It began, as it always did, with a phone call to 911. "Now listen here," the caller demanded, his voice frantic. "I've got two people here held hostage, all right? Now, you know what happens to people that are held hostage? It's not like on the movies or nothing, you understand that?"
"OK," the 911 operator said.
"One of them here's name is Danielle, and her father," the caller continued. "And the reason why I'm doing this is because her father raped my sister."
The caller, who identified himself as John Defanno, said that he had the 18-year-old Danielle and her dad tied up in their home in Security, a suburb of Colorado Springs. He'd beaten the father with his gun. "He's bleeding profusely," Defanno warned. "I am armed, I do have a pistol. If any cops come in this house with any guns, I will fucking shoot them. I better get some help here, because I'm going fucking psycho right now."
The 911 operator tried to keep him on the line, but Defanno cut the call short. "I'm not talking anymore," he snapped. "You have the address. If I don't have help here now, in the next five minutes, I swear to fucking God, I will shoot these people." Then the line went dead.
Officers raced to the house, ready for an armed standoff with a homicidal suspect. But when they arrived, they found no gunman, no hostages, no blood. Danielle and her father were safe and sound at home — alone. They had never heard of John Defanno, for good reason: He didn't exist.
Here's an article (7 pages; interesting story) about this kid who is blind but has really good hearing. He can mimic voices just from hearing them once and can recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed. He used his power to get revenge on people by calling SWAT teams to their houses, etc. He manipulated people into giving him PIN numbers and other confidential information by using his ability to mimic voices.
What would you do if you had his powers? What else realistic super human powers are there? (I know there's that blind kid who uses echolocation to get around)
not gonna read this cos it's the rolling stone and it has 7 pages of ad-filled glory but he sounds like a d-bag who wont go to prison/will get a lightere sentence because people pity him because he's blind
i remember he could also play mortal kombat or street fighter or something using only the sounds and he proved it by kicking the reporter's ass in the game no problem
Jeff Daniels, a former phreaker who befriended Weigman on a chat line. "When you're a blind little tubby bald kid in a broke-ass family, and you have that one ability to make yourself feel good, what do you expect to happen?"
edit: Thats some harsh words for describing the kid.
Meh. The only real people who have "super powers" are the savants, usually with Autism and there was this episode one night on Discovery with people with crazy abilities. Like a guy in Finland who had blood that acted like anti-freeze and he ran a marathon in the winter in Norway in nothing, but like a pair of boxers. It was insane. Let me see if I can find it.
On August 25 2009 15:58 Aegraen wrote: Meh. The only real people who have "super powers" are the savants, usually with Autism and there was this episode one night on Discovery with people with crazy abilities. Like a guy in Finland who had blood that acted like anti-freeze and he ran a marathon in the winter in Norway in nothing, but like a pair of boxers. It was insane. Let me see if I can find it.
wasn't there also this prof who jizzed his pants when some blind dude drew a picture of a building as well? i totally did not understand why the guy was so excited, especially if the blind dude was not born blind as he would have had previous memories and images in his head
On August 25 2009 15:58 Aegraen wrote: Meh. The only real people who have "super powers" are the savants, usually with Autism and there was this episode one night on Discovery with people with crazy abilities. Like a guy in Finland who had blood that acted like anti-freeze and he ran a marathon in the winter in Norway in nothing, but like a pair of boxers. It was insane. Let me see if I can find it.
wasn't there also this prof who jizzed his pants when some blind dude drew a picture of a building as well? i totally did not understand why the guy was so excited, especially if the blind dude was not born blind as he would have had previous memories and images in his head
Yeah he was in it. It was because he was drawing the buildings in 3D. It was pretty remarkable.
On August 25 2009 15:58 Aegraen wrote: Meh. The only real people who have "super powers" are the savants, usually with Autism and there was this episode one night on Discovery with people with crazy abilities. Like a guy in Finland who had blood that acted like anti-freeze and he ran a marathon in the winter in Norway in nothing, but like a pair of boxers. It was insane. Let me see if I can find it.
wasn't there also this prof who jizzed his pants when some blind dude drew a picture of a building as well? i totally did not understand why the guy was so excited, especially if the blind dude was not born blind as he would have had previous memories and images in his head
Yeah he was in it. It was because he was drawing the buildings in 3D. It was pretty remarkable.
yeah but if he wasn't born blind, he would've had previous memories and images in his head of how to draw things in 3D right? and if i remember correctly nobody asked whether or not anyone had taught the blind guy how to draw in 3D or even advised him that his pictures looked 2d when he first started drawing...
Being a progamer would be pretty cool...or any other celebrity. I guess that's a superpower in the same way that getting a bunch of people to listen and follow you is a superpower.
I think it's remarkable that someone can spend their life developing a talent they can never appreciate themselves. Like if I were blind painter, I would always be thinking "Are they just fucking with me when they say it's so realistic?"
