His other example of the decades-new identity makes it sound like special functions have seen better days, not that we should give him some brownies.
One type of counter-signal is being nuts and right at the same time, all the time. This is not anything I've seen in HN comments not to mention this blogger. (Nor from Neumann, really. He did point to people who were, though, like Szilard, Seth Neddermeyer, etc)
[0]"Precocity" is NOT a counter-signal, it's a bad system smell?
[1] I saw a YouTube comment today which observed that mathematicians agree [on whether something is a breakthrough] much more readily than philosophers (and physicists, I would add)