Now that this research is in, I predict that all website designers will realize the futility of flashy designs and instead remake their sites to be more like Craigslist or Google. I'm predicting an end to Flash and Javascript.[/naivete]
I hope you're being sarcastic; sometimes I have a hard time telling.
I'm familiar with the Ackbar scene in RotJ, okay? I understand what "it's a trap" refers to. I understand the internet phenomenon of mocking it. I don't, however, understand why people are sticking that tag on EVERY story, right in lockstep, even and especially where it doesn't apply.
Someone want to explain the joke? As in, why it's in every story on the front page (except for one with the close variants "!itsatrap" and "itsnotatrap")?
'Cause if it's a protest to bring attention to the total failure of tags to accomplish anything useful -- I'm all for it. The only tags anyone puts on a story anymore are
-obvious indicators of the topic ("microsoft", "australia") -contradictions ("fud" tag AND "notfud" tag, or "yes" AND "no" tag) -buzzwords related to the subject ("bigbrother")
Caplan's thesis doesn't require that each and every person reject logic in the voting booth, just a large enough portion. The incentive to dispense with your "face-reality" reasoning (that you use with your wife) is much higher in the voting booth, where you can costlessly indulge your "long term bonds won't raise taxes!" fantasy. Remember -- your vote doesn't make a difference, so you will never suffer the consequences of it like you would the Toyota purchase.
It's true that some people will buck the trend and spend as much mental effort rejecting "feel good" beliefs, but Caplan's point is that the incentives push enough people away from doing this that democracy results in bad policies.
I'm surpised the Mankiw piece got linked without mentioning a someone similar piece by Prof. Bryan Caplan (who himself links the Mankiw piece) that summarizes his upcoming book, The Myth of the Rational Voter.
Long story short, he argues that because people don't personally bear the cost of holding ridiculous political beliefs, they relax their standards of intellectual rigor, similar to how they do with religious beliefs. They thus use voting to appeal to their "feel good" side rather than seriously analyze the issues (like the would with, e.g. their own finances), resulting in destructive policies all-around.
So he takes Mankiw one step further and says that it's not just ignorance that's a problem, but irrationality. If it were mere ignorance, the errors would cancel. But, Caplan, claims, they don't -- they skew the wrong way.
I agree, and think this is one instance of a more general mentality of "more advanced technology = better" -- a mentality people should dump ASAP. It's the attitude that makes software bloat right as computational power increases (Microsoft, I'm looking in your general direction). It's the attitude that says people should shift movie formats every 6-7 years (Sony, I'm looking in your general direction).
It's not Luddism if you want a new technology to actually be an improvement before you switch to using it.
Um, shouldn't this comment be applied to the poster I was responding to? I was defending the use of the alternate term.
Of course, even that poster wasn't criticizing the use of a term different from what natives call the country; he was criticizing the use of a term different from the one natives (well, the government there) ask English-speakers to call it.
Also, ESRB ratings can, at least in theory, let you know the appropriateness of the game for mixed company, even if you don't care about the kids. If I want to show a game to a group of a adults and their kids, I'd like to know if there's something I should worry about.
However, I'm kind of disappointed here. DDR Extreme obviously doesn't offend me, but you'd think that, being rated E, I could use it in the above situation without having to say "Oh, don't do that song!" However, that version does have lyrics like "I'll rape your rhymes", "buggin' you up" (which sounds VERY SUSPICIOUSLY like "fuckin' you up"), and some videos with offensive dance gestures. Now, again, it obviously doesn't offend me, but if I were to trust that rating and present it in mixed company, with people's kids around, I could earn some enemies real quickly.
Looks like Slashdot just violated the US's campaign finance laws through its promotion or opposition of certain canditates within 30 days of an election, which amounts to an in-kind contribution.
Okay, okay, if it's not illegal yet, it soon will be.
They're probably calling it Burma in protest of the military government there, one of whose changes was the name. It's not uncommon. For example, this non-crank author does it.
And I seriously doubt "human rights groups" put "profiteering" on the same level as e.g. torture and racism. Where are the human rights protests over Microsoft?
