EmperorRyker

Which GRE? If the general one, you don't really need to study for it, unless you're not a native speaker. I wasn't, so I spent a week doing those word and context exercises a couple of hours each day, and ran through the instruction sheet for the quantitative part, so that I know what definitions they're using.

Oh, that's sad then, I guess. Admissions committees probably have higher standards as to what they consider the norm, though.

Yeah, but who doesn't know a foreign language? Knowing just one doesn't really make you stand out.

Nope. You don't get a medal for learning a foreign language. That's not an extreme achievement and is something people do on a regular basis. In fact, a lot of them learn more than a single foreign language.

Has anyone here stayed in Ridgewood? If so, what's your opinion of it? I'm trying to decide between there and The Chateau.

It's like craigslist.

Ugh, is this a trick question instead of the answer just being you reply with both or specify what you're referring to?

How much are broker fees then usually?

What was it you didn't like about Chapel Hill?

I'm not familiar with Food Lion, so is it supposed to have reasonable prices? And is it a big store?

What about grocery shopping in Chapel Hill? It seems there aren't a lot of big stores with reasonable prices, and that you're pretty doomed if you don't have a car and live somewhere not close to Whole Foods (for example, I don't see much in the way of grocery stores in Carrboro).

I don't mind people posting studies. In fact, I think people should do that. But here they have cited studies and then misinterpreted the results. For example, the person studying nutrition seems to have gotten some numbers that describe the current behavior of the population in general (or only of overweight people), whereas I thought the discussion was about personal, i.e. individual behavior. Then there's also that old causation/correlation thing going on. Not everyone does it, of course. For example, I think TakeruK has taken a different stance (one that I actually really like myself), but you can't really have a discussion when free will is effectively discarded, and the two sides that seemingly battle aren't even fighting on the same grounds. Of course no one can lose or win in that situation, there's no one to fight!

I don't know what some of you are trying to say. People who are here described as "fat-shamers" or with some other descriptor that doesn't reflect their posts, have acknowledged everything about the relationship between obesity and factors that influence people's choices. No one is saying one person can't have it harder than the other. No one is saying that people's emotional, social and financial well-being doesn't influence their behavior and perhaps have them find solace in food. That's what everyone here has acknowledged, yet there seem to be insults thrown at people who have done that, but just hold fat people to different standards of personal behavior. It's really getting ridiculous. I also wonder about the honesty of some of you and wonder whether you think the same about those who lie, cheat, steal, whatever. Italians are "known" to disregard traffic rules. Hence, if you're an Italian, it isn't really your fault if you do that. It's that you're, well... Italian. Can't go against that current, right? But now I'm shaming the Italians. Mi scusi. To reiterate, because some don't seem to get it. Yes, some have to eat less or fight outside factors influencing their psychological state to stay at a "normal" weight. But since everyone can eat and/or exercise, some people believe that they are ultimately in control. Because technically speaking they are. They just have to have that much more determination. But isn't that the case in all aspects of life?

1. That's exactly what we've been saying, how many times do we need to repeat it? It's obvious with fat people that in the past not all energy that came in went out. It's because they ate more (i.e. took in more usable energy in the form of food, the only known form that can increase body weight) than they could expend (i.e. what their energy out part was, something partially controlled by activity) that they got that way, whatever psychological factor might have played a role in that. I'm not even saying about the latter at this point. 2. What's your point in regards to friction? Friction results in energy going out of a system. But taken as a whole when that system is included in the environment, the energy still does not appear out of nothing or disappear into nothingness.

Oh, I see. Your point is that fat people somehow accrue mass out of thin air. Got ya' But it seems to me that was the whole point of the argument. That since bodies aren't closed systems, people are fat because they ingest and make out of thin air (or ether, probably not air) more mass than they excrete or waste in other forms of "energy out".

Personally, I've read at least a hundred, but I don't know about the others. I also threw around concepts that I did see since 9th grade physics? I learned that they apply in this case. So how does that one go again? Let he who is without sin cast the first stone? In any case, we should stop this debate, because no matter what our opinion on the topic of fat people being fat by choice or not, this is not what the OP was looking for.

I find it funny and ironic you start insulting people who have not done thrown a single insult, and then call them assholes.

Yeah, ultimately it's all fuzzy anyway. You can't tell whether a person is just not trying hard enough or actually can't do it. But then what does "actually can't do it" mean, right? In a way you're right, but on the other hand, due to there not being a clear dividing line in matters like these, we can explain away any (and I mean any) behavior with saying it was the psychological factors that caused it (because ultimately, that's true). I just drew an arbitrary line, and you can choose to draw it elsewhere. That's fine with me. I'm not sure what you're saying here, though: "obviously if a person does not eat, they would gain less weight than if they did eat, no matter what other circumstances are at play". They wouldn't gain less weight. They would lose weight. What's your opinion on stuff like crime, though? Only focusing on the choice and not the consequences, can a murderer prevented himself from not killing a person? Or perhaps a slightly different question, was it his fault he didn't?

It actually is. The motivation behind why someone overindulges and the reasons why certain people have a more thrifty metabolism can of course differ, so there is a component that will affect just how much you can eat to stay at a healthy weight. But it does boil down to thermodynamics in the end. And a lot of those issues impacting the metabolism can a) be treated or mitigated, or only "decrease" the metabolism by, say, 20 - 30%, which I think is still alright as far as being able to eat reasonably normally. In any case, it's clear that Mordekaiser was exaggerating and that people can still eat and lose weight. Brains and other organs still require a certain minimum amount of energy to keep working. So saying people have no control is an excuse. I understand psychological factors might make it hard to do so, but ultimately they can control their weight.

I don't want to spam, but I'd like to again express the question of how much utilities in general add up to in CH/Carrboro for a 1BR apartment in, say, The Chateau or some other apartment complex.

How much would you have to add for utilities on top of that?

Hey guys, I was wondering about the following. I just got admitted to UC Boulder, but haven't accepted the offer yet. The latter came with a TAship of just a tad below ~$16.9k, which would amount to about $1.4k montly. Is that enough for a living in Boulder without going into further debt? I looked up university housing and it seems there are some studio options even in the range of $800 - 900. I wonder about the food prices and all the other stuff, though. For example, here in Alberta, I spend $400 - 500 on food each month, most likely since a lot of it goes to meat and veggies. In any case, any and all feedback in regards to this would be greatly appreciated.