Many of us are often confused when talking about Crocodile and Alligator. They have been used mispropriately in many situations. Both of them have a compelling list of differences which are listed below:
1. The first difference between a crocodile and an alligator is that they are from different families of crocodilians. Crocodiles are from the crocodylidae family, while alligators and caiman are from the alligatoridae family.
2. In terms of physical differences the easiest way to tell the difference between the two is that a crocodile has a very long, narrow, V-shaped snout, while the alligator's snout is wider and U-shaped
3. Another physical difference between the crocodile and the alligator is that the crocodile's upper and lower jaws are nearly the same width, so the teeth are exposed all along the jaw line. An alligator, on the other hand, has a wider upper jaw, so when its mouth is closed the teeth in the lower jaw fit into sockets of the upper jaw, hidden from view. Only the teeth of the upper jaw are exposed along the lower jaw line.
4. Another physical difference is that crocodiles have a lighter olive brown coloration, while alligators appear blackish
5. Alligators prefer freshwater while crocodiles like brackish water and sometimes even ocean.
6. Crocodiles and alligators both have glands on their tongues, crocodiles still use these glands to excrete excess salt. Alligators seem to have lost this ability, making their tolerance for salt water comparatively brief.
7. Alligators are docile compared to aggressive saltwater crocodiles, and that crocodiles grow larger. As an example, the average alligator grows to about 14 feet (4.3 meters), while crocodiles can reach 19 feet (5.8 meters) or more
8. Crocodiles lay their eggs in mud or sand nests near brackish water, while alligators make their nests out of mounds of vegetation surrounding freshwater.
So next time when someone use the words interchangably, you can remember these points and correct them.
Mohan Rao.
We should feel sorrow, but not sink under its oppression.
- Confucius.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Dunning-Kruger effect
How many of us have seen people around us, who are less deserving or knowledgable boasting about themselves and over rating them. Well it all bogs down to their psychological make up. Just read on.
The Dunning-Kruger effect is an example of cognitive bias(tendency to make errors in judgment) in which "people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it". They therefore suffer an illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average. This leads to a perverse result where people with less competence will rate their ability more highly than people with relatively more competence.
The phenomenon was demonstrated in a series of experiments performed by Justin Kruger and David Dunning, then both of Cornell University.They hypothesized that with a typical skill which humans may possess in greater or lesser degree,
1. Incompetent individuals tend to overestimate their own level of skill.
2. Incompetent individuals fail to recognize genuine skill in others.
3. Incompetent individuals fail to recognize the extremity of their inadequacy.
4. If they can be trained to substantially improve their own skill level, these individuals can recognize and acknowledge their own previous lack of skill.
They set out to test these hypotheses on human subjects consisting of Cornell undergraduates who were registered in various psychology courses. In a series of studies, Kruger and Dunning examined self-assessment of logical reasoning skills, grammatical skills, and humor. After being shown their test scores, the subjects were again asked to estimate their own rank, whereupon the competent group accurately estimated their rank, while the incompetent group still overestimated their own rank.
Meanwhile, people with true knowledge tended to underestimate their competence. A follow-up study suggests that grossly incompetent students improve both their skill level and their ability to estimate their class rank only after extensive tutoring in the skills they had previously lacked.
In 2003 Dunning and Joyce Ehrlinger, also of Cornell University, published a study that detailed a shift in people's views of themselves influenced by external cues. Participants in the study (Cornell University undergraduates) were given tests of their knowledge of geography, some intended to positively affect their self-views, some intended to affect them negatively. They were then asked to rate their performance, and those given the positive tests reported significantly better performance than those given the negative.
hmmm...Are you recollecting somebody's name? Not my mistake!!!
Source: Wikipedia
Mohan Rao.
The man of virtue makes the difficulty to be overcome his first business, and success only a subsequent consideration - Confucius
The Dunning-Kruger effect is an example of cognitive bias(tendency to make errors in judgment) in which "people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it". They therefore suffer an illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average. This leads to a perverse result where people with less competence will rate their ability more highly than people with relatively more competence.
The phenomenon was demonstrated in a series of experiments performed by Justin Kruger and David Dunning, then both of Cornell University.They hypothesized that with a typical skill which humans may possess in greater or lesser degree,
1. Incompetent individuals tend to overestimate their own level of skill.
2. Incompetent individuals fail to recognize genuine skill in others.
3. Incompetent individuals fail to recognize the extremity of their inadequacy.
4. If they can be trained to substantially improve their own skill level, these individuals can recognize and acknowledge their own previous lack of skill.
They set out to test these hypotheses on human subjects consisting of Cornell undergraduates who were registered in various psychology courses. In a series of studies, Kruger and Dunning examined self-assessment of logical reasoning skills, grammatical skills, and humor. After being shown their test scores, the subjects were again asked to estimate their own rank, whereupon the competent group accurately estimated their rank, while the incompetent group still overestimated their own rank.
Meanwhile, people with true knowledge tended to underestimate their competence. A follow-up study suggests that grossly incompetent students improve both their skill level and their ability to estimate their class rank only after extensive tutoring in the skills they had previously lacked.
In 2003 Dunning and Joyce Ehrlinger, also of Cornell University, published a study that detailed a shift in people's views of themselves influenced by external cues. Participants in the study (Cornell University undergraduates) were given tests of their knowledge of geography, some intended to positively affect their self-views, some intended to affect them negatively. They were then asked to rate their performance, and those given the positive tests reported significantly better performance than those given the negative.
hmmm...Are you recollecting somebody's name? Not my mistake!!!
Source: Wikipedia
Mohan Rao.
The man of virtue makes the difficulty to be overcome his first business, and success only a subsequent consideration - Confucius
Friday, January 8, 2010
Learning by self - Autodidacticism
Are you not so good at studies? Dont worry you have the company of some great people who are like you. Just read on.
