@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

KeithDevlin

@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org

Mathematician (Emeritus Stanford), author (inc. many for a general audience), and avid cyclist. For many years "The Math Guy" on NPR. Co-founder of the ed tech company BrainQuake. I write an edited monthly blog for the Math. Assoc. of America called "Devlin's Angle", often (not always) about #mathed. The ranking site AcademicInfluence.com ranks me No.1 of the world's "Ten Most Influential Mathematicians 2000-2020". [https://tinyurl.com/w6p2bx5s] Being active on sites like this probably helped!

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

phonner, to random
@phonner@mathstodon.xyz avatar

I really don't understand why people who left Twitter angry and disillusioned would use Bluesky. It's vulnerable to the same problems. It was started by the exact same person!

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@phonner There does seem to be an intent to avoid those pitfalls. Whether it will work is another matter https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/02/06/bluesky-launch-public-jay-graber/

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@phonner Well, I'm not taking bets on this 🤨

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Gov Ron Desantis is pretty clearly a man with a major personality disorder. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/31/magazine/new-college-desantis-florida.html?campaign_id=190&emc=edit_ufn_20240206&instance_id=114480&nl=from-the-times&regi_id=73803742&segment_id=157461&te=1&user_id=10a006dbdb5927dddcd3af03293353ee

KeithDevlin, to mathematics
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

How did human beings acquire the ability to do ? New "Devlin's Angle" post for the Math. Assoc. of America https://mathvalues.squarespace.com/masterblog/category/Devlin%27s+Angle

nfanget, to random

Seriously Adobe, that’s how you want to play this? I’m not going to set up a managed review just to annotate a few PDFs. That means I’m just going to find another application, your loss.

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@nfanget Mac users can annotate PDFs in Preview, a basic little Apple app that also does simple video editing. I use is as my default PDF reader instead of Adobe’s. Though I do have Acrobat Pro for serious PDF processing

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@nfanget Yes, there isn't the suite you'd want for typesetting proofing. (I do use Acrobat for that. I have a cheap Edu edition I bought years ago.)

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

The meltdown over Taylor Swift. Great cartoons that nail their idiocy https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/opinion/drawing-board-taylor-swift-goes-to-the-super-bowl/?artslide=0

ProfKinyon, to random
@ProfKinyon@mathstodon.xyz avatar

It pains me that before today, I spent nearly 60 years of my life having never encountered the permille ‰ and permyriad ‱ symbols.

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@ProfKinyon Well, at least you have now taken a whole bunch of us with you! 😳

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

SNL scores a winner! 😂 https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/2024/02/04/nikki-haley-saturday-night-live-ayo-edebiri/

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Right on target

sebwilken, to random German
@sebwilken@mastodon.social avatar

Frühstück mit Aussicht.

📸: Nachtzug nach Rovaniemi, Finnland

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@sebwilken Lapland in winter can be magical ...

lin11c, to random
@lin11c@toad.social avatar

New paid ads I saw on Facebook today. This is just 3 of the 8 I reported. Very disturbing. There appears to be zero standards or regulation on social media.

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KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@lin11c Are the quotations real?

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@lin11c I assumed so, but it's a relief to know for sure

lauren, to random
@lauren@mastodon.laurenweinstein.org avatar

What became known as Viagra (sildenafil citrate) was originally developed as (and eventually actually was also used as) a blood pressure and angina control drug. During the original clinical trial phase, an alert nurse noticed something odd. When she entered male patient rooms, they'd quickly turn over onto their stomach, as if they were hiding something embarrassing. She reported this anomalous behavior and the research study very quickly changed its focus.

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@lauren Is this for real? That the effect on erections was a surprise seems very plausible, but the nurse story sounds like many Silicon Valley startup origin stories, a fiction crafted to generate popular media interest 🤔

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Algebra ain't what you think it is. New post in my Mathematics Outreach Project blog, where I look at those recurring Internet debates where people get different answers to a simple arithmetic problem, such as "8 ÷ 2(2 + 2)". https://sumop.org/blog/

Sebschmoller, to random
@Sebschmoller@mastodon.social avatar

Interesting piece by Dave Bocking
about Sheffield's woodlands and their creation preservation and development. This picture in the article is from the ancient wet woodland in Gleadless Valley, where I walk almost daily: https://abitblackoverbillsmothers.substack.com/p/sunday-at-bills-mothers-28th-jan

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@Sebschmoller I can see why you would want to ...

0xabad1dea, to random

A few times I have told the anecdote that the singly most baffling thing I ever saw in a code review — not the most insecure, just the most “how could a real programmer have written this? how could this ever make sense?” thing — was simply a C++ variable “number_of_trucks” … declared as float. Unambiguously referring to real physical trucks in a fleet.

Reader, it’s been over ten years and I am blowing the gods damn whistle. I had edited that story to protect the guilty: the variable was named number_of_planes. It was shipped by a company whose name begins with “B” and rhymes with “GOING out of business.”

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@0xabad1dea OTOH, given that bits of Boeing planes fall off, maybe that declaration was appropriate. Just saying 🤔

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Algebra ain't what you think it is. New post in my Mathematics Outreach Project blog, where I look at those recurring Internet debates where people get different answers to a simple arithmetic problem, such as "8 ÷ 2(2 + 2)". https://sumop.org/blog/

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Reminder that the now publishes its monthly opinion essays on the first Tuesday of the month, so the new "Devlin's Angle" will go live on Tuesday February 6.

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Republicans are nuts https://www.theguardian.com/music/2024/jan/31/taylor-swift-travis-kelce-super-bowl-rightwing-conspiracy-biden

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

I'm not a bar guy, so never actually went inside, but Antonio's Nut House was part of my local Palo Alto neighborhood for much of my Stanford career. It closed in 2020. I walked past it tonight, and this is what's left. The site's future looks bright in a Silicon Valley sort of way, but the NH I knew is definitely now just a memory. https://www.paloaltoonline.com/2022/01/05/new-plan-would-refurbish-partially-demolish-nut-house-building/

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DemocracyMattersALot, to random
@DemocracyMattersALot@mstdn.social avatar

True!

The Supreme Court can’t punt on Trump’s disqualification without threatening the Constitution https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/4435677-the-supreme-court-cant-punt-on-trumps-disqualification-without-threatening-the-constitution/

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@DemocracyMattersALot But let's not pretend that the Republican majority on the actually respects the Constitution. They play a game where you have to start with the text and create an argument that results in whatever X the says they want and is enough to convince MAGA types its logical. (A low bar.)

KeithDevlin, to random
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

Cool. The 49ERS are back in the Superbowl, this time facing up against Taylor Swift and her team ...

djnavarro, to random
@djnavarro@hachyderm.io avatar

I have tried my best to keep up with the language. Truly. I gave up my pedantic obsession with the meaning of “ironic”, “literal”, and many many others. But try though I might I cannot stop myself from flinching every time someone uses “exponential” to mean “big”

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@djnavarro A false statement to which one can always correctly append "Not even close". 🙄

xpof, to random German

KeithDevlin,
@KeithDevlin@fediscience.org avatar

@xpof I'd feel a lot happier if we saw that kind of response here in the US. We are currently playing with fire. "American exceptionalism" is not a character description or a consequence of the Constitution; it's a state of affairs that came about as a result of a sequence of historical happenstances

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