On August 25 2009 15:58 Aegraen wrote: Meh. The only real people who have "super powers" are the savants, usually with Autism and there was this episode one night on Discovery with people with crazy abilities. Like a guy in Finland who had blood that acted like anti-freeze and he ran a marathon in the winter in Norway in nothing, but like a pair of boxers. It was insane. Let me see if I can find it.
wasn't there also this prof who jizzed his pants when some blind dude drew a picture of a building as well? i totally did not understand why the guy was so excited, especially if the blind dude was not born blind as he would have had previous memories and images in his head
Yeah he was in it. It was because he was drawing the buildings in 3D. It was pretty remarkable.
yeah but if he wasn't born blind, he would've had previous memories and images in his head of how to draw things in 3D right? and if i remember correctly nobody asked whether or not anyone had taught the blind guy how to draw in 3D or even advised him that his pictures looked 2d when he first started drawing...
ROFL. just watched the video. The dude was born without eyes, meaning he was blind all his life.
On August 25 2009 15:58 Aegraen wrote: Meh. The only real people who have "super powers" are the savants, usually with Autism and there was this episode one night on Discovery with people with crazy abilities. Like a guy in Finland who had blood that acted like anti-freeze and he ran a marathon in the winter in Norway in nothing, but like a pair of boxers. It was insane. Let me see if I can find it.
wasn't there also this prof who jizzed his pants when some blind dude drew a picture of a building as well? i totally did not understand why the guy was so excited, especially if the blind dude was not born blind as he would have had previous memories and images in his head
Yeah he was in it. It was because he was drawing the buildings in 3D. It was pretty remarkable.
yeah but if he wasn't born blind, he would've had previous memories and images in his head of how to draw things in 3D right? and if i remember correctly nobody asked whether or not anyone had taught the blind guy how to draw in 3D or even advised him that his pictures looked 2d when he first started drawing...
ahh... well i'm less cynical about his abilities now i guess, but i'm still wondering whether or not anybody ever helped him with his 3D imaging or if he had had practice with 3D imaging prior to his 'test'.
EDIT: Actually, from watching the video, I can see he already knows how to paint in 3D prior to the test... So another question arises, albeit less relavent: why did the UofT prof even bother 'testing' him and declaring that he had just repeated Filippo Brunelleschi's feat when he already has demonstrated that he can draw in 3D?
It began, as it always did, with a phone call to 911. "Now listen here," the caller demanded, his voice frantic. "I've got two people here held hostage, all right? Now, you know what happens to people that are held hostage? It's not like on the movies or nothing, you understand that?"
"OK," the 911 operator said.
"One of them here's name is Danielle, and her father," the caller continued. "And the reason why I'm doing this is because her father raped my sister."
The caller, who identified himself as John Defanno, said that he had the 18-year-old Danielle and her dad tied up in their home in Security, a suburb of Colorado Springs. He'd beaten the father with his gun. "He's bleeding profusely," Defanno warned. "I am armed, I do have a pistol. If any cops come in this house with any guns, I will fucking shoot them. I better get some help here, because I'm going fucking psycho right now."
The 911 operator tried to keep him on the line, but Defanno cut the call short. "I'm not talking anymore," he snapped. "You have the address. If I don't have help here now, in the next five minutes, I swear to fucking God, I will shoot these people." Then the line went dead.
Officers raced to the house, ready for an armed standoff with a homicidal suspect. But when they arrived, they found no gunman, no hostages, no blood. Danielle and her father were safe and sound at home — alone. They had never heard of John Defanno, for good reason: He didn't exist.
Here's an article (7 pages; interesting story) about this kid who is blind but has really good hearing. He can mimic voices just from hearing them once and can recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed. He used his power to get revenge on people by calling SWAT teams to their houses, etc. He manipulated people into giving him PIN numbers and other confidential information by using his ability to mimic voices.
What would you do if you had his powers? What else realistic super human powers are there? (I know there's that blind kid who uses echolocation to get around)
and FHL or HDI? (for the ending)
That's just called perfect pitch. It's impressive and uncommon but still quite a bit short of super powers. my friend who is a piano performance major has that ability.
he just sounds like a douchebag that hit a small jackpot ability and abused it then didnt want to pay the price and go to prison so he became even more of a douche
this is probably the first and last rollingstone article i'll read. what a load of unnecessary crap in the text.
recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed eh.. i think i could do that if i just learned which sound is which number, cause theyre all obviously different? or is it harder than it seems?
On August 25 2009 18:12 nttea wrote: recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed eh.. i think i could do that if i just learned which sound is which number, cause theyre all obviously different? or is it harder than it seems?
The phone number sound is 2 sounds on top of each other. Its like the row from 1 to 3 has a sound and the row from 1 to like 7 has one. So then you take like number 5. It takes the 2x2 sound or something. I dont know if i wrote it so that one cant understand it, but it is very hard.
