User23's comments

On: They tried Made in the USA – it was too expensive for their customers

[User23]

It took decades to gut American consumer manufacturing. Anyone who thinks it can be brought back without pain is deluded. But nevertheless, it’s worth that pain.

As the Chinese are well aware, every time in history a great financial power and a great industrial power have come into conflict, the industrial power wins.

On: Central Park hits temp record last seen in 1888

[User23]

Given that we basically use the same technique for censuses today, the ancient ones probably weren’t especially less reliable.

On: Scientists genetically engineer a lethal mosquito STD to combat malaria

[User23]

Next do ticks.

[rickydroll → User23]

Yes, do ticks like the Asian Longhorn tick. Nasty little fuckers.

On: The Art of Lisp and Writing (2003)

[User23]

> You can’t avoid parentheses

Well, you can with reader macros, assuming you’re willing to consider an init file that you only look at when you write sufficiently avoidant.

It’s not done though, because experience has shown it’s not really worth it.

On: The Art of Lisp and Writing (2003)

[User23]

Have you seen LOOP[1]? That example barely scratches the surface too.

As for being able to make words mean different things and break grammatical strictures; that’s called poetry when we do it in English. And yes there is bad poetry, but some is superlative.

[1] https://www.lispworks.com/documentation/lw51/LWRM/html/lwref...

On: Peano arithmetic is enough, because Peano arithmetic encodes computation

[User23]

Canonically indented Lisp reads an awful lot like Python. You don’t read the braces, you read the indentation.

On: Cysteine depletion triggers adipose tissue thermogenesis and weight loss

[User23]

I would make a stronger statement and say that this belongs squarely on the effect and not the cause side.

I could be wrong, but I doubt it. Amino acid depletion sounds way more likely to be due to some kind of disruption in homeostasis rather than dietary intake.

On: Machine Code Isn't Scary

[User23]

This is super cool!

Creating an assembler with Lisp syntax and then using that to bootstrap a Lisp compiler (with Lisp macros instead of standard assembler macros) is one of those otherwise pointless educational projects I’ve been wanting to do for years. One day perhaps.

[pjmlp → User23]

Even though I tend to be a bit negative into the whole WebAssembly hype, that is exactly a good starting point.

You already have the assembler with Lisp syntax covered.

Add some macro support on top, and you can start already implementing the upper layer for your Lisp.

Naturally there are already a couple of attempts at that.

On: Why does the U.S. always run a trade deficit?

[User23]

More precisely it’s because the EU has no fiscal unified fiscal policy. Every member is a currency user of a foreign currency it must acquire from the ECB.

Wynne Godley explained this all nicely in Maastricht and All That.

On: The effect of physical fitness on mortality is overestimated

[User23]

All else being equal a more fit person is more likely to avoid an otherwise fatal accident.