[PREV - GANGSTERISM]    [TOP]

SANDPITS

                                             April    13, 2012
                                             September 3, 2013

  There are traps in the
  intellectual landscape,           TRAPS
  dead ends that everyone
  is likely to run into.
                                     Recently, a joke went around
                                     the internet where someone was
  At any given time, editors         ranting about how you should
  are likely to recieve              not use regular expressions to
  multiple submissions of the        parse html; and the rant
  same clever story idea.            devolved into a Lovecraftian
                                     parody about how this act could
                                     unleash the Old Ones.
         SLUSH
                                         Sterling wondered what the guy
                                         was going on about: the point
     One of the greatest                 of the joke is simply that this
     traps, the trap that                is an approach that looks good
     underlies many others               at first, but is typically
     is to assume a                      only useful for simple tasks;
     successful strategy                 but because it *is* useful for
     in one field will                   simple tasks, beginners get
     be successful in                    stuck on it, and try to push
     all others.                         it further than they should.

     We can find certain answers                         (The right thing to
     in math; we would like to                           do-- often-- is to
     find certain answers in                             drop the regexps and
     *this* field; therefore we                          find some tree
     will apply math to it.                              parsing code.)

     The free market does a
     great job of coordinating
     social activity in *this*
     area; I bet it will do                Some mental traps often seem
     a great job in *that* area.           intractable, possibly hardwired
     Maybe in *all* areas!                 into human nature: "cognitive
                                           biases".

                                           Others, I suspect, or more
                                           conditional on the particular
                                           state of knowledge of a given
                                           field.


                                               The reason calling an idea
                                               "sophomoric" is an insult.







                                       BICAMERAL_CITY

                              TWO_CULTS
                BIBLES
                                           FUSILE_LINK
                     AUGUSTE_COMTE
                                                   STRUCTURAL_FAILURES

                                     JONAHS_COOKIE







--------
[NEXT - RETHINK]