If you're a scientist, why not give them the raw data & your conclusions?
Good point. What I'd like to see is a place where I can download the state-of-the-art models. That is, I want to be able to review their code, all assumptions going into the model, all justifications for the assumptions, and all historical evidence so I can replicate the predictions myself.
Since this is science, that information *should* be publicly available somewhere.
No, an "xxx algorithm" really means an algorithm for doing xxx.
And what does "running shoes" mean? Does it mean "shoes for running"? Or does it mean "shoes that run [i.e., by their own locomotion]"? What you need to be aware of, is that formulations like these can have multiple meanings. You have to look at context and pick the one that is most appropriate. ("Most appropriate" does not mean, as you seem to think, "gives me an opportunity to demean the poster and show off what little knowledge I have".)
In a large program, it isn't always transparent where a value comes from. You can't just put a check in front of the division operator. What are you going to do in the case of zero? Quit the program? That's no better than the OS killing your program because of divide-by-zero error.
Well, if you thought about it for more than ten seconds, you would probably look at the context (I'm talking about intelligent people here btw) and say, "well, what does a zero in this equation *mean*"? For example, if the program were computing an average, but there were zero cases so far, it would suffice to avoid the division and return "zero". (i.e., if there are no cases yet, leave the result as zero) Of course, that's assuming you can't even see the entire function (!). Despite what you said:
different parts of the program are written by different programmers working on different teams, where each programmer only has a limited understanding of the part his team works on
I doubt the work is ever divided down enough so that one programmer only sees a few lines within a function. And even so, that would still mean someone passed through a variable that would be in a denominator without checking for zero.
As for your last point. Maybe you are right. Perhaps I like being called an asshole.
I didn't contest that you didn't like being called an asshole; I only explained why were acting like one. Let's work on that reading comprehension some more. Next lesson: context clues.
In english "division algorithm" means a step-by-step description of how one does division.
False. It can have different meanings, depending on the context. Intelligent individuals are able to discern this, rather than cover up for their own incapability by "misinterpreting" it to mean something that gives them a chance to make a lecture they've been looking for an opportunity to use.
(Well, technically this isn't true either. The division algorithm is a mathematical theorem)
Golly, you're breadth of knowledge sure impresses me! You must not have been looking for an opportunity to show off!
And yes, anywhere you use division in a program, you should make sure that the denominator is non-zero. However, if you have participated in writing or maintained a real-world program with more than 100000 lines of code, you will realize that errors happen, even though the programmers who have been working on it are highly talented people. That's the difference between theory and practice.
Oh, so, in theory, you need to check input data for validity. But in practice, you don't need to check input data.
Wait.
I think what you mean is, one should check input for validity, but people err and don't do this.
No shit, Sherlock. But you were going one step further and saying this is typical and understandable. Yeah, I guess the programming world does have pretty low standards. But when most people talk about the whole "theory vs. practice" distinction, they're talking about rules ("theory") that lose applicability in unanticipated scenarios ("practice"). It's not used to refer to scenarios where someone deviates from the theory *to his own detriment*. Seems to me the "theory" was fine.
But at least you have a good grasp on English, right?
And no, that part of the package was certainly experimental. If it wasn't, it would not exhibit this embarassing error. If you wish, you can continue to insist that the subroutine that failed so spectacularly in this experimental software, was a reliable well-tested and well-understood piece of code. But I doubt you will convince many.
Dividing, and checking for a non-zero denominator is not experimental, kid. Sorry.
By the way, I don't like being called an asshole.
Then maybe -- and this is just a thought -- you shouldn't "misinterpret" a poster's comment in a way designed to make the poster look stupid so you can lecture him and give yourself gratuitous opportunities to show of what little knowledge you're proud to have actually absorbed? It might work.
True. In that respect, I erred. I guess an OS's only line of defense against programs that crash, is not to shut down vital systems and disable manual overrides.
I answered all that already. I explained very carefully, in words with a +4 sigma probability you'd understand, why that wouldn't make much of a difference if at all, so you should terminate your bizarre fantasies about "getting back" at businesses by revoking their charters.
