Teen dies after fall from Terra Mitica roller coaster

cdude3 said:

As a statistician I get unusually uncomfortable in the face of apparent fallacies.

How do you feel about the minimum number of riders needed to effectively assemble a best roller coaster list?

Yeah I've been on coasterbuzz for over 12 years, thank you, but just on different handles.

I use punctuation and capitalization according to the tone I wish to express.

Re: kpjb, it depends on how "confident" you want to be about the quality of the list (consider a law of large numbers sort of argument). If the list is ranked, then things become harder. In part, this is because often preferences are conceived of as latent (or unobserved), so that the questionnaire respondent maps her unobserved preferences to the list she writes down. For example, suppose Wanda is OBSESSED with Balder but thinks everything else is just ok, and say weakly prefers El Toro to Golaith. But then if John and Jerry just weakly prefer El Toro to Balder and prefers Balder to Goliath, it's not obvious that John and Jerry's weak preferences dominate Wanda's very strong preference for Balder.

I'm not an expert in polling and construction of ordered lists (I specialize in machine learning and probability theory). I say though that as long as list weren't understood to be SCIENTIFIC ignoring this latent preference stuff and equal weighting of everyone's lists isn't unreasonable. Though unordered lists (e.g., top 25 best coasters in world, no order) are probably best.

Also I'll note that notions of "politeness" are just constructions developed by the community to which the notions pertain. Politeness isn't what our mother told us it is. It's whatever we want it to be. I want it to be colloquial and snarky.

In other forums, e.g., Gawker, such language is just understood as normal or unsurprising.

And yet, as a "long time" member of this forum, you should know that such language is highly unusual and is interpreted as some combination of aggressiveness and childishness.

lol wut language

English. Perhaps you've heard of it.

Yeah. If you're a real seasoned member, then you should know what's acceptable here and what isn't.

Trying to force yourself on everyone won't get you much in this particular community. Which is not affiliated with Gawker Media last I checked.

But thanks for playing. (Is that snarky enough for you?)

Tekwardo-

Yes! :D I love that.

I mean it sounds like you're just making stuff up.

I've just read the posting guidelines, and they seem to me regressive. The internet isn't only a place of English, and defining an arbitrary standard of English seems pretty silly. For instance, I don't like reading sentences that end with prepositions -- I certainly don't end my sentences with prepositions. This is sometimes understood to be "proper" English, so why isn't this the standard? The apparent arbitrariness of the rules follows from these reductio ad absurdum arguments pretty quickly.

The internet in general isn't a "family friendly place." Kids can access whatever they like. Partitioning the internet into "safe" and "not safe" places is an old (and failed) idea of the '90s.

So, subject to more or less following the rules to which I agreed when I made an account, I will not follow your apparent rules against "aggressiveness" and "childishness".

Too Long; Didn't read: Imma do my own thing thanks bro.

I guess it just comes off as a really negative attitude - to be so argumentative for the sake of being right. In all honesty, who/what in this debate really does not matter so long as it creates a good forum environment for the niche topic this site is going for (which, it isn't).

Can we go back to talking about roller coasters? At the very least, restraints!! Don't you just hate how (tight/not) the (part of restraint) feels on your (insert body part)?!

...which is what she said... /sigh

Just ignore him. If you've learned anything around here, it's to stop feeding the trolls and eventually they go away.

Just because it's too good to pass up:

Ending sentences with prepositions is actually a non-standard rule which is NOT required for correct grammar...up.

http://www.waywordradio.org/preposition-at-the-end-of-a-sentence/

Then don't expect people to follow your rules. Simple as that.

You throw arbitrary rules out and refuses to follow community standards, don't expect to be treated any different than the douche you're coming across as.

cdude3 said:

I've just read the posting guidelines, and they seem to me regressive. The internet isn't only a place of English, and defining an arbitrary standard of English seems pretty silly.

Fortunately for us, you don't pay for this little piece of the Internet. I do, and these rules have served us well for 14 years. You can play nice with the other kids, or you can go find a different place to hang out. No one here will care either way, "bro."

So... hows about that thurr kid what falled down from that spinney rolley coastey deal.

I heard them mighty machines that vitamin or something like that makes, can throw a tractor 27 miles.

If I were a betting man, my guess is that you're dangerously close to joining the Tyler Boes Hall Of Fame.

High five!!!

Gonch, are you talking Rick or cdude? (Or both?)

I meant Rick.

He just oozes the Boes vibe.

For sure he needs to not quit his day job. If he's guilty of anything, like Jeff said, it's trying way too hard. Which isn't totally heinous, but it sure can be irritating to those that have a well established groove.

I remember when I was the new guy around here, after posting on Pointbuzz for a while and catching wind of another group around the corner. And while the memory of ten years ago is hazy, I know I was far from young, was rather new to the Internet, and didn't really have a clue about message boards. So I enjoyed reading, spoke up when I felt like it was appropriate and probably got a few laughs and more than a few eye rolls.

Since then I've enjoyed watching new ones join in. Some make it, some don't. Those that don't are the really young ones, the know it all's, the instant smart-asses, or the most off-putting of all, those that claim to have lurked for years then suddenly show up to throw their weight around. This last one is a shame especially when the perp has interesting information or specific knowledge to share but feels he's above the social conventions established for the group. We can all act the way we want to at home, we just shouldn't expect to be allowed to in church.

What do we do in real life social situations when we aren't hiding behind the security of a keyboard? We watch our manners, our first impressions, and most importantly, we quietly sit back in order to determine who's who and how we should interact. And if we've got a problem with it we move along. At least if we're smart we do, it makes life easier.

One of the good things about being around here, and why I stuck it out, is this is a different environment from most fan-centric sites I've seen. One of the things that is best is the adherence to a standard- we watch our language, our spelling, our grammar, and our tolerance levels. And those that don't can expect to be called out.

It's one big happy self-policing family here. Which is how it should be.