*, and Virgil's *Aeneid* were taught as a trilogy of sorts.
Was Virgil the first Roman to refer to Odysseus as 'Ulysses' or was there another (recorded) author before him who did so? | 2017/01/20 | [
"https://literature.stackexchange.com/questions/336",
"https://literature.stackexchange.com",
"https://literature.stackexchange.com/users/188/"
] | Ulysses is the Latin form of the Greek Odysseus, stemming from the Sicilian or alternate Latin form Ulixes. The first instance of these forms in literature that I can find is in the *Odusia* by [Livius Andronicus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Livius_Andronicus#Odusia). This is an early translation of the Odyssey (third century BC). The only parts of it that survive are 46 lines from 17 books of the Odyssey, but this is one of those lines:
>
> Inferus an superus tibi fert deus funera, Ulixes?
> (Od. 10, 64)
>
>
>
I found the surviving text of the Odusia [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Livius_Andronicus#Odusia).
[Marcus Pacuvius](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacuvius) was an early Latin dramatist who probably used Ulysses. Though I'm not sure, he wrote many of his plays on Greek topics, and the translations of his works I found use the name Ulysses.
So to answer your question: **Livius Andronicus** was the first writer I can find who used a form of the Latin name of Odysseus, and Virgil was not the first. | I am not a linguist, but I think it's worth mentioning that the Odysseus→Ulysses transformation is a special case of something called the "Sabine L": some words that had "d" sounds in Old Latin (or in Greek) became "l" in later (classical) Latin. Examples include:
* *lacrima* in Latin from Old Latin *dacrima*, from Greek *dakry* from PIE \*dakru- from which both English *tear* and Sanskrit *aśru*.
* *olere* "smell," from the same root as *odor*
* *lingua* from *dingua* (cognate *tongue*, Sanskrit *jihvā*)
* Latin *lēvir* "husband's brother" (cf. "levirate") from \*daivēr > Sanskrit देवृ still present in Hindi as *devar*
So just to avoid any ambiguity here at this question, *Ulixes* being the Latin form of Greek *Odysseus* is not an arbitrary choice made up by some author. |
352,752 | In US foods and other products, "organic" simply is a federal certification guaranteeing a set of standards are met. Within the organic product space, differentiators include fair trade, local sourcing, no animal testing, and other practices that appeal to the "conscious consumption" aspect of the field.
What is a way of saying "the 'organic' of X," where X is a field NOT associated with actual organic products? Implying conscious differentiators without spelling them out. | 2016/10/10 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/352752",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/200292/"
] | Consider *the **sustainability** of X* as a phrase to identify 'differentiators' along the lines of *organic*, but related to products that *organic* isn't appropriate for.
>
> **Sustainable** *adjective*
> 1.1 Conserving an ecological balance by avoiding depletion of natural resources:
> ‘our fundamental commitment to sustainable development’
> [- ODO](https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/sustainable)
>
>
>
Here are some examples:
* from [wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_development):
>
> Sustainable development is a process for meeting human development goals while sustaining the ability of natural systems to continue to provide the natural resources and ecosystem services upon which the economy and society depends.
>
>
>
* from the journal [Sustainable Computing](http://www.journals.elsevier.com/sustainable-computing):
>
> The aim of Sustainable Computing: Informatics and Systems (SUSCOM) is to publish the myriad research findings related to energy-aware and thermal-aware management of computing resource.
>
>
>
* from [US EPA](https://archive.epa.gov/sustainablemanufacturing/web/html/):
>
> Sustainable manufacturing is the creation of manufactured products through economically-sound processes that minimize negative environmental impacts while conserving energy and natural resources.
>
>
> | The *Cadillac* of X.
Cadillac: "The best of its kind; standard of excellence; paragon : Republicans call New York the Cadillac of welfare states/ Revos are the Cadillac of sunglasses" The Dictionary of American Slang, Fourth Edition, which I found at <http://www.dictionary.com/browse/cadillac?s=t> |
66,011 | Why does water have several different solid phase but only one liquid and gas phase? Is there any meaning? or any reason behind it?
Or is it just the way the nature behaves? | 2013/05/26 | [
"https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/66011",
"https://physics.stackexchange.com",
"https://physics.stackexchange.com/users/23103/"
] | Solid phases differ by the arrangement of the molecules. Molecules in solids stay at the same place so you can have different geometrical arrangements (different phases). In liquids and gases, molecules always move, so you cannot define a fixed arrangement. | Some other liquids can have multiple phases though. Liquid helium can undergo a phase transition between a superfluid and a non-superfluid phase. |
2,343,560 | Can you install a hardware driver, built using WinUSB, along with a C# application deployed using Click-once? | 2010/02/26 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/2343560",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/80589/"
] | ClickOnce cannot install a driver.
ClickOnce simply copies files from a server location to a client's profile and keeps them in sync. The main reason people get confused is because Visual Studio does extra stuff when you use it to deploy. It creates both a web page and a bootstrapper for prerequisites. The bootstrapper bundles all your prerequisites into a single package but is totally separate from ClickOnce.
You could include your driver in the bootstrapper, but users are ultimately responsible for deciding whether or not to run the bootstrapper before your ClickOnce app. Another option would be to use ClickOnce to deploy the driver file and then write custom code in your application to install it. This assumes your application is able to start without the driver installed and that the user has enough privilege to install the driver.
If you come up with a working solution, please follow up. | See the following discussion: <http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-SG/winformssetup/thread/51f897d9-a84c-49a6-9305-df9e19986918>
It would appear that the recommended practice is to create a setup prerequisite for the drivers, then include that prerequisite in the clickonce for your app's properties. |
2,343,560 | Can you install a hardware driver, built using WinUSB, along with a C# application deployed using Click-once? | 2010/02/26 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/2343560",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/80589/"
] | See the following discussion: <http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-SG/winformssetup/thread/51f897d9-a84c-49a6-9305-df9e19986918>
It would appear that the recommended practice is to create a setup prerequisite for the drivers, then include that prerequisite in the clickonce for your app's properties. | Drivers can be uninstalled. My ClickOnce apps deploy the driver files locally on install, then my app checks to see if the USB device is present and if the drivers have been applied. I think this is best, because the user gets the correct error for their situation. If the drivers aren't there, I prompt the user and runas or simply run the installer. |
2,343,560 | Can you install a hardware driver, built using WinUSB, along with a C# application deployed using Click-once? | 2010/02/26 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/2343560",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/80589/"
] | ClickOnce cannot install a driver.
ClickOnce simply copies files from a server location to a client's profile and keeps them in sync. The main reason people get confused is because Visual Studio does extra stuff when you use it to deploy. It creates both a web page and a bootstrapper for prerequisites. The bootstrapper bundles all your prerequisites into a single package but is totally separate from ClickOnce.
You could include your driver in the bootstrapper, but users are ultimately responsible for deciding whether or not to run the bootstrapper before your ClickOnce app. Another option would be to use ClickOnce to deploy the driver file and then write custom code in your application to install it. This assumes your application is able to start without the driver installed and that the user has enough privilege to install the driver.
If you come up with a working solution, please follow up. | Drivers can be uninstalled. My ClickOnce apps deploy the driver files locally on install, then my app checks to see if the USB device is present and if the drivers have been applied. I think this is best, because the user gets the correct error for their situation. If the drivers aren't there, I prompt the user and runas or simply run the installer. |
212,363 | A friend recently told me that "can" is a rare verb without an infinitive. I have since looked it up and discovered it is an auxiliary verb. In my mind it modifies a "proper" verb in much the same way an adverb does.
"I *can* **jump** puddles"
"I *could* **do** it"
"to jump" and "to do" are OK, "to can" is wrong (meaning "to be able to").
"I *am able to* **jump** puddles"
"I *was able to* **do** it"
So, are words like "can/could", "must", "will/would", etc. actually verbs or are they only auxiliary or modal verbs and not "proper" verbs? I was also chatting to a Frenchman and he said in French auxiliary verbs are just called auxiliaries and are not considered to be verbs, so is it the same in English? It seems to me that if you can't "to" or "-ing" a word it is not proper verb.
"to jump", "jumping" - OK
"to must", "musting" - wrong
However, if auxiliary and modal verbs are actually verbs is there a word to describe a non-modal, non-auxiliary verb?
Please, no comments about canning factories or making wills. I already know that the words "can" and "will" can be infinitives but with a different meaning.
**EDIT**
Black bears, brown bears and polar bears are actually bears. Koalas and pandas are not bears yet some people call them koala bears and panda bears because they look a bit like bears. Likewise jellyfish and starfish are not fish but are aquatic animals as fish are. Alternative names for them are sea jellies and sea stars. Ironically, the seahorse is actually a fish. Things are not always what they're called. So are auxiliary verbs actually verbs or just called verbs? | 2014/12/07 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/212363",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/73636/"
] | There are different views on the things you ask about and the major grammar texts do seem to differ in the details, so there are "traditional grammars" and "modern grammars" as authors grapple with various complexities and redefinitions and have different views.
I'm not sure about what you call a "proper verb" (a judgement call really) but the term 'main verb' is similar to what I think you mean.
Most simply:
A "simple verb" consists of a single "verb" (a 'main verb') in the "verb phrase".
A "compound verb" consists of more than one verb in the verb phrase.
These extra verbs are "auxiliary verbs", this later group consisting of the "**primary auxilaries**" ('have', 'be', 'do') and the "**modal auxilaries**" (a closed group of 9 including 'have', 'can', 'will'). [This is one classification system of verbs, though here not including copular verbs]
The auxilary verbs bring something extra to the verb phrase (for example assisting with indicating tense, mood, modality).
Modal auxilaries (like 'can') are defective in that they do not have all the properties of a 'main verb': they have no infinitive form, no regular adjustment for tense (excepting a historical use of shall/should for example), and only a single form for all persons. There are also the first verb in a verb phrase. They do not have past or present participle forms, so 'musting' is ungrammatical.
The primary auxilaries 'have' and 'be' can also function as main verbs. I think that 'can' can too but only when it not used as a modal auxilary, i.e. when it has a certain different meaning. One can provide the following advice to their teenage children playing music too loud in their room: "Can the noise now please!" (where 'can' means 'turn it off'), but this is like your note about canning factories - its a different meaning to say " 'to can' the beans" - from what you were asking about. | I agree totally with you about the issue, except that modal auxiliary verbs should be classified as adjectives.
In "{Mary is} pretty"
* *is* modifies Mary's existentialism, by being an adjective to *Mary*.
* pretty modifies Mary's existentialism, by stating that {Mary's existentialism} being pretty.
However, the more established way to look at it is, in **not quite precise** explanation,
* The actual verb is not *is*, but *be*.
* *is* is merely an auxiliary form to the verb *be*.
* Perhaps more precisely, *is* and *being* are inflections of *be*.
* *is* is an auxiliary inflection to the word *be*.
* The gerund/present-participle/verbal-noun of *is* is *being*.
* The to-infinitive of *is* is *to be*.
"She can come"
* *can*/*could* are auxiliary forms of the complex-verb/verb-phrase *be able to*.
* The to-infinitive of *can*/*could* is *to be able to*.
* The gerund/present-participle/verbal-noun of *can*/*could* is *being able to*.
* Thus, "She is able", where *is* is the auxiliary inflection of *be*.
\*She will sing"
* *will-1* is a complete verb of its own right.
* *to will* is the to-infinitive. e.g. *To will* oneself to sing.
* *willing* is the present-participle. e.g., she is *willing* to sing.
Similarly, *have*, *need*, *want* are complete verbs of their own right.
Some of the other modal auxiliaries and the actual inflectable verb-phrases they **encapsulate**:
* will-2: be definite to.
"She will die" = "She is definite to die".
* may-1: will have possibility.
"She may come" = "She will have possibility to come".
"She might come" = "She would have possibility to come".
* may-2: is allowed to.
"You may come in" = "You are allowed to come in".
* must-1: bear the imperative.
"She must die" = "She bears the imperative to fail".
* must-2: bear the obligation.
"She must succeed" = "She bears the obligation to succeed".
* must-3: carry a heavy presumed possibility.
"She must have eaten my corn dog!" = "She carries a heavy presumed possibility of having eaten my corn dog!" |
212,363 | A friend recently told me that "can" is a rare verb without an infinitive. I have since looked it up and discovered it is an auxiliary verb. In my mind it modifies a "proper" verb in much the same way an adverb does.
"I *can* **jump** puddles"
"I *could* **do** it"
"to jump" and "to do" are OK, "to can" is wrong (meaning "to be able to").
"I *am able to* **jump** puddles"
"I *was able to* **do** it"
So, are words like "can/could", "must", "will/would", etc. actually verbs or are they only auxiliary or modal verbs and not "proper" verbs? I was also chatting to a Frenchman and he said in French auxiliary verbs are just called auxiliaries and are not considered to be verbs, so is it the same in English? It seems to me that if you can't "to" or "-ing" a word it is not proper verb.
"to jump", "jumping" - OK
"to must", "musting" - wrong
However, if auxiliary and modal verbs are actually verbs is there a word to describe a non-modal, non-auxiliary verb?
Please, no comments about canning factories or making wills. I already know that the words "can" and "will" can be infinitives but with a different meaning.
**EDIT**
Black bears, brown bears and polar bears are actually bears. Koalas and pandas are not bears yet some people call them koala bears and panda bears because they look a bit like bears. Likewise jellyfish and starfish are not fish but are aquatic animals as fish are. Alternative names for them are sea jellies and sea stars. Ironically, the seahorse is actually a fish. Things are not always what they're called. So are auxiliary verbs actually verbs or just called verbs? | 2014/12/07 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/212363",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/73636/"
] | To determine whether auxiliaries are verbs, we should examine two kinds of properties. One kind of important property relates to word forms, and the other kind of property relates to word use.
Most verbs have properties such as tense, aspect and mode.
The verb *to be* is a normal, complete verb. *Was* and *were* are past tense forms of *to be*, and *is*, *are* and *am* are present tense forms. *Being* is a continuous aspect form, and *been* is a perfect aspect form. The *were* of "if I were a rich man" and the *be* of "be he live or be he dead, I'll grind his bones into my bread" are subjunctive forms.
If *can* is a verb, then it is a defective verb. It doesn't have forms that show aspect. The forms *canning* and *canned* don't exist for the auxiliary. Neither does the infinitive *to can*.\* However, it does have the properties of tense and mode. *Could* is both a past tense form and a subjunctive mode form, just as *were* is both a past tense form and a subjunctive form of *to be*.
Word form isn't the only way to show a verb's mode. The interrogative mode is usually shown by the verb's position.
The statement "he is a student" employs the indicative mode. The interrogative mode places the first word of the verb\*\* before the subject: "is he a student?" The statement "he can be a student" is subject to the same transformation: "can he be a student?"
A clause pairs a subject with a predicate. A predicate requires a verb. We consider a statement like "he studies" to be a complete clause. In answer to the question "is he a student?", the answer "he is" also counts as a complete clause. If, in answer to "can he be a student?", the statement "he can" is a complete clause, then the *can* must be a verb.
Although we can see that the auxiliary *can* doesn't exhibit every property that most verbs have, it does exhibit properties that only verbs have. It has a form that marks tense or mode. Its position can indicate a mode that word forms cannot. It can act on its own as the predicate of a clause.
All these reasons support the idea that defective verbs are verbs. We don't have a good reason to place such words in a different grammatical category.