Wait wait wait -- remind me what I'm responding to, and why? I mean, I like debating weighty matters and all, but for my own sake, not to give some clueless poster his jollies.
Re:Not even capable of what the original XBOX can
on
Wii Confirmed at 480p
·
· Score: 1
Yeah man, I guess we just shouldn't buy it now. The Wii may be the most innovative system in a long time, but hell, if it can't do 720p, I guess we're just going to have to shell out more for one of the other consolso we can get better eye candy in our sequels.
Well, that's probably because the programmer didn't write the division algorithm himself. I may be going out on a limb here, but I believe the programmer may have used a built-in operator from the programming language he was using, the operator being called "/".
Very funny, asshole. I was talking about the function that contained that "/". *That* function should have made sure all denominators would be non-zero. That part of the package is most certainly *not* experimental. On that task, basic programming practice would have said to make sure none of the variables going into the denominator position are zero. The fact that it's some "early stage" is no excuse.
A server application accepted this bad data, performed a bad calculation, and corrupted it's database. Client apps that tried to use this database crashed. These events are OS independent, the same thing would have happened under MacOS X or Linux.
Yeah, because *every* OS out there fails to check for valid input, and in fact, *must* fail to check for valid input.
Wow. That's pretty bad. Entering a zero into a field causes the ship's propulsion to die because some programmer, and all his reviewers, couldn't be bothered to check for zero in a division algorithm.
That's par for the course for MS. Remember the expandable menus? Hope you didn't hover your mouse a moment too long before clicking -- you might have saved your document when you were looking for the page setup.
But then, I've seen it in open source too. Not monitoring the critical paths closely enough. Had a friend who got locked out of Windows because he tried to install a mature Linux distro dual boot. Fixable, but shouldn't have happened.
Slashdot Mirror
Now that this research is in, I predict that all website designers will realize the futility of flashy designs and instead remake their sites to be more like Craigslist or Google. I'm predicting an end to Flash and Javascript.[/naivete]
I hope you're being sarcastic; sometimes I have a hard time telling.
I'm familiar with the Ackbar scene in RotJ, okay? I understand what "it's a trap" refers to. I understand the internet phenomenon of mocking it. I don't, however, understand why people are sticking that tag on EVERY story, right in lockstep, even and especially where it doesn't apply.
Someone want to explain the joke? As in, why it's in every story on the front page (except for one with the close variants "!itsatrap" and "itsnotatrap")?
'Cause if it's a protest to bring attention to the total failure of tags to accomplish anything useful -- I'm all for it. The only tags anyone puts on a story anymore are
-obvious indicators of the topic ("microsoft", "australia")
-contradictions ("fud" tag AND "notfud" tag, or "yes" AND "no" tag)
-buzzwords related to the subject ("bigbrother")
Caplan's thesis doesn't require that each and every person reject logic in the voting booth, just a large enough portion. The incentive to dispense with your "face-reality" reasoning (that you use with your wife) is much higher in the voting booth, where you can costlessly indulge your "long term bonds won't raise taxes!" fantasy. Remember -- your vote doesn't make a difference, so you will never suffer the consequences of it like you would the Toyota purchase.
It's true that some people will buck the trend and spend as much mental effort rejecting "feel good" beliefs, but Caplan's point is that the incentives push enough people away from doing this that democracy results in bad policies.
Dangit, I should have made this reply here.
I'm surpised the Mankiw piece got linked without mentioning a someone similar piece by Prof. Bryan Caplan (who himself links the Mankiw piece) that summarizes his upcoming book, The Myth of the Rational Voter.
Long story short, he argues that because people don't personally bear the cost of holding ridiculous political beliefs, they relax their standards of intellectual rigor, similar to how they do with religious beliefs. They thus use voting to appeal to their "feel good" side rather than seriously analyze the issues (like the would with, e.g. their own finances), resulting in destructive policies all-around.
So he takes Mankiw one step further and says that it's not just ignorance that's a problem, but irrationality. If it were mere ignorance, the errors would cancel. But, Caplan, claims, they don't -- they skew the wrong way.
