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A comment on How not to be a crank: rules for not being a science-dick. Parent comment

Re:How not to be a crank: rules for not being a science-dick by ninkendo on Sunday March 04, 2018 @02:01PM (#16515965)
How do you improve your knowledge if every path forward is still wrong?

(In ML terms, how do you apply gradient descent if every path forward is up?)

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Re:How not to be a crank: rules for not being a science-dick by kevan on Sunday March 04, 2018 @02:38PM (#16516182)
Not OP, but I think the idea is to consciously pause before taking the path that is obviously (to you) downhill. This gives you a chance to think whether it's actually downhill instead of making an assumption. It's a way to practice mindfulness
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Re:How not to be a crank: rules for not being a science-dick by Thrymr on Sunday March 04, 2018 @04:40PM (#16516929)
You start with a prior, but you assume that it is not the optimal solution.
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