\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
\* Yes, there are homonyms that do have continuous, perfect and infinitive forms. We won't consider those to be the same verb.
\*\* Most one-word verbs require that a word be added to the verb phrase so that the added word can be moved. The statement "he studies" becomes "he does study" on its way to becoming "does he study?" The notable exception to this is when the one-word verb is a form of *to be*. | There are different views on the things you ask about and the major grammar texts do seem to differ in the details, so there are "traditional grammars" and "modern grammars" as authors grapple with various complexities and redefinitions and have different views.
I'm not sure about what you call a "proper verb" (a judgement call really) but the term 'main verb' is similar to what I think you mean.
Most simply:
A "simple verb" consists of a single "verb" (a 'main verb') in the "verb phrase".
A "compound verb" consists of more than one verb in the verb phrase.
These extra verbs are "auxiliary verbs", this later group consisting of the "**primary auxilaries**" ('have', 'be', 'do') and the "**modal auxilaries**" (a closed group of 9 including 'have', 'can', 'will'). [This is one classification system of verbs, though here not including copular verbs]
The auxilary verbs bring something extra to the verb phrase (for example assisting with indicating tense, mood, modality).
Modal auxilaries (like 'can') are defective in that they do not have all the properties of a 'main verb': they have no infinitive form, no regular adjustment for tense (excepting a historical use of shall/should for example), and only a single form for all persons. There are also the first verb in a verb phrase. They do not have past or present participle forms, so 'musting' is ungrammatical.
The primary auxilaries 'have' and 'be' can also function as main verbs. I think that 'can' can too but only when it not used as a modal auxilary, i.e. when it has a certain different meaning. One can provide the following advice to their teenage children playing music too loud in their room: "Can the noise now please!" (where 'can' means 'turn it off'), but this is like your note about canning factories - its a different meaning to say " 'to can' the beans" - from what you were asking about. |
212,363 | A friend recently told me that "can" is a rare verb without an infinitive. I have since looked it up and discovered it is an auxiliary verb. In my mind it modifies a "proper" verb in much the same way an adverb does.
"I *can* **jump** puddles"
"I *could* **do** it"
"to jump" and "to do" are OK, "to can" is wrong (meaning "to be able to").
"I *am able to* **jump** puddles"
"I *was able to* **do** it"
So, are words like "can/could", "must", "will/would", etc. actually verbs or are they only auxiliary or modal verbs and not "proper" verbs? I was also chatting to a Frenchman and he said in French auxiliary verbs are just called auxiliaries and are not considered to be verbs, so is it the same in English? It seems to me that if you can't "to" or "-ing" a word it is not proper verb.
"to jump", "jumping" - OK
"to must", "musting" - wrong
However, if auxiliary and modal verbs are actually verbs is there a word to describe a non-modal, non-auxiliary verb?
Please, no comments about canning factories or making wills. I already know that the words "can" and "will" can be infinitives but with a different meaning.
**EDIT**
Black bears, brown bears and polar bears are actually bears. Koalas and pandas are not bears yet some people call them koala bears and panda bears because they look a bit like bears. Likewise jellyfish and starfish are not fish but are aquatic animals as fish are. Alternative names for them are sea jellies and sea stars. Ironically, the seahorse is actually a fish. Things are not always what they're called. So are auxiliary verbs actually verbs or just called verbs? | 2014/12/07 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/212363",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/73636/"
] | If you are building a parser, you will separate modals, auxiliaries, and lexical verbs; mixing them up would be ungrammatical. You can lump them together as verbals (components of predicators), and equate that group with the historical verbs (named as a part-of-speech back when it was important not to over-complicate the analysis).
P.S. Beware the sentence fragment. Having a modal without another verbal does not force it to be a verb.
P.P.S. Modals could be stored like adverbs, or they could be stored as part of the auxiliary (components of memory are typically elided in discourse if they can be assumed); but 'adverb' is already an overloaded part-of-speech. | There are different views on the things you ask about and the major grammar texts do seem to differ in the details, so there are "traditional grammars" and "modern grammars" as authors grapple with various complexities and redefinitions and have different views.
I'm not sure about what you call a "proper verb" (a judgement call really) but the term 'main verb' is similar to what I think you mean.
Most simply:
A "simple verb" consists of a single "verb" (a 'main verb') in the "verb phrase".
A "compound verb" consists of more than one verb in the verb phrase.
These extra verbs are "auxiliary verbs", this later group consisting of the "**primary auxilaries**" ('have', 'be', 'do') and the "**modal auxilaries**" (a closed group of 9 including 'have', 'can', 'will'). [This is one classification system of verbs, though here not including copular verbs]
The auxilary verbs bring something extra to the verb phrase (for example assisting with indicating tense, mood, modality).
Modal auxilaries (like 'can') are defective in that they do not have all the properties of a 'main verb': they have no infinitive form, no regular adjustment for tense (excepting a historical use of shall/should for example), and only a single form for all persons. There are also the first verb in a verb phrase. They do not have past or present participle forms, so 'musting' is ungrammatical.
The primary auxilaries 'have' and 'be' can also function as main verbs. I think that 'can' can too but only when it not used as a modal auxilary, i.e. when it has a certain different meaning. One can provide the following advice to their teenage children playing music too loud in their room: "Can the noise now please!" (where 'can' means 'turn it off'), but this is like your note about canning factories - its a different meaning to say " 'to can' the beans" - from what you were asking about. |
212,363 | A friend recently told me that "can" is a rare verb without an infinitive. I have since looked it up and discovered it is an auxiliary verb. In my mind it modifies a "proper" verb in much the same way an adverb does.
"I *can* **jump** puddles"
"I *could* **do** it"
"to jump" and "to do" are OK, "to can" is wrong (meaning "to be able to").
"I *am able to* **jump** puddles"
"I *was able to* **do** it"
So, are words like "can/could", "must", "will/would", etc. actually verbs or are they only auxiliary or modal verbs and not "proper" verbs? I was also chatting to a Frenchman and he said in French auxiliary verbs are just called auxiliaries and are not considered to be verbs, so is it the same in English? It seems to me that if you can't "to" or "-ing" a word it is not proper verb.
"to jump", "jumping" - OK
"to must", "musting" - wrong
However, if auxiliary and modal verbs are actually verbs is there a word to describe a non-modal, non-auxiliary verb?
Please, no comments about canning factories or making wills. I already know that the words "can" and "will" can be infinitives but with a different meaning.
**EDIT**
Black bears, brown bears and polar bears are actually bears. Koalas and pandas are not bears yet some people call them koala bears and panda bears because they look a bit like bears. Likewise jellyfish and starfish are not fish but are aquatic animals as fish are. Alternative names for them are sea jellies and sea stars. Ironically, the seahorse is actually a fish. Things are not always what they're called. So are auxiliary verbs actually verbs or just called verbs? | 2014/12/07 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/212363",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/73636/"
] | To determine whether auxiliaries are verbs, we should examine two kinds of properties. One kind of important property relates to word forms, and the other kind of property relates to word use.
Most verbs have properties such as tense, aspect and mode.
The verb *to be* is a normal, complete verb. *Was* and *were* are past tense forms of *to be*, and *is*, *are* and *am* are present tense forms. *Being* is a continuous aspect form, and *been* is a perfect aspect form. The *were* of "if I were a rich man" and the *be* of "be he live or be he dead, I'll grind his bones into my bread" are subjunctive forms.
If *can* is a verb, then it is a defective verb. It doesn't have forms that show aspect. The forms *canning* and *canned* don't exist for the auxiliary. Neither does the infinitive *to can*.\* However, it does have the properties of tense and mode. *Could* is both a past tense form and a subjunctive mode form, just as *were* is both a past tense form and a subjunctive form of *to be*.
Word form isn't the only way to show a verb's mode. The interrogative mode is usually shown by the verb's position.
The statement "he is a student" employs the indicative mode. The interrogative mode places the first word of the verb\*\* before the subject: "is he a student?" The statement "he can be a student" is subject to the same transformation: "can he be a student?"
A clause pairs a subject with a predicate. A predicate requires a verb. We consider a statement like "he studies" to be a complete clause. In answer to the question "is he a student?", the answer "he is" also counts as a complete clause. If, in answer to "can he be a student?", the statement "he can" is a complete clause, then the *can* must be a verb.
Although we can see that the auxiliary *can* doesn't exhibit every property that most verbs have, it does exhibit properties that only verbs have. It has a form that marks tense or mode. Its position can indicate a mode that word forms cannot. It can act on its own as the predicate of a clause.
All these reasons support the idea that defective verbs are verbs. We don't have a good reason to place such words in a different grammatical category.
\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
\* Yes, there are homonyms that do have continuous, perfect and infinitive forms. We won't consider those to be the same verb.
\*\* Most one-word verbs require that a word be added to the verb phrase so that the added word can be moved. The statement "he studies" becomes "he does study" on its way to becoming "does he study?" The notable exception to this is when the one-word verb is a form of *to be*. | I agree totally with you about the issue, except that modal auxiliary verbs should be classified as adjectives.
In "{Mary is} pretty"
* *is* modifies Mary's existentialism, by being an adjective to *Mary*.
* pretty modifies Mary's existentialism, by stating that {Mary's existentialism} being pretty.
However, the more established way to look at it is, in **not quite precise** explanation,
* The actual verb is not *is*, but *be*.
* *is* is merely an auxiliary form to the verb *be*.
* Perhaps more precisely, *is* and *being* are inflections of *be*.
* *is* is an auxiliary inflection to the word *be*.
* The gerund/present-participle/verbal-noun of *is* is *being*.
* The to-infinitive of *is* is *to be*.
"She can come"
* *can*/*could* are auxiliary forms of the complex-verb/verb-phrase *be able to*.
* The to-infinitive of *can*/*could* is *to be able to*.
* The gerund/present-participle/verbal-noun of *can*/*could* is *being able to*.
* Thus, "She is able", where *is* is the auxiliary inflection of *be*.
\*She will sing"
* *will-1* is a complete verb of its own right.
* *to will* is the to-infinitive. e.g. *To will* oneself to sing.
* *willing* is the present-participle. e.g., she is *willing* to sing.
Similarly, *have*, *need*, *want* are complete verbs of their own right.
Some of the other modal auxiliaries and the actual inflectable verb-phrases they **encapsulate**:
* will-2: be definite to.
"She will die" = "She is definite to die".
* may-1: will have possibility.
"She may come" = "She will have possibility to come".
"She might come" = "She would have possibility to come".
* may-2: is allowed to.
"You may come in" = "You are allowed to come in".
* must-1: bear the imperative.
"She must die" = "She bears the imperative to fail".
* must-2: bear the obligation.
"She must succeed" = "She bears the obligation to succeed".
* must-3: carry a heavy presumed possibility.
"She must have eaten my corn dog!" = "She carries a heavy presumed possibility of having eaten my corn dog!" |
212,363 | A friend recently told me that "can" is a rare verb without an infinitive. I have since looked it up and discovered it is an auxiliary verb. In my mind it modifies a "proper" verb in much the same way an adverb does.
"I *can* **jump** puddles"
"I *could* **do** it"
"to jump" and "to do" are OK, "to can" is wrong (meaning "to be able to").
"I *am able to* **jump** puddles"
"I *was able to* **do** it"
So, are words like "can/could", "must", "will/would", etc. actually verbs or are they only auxiliary or modal verbs and not "proper" verbs? I was also chatting to a Frenchman and he said in French auxiliary verbs are just called auxiliaries and are not considered to be verbs, so is it the same in English? It seems to me that if you can't "to" or "-ing" a word it is not proper verb.
"to jump", "jumping" - OK
"to must", "musting" - wrong
However, if auxiliary and modal verbs are actually verbs is there a word to describe a non-modal, non-auxiliary verb?
Please, no comments about canning factories or making wills. I already know that the words "can" and "will" can be infinitives but with a different meaning.
**EDIT**
Black bears, brown bears and polar bears are actually bears. Koalas and pandas are not bears yet some people call them koala bears and panda bears because they look a bit like bears. Likewise jellyfish and starfish are not fish but are aquatic animals as fish are. Alternative names for them are sea jellies and sea stars. Ironically, the seahorse is actually a fish. Things are not always what they're called. So are auxiliary verbs actually verbs or just called verbs? | 2014/12/07 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/212363",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/73636/"
] | If you are building a parser, you will separate modals, auxiliaries, and lexical verbs; mixing them up would be ungrammatical. You can lump them together as verbals (components of predicators), and equate that group with the historical verbs (named as a part-of-speech back when it was important not to over-complicate the analysis).
P.S. Beware the sentence fragment. Having a modal without another verbal does not force it to be a verb.
P.P.S. Modals could be stored like adverbs, or they could be stored as part of the auxiliary (components of memory are typically elided in discourse if they can be assumed); but 'adverb' is already an overloaded part-of-speech. | I agree totally with you about the issue, except that modal auxiliary verbs should be classified as adjectives.
In "{Mary is} pretty"
* *is* modifies Mary's existentialism, by being an adjective to *Mary*.
* pretty modifies Mary's existentialism, by stating that {Mary's existentialism} being pretty.
However, the more established way to look at it is, in **not quite precise** explanation,
* The actual verb is not *is*, but *be*.
* *is* is merely an auxiliary form to the verb *be*.
* Perhaps more precisely, *is* and *being* are inflections of *be*.
* *is* is an auxiliary inflection to the word *be*.
* The gerund/present-participle/verbal-noun of *is* is *being*.
* The to-infinitive of *is* is *to be*.
"She can come"
* *can*/*could* are auxiliary forms of the complex-verb/verb-phrase *be able to*.
* The to-infinitive of *can*/*could* is *to be able to*.
* The gerund/present-participle/verbal-noun of *can*/*could* is *being able to*.
* Thus, "She is able", where *is* is the auxiliary inflection of *be*.
\*She will sing"
* *will-1* is a complete verb of its own right.
* *to will* is the to-infinitive. e.g. *To will* oneself to sing.
* *willing* is the present-participle. e.g., she is *willing* to sing.
Similarly, *have*, *need*, *want* are complete verbs of their own right.
Some of the other modal auxiliaries and the actual inflectable verb-phrases they **encapsulate**:
* will-2: be definite to.
"She will die" = "She is definite to die".
* may-1: will have possibility.
"She may come" = "She will have possibility to come".
"She might come" = "She would have possibility to come".
* may-2: is allowed to.
"You may come in" = "You are allowed to come in".
* must-1: bear the imperative.
"She must die" = "She bears the imperative to fail".
* must-2: bear the obligation.
"She must succeed" = "She bears the obligation to succeed".
* must-3: carry a heavy presumed possibility.
"She must have eaten my corn dog!" = "She carries a heavy presumed possibility of having eaten my corn dog!" |
212,363 | A friend recently told me that "can" is a rare verb without an infinitive. I have since looked it up and discovered it is an auxiliary verb. In my mind it modifies a "proper" verb in much the same way an adverb does.
"I *can* **jump** puddles"
"I *could* **do** it"
"to jump" and "to do" are OK, "to can" is wrong (meaning "to be able to").
"I *am able to* **jump** puddles"
"I *was able to* **do** it"
So, are words like "can/could", "must", "will/would", etc. actually verbs or are they only auxiliary or modal verbs and not "proper" verbs? I was also chatting to a Frenchman and he said in French auxiliary verbs are just called auxiliaries and are not considered to be verbs, so is it the same in English? It seems to me that if you can't "to" or "-ing" a word it is not proper verb.