+ you need some uber hearing to be able to hear the sound any more far than ear directly near the speaker
It was kind of disturbing to be honest. I know he comes from a poor and abusive background but to harass innocent people like he did was ridiculous.
As far as super human powers go though, I was listening to my local radio station once on the topic and they had callers talk about it. Some guy called in and told the station that he dropped like a mini-fridge on his foot (350lbs or something?) and he managed to somehow lift it off and push it aside from all the uber testosterone adrenaline he got from the fact that a mini-fridge dropped on his damn foot.
On August 25 2009 20:22 starfries wrote: a lot of Asians have perfect pitch. No joke.
i read somewhere that an average of 90% of the students in music conservatories in china possess perfect pitch, compared to 10% in the usa or some other western country the article also said it prbly had something to do with the linguistics of mandarin and how the language helped develop pitch identification in it's speakers
oh yeah, i think perfect pitch can also be trained into ppl, but its much much harder than relative pitch, which is pretty hard itself
also i'd imagine that blind ppl should naturally possess stronger senses of hearing, so a blind guy being able to know the tones of a phone really isn't that amazing imo
blind ppl can prbly hear things in the voices of other ppl and their own voices that normal ppl cannot detect, which i'd imagine would also help when replicating the voices of others...
probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
i think it's cause the chinese has a much larger pool to choose from = higher top talent.
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
I remember watching a very old documentary on YouTube, and it had this chinese guy in his 50's or so, and he practises electrical therapy on patients... The catch here is, that he doesn't use any technological equipment, but his fingers. He can generate small shocks on the tip of his fingers, and then points with his fingers on the patient. He also did it on the documentary crew because they were skeptical at first. In the middle of the documentary or so, he took a newspaper, crumbled it up, and set it on fire WITH HIS BARE HANDS - I was like, "wtf, that is so cool!" He also pushed a chopstick through a thick wooden table. After that, there were some splinters that hurt some people nearby and the next night he had a dream in which his master told him to stop showing his skills to the crew. Next day he asked the crew to leave.
This means that it's possible that any human can do this, but the downside is you probably need dozens of years of meditation and good spirit.
On August 25 2009 21:27 Ecorin wrote: I remember watching a very old documentary on YouTube, and it had this chinese guy in his 50's or so, and he practises electrical therapy on patients... The catch here is, that he doesn't use any technological equipment, but his fingers. He can generate small shocks on the tip of his fingers, and then points with his fingers on the patient. He also did it on the documentary crew because they were skeptical at first. In the middle of the documentary or so, he took a newspaper, crumbled it up, and set it on fire WITH HIS BARE HANDS - I was like, "wtf, that is so cool!" He also pushed a chopstick through a thick wooden table. After that, there were some splinters that hurt some people nearby and the next night he had a dream in which his master told him to stop showing his skills to the crew. Next day he asked the crew to leave.
This means that it's possible that any human can do this, but the downside is you probably need dozens of years of meditation and good spirit.
On August 25 2009 21:27 Ecorin wrote: I remember watching a very old documentary on YouTube, and it had this chinese guy in his 50's or so, and he practises electrical therapy on patients... The catch here is, that he doesn't use any technological equipment, but his fingers. He can generate small shocks on the tip of his fingers, and then points with his fingers on the patient. He also did it on the documentary crew because they were skeptical at first. In the middle of the documentary or so, he took a newspaper, crumbled it up, and set it on fire WITH HIS BARE HANDS - I was like, "wtf, that is so cool!" He also pushed a chopstick through a thick wooden table. After that, there were some splinters that hurt some people nearby and the next night he had a dream in which his master told him to stop showing his skills to the crew. Next day he asked the crew to leave.
This means that it's possible that any human can do this, but the downside is you probably need dozens of years of meditation and good spirit.
SOMEONE FIND THIS. We must overanalyze the video and declare it fake! Or else, it stays legendary genuine.
I did searching and found a clip of the documentary, it's called "The Ring Of Fire" Turns out it's actually an indonesian who practises Taoism, meditates every day, does yoga etc. And it's controlling the chi energy of one, anyone can do it, but 18 years of daily meditation is a pretty big thing to pay for it.
The only way you will probably believe it, is when you get sick in your old age and spend money to go search for qigong masters or yogi masters, who use alternative medicine to cure you.
