orangeeater
...written in 1984. I do not believe we've made any progress in terms of creating "responsible machines."
My general feeling about the Chinese Room argument is that it discusses the "psychological phenomenon of understanding." We don't really know what that phenomenon is, it's a feeling or sensation from our perspective (or at least from mine) and so I'm uncomfortable ascribing much importance to it. Until we understand how our minds actually work, the "Turing test approach" makes sense to me: if we can't tell the difference, then it's "responsible."
My experience has been that, in everything with a competitive aspect, there is a phenomenon where suboptimal choices become optimal because they are unexpected.
Chess, war, video games, sports, everything. As you point out, in the long run, the better player comes out ahead. That's what "being better" means. But the long run isn't always what counts. Sometimes two competitors are going to meet exactly once or the situation is going to be "winner takes all".
The cultural elite isn't self-appointed. They clawed their way up there the same way as everyone else who has reached some position in some hierarchy. And that includes various hierarchies of artists.
> The disparity in esteem between pop and rock springs to mind. We have an ingrained sense that if a record appeals to 13-year-old girls, then it must on some level be inherently inferior to a record that appeals to middle-aged men, regardless of the actual sophistication of the music in question.
I think the more standard criticism is that some music is made by a committee as a product whereas other music is the result of a group/individual trying to make good music and that, in general, the latter category is better. I don't necessarily accept this argument, but it's different than the one you're proposing.
More generally, I find your attitude perplexing. If you want to think about this subject seriously, then surely there is no objective way to view art. If that's the case, then saying "you can be goofy and make art" is pointless because it's obvious. It's all just people's opinions. "Being goofy" can be art just like anything else.
Where I strongly disagree is where you sneer at "high art" and the "cultural elite". In my opinion, "high art" is art that is appreciated by rich/educated people who have been exposed to different things than less rich/less educated people. "High art" isn't better or worse than "low art". The definition of art is "something from which people derive emotion".
Ah, that's quite cool.
Urgh. Really?
I think intensive parenting is an arms race, more or less. I don't know if it "works" but I think it's increasingly common mainly due to a feedback loop of parental anxiety.
I don't think it has a thing to do with race, though.
Can you explain what Java offers with regard to reflection that JS doesn't?
My feeling is that reflection is almost moot in JS since you can inspect/mutate objects at runtime however you like. But maybe I'm missing the point of reflection.
There is a Reflect object with a bunch of static methods on it in ES6. It mostly just replicates functonality that already exists in the language, and my suspicion is that it's mainly there so it can be extended at a later date without breaking backwards compatiblity.
Agreed: ignorance is not embarrassing. We're all ignorant about most things.
But it is embarrassing to say something like "why'd they name iota after a Greek letter? To seem smart?" As this article explains, there is a history there and it doesn't have anything to do with "seeming smart".
I didn't know the history of "iota". I'm only vaguely familiar with APL. And I've never listened to a Turning Award lecture. This makes me ignorant. But I also didn't criticize this feature from my place of ignorance because I'm aware of it. Had I done so, it would be embarrassing.
I have criticized things from ignorance in the past, and it was embarrassing.
He's working for amazon to get a loan so he can refinance his house. I think that's half-true, and I suspect the other half is that he got a job there so he could write this article.
Either way I liked the article - it's a little misleading though.
Few general remarks:
1. If people have lots of luggage or aren't comfortable using the escalator, they can take the elevator (and they do).
2. Saying that standing would prevent accidents is like saying banning cars would prevent accidents - not a particularly helpful observation. Humans are only willing to minimize risk up to a point.
3. The more complicated argument in the article is that standing would increase capacity. I don't know - I avoid rush hour, but the escalators seem empty enough so that I can walk up/down unobstructed. It's hard for me to see how I'm negatively affecting capacity. In cases where the escalator is packed, I'll stand rather than being pushy, but that never happens during the week.
I doubt many people would use this app. Physical attraction is too important.
If I was going to design a dating app, I would restrict people to having 1-3 (needs testing) likes/conversations at a time. If you start a new conversation, you drop your oldest one, and the person you dropped would be informed.
The idea would be to encourage users to be more discerning and invest more in conversations.
More generally, I reject the "soul mate theory of dating" - I think most people could be happy with most of the people they find interesting/attractive off the bat (and some of the people they don't). But the multitude of options discourages users from investing in a conversation or meeting up and encourages flash-in-the-pan dating strategies. These strategies rarely translate into the long-term relationships that most users claim to be looking for.
I'm not convinced that this idea would be popular. Admittedly it mainly appeals to my sensibilities (I've never been comfortable with "casting a wide net").