ntownsend

8 ms·

31.
by ntownsend 17y ago
One of the reasons that mathematics is so vast and powerful is because people have focused their efforts in specialized areas. If math weren't so broad that a single person could understand it all then it would be pretty unimpressive. I d
32.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Most of the Internet == Wikipedia?
33.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Good catch. I'm using "paradox" very loosely here. What I was trying to say is that we ignore the shortcomings of ZFC: undecidable statements, unnecessarily strong axioms added (regularity and replacement). In some ways avoiding Russell's p
34.
by ntownsend 17y ago
I agree, there was a vast effort, but that was decades ago. As I said, most working mathematicians don't concern themselves with these issues and just stick with ZFC.
35.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Procedural programming is still mathematical.
36.
by ntownsend 17y ago
I'm not sure what this has to do with the original post, but I'll go with it... You also have category theory, proof theory, model theory, recursion theory, type theory... They all fail as "foundations" because they all emit paradoxes. In s
37.
by ntownsend 17y ago
For an excellent treatment of how doing mathematics is a subtle and dynamic interplay of the "Greek" and "Babylonian" approaches I recommend Imre Lakatos' "Proofs and Refutations" ( http://books.google.ca/books?id=EjQqJT4Z-VoC&lpg=PP1&#
38.
by ntownsend 17y ago
I could not say that it is "mostly" about cost of living (edit: or standard of living, which is subjective). Who's whining here except you about how the suburbs get a bad rap for being evil? Why don't YOU work to make YOUR urban center bett
39.
by ntownsend 17y ago
The environmental impact and culture of waste are enough to make suburban-living evil to me. It's not just about the cost to you in driving your ass around.
40.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Just tried lazeroids on Chrome again. Vast improvements! No trails. Great frame-rate. Very responsive.
41.
Ask HN: As an "IT Professional" do you/should you get to claim overtime?
5 points by ntownsend 17y ago|4 comments
42.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Lazeroids is an awesome idea, but it doesn't work in Chrome (asteroids have trails) and I find the frame-rate is consistently pretty low. Love the sound and music though.
43.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Clean. Seemingly lightweight. Using Chrome I had some issues with the resize handle of the input field. I could drag it to the right, out of the container, and off my screen where it became lost forever. Also, I know that Chrome adds the re
44.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Agreed.
45.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Yes and no. There are currently no known ways to verify it epxerimentally, but, on the other hand, the theory has recently used to explain high-temperature superconductivity: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090706113702.ht...
46.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Toronto, and I can't relocate for about another year.
47.
by ntownsend 17y ago
That was an excellent explanation of the intuition and motivation behind eigenvectors. Eigenvectors are also used extensively in pattern recognition. Notably, in facial recognition: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eigenface
48.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Any Canadians, um, eh?
49.
by ntownsend 17y ago
Ah. I misread the NewScientist article. It wasn't clear to me that in the experiment to mimic the slime they, in fact, modeled the slime with a circuit that _included_ a memristor and not with just a memristor. The paper the article cites a
50.
by ntownsend 17y ago
I think I missed something. What is the mechanism that causes the slime/memristor to keep changing states after the external stimulus is removed? I thought the memristor just remembers a voltage. After you remove the external voltage then w