That’s surprisingly accurate, as people here are highlighting (it makes geometrical sense when dealing with complex numbers).

My nephew once asked me this question. The way that I explained it was like this:

• the friend of my friend is my friend; (+1)*(+1) = (+1)
• the enemy of my friend is my enemy; (+1)*(-1) = (-1)
• the friend of my enemy is my enemy; (-1)*(+1) = (-1)
• the enemy of my enemy is my friend; (-1)*(-1) = (+1)

It’s a different analogy but it makes intuitive sense, even for kids. And it works nice as mnemonic too.

I’ve seen even people in their 40s using them. I don’t think that it’s a big deal, or that it’s too late for that.

Brain plasticity, window of opportunity, it’s all babble. You can learn new languages just fine as you age; the matter here is how much time you spend using the language.

The reason why adults perform generally worse than kids learning languages is mostly motivational, and not spending enough time with the language. But as an adult you got access to a bunch of resources that kids wouldn’t, such as a decent grasp of grammar on theoretical grounds, that you can (and should) use to your advantage.

Note however that watching sitcoms will likely not be enough to get any decent grasp of any language. (Otherwise I’d be speaking Japanese, given the amount of anime that I watch.) You’ll need proficiency on four levels: hearing, speaking, reading, writing.

Even if this is a joke, this is a great example of something that happens all the time: people avoiding responsibility by blaming some chunk of software. The electronic equivalent of “No, sir! I didn’t kill that person. The butter knife did it!”

This might be related but I’ve noticed that someone is [likely automatically] following my posts and downvoting them. Kind of funny in a 'verse without karma.

Because the main instance is a drop in the ocean that the lemmyverse should be, so it makes sense to call it a “millilitre” (ml). [inb4 I’m making shit up.]