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
you're born with it, you cant practice to get a photograpic memory or be naturally ambidexterious
there are people who can do head multiplication far greater than most calculators, such unique abilities cannot be achieved by practice, only genes
On August 25 2009 21:57 Ecorin wrote: I did searching and found a clip of the documentary, it's called "The Ring Of Fire" Turns out it's actually an indonesian who practises Taoism, meditates every day, does yoga etc. And it's controlling the chi energy of one, anyone can do it, but 18 years of daily meditation is a pretty big thing to pay for it.
i have overwhelming deja vu (almost like seeing into the future except I can't always remember what happens). If I happen to speak about what I dream about, then it typically doesn't come true. Sometimes I will do something and honestly feel like I was there doing whatever the activity was at a previous time. Typically these dreams could have occurred between 1 and 12 months prior to the activity..
I am going to try and write stuff down to see if this is accurate
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
you're born with it, you cant practice to get a photograpic memory or be naturally ambidexterious
there are people who can do head multiplication far greater than most calculators, such unique abilities cannot be achieved by practice, only genes
Not true. The calculations can be trained from an early age using Japanese kids and abacuses. I saw a tv programme a British savant guy who was pretty much normal and people were suspicious he'd just learned his calculating ability but he proved otherwise. He was no better at sums than the crazy Japanese kids but he just imagined each number as a shape and they converged into a new shape which gave him the answer. They made him make a load of numbers with plasticine and then he could replicate them at will later, proving he wasn't bullshitting.
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
you're born with it, you cant practice to get a photograpic memory or be naturally ambidexterious
there are people who can do head multiplication far greater than most calculators, such unique abilities cannot be achieved by practice, only genes
Not true. The calculations can be trained from an early age using Japanese kids and abacuses. I saw a tv programme a British savant guy who was pretty much normal and people were suspicious he'd just learned his calculating ability but he proved otherwise. He was no better at sums than the crazy Japanese kids but he just imagined each number as a shape and they converged into a new shape which gave him the answer. They made him make a load of numbers with plasticine and then he could replicate them at will later, proving he wasn't bullshitting.
Thats not something anyone could do, becoming the worlds best calculator or the worlds strongest man is not something that will be achieved by practice alone. It is genetical
Too bad that fire trick is pretty much useless unless you get lost in the woods.
The gun has made pretty much every human facet moot. You can run like Usain Bolt? You can see like a Hawk? You can smell like a Shark? You can hear like a bat? Doesn't matter, 50CAL from 2 Miles got you! Kind of sad really...such as we pine for the legends of old such as Arthurian, Alexander the Great, and Hannibal. Human feats have been reduced to petty ceremonies and once every 2 year events ;/
What I can't wait for though is for the first Cyborg. Now there is someone who is going to break every record!
On August 25 2009 23:26 Kwark wrote: Not true. The calculations can be trained from an early age using Japanese kids and abacuses. I saw a tv programme a British savant guy who was pretty much normal and people were suspicious he'd just learned his calculating ability but he proved otherwise. He was no better at sums than the crazy Japanese kids but he just imagined each number as a shape and they converged into a new shape which gave him the answer. They made him make a load of numbers with plasticine and then he could replicate them at will later, proving he wasn't bullshitting.
This is Daniel Tammet (part 1 of 5 videos). The video shows his abilities and also shows the Japanese kids with abaci which is different and learnt. He also has a remarkable ability to learn languages at an incredible speed (also shown in the video series).
Kim Peek (part 1 of 5) is also similarly remarkable in that he can remember almost all information to which he is exposed. The video shows that his brain structure is extremely different to our own though which is the likely cause behind his abilities (and handicaps).
On the other hand Arthur Benjamin can perform extremely fast computations in his head, but from what I've gathered, he specifically trained himself to perform the calculations and uses a number of mathematical algorithms to help him. He also holds a PhD in mathematics so his not just skilled in arithmetic.
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
you're born with it, you cant practice to get a photograpic memory or be naturally ambidexterious
there are people who can do head multiplication far greater than most calculators, such unique abilities cannot be achieved by practice, only genes
Not true. The calculations can be trained from an early age using Japanese kids and abacuses. I saw a tv programme a British savant guy who was pretty much normal and people were suspicious he'd just learned his calculating ability but he proved otherwise. He was no better at sums than the crazy Japanese kids but he just imagined each number as a shape and they converged into a new shape which gave him the answer. They made him make a load of numbers with plasticine and then he could replicate them at will later, proving he wasn't bullshitting.
Thats not something anyone could do, becoming the worlds best calculator or the worlds strongest man is not something that will be achieved by practice alone. It is genetical
When a team of scientists led by Ramachandran were looking at Daniel Tammet and assessing his abilities, one of their concerns was that advanced mathematical abilities can be acquired, and they wanted to check that his abilities of great computation skills were not acquired. Indeed, children in Japan taught the abacus method can perform large mathematical operations in a matter of seconds. This however requires large amounts of practice and training.
I think i remember a thread here about a guy who did a fly-by of the Colosseum in a helicopter for like 1 minute then re-drew it perfectly down to every last detail.
