16 NOV 2017 by ideonexus
Understanding the Education Customer
VCs and entrepreneurs tend to be well educated. Well educated people think about education as an investment. You put as many of your resources in to an investment as you can. It may take 20 years to pay off, but if the return-on-investment is high (which it is for education) then you invest. This group of people — if you’re reading this, you fall into this group — generally understand that education is an investment, and as a result are price insensitive and will optimize for quality ... 1 
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notes24 MAR 2015 by ideonexus
There is Too Much Art to Consume It All
So I have a counterclaim that exists today - Deviantart.
Why can't everyone be an artist? Because you can only consume so much art. I have a page group that is currently ~45 pages of artists on that website whose galleries I need to review and potentially watch. They total up to around 15k works of art, and that pool just grows, I can never get it under wraps, because it would take me probably a full workweek just to get through half of that.
On that, I'm already following nearly one thousa... 1 notes
notes06 FEB 2015 by ideonexus
We Must Think Outside the Rocket Equation
The rocket equation contains three variables. Given any two of these, the third becomes cast in stone. Hope, wishing, or tantrums cannot alter this result. Although a momentum balance, these variables can be cast as energies. They are the energy expenditure against gravity (often called delta V or the change in rocket velocity), the energy available in your rocket propellant (often called exhaust velocity or specific impulse), and the propellant mass fraction (how much propellant you need com... 1 notes
notes09 AUG 2014 by ideonexus
Hydrogen Levels in the Universe
Our Sun is significantly enriched, having formed when the Universe was more than 9 billion years old in the plane of a spiral galaxy, one of the most enriched places in the Universe. Yet, when our Sun formed, it was still made out of — by mass — 71% hydrogen, 27% helium, and about 2% “other” stuff. If we convert that into “number of atoms” and treat the Sun as typical of the Universe, that means, over the first 9.3 billion years of the Universe, the fraction of hydrogen ha... 1 notes
notes24 JUN 2014 by ideonexus
The Law of Large Numbers
The game is called who’s the best at flipping coins. It’s pretty simple. You flip a bunch of coins and whoever gets the most heads wins. To make this a little more interesting, though, not everybody has the same number of coins. Some people—Team Small—have only ten coins, while the members of Team Big have a hundred each.
If we score by absolute number of heads, one thing’s for almost sure—the winner of this game is going to come from Team Big. The typical Big player is going to ...Folksonomies: mathematics statistics
Folksonomies: mathematics statistics
1 notes
notes30 DEC 2013 by ideonexus
Gompertz Law of human mortality
What do you think are the odds that you will die during the next year? Try to put a number to it — 1 in 100? 1 in 10,000? Whatever it is, it will be twice as large 8 years from now.
This startling fact was first noticed by the British actuary Benjamin Gompertz in 1825 and is now called the “Gompertz Law of human mortality.” Your probability of dying during a given year doubles every 8 years. For me, a 25-year-old American, the probability of dying during the next year is a fairly ...Folksonomies: statistics mortality
Folksonomies: statistics mortality
1 notes
notesYour chances of dying double every eight years.
29 DEC 2013 by ideonexus
Language is Important in Direction
The room is made i.^ up of four curtains, used to create four walls in a rectangle, defined by two types of information: geometric (two short walls and two long walls) and color information (one red wall).
Now, think about the corners. If you are using only geometric information, pairs of corners are identical. There are two corners with a short wall on the ft and a long wall on the right, and two corners the other way around. If you are using only color information, there are also two pair... 1 notes
notesDeprived of the language centers of the brain, subjects are unable to determine their location in a test.
26 AUG 2013 by ideonexus
Starcraft and Neuroplasticity
Prior experimental investigation of the cognitive consequences of video gaming provides evidence that cognitive and perceptual changes occur in those who transition from non-gamers to gamers. Specifically, training on action games (e.g., first-person, fast paced, kill-or-be-killed situations) has been linked to enhanced core perceptual processing [10], [11]. Action video game novices assigned to action video game training experience a number of benefits, including higher contrast sensitivity ... 1 notes
notesDesign of an experiment to determine if the realtime strategy game improves cognition.
08 APR 2013 by ideonexus
The Planning Fallacy
Professor McGonagall opened her mouth, then closed it. The witch rubbed the bridge of her nose, looking thoughtful. "Mr. Potter... if I were to offer to listen to you for a while... is there anything you'd like to talk to me about?"
"About what?"
"About why you're convinced you must always be on your guard against terrible things happening to you."
Harry stared at her in puzzlement. That was a self-evident axiom. "Well..." Harry said slowly. He tried to organise his thoughts. How could he e...Folksonomies: cognitive bias fallacy
Folksonomies: cognitive bias fallacy
1 notes
notesWe underestimate how close we are to completing a task, the only solution is to consider how long it took us to complete the last time we did it.
03 MAY 2011 by ideonexus
Two Sexes is Inefficient
Many fungi are sexual, but they do not have males. They have tens of thousands of different sexes, all physically identical, all capable of mating on equal terms. but all incapable of mating with themselves. Even among animals there are many, such as the earthworm, that are hermaphrodites. To 3e sexual does not necessarily imply the need for sexes, let alone for just two sexes, let alone for two sexes as different as men and women. Indeed, at first sight, the most foolish system of all is two... 1 notes
notesFungi have thousands of different sexes, making almost everyone a potential partner, for humans, 50% of people are not potential partners.
