All heard today on Asheville FM’s Onward Through The Fog radio show: fun stuff that would work at most any old party:
[Interesting, although I don’t even know where to begin evaluating the truth of it. -egg]
On Thursday, the Federal Reserve kept its benchmark interest rate target pegged to a range of 0% to 0.25%, which is where it has been since December 2008.That’s low.Interestingly, rates aren’t just low within the context of American history.They also happen to be at the lowest levels in the 5,000 years of civilization.
Here’s an incredibly thoughtful and articulate critique of Noam Chomsky’s position on linguistic modeling from Peter Norvig, directory of research at Google. Just a totally fantastic read.
At the Brains, Minds, and Machines symposium held during MIT’s 150th birthday party, Technology Review reports that Prof. Noam Chomsky MIT: 150derided researchers in machine learning who use purely statistical methods to produce behavior that mimics something in the world, but who don’t try to understand the meaning of that behavior.The transcript is now available, so let’s quote Chomsky himself:It’s true there’s been a lot of work on trying to apply statistical models to various linguistic problems. I think there have been some successes, but a lot of failures. There is a notion of success … which I think is novel in the history of science. It interprets success as approximating unanalyzed data.This essay discusses what Chomsky said, speculates on what he might have meant, and tries to determine the truth and importance of his claims.
Source: On Chomsky and the Two Cultures of Statistical Learning
Note: a fair amount of Norvig’s position seems to be drawn from Christopher Manning’s 2002 paper “Probabilistic Syntax,” which goes into more depth on some of these topics and is also a good read, although not as much fun as Norvig’s.
A thrice-weekly webcomic written and illustrated by Reza Farazmand. New comics every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
Source: Poorly Drawn Lines – Motivated
Long before the rising waters from Greenland’s glaciers displace the desperate millions, [glaciologist Jason Box] says more than once, we will face drought-triggered agricultural failures and water-security issues—in fact, it’s already happening. Think back to the 2010 Russian heat wave. Moscow halted grain exports. At the peak of the Australian drought, food prices spiked. The Arab Spring started with food protests, the self-immolation of the vegetable vendor in Tunisia. The Syrian conflict was preceded by four years of drought. Same with Darfur. The migrants are already starting to stream north across the sea—just yesterday, eight hundred of them died when their boat capsized—and the Europeans are arguing about what to do with them. “As the Pentagon says, climate change is a conflict multiplier.”
His home state of Colorado isn’t doing so great, either. “The forests are dying, and they will not return. The trees won’t return to a warming climate. We’re going to see megafires even more, that’ll be the new one—megafires until those forests are cleared.”
However dispassionately delivered, all of this amounts to a lament, the scientist’s version of the mothers who stand on hillsides and keen over the death of their sons. In fact, Box adds, he too is a climate refugee. His daughter is three and a half, and Denmark is a great place to be in an uncertain world—there’s plenty of water, a high-tech agriculture system, increasing adoption of wind power, and plenty of geographic distance from the coming upheavals. “Especially when you consider the beginning of the flood of desperate people from conflict and drought,” he says, returning to his obsession with how profoundly changed our civilization will be.
[My god, if I had only known. -egg]
It’s listed on WD-40 official website as a myth. They say that it’s technically a lubricant, it’s job is to clean things. For some tasks around the house, WD-40 offers the job of both cleaning and lubricating. However, using WD-40 on a job that specifically needs lubrication will not yield the results you desire. I only recently learned this and wish I knew it before wasting time spraying door hinges to keep them from squeaking. You should have 3-in-1 oil along side of your WD-40. Just as versatile.
[…]
This is a common misunderstanding. It does have an oily texture, but it does dry out and it won’t keep things lubed up forever. Now, cleaning a surface that had oil or grease on it with WD-40, and then using some Tri-flow is probably your best bet.
Just had a tintype done — I like it, although less than the other tintype we’ve gotten, because it turns out that photochromic lenses don’t behave well with this technology. Still, definitely fun 🙂
In Paul Graham’s 2001 essay Beating The Averages, he convinces you that:Viaweb succeeded because Paul Graham and Robert Morris were better at programming than the other guys.PG & RTM were better at programming than the other guys ‘cuz Lisp.You should use Lisp to start shellacking the competition today!So, 14 years later, what’s changed? Can writing your company’s product with Lisp still be an advantage?
[Here’s a mighty silly country song. -egg]
[Dang, story of my life. Been thinking about this one and looking for parts I can cut out…-egg]
Source: xkcd: Tech Loops