And my mom who does reiki/yoga/etc rubs her hands together than puts them on injuries or w/e to heal you. Idk if it actually does anything but her hands stay abnormally warm(not fire starting hot :p) for extended periods of time. presumably by 'channeling her energy' ~.~
I suppose I'm in the minority, but I felt a lot of sympathy for the boy and his situation. Of course, it doesn't excuse any of the things that he did, but I could understand why he did them and why he kept doing them even after knowing that they'd be his eventual downfall.
On August 25 2009 23:19 Amber[LighT] wrote: i have overwhelming deja vu (almost like seeing into the future except I can't always remember what happens). If I happen to speak about what I dream about, then it typically doesn't come true. Sometimes I will do something and honestly feel like I was there doing whatever the activity was at a previous time. Typically these dreams could have occurred between 1 and 12 months prior to the activity..
I am going to try and write stuff down to see if this is accurate
I've been having the same exact thing for the past 4-5 years ! Maybe it's some normal phenomenon, some people just remember it, some don't ?
Yeah that kid does seem like a douche, a total idiot at the very least due to a clear warning when he turned 18 followed by him repeating the exact same shit. Oh well I guess prison is just the same as anywhere else for him, not like he's missing any good sights while he's in there.
On August 25 2009 18:12 nttea wrote: recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed eh.. i think i could do that if i just learned which sound is which number, cause theyre all obviously different? or is it harder than it seems?
Don't a lot of numbers share the same tone? Like 147, 2580, and 369?
On August 25 2009 18:12 nttea wrote: recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed eh.. i think i could do that if i just learned which sound is which number, cause theyre all obviously different? or is it harder than it seems?
Don't a lot of numbers share the same tone? Like 147, 2580, and 369?
No but it's done in quite a ridiculous way so they sound similar but are actually different, very difficult for the human ear to differentiate them.
On August 25 2009 18:12 nttea wrote: recognize phone numbers from the buttons pressed eh.. i think i could do that if i just learned which sound is which number, cause theyre all obviously different? or is it harder than it seems?
Don't a lot of numbers share the same tone? Like 147, 2580, and 369?
No but it's done in quite a ridiculous way so they sound similar but are actually different, very difficult for the human ear to differentiate them.
It's much more pronounced on cellphones but if you play numbers with similar tones one after the other it's easier to notice even when you don't have perfect pitch.
For instance, I can kind of hear what the kid is describing when I telephone a number I call a lot (like my best friend or my mom), but it's more habituation from calling at least once a day than super hearing sense.
On August 25 2009 15:54 Disregard wrote: Jeff Daniels, a former phreaker who befriended Weigman on a chat line. "When you're a blind little tubby bald kid in a broke-ass family, and you have that one ability to make yourself feel good, what do you expect to happen?"
edit: Thats some harsh words for describing the kid.
Harsh, but almost necessary. He's kind of a piece of shit if he's using his power talent to manipulate people into giving PIN codes and stuff.
If you guys want to see someone truly amazing, look up daniel tammet. There is a documentary on him called "The Boy With an Incredible Brain". If you haven't heard of kim peek, you should look him up too, he was the person "Rain Man" was based on. Great documentary on him called "The Real Rain Man"
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
You don't really achieve perfect pitch. Relative pitch, yes, but not perfect pitch.
On August 25 2009 21:19 Machine leg wrote: probably just lazy westerners that study music for fun while the chinese in this case has alot more pressure and study alot harder and achieve this perfect pitch.
You don't really achieve perfect pitch. Relative pitch, yes, but not perfect pitch.
What would you call "perfect pitch" and "relative pitch"? For example, when tuning my guitar, I do not use a tuner (when not on stage) because I can hear the pitch in my head. Would this be "perfect pitch" since I am not comparing the the specific pitch I hear in my head?
relative pitch is being able to differentiate a tone with the basis of another tone. like, you tune your e string with a tuner and then tune the rest of the strings by knowing what they sound like in relation to the e string.
perfect pitch is being able to tell what any note is regardless of where it comes from. people with true perfect pitch can listen to a chord with 13 notes in it and be able to tell you what they all are, and replicate the chord.
this is,of course a very specific example, but it applies to anything involving tones (i.e phones dialing), it's quite impressive to have perfect pitch, and true perfect pitch is NOT able to be learned. "fake" perfect pitch you can learn, for instance, having someone play a note on a piano and you being able to tell what note that is. but you have to be born with TRUE perfect pitch.
Read the article, then watched the videos in this thread. It's simply amazing what the human brain can do. Kind of makes me sad that I have no special abilities (or at least haven't discovered them yet). The guy who lit the newspapers on fire was by far the most bad ass and I definitely want to know how he does that.
The only questionable statement in the above article being the sentence "The money is held in the form of immediately negotiable bonds held by Goldman Sachs, a highly respected investment firm." but I guess that was written before... you know...