"to jump", "jumping" - OK
"to must", "musting" - wrong
However, if auxiliary and modal verbs are actually verbs is there a word to describe a non-modal, non-auxiliary verb?
Please, no comments about canning factories or making wills. I already know that the words "can" and "will" can be infinitives but with a different meaning.
**EDIT**
Black bears, brown bears and polar bears are actually bears. Koalas and pandas are not bears yet some people call them koala bears and panda bears because they look a bit like bears. Likewise jellyfish and starfish are not fish but are aquatic animals as fish are. Alternative names for them are sea jellies and sea stars. Ironically, the seahorse is actually a fish. Things are not always what they're called. So are auxiliary verbs actually verbs or just called verbs? | 2014/12/07 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/212363",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/73636/"
] | To determine whether auxiliaries are verbs, we should examine two kinds of properties. One kind of important property relates to word forms, and the other kind of property relates to word use.
Most verbs have properties such as tense, aspect and mode.
The verb *to be* is a normal, complete verb. *Was* and *were* are past tense forms of *to be*, and *is*, *are* and *am* are present tense forms. *Being* is a continuous aspect form, and *been* is a perfect aspect form. The *were* of "if I were a rich man" and the *be* of "be he live or be he dead, I'll grind his bones into my bread" are subjunctive forms.
If *can* is a verb, then it is a defective verb. It doesn't have forms that show aspect. The forms *canning* and *canned* don't exist for the auxiliary. Neither does the infinitive *to can*.\* However, it does have the properties of tense and mode. *Could* is both a past tense form and a subjunctive mode form, just as *were* is both a past tense form and a subjunctive form of *to be*.
Word form isn't the only way to show a verb's mode. The interrogative mode is usually shown by the verb's position.
The statement "he is a student" employs the indicative mode. The interrogative mode places the first word of the verb\*\* before the subject: "is he a student?" The statement "he can be a student" is subject to the same transformation: "can he be a student?"
A clause pairs a subject with a predicate. A predicate requires a verb. We consider a statement like "he studies" to be a complete clause. In answer to the question "is he a student?", the answer "he is" also counts as a complete clause. If, in answer to "can he be a student?", the statement "he can" is a complete clause, then the *can* must be a verb.
Although we can see that the auxiliary *can* doesn't exhibit every property that most verbs have, it does exhibit properties that only verbs have. It has a form that marks tense or mode. Its position can indicate a mode that word forms cannot. It can act on its own as the predicate of a clause.
All these reasons support the idea that defective verbs are verbs. We don't have a good reason to place such words in a different grammatical category.
\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_
\* Yes, there are homonyms that do have continuous, perfect and infinitive forms. We won't consider those to be the same verb.
\*\* Most one-word verbs require that a word be added to the verb phrase so that the added word can be moved. The statement "he studies" becomes "he does study" on its way to becoming "does he study?" The notable exception to this is when the one-word verb is a form of *to be*. | If you are building a parser, you will separate modals, auxiliaries, and lexical verbs; mixing them up would be ungrammatical. You can lump them together as verbals (components of predicators), and equate that group with the historical verbs (named as a part-of-speech back when it was important not to over-complicate the analysis).
P.S. Beware the sentence fragment. Having a modal without another verbal does not force it to be a verb.
P.P.S. Modals could be stored like adverbs, or they could be stored as part of the auxiliary (components of memory are typically elided in discourse if they can be assumed); but 'adverb' is already an overloaded part-of-speech. |
269,871 | I have a problem with this logic circuit I have designed:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/yGn6D.png)
**The intended behaviour is**: when the clock comes high, the counter's state is latched and decoded
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/pae5e.png)
**What happens is**: when the clock is high, the old state of the counter (if it has been incremented last cycle for example) is very briefly present on the line decoder's input before the latches switch to the 'new' data and the decoder's output then becomes correct
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/KgiIj.png)
This means the 'fetch' mode is enabled again for a few ns before the decoder switches to 'load'. This causes the counter to be incremented again amongst other problems!
I have tried adding a string of NOT gates on the line decoder's enable, but it does not seem to help. Also, I tried using a capacitor+resistor to add a delay but this only helps when the created delay is a few micro seconds - far too long.
In summary I need to make sure the data is valid on the decoder's input before it is enabled - to prevent false triggering of its outputs.
NOTE: The increment input is decided by other circuitry that is triggered by the decoder - it is in phase with but is not necessarily the same as the clock
tl;dr line decoder is enabled too soon, chains of gates to delay signal don't help | 2016/11/17 | [
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/269871",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/users/103323/"
] | It's quite uncommon for inputs to arrive in-phase with the clock. The usual design is for inputs to be sampled at the rising edge of the clock. You see this in the 7474 you use; it triggers on the rising edge. See, for instance, <https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SPI_timing_diagram2.svg> .
If you allow inputs to come in at the same time as the clock, you're going to have hazards. If nothing else, there's the race of the input vs the clock! As you try to design around that, you usually introduce hazards in other stages - as you've seen here.
That's one reason that you often see timing diagrams showing rise and fall times (as in the above-linked example). It makes it more clear when your timings are introducing hazards.
You may want to draw a Karnaugh map for your circuit to identify hazards and make sure that you're ok. | I think this is because of latch delay in 4514. You could consider to remove 7474 flip/flops or if you really need them replace 4514 with few nand gates all you need is three decoded outputs after all. |
269,871 | I have a problem with this logic circuit I have designed:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/yGn6D.png)
**The intended behaviour is**: when the clock comes high, the counter's state is latched and decoded
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/pae5e.png)
**What happens is**: when the clock is high, the old state of the counter (if it has been incremented last cycle for example) is very briefly present on the line decoder's input before the latches switch to the 'new' data and the decoder's output then becomes correct
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/KgiIj.png)
This means the 'fetch' mode is enabled again for a few ns before the decoder switches to 'load'. This causes the counter to be incremented again amongst other problems!
I have tried adding a string of NOT gates on the line decoder's enable, but it does not seem to help. Also, I tried using a capacitor+resistor to add a delay but this only helps when the created delay is a few micro seconds - far too long.
In summary I need to make sure the data is valid on the decoder's input before it is enabled - to prevent false triggering of its outputs.
NOTE: The increment input is decided by other circuitry that is triggered by the decoder - it is in phase with but is not necessarily the same as the clock
tl;dr line decoder is enabled too soon, chains of gates to delay signal don't help | 2016/11/17 | [
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/269871",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/users/103323/"
] | In general you have to **be careful when mixing different logic IC technologies**:
The output of a LS gate (e.g, IC2a, 74LS08) cannot be used directly for an input of a CMOS gate (e.g. IC3, 4029).
In your case this may cause that the reset pusle is detected way too late.
At least you should add a pull-up resistor (because LS high output is not high enough for CMOS high input) or better just use CMOS AND-gates (4081) for IC2.
BTW: You can replace this whole circuit by one 4017 IC (Johnson Counter) with O3 shorted back to reset and 3 AND gates:
[simulate this circuit](/plugins/schematics?image=http%3a%2f%2fi.stack.imgur.com%2ftoYQi.png) – Schematic created using [CircuitLab](https://www.circuitlab.com/) | I think this is because of latch delay in 4514. You could consider to remove 7474 flip/flops or if you really need them replace 4514 with few nand gates all you need is three decoded outputs after all. |
269,871 | I have a problem with this logic circuit I have designed:
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/yGn6D.png)
**The intended behaviour is**: when the clock comes high, the counter's state is latched and decoded
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/pae5e.png)
**What happens is**: when the clock is high, the old state of the counter (if it has been incremented last cycle for example) is very briefly present on the line decoder's input before the latches switch to the 'new' data and the decoder's output then becomes correct
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/KgiIj.png)
This means the 'fetch' mode is enabled again for a few ns before the decoder switches to 'load'. This causes the counter to be incremented again amongst other problems!
I have tried adding a string of NOT gates on the line decoder's enable, but it does not seem to help. Also, I tried using a capacitor+resistor to add a delay but this only helps when the created delay is a few micro seconds - far too long.
In summary I need to make sure the data is valid on the decoder's input before it is enabled - to prevent false triggering of its outputs.
NOTE: The increment input is decided by other circuitry that is triggered by the decoder - it is in phase with but is not necessarily the same as the clock
tl;dr line decoder is enabled too soon, chains of gates to delay signal don't help | 2016/11/17 | [
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/269871",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com",
"https://electronics.stackexchange.com/users/103323/"
] | In general you have to **be careful when mixing different logic IC technologies**:
The output of a LS gate (e.g, IC2a, 74LS08) cannot be used directly for an input of a CMOS gate (e.g. IC3, 4029).
In your case this may cause that the reset pusle is detected way too late.
At least you should add a pull-up resistor (because LS high output is not high enough for CMOS high input) or better just use CMOS AND-gates (4081) for IC2.
BTW: You can replace this whole circuit by one 4017 IC (Johnson Counter) with O3 shorted back to reset and 3 AND gates:
[simulate this circuit](/plugins/schematics?image=http%3a%2f%2fi.stack.imgur.com%2ftoYQi.png) – Schematic created using [CircuitLab](https://www.circuitlab.com/) | It's quite uncommon for inputs to arrive in-phase with the clock. The usual design is for inputs to be sampled at the rising edge of the clock. You see this in the 7474 you use; it triggers on the rising edge. See, for instance, <https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SPI_timing_diagram2.svg> .
If you allow inputs to come in at the same time as the clock, you're going to have hazards. If nothing else, there's the race of the input vs the clock! As you try to design around that, you usually introduce hazards in other stages - as you've seen here.
That's one reason that you often see timing diagrams showing rise and fall times (as in the above-linked example). It makes it more clear when your timings are introducing hazards.
You may want to draw a Karnaugh map for your circuit to identify hazards and make sure that you're ok. |
141,302 | I have an ML system which classifies a series of objects. These objects have a possible status `X` assigned by the system.
This information is displayed on a dashboard table to users.
An example output is below:
| Object | Is X? |
| --- | --- |
| A | X |
| B | X |
| C | |
| D | X |
| E | |
**I need users to confirm whether the classification for each object is correct (True Positive) or not (False Positive), but its not mandatory.**
What would be a suitable design solution for this? They should ideally be able to do this confirmation on the table itself. | 2021/10/15 | [
"https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/141302",
"https://ux.stackexchange.com",
"https://ux.stackexchange.com/users/143013/"
] | If verifications in your system are expected to produce as many false positives as true positives, a three-state selector would be appropriate (like the Holly's Coffee example in another answer):
Unknown (Default state) | Correct | Incorrect
If false positives are an *exception* and are usually rare, a better pattern would be a flag. Since verifying items is optional, perhaps there is simply a "Mark as invalid" option somewhere in the row actions. Invalid/false positive rows can then be treated differently - red text, moved to another table, different status, etc. | It depends on who the user is and what his tasks are. Is it part of their job or is it mandatory for them to do this?
Is it optional?
I have two suggestions. One would immerse users and create more focus on this task if it is an important task :
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/6diCC.png)
The other version would be to add one extra column called "Your Input"
[](https://i.stack.imgur.com/8rgV3.png) |
922,766 | I have a list template in a MOSS List Template Gallery and I need to create a list using this template from a feature receiver. This sounds really easy but I cannot find a way of doing this.
SPWeb has a GetCatalog method that returns an SPList with 1 item - my template - but it is an SPListItem and I need an SPListTemplate. How can I 'convert' the item to the correct type?
Thanks | 2009/05/28 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/922766",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/98406/"
] | No. Font size is readonly for existing "Font" objects. | Make sure you use the constructor method that allows you to use the base font and pass in the new size you desire. This will save you some code from the other approaches. |
18,487 | **Aliens, for some unknown reason, want all the water (H2O) in our oceans, seas, lakes, rivers, (all large bodies of water on earth), and plan to steal it from us overnight.**
Luckily for us, they don't want to wreck life on this planet.
As highly advanced lifeforms, they have the technology to replace all our water with an equivalent amount of "magic liquid". We don't know why they can't make H2O - they just can't, but they can make anything else.
**So the question is: Is there a replacement for H2O that the aliens can replace our water with that won't destroy life as we know it? This chemical compound should have most (if not all) of the properties of H2O.**
**Note:** How they manage to do this is irrelevant. You can assume that by some hand-waved process, all the H2O just gets replaced with the aforementioned magic liquid instantaneously. | 2015/06/03 | [
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/18487",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | I'll revert to my old pessimistic self and say that there's nothing that can replace good ol' H2O.
Here are some things that a replacement liquid would have to do:
1. **Be denser as a liquid than a solid.** This is atypical of most substances, but water is an exception. This is why only the tops of ponds freeze over and the lower layers are frozen. Otherwise, nothing would survive in winter, because ice would form and sink down, letting more water freeze. Ice fishing would be much less interesting nonexistent.
2. **[Be the next universal solvent.](http://water.usgs.gov/edu/solvent.html)** If you've taken high school biology, then you might have heard the phrase "water is the universal solvent" a couple times. Water is good because it can dissolve quite a lot of things. A related pure-chemistry-inspired property is that water plays a huge role in the reactions of acids and bases.
3. **Stay liquid at room temperature, and the moderate ranges of temperatures seen on Earth.** If a substance is solid at 25 degrees Celsius, then we've got a problem (namely, the oceans). It must also be possible for this substance to be gaseous at some point, facilitating the water cycle.
4. **Be useable in both [cellular respiration](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_respiration) and [photosynthesis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photosynthesis).** The reasons for this are pretty straightforward. These are clearly not the only forms of energy production used by organisms on Earth (e..g thermophiles use different mechanisms), but they're what you'll have to use if you want things to stay normal. | I believe the answer is "NO". Water is water is water. On top of that, hydrogen and oxygen are two of the most abundant elements in the universe. Stealing it from a populated planet (where you don't want to hurt the lifeforms) is madness. |
18,487 | **Aliens, for some unknown reason, want all the water (H2O) in our oceans, seas, lakes, rivers, (all large bodies of water on earth), and plan to steal it from us overnight.**
Luckily for us, they don't want to wreck life on this planet.
As highly advanced lifeforms, they have the technology to replace all our water with an equivalent amount of "magic liquid". We don't know why they can't make H2O - they just can't, but they can make anything else.
**So the question is: Is there a replacement for H2O that the aliens can replace our water with that won't destroy life as we know it? This chemical compound should have most (if not all) of the properties of H2O.**
**Note:** How they manage to do this is irrelevant. You can assume that by some hand-waved process, all the H2O just gets replaced with the aforementioned magic liquid instantaneously. | 2015/06/03 | [
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/18487",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | I believe the answer is "NO". Water is water is water. On top of that, hydrogen and oxygen are two of the most abundant elements in the universe. Stealing it from a populated planet (where you don't want to hurt the lifeforms) is madness. | [Dihydrogen Monoxide](http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html)
=====================================================
Dihydrogen Monoxide is a clear liquid, mostly flavourless chemical that is often used in pesticide production and distribution which can effectively replace water in an ecosystem. When sprayed over crops it was discovered that DHMO had an almost *identical* affect on the crops growth as naturally occurring water. Shortly after pure DHMO is introduced into an ecosystem it quickly absorbs minerals in solution making it almost indistinguishable from real water that falls as precipitation!
There are a few ways to detect dihydrogen monoxide however: it is highly reactive with pure sodium, lithium and potassium (as in explosive reactive), and when poured over iron, it can cause a redox reaction that will turn the iron red and make it brittle.
