Recent submissions

Comment · 2 months ago
I imagine the word thickness represents the great number of (metaphorical) layers of a painting, since paintings are the reoccurring symbol to talk about art in this essay.
Comment · 3 months ago
Thank you! That’s s very thorough explanation on the page you linked and the comment. I’ll certainly look into the app more in the future. Thanks again for taking time to explain and for making the app!
Comment · 3 months ago
If the smartwatch data isn’t precise enough to estimate energy expenditure, what data does your website use that is so much better? Also, how much better it is? How do we even know it’s better? (I am not necessarily doubting it’s better, I am just interested in metrics you used)
Comment · 4 months ago
Comment · 6 months ago
Comment · 6 months ago
I am pretty sure you’re right, they are probably recording alpha waves, possibly combined with heart rate.

Decoding limb joint movements from EEG scalp recordings is basically an unsolved problem (we can barely do it in lab with implants), I doubt an advertising company has cracked it.

Comment · 6 months ago
There is quite a number of freely available EEG software for different paradigms (one such collection is MOABB - Mother of All BCI Benchmarks, and there’s a huge number of scientific articles).

The biggest bottleneck for a hobbyist is that when using EEG, most paradigms require somewhat expensive hardware to work and that most paradigms still don’t work well with scalp recordings outside a lab environment, even when using mid-cost devices.

There’s also the issue that classifiers usually have to be quite simple because datasets are small, because they are time consuming to record (and after you remove noisy epochs, you have even less data left). Cross-session and cross-subject learning rarely works, since EEG is dependent on so many factors like subjects’ brain anatomy, the type and precise location of electrodes, amount of gel (or lack thereof) and how dried out it is, mood and focus of the subjects, a huge number of environmental factors that influence subjects’ focus and many others.

The only paradigm I have seen to work a bit more reliably than others is Steady State Visual Potentials, because you have extra information that doesn’t need to be learned from EEG (the frequency of visual stimuli is roughly the same as the one in subjects’ occipital lobe).

Comment · 9 months ago
But the 18th century artist who did portraits and wedding paintings is the today’s (wedding) photographer.

Does it take less money to commission a single wedding photo rather than a wedding painting? Yes. But many more people commission them and usually in tens to hundreds, together with videos, etc.

An 18th century wedding painter wasn’t in the business of paintings, but in the business of capturing memories and we do that today on much larger scale, more often and in a lot of different ways.

I’d also argue more landscape painters exist today than ever.

Comment · 1 year ago
I assume you’re talking about another country, because in Denmark there was no general curfew under Covid (attendance to events might have required proof of negative COVID test or vaccination, but shops never did).
Comment · 1 year ago
Comment · 1 year ago
I find this distinction unnecessarily nitpicky in this context. A BCI can be implement using EEG as an input so yes, you can definitely make a BCI using PiEEG.

130dB SNR is also not too shabby for a low-cost device, I wonder how it compares in a real world scenario with some of the OpenBCI offerings. For now at least it seems to be a cheaper option to OpenBCI Cyton with a comparable performance, unless I missed something.

Comment · 2 years ago
Grant application and advancement in scientific careers. As a junior researcher, you either publish in impactful peer reviewed journals or you don’t get your PhD. As a senior researcher, you either publish in impactful peer reviewed journals or your PhD student doesn’t get the PhD degree (this hurts both of you). Moreover, you won’t get grants so you can’t even hire a PhD student in the first place.

While scientists’ prestige might be a part of the equation, it’s mostly the academic leaderships and fonds that have brought us here.

Comment · 2 years ago
Comment · 2 years ago
Not only does English get you by in most big cities, a fair amount of European citizens are multilingual and often it’s the neighbouring countries that people speak the language of.
Comment · 2 years ago
> Every in-demand field of study is guarded by the all-important grade-point average from High School. If yours is too low, well, sorry, you’re just not going to study psychology or become a midwife. It doesn’t matter whether you came from an underprivileged background, did a million extracurriculars, or hail from an ethnic minority. You either make the grade for your first choice or you pick something else to study.

This is not Denmark specifically, it’s just Europe, and it’s not even true.

In Denmark there’s something called Quota 2, which is an admission track that is not based on the average, but on extra-curriculars, volunteering, work experience, …

Ofc it’s easier if you have the average and a lot depends on what subjects you choose to graduate from, but not all is lost even if you chose the wrong subjects. If you need let’s say extra physics classes, a lot of universities/schools offer pre-university courses which can teach you the subject in the summer and you can apply for your dream programme the same year.

A lot of people actually start university and then later find out it’s not what they like and switch to another programme or (trade) school after a year. Generally, in Denmark, you can study what you want, unless you’re really ill-equipped for some reason (but then you probably have bigger issues to resolve first).

That being said, I don’t know about any way how you can get into a university programme based on being a member of an ethnic minority.

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