I would love to have the ability to sense and interpret the minute EMF from people's brains and so be able to know how they feel or what state they're in (fear, excitement, disappointment, etc.).
On August 26 2009 14:29 tossinYoSalad wrote: this is,of course a very specific example, but it applies to anything involving tones (i.e phones dialing), it's quite impressive to have perfect pitch, and true perfect pitch is NOT able to be learned. "fake" perfect pitch you can learn, for instance, having someone play a note on a piano and you being able to tell what note that is. but you have to be born with TRUE perfect pitch.
what's your argument or evidence for that? i think we all understand that east asians brought up in east asia have a greater likelihood of having perfect pitch than east asians brought up in america. the hypothesis is that it's due to the environment, specifically hearing/learning tonal language as an infant. but whether or not that's the case, it seems clear that if changing the environment of childhood has a demonstrated effect on the frequency of perfect pitch in people, then perfect pitch is definitely learned and not purely genetic.
i think the fact that adults have failed to artifically learn perfect pitch is not evidence that it is not possible. perhaps once researchers have a clear understanding of how perfect pitch is learned naturally, then a method of teaching can be formulated
there was a few documentaries in a series on Discovery/science channel about human abilities and such. There was one blind lady who had some kind of light therapy on her eyes to make her not so blind anymore. And other amazing feat of humans and their abilities. Particularly one episode where it showed feats of strength and survival mode. One guy had a boulder fall on him that weight a few tons and he was sliding down a cliff and managed to throw it off but tore a shit load of muscles and ligaments in the process. So he overpowered his body with his mind (makes you think of the animatrix runner). Then there was this one lady who fell off a cliff and broke a shit load of bones and managed to hike/crawl a few miles to safety. And ofc there is the guy who got his hand stuck in a crevice and sawed it off with some shady swiss army knife.
On August 26 2009 14:29 tossinYoSalad wrote: this is,of course a very specific example, but it applies to anything involving tones (i.e phones dialing), it's quite impressive to have perfect pitch, and true perfect pitch is NOT able to be learned. "fake" perfect pitch you can learn, for instance, having someone play a note on a piano and you being able to tell what note that is. but you have to be born with TRUE perfect pitch.
what's your argument or evidence for that? i think we all understand that east asians brought up in east asia have a greater likelihood of having perfect pitch than east asians brought up in america. the hypothesis is that it's due to the environment, specifically hearing/learning tonal language as an infant. but whether or not that's the case, it seems clear that if changing the environment of childhood has a demonstrated effect on the frequency of perfect pitch in people, then perfect pitch is definitely learned and not purely genetic.
i think the fact that adults have failed to artifically learn perfect pitch is not evidence that it is not possible. perhaps once researchers have a clear understanding of how perfect pitch is learned naturally, then a method of teaching can be formulated
I COULD be mistaken about it being learnable, but I highly doubt it seeing as true perfect pitch borders on savant level abilities. I don't have any proof (and really I'm too lazy to find some) I just always thought that was how it was. I know a few people who have "learned" perfect pitch and one person who was born with it. The people who learned perfect pitch are able to differentiate notes on command, but the person who was born with it can listen to a song and transcribe every chord perfectly. very different things. But again, i could be wrong nony I just always thought that's how it was since I grew up around it lol.
On August 26 2009 14:29 tossinYoSalad wrote: this is,of course a very specific example, but it applies to anything involving tones (i.e phones dialing), it's quite impressive to have perfect pitch, and true perfect pitch is NOT able to be learned. "fake" perfect pitch you can learn, for instance, having someone play a note on a piano and you being able to tell what note that is. but you have to be born with TRUE perfect pitch.
what's your argument or evidence for that? i think we all understand that east asians brought up in east asia have a greater likelihood of having perfect pitch than east asians brought up in america. the hypothesis is that it's due to the environment, specifically hearing/learning tonal language as an infant. but whether or not that's the case, it seems clear that if changing the environment of childhood has a demonstrated effect on the frequency of perfect pitch in people, then perfect pitch is definitely learned and not purely genetic.
i think the fact that adults have failed to artifically learn perfect pitch is not evidence that it is not possible. perhaps once researchers have a clear understanding of how perfect pitch is learned naturally, then a method of teaching can be formulated
I COULD be mistaken about it being learnable, but I highly doubt it seeing as true perfect pitch borders on savant level abilities. I don't have any proof (and really I'm too lazy to find some) I just always thought that was how it was. I know a few people who have "learned" perfect pitch and one person who was born with it. The people who learned perfect pitch are able to differentiate notes on command, but the person who was born with it can listen to a song and transcribe every chord perfectly. very different things. But again, i could be wrong nony I just always thought that's how it was since I grew up around it lol.
personally, i play piano and a bunch of other instruments, with the piano being my strongest instrument. i can identify notes on a piano without prior tones as reference (perfect pitch? prbly not=( , while i do need prior reference for the other instruments (thats definately relative pitch). however, i've noticed my ability diminishing (lol) these past few months as i've stopped taking music lessons and have barely played my instruments recently. so idk whats up with that.