Autodidacticism (also autodidactism) is self-education or self-directed learning. An autodidact is a mostly self-taught person, as opposed to learning in a school setting or from a tutor.
A person may become an autodidact at nearly any point in his or her life. While some may have been educated in a conventional manner in a particular field, they may choose to educate themselves in other, often unrelated areas.
Self-teaching and self-directed learning are not necessarily lonely processes. Some autodidacts spend a great deal of time in libraries or on educative websites. Many, according to their plan for learning, avail themselves of instruction from family members, friends, or other associates, although strictly speaking this might not be considered autodidactic, unless the emphasis is placed on collecting specific information as opposed to being guided in a general course of study by a teacher figure.
1. A number of famous British scientists in the nineteenth century taught themselves. The chemist and physicist Michael Faraday, the natural historians Alfred Russel Wallace (co-discoverer of natural selection) and Henry Walter Bates, "Darwin's Bulldog" Thomas Henry Huxley, the social philosopher Herbert Spencer.
2. The visionary artist and poet William Blake was an autodidact. He was initially educated by his mother prior to his enrollment in drawing classes and never received any formal schooling due to his rebellious temperament. Instead, he read widely on subjects of his own choosing.
3. Vincent J. Schaefer, who discovered the principle of cloud seeding, was schooled to 10th grade when asked by parents to help with family income. He continued his informal education by reading, participation in free lectures by scientists and exploring nature through year-round outdoor activity.
4. John Boyd, fighter pilot and military strategist, was an accomplished autodidact who not only revolutionized fighter-aircraft design, but also developed new theories on learning and creativity.
5. The musician Frank Zappa is noted for his exhortation, "Drop out of school before your mind rots from exposure to our mediocre educational system. Forget about the Senior Prom and go to the library and educate yourself if you've got any guts. Some of you like Pep rallies and plastic robots who tell you what to read."
6. Many successful filmmakers did not attend college or dropped out. These include Steven Spielberg, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, Paul Thomas Anderson, David Fincher, Stanley Kubrick, John Huston, Woody Allen, Steven Soderbergh and Dario Argento.
7. Kató Lomb, one of first simultaneous interpreters of the world, spoke more than ten languages fluently and she learnt them by gleaning their rules and vocabulary from books (mostly novels), as she described in her book Polyglot: How I Learn Languages (2008), originally published in Hungarian in four editions (1970, 1972, 1990, 1995).
8. Mathematical genius Srinivasa Ramanujan and Newton's contemporary Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz were largely self-taught in mathematics, as was Oliver Heaviside. Ramanujan is notable as an autodidact for having developed thousands of new mathematical theorems despite having no formal education in mathematics.
hmmm... so it is never too late I guess.
Mohan Rao.
The will to win, the desire to succeed, the urge to reach your full potential... these are the keys that will unlock the door to personal excellence.
- Confucius
Autodidacticism (also autodidactism) is self-education or self-directed learning. An autodidact is a mostly self-taught person, as opposed to learning in a school setting or from a tutor.
A person may become an autodidact at nearly any point in his or her life. While some may have been educated in a conventional manner in a particular field, they may choose to educate themselves in other, often unrelated areas.
Self-teaching and self-directed learning are not necessarily lonely processes. Some autodidacts spend a great deal of time in libraries or on educative websites. Many, according to their plan for learning, avail themselves of instruction from family members, friends, or other associates, although strictly speaking this might not be considered autodidactic, unless the emphasis is placed on collecting specific information as opposed to being guided in a general course of study by a teacher figure.
1. A number of famous British scientists in the nineteenth century taught themselves. The chemist and physicist Michael Faraday, the natural historians Alfred Russel Wallace (co-discoverer of natural selection) and Henry Walter Bates, "Darwin's Bulldog" Thomas Henry Huxley, the social philosopher Herbert Spencer.
2. The visionary artist and poet William Blake was an autodidact. He was initially educated by his mother prior to his enrollment in drawing classes and never received any formal schooling due to his rebellious temperament. Instead, he read widely on subjects of his own choosing.
3. Vincent J. Schaefer, who discovered the principle of cloud seeding, was schooled to 10th grade when asked by parents to help with family income. He continued his informal education by reading, participation in free lectures by scientists and exploring nature through year-round outdoor activity.
4. John Boyd, fighter pilot and military strategist, was an accomplished autodidact who not only revolutionized fighter-aircraft design, but also developed new theories on learning and creativity.
5. The musician Frank Zappa is noted for his exhortation, "Drop out of school before your mind rots from exposure to our mediocre educational system. Forget about the Senior Prom and go to the library and educate yourself if you've got any guts. Some of you like Pep rallies and plastic robots who tell you what to read."
6. Many successful filmmakers did not attend college or dropped out. These include Steven Spielberg, Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, Paul Thomas Anderson, David Fincher, Stanley Kubrick, John Huston, Woody Allen, Steven Soderbergh and Dario Argento.
7. Kató Lomb, one of first simultaneous interpreters of the world, spoke more than ten languages fluently and she learnt them by gleaning their rules and vocabulary from books (mostly novels), as she described in her book Polyglot: How I Learn Languages (2008), originally published in Hungarian in four editions (1970, 1972, 1990, 1995).
8. Mathematical genius Srinivasa Ramanujan and Newton's contemporary Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz were largely self-taught in mathematics, as was Oliver Heaviside. Ramanujan is notable as an autodidact for having developed thousands of new mathematical theorems despite having no formal education in mathematics.
hmmm... so it is never too late I guess.
Mohan Rao.
The will to win, the desire to succeed, the urge to reach your full potential... these are the keys that will unlock the door to personal excellence.
- Confucius
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