4 ms·

Is it just me who doesn't understand what the body of the article had to do with Google or Microsoft?

cturner 13y ago
It made some sense to me. The author used the G/M thing to introduce an idea: that it's powerful to think at scale. And then seeks a way to make a thinking-at-scale structure (bayes' rule) as accessible to the programmer as an if statement, by putting it in the language. That was the only bit of the article that did make sense to me :) I get lost trying to read ML-style languages.
sordina 13y ago
What people are referring to with respect to Google is that if higher-level statistical operations are as easy as an if statement, then this may explain why google takes (presumably amorally) such a statistical approach their customers (because it is easy to).
- wfunction 13y ago
  But what did any of that have to do with Microsoft, or even Google's practices? The entire article was a tutorial on Bayes's rule, with a completely irrelevant introductory paragraph thrown in at the top. Nothing about Google or Microsoft's practices was actually mentioned anywhere.
  - sordina 13y ago
    Yes, the article was about simplifying statistical operations. The comments were inferring that some observed practices may have followed as a consequence. I'd prefer to discus the meat of the article, but it's not unusual to see comments go off on a tangent like this.
    - wfunction 13y ago
      What annoys me is when people write irrelevant provocative introductions just to attract attention to their otherwise not so interesting writings.
      - dllthomas 13y ago
        In this case, it was a quote of a relevant provocative sentence, where the provocation itself was irrelevant. Really, the title was far more intriguing than the quote, but unfortunately the article didn't quite live up to it.
iand 13y ago
It's just a quotation that makes you think "what if...". I wouldn't fixate on the company names.

It made some sense to me. The author used the G/M thing to introduce an idea: that it's powerful to think at scale. And then seeks a way to make a thinking-at-scale structure (bayes' rule) as accessible to the programmer as an if statement, by putting it in the language. That was the only bit of the article that did make sense to me :) I get lost trying to read ML-style languages.

sordina 13y ago

What people are referring to with respect to Google is that if higher-level statistical operations are as easy as an if statement, then this may explain why google takes (presumably amorally) such a statistical approach their customers (because it is easy to).

wfunction 13y ago
But what did any of that have to do with Microsoft, or even Google's practices? The entire article was a tutorial on Bayes's rule, with a completely irrelevant introductory paragraph thrown in at the top. Nothing about Google or Microsoft's practices was actually mentioned anywhere.
- sordina 13y ago
  Yes, the article was about simplifying statistical operations. The comments were inferring that some observed practices may have followed as a consequence. I'd prefer to discus the meat of the article, but it's not unusual to see comments go off on a tangent like this.
  - wfunction 13y ago
    What annoys me is when people write irrelevant provocative introductions just to attract attention to their otherwise not so interesting writings.
    - dllthomas 13y ago
      In this case, it was a quote of a relevant provocative sentence, where the provocation itself was irrelevant. Really, the title was far more intriguing than the quote, but unfortunately the article didn't quite live up to it.

iand 13y ago

It's just a quotation that makes you think "what if...". I wouldn't fixate on the company names.