But you can drink it, you can swim in it, and you can even make ice with it! To the naked eye, and without specialized equipment, it would be *impossible* for the average person to distinguish DHMO from H2O.
You can learn more about **DHMO** here: [Frequently Asked Questions About Dihydrogen Monoxide (DHMO) What is Dihydrogen Monoxide?](http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html) |
18,487 | **Aliens, for some unknown reason, want all the water (H2O) in our oceans, seas, lakes, rivers, (all large bodies of water on earth), and plan to steal it from us overnight.**
Luckily for us, they don't want to wreck life on this planet.
As highly advanced lifeforms, they have the technology to replace all our water with an equivalent amount of "magic liquid". We don't know why they can't make H2O - they just can't, but they can make anything else.
**So the question is: Is there a replacement for H2O that the aliens can replace our water with that won't destroy life as we know it? This chemical compound should have most (if not all) of the properties of H2O.**
**Note:** How they manage to do this is irrelevant. You can assume that by some hand-waved process, all the H2O just gets replaced with the aforementioned magic liquid instantaneously. | 2015/06/03 | [
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/18487",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | I believe the answer is "NO". Water is water is water. On top of that, hydrogen and oxygen are two of the most abundant elements in the universe. Stealing it from a populated planet (where you don't want to hurt the lifeforms) is madness. | It is a non-believable old story trope that aliens want *our* water. Why not just grab a chunk from the Oort cloud? I read reciently that it looks like one of Jupiter's moons appears to have a bit more water than Earth's oceans. The most common elements in the universe are, in order, Hydrogen, Helium, and Oxygen. Water is ubiquitous. |
18,487 | **Aliens, for some unknown reason, want all the water (H2O) in our oceans, seas, lakes, rivers, (all large bodies of water on earth), and plan to steal it from us overnight.**
Luckily for us, they don't want to wreck life on this planet.
As highly advanced lifeforms, they have the technology to replace all our water with an equivalent amount of "magic liquid". We don't know why they can't make H2O - they just can't, but they can make anything else.
**So the question is: Is there a replacement for H2O that the aliens can replace our water with that won't destroy life as we know it? This chemical compound should have most (if not all) of the properties of H2O.**
**Note:** How they manage to do this is irrelevant. You can assume that by some hand-waved process, all the H2O just gets replaced with the aforementioned magic liquid instantaneously. | 2015/06/03 | [
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/18487",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | I'll revert to my old pessimistic self and say that there's nothing that can replace good ol' H2O.
Here are some things that a replacement liquid would have to do:
1. **Be denser as a liquid than a solid.** This is atypical of most substances, but water is an exception. This is why only the tops of ponds freeze over and the lower layers are frozen. Otherwise, nothing would survive in winter, because ice would form and sink down, letting more water freeze. Ice fishing would be much less interesting nonexistent.
2. **[Be the next universal solvent.](http://water.usgs.gov/edu/solvent.html)** If you've taken high school biology, then you might have heard the phrase "water is the universal solvent" a couple times. Water is good because it can dissolve quite a lot of things. A related pure-chemistry-inspired property is that water plays a huge role in the reactions of acids and bases.
3. **Stay liquid at room temperature, and the moderate ranges of temperatures seen on Earth.** If a substance is solid at 25 degrees Celsius, then we've got a problem (namely, the oceans). It must also be possible for this substance to be gaseous at some point, facilitating the water cycle.
4. **Be useable in both [cellular respiration](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_respiration) and [photosynthesis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photosynthesis).** The reasons for this are pretty straightforward. These are clearly not the only forms of energy production used by organisms on Earth (e..g thermophiles use different mechanisms), but they're what you'll have to use if you want things to stay normal. | [Dihydrogen Monoxide](http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html)
=====================================================
Dihydrogen Monoxide is a clear liquid, mostly flavourless chemical that is often used in pesticide production and distribution which can effectively replace water in an ecosystem. When sprayed over crops it was discovered that DHMO had an almost *identical* affect on the crops growth as naturally occurring water. Shortly after pure DHMO is introduced into an ecosystem it quickly absorbs minerals in solution making it almost indistinguishable from real water that falls as precipitation!
There are a few ways to detect dihydrogen monoxide however: it is highly reactive with pure sodium, lithium and potassium (as in explosive reactive), and when poured over iron, it can cause a redox reaction that will turn the iron red and make it brittle.
But you can drink it, you can swim in it, and you can even make ice with it! To the naked eye, and without specialized equipment, it would be *impossible* for the average person to distinguish DHMO from H2O.
You can learn more about **DHMO** here: [Frequently Asked Questions About Dihydrogen Monoxide (DHMO) What is Dihydrogen Monoxide?](http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html) |
18,487 | **Aliens, for some unknown reason, want all the water (H2O) in our oceans, seas, lakes, rivers, (all large bodies of water on earth), and plan to steal it from us overnight.**
Luckily for us, they don't want to wreck life on this planet.
As highly advanced lifeforms, they have the technology to replace all our water with an equivalent amount of "magic liquid". We don't know why they can't make H2O - they just can't, but they can make anything else.
**So the question is: Is there a replacement for H2O that the aliens can replace our water with that won't destroy life as we know it? This chemical compound should have most (if not all) of the properties of H2O.**
**Note:** How they manage to do this is irrelevant. You can assume that by some hand-waved process, all the H2O just gets replaced with the aforementioned magic liquid instantaneously. | 2015/06/03 | [
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/18487",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/users/-1/"
] | I'll revert to my old pessimistic self and say that there's nothing that can replace good ol' H2O.
Here are some things that a replacement liquid would have to do:
1. **Be denser as a liquid than a solid.** This is atypical of most substances, but water is an exception. This is why only the tops of ponds freeze over and the lower layers are frozen. Otherwise, nothing would survive in winter, because ice would form and sink down, letting more water freeze. Ice fishing would be much less interesting nonexistent.
2. **[Be the next universal solvent.](http://water.usgs.gov/edu/solvent.html)** If you've taken high school biology, then you might have heard the phrase "water is the universal solvent" a couple times. Water is good because it can dissolve quite a lot of things. A related pure-chemistry-inspired property is that water plays a huge role in the reactions of acids and bases.
3. **Stay liquid at room temperature, and the moderate ranges of temperatures seen on Earth.** If a substance is solid at 25 degrees Celsius, then we've got a problem (namely, the oceans). It must also be possible for this substance to be gaseous at some point, facilitating the water cycle.
4. **Be useable in both [cellular respiration](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_respiration) and [photosynthesis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photosynthesis).** The reasons for this are pretty straightforward. These are clearly not the only forms of energy production used by organisms on Earth (e..g thermophiles use different mechanisms), but they're what you'll have to use if you want things to stay normal. | It is a non-believable old story trope that aliens want *our* water. Why not just grab a chunk from the Oort cloud? I read reciently that it looks like one of Jupiter's moons appears to have a bit more water than Earth's oceans. The most common elements in the universe are, in order, Hydrogen, Helium, and Oxygen. Water is ubiquitous. |
36,586 | As a foreigner, using articles is one of the most difficult part.
What is the difference between "Simple is best" and "Simple is the best"? When I googled it, both appeared with many results, so it seems both are right. Are they same or have some differences? | 2011/08/03 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/36586",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/10095/"
] | Logically they are the same, but they have different psychological connotations. "Simple is best" is a bit warmer and implies that the receiver is being edified. "Simple is the best" is stated in a way that makes it sound more like it's an objective fact or something. It's kind of hard to describe.
**Edit:** After nearly ten years of considering this every time someone upvotes this, I think the difference boils down to sexuality. "Simple is best" is feminine, warm, nurturing, cunning. "Simple is the best" is masculine, cold, challenging, confrontational. | The long and short of *this particular* phrase, is they're both the same in meaning, and they're both grammatical. Note that I have italicized "this particular". This is to indicate that "the" can make a difference in certain other situations, but not in *this particular situation.*
Both of them are stating that the speaker supports simplicity |
36,586 | As a foreigner, using articles is one of the most difficult part.
What is the difference between "Simple is best" and "Simple is the best"? When I googled it, both appeared with many results, so it seems both are right. Are they same or have some differences? | 2011/08/03 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/36586",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/10095/"
] | Logically they are the same, but they have different psychological connotations. "Simple is best" is a bit warmer and implies that the receiver is being edified. "Simple is the best" is stated in a way that makes it sound more like it's an objective fact or something. It's kind of hard to describe.
**Edit:** After nearly ten years of considering this every time someone upvotes this, I think the difference boils down to sexuality. "Simple is best" is feminine, warm, nurturing, cunning. "Simple is the best" is masculine, cold, challenging, confrontational. | "Simple is best" is probably the phrase you want to use.
Compare to an adage like "mother knows best." The phrase is idiomatic - a token of speech that can't be divided - so "mother knows the best" sounds wrong.
It's harder to pin down the reason for this. In the first case, the phrase means that the simplest way is the best way. In the second case, your mother knows the best thing to do. These statements became shortened over time.
The meter of speech has a lot to do with the way idioms evolve. Words are dropped, and ungrammatical phrases may result. In this case, the idiom prescribes the grammar, not the other way around, so I don't think it's fruitful to speak of whether "best" is being used as an adjective or a noun.
Theodore Bernstein says in *The Careful Writer*: "A writer tampers with idiom at his own peril, and the peril is great. When he writes, 'At that time Sceptre was all except [two syllables] invisible in the haze,' he has flouted the idiom 'all but'." |
36,586 | As a foreigner, using articles is one of the most difficult part.
What is the difference between "Simple is best" and "Simple is the best"? When I googled it, both appeared with many results, so it seems both are right. Are they same or have some differences? | 2011/08/03 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/36586",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/10095/"
] | Logically they are the same, but they have different psychological connotations. "Simple is best" is a bit warmer and implies that the receiver is being edified. "Simple is the best" is stated in a way that makes it sound more like it's an objective fact or something. It's kind of hard to describe.
**Edit:** After nearly ten years of considering this every time someone upvotes this, I think the difference boils down to sexuality. "Simple is best" is feminine, warm, nurturing, cunning. "Simple is the best" is masculine, cold, challenging, confrontational. | "Simple is the best" implies that simple is a noun. The meaning of simple as a noun is something simple, unmixed or compounded, a simple *thing* or worse, an ignorant, foolish or gullible person, a commoner, a "simple".
"Simple is best" implies that "simple" is an adjective, like "best." This is by far the more elegant way of expressing the concept because both sides of the "is" are the same parts of speech and express clearly the sense of [Occam's Razor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor) within this sentence. |
36,586 | As a foreigner, using articles is one of the most difficult part.
What is the difference between "Simple is best" and "Simple is the best"? When I googled it, both appeared with many results, so it seems both are right. Are they same or have some differences? | 2011/08/03 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/36586",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/10095/"
] | The long and short of *this particular* phrase, is they're both the same in meaning, and they're both grammatical. Note that I have italicized "this particular". This is to indicate that "the" can make a difference in certain other situations, but not in *this particular situation.*
Both of them are stating that the speaker supports simplicity | "Simple is the best" implies that simple is a noun. The meaning of simple as a noun is something simple, unmixed or compounded, a simple *thing* or worse, an ignorant, foolish or gullible person, a commoner, a "simple".
"Simple is best" implies that "simple" is an adjective, like "best." This is by far the more elegant way of expressing the concept because both sides of the "is" are the same parts of speech and express clearly the sense of [Occam's Razor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor) within this sentence. |
36,586 | As a foreigner, using articles is one of the most difficult part.
What is the difference between "Simple is best" and "Simple is the best"? When I googled it, both appeared with many results, so it seems both are right. Are they same or have some differences? | 2011/08/03 | [
"https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/36586",
"https://english.stackexchange.com",
"https://english.stackexchange.com/users/10095/"
] | "Simple is best" is probably the phrase you want to use.
Compare to an adage like "mother knows best." The phrase is idiomatic - a token of speech that can't be divided - so "mother knows the best" sounds wrong.
It's harder to pin down the reason for this. In the first case, the phrase means that the simplest way is the best way. In the second case, your mother knows the best thing to do. These statements became shortened over time.
The meter of speech has a lot to do with the way idioms evolve. Words are dropped, and ungrammatical phrases may result. In this case, the idiom prescribes the grammar, not the other way around, so I don't think it's fruitful to speak of whether "best" is being used as an adjective or a noun.
Theodore Bernstein says in *The Careful Writer*: "A writer tampers with idiom at his own peril, and the peril is great. When he writes, 'At that time Sceptre was all except [two syllables] invisible in the haze,' he has flouted the idiom 'all but'." | "Simple is the best" implies that simple is a noun. The meaning of simple as a noun is something simple, unmixed or compounded, a simple *thing* or worse, an ignorant, foolish or gullible person, a commoner, a "simple".
"Simple is best" implies that "simple" is an adjective, like "best." This is by far the more elegant way of expressing the concept because both sides of the "is" are the same parts of speech and express clearly the sense of [Occam's Razor](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor) within this sentence. |
397,641 | In Java is this nice tool called [FindBugs](http://findbugs.sourceforge.net/).
Is there something similar in .Net? | 2008/12/29 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/397641",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/49786/"
] | [FxCop](http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/codeanalysis/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=553) and [StyleCop](http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/sourceanalysis) will advise on usage.
For actual bugs, perhaps [PEX](http://research.microsoft.com/projects/Pex/)? There was a [PDC video](http://channel9.msdn.com/pdc2008/TL51/), too. | Here is [Wikipedia List](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tools_for_static_code_analysis#.NET) and [CodeRush](http://www.devexpress.com/Products/CodeRush/) is a nice tool to use for .NET. |
397,641 | In Java is this nice tool called [FindBugs](http://findbugs.sourceforge.net/).
Is there something similar in .Net? | 2008/12/29 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/397641",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/49786/"
] | [FxCop](http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/codeanalysis/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=553) and [StyleCop](http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/sourceanalysis) will advise on usage.
For actual bugs, perhaps [PEX](http://research.microsoft.com/projects/Pex/)? There was a [PDC video](http://channel9.msdn.com/pdc2008/TL51/), too. | Try [PVS-Studio](http://www.viva64.com/en/pvs-studio/) is really great, can find a lot of obscure bugs. The drawback is it is commercial product and can be expensive. |
397,641 | In Java is this nice tool called [FindBugs](http://findbugs.sourceforge.net/).
Is there something similar in .Net? | 2008/12/29 | [
"https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/397641",
"https://Stackoverflow.com",
"https://Stackoverflow.com/users/49786/"
] | Here is [Wikipedia List](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tools_for_static_code_analysis#.NET) and [CodeRush](http://www.devexpress.com/Products/CodeRush/) is a nice tool to use for .NET. | Try [PVS-Studio](http://www.viva64.com/en/pvs-studio/) is really great, can find a lot of obscure bugs. The drawback is it is commercial product and can be expensive. |
171,517 | Recently I've been looking into Metallic Hydrogen as a fuel for the vehicles of my fictional future world. The only issue is that I'm uncertain if the blasted stuff is metastable. And while I know that no one knows for sure if it is, I would like some sources on some of the latest findings for me to judge the risk of whether or not of including it.
Thank you. | 2020/03/17 | [
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/171517",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com",
"https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/users/69795/"
] | Full disclosure - everything factual here I'm about to write comes from the same paper that AlexP quoted in the comments, I'm just going to go over a bit more things. The paper is [here](https://arxiv.org/pdf/1611.02593.pdf) if you want to look at it.