I agree, and think this is one instance of a more general mentality of "more advanced technology = better" -- a mentality people should dump ASAP. It's the attitude that makes software bloat right as computational power increases (Microsoft, I'm looking in your general direction). It's the attitude that says people should shift movie formats every 6-7 years (Sony, I'm looking in your general direction).
It's not Luddism if you want a new technology to actually be an improvement before you switch to using it.
Um, shouldn't this comment be applied to the poster I was responding to? I was defending the use of the alternate term.
Of course, even that poster wasn't criticizing the use of a term different from what natives call the country; he was criticizing the use of a term different from the one natives (well, the government there) ask English-speakers to call it.
Also, ESRB ratings can, at least in theory, let you know the appropriateness of the game for mixed company, even if you don't care about the kids. If I want to show a game to a group of a adults and their kids, I'd like to know if there's something I should worry about.
However, I'm kind of disappointed here. DDR Extreme obviously doesn't offend me, but you'd think that, being rated E, I could use it in the above situation without having to say "Oh, don't do that song!" However, that version does have lyrics like "I'll rape your rhymes", "buggin' you up" (which sounds VERY SUSPICIOUSLY like "fuckin' you up"), and some videos with offensive dance gestures. Now, again, it obviously doesn't offend me, but if I were to trust that rating and present it in mixed company, with people's kids around, I could earn some enemies real quickly.
Oh, sorry, I'm bad at that :-/
Let's try again, kid. Those don't look like "HUMAN RIGHTS PROTESTS"; they look like people griping about software sales contracts. See sig.
Looks like Slashdot just violated the US's campaign finance laws through its promotion or opposition of certain canditates within 30 days of an election, which amounts to an in-kind contribution.
Okay, okay, if it's not illegal yet, it soon will be.
They're probably calling it Burma in protest of the military government there, one of whose changes was the name. It's not uncommon. For example, this non-crank author does it.
And I seriously doubt "human rights groups" put "profiteering" on the same level as e.g. torture and racism. Where are the human rights protests over Microsoft?
I agree. It's basically saying, "Scientist is modeling something."
*yawn*
Let me know when he gets *results*. Anyone can "make a model".
If you're a scientist, why not give them the raw data & your conclusions?
Good point. What I'd like to see is a place where I can download the state-of-the-art models. That is, I want to be able to review their code, all assumptions going into the model, all justifications for the assumptions, and all historical evidence so I can replicate the predictions myself.
Since this is science, that information *should* be publicly available somewhere.
No, an "xxx algorithm" really means an algorithm for doing xxx.
And what does "running shoes" mean? Does it mean "shoes for running"? Or does it mean "shoes that run [i.e., by their own locomotion]"? What you need to be aware of, is that formulations like these can have multiple meanings. You have to look at context and pick the one that is most appropriate. ("Most appropriate" does not mean, as you seem to think, "gives me an opportunity to demean the poster and show off what little knowledge I have".)
In a large program, it isn't always transparent where a value comes from. You can't just put a check in front of the division operator. What are you going to do in the case of zero? Quit the program? That's no better than the OS killing your program because of divide-by-zero error.
Well, if you thought about it for more than ten seconds, you would probably look at the context (I'm talking about intelligent people here btw) and say, "well, what does a zero in this equation *mean*"? For example, if the program were computing an average, but there were zero cases so far, it would suffice to avoid the division and return "zero". (i.e., if there are no cases yet, leave the result as zero) Of course, that's assuming you can't even see the entire function (!). Despite what you said:
different parts of the program are written by different programmers working on different teams, where each programmer only has a limited understanding of the part his team works on
I doubt the work is ever divided down enough so that one programmer only sees a few lines within a function. And even so, that would still mean someone passed through a variable that would be in a denominator without checking for zero.
As for your last point. Maybe you are right. Perhaps I like being called an asshole.
I didn't contest that you didn't like being called an asshole; I only explained why were acting like one. Let's work on that reading comprehension some more. Next lesson: context clues.
