shoyer

31 ms·

241.
by shoyer 13y ago
I recently finished my PhD on quantum effects in biology (my focus was on photosynthesis). This article and the many others like it are full of poorly substantiated hype. Yes, quantum mechanics is important to some biological processes. But
242.
by shoyer 13y ago
Really? Lucentis is injected into the eye by doctors -- it's not something you're taking at home.
243.
by shoyer 13y ago
This article seems to miss the bigger picture -- why is Lucentis 40x more expensive than Avastin? The answer is that drugs aren't priced by how much they cost to manufacture a dose -- nor should they be! Roughly, they're priced by
244.
by shoyer 13y ago
Actually, it won't be so easy. Avastin is a biologic drug, so it's not possible for generic manufacturers to produce an exactly equivalent product. Eventually, generic manufacturers may be able to compete (the generic clones of bi
245.
by shoyer 13y ago
In my experience, the easiest way to analyze Python performance is with the %time, %timeit and %prun magic commands in IPython, an alternative Python shell that is far more powerful than the original. With IPython, you can simply write:
246.
by shoyer 13y ago
OK, but what says merchants are required to accept this "coin" card as your Visa? Even if they aren't allowed to check ID, they certainly are allowed to check signatures. Since merchants are held at least partially responsibl
247.
by shoyer 13y ago
Everybody (except the Math PhD) writes the naive O(2^n) solution? Fat chance...
248.
by shoyer 13y ago
Holding farmers hostage over the weather? I think the weather does a fine job of holding farmers hostage already. It's hard to see how providing more information about weather and corresponding farming best practices (i.e., what Climat
249.
by shoyer 13y ago
Uh... no. A New Kind of Science is its own special kind of nonsense. For the most part, Wolfram argues that cellular automata are a transformative paradigm for science. It's not about the power of "big data" at all.
250.
by shoyer 13y ago
Okay, yes, random matrix theory is a type of mathematics that was developed largely for its applications in physics. But it's still a branch of elementary mathematics! You don't need to know anything about quantum mechanics to won
251.
by shoyer 13y ago
No, my internship was also in a data scientist type role. I was thinking of data science as a sub-specialty of software engineering. But I do expect that any internship, even if not in the exact role you are looking for, would help your emp
252.
by shoyer 13y ago
I just finished my PhD in theoretical physics and had a relatively easy time finding a "data scientist" like job in the tech industry. I had two jobs offers from two interviews, neither of which were very close to my PhD research.
253.
by shoyer 13y ago
This guide is a nice start, but it misses the easiest way to analyze Python performance -- using the %time, %timeit and %prun magic commands in IPython, the better python command line interface (and which also has a killer web notebook inte
254.
by shoyer 13y ago
No PhD required, but you're expected to pay 14k in tuition. In contrast, Insight pays you. If you want to pay money for experience, why not get an actual degree from an accredited institution? A more realistic alternative to Insight is
255.
by shoyer 13y ago
Actually, yes. I had dinner on Monday with the author of this article. Obviously Insight worked out very well for him.
256.
by shoyer 13y ago
Well, if you believe Insight's white paper ( http://insightdatascience.com/Insight_White_Paper_2013.pdf ), the answer is "Yes".
257.
by shoyer 13y ago
This is a nice explanation, but I couldn't help but notice that the estimate of the number of gumballs in the pictured machine seems closer to 1000 than 100 (contrary to the claim in the article). You can actually see about 100 gumball
258.
by shoyer 13y ago
It looks wonderful on my iPad (third gen).
259.
by shoyer 13y ago
This is an intriguing proposal, but one that I think it ultimately flawed. Once a wave is strong enough for there be to appreciable density differences (NOT the usual case for sound waves), the usual wave equation for sound does not apply [
260.
by shoyer 13y ago
OK, after looking at the diagram and re-reading the article you are right -- you did not in fact mix up group and particle velocity
261.
by shoyer 13y ago
The author appears to have confused group velocity (the speed of the wave) with particle velocity (the speed of the air molecules). This is a very basic notion of how waves work -- the waves move, not the medium. In this case, the wave (and
262.
by shoyer 13y ago
The trouble is that it doesn't help anyone on average if you can't identify whether they're in the relevant subpopulation before you give people them the drug. That's why the FDA doesn't approve such treatments. Ind
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by shoyer 13y ago
Exactly -- the tests may have been done on different populations. In an extreme case, imagine both treatments are randomized trials for an otherwise terminal illness, but Drug A was tested on the elderly and Drug B was tested on youths. Whe
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by shoyer 13y ago
It may be "too often" that new treatments are compared to placebos, but it's not the prevailing practice, at least for serious indications like cancer. It would clearly be unethical to deny people proven treatments would exte
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by shoyer 13y ago
How do you plan to eventually bring your compound to market without IP rights? As I'm sure you know, clinical trials are very expensive, and investors expect IP rights to guarantee a return on their investment.
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by shoyer 13y ago
Just because there's a clearly defined path to making a lot of money in a high prestige job doesn't mean it's easy or that everyone can pull it off. The best way to start an "upper class career" is to be born into the upper class. Good luck
267.
by shoyer 13y ago
Interesting, but it's looks like you're under too high of a load right now for me to select my friends.
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by shoyer 13y ago
There is an OrderedDict class in the collections module of standard library. Enums store their members in a special __members__ attribute, which is such an OrderedDict. See this section of the PEP: http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0435/#
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by shoyer 13y ago
"MATLAB in the cloud" sounds a lot like IPython + PiCloud: http://blog.picloud.com/2012/12/23/introducing-the-picloud-n...
270.
by shoyer 14y ago
Those "fuel surcharges" that add up to hundreds of dollars are imposed and collected by the airlines themselves. It's just another way for them to price their tickets.

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