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If we really aspire to be an information-driven culture who makes informed decisions about important topics, we really ought to curate lists like these down to

If we really aspire to be an information-driven culture who makes informed decisions about important topics, we really ought to curate lists like these down to actual informed discussions on the items in the list. Printing out a list of "falsehoods" littered with personal opinions and calling them "demonstrable" [1] without a shred of evidence is not going to contribute to general knowledge. There may be some utility in getting me thinking, but for the most part I just find it self-aggrandizing. For what it's worth, I do find this [2] format much more helpful. I'd very much rather see valid counterexamples proving a sweeping statement false than yet another sweeping statement that happens to cover a few sweeping statements. Of course, the above is my personal opinion and may not be shared by the rest of the community, but please can we do better than curating a list of lists we agree with? [1] https://chiselapp.com/user/ttmrichter/repository/gng/doc/trunk/output/falsehoods.html https://chiselapp.com/user/ttmrichter/repository/gng/doc/tru... [2] https://www.mjt.me.uk/posts/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-addresses/ https://www.mjt.me.uk/posts/falsehoods-programmers-believe-a...

spacehacker 10y ago
https://kevin.deldycke.com/2016/12/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-falsehoods-lists/ https://kevin.deldycke.com/2016/12/falsehoods-programmers-be...
- Semiapies 10y ago
  And you illustrate the smug unhelpfulness of the falsehood lists at their worst.
Bartweiss 10y ago
Similarly, the famous list of falsehoods about names: http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-names/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-b... Even aside from the politicized content, I found it jarring that this bounced between clear and 'demonstrable' statements and entries like "you do not need a postal address", which was just a Twitter link to some letter delivered without one. It's not how I'd prefer to see this stuff curated, either.
- nostrebored 10y ago
  Postal addressing is actually a very interesting topic; that statement is demonstrable. Many smaller towns internationally do not require an address line; all letters to the city are delivered to a central hub and distributed based on name/other information.
  - Bartweiss 10y ago
    My complaint was with the wording and generalization. "Not everyone has/needs a postal address" is true, "you do not need a postal address" is not - living in a big city, I don't get mail that's even slightly mislabeled. And yes, that's a nitpick, but I was mostly objecting to a sweeping statement with a Twitter link that doesn't clarify much. (As for the specific question, postal addressing is fascinating. Someone in my family has an unusable address with an alphanumeric house number, and Amazon won't ship to it. And in the last one of these threads, someone mentioned living in a country which uses standardized directions-from-landmark as a formal address!)
  - spc476 10y ago
    There's an apocryphal story of someone writing a letter and placing it in an envelope with a picture of Alfred E. Neuman on it and mailing it (with appropriate postage). It was delivered to Mad Magazine, the intended recipient.
    - Bartweiss 10y ago
      Similarly, a letter supposedly addressed: Hill John Mass Which was delivered to John Underhill, Andover, Mass. Unlikely to be true, but a great story.
  - Arizhel 10y ago
    >Many smaller towns internationally do not require an address line Citation needed. I've sent mail all over the world, and the only place I've seen where you can get away with that is Ireland. It's actually famous for this. Unless you're talking about some really backwater developing nations, every nation I've sent mail to does require an address line of some kind. However, in the UK, there are a lot of funny-looking addresses in the more rural areas. They have an address line, but it's really just the name of some hamlet or house or something, then they give the name of some farther-away but larger town, and finally the name of some main town/city where the mail is first routed. But they also have a detailed postal code that can route things by itself. Out of reasonably-developed nations, Ireland is the one that really stands out for having an antiquated postal system, but it does seem to work fine for them. It's also different and more modern for addresses within Dublin, where they do have a (very short) postal code. The only other place where I've seen a place where you don't need a street or house number is for addresses at Kibbutzes in Israel.
benchaney 10y ago
Not only that, but a fair number of them are actually true statements (e.g. People have names). I can only assume someone got overzealous trying to prevent assumptions about other cultures, but I still don't really understand the train of though that lead to their inclusion.
- stevula 10y ago
  It is fairly common for newborn babies not to have names, which can cause issues with medical record systems. In most cases a workaround is used, such as "Baby {{Lastname}}". In the US, I suppose, the baby would at least have a last name, so not entirely nameless.
  - eli 10y ago
    Agree with everything except the last name part. A baby isn't born with a last name and there's no obligation for a baby to have the same last name as either parent. Our daughter was "Baby Girl <Mother's Last Name>" in the EMR system for a few days even though no part of that was her name and that isn't the last name she ended up with.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - DashRattlesnake 10y ago
    That's also an example where trying to model the strict reality (having no known name) might be worse than just using a workaround in a simpler model. As long as system acknowledges that different people can have the same name and duplicate profiles may be found and need to be merged, John/Jane Doe and Baby <Lastname> seem perfectly fine to me.
    - eli 10y ago
      Only if you're sure you can treat the unnamed the same as the named. If there's logic anywhere in the system that treats the unnamed babies differently (e.g. delaying filing for a birth certificate) that would be a problem if and when someone actually does want their child's first name to be "Baby"
kdeldycke 10y ago
That's one of my concerns too. We're currently in Phase 1 of the project. Which is all about collecting, in the wild, instances of this trending writing style. Now if it get traction and grows out of a gimmick, and if Falsehoods articles become a new literary form in its own right, then maybe we'll have enough resources in the community to start Phase 2. Which might see more curation happens, as well as writing guidelines and add more structure.

