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Comment: Re:Holmes (Score 2) 206

by Z8 (#46120851) Attached to: It's Not Memory Loss - Older Minds May Just Be Fuller of Information


Comment: We can learn a lot from NK about ski park design (Score 4, Funny) 101

by Z8 (#46017575) Attached to: US Geneticist Discusses North Korea Trip With Dennis Rodman
From TFA:


Let me guess, the water park slides all end in shark tanks?

Comment: Re:golden age of SF/Fantasy paperback is so over (Score 1) 83

by Z8 (#43865847) Attached to: Writer Jack Vance Dead At 96



Comment: Know stuff AND be a good manager (Score 1) 161

by Z8 (#43755603) Attached to: How To Talk Like a CIO









Comment: Re:Why not have a petition for something USEFUL? (Score 1) 205

by Z8 (#42584407) Attached to: Nuclear Rocket Petition On White House Website

There is basically no inefficient way to generate heat. It's just energy. One hundred 10 watt speakers are the same as ten 100 watt lightbulbs are the same as 1 kilowatt heater. The only way you lose energy is if it leaves your home. This is basic stuff.

But there are inefficient ways of heating your home with electricity. Excess heat from lighting has a coefficient of performance (COP) of only 1, compared to 2-3 for many practical alternatives.


Comment: Re:Bad Statistics (Score 1) 361

by Z8 (#41365853) Attached to: Why America's School "Lag" Has Never Mattered

Sorry to reply to myself, but this CDC report says that the main reason the US does poorly is that it has a larger proportion of preterm births.

Why does the US have more preterm births? This article mentions a few factors: a greater percentage of mothers may be teenagers or older than 35, mothers may have worse preventative health care, and/or mothers have higher risk factors like diabetes and obesity.

So anyway it seems like a complex situation; I'm sure there's plenty in here anyone can cherrypick to support their political views.

Comment: Re:Bad Statistics (Score 1) 361

by Z8 (#41365751) Attached to: Why America's School "Lag" Has Never Mattered

The normal quoted newborn survival statistics are in fact from the CIA world fact book [cia.gov], which is quoted as "the number of deaths of infants under one year old in a given year per 1,000 live births in the same year", thus not really warped at all.

All statistics are warped in some way. The issue isn't whether the baby is 100 days old as GP said, but what counts as a "live birth". This page has some discussion of the complexities. Apparently some, but not most, of the US's poor record is due to these issues.

Comment: Re:Except (Score 1) 85

by Z8 (#40702905) Attached to: Small, Big-Brained Animals Dodge Extinction

As other people have pointed out, this isn't necessarily a good measure. If two animals have the same brain size and one is smaller, it doesn't mean the smaller one is smarter.

A better measure may just be the number of neurons in the cerebral cortex. See this list for example. Humans come out on top by this definition, even though whales have much bigger brains.

Comment: Re:Functional languages - whats the point? (Score 1) 93

by Z8 (#40360411) Attached to: Erlang and OpenFlow Together At Last
This seems to conflate dynamic vs static typing and functional vs procedural. The problem you discuss comes up in procedural languages all the time:

if (TEST) return bar(); else return baz();

That's more a "problem" with dynamic typing. Statically typed functional languages like Haskell or the ML family use type inferencing systems to detect these types of problems at compile-time. There's been a lot of progress made on type systems since C/C++ were developed. As the previous poster mentioned, Haskell has a particularly nice type system that can catch at compile-time issues that would generate run-time errors in C-like languages.

Comment: Re:Just read proposed legislation (Score 1) 115

by Z8 (#39796655) Attached to: Hacking the Law

Wow, thanks for the thoughtful and constructive post that is a refreshing change from the kneejerk cynicism/fatalism that is the usual Slashdot groupthink.

I once was on a plane and sat next to a state legislator. I brought up the concept of gerrymandering electoral districts, and argued that it's unfair to moderate voters and creates a less responsive, more divisive political culture. I think he honestly hadn't thought much about these issues before and I hopefully influenced his opinion a bit. Also it's not hopeless—quite a few states have moved to a fairer process recently.

But anyway, if I can be the typical Slashdot cynic for a moment, how do we know that the politicians actually pay attention to these letters or conversations? Do you have any specific stories or evidence which let you to believe you made a difference?

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