4 ms·

Better than the average driver, but maybe not the median driver

• gowld 6y ago
  "average" is "mean", "median", or "mode" depending on context.
  • earthboundkid 6y ago
    One of the great things nerds do is take a piece of ordinary language, turn it into jargon, and then get mad at you for using it as ordinary language instead of jargon. From now on, I say "means" means "means in ordinary language" and if you use "mean" to mean "means in jargon" you're wrong and I will get mad at you online.
    • eyelidlessness 6y ago
      I like this rule and fully subscribe to your newsletter[1] [1] Saying this as someone who’s neurodivergent, took to overly specific language as a way to understand the world at a young age, learned that people find it irritating to be corrected when you can infer their meaning in context, and grew to share that annoyance. Also saying this as a hobbyist linguistics nerd fully on the descriptivist side of the fence.
    • solipsism 6y ago
      Then they write blog posts explaining the real meaning of things, and they post them to HN, and legions of people will read the post and "learn something new", only to go and inflict their enlightenment on everyone around them.
  • mattkrause 6y ago
    I've heard this a million times, but I'm not sure I've ever actually seen average=median used in the wild.