mariodiana

The "two weeks" originated from the idea of instituting periodic, local lockdowns in order to keep hospitals from filling to overflow. The idea wasn't to keep people from dying from COVID-19, per se. The idea was that there would be some people who would be affected severely by the virus, but who could pull through if given supportive care in a hospital. What we didn't want was numbers getting so high that people who could have pulled through wouldn't because there were no available bed for them. That's the original idea behind how lockdowns were supposed to be used.

But, returning to my original point, once things locked down, a number of politicians realized that they would be blamed for any deaths that occurred when the lockdown was lifted. These politicians received support from the "if we can save even just one life" crowd — which I'm characterizing as the neurotic.

Some of us would argue that the year-long (and counting) lockdowns are the result of neurotics imposing on the rest of us. Some of us have been arguing since the beginning of all this that the old and infirm should have been the ones to isolate themselves — with accommodations and support from the rest of society — while the rest of us took sensible precautions and continued on with the business of life. Some of us trusted that "two weeks to slow the spread" was the sensible policy and what our governments would follow. Instead, what happened was an extended and irrational panic by some forced on the rest of us.

So, I think it's terrific if people would accept their neuroses and not bother the rest of us. But there is no evidence that that's how things work.

It says the aliens have surreptitiously captured the EU and are using seemingly benign regulations to censor information that threatens their plans to enslave humanity.

Thank you. In light of the fact that George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language" essay was just recently posted here, I want to acknowledge that you make a better case than I do. One should aim to make one's meaning plain, as opposed to resorting to inflated (and often vague) language.

You're welcome. But I have to say that I think one of the other replies to my post makes a better case than I.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27223555

The first call for censorship, after the invention of the printing press, and specifically because of the printing press, was from scholars upset that their authority was being challenged by this new technology, which allowed anyone to distribute information.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/renaissance-quarterl...

I remembered this because I cited this essay in an undergraduate history paper I wrote. The author was my professor — which didn't hurt ;-)

It's a neologism. Some people love it. (Actually, it seems like a lot of people do.) To others however, it strikes the ear as awkward sounding. I wouldn't say there's anything "wrong" about it. It's a matter of taste. It's a bit of a pet peeve for some of us.

I bought a book a couple of years ago: iOS and macOS Performance Tuning. I took note that the author had not used the word "performant" even once in the book's 400 pages. Maybe I'm a snob, but it made the author seem the more credible to me.

I can't fault Indians for "prepone" when so many of my fellow programmers say "performant."

> [I]t was just a twisted protein, capable of performing the microscopic equivalent of a Jedi mind trick, compelling normal proteins on the surface of nerve cells in the brain to contort just like them. The so-called "prions," or "proteinaceous infectious particles," would eventually misfold enough proteins to kill pockets of nerve cells in the brain […]

Disclaimer: Somebody stop me if I'm spreading misinformation, because I am way out of my wheelhouse. Honestly, I would like to be disabused of this suspicion if it's entirely fanciful. So, if someone knows something about what I'm about to discuss, please weigh in. The subject is genetically modified organisms.

My understanding is that at least some (if not all) GMO's are produced by bombarding an organism's genetic material with radiation and then separating out modified organisms that seem to be useful. This process, however, does result in misfolded proteins. Often, scientists judge that these misfolded proteins are of no harm, and so some GMO's (if not all) make it to market with misfolded proteins. That's my understanding.

I'm wondering two things. First, is my above account (over-simplified in any case) basically right or way off base? Second, if it's basically right, aren't we playing a very dangerous game with things we don't understand well enough?

I read about this years ago in a very good book (for the layman) on the subject of probability: "The Drunkard's Walk." I highly recommend the book.

You're no doubt correct. But gym class for me was something like 35 years ago.

Having been historically marginalized in gym class, I ask why stop at math?

A natural diamond is nature's NFT.

I can't be the only one, but I feel pretty sure I'm in a minority among computer programmers. This "bottom-up" approach is just not the way my brain works. I definitely feel I'm a top-down sort of thinker and learner, and this puts me at a disadvantage, regarding the literature and approach in this profession.