**Metallic Hydrogen is metastable**
Once created, as long as it's kept in the same conditions as it was created in, it's expected to be metastable. However, this may prove tricky, as it requires around 500 GPa to create, or about 5,000,000 atmospheres of pressure. As in, not that keeping it is tricky but making the stuff is. It's unclear if we've actually created the stuff, by the way, a lab claimed that they made it, however, due to the nature of the small sample and the fact that it was between diamond anvils, they were unable to perform conclusive tests. But, given the insane difficulty in making the stuff, there is what to believe that it's going to be metastable at the pressure it was created in.
And, as the paper states, dropping the pressure even to about 10 GPa, or a mere 100,000 atmospheres, is about the least you can do without the metallic hydrogen decaying. To give you another comparison, this is roughly the pressure that diamonds form at. I wouldn't actually worry about this part, though. Metallic hydrogen, at least by our current means, is impossible to mass produce. If we develop the means to mass produce it, that means we've develop specialized equipment to handle creating something at that kind of pressure, so it's very conceivable that we'll have equivalent level fuel tanks to hold it. (If you're wondering, diamond fuel tanks can easily withstand that much pressure, but that's currently impractical, for various reasons.) | It is not meta-stable in ambient conditions, but since you're writing about a **fictional** world, you *could* add some form of futuristic containment chamber that would stabilize it. For the thrusters, you can add Cesium to the metallic hydrogen and use a magnetic field to prevent the exhaust from coming into contact with the nozzle. This thruster, would **only** be usable *in a vacuum* as if you were ti use in the atmosphere, the super-heated exhaust fumes would cause the air to combust, thus melting the nozzle. If you want more info, I suggest you look at:
* Youtube -> <https://youtu.be/aR4b9EWxgWs?t=102>
* Cornell University -> <https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.04900> |
399,959 | My brother and I recently decided to beat *Zelda II* on NES. When we finally reached the end screen, after nearly three months of zero-cheating torture, we had all the spells, all items, all magic containers, all heart containers, level 8 on everything, had fully beaten all temples (meaning they turn into mountains so you cannot re-enter them)... but still somehow four keys left.
Even after we had found the "Magic Key", which according to the cryptic manual "can open several of the locked doors" (in contrast to the original game where it just meant "unlimited keys"), the game kept giving us several normal keys in the last two temples, which never went anywhere. There were four nonexistent doors left for the keys to open. Just not present anywhere. And we made careful maps to really scan through each temple.
Isn't the Magic Key *required* to even get anywhere in the second-to-last temple? We had zero keys for the longest time until we found that key and could proceed into that temple's first (and only) locked door... only to get more keys inside. But no doors anywhere to actually use the keys. Not even ones that open with the Magic Key. No doors period.
Also worth to mention is that, unlike the first game, *Zelda II* has no way to *purchase* keys. They are always found or rewarded for beating a mini-boss, and appear to be presented as very important objects.
Also, a person in the game literally tells you to "use the keys in the same palace as where you find them". I wonder what that means since you appear to have no choice?
Am I fundamentally confused about what it means when a temple turns into a mountain tile (and prevent you from re-entering)? Does it perhaps only signify that you beat the boss and got out of the temple, but there are no guarantees that you found all items/secrets inside?
How could we have four keys left? | 2022/10/30 | [
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/399959",
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com",
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com/users/296681/"
] | Good question! Also, props to you. My brother and I beat Zelda 2 on the NES a few years ago using soley the manual as well.
How could we have four keys left?
---------------------------------
The reason you can have four keys left in the game is because you collected the **Magical Key** from the town **New Kasuto**. The Magical Key *allows Link to unlock any Locked Door. Unlike a normal Key, it is reusable, meaning that regular Keys are rendered useless once obtained.*[[1]](https://zelda.fandom.com/wiki/Magical_Key)
What? If the Magical Key unlocks every other door, and it is *required* to collect, why would there be any other keys hidden on the maps?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfortuantely, this is just another instance of wonky NES game design. It doesn't make sense. Just as [the original LoZ will claim that there is a secret hidden on every screen of the map when there isn't](https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/287812/is-there-actually-a-cave-entrance-on-every-screen), NES games are somewhat notorious for sometimes not having fully thought-out aspects of their game design. (In this case, that there is no reason to hide any more keys once you require players to collect the Magical Key.)
This is complete conjecture, but this could have resulted from the game designers later adding in the Magical Key's ability to unlock every door instead of just being a regular key, and then not going back and removing the other regular keys afterward.
Where did the extra keys come from?
-----------------------------------
After obtaining the Magical Key, every door you unlock expends **no keys** when you open them. Yet there are still keys hidden in the last two dungeons such as after the horse-mounted Blue Iron Knuckle ("*Once you defeat him, a key will fall, but this key is useless since you already have the Magic Key.*"[[2]](https://strategywiki.org/wiki/Zelda_II:_The_Adventure_of_Link/Hidden_Palace)) or after the temple's boss.
---
**EDIT:** All credit to @Hearth in the comments below on this answer. Go give him some Internet points by upvoting his comment or answer, but I am rephrasing his observation here for convenience:
He pointed out that Zelda II's system for opening the boss gates on the side of the screen is triggered by collecting a key, so that *is* a reason for the developers to keep including some of the keys in the last two dungeons: Not because you might "need" them to unlock a door, but because they were the trigger for indicating to the game that the boss room was ready to be exited. | As far as I recall, you could fly through keyholes with the Fairy spell ( I just looked it up and apparently this wasn't possible on European versions of the game, wild! ), so even before getting the Magic Key you have the potential to skip using some keys, magic power allowing.
If you're feeling really wild, with this feature you can end the game with a letter number of keys left over, but that takes some doing.
Edit to include clarification from @wizzwizz4 in regards to holding more than 9 keys: " It indexes into the tileset. If it's not got any base support, 10 will just use the next tile after 9."
Edit edit: Source: I played the living crap out of this game with my little brother. <3 |
399,959 | My brother and I recently decided to beat *Zelda II* on NES. When we finally reached the end screen, after nearly three months of zero-cheating torture, we had all the spells, all items, all magic containers, all heart containers, level 8 on everything, had fully beaten all temples (meaning they turn into mountains so you cannot re-enter them)... but still somehow four keys left.
Even after we had found the "Magic Key", which according to the cryptic manual "can open several of the locked doors" (in contrast to the original game where it just meant "unlimited keys"), the game kept giving us several normal keys in the last two temples, which never went anywhere. There were four nonexistent doors left for the keys to open. Just not present anywhere. And we made careful maps to really scan through each temple.
Isn't the Magic Key *required* to even get anywhere in the second-to-last temple? We had zero keys for the longest time until we found that key and could proceed into that temple's first (and only) locked door... only to get more keys inside. But no doors anywhere to actually use the keys. Not even ones that open with the Magic Key. No doors period.
Also worth to mention is that, unlike the first game, *Zelda II* has no way to *purchase* keys. They are always found or rewarded for beating a mini-boss, and appear to be presented as very important objects.
Also, a person in the game literally tells you to "use the keys in the same palace as where you find them". I wonder what that means since you appear to have no choice?
Am I fundamentally confused about what it means when a temple turns into a mountain tile (and prevent you from re-entering)? Does it perhaps only signify that you beat the boss and got out of the temple, but there are no guarantees that you found all items/secrets inside?
How could we have four keys left? | 2022/10/30 | [
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/399959",
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com",
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com/users/296681/"
] | Good question! Also, props to you. My brother and I beat Zelda 2 on the NES a few years ago using soley the manual as well.
How could we have four keys left?
---------------------------------
The reason you can have four keys left in the game is because you collected the **Magical Key** from the town **New Kasuto**. The Magical Key *allows Link to unlock any Locked Door. Unlike a normal Key, it is reusable, meaning that regular Keys are rendered useless once obtained.*[[1]](https://zelda.fandom.com/wiki/Magical_Key)
What? If the Magical Key unlocks every other door, and it is *required* to collect, why would there be any other keys hidden on the maps?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfortuantely, this is just another instance of wonky NES game design. It doesn't make sense. Just as [the original LoZ will claim that there is a secret hidden on every screen of the map when there isn't](https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/287812/is-there-actually-a-cave-entrance-on-every-screen), NES games are somewhat notorious for sometimes not having fully thought-out aspects of their game design. (In this case, that there is no reason to hide any more keys once you require players to collect the Magical Key.)
This is complete conjecture, but this could have resulted from the game designers later adding in the Magical Key's ability to unlock every door instead of just being a regular key, and then not going back and removing the other regular keys afterward.
Where did the extra keys come from?
-----------------------------------
After obtaining the Magical Key, every door you unlock expends **no keys** when you open them. Yet there are still keys hidden in the last two dungeons such as after the horse-mounted Blue Iron Knuckle ("*Once you defeat him, a key will fall, but this key is useless since you already have the Magic Key.*"[[2]](https://strategywiki.org/wiki/Zelda_II:_The_Adventure_of_Link/Hidden_Palace)) or after the temple's boss.
---
**EDIT:** All credit to @Hearth in the comments below on this answer. Go give him some Internet points by upvoting his comment or answer, but I am rephrasing his observation here for convenience:
He pointed out that Zelda II's system for opening the boss gates on the side of the screen is triggered by collecting a key, so that *is* a reason for the developers to keep including some of the keys in the last two dungeons: Not because you might "need" them to unlock a door, but because they were the trigger for indicating to the game that the boss room was ready to be exited. | There are two reasons for this: a game design one, and a technical one.
The game design reason is simple. There are doors in each dungeon that you don't have to open. Some doors only lead to minor rewards like a point bag or magic refill, neither of which is required to beat the dungeon. Once you do beat the dungeon, which consists of nothing more or less than obtaining the dungeon's main item and placing the crystal into the statue, the dungeon is replaced on the world map with a mountain tile and is no longer accessible, leaving any still-locked doors behind while Link takes the keys with him.
Additionally, one of the effects of the Fairy spell is that, in fairy form, Link can fly "through the keyhole" of locked doors, bypassing them entirely. If you have any keys when you try to do this, the door will still be opened (this might be considered a glitch, depending on who you ask), but if you have no keys and approach a door in fairy form, you can just fly right through.
---
The technical reason is that when Link encounters a boss or miniboss, the screen is locked so that you can't leave the boss arena. Every boss drops a key to unlock the door right behind their arena--likely both to give an in-universe reason for you to be fighting them instead of running past, and to give you a "you beat the boss and got a thing" sense of achievement similar to the orbs after every Castlevania boss.
Perhaps to ensure you can't miss it (as it would probably--but I can't say for sure--despawn if you left the room), the screen remains locked until you pick up the key. As a side effect of this decision, the only way in the code for the screen to unlock is for Link to pick up a key. Rather than complicate matters by making special cases for the handful of bosses you fight after getting the magic key, they just have those bosses still drop keys so that you can unlock the screen and move on. |
399,959 | My brother and I recently decided to beat *Zelda II* on NES. When we finally reached the end screen, after nearly three months of zero-cheating torture, we had all the spells, all items, all magic containers, all heart containers, level 8 on everything, had fully beaten all temples (meaning they turn into mountains so you cannot re-enter them)... but still somehow four keys left.
Even after we had found the "Magic Key", which according to the cryptic manual "can open several of the locked doors" (in contrast to the original game where it just meant "unlimited keys"), the game kept giving us several normal keys in the last two temples, which never went anywhere. There were four nonexistent doors left for the keys to open. Just not present anywhere. And we made careful maps to really scan through each temple.
Isn't the Magic Key *required* to even get anywhere in the second-to-last temple? We had zero keys for the longest time until we found that key and could proceed into that temple's first (and only) locked door... only to get more keys inside. But no doors anywhere to actually use the keys. Not even ones that open with the Magic Key. No doors period.
Also worth to mention is that, unlike the first game, *Zelda II* has no way to *purchase* keys. They are always found or rewarded for beating a mini-boss, and appear to be presented as very important objects.
Also, a person in the game literally tells you to "use the keys in the same palace as where you find them". I wonder what that means since you appear to have no choice?
Am I fundamentally confused about what it means when a temple turns into a mountain tile (and prevent you from re-entering)? Does it perhaps only signify that you beat the boss and got out of the temple, but there are no guarantees that you found all items/secrets inside?
How could we have four keys left? | 2022/10/30 | [
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/399959",
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com",
"https://gaming.stackexchange.com/users/296681/"
] | There are two reasons for this: a game design one, and a technical one.
The game design reason is simple. There are doors in each dungeon that you don't have to open. Some doors only lead to minor rewards like a point bag or magic refill, neither of which is required to beat the dungeon. Once you do beat the dungeon, which consists of nothing more or less than obtaining the dungeon's main item and placing the crystal into the statue, the dungeon is replaced on the world map with a mountain tile and is no longer accessible, leaving any still-locked doors behind while Link takes the keys with him.
Additionally, one of the effects of the Fairy spell is that, in fairy form, Link can fly "through the keyhole" of locked doors, bypassing them entirely. If you have any keys when you try to do this, the door will still be opened (this might be considered a glitch, depending on who you ask), but if you have no keys and approach a door in fairy form, you can just fly right through.
---
The technical reason is that when Link encounters a boss or miniboss, the screen is locked so that you can't leave the boss arena. Every boss drops a key to unlock the door right behind their arena--likely both to give an in-universe reason for you to be fighting them instead of running past, and to give you a "you beat the boss and got a thing" sense of achievement similar to the orbs after every Castlevania boss.
Perhaps to ensure you can't miss it (as it would probably--but I can't say for sure--despawn if you left the room), the screen remains locked until you pick up the key. As a side effect of this decision, the only way in the code for the screen to unlock is for Link to pick up a key. Rather than complicate matters by making special cases for the handful of bosses you fight after getting the magic key, they just have those bosses still drop keys so that you can unlock the screen and move on. | As far as I recall, you could fly through keyholes with the Fairy spell ( I just looked it up and apparently this wasn't possible on European versions of the game, wild! ), so even before getting the Magic Key you have the potential to skip using some keys, magic power allowing.
If you're feeling really wild, with this feature you can end the game with a letter number of keys left over, but that takes some doing.
Edit to include clarification from @wizzwizz4 in regards to holding more than 9 keys: " It indexes into the tileset. If it's not got any base support, 10 will just use the next tile after 9."
Edit edit: Source: I played the living crap out of this game with my little brother. <3 |
63,384 | I have stumbled across many depictions of Roman coins with the abbreviation CONOB on it, such as [this one](https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herakleios#/media/Datei%3ARevolt_of_the_Heraclii_solidus%2C_608_AD.jpg).
What does it stand for? | 2021/03/28 | [
"https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/63384",
"https://history.stackexchange.com",
"https://history.stackexchange.com/users/48293/"
] | **Constantinopoli obryzum**
According to a poorly cited Wikipedia article CON indicates the mint of Constantinople and OB is an abbreviation of obryzum, and quite literally translates to "1/72 of a pound of pure gold".
[CONOB, Wikipedia](https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/CONOB)
>
> CONOB is a legend found in much of Byzantine gold coinage . Sometimes COMOB is found.
>
>
>
>
> It was found, for example, in exergue in the solids produced by the mint of Constantinople.
>
>
>
>
> CON indicates the mint of Constantinople.
>
>
>
>
> OB has a double meaning:
>
>
>
>
> the two letters in the Greek numbering system correspond to the numbers 72 and indicate that the monetary foot used for the solid is 1/72 of a pound
> they are also the beginning of the Latin word obryzum , [2](https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=CONOB) which indicates refined, pure gold.