On August 25 2009 23:19 Amber[LighT] wrote: i have overwhelming deja vu (almost like seeing into the future except I can't always remember what happens). If I happen to speak about what I dream about, then it typically doesn't come true. Sometimes I will do something and honestly feel like I was there doing whatever the activity was at a previous time. Typically these dreams could have occurred between 1 and 12 months prior to the activity..
I am going to try and write stuff down to see if this is accurate
On August 25 2009 23:19 Amber[LighT] wrote: i have overwhelming deja vu (almost like seeing into the future except I can't always remember what happens). If I happen to speak about what I dream about, then it typically doesn't come true. Sometimes I will do something and honestly feel like I was there doing whatever the activity was at a previous time. Typically these dreams could have occurred between 1 and 12 months prior to the activity..
I am going to try and write stuff down to see if this is accurate
I have similar De Ja Vu, i dream about things that happen in the future.. I don't remember them though until it actually happens and then i remember that i've done/seen this (whatever i'm doing before.)
I'm not sure about how far ahead of time, but easily 1-12 months and prolly more.
Sometimes it happens quite alot (couple of times a week) and sometimes weeks will go by without De Ja Vu..
It'd be even more awesome if i remembered the stuff that'd happen when i wake up.
this show (with the iceman YT clip) is on right now lol, this elsatic kid and this old asian dude who has smooth/sticky skin to have metal stick to him. iceman has since done many other feats.
Yeah I saw this on digg It was pretty interesting and to use his talents like that is pretty ridiculous. I always wondered what phone hacking entailed.
they are saying that inuit peoples automatically have lower core temperatures. So if this Yim guy had a kid with one of them we could have an even more super iceman
On August 25 2009 15:54 Disregard wrote: Jeff Daniels, a former phreaker who befriended Weigman on a chat line. "When you're a blind little tubby bald kid in a broke-ass family, and you have that one ability to make yourself feel good, what do you expect to happen?"
edit: Thats some harsh words for describing the kid.
Harsh, but almost necessary. He's kind of a piece of shit if he's using his power talent to manipulate people into giving PIN codes and stuff.
Kind of? He's a total piece of shit. I don't care if you're blind, fat, or whatever, what he's done is inexcusable. He should be tried and put in jail for creating panics, etc. He's a fat little douche bag who deserves punishment. Pranking 911 could result in people who really need help losing their lives.
And that's not even the worst of it. The little prick stole money from people too.
The people who are calling this kid a piece of shit have to consider that it is not entirely his fault. The fact that he was born blind, had a horrible father, lived in a poor family and was bullied constantly did insurmountable damage to his developing brain causing him to become what he is. It wausn't his fault he had to live through all that shit, hes just very unfortunate.
perfect pitch means you can pick out a note without hearing any prior pitch; most people at best can only have very good relative pitch (never perfect pitch), and generally require a reference note in order to find notes/intervals.
people with perfect pitch recognize pitches (the frequencies/vibrations of the sounds) much like we recognize words. for example: to us, the word "starcraft" represents to the computer game and nothing else; it is an absolute. to those with perfect pitch, the vibrations of an A or a C# represent those notes specifically and nothing else; they cannot be anything else.
it really is quite a remarkable ability. it's generally accepted among musicians i think (in the classical world, at least -- i've been told this from the music theory professors that i've been taught by from juilliard/rice/cleveland/texas) that perfect pitch is not something that can be learned. if you don't have it, then you're out of luck.
On August 27 2009 16:03 SweeTLemonS[TPR] wrote: Kind of? He's a total piece of shit. I don't care if you're blind, fat, or whatever, what he's done is inexcusable. He should be tried and put in jail for creating panics, etc. He's a fat little douche bag who deserves punishment. Pranking 911 could result in people who really need help losing their lives.
And that's not even the worst of it. The little prick stole money from people too.
I can't help but find this post hilarious.
"He could've effectively killed people by abusing the emergency system...
On August 27 2009 16:03 SweeTLemonS[TPR] wrote: Kind of? He's a total piece of shit. I don't care if you're blind, fat, or whatever, what he's done is inexcusable. He should be tried and put in jail for creating panics, etc. He's a fat little douche bag who deserves punishment. Pranking 911 could result in people who really need help losing their lives.
And that's not even the worst of it. The little prick stole money from people too.
I can't help but find this post hilarious.
"He could've effectively killed people by abusing the emergency system...
BUT FORGET THAT HE STOLE MONEY WTF"
Could have but didn't, so the actual is worse than the possible. Yes.