In english "division algorithm" means a step-by-step description of how one does division.
False. It can have different meanings, depending on the context. Intelligent individuals are able to discern this, rather than cover up for their own incapability by "misinterpreting" it to mean something that gives them a chance to make a lecture they've been looking for an opportunity to use.
(Well, technically this isn't true either. The division algorithm is a mathematical theorem)
Golly, you're breadth of knowledge sure impresses me! You must not have been looking for an opportunity to show off!
And yes, anywhere you use division in a program, you should make sure that the denominator is non-zero. However, if you have participated in writing or maintained a real-world program with more than 100000 lines of code, you will realize that errors happen, even though the programmers who have been working on it are highly talented people. That's the difference between theory and practice.
Oh, so, in theory, you need to check input data for validity. But in practice, you don't need to check input data.
Wait.
I think what you mean is, one should check input for validity, but people err and don't do this.
No shit, Sherlock. But you were going one step further and saying this is typical and understandable. Yeah, I guess the programming world does have pretty low standards. But when most people talk about the whole "theory vs. practice" distinction, they're talking about rules ("theory") that lose applicability in unanticipated scenarios ("practice"). It's not used to refer to scenarios where someone deviates from the theory *to his own detriment*. Seems to me the "theory" was fine.
But at least you have a good grasp on English, right?
And no, that part of the package was certainly experimental. If it wasn't, it would not exhibit this embarassing error. If you wish, you can continue to insist that the subroutine that failed so spectacularly in this experimental software, was a reliable well-tested and well-understood piece of code. But I doubt you will convince many.
Dividing, and checking for a non-zero denominator is not experimental, kid. Sorry.
By the way, I don't like being called an asshole.
Then maybe -- and this is just a thought -- you shouldn't "misinterpret" a poster's comment in a way designed to make the poster look stupid so you can lecture him and give yourself gratuitous opportunities to show of what little knowledge you're proud to have actually absorbed? It might work.
True. In that respect, I erred. I guess an OS's only line of defense against programs that crash, is not to shut down vital systems and disable manual overrides.
I answered all that already. I explained very carefully, in words with a +4 sigma probability you'd understand, why that wouldn't make much of a difference if at all, so you should terminate your bizarre fantasies about "getting back" at businesses by revoking their charters.
Are we done here then?
Wait wait wait -- remind me what I'm responding to, and why? I mean, I like debating weighty matters and all, but for my own sake, not to give some clueless poster his jollies.
Yeah man, I guess we just shouldn't buy it now. The Wii may be the most innovative system in a long time, but hell, if it can't do 720p, I guess we're just going to have to shell out more for one of the other consolso we can get better eye candy in our sequels.
Well, that's probably because the programmer didn't write the division algorithm himself. I may be going out on a limb here, but I believe the programmer may have used a built-in operator from the programming language he was using, the operator being called "/".
Very funny, asshole. I was talking about the function that contained that "/". *That* function should have made sure all denominators would be non-zero. That part of the package is most certainly *not* experimental. On that task, basic programming practice would have said to make sure none of the variables going into the denominator position are zero. The fact that it's some "early stage" is no excuse.
A server application accepted this bad data, performed a bad calculation, and corrupted it's database. Client apps that tried to use this database crashed. These events are OS independent, the same thing would have happened under MacOS X or Linux.
Yeah, because *every* OS out there fails to check for valid input, and in fact, *must* fail to check for valid input.
If you switch out every aspect of E3 except the blessing of E3 heads and it being in L.A., is it still really the "successor to E3"?
You're welcome.
Wow. That's pretty bad. Entering a zero into a field causes the ship's propulsion to die because some programmer, and all his reviewers, couldn't be bothered to check for zero in a division algorithm.
That's par for the course for MS. Remember the expandable menus? Hope you didn't hover your mouse a moment too long before clicking -- you might have saved your document when you were looking for the page setup.
But then, I've seen it in open source too. Not monitoring the critical paths closely enough. Had a friend who got locked out of Windows because he tried to install a mature Linux distro dual boot. Fixable, but shouldn't have happened.