News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:So much of academia is about connections and reputation l... by throwlaplace on Friday May 15, 2020 @10:21PM (#23199912)
>Secondarily, the fact that the polynomial is described as cubic, when it appears to be quadratic.

wut. a quadratic only has one inflection point. that plotted curve clearly has 2.

Re:So much of academia is about connections and reputation l... by andi999 on Saturday May 16, 2020 @12:02AM (#23200390)
Yes the curve has 2 inflection points, so if it were a polynomial is would have to be quartic. (Cubic polynomials have 1 inflection point at most). Buz I dont think this is a polynomial.
Re:So much of academia is about connections and reputation l... by Myrmornis on Saturday May 16, 2020 @01:05AM (#23200635)
Yep you’re right, I said something daft. It looks pretty much like a Gaussian doesn’t it?
Re:So much of academia is about connections and reputation l... by throwlaplace on Saturday May 16, 2020 @01:07AM (#23200649)
small tails. maybe. it could be anything though with the right parameters.
Re:So much of academia is about connections and reputation l... by gji on Saturday May 16, 2020 @01:22AM (#23200719)
Definitely not a cubic function though, you can't get a polynomial to hit 0 that nicely. Any polynomial's leading order term will dominate as x increases. Unless they're using a super high order polynomial and hiding the blowup off the edge of the plot.