tgb

199 ms·

1921.
by tgb 14y ago
You might be interested in GameTap ( http://www.gametap.com/ ). Lowering the bar of entry meant that I tried out a bunch of games I otherwise would never have tried, but when I was using it there were constant problems. Downloads completed
1922.
by tgb 14y ago
"The Man Who Knew Infinity" by Robert Kanigel on Ramanujan is good. "Georg Cantor" by Joseph Dauben is dense but interesting; it is closer to a mathematical treatment of Cantor's works than a biographical one. Some experience with the basic
1923.
by tgb 14y ago
Risk prediction is about minimizing expected risk, which does not exactly correspond to the eventual damage done. This means that there will be times when they are wrong. If we punish risk predictors this harshly for being wrong, no one wil
1924.
by tgb 14y ago
These are mentioned at least once in GEB.
1925.
by tgb 14y ago
Does Google report this anywhere nowadays? I searched for it a while back and couldn't find it.
1926.
by tgb 14y ago
I've been using semantic line breaks for a while for LaTeX since, using Vim, this is the only editing style that is sane on default settings. But that shouldn't necessarily be true; what can I do to make vim friendlier to work with files th
1927.
by tgb 14y ago
You're implicitly assuming Newtonian mechanics and won't get anywhere until you stop. Here's an explanation of a simple thought-experiment based almost entirely on the assumption that the speed of light is constant that lets you easily deri
1928.
by tgb 14y ago
The linked article claims that metronomes start 'pairing up' with their nearest neighbors saying that "strongest forces on a metronome will initially be from its nearest neighbors." But if the forces are spread by the string-suspended table
1929.
by tgb 14y ago
I haven't specifically used an iDevice, but all the gyroscopes I'm familiar with provide the first derivative, not second. I'm also curious why he doesn't mention any use of magnetometers, which can give absolute orientation (not just the d
1930.
by tgb 14y ago
I like the linked paper a lot so far (still reading it) even though I disagree that everyone should learn this just so that physics majors and similar can avoid some amount of confusion.
1931.
by tgb 14y ago
Clearly there are varying gradations of being wrong and just because they're wrong doesn't mean they're as completely wrong, or as frequently wrong; the article only claims that they will be more wrong. See the http://lesswrong.com/lw/mm/t
1932.
by tgb 14y ago
Earnshaw's theorem only applies to static electromagnetic fields. An electromagnet coupled with some sensors and a computer can give feedback to make stable levitation. But, as you said, it would constantly use energy.
1933.
by tgb 14y ago
The trend I've seen in Intel processors is that every time they jump down a manufacturing size (eg: 32 vs. 22nm), the power usage (per flop, at least) has gone down. Why's that?
1934.
by tgb 14y ago
What silverdrake said, but also it's a matter of error-tolerance. If we want to do a difficult two-step computation and know when each sub-step succeeds or fails, than: 1) Perform the first step on a qubit (repeat if failed) 2) Your friend
1935.
by tgb 14y ago
This method requires the initial entangled qubits to be in a "Bell State" (equal superposition of both in 0 and both in 1). After teleportation, its no longer in that state. So it's not reusable by this method, but maybe by another that I d
1936.
by tgb 14y ago
(Note: my full qualifications are an on-going Coursera course on quantum computing that covers quantum teleportation lightly. FWIW, I recommend the course.) In vague terms, the process of quantum teleportation is the following: * You have a