https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embarrassingly_parallel

My point was that safety factors are a part of this. A safety factor of 1.0, designing bridges so that they can perfectly withstand the expectations of intended use, means that some unacceptable % of those bridges will fall down in practice.

In other words, it's true that you can explain safety factors as:

> Assuming perfect construction, and no defects, under designed maximum load, make sure that this bridge really stays up by a wide margin

But that misses the point of why we use safety factors. Nobody is paying for a bridge to really stay up by a wide margin. Because there's no material difference between a bridge that stays up, and a bridge that really stays up, right up until the point that the weaker one falls down due to inevitable over-loading or defects in construction / materials.

Without a safety factor, that uncertainty means that, some of the time, some of your bridge will fall down

In fact it's worse for the astronauts, because in this hypothetical only the heat shield failing will condemn the POs to death, whereas any critical part failing kills the astronauts

Yes, it's a much sexier job than project manager, but clearly there are some people, in some circumstances, that would accept it.

For a contrived example, imagine I'm in a warzone:

- Secure = Enemies can't read my messages. Good. But they can still triangulate my position.

- Covert = Enemies don't know I exist

- Signalling: I dress more formally than everyone else to make up for the fact I'm less professional in other ways

- No signalling: I dress like everyone else because I am like everyone else

- Countersignalling: I wear ratty old clothes with holes in them, and nobody will dare to question it because I'm the important one here

If you approach it as a cost cutting exercise, you end up with crap. If you approach it as a way to make a better experience while you sleep, it's achievable.

It's hinted at a little bit in the OP, with:

> What does good system design look like? I’ve written before that it looks underwhelming

This is because there are humans in your system! Other developers! You in the future! You have to resort to heuristics like "simple == good" because you're only looking at a small part of the whole system.

And zoom out even more, you get to the actual users. How do they interact with the system? If you implement a rate limiter, how do the users respond when they hit it? Do they just spam-refresh the page? Open more tabs? Use their phone? Do they develop weird superstitions about it? Do they spam-call your phone support lines? Does your response to a thundering herd anticipate the second-order impact of your phone support lines being DDOSed?

Someone with ADHD taking a large dose will therefore feel the same as someone without ADHD taking a small(er) dose.

Methylphenidate improves sleep in people with ADHD: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2276739/

> Compared to [non-adhd] controls untreated [adhd] patients showed increased nocturnal activity, reduced sleep efficiency, more nocturnal awakenings and reduced percentage of REM sleep. Treatment [of those with adhd] with methylphenidate resulted in increased sleep efficiency as well as a subjective feeling of improved restorative value of sleep.

I can't find a corresponding paper studying the effect of stimulants on sleep in healthy adults. I would assume it hasn't been studied because it's common knowledge and it's not worth the risk of making healthy people take stimulants. I also don't think that's the part you were disputing.

The phrase is "normal, non-zero-tolerance policy"

> A zero-tolerance policy is one which imposes a punishment for every infraction of a stated rule. Zero-tolerance policies forbid people in positions of authority from exercising discretion or changing punishments to fit the circumstances subjectively; they are required to impose a predetermined punishment regardless of individual culpability, extenuating circumstances, or history.

If you use "zero tolerance" to mean "zero tolerance for starting a fight" you need to make that very clear, because that's not how it's used in schools currently.