hugh

104 ms·

961.
by hugh 19y ago
I can't see that it should end immediately -- the conditions under which it was started are still in place. However, it's probably a good opportunity to start negotiations with whoever takes over -- a gradual lifting of the embargo in excha
962.
by hugh 19y ago
Hey, you're right. I totally missed that paragraph when I read it the first time -- I thought they were only reporting numbers for the "middle income" folks. I'm actually amazed that the number is that high -- I figured that even the "menia
963.
by hugh 19y ago
The article is trying to give the impression of a vanishing middle class, but the data really don't seem to back it up. It defines "middle-wage jobs" as people earning between $30K and $80K, and notes that the proportion of these has droppe
964.
by hugh 19y ago
Actually I think the European thing is just an example of a broader phenomenon: democracies never go to war with other democracies. (I went googling to make sure that was true, and found this: http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/demowar.htm w
965.
by hugh 19y ago
Actually, before I read this article I had no idea who DHH was. Oh, he wrote Rails? I guess I assumed somebody must have, but I never especially cared what the guy's name was. Is this guy really famous enough to be referred to by his initia
966.
by hugh 19y ago
On the other hand, I did think it was pretty silly the other day when I saw water from New Zealand for sale here in California. Loading water onto a ship to ship it across more water to sell in a place which already has plenty of water seem
967.
by hugh 19y ago
I don't really have a lot of time for people who go around labelling others as "conformists". It's a bit of a content-free slur that seems to be the end of a thought process that goes like this: 1. Not many people agree with my opinions 2.
968.
by hugh 19y ago
"Drinking bottled water should be made as unfashionable as smoking, according to a government adviser" Yeah, and I think that telling other people what to do with their lives in order to prevent the emission of miniscule amounts of CO2 shou
969.
by hugh 19y ago
Mostly true, but I think it makes a big difference whether you leave as a 23-year-old PhD student or as a 42-year-old assistant professor.
970.
by hugh 19y ago
Most of those images are triumphs of postprocessing, rather than particularly impressive microscopy. Take the first one, for instance. If you visualize that in the standard way, it'll look like a bunch of light grey dots on a dark grey back
971.
by hugh 19y ago
I think it's a bit exaggerated. Certainly the _average_ assistant professor isn't denied tenure: that only happens in about 10-20% of cases as I understand it. http://incoherently-scattered.blogspot.com/2008/02/how-commo...
972.
by hugh 19y ago
Growing up in the eighties, I distinctly remember Mad Magazine assuring me that soon the Japanese would own everything in America. Is this just the same thing again?
973.
by hugh 19y ago
Perhaps the solution is a bit of humility. Half the time you think you're "correcting" somebody it seems that you're actually completely misunderstanding their point, and half the other half you're just misunderstanding the issue. The conde
974.
by hugh 19y ago
Random challenge -- yes, exactly. I'm thinking it would be good for people who are really bored. Also, it's good for new users who are trying to get an idea of what kind of things are on the site. Terminology probably does need work, I thin
975.
by hugh 19y ago
I'm confused by the distinction between "scenes" and "safaris". Personally I'd like it if everything were called a safari, cuz going on a safari sounds like much more fun than... making a scene. Oh, and how about a "random challenge" link?
976.
by hugh 19y ago
If you want to go to the fundamentals, I'd suggest The Principles of Mathematics by Bertrand Russell. It won't tell you much about the specific sub-branches of mathematics, but it's a good introduction to mathematics the way mathematicians
977.
by hugh 19y ago
This could be good news for startups. Suggested business plan: 1. Find something Yahoo currently does well (e.g. flickr) 2. Make a clone of it. 3. Wait for Microsoft to ruin the original.
978.
by hugh 19y ago
There are so many different kinds of entrepreneurs, and so many different types of new enterprises (restaurants, used car dealerships, high-tech startups, law firms) that statistics about the "average entrepreneur" aren't very much use to a
979.
by hugh 19y ago
I don't want this to sound like a personal attack, but personally I'd consider the "prizes for invites" thing to be barely a step above the "forced invites" thing. Either way, you're encouraging people to spam their friends -- not because t
980.
by hugh 19y ago
These kinds of stories are very dangerous for social news sites. People vote them up not because they're interesting, but just to support their preferred candidate. Maybe somebody should submit an "Ask YC: What Presidential candidate do you
981.
by hugh 19y ago
Oh yeah, and also (replying to myself here) you can use the waste products which you get from crop production anyway -- e.g. the stalks and leaves -- so it can work in parallel with food production. That stuff currently has negative value -
982.
by hugh 19y ago
I'm not sure why this was posted, but I think this is Awkward Journalistic Simile of the day: "The 100-pound dumbbells he used to easily throw around felt like lead weights. "
983.
by hugh 19y ago
Yes, but there's a lot of marginal semi-arid land out there which is no good for producing crops, but fine for producing something like the switchgrass they're thinking of using.
984.
by hugh 19y ago
OK, I googled "coskata 2011", and all other sources say they're planning to make 50-100 _million_ gallons a year by 2011, which makes much more sense. For what it's worth, the total US consumption of gasoline is about 140 billion gallons a
985.
by hugh 19y ago
Interesting technology. There's no reason why it shouldn't work, and if it does, it'll be great. But the numbers in the article don't quite seem to work out. The first "commercial-scale" plant in 2011 will only make 100,000 gallons a year.
986.
by hugh 19y ago
Isn't that basically the same argument, except with the words "mysterious and complex" replaced with the words "probably not computable"?
987.
by hugh 19y ago
Of all the bad economic news I've read over the past few days, "Starbucks considering $1 coffee" is somehow the most depressing.
988.
by hugh 19y ago
I don't think we're gonna see hyperinflation. In fact, I'll bet you a million bucks we don't!
989.
by hugh 19y ago
How dumb is Daniel Dennett? Umm, not very. From what I've read of his work he seems to be pretty smart, which is why I suspect that this Aaron guy is misunderstanding his argument. I note that his summary is in fact a summary of somebody el
990.
by hugh 19y ago
This article is about five years old, and boy, am I glad that the terminology "Bright" hasn't caught on. I'd be way too embarrassed to go around trying to tell people I was a "bright" -- it just sounds weird and creepy.

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