wjy

7 ms·

1.
by wjy 11y ago
Vance seems to be confusing the right to privacy with the ability to actually enforce it. Apparently, a "right" to privacy is all well and good, as long it can be casually violated and a warrant served later. As soon as the mech
2.
by wjy 12y ago
Many processors in a modern car have no floating point capability whatsoever. Fractional numbers are represented using integers - "fixed point" representation. While it's almost certainly true that vehicle speed is calculat
3.
by wjy 12y ago
Heat. If there's no airflow around the blower (and therefore the blower motor which is usually integrated, then the motor will run hotter. Temperature has an inverse relationship with motor lifetime. The hotter it runs, the sooner i
4.
by wjy 13y ago
If he wanted to be shut down over guilty feelings, he could, you know, just stop. So that's probably not it.
5.
by wjy 13y ago
You push a button and the blade snaps out in both cases. What's the real difference? The internal mechanisms differ, but the end result is the same.
6.
by wjy 13y ago
It's also interesting that there is no effective difference between a switchblade and these "spring assisted" knives. Yes, the mechanism is different. But in both cases, you push a button, and the blade pops out rapidly. The very existenc
7.
by wjy 14y ago
No, but that's just the point. It's smart enough to know that at key-on, it has very little information about the actual fuel level, so it allows the needle to move rapidly. As it continues to operate, it gradually (probably over a few se
8.
by wjy 14y ago
Edit: grammar Some cars are really good at this. Some are not. It depends on so many factors, including the egghead quality. I'm one of those firmware eggheads, btw. As another example, when I fuel my car from emtpy to full, as soon as I
9.
by wjy 14y ago
Being a controls engineer, this behavior always drives me crazy. I love to observe the temperature controller do its job. But it does depend on the car. A good controller will blast the heat at max until the temperature gets close to the
10.
by wjy 14y ago
My carrier didn't subsidize my phone. I bought it from Google, and put my old SIM card in it.
11.
by wjy 14y ago
There's a book called Buddha's Brain that documents several studies of people meditating while being scanned by an fMRI machine. It's quite fascinating. Regular meditation alters connections in the brain, similar to how working out a musc
12.
by wjy 15y ago
Thank you both _delirium and bermanoid. You have managed to express my sentiments exactly, but much more eloquently than I could have. I am always so frustrated by the notion of "the market is always right". As if a system with billions o
13.
by wjy 15y ago
Scheme works great in SICP because it doesn't get in the way. After the first few pages, it doesn't feel like you're reading a programming language so much as reading the direct expression of concepts discussed in the text. The programmin
14.
by wjy 15y ago
In that sentence, "one" is the subject and "in four teens" is a prepositional phrase. When choosing the verb form, we look at the subject, which is this case is singular. So, "is" is in fact the correct form to use. A more detailed explan
15.
by wjy 15y ago
That sort of reasoning works fine right up until there are only ebooks. Then there's no alternative, and the terms of service are effectively no longer voluntary.
16.
by wjy 15y ago
If voting was meant to indicate agreement or disagreement, then EVERYBODY would be able to downvote.
17.
by wjy 16y ago
I believe the article states they notified the banks before publishing the original work.
18.
by wjy 16y ago
On capitalization: You're not E.E. Cummings. He deliberately eschewed punctuation as part of his poetry, exploring possibilities. HN comments are not usually poetry in that sense. The point is to communicate ideas efficiently to others.
19.
by wjy 16y ago
I think you're right. They want to close the deal because they may have been searching for a new hire for a while, and they can only field ONE offer at a time. If you decline, they want to know as soon as possible so they can offer to the
20.
by wjy 16y ago
With all due respect, if you want the airlines to listen to you, you should say it to them , not HN.
21.
by wjy 16y ago
Good point. Maybe we should stop thinking of Lexus and Acura as luxury brands. Real luxury brands are the ones those of us in the middle class can't even consider buying. Maybach. Bentley. Rolls Royce. Bugatti. I could drive a Lexus
22.
by wjy 16y ago
Testifying is providing information to the court. Decrypting your hard drive is providing information to the court. What's the difference? I would argue that all evidence is really just information. Once again, the old lines dividing one
23.
by wjy 16y ago
You're exactly right. As a sole proprietor, I can save WAY more in my own 401k than I could at any previous employer. I think about 3x more. It's known as a "Solo 401k", adapted to suit the needs of one person's (or a married couple's) n
24.
by wjy 16y ago
That's really funny. It reminds me of my old Quiz Bowl days, where I would raise my hand while still working out the answer. I trusted my brain would finish the problem before the "well, what's your answer?" pause ran out. I suspect this
25.
by wjy 16y ago
All good questions, I think, except the last one. It doesn't matter if you volunteer to sip your explosive liquids because your intent is to die in the upcoming explosion anyway. Sipping them doesn't prove anything.
26.
by wjy 16y ago
I think the point of saying nothing is that once you open your mouth, you can say something inadvertently that could be used against you (rightly or wrongly). Once the words start coming out, one follows the other, and you'll likely end up
27.
by wjy 16y ago
Perhaps they're just independent observations of real phenomena?
28.
by wjy 16y ago
Agree. My wife and I have a protocol worked out. I can ignore any call if I need to. If it's an emergency, she will call again immediately, and that means I'd better answer it.
29.
by wjy 16y ago
One possible justification would be it distorts the reality of what actually happened in the past. It alters conversations by removing a speaker, creating a hole. I'm not judging you one bit. I don't know which sites you were referring to
30.
by wjy 16y ago
This exact same argument could be used on the theoretical pacemaker in another question. But he believes the pacemaker should free software. His response there could have been tongue-in-cheek, but I can't quite tell.

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