> So OB in this case means 1/72 of a pound of pure gold.
>
>
>
**FORVM ANCIENT COINS**
For a non Wikipedia reference you can visit [FORVM ANCIENT COINS](https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=CONOB). It says the same thing. | It appears your answer is here:
<https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=conob>
CONOB. Constantinopoli obryzum. The solidus weighed 1/72 of the Roman pound. "OB" was both an abbreviation for the word obryzum, which means refined or pure gold, and is the Greek numeral 72. Thus the exergue CONOB coin may be read "Constantinople, 1/72 pound pure gold." -- "Byzantine Coinage" by Philip Grierson
Just to partially confirm from other sources:
<https://www.islamic-awareness.org/history/islam/coins/dinar5>
Here it says CONOB a mint mark indicating it was coined in Constantinople. Although, given the meaning given by the first reference, I am not sure if CONOB would also be used for other mints outside of Constantinople but inside the Empire and under the authority of the Emperor - it may only mean that it is an imperial coin. Also be aware that if crosses are defaced or eliminated, your coin may be an Arab imitation.
And CONOB is called 'mintmark' here:
<https://www.wildwinds.com/coins/byz/heraclius/i.html> |
100,430 | I have read a number of threads here similar to but not the same as the problem my group and I are having (including [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/15637/15689) thread, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/15640/15689) answer, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/78839/15689) answer to a similar situation, and [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/33948/how-do-i-deal-with-a-bored-or-distracted-player-bringing-down-the-group) question which addresses only 1 person).
I have a question related to dealing specifically with 2 problem players, and would like to explore avenues of resolution other than disbanding or kicking these players out of the group.
After joining a new group recently, I am finding more and more that two people in the group are surprisingly immature, a fact not helped by them both feeding off of each other's behaviour. While this is not necessarily a problem in and of itself (and in theory could actually lead to some fun interactions), it is unfortunately leading to some detrimental effects for the rest of the group (and the DM in particular). these effects include:
* **Slowing the game down** - When these two players get together, they tend to distract one another. This is especially frustrating when playing with a larger group (5 or 6 other players), since in talking to one another they miss what is happening, and we consistently spend time having to catch them up on what other players have done, the state of the battlefield, etc. While not a huge problem for me as a player (though certainly irritating), our DM is getting understandably frustrated having to repeat everything twice, since neither of these two players are paying attention. They also don't think ahead when its not their turns, and since they are both spellcasters, this frustrates us other players a great deal, as our turns often take under 30 seconds, while because of their distracting behaviour their turns frequently take upwards of 5 minutes each.
* **Losing a sense of cohesion** - Their two characters almost exclusively look out for each other, even to the detriment of the rest of the party. While this could make for an interesting dynamic in game, their behaviour is inconsistent, and they appear to show little loyalty to the order our group serves (around which our 2 month campaign has been based; loyalty to this order was the prerequisite for joining the group), our overarching mission, and more importantly the welfare of our group (eg last session they refused to heal our tank because they wanted to save their healing spells for "more important characters"). This is, unsurprisingly, leading to resentment both in and outside of the game.
* **Ruining Immersion** - A large draw for many of us to this group in particular is the role playing aspect of the game. However, the constant bickering and out-of-game discussions among these 2 players is constantly drawing us out of the game. Our DM has tried calling them out at the table for being distracting and taking away from the game, as well as speaking to them privately (though I was not present when this conversation took place). Regardless, the poor behaviour continues, and our DM appears to be at his wit's end.
* **Poor Gameplay** - Before anyone gets upset about me listing this, let me explain. The two players tend to make decisions against the advice of the rest of the group and the DM (which is fine - after all, we are roleplaying). HOWEVER, these decisions (unsurprisingly) often lead to a poor situation for them, to which they respond with resentment towards the group and the DM, consequently leading them to spend the rest of the night complaining about how boring the game is, and further distracting the group. For example, in our last session we were fighting a group of dragons. Rather than mounting their dragons and helping in the fight, both decided instead to head into town and get drunk, even after the rest of us, including the DM, advised against it. When they realized that the rest of us were having a great time slaying Shadow Dragons, they complained that they were stuck in a tavern in town essentially doing nothing, and began berating the DM for not allowing them to instantaneously join the battle. We are unsure of how to handle this behaviour, and their boredom undoubtedly contributes to the distracting behaviour that is frustrating the rest of the group.
Ultimately, the question boils down to this: **How do we deal with 2 immature players who feed off of one another, and detract from the experiences of other players?**
Although simply kicking them out or forming a new group is certainly an option, I figured sharing our predicament with the wonderful RPG community here may lead to some unexpected solutions which may help us actually resolve the problem. | 2017/05/26 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/100430",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/15689/"
] | In response to your sectionals:
>
> * Slowing the game down:
>
>
>
Do NOT repeat things for them. If they miss it, they miss it, they have earned no special treatment - do not offer them any.
As much as I personally dislike it, a time limit (say 1 min) for each player, each turn may be in order. (the time limit is only on committing to an action, not actually finishing it ... ie large meteor swarm could take a while to resolve)
>
> * Losing a sense of cohesion:
>
>
>
If their characters are no longer fulfilling a prerequisite for something, then their characters should suffer some penalty or issue. This is an item for the DM to discuss with them. Although it could lead to booting the characters (not players) from the party, it could lead to new character creation .. or even player dismissal ... although this isn't necessarily what I'm leading at here ;)
>
> * Ruining Immersion:
>
>
>
If the players themselves are not abiding by the rules of the table, and communicating with them has failed, I'm not sure I see any other option than to start enforcing stricter penalties on them, or asking them outright to leave. I know you didn't want to hear that, however, some people just don't "get it". *shrug*
>
> * Poor Gameplay:
>
>
>
You don't need to handle this behaviour, neither does the GM. Just simply point out . "Hey, it was your choice ... live with YOUR choices". These hard heads need to grow up .. short and simple. :) | In the interim, until more permanent solutions are found, maybe just having them not sit next to each other might help. |
100,430 | I have read a number of threads here similar to but not the same as the problem my group and I are having (including [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/15637/15689) thread, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/15640/15689) answer, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/78839/15689) answer to a similar situation, and [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/33948/how-do-i-deal-with-a-bored-or-distracted-player-bringing-down-the-group) question which addresses only 1 person).
I have a question related to dealing specifically with 2 problem players, and would like to explore avenues of resolution other than disbanding or kicking these players out of the group.
After joining a new group recently, I am finding more and more that two people in the group are surprisingly immature, a fact not helped by them both feeding off of each other's behaviour. While this is not necessarily a problem in and of itself (and in theory could actually lead to some fun interactions), it is unfortunately leading to some detrimental effects for the rest of the group (and the DM in particular). these effects include:
* **Slowing the game down** - When these two players get together, they tend to distract one another. This is especially frustrating when playing with a larger group (5 or 6 other players), since in talking to one another they miss what is happening, and we consistently spend time having to catch them up on what other players have done, the state of the battlefield, etc. While not a huge problem for me as a player (though certainly irritating), our DM is getting understandably frustrated having to repeat everything twice, since neither of these two players are paying attention. They also don't think ahead when its not their turns, and since they are both spellcasters, this frustrates us other players a great deal, as our turns often take under 30 seconds, while because of their distracting behaviour their turns frequently take upwards of 5 minutes each.
* **Losing a sense of cohesion** - Their two characters almost exclusively look out for each other, even to the detriment of the rest of the party. While this could make for an interesting dynamic in game, their behaviour is inconsistent, and they appear to show little loyalty to the order our group serves (around which our 2 month campaign has been based; loyalty to this order was the prerequisite for joining the group), our overarching mission, and more importantly the welfare of our group (eg last session they refused to heal our tank because they wanted to save their healing spells for "more important characters"). This is, unsurprisingly, leading to resentment both in and outside of the game.
* **Ruining Immersion** - A large draw for many of us to this group in particular is the role playing aspect of the game. However, the constant bickering and out-of-game discussions among these 2 players is constantly drawing us out of the game. Our DM has tried calling them out at the table for being distracting and taking away from the game, as well as speaking to them privately (though I was not present when this conversation took place). Regardless, the poor behaviour continues, and our DM appears to be at his wit's end.
* **Poor Gameplay** - Before anyone gets upset about me listing this, let me explain. The two players tend to make decisions against the advice of the rest of the group and the DM (which is fine - after all, we are roleplaying). HOWEVER, these decisions (unsurprisingly) often lead to a poor situation for them, to which they respond with resentment towards the group and the DM, consequently leading them to spend the rest of the night complaining about how boring the game is, and further distracting the group. For example, in our last session we were fighting a group of dragons. Rather than mounting their dragons and helping in the fight, both decided instead to head into town and get drunk, even after the rest of us, including the DM, advised against it. When they realized that the rest of us were having a great time slaying Shadow Dragons, they complained that they were stuck in a tavern in town essentially doing nothing, and began berating the DM for not allowing them to instantaneously join the battle. We are unsure of how to handle this behaviour, and their boredom undoubtedly contributes to the distracting behaviour that is frustrating the rest of the group.
Ultimately, the question boils down to this: **How do we deal with 2 immature players who feed off of one another, and detract from the experiences of other players?**
Although simply kicking them out or forming a new group is certainly an option, I figured sharing our predicament with the wonderful RPG community here may lead to some unexpected solutions which may help us actually resolve the problem. | 2017/05/26 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/100430",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/15689/"
] | In response to your sectionals:
>
> * Slowing the game down:
>
>
>
Do NOT repeat things for them. If they miss it, they miss it, they have earned no special treatment - do not offer them any.
As much as I personally dislike it, a time limit (say 1 min) for each player, each turn may be in order. (the time limit is only on committing to an action, not actually finishing it ... ie large meteor swarm could take a while to resolve)
>
> * Losing a sense of cohesion:
>
>
>
If their characters are no longer fulfilling a prerequisite for something, then their characters should suffer some penalty or issue. This is an item for the DM to discuss with them. Although it could lead to booting the characters (not players) from the party, it could lead to new character creation .. or even player dismissal ... although this isn't necessarily what I'm leading at here ;)
>
> * Ruining Immersion:
>
>
>
If the players themselves are not abiding by the rules of the table, and communicating with them has failed, I'm not sure I see any other option than to start enforcing stricter penalties on them, or asking them outright to leave. I know you didn't want to hear that, however, some people just don't "get it". *shrug*
>
> * Poor Gameplay:
>
>
>
You don't need to handle this behaviour, neither does the GM. Just simply point out . "Hey, it was your choice ... live with YOUR choices". These hard heads need to grow up .. short and simple. :) | I see the question has been resolved, but I would like to add my answer as an additional viewpoint.
>
> I have a question related to dealing specifically with 2 problem
> players, and would like to explore avenues of resolution other than
> disbanding or kicking these players out of the group.
>
>
>
I believe its possible in this situation to achieve the aims you are looking for.
>
> ... **detrimental effects for the rest of the group (and the DM in
> particular).**
>
>
>
Its common to experience moments where members of a D&D group may get annoyed with each other for a variety of reasons. It is when these moments are allowed to detract from the overall enjoyment of the game that action becomes necessary.
There are two rules which I would apply to any D&D group that I participate in:
1. The DM is responsible for the flow of the game, and must take action
to control the narrative to limit those elements of the game which
are not enjoyable, and so allow everyone to focus on those elements
which are enjoyable. These tend to vary from game to game, and
depend largely on the personalities that you have gathered for your
group.
2. The players are equally responsible for action when things are starting to
lose their enjoyment. Players can brush aside uncooperative
behaviour from their fellow players with jokes that let their
friends know to adjust their behaviour while keeping things
lighthearted. If the culprits do not get the hint, then less subtle measures are called for such as stopping your participation in the game immediately until they become cooperative. A player should never tolerate ongoing annoyance in a session, they should speak up immediately and either ask for the players to cease, or for the DM to act to resolve the conflict which has arisen.
The steps for escalation would be
1. immediate, friendly and respectful hints and reminders that
incorporate a sense of humour so that the game is not interrupted, followed by
2. penalties and consequences which apply immediately, without further
warning. Disruptive players don't get second chances. Don't lecture the players, and don't waste time discussing what happened. Make it quick and obvious, and incorporate good humour and lighthearted manner to minimise the impact on the game, and then
3. immediate pause of the game, with a demand for cooperation with
expected standards for everyone's enjoyment of the game. Establish an agreement with all the players, then quickly resume the game with good humour.
>
> **Slowing the game down ...**
>
>
>
This is the responsibility of the DM to enforce. I would allow this to happen once, but at the same time making my thoughts clear that their actions may have an impact on their characters in game. But anything beyond that should not be tolerated by the DM at all.
>
> **Losing a sense of cohesion ...**
>
>
>
This is a basic principle of role playing: that the members of an RPG group need to work together to accomplish their goals within the parameters set by the DM. Beyond that the players are free to let their character expression fill in the gaps as a form of expression. If a player can't grasp this basic principle, they need to be told this by the DM and supported by the players as soon as it becomes an issue, not later on.
>
> **Ruining Immersion ...**
>
>
>
The DM has created a world for the game to exist in, and this effort demands some respect from the players. If this respect is lacking, the DM must confront this issue, and be prepared to pause the game until the players show some respect for the game world. There shouldn't be any discussion of this issue at all. They don't need to appreciate all the fine details, but at the least, their behaviour should not detract from the enjoyment of their fellow players.
>
> **Poor Gameplay ...**
>
>
>
In this situation, the DM cannot reward uncooperative behaviour. Those players will be required to wait out their time while the other players resolve their game actions. The players could be asked to leave the table until their turn arrives. At the extreme situation, they may be required to sit out the remainder of the session. If they continue to be disruptive, they should be asked to leave the location and return later at an agreed time. |
100,430 | I have read a number of threads here similar to but not the same as the problem my group and I are having (including [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/15637/15689) thread, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/15640/15689) answer, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/78839/15689) answer to a similar situation, and [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/33948/how-do-i-deal-with-a-bored-or-distracted-player-bringing-down-the-group) question which addresses only 1 person).
I have a question related to dealing specifically with 2 problem players, and would like to explore avenues of resolution other than disbanding or kicking these players out of the group.
After joining a new group recently, I am finding more and more that two people in the group are surprisingly immature, a fact not helped by them both feeding off of each other's behaviour. While this is not necessarily a problem in and of itself (and in theory could actually lead to some fun interactions), it is unfortunately leading to some detrimental effects for the rest of the group (and the DM in particular). these effects include:
* **Slowing the game down** - When these two players get together, they tend to distract one another. This is especially frustrating when playing with a larger group (5 or 6 other players), since in talking to one another they miss what is happening, and we consistently spend time having to catch them up on what other players have done, the state of the battlefield, etc. While not a huge problem for me as a player (though certainly irritating), our DM is getting understandably frustrated having to repeat everything twice, since neither of these two players are paying attention. They also don't think ahead when its not their turns, and since they are both spellcasters, this frustrates us other players a great deal, as our turns often take under 30 seconds, while because of their distracting behaviour their turns frequently take upwards of 5 minutes each.
* **Losing a sense of cohesion** - Their two characters almost exclusively look out for each other, even to the detriment of the rest of the party. While this could make for an interesting dynamic in game, their behaviour is inconsistent, and they appear to show little loyalty to the order our group serves (around which our 2 month campaign has been based; loyalty to this order was the prerequisite for joining the group), our overarching mission, and more importantly the welfare of our group (eg last session they refused to heal our tank because they wanted to save their healing spells for "more important characters"). This is, unsurprisingly, leading to resentment both in and outside of the game.