On August 25 2009 21:57 Ecorin wrote: I did searching and found a clip of the documentary, it's called "The Ring Of Fire" Turns out it's actually an indonesian who practises Taoism, meditates every day, does yoga etc. And it's controlling the chi energy of one, anyone can do it, but 18 years of daily meditation is a pretty big thing to pay for it.
Actually there are such "qigong" masters in other parts of the world too. In a taiwan variety show theres an acupuncturist who generates an electric current in a similar fashion =o
On August 27 2009 16:40 TheMusiC wrote: perfect pitch means you can pick out a note without hearing any prior pitch; most people at best can only have very good relative pitch (never perfect pitch), and generally require a reference note in order to find notes/intervals.
people with perfect pitch recognize pitches (the frequencies/vibrations of the sounds) much like we recognize words. for example: to us, the word "starcraft" represents to the computer game and nothing else; it is an absolute. to those with perfect pitch, the vibrations of an A or a C# represent those notes specifically and nothing else; they cannot be anything else.
it really is quite a remarkable ability. it's generally accepted among musicians i think (in the classical world, at least -- i've been told this from the music theory professors that i've been taught by from juilliard/rice/cleveland/texas) that perfect pitch is not something that can be learned. if you don't have it, then you're out of luck.
I dunno if its counted as perfect pitch but i've sort of memorised notes on my violin/viola and can then do relative pitching from there if need be, cos sometimes when i try to identify the rarer notes it may not be accurate. Dont know why that happens but it does =X
It's possible to learn perfect pitch (or something close enough anyway, I don't think we'll ever really need someone who can tell if a sound is half of a half of a half-step off or something like that unless it's some sort of science thing), but we all would need a lot of time to recognize the letter attributed to the pitch and then hear the pitch so many times that we can memorize it. Like I don't have perfect pitch but I can play around on a keyboard and then be able to find the note pretty quickly. If I practice enough at this kind of thing, I'm confident that I could play songs by ear easily.
I think what makes perfect pitch special is how easily they do it, since it's a natural ability to them to hear and differentiate minute differences in sound.
I can hear a note and tell you which note it is without any sort of "relating" to another pitch. The notes are engrained. I can "hear" them by just thinking about which note it is. I think anyone who has played piano or guitar can do this. I really don't see the big deal.
the kid's ability to imitate voices he has heard before is also pretty amazing. it's probably because he has such good hearing that he could simply absorb a voice and reproduce it.
i think he's an idiot for not stopping after he turned 18. he probably knew that they were going easy on him because he was a minor. he had his chance to change
On August 27 2009 16:14 TheTyranid wrote: The people who are calling this kid a piece of shit have to consider that it is not entirely his fault. The fact that he was born blind, had a horrible father, lived in a poor family and was bullied constantly did insurmountable damage to his developing brain causing him to become what he is. It wausn't his fault he had to live through all that shit, hes just very unfortunate.
how the fuck is having difference voices a "super power"? its like calling a person who can grow their finger nails faster than other humans a super hero. lol fucken useless power.
On August 25 2009 16:59 blue_arrow wrote: EDIT: Actually, from watching the video, I can see he already knows how to paint in 3D prior to the test... So another question arises, albeit less relavent: why did the UofT prof even bother 'testing' him and declaring that he had just repeated Filippo Brunelleschi's feat when he already has demonstrated that he can draw in 3D?
Octagonal building is a little more complex than a cube. I assume he wanted to see if he could pull off drawing a shape he had never done before, so it couldn't be chalked up to repeated practice.
Seriously, it's pretty amazing. It's hard for me to imagine how perspective was discovered. That is to say, it is hard for me to imagine how it took so long. It seems so obvious that things that are farther away are smaller, yet you look at so many Byzantine paintings for example, and you have crowds of people with the ones in back every bit as big as the ones in front. I wish I could ask those people wtf they were doing. Does that guy across the street look as big as I do FFS?
Yet somehow, this stuff eluded everyone. What Brunelleschi discovered was more than that though. He figured out how the lines converged to the horizon, and how to accurately draw a shape on a 2d plane, not just vaguely making things in the background smaller.
It all seems incredibly obvious to me, and to you. We can look at paintings and drawings and drafts and first person games and see how it works. It seems so obvious we wonder how it was ever not known, yet it was only 600 years ago that it was discovered. The blind guy didn't benefit from having this stuff already known. He guy can't look at 2d drawings of 3d objects, and make the connection with how things that are farther away appear smaller. To make that same leap as Brunelleschi, and without eyes is astonishing. Having him draw the baptistry was I assume (in addition to the stunterific nature of it) to show that he didn't just know how to draw a cube, but could really translate a shape into a 2d representation with perspective.
That said, you could see 5 walls of the baptistry in his drawing instead of 3, so it wasn't perfect. I'm pretty willing to cut him a little slack given his lack of eyes. His roof and ground lines did what they were supposed to. I am really amazed.
EPT
