theoh

17 ms·

91.
by theoh 7y ago
It's one thing to write code with Unicode characters like ≢. That should be fine, and it's not difficult for programming languages to support it. (You could roll your own preprocessing tool). Doing it with ligatures is not a grea
92.
by theoh 7y ago
"Sarawak Chamber was so big, Mad Phil explained, that it almost certainly contained new passages—particularly in the roof, where no one had ever searched. Although it’s tempting to think of caves as similar to mine shafts—tunnels that
93.
by theoh 7y ago
Isn't it more or less a case of usually launching an application into a newly created window? It's been a long time. The Plan 9 emphasis on per-process namespaces corresponds to the idea that a new graphical application is given a
94.
by theoh 7y ago
Before anyone else has to go to the trouble of looking these up: "Destined for War" is a book by Graham Allison https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_T._Allison . The others are books by Henry Kissinger (!).
95.
by theoh 7y ago
That's the image on the TV Tropes page.
96.
by theoh 7y ago
It's a trope: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SeverelySpeciali...
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by theoh 7y ago
Not everyone can be the protagonist in real life, but they can imitate a prominent person and thereby associate themselves with that person's success and prestige. It's a variety of narcissism in which less successful people deal
98.
by theoh 7y ago
Trust HN commenters to call into question the (perfectly reasonable) premise of the article. The fact that Instagram is visual, not drably textual like HN, shouldn't really prevent anyone from discerning the fact that there's a si
99.
by theoh 7y ago
I think the point is that a conjecture or open question can be canon. Hilbert's problems are an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert%27s_problems The P=NP question would be an example of a canonical unso
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by theoh 7y ago
"Tech" is not going to provide jobs for people who previously did manual or clerical work. It's intrinsically geared towards automating away those classes of labour, without any guaranteed provision of a one-for-one replaceme
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by theoh 7y ago
This is explained more formally here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empty_product
102.
by theoh 7y ago
It's definitely a thing. Here's one theory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limerence
103.
by theoh 7y ago
I'm not sure about the justification for the X-Y figure, but it seems like larger numbers would tend to make this kind of effect unlikely. If you assume that in- and out-migration are not in equilibrium, but that the probability of mig
104.
by theoh 7y ago
Here's some valuable research: https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.00023
105.
by theoh 7y ago
Thanks for this comment. I recently discovered that the inventor of PCM, Alec Reeves, was also involved in the development Oboe system for guidance of bombers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alec_Reeves (the offsite ref
106.
by theoh 7y ago
There's no "just" to any aspect of this topic. I think what you are talking about is what is sometimes called "classification parity", and there are problems with it, and with everything else we've come up with
107.
by theoh 7y ago
Consider the possibility that the (pre-AI system) probability of success for a female applicant is the same as the probability of success of a male applicant. You could make a "per capita" quota as a kind of goal. That's not
108.
by theoh 7y ago
In OSI networking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coloured_Book_protocols
109.
by theoh 7y ago
That's not what Shannon means. He just meant "solve the inverse problem".
110.
by theoh 7y ago
If N64 games are still worth playing, it's surely equally true that there's really nothing about the styling of the original iPhone that makes it an eyesore. It's just obsolete.
111.
by theoh 7y ago
The comment I was replying to said "this is your course". I don't think the particular approach taken by the instructors is a good one, so I replied "this is a course" (not necessarily the course to take). A lot
112.
by theoh 7y ago
This is a course. Not necessarily a good way to an understanding of that line.
113.
by theoh 7y ago
Looking at the context, I don't buy this explanation. It's ingenious but a bit too subtle to be true. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:Passages_from_the_Life_o...
114.
by theoh 7y ago
I don't like it either. I think Babbage saw the machine as implementing a mathematical function, which is why he thought the question was ridiculous. I suspect that the people who asked the question did not realise that it just calcu
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by theoh 7y ago
I'm not convinced by ActivityPub. A lot of people seem to think that it's cool but the documentation makes it look like it's just a schema for social media applications. It might be an obvious move to try to standardize socia
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by theoh 7y ago
Acquiring the ability to wipe ourselves out with nuclear weapons is the classic example of this problem. The physicists weren't expecting that pushing the boundaries of what was technically possible would result in a very bad escalatio
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by theoh 7y ago
A lot of aspects of Notre Dame date to the 19th C. Viollet-le-Duc made a lot of questionable improvements, including the addition of the flèche (spire). That's part of the building's history now, for better or worse. I expect Viol
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by theoh 7y ago
I didn't say that they stayed the same. The point is that you can't say objectively that these arts have progressed any more that you can say that human nature has changed for the better. What I'm saying is not an unusual opi
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by theoh 7y ago
Construction technology is not the same thing as architecture. Architecture as an art doesn't progress. Music is the same, painting is the same. A piece of medieval music can be perfect on its own terms. It wouldn't make sense t
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by theoh 7y ago
There are agreed principles for the conservation of buildings. Three basic ones are: a) Replace like with like (don't change materials or construction techniques) b) Make any repair work obvious (don't try to pass new fabric off a

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