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How to determine if your A/B test is statistically significant
A/B testing tools often lie about whether something is "statistically significant." Here's an extremely simple, mathematically sound formula to compute it for yourself.
Topics /
Math & Algorithms
The most popular blog posts about math & algorithms on Hacker News. 2,394 posts.
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Are you one of the 10% of programmers who can write a binary search?
There are some programming books that I’ve read from cover to cover repeatedly; there are others that I have dipped into many times, reading a chapter or so at a time. Jon Bentley’s 19…
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Notation And Thinking
Does notation shape our thinking? Kenneth Iverson was a mathematