Hacker News: robinh

The Laughing Muggers

robinh — Wed, 09 Jul 2014 11:18:31 +0000

Article URL: https://medium.com/the-nib/80b1b36e4448

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8009034

Points: 1

# Comments: 0

New comment by robinh in "Woman’s cancer killed by measles virus in trial"

robinh — Thu, 15 May 2014 14:10:11 +0000

Sadly not: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarcoma

New comment by robinh in "Syntax highlighters are wrong"

robinh — Sun, 11 May 2014 15:53:19 +0000

The color red is often associated with bad; needs to stop; wrong. Removal isn't such a big step from there, I think. The opposite probably applies to green.

New comment by robinh in "Tell HN: Call your mom"

robinh — Sun, 11 May 2014 15:34:43 +0000

Best of luck to you today, too.

New comment by robinh in "Tell HN: Call your mom"

robinh — Sun, 11 May 2014 15:14:00 +0000

Ha, fairy nuff. It's what prompts one to have such a day that matters, methinks. ;)

New comment by robinh in "Tell HN: Call your mom"

robinh — Sun, 11 May 2014 15:13:36 +0000

I'm pretty sure that's not even remotely related.

New comment by robinh in "Tell HN: Call your mom"

robinh — Sun, 11 May 2014 15:13:15 +0000

Thank you. :)

New comment by robinh in "Tell HN: Call your mom"

robinh — Sun, 11 May 2014 12:40:33 +0000

I suppose it's an OK sentiment, but I'm not in contact with my parents and on days like these I keep getting reminded of that fact. I was secretly hoping there wouldn't be anything about it on HN, but I guess I'll just have to learn to deal with it.

New comment by robinh in "Can Programming Be Liberated From The Von Neumann Style? (1977) [pdf]"

robinh — Wed, 30 Apr 2014 08:49:12 +0000

I agree that concurrency isn't fundamentally hard, but the reason everyone kind of prefers faster serial execution is because a lot of algorithms (extremely simple example: f^100000(x)) are fundamentally unparallelizable. Faster serial execution is just so much more straightforward.

So a common problem with concurrency tends to be not "How do I make these functions run in parallel", but "Is there an algorithm that does the same thing I want without relying on constant function composition?"

New comment by robinh in "The Control Group Is Out of Control"

robinh — Tue, 29 Apr 2014 15:15:02 +0000

Okay, but that's not actually an answer to my question. My question basically comes down to this:

> Yes, that is intellectually dishonest, which is a huge problem. Scientists have two options: (1) accept parapsychology as real, or (2) accept that the "scientific method" (in social "sciences", at least) is insufficient.

I don't get why the whole thing is such a huge problem. The entire problem rests on needing parapsychology effects to not be real. If that need did not exist, we could just go "Okay, interesting, seems likely that there's something to it then. Let's do more research!" because, you know, we take that approach everywhere else. So my question remains: what is it about parapsychology that makes option two even valid to consider? All I can see is people just not liking that that may be how things work.

New comment by robinh in "The Control Group Is Out of Control"

robinh — Tue, 29 Apr 2014 14:53:50 +0000

So... I know next to nothing about parapsychology itself, but have seen a lot of the drama around it, and I just have to ask: is it not intellectually dishonest to call something the 'control group of science' when their results overwhelmingly support the hypothesis? I have a hard time seeing how this is different from any other form of science denialism. "We don't like the results because they clash with our preconceived notions of how the universe works so we made up this thing to ignore your evidence"? That's hardly a valid complaint. Basically, on what grounds can people claim one field to be nonsense (e.g. calling parapsychology the control group of science) but not others? Can someone explain this to me?

New comment by robinh in "Muen Kernel: Trustworthy by Design – Correct By Construction"

robinh — Sun, 27 Apr 2014 21:30:02 +0000

I think you accidentally commented in the wrong thread. Gave me a hearty chuckle in this context, though.

New comment by robinh in "Why You Shouldn't Say It's Easy When Teaching"

robinh — Sun, 27 Apr 2014 21:27:34 +0000

Good god, if only mathematics professors would learn this. If I hear the word 'trivial' one more time I swear I'm going to scream.

New comment by robinh in "Coming Soon to Hacker News: Pending Comments"

robinh — Sat, 22 Mar 2014 00:09:06 +0000

Except if you post a comment in a dead thread, your account is practically banned from participating again.

New comment by robinh in "Coming Soon to Hacker News: Pending Comments"

robinh — Sat, 22 Mar 2014 00:07:03 +0000

I'm not yet sure how to feel about this, but I have one question that remains unanswered: Will this apply to submissions (possibly in the future) as well?

PHD Comics: Cosmic Inflation Explained

robinh — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 15:41:28 +0000

Article URL: http://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1691

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7442917

Points: 10

# Comments: 1

New comment by robinh in "Python Language Features and Tricks"

robinh — Sat, 08 Mar 2014 16:36:14 +0000

I have two questions.

1. I'm unfamiliar with the term 'unpacking'. Is it any different from pattern matching in, say, Haskell (but perhaps not as feature-rich)?

2. Aren't slices pretty much a staple in Python? I didn't think using them was considered a 'trick'.

New comment by robinh in "Sixteen, Alone, 23 Hours a Day, in a Six-by-Eight-Foot Box"

robinh — Fri, 07 Mar 2014 22:02:56 +0000

Even in those extreme cases (which I hope we all agree are the exception rather than the norm), I would still consider putting someone in a few-square-meter box "cruel and unusual punishment" by any reasonable standard.

New comment by robinh in "A brief introduction to Haskell, and why it matters"

robinh — Fri, 07 Mar 2014 13:44:54 +0000

RWH is a good recommendation, although it contains a rather large number of errors. LYAH is very good for learning the basics, too.

But, if you're already a very experienced programmer, you can probably learn how to write practical programs in Haskell by just reading the IO chapter (http://book.realworldhaskell.org/read/io.html) and the Systems Programming chapter (http://book.realworldhaskell.org/read/systems-programming-in...) from RWH. These will help you understand how IO actually works in Haskell. The rest is just libraries and learning the language itself.

On a related note: I've found that starting with the main IO function is a good way to start writing any large program in Haskell. Most people I know who complain about Haskell being a mess in impure environments tend to write pure functions first, then build their IO functions on top of that, instead of the other way around. I'm not sure whether this applies for everyone, and of course this approach works well in domains that have little to do with IO (e.g. mathematical programming), but it's something to keep in mind.

New comment by robinh in "A brief introduction to Haskell, and why it matters"

robinh — Fri, 07 Mar 2014 13:39:19 +0000

Yes. Although I have no experience with Racket (so correct me if I'm wrong), the Lisps are inherently multi-paradigm languages. Haskell, on the other hand, is functional programming in its purest form. I would consider it worth learning if only for that reason, even if you don't end up using Haskell a lot.

EDIT: ...Did I just accidentally paraphrase what ESR used to say about Lisp?