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artpepper

193 karma · joined January 4, 2016

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artpepper··on Twitter drops lawsuit, saying summons has been withdrawn
You just invented the semantic web. :-)
artpepper··on Who Buried Paul? (1999)
I really like "Ram"
artpepper··on California has the USA’s highest poverty rate, when factoring in cost-of-living
That article does not dispute the claim that net immigration from Mexico has been negative.
artpepper··on Has philosophy ever clarified mathematics?
If I knew, I'd be the next Hume :-)

I suspect it couldn't be a physics result, because the question is something like "Why does the universe follow natural laws at all" and/or "what IS a natural law, in metaphysical terms" ?

artpepper··on We Need More ‘Useless’ Knowledge
> I know that our budgets are already creaking under the load of our spending and entitlement programs

Federal budget has been ~ 30-35% of GDP since the '80s, although there was a spike during the Great Recession for obvious reasons.

artpepper··on Has philosophy ever clarified mathematics?
Physics is arguably the most successful branch of science (at least in terms of the accuracy of its predictions), and yet physics hasn't resolved the basic dispute between Hume and Kant regarding the nature of causality and objective reality.

Same thing is likely to hold vis-a-vis neuroscience and philosophy of mind.

artpepper··on What the feud between Nabokov and Edmund Wilson says about translation
That's the part I don't understand about their feud. (I haven't read the translation, just reviews of Beam's book.) It seemed clear that Nabokov's translation aims at a different purpose than more "readable" translations, and there is a valid place for both approaches.
artpepper··on San Francisco Asks: Where Have All the Children Gone?
Because the U.S. has evolved a model where childcare is very expensive and people are expected to work > 40 hours per week. We need public pre-K and a 30- to 40-hour workweek.
artpepper··on I made my son cannabis cookies. They changed his life
(3) isn't a completely separate issue. Incarceration sucks up a lot of public funds that could go toward treatment programs.
artpepper··on New Year’s Resolutions for Introverts
I still see a lot of people describe introversion as "not wanting to do what extroverts do", as if being an introvert is defined by an absence of something.

But for me, time spent by myself isn't an empty expanse that I'm too scared to fill with socializing. It's absolutely vital to me, it's when I can really think, write, read, be creative, experience my emotions, etc.

I'm fine with socializing (preferably in a small group, with close friends -- I don't get much out of parties or big get-togethers) but I need to make room in my schedule for solitude.

artpepper··on What Scientific Term or Concept Ought to be More Widely Known?
Bayesian probability. I see a lot of popular reporting that talks very naively about probability and relative risk.
artpepper··on New evidence that Nixon sabotaged 1968 Vietnam peace deal
I'm no fan of Kissinger but that really shows the importance of having qualified advisors.
artpepper··on Falsehoods programmers believe about video
Interesting! Especially the inclusion of a time period field. That's important in time zone information, too.
artpepper··on How ‘Rogue One’ Brought Back Familiar Faces
That's funny, I had the opposite reaction - CGI Tarkin didn't bother me too much but Leia was creepy.
artpepper··on Falsehoods programmers believe about video
What I take from the names article is to make sure you understand your requirements. A blogging platform will have different requirements than, say, electronic medical records.
artpepper··on A Git catastrophe cleaned up
But how do you revert a commit if there were subsequent commits that changed the same files? (If I'm reading the original post correctly.)
artpepper··on Ask HN: Question for Parents of HN
> Be a good person and a role model

This. More and more, I've realized that I want my kid to have empathy, curiosity about the world, and a strong sense of self, and I trust that the rest will fall into place.

The specifics of what she learns or what her interests are, matter less. (Obviously I want her to learn all the academic basics, reading and math, etc.)

[slight edits]

artpepper··on Ask HN: Question for Parents of HN
- Empathy

- Imagination

- Self-actualization / strong sense of self

- Names of dinosaurs

artpepper··on How Japan Prepares Its Children for Independence
> parents are so awful at it

That's a really sweeping statement. In reference to this particular article, there may be a lot of reasons why fewer American children travel to school by themselves, including geography and transportation options.

artpepper··on How Japan Prepares Its Children for Independence
I think it depends a lot where you live, and whether it's urban, suburban, or rural.

My kid could definitely bike to school when she gets older. But to get to, say, her gymnastics class, it's 8 miles through heavy traffic with only occasional bike lanes. (In the dark in the rain, at this time of year.)

artpepper··on How Japan Prepares Its Children for Independence
But in many American suburbs, car is the only feasible way to get somewhere. So unless the 12-year-olds are driving, it's got to be the parents.
artpepper··on How Japan Prepares Its Children for Independence
My daughter's preschool [American] went on several field trips, it's not that weird. And her first "solo day of class" was sooner than a month in.

I walked to school by myself in NYC. Now I live in the suburbs, and I see plenty of kids walking themselves to school in my neighborhood. But a lot of it depends on how far away you live and the route.

Basically, I don't worry about my daughter's ability to find her way to school, I worry about her getting run down by some idiot in an SUV.

artpepper··on Time to Dump Time Zones
The real inefficiencies stem from daylight savings, and the fact that (in some places) time zones change for political reasons.
artpepper··on Time to Dump Time Zones
This is basically a form of Utopian thinking, that we should adopt a convention because it's "logical" rather than one that meets human needs.

> People forget how recent is the development of our whole ungainly apparatus. A century and a half ago, time zones didn’t exist.

That's true, but not because everyone was living on GMT. Time zones are somewhat arbitrary, but aligning everyone to a single time zone is even more arbitrary.

artpepper··on American Children Are Drowning in Self-Esteem
The author seems to be attacking common core ("so many different ways to think about simple addition") but then links it to self-esteem, without actually showing the connection. How does he know the math curriculum was designed to boost self-esteem?

Also, the ability to do rote sums is not the same as understanding math. So the fact that his son "could add up already" doesn't mean much, at least out of context.

artpepper··on Introvert Hangovers Can Be Really Rough
The "recharge" analogy resonates with me.

But solitude (at least for me) isn't just about not being around people, as if people are some kind of negative stimulus, like an allergen.

Solitude is more like a basic need for me, and too much socializing is like being starved of that need.

artpepper··on KDE Project releases KDE 1
But people do restore classic cars, for fun.
artpepper··on Using the .NET HttpClient class wrongly can destabilize software
I think the case that trips people up is using HttpClient in an ASP.NET MVC controller action. There, it doesn't look like a loop, but if you create/dispose on each request, you can get socket exhaustion under load.
artpepper··on The Dreaded Weekly Status Email
I have found standup works best when it's

- Quick, 5 to 10 minutes

- Strictly focused on current status and blockers,

- Attended only by people who are directly working on the same project.

- Has someone designated to run the standup, who is empowered to table any discussions that start to drift.

artpepper··on The Dreaded Weekly Status Email
I find standup useful exactly because it's synchronous. It's like a checkpoint, and keeps the project running smoothly, with everyone's goals aligned, nobody blocked, etc.

(We work in teams of 4-6 and standup is never more than 10 minutes. I've also had the "30-minute standup" which not really a standup...)

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