spacehacker 10y ago

https://kevin.deldycke.com/2016/12/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-falsehoods-lists/ https://kevin.deldycke.com/2016/12/falsehoods-programmers-be...

Semiapies 10y ago
And you illustrate the smug unhelpfulness of the falsehood lists at their worst.

Bartweiss 10y ago

Similarly, the famous list of falsehoods about names: http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-names/ http://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-b... Even aside from the politicized content, I found it jarring that this bounced between clear and 'demonstrable' statements and entries like "you do not need a postal address", which was just a Twitter link to some letter delivered without one. It's not how I'd prefer to see this stuff curated, either.

nostrebored 10y ago
Postal addressing is actually a very interesting topic; that statement is demonstrable. Many smaller towns internationally do not require an address line; all letters to the city are delivered to a central hub and distributed based on name/other information.
- Bartweiss 10y ago
  My complaint was with the wording and generalization. "Not everyone has/needs a postal address" is true, "you do not need a postal address" is not - living in a big city, I don't get mail that's even slightly mislabeled. And yes, that's a nitpick, but I was mostly objecting to a sweeping statement with a Twitter link that doesn't clarify much. (As for the specific question, postal addressing is fascinating. Someone in my family has an unusable address with an alphanumeric house number, and Amazon won't ship to it. And in the last one of these threads, someone mentioned living in a country which uses standardized directions-from-landmark as a formal address!)
- spc476 10y ago
  There's an apocryphal story of someone writing a letter and placing it in an envelope with a picture of Alfred E. Neuman on it and mailing it (with appropriate postage). It was delivered to Mad Magazine, the intended recipient.
  - Bartweiss 10y ago
    Similarly, a letter supposedly addressed: Hill John Mass Which was delivered to John Underhill, Andover, Mass. Unlikely to be true, but a great story.
- Arizhel 10y ago
  >Many smaller towns internationally do not require an address line Citation needed. I've sent mail all over the world, and the only place I've seen where you can get away with that is Ireland. It's actually famous for this. Unless you're talking about some really backwater developing nations, every nation I've sent mail to does require an address line of some kind. However, in the UK, there are a lot of funny-looking addresses in the more rural areas. They have an address line, but it's really just the name of some hamlet or house or something, then they give the name of some farther-away but larger town, and finally the name of some main town/city where the mail is first routed. But they also have a detailed postal code that can route things by itself. Out of reasonably-developed nations, Ireland is the one that really stands out for having an antiquated postal system, but it does seem to work fine for them. It's also different and more modern for addresses within Dublin, where they do have a (very short) postal code. The only other place where I've seen a place where you don't need a street or house number is for addresses at Kibbutzes in Israel.

benchaney 10y ago

Not only that, but a fair number of them are actually true statements (e.g. People have names). I can only assume someone got overzealous trying to prevent assumptions about other cultures, but I still don't really understand the train of though that lead to their inclusion.

stevula 10y ago
It is fairly common for newborn babies not to have names, which can cause issues with medical record systems. In most cases a workaround is used, such as "Baby {{Lastname}}". In the US, I suppose, the baby would at least have a last name, so not entirely nameless.
- eli 10y ago
  Agree with everything except the last name part. A baby isn't born with a last name and there's no obligation for a baby to have the same last name as either parent. Our daughter was "Baby Girl <Mother's Last Name>" in the EMR system for a few days even though no part of that was her name and that isn't the last name she ended up with.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- DashRattlesnake 10y ago
  That's also an example where trying to model the strict reality (having no known name) might be worse than just using a workaround in a simpler model. As long as system acknowledges that different people can have the same name and duplicate profiles may be found and need to be merged, John/Jane Doe and Baby <Lastname> seem perfectly fine to me.
  - eli 10y ago
    Only if you're sure you can treat the unnamed the same as the named. If there's logic anywhere in the system that treats the unnamed babies differently (e.g. delaying filing for a birth certificate) that would be a problem if and when someone actually does want their child's first name to be "Baby"

kdeldycke 10y ago

That's one of my concerns too. We're currently in Phase 1 of the project. Which is all about collecting, in the wild, instances of this trending writing style. Now if it get traction and grows out of a gimmick, and if Falsehoods articles become a new literary form in its own right, then maybe we'll have enough resources in the community to start Phase 2. Which might see more curation happens, as well as writing guidelines and add more structure.