Vitaly Parnas

All articles

1. Public speaking club - continued

   After the third rendition of the weekly public speaking club, I believe to have a fairly working structure. The first unofficial 30 minute warm-up facilitates an open discussion of our …

2. Assimilate vs adapt that language

   How you’re psychologically disposed to that language will play a paramount role in determining your ultimate progress. Having said that, I’ll pose the following question. Do you wish …

3. What is this success in languages?

   In language development, I consider factors such as degree of fluency, the speed of development, and the extent of naturally sounding vocalization. I would classify the above as simply your …

4. Fun with self-referential paradoxes and the halting problem

   I want to explore a set of paradoxes that arise from self-referential problem formulations. I will then proceed to present the paradox in a more formal setting of computability theory …

5. Creating a public speaking club

   In Curitiba, BR, Toastmasters clubs are scarce. Until recently, a few specialized TM clubs had existed. Now, even those no longer appear in the search.

   While I had transferred my …

6. The elusive guttural ‘r’

   I finally succeeded at voicing that infamous guttural ‘r’. It marks my greatest linguistic achievement in a while. You know the sound I speak of - the ‘r’ articulated entirely from …

7. Foz do Iguaçú and the value of experiences

   I happened to spend a couple of days at Foz do Iguaçú last week upon my return to Brazil. The small city, situated at the triangular border with Argentina and …

8. Focus on the core, independent components

   Suppose you have a challenge you need to address. See if you can identify the causality relationship from the root of the challenge to the goal. Represent it in the …

9. About not sure what

   I’ve been entertaining a recurring thought about my arrivals in Brazil. Each time I return, just a tiny sip instantly triggers the immense pleasure found in the unmistakable taste …

10. A few words on programming yourself

    Over breakfast I skimmed most of the book Mind Hacks: Tips & Tools for Using Your Brain, by Tom Stafford & Matt Webb. It explores the functioning of our brain, hearing, vision …

11. At a bunker

    I always enjoyed taking meals in a basement. You could also call it a bunker. It need not be a glorified bunker either. It need not be a Bavarian beer …

12. Toastmasters from physical to virtual

    I had to transition from my Toastmasters club in presence of impending travels. How was I to proceed with public speaking development, which I had adapted like a healthy sport …

13. Jazz tastes

    My taste buds for jazz listening have become considerably spoiled. A classic bop composition no longer excites me in the way it used to. Too many chords. Too much rhythmic …

14. On the great purge, house plants, and enduring creatures.

    Around the year 2009, I found myself aggressively simplifying, eliminating and organizing - mostly the first two, since upon the simplifying and the eliminating, there was little left to organize. I …

15. A few stoic ideas from an ancient text

    Simple ideas have survived the test of time. Or have they? In my on-and-off attempts to read Marcus Aurelius, I’ve encountered much allusion to Stoicism, the same guiding principles …

16. On marginal value of books

    I see several reasons for wanting to read a book.

    1. To learn new material.
    2. To be inspired.
    3. To be entertained by the content.
    4. To enjoy fantastically written prose.

    The more …

17. An enhanced, but compact shell-command processor

    Not long ago I devised an enhanced command processor in shell script, and called it exec-cmd. It might be the shortest (60-70 line) most-handy utility I had written, although shell …

18. How to practice improvised speeches for lazy folk, part 2

    I created a routine to invoke the all-inclusive topic generator/speech recorder/logger, per the previous post using an exec-cmd command.

    The routine requires

    1. exec-cmd.
    2. sent, from suckless.org, which …

19. How to leverage a multi-language OS environment

    If you’re a multi-language fanatic like myself, you want the ease of switching between languages in a variety of contexts. These include typing, spell-checking and interfacing with applications in …

20. How to practice improvised speeches for lazy folk, part 1

    In Toastmasters, we dedicate part of each meeting to Table Topics, an improvised question and answer portion related to a specific theme. A Table Topic master asks a volunteer one …

21. Quick, but killer exercise circuits with aid of technology

    I only exercise at home or outdoors. Sometimes, I postpone my exercise until close to the evening time-frame, right before a timely event or commitment (of importance to me), leaving …

22. Plus one minus two rule

    I don’t recall where I drew inspiration for this rule, if any source in particular, or if I derived it on my own. However, in solidifying the mentality for …

23. Shades of modern and old English

    I recently finished reading Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, featuring some of the most beautiful English-language prose I’ve encountered. In fact, the last such experience may have …

24. Speculative execution in Computer Architecture

    In Computer Architecture, speculative execution is one of a multitude of strategies processors have employed for decades to maximize computational throughput (speed). Specifically, SE is an Instruction Level Parallelism technique …

25. More Inspiring Technologies

    Three years ago I had written an article on the three most inspiring technologies in my routine. The personal impact of those three items still by far prevails over any …

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