* **Ruining Immersion** - A large draw for many of us to this group in particular is the role playing aspect of the game. However, the constant bickering and out-of-game discussions among these 2 players is constantly drawing us out of the game. Our DM has tried calling them out at the table for being distracting and taking away from the game, as well as speaking to them privately (though I was not present when this conversation took place). Regardless, the poor behaviour continues, and our DM appears to be at his wit's end.
* **Poor Gameplay** - Before anyone gets upset about me listing this, let me explain. The two players tend to make decisions against the advice of the rest of the group and the DM (which is fine - after all, we are roleplaying). HOWEVER, these decisions (unsurprisingly) often lead to a poor situation for them, to which they respond with resentment towards the group and the DM, consequently leading them to spend the rest of the night complaining about how boring the game is, and further distracting the group. For example, in our last session we were fighting a group of dragons. Rather than mounting their dragons and helping in the fight, both decided instead to head into town and get drunk, even after the rest of us, including the DM, advised against it. When they realized that the rest of us were having a great time slaying Shadow Dragons, they complained that they were stuck in a tavern in town essentially doing nothing, and began berating the DM for not allowing them to instantaneously join the battle. We are unsure of how to handle this behaviour, and their boredom undoubtedly contributes to the distracting behaviour that is frustrating the rest of the group.
Ultimately, the question boils down to this: **How do we deal with 2 immature players who feed off of one another, and detract from the experiences of other players?**
Although simply kicking them out or forming a new group is certainly an option, I figured sharing our predicament with the wonderful RPG community here may lead to some unexpected solutions which may help us actually resolve the problem. | 2017/05/26 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/100430",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/15689/"
] | In response to your sectionals:
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> * Slowing the game down:
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Do NOT repeat things for them. If they miss it, they miss it, they have earned no special treatment - do not offer them any.
As much as I personally dislike it, a time limit (say 1 min) for each player, each turn may be in order. (the time limit is only on committing to an action, not actually finishing it ... ie large meteor swarm could take a while to resolve)
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> * Losing a sense of cohesion:
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If their characters are no longer fulfilling a prerequisite for something, then their characters should suffer some penalty or issue. This is an item for the DM to discuss with them. Although it could lead to booting the characters (not players) from the party, it could lead to new character creation .. or even player dismissal ... although this isn't necessarily what I'm leading at here ;)
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> * Ruining Immersion:
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If the players themselves are not abiding by the rules of the table, and communicating with them has failed, I'm not sure I see any other option than to start enforcing stricter penalties on them, or asking them outright to leave. I know you didn't want to hear that, however, some people just don't "get it". *shrug*
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> * Poor Gameplay:
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You don't need to handle this behaviour, neither does the GM. Just simply point out . "Hey, it was your choice ... live with YOUR choices". These hard heads need to grow up .. short and simple. :) | Every game has rules mechanics that encourage or discourage certain gaming behaviors. For example, if the only way to gain experience is to kill creatures, then don't be surprised if your party tends to migrate towards the "murder-hobos" playstyle.
Every DM has house rules or ways to act as a DM, that also encourage/discourage some playstyles or table behaviors.
Here, your DM is at their wit's end, but isn't willing to actually do something "real" about it.
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I suggest the following:
#1:
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Present the Murky Mirror (Google AngryGM Murky Mirror) to your group (maybe by email). Ask their opinion about it. Personal experience with this is that it simplifies the game a lot and avoid tons of problems like: "My Guy Syndrome", "Metagaming", "Hostile Dark Secrets", and "My PC Can Act Like A Jerk, But I'm Not Him, Honest!" etc.
Say you think it's a good idea, and anybody not answering is basically agreeing fully to add this to the campaign. Since the article is long, copy-paste it and cut it down to max 1 page or so, only what is essential, with a link to the full article.
AngryGM has tons of other useful articles, but don't swamp your group, that would just create a "TL;DR" situation. One thing at a time!
Try to get everybody's contact info. If they ask what's it about: "Not sure yet. Depends. We'll make sure to call you for your opinion." If somebody refuses to give contact info: "Stop with the paranoia, please? You're a part of this group, not standing outside of it, and we value your opinion, you know? If you don't want to be reached, then you have to agree that if something ever gets decided, you accepted it in advance, no complaints later on."
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#2:
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After enough time for everybody to answer (2+ weekends), try to meet or phone call or Skype (no email, no text!) everybody, one by one, at a moment that they have time to give (i.e. if you're busy right now just call me later this evening or tomorrow." (and call them back if they don't). Basically go get their input on the Murky Mirror thing, but quickly phase to the "artificial separation" of you feeling that having a party that is seemingly split between 2 sub-groups of PCs, which act as more or less separate entities, instead of as a true team, and how you think this overall feels like something that is quite detrimental to your enjoyment of the game.
You call the other players, then the problem players, then the DM, in that order. Say that you find the situation problematic and not very fun, and ask them what they think and what they suggest could improve the overall fun and positivism at the gaming table, for everybody, seen as a group. A full group. Not a group of 2 plus a group of the rest. Anything they think they could do or suggest to try to improve the overall "group morale" and team spirit.
The idea here is you being respectful and trying to avoid a situation when you "prejudge" these 2 guys (reasoning: "since I find them not fun, thus they're wrong, thus I don't feel the need to include their opinions on this despite they being directly concerned by it."). Avoid projecting your opinions on the rest of the group: Maybe they don't care as much or exactly like you do, so again thinking "the rest of the group thinks" can create way too easily false dichotomies here. It's not "the rest of the group", like some kind of "us vs. them" group-think. It's each and everyone in the group (the 2 problematic guys included) having a different opinion. So go get all of those first.
Don't try to "direct" the conversations. Your goal here is not to convince or harass, but just to say (once) you think that you feel a problem, and that you want their opinion on it. If they ask what you think or suggest, tell them you're just polling everybody's opinions and ideas, not trying to force your own ideas or influence their own ideas. You're merely "getting the pulse" of the group's wants and opinions, that's it. Taking notes. Not debating issues.
Keep it short. If all goes well (i.e. they all answer when you call, and are not busy with something else at the moment - it's important to check that first as you call because you need them at their best mindful ad receptive availability), then you should be able to do the full "round" of everybody in a single hour, no more, and ideally much less. Cut off any conversation that needlessly prolongs if need be. 5 to 15 minutes each, tops. Give more time for the problem players and to the DM to really express themselves, if they wish. Allow also more time for you to express yourself but to the DM only, if he asks.
Maybe just talking will solve the problem. With the DM, you can go into more details (after 10 minutes, ask him if he really want to talk longer about this -- you don't want him to feel swamped with and put in the middle of a huge problem). Maybe give him the link to this answer.
In any case, unless you have the full support of the GM from A to Z, you're doomed to fail and the only choice you have are shutting up or adding up more resentment and fire on the oil slick.
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#3:
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After that, beginning of the next game session, with everybody, put the problem in front of the table and ask for a collective brainstorming, because you feel there are some frictions which reduce the overall fun at the gaming table. Ideally, it is the DM that should start it and then, only if he is somebody that is super bad at diplomacy, he should officially say that you will handle the discussions, and that you both already discussed it and you have his full support in this.
Do not do this at the end of a game session with everybody tired and wanting to go home, and able to just leave ignoring the topic, but when everybody is all fresh, when you can have all their attention, and their choice to leave means they're not going to play.
If one of them says "I came here to play, not waste my time with such stupid talks!", anything even resembling that, very early and quickly in the talks, don't push your agenda, but politely say: "Ok, you think such talks are stupid and useless. I respect your opinion. However, I personally don't think so, and I hope you can also respect me as a player, which is exactly the point I'm trying to make with this whole discussion, which is about trying to find ways to behave and respect each other. So, let's vote. Left hand up everybody thinking these talks are important, and right hand up those thinking we should just forget about it." Obviously, if you did your homework properly, all but the 2 guys should vote for your side. "Apparently it seems most people at this gaming table think this issue is indeed important. So yeah we will solve it and play afterwards, because 2 players aren't more important than an entire group of 6, right?" If they decide to leave or become hostile, then they're assholes, and your group is better off without them.
Put emphasis on the fact that it's important for everybody to have fun at any gaming table. Way more important that "My Guy syndrome". For example, maybe it's quite logical in their head for their characters to not have healed the tank. But it should be obvious even to them that saying that the tank is not important enough to be healed, means they are insulting him, which is detrimental to the group harmony and cohesion, both in the game and more importantly around the game table.
However, the personality of their characters is not forced upon the players but fully determined and decided by them. So yeah in face of a PC acting like a jerk, it is 100% the player's fault. If a PC is unlikable, to the point of reducing the overall fun around the gaming table, just change his personality already. Easy. Just change the scribble of the sheet of paper to something less bad. The people around the gaming table are way more important than the sheet-of-paper PCs. PCs are only avatars in a fantasy world of the group's own making. The PC personality is not some kind of holy book falling from the sky that can be used to stomp on the fun of others. Players have a responsibility to adjust their PCs in order to make sure everybody is having fun. Everybody. Not just themselves. Acting anti-team or greedy or selfish is not fun, clear?
If they feel that they have much more mastery and experience, then it should be obvious that they also need to be the leaders that make dang sure that everybody else feels included in the game and can voice his opinions with respect. Everybody comes playing to have fun.
So if there is a conflict between respecting a PC's personality, and the fun of others, it should be obvious which one should is more important. Making mistakes here and there is ok, but if a player's intent is to have fun at the expense of the fun of others, then that is not acceptable gaming behavior.
If a player actually dislikes another player, they should talk about it, try to reach common ground. Definitely not use their PC in order to punish or avoid the PC of the other player. The PCs don't have to be best buddies, sure, but that should be something fully agreed upon between the two players in order to enhance their roleplay. Otherwise by default they should act as part of a real team. Any hostility (or completely refraining to help when asked) should be approved first as being something officially considered "fun" by the very target of the conflict. Otherwise, it's acting like a jerk around the gaming table.
Ideally, in all this, it should not be a "we (rest of group) find you (two guys) guilty, so repent or go away!" aka an "us vs them" mentality. That is just asking for things to deteriorate, a lot. Instead, treat it more like a family trying to solve it's problems, to help each other find new ways to understand each other.
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#4:
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The DM has to actually implement some new house rules that will encourage the gaming table behavior he likes, while discouraging behaviors he dislikes. Applying them fairly to everybody.
DM begins each point by telling why he thinks a house rule is needed.
* (1A) Slowing the game down - Making the DM repeat himself:
I want to encourage actually strongly following what is happening in the game. I'm tired of repeating myself.
We'll just use the Murky Mirror. A round is only 6 seconds. In the middle of combat, 6 seconds is crazy short.
So, if a player is not following the action, then his PC is also not following the action, too. The PC will get just as lost as his player.
The excuse "But my PC is as high level hero" is not good. High level doesn't mean perfect like a godlike computer. That super genius wizard that also gives super-wise advice, throwing powerful spells, can be somebody quite absent minded, and so on. If you want your PC to act perfect, then play perfect.
After all, the player drive the PC, it is not an independent entity. So try to cut down on all the side table tangents, try to follow the main action of the game. Else, I'm not going to repeat myself and your character will just end up risking wasting his turn. In short: I'll focus my attention, as a DM, on players that choose to focus on the actual game.
Follow, even when it's not your turn! Especially when it's not your turn! This game is a social game based on acting as a team, and if you do something that isn't fun for others, you're not a team player. Anybody not able to actively and seriously follow and silently listen attentively to what is occurring with other PCs, without interrupting for at least 10 minutes, is basically saying to the rest of the table: I think only my own PC is important, and I don't care at all about any of you!". Rude and, frankly, socially speaking, that's being a jerk. So you also have to follow the actions of everybody, not just your own actions.
From now on, if a player asks "What is going on", and I already did share that info, then his action for his current turn (or his next, if he does that in a turn that is not his turn), will be a quick recap by me of the situation, but that will be his turn. No action, no movement, no interact with an object, no ready an action, nothing. Player obviously wasn't paying attention to the situation at hand at all. Same for his PC, who ends up wasting a few precious seconds. Follow the game or lose your turn.
Note that if at that very instant, the character is over a pit of lava and needed to "grab something" to avoid falling to his death, well, he will get the recap but, at best, will get to make a "roll or die" check at a "you were being inattentive" penalty.
Anything that is not "roll or die" is resolved with the" yo get the recap but lose your turn. A pit trap opens under group, but instead of grabbing dice to roll Dex Save like everybody else is asked to do, the player just says "Huh? What's going on Guys?" Well... You play your character, what he sees and what he hears leads to what he does, and all of it is you, the player, deciding all of it; he's not a remote-controlled puppet acting independently of the player. So that PC also ended up saying "Huh? What's going on?" while everybody else that was paying attention was hurriedly ducking out of harm's way, and the PC gets no save and auto-fails.
Basically, if your PC dies because you weren't paying attention, that's no bad blood on my part! It was all just your own fault, really. Just pay better attention to the game, ok? Because if you aren't even interested in following the game, then why are you even here?
Out of combat, duration will be longer that 1 round. Impose no action and attentive silence on the player for a few minutes. This should be enough to let him catch again the flow of the story. And attentive silence means no talking to the player next to you, no checking cell phone, whatever. If a player can't interest himself in what the other PCs are doing, why should anybody be interested in seeing what he does? That seems only fair. You don't follow the game, then you don't get to play. Simple enough! This is a team game, not a solo game. If what the others do don't interest you, go back to your single player video game.
* (1B) Slowing the game down - Arguing with the DM:
I am the DM, the players aren't. My job is to deal with the rules and the flow of the game, and I use the rules to make a good game, but I am in no way obligated to follow them. They're more like guidelines, really. Your jobs as players is simpler: roleplay your character in a way that makes it fun for the entire gaming table. Not just you: Everybody!
Basically, I don't want to DM a game full of rules arguments. That's no fun. So if a player gets annoyed or contradictory with me, he's trying to do the DM's job instead of trying to do a player's job. That's crazy, right?
So, from now on, it's the Murky Mirror approach: if rules-arguing occurs, relevant PC is Stunned and Immobile for 1 full round's worth of actions, losing even his Reaction. His PC starts to wast his time babbling incoherently like a madman about how reality should work some other way, instead of focusing on what is really happening in front of him.
A player is allowed to very politely ask about a rule, in a "trying to help the DM which seems a little bit lost on a rule here". Once. But anything more than and that's arguing and then it's "Stunned" time.
Outside of combat (or other high speed adrenaline filled events), that "insanity" lasts longer. Again, typically a few minutes of attentive silence by the player.
* (1C) Slowing the game down - Taking too long to decide on your action:
I think a slow pace reduces the overall fun and amount of actions done in the game session. So I'll discourage tasking too much time to decide your actions.
From now on, you really have to realize that a round is only 6 seconds long. I'll adopt the Murky Mirror, so if the player hesitates, his PC too. If you want your PC to know all of his powers by heart, then you the player also need to learn all of them by heart, too.
When I think a player is taking too long to decide what to do, I will say "6 seconds!" (or another quick and clear keyword). Last chance to immediately describe your action, or lose your round.
If even with the warning he still takes too much time, he gets a quick recap of the general situation, but loses his whole turn.