Are the terms describing the two approaches here "empirical" versus "rational"? I'm talking about building bit by bit as opposed to getting an overview and then drilling down. I definitely feel like I benefit from the second. And I almost feel like it may not be too strong to suggest that I'm actively harmed by the first.

Something like the author's approach is great, for my purposes, when I already pretty much understand something. But I can't start here.

Again, I feel like I'm in a minority. But anyone else have this turn of mind, too? How do you cope? Do you just look for other materials?

What did all these people have in common? I can't imagine.

The more experience I gain as professional software developer, the more I begin to appreciate that what matters is the entire "ecosystem," rather than what language I'm programming in.

What's the IDE like? How are dependencies managed? Is there a solid framework, as opposed to "move fast and break things" frameworks or "scores of amateurish third-party add-ons to choose from" to solve everyday problems? What's the programming community like? What kind of companies use these solutions, and what's the culture like there?

Tools a big part of what we do. If I were a mechanic, I would rather work on Hondas with a good set of tools than I would Ferraris with tools bought at WalMart.

Personally, I've done only a tiny amount of C# development. I'd have no problem going back to that.

Facebook should stay out of policing speech.

Plus, when a 100-year pandemic hits and people flee the nearby metropolitan area for your upstate town, waving wads of cash and bidding up prices, and your landlady decides she'd like to get in on the action and put up for sale the house you live in, so on top of all the other stress and uncertainty of living through a 100-year pandemic you can also wonder where you're going to find a new place to live, you'll thank your lucky stars you never made the mistake of becoming a homeowner.

I was a history major in the 1990's, at a rather modest public college (in the U.S.), and we were fully disabused of this myth. In fact, even in my survey course this myth was addressed.

If this myth is still going on, it's because everything is so oversimplified in high school (arguably, with good reason), and few people ever go beyond that. Historians have long since moved past Burkhardt.

> DNA digital data storage is the process of encoding and decoding binary data to and from synthesized strands of DNA.

If each "bit" of DNA can be either A, C, G, or T, why call that binary?

Voter fraud is rare. I think I read that in the Washington Post.

I'm going by memory of Spolsky's article, from when I read it many years ago. One of his main points was that in asking a person to reverse a linked list, he watched to see if the person first sketched out a diagram, or simply started writing code -- because, as he believed, no one could do this without first sketching out a diagram, and going right to code was a red flag, indicating someone who (my memory is foggier, here) lacked the right temperament for a developer.

I had been going to the gym, three or four days a week, for 9 months, until the gyms got shut down. I had never been a gym goer before in my entire life, and never really exercised all that regularly. The gym has since reopened -- with various restrictions -- but I have not found my way back. I have gained at least an inch on my waist.

No.

> 90% of them are just shit at their jobs.

As the joke goes, "What do you call the person who graduated last in his or her class in medical school? Doctor."

Some years ago I was applying for a job and had to fill out a form for a background check. The background check asked for my last several addresses — and I had no idea what they were. Even then, it seemed obvious to try googling myself. Scary! In a few minutes I had every address I had ever lived at.

The world would be a much better place if Twitter were used only by mouth-breathing weirdos battling one another in full-on flame wars over which is better: vi or emacs.

I'm not joking. I think the pathology that exists on Twitter has always been with us. But, years ago, there was only a "select" group of individuals who had their pathology amplified by Internet forums. Now, people who have no idea what a flame war even is — much less vi or emacs — go to war day after day. And there are millions of them, from every walk of life.

So, we've demonstrated flame wars are scalable. Hooray.

> While it may certainly be satisfying to see President Trump—by all accounts a dangerous leader who goaded his white supremacist followers into violent actions—banned […]

This is the counterpoint? They share the same assumptions.

There is an NPR (National Public Radio) show called "This American Life" and several years back it had an episode devoted to this. They interviewed regulators. The big banks, for instance, will have an office on site for a regulator. The pull is to "go native" at some point.

There is no "probably." It is well-known that people leave their civil servant jobs at regulatory industries, after putting in their time, and bring their know-how and connections to big banks and hedge funds in return for cushy salaries.