camccann

28 ms·

181.
by camccann 17y ago
I don't know, that was a more valid use than most. The question "Is X in category Y?" implicitly assumes, among other things, that X exists and that Y is a valid category. If the validity of category Y is not established, then to argue whet
182.
by camccann 17y ago
Domains of scientific inquiry can be roughly considered along two axes: ability to partition the world into context-free discrete objects, and ability to test predictions by direct intervention. The former includes the type of abstract simp
183.
by camccann 17y ago
I'm working (slowly) on an interpreter for a minimal, non-strict, pure untyped lambda calculus. Bonus features include syntactic whitespace, some basic optimizations, simple tracing/debugging features, and support for "compiling" multiple s
184.
by camccann 17y ago
On one hand, this guy is a classic example of why sometimes it's best to stay out of the way and let a professional be the public face of a company. On the other hand, he may be a loose cannon, but at least he's interesting , and you have
185.
by camccann 17y ago
there are no common physical laws between the warming phenomenon in glass houses and the fictitious atmospheric greenhouse effects Seriously? What next, are we going to discover that black holes aren't actual literal holes, and that no pa
186.
by camccann 17y ago
I think Accordion Hero did okay, though: http://www.phobe.com/sfi/accordion.html
187.
by camccann 17y ago
Aren't planes at cruising altitude flown mostly on autopilot? Computer controls don't suffer from the sluggish reaction speeds that make following closely risky for humans driving on a highway.
188.
by camccann 17y ago
I'm very surprised that there still isn't some screening machine that detects all explosives. How hard can it be? I think the state of the art technology for odor-based explosive screening is "dogs".
189.
by camccann 17y ago
Your comment history seems to be mostly 1s, so I'm guessing a passing philanthropist has taken matters into their own hands. But for what it's worth, the most likely explanation for a small number of downvotes on each of many comments by a
190.
by camccann 17y ago
Don't know, it's not my argument. I was objecting to what seemed to be an attempt to make an issue of osipov's feelings on the matter. Arguments whose topics include the emotional state of one of the participants rarely end well. There also
191.
by camccann 17y ago
The best interpretation of this drivel is that you want people to accept your claims of superior productivity just on your say so but not ask for any evidence because asking you back up your unsubstantiated claims of superiority would be "
192.
by camccann 17y ago
And here I thought that was talking about perl...
193.
by camccann 17y ago
Why does it matter? He seems to be alleging that the author of this piece is potentially responsible for as much misery and destruction as the people who killed the lawyer in the story, and that this undermines the moral legitimacy of the a
194.
by camccann 17y ago
If the effect size is large (i.e. the magnitude of difference between the means of lisp vs non-lisp programmers) the size of problem should be irrelevant. Writing a "Hello, world" is going to take about the same amount of time in any lang
195.
by camccann 17y ago
Distributed version control is a fundamental innovation in software development, and Git is the most successful DVCS by far. Is this is the same git that Torvalds tossed together as a quick hack to replace the proprietary BitKeeper DVCS a
196.
by camccann 17y ago
A competition to solve a toy problem wouldn't necessarily say much, though. So the question is, how big of a problem would you need, and where are you going to find enough programmers (of reasonable and roughly similar competence) who don't
197.
by camccann 17y ago
Yeah, I don't mean to bash Gladwell himself either. At times he indulges in glib bullshitting[0] but his infectious enthusiasm for exploring neat-sounding ideas is charming, and refreshing compared to some of the utter tripe that's out ther
198.
by camccann 17y ago
So basically, sometimes he says things that are flat-out wrong, and he doesn't care as long as they're thought-provoking falsehoods, and people read it anyway because it's fun and engaging and thought-provoking in a way completely unrelat
199.
by camccann 17y ago
The expectation of market clearing for programmer wages is completely implausible here. Going independent requires additional skills beyond the programming productivity that we're supposedly trying to measure, is perceived as riskier (and i
200.
by camccann 17y ago
Well, a physical dollar bill has intrinsic value as well; if nothing else, you could burn it for energy. The intrinsic value is a minuscule fraction of the "official" value, but still nonzero. The intrinsic value of gold is a lot greater, b
201.
by camccann 17y ago
Unacknowledged differences of that magnitude would imply a massive arbitrage opportunity that has persisted for many years. Only if "programmer productivity" is a primary limiting factor and one can reliably distinguish relative productiv
202.
by camccann 17y ago
Stringing a conductor between the cloud and target is what I meant to exclude by "the confines of the device". I figure that if you can successfully get something physically attached to the target, it probably makes more sense to skip the w
203.
by camccann 17y ago
Directed electrical disharge is a popular idea that, generally, doesn't end up working very well. Engineering geeks still love it, though, and DARPA keeps funding attempts. Electrical arcs have an annoying habit of doing as they please once
204.
by camccann 17y ago
The sugar lobby is the corn lobby, because that's where most refined sugar comes from. In other words, Midwest farmers, particularly in Iowa. See the problem now?
205.
by camccann 17y ago
It'd take more than just a bottle of vitamin C pills, I think--it's one of the least toxic substances known. The LD50 on vitamin C is probably about two pounds of pure vitamin for an average adult. It's probably easier (and certainly more
206.
by camccann 17y ago
There is some variation in how sensitive people are to individual odors. Picking up the ozone smell before storms seems to be sufficiently rare that a lot of people end up wondering if they're the only one. Anyway, as I said, the ozone is p
207.
by camccann 17y ago
This seems to be describing the inevitable end result of confusing mere words with the intent behind them. Mistaking superficially "polite" language for actually showing respect to others will of course lead to those who most lack the latte
208.
by camccann 17y ago
Are you thinking of a smell with a kind of sharp, metallic or chemical odor, right before a heavy thunderstorm? If memory serves me, that's due to the voltage between the storm and the ground turning O2 molecules into O3 (ozone), which gets
209.
by camccann 17y ago
Well, iterative (and smart tail recursive [0]) solutions are going to be roughly O(n) for the nth Fibonacci number, assuming addition is O(1). In bignum territory, addition isn't free, but is still pretty cheap. The closed form solution inv
210.
by camccann 17y ago
No, the iterative approach is only marginally less terrible. If, for some strange reason, you actually need a Fibonacci function that's efficient, you have two choices, depending on the return type: Are you returning a machine integer (long

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