* (2) Losing a sense of cohesion - Group Morale & Team Spirit:
If I start a campaign that said "You are all a group of dwarfs from the same fortress! There is this huge war with the elves going on, too." and then a player joins, either at the start or later, but insists on playing an elf and ignoring said war, well, such a player is really not respecting the campaign table and style and setting much, ain't he?
I as a DM presented this campaign as being one in which the group follows, and is loyal to, this dwarf order. You guys really have to roleplay this, at least a little bit. This is a campaign prerequisite. I'm willing to ignore past actions, but from now on, try to act the part at least a little bit.
I'll make it clearer: I will give a 7th score to each of you: Karma.
Everybody starts at 12: the minimum expected value of putting forth the precepts of your order and teammates happiness.
Following and being loyal to your order's precepts, and favoring actions good for team morale and feelings, translate into higher Karma. The opposite translates into lower Karma. The GM might adjust the Karma of any PC at any time, usually by increasing or lowering by 1 (or 2 points for the really big ones), "towards" the value that he thinks (in his head) the player and/or his character are displaying.
Example: Refusing to heal the tank while also saying it's for "keeping it for somebody more important" is basically saying to the other player: "You're not important!" That kind of rudeness definitely deserves a drop in 2 Karma (unless he was already quite low, then -1 is sufficient). You're a team. The tank is there to take the damage and the first one to take the brunt of the attacks, so of course it is very important to heal him. Anybody thinking otherwise is basically not a team player, and so... bad Karma.
Remember: Murky Mirror! Whatever the player does, the PC does the equivalent. And whatever the player makes their PC say or do, applies to the player, too. If you make your PC act like a jerk to the other PCs, then the player is acting like a jerk to the other players, too. Do you want to be perceived as a friend or as a jerk?
It is important to note that gaining/losing karma is not based only on the "karmatic" actions themselves, but also on the already existing score. Doing something good for karma when you already have a 16 in Karma score, is just that much harder to accomplish. Because you are expected to be a great team player already at nearly all times. Doing something bad to worsen your karma when it's already at 6, is similarly quite hard to do. Your teammates already know you're not worth any respect already, so they don't expect much out of you anyway. A Karma of 20 means basically a PC that always puts the precepts of his order and of the well-being and happiness of his teammates first, 100% to the detriment of his own interests and happiness, 100% of the time. Think giving everything you have and all your time to your church and friends, that is just impossible. Same for selfish behaviors. A Karma is 3 is basically a player so bad it's instant kick-the-jerk-out-the-campaign time. Most players should end up with a Karma between 8 and 16, with maybe one or two of you that are very slightly out of that range. And 12 is a good stat since it gives +1.
Karma needs to be "constantly supported". Every level-up, Karma will move by 1 points towards a score value of 10 (which is a truly neutral stance, putting as much importance on the order and teammates, as on yourself) (clearly your 2 guys act more like something like 8 Karma but you'll start at 12 Karma anyway).
At the beginning of each game session, one after another, everybody rolls a karma check DC 10, clearly stating their Karma modifier before rolling (otherwise it's an instant failure). Success means the character start that game session with Inspiration (or whatever "heroic" mechanic exists in the campaign), failure means he starts without it.
Sometimes the DM will also ask for a Karma Check with some DC, optionally stating why he asks that roll. Just add the Ability modifier from your Karma. Success means getting the relevant benefit or successfully avoiding the relevant penalty. The DM doesn't have to tell in advance what the benefit or penalty will be.
If the DM uses per-player-XP, then Karma could directly impact how many XPs they get. So jerks end up leveling up slower than "good" players.
Basically, the players can play however they want. But the DM is perfectly entitled to encourage and reward what he finds "fun" behaviors that support the campaign style he's trying to run, and disfavor and penalize opposite behaviors.
* (3) Ruining immersion:
The DM really has to put on his pants on here.
whenever the DM says out loud "Focus!", it means:
"Stop with your bickering/arguing/wasting time, right now! Focus on making progress on the main story events."
It's a dire warning to stop diddling around.
Players that ignore the warning, or follow it only for a short while and start again and again and again, i.e. repeated offenses can stack up, then the offending players get some penalty. It could again be the stay silent for some minutes. I had a group of 6 players and I used "You 2, you're too disruptive and don't follow the game, so you go into the living room until I call you back (we played in the kitchen). Your PCs are in "do absolutely nothing mode, not even defend themselves effectively". Well, you can just roleplay with each other, since you seemed to want to do that so much instead of following the action, so you 2 go do that until it's out of your system. And if a fight breaks out, and it did, I called them back only after they took some damage and missed the first half of the fight.
Without any real consequences of rewards and punishments, a DM is no more intelligent than a parent repeatedly saying to his unruly child "I"m telling you to stop this for the very last time, I won't repeat it!"
When its only 1 player, force silence even for 5 minutes, if he is an outspoken player, this can seem like extreme punishment. For 2+ players getting too disruptive because sidetracked, it's obvious their little RP session is more important to them than the game, so let them go and do that. If you count XP, give them a tiny bit less, and if they ask why: "Why do you ask? I had to make you go into timeout mode because you were being disruptive and more interested in your personal PCs discussion, than on the actual game, do you sincerely think I should reward that kind of behavior? You want XPs, then follow the whole game, not whatever seems interesting to you."
Other players may also say *Focus!*, as a friendly reminder (i.e. without real consequences) to do the same thing. Here it's more like saying: "I feel we are getting sidetracked, let's focus on the main story events please!"
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And if they whine about finding the game boring, just tell them:
It's the first time you say the game is boring. It's noted. Please don't think the game is boring because things didn't didn't go your way. Are your characters actually whining like this every time things don't go like they wanted? You decided what to do, going contrary to what the rest of the group wanted, so you have only yourself to blame. If you find that boring, then it's you who are boring, because you are the source of that. And you're certainly not adding any fun to the gaming table right now.
It's the second time you say the game is boring. I'm starting to think you're not really into this campaign. You job is to roleplay your character in a way that adds fun for the entire gaming table and right now you're definitely not doing that. Tell you what, instead of focusing on your boring resentment, try to add to the fun, focus also on what the others are doing, and next time there is a plan, don't always try to control the decisions, sometimes let them decide how to do it. In fact, as there are 5 PCs, unless you want to look like a control freak, then you should not try to control the decisions more than 20% of the time. In any case, it is your job making the game fun, both for you and for everybody. I have already enough on my plate as it is and I also deserve to have fun and your repeated complaints are just grating.
It's the third time you say the game is boring. That's it, third strike, I've had enough. You have no fun being here, and I have no fun with all that repeated whining. You can just pick up your stuff and go home, and think seriously about what kind of positive contribution you'll be willing to add to the gaming environment next game, if you decide to come back. I'd be sad to lose you, but I can't accept that kind of poisonous gaming table behavior anymore. If he says sorry, sorry. Don't say you're sorry to me, say you're sorry to them (points the other players). It's you who failed to make the game fun, not me. Ok, ok, you can stay, but that was your last chance (and make it really the last chance otherwise the other players won't take anything you say seriously anymore).
It's the fourth time you say the game is boring. Enough is enough. Sorry doesn't cut it anymore. Not for tonight, I'm just too tired. So, for tonight, just go home (they whine some more). I just told you I'm too tired for this kind of sit anymore. Now, either you are sorry and leave silently for tonight without making any more trouble, unless you prefer a permanent ban from the entire campaign instead? Because you really are no fun at all.
Then: Good evening, I really wish you'd try to think about how you could improve, and good night. I'm sure you can do it.
Personally I really prefer big groups, like, 5 or even 6 players.
But I'd rather play with 3 good players, than with 6 players but with 2 of them acting like self-entitled asocial misfits.
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If a DM doesn't take responsibility to really direct and enforce good behaviors, then he is basically the same as a kindergarten teacher that lets them do what they wish without consequences. In real life, this very soon leads to daily chaos and bad stuff. So why would a gaming table be any different? Maturity and respect aren't ingrained, they must be learned, and without any clear incentives to, players lacking these basic social skills will never learn. As long as they can "get away with it", they will continue. Just telling them to stop ain't enough. There has to be actual consequences.
Basically, you see that whenever somebody acts like a jerk or does something I don't want to see in this campaign, wham, you lose. Note that it is always both the player and his PC that get punished both at the same time. In a campaign, one doesn't exist without the other, and so they share the same fate.
Without actual in-game house-rules to encourage/discourage specific behaviors with clear results, this is like a cop running after a bandit, equipped only with a whistle, and only allowed to say, "Stop or I will shout 'Stop' again!"
You want to tame them? Then make it super clear that bad actions have bad consequences.
Otherwise, without actual consequences, it's all good and nice to try to add some focus and discipline, but you're ending up just shooting with blanks.
Now, they will probably object to all of the above. Tell them: Ok, I'm willing to admit that you're more than mature enough to realize that you need to improve, without forcing you to, and that from now on you will provide a better gaming experience for the other players at the gaming table. But if I don't see a dramatic improvement, not starting right now, not just for a few games but for every game, then it means that you really aren't such good players as you think, and that you really need help with these things. So, if that occurs, then I'm going to start using these house rules. Not to punish you but to actually help you become really experienced and better players. I'm not adding rocket science stuff here, I'm merely doing this one this: gaming table behavior is social behavior. These are very basic behaviors that you as an adult should already master anyway. So, I'll let you prove it, otherwise I'll be forced to use this "bad things results in bad consequences" set of house rules. You two aren't the only players around the gaming table, and it's high time that you realize that.
Basically, silk smooth glove (politeness, respect, take their inputs), well fitted over an iron fist (no budging on the importance to change right now).
It's the DM's game. He has to put some firm limits, or else it's normal that some players will think it's ok to trample all over them, and thus over him and over his campaign and over the other players. |
100,430 | I have read a number of threads here similar to but not the same as the problem my group and I are having (including [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/q/15637/15689) thread, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/15640/15689) answer, [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/a/78839/15689) answer to a similar situation, and [this](https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/33948/how-do-i-deal-with-a-bored-or-distracted-player-bringing-down-the-group) question which addresses only 1 person).
I have a question related to dealing specifically with 2 problem players, and would like to explore avenues of resolution other than disbanding or kicking these players out of the group.
After joining a new group recently, I am finding more and more that two people in the group are surprisingly immature, a fact not helped by them both feeding off of each other's behaviour. While this is not necessarily a problem in and of itself (and in theory could actually lead to some fun interactions), it is unfortunately leading to some detrimental effects for the rest of the group (and the DM in particular). these effects include:
* **Slowing the game down** - When these two players get together, they tend to distract one another. This is especially frustrating when playing with a larger group (5 or 6 other players), since in talking to one another they miss what is happening, and we consistently spend time having to catch them up on what other players have done, the state of the battlefield, etc. While not a huge problem for me as a player (though certainly irritating), our DM is getting understandably frustrated having to repeat everything twice, since neither of these two players are paying attention. They also don't think ahead when its not their turns, and since they are both spellcasters, this frustrates us other players a great deal, as our turns often take under 30 seconds, while because of their distracting behaviour their turns frequently take upwards of 5 minutes each.
* **Losing a sense of cohesion** - Their two characters almost exclusively look out for each other, even to the detriment of the rest of the party. While this could make for an interesting dynamic in game, their behaviour is inconsistent, and they appear to show little loyalty to the order our group serves (around which our 2 month campaign has been based; loyalty to this order was the prerequisite for joining the group), our overarching mission, and more importantly the welfare of our group (eg last session they refused to heal our tank because they wanted to save their healing spells for "more important characters"). This is, unsurprisingly, leading to resentment both in and outside of the game.
* **Ruining Immersion** - A large draw for many of us to this group in particular is the role playing aspect of the game. However, the constant bickering and out-of-game discussions among these 2 players is constantly drawing us out of the game. Our DM has tried calling them out at the table for being distracting and taking away from the game, as well as speaking to them privately (though I was not present when this conversation took place). Regardless, the poor behaviour continues, and our DM appears to be at his wit's end.
* **Poor Gameplay** - Before anyone gets upset about me listing this, let me explain. The two players tend to make decisions against the advice of the rest of the group and the DM (which is fine - after all, we are roleplaying). HOWEVER, these decisions (unsurprisingly) often lead to a poor situation for them, to which they respond with resentment towards the group and the DM, consequently leading them to spend the rest of the night complaining about how boring the game is, and further distracting the group. For example, in our last session we were fighting a group of dragons. Rather than mounting their dragons and helping in the fight, both decided instead to head into town and get drunk, even after the rest of us, including the DM, advised against it. When they realized that the rest of us were having a great time slaying Shadow Dragons, they complained that they were stuck in a tavern in town essentially doing nothing, and began berating the DM for not allowing them to instantaneously join the battle. We are unsure of how to handle this behaviour, and their boredom undoubtedly contributes to the distracting behaviour that is frustrating the rest of the group.
Ultimately, the question boils down to this: **How do we deal with 2 immature players who feed off of one another, and detract from the experiences of other players?**
Although simply kicking them out or forming a new group is certainly an option, I figured sharing our predicament with the wonderful RPG community here may lead to some unexpected solutions which may help us actually resolve the problem. | 2017/05/26 | [
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/100430",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com",
"https://rpg.stackexchange.com/users/15689/"
] | In response to your sectionals:
>
> * Slowing the game down:
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>
>
Do NOT repeat things for them. If they miss it, they miss it, they have earned no special treatment - do not offer them any.
As much as I personally dislike it, a time limit (say 1 min) for each player, each turn may be in order. (the time limit is only on committing to an action, not actually finishing it ... ie large meteor swarm could take a while to resolve)
>
> * Losing a sense of cohesion:
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>
>
If their characters are no longer fulfilling a prerequisite for something, then their characters should suffer some penalty or issue. This is an item for the DM to discuss with them. Although it could lead to booting the characters (not players) from the party, it could lead to new character creation .. or even player dismissal ... although this isn't necessarily what I'm leading at here ;)
>
> * Ruining Immersion:
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>
>
If the players themselves are not abiding by the rules of the table, and communicating with them has failed, I'm not sure I see any other option than to start enforcing stricter penalties on them, or asking them outright to leave. I know you didn't want to hear that, however, some people just don't "get it". *shrug*
>
> * Poor Gameplay:
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You don't need to handle this behaviour, neither does the GM. Just simply point out . "Hey, it was your choice ... live with YOUR choices". These hard heads need to grow up .. short and simple. :) | Here are some simple tips to minimize issues, without any OOC discussions or problems.
1. To fix the issue of slow decision making, get a one minute timer for battle decisions. If they can't make decisions during that time, no turn. Make sure the DM adjusts combat for the likely fact that they'll be less effective. Make sure to communicate to them that they should be listening to the game actively and planning their moves while others are acting. This has worked well in my games to encourage slow players to prepare, since combat is fun.
2. Make a short list of loyalty rules (heal when asked out of combat or when needed to stop death in combat, don't damage other characters, don't steal from other characters, don't purposely injure allies, don't purposely split the party without good reasons) and if they violate said rules, have your characters abandon them since they clearly are not loyal. They can then reroll more loyal characters.
3. Have the entire group ready to shut down them when they refuse to play. Playing DND is about adventure. If they want to go drinking and dunking donuts and not dungeon delving and dragon fighting, they clearly are not appropriate adventurers. If they bitch endlessly, have the entire group call them out, and discourage them. They were bored because they chose to have boring characters. If they want to have fun, they need to interact with you and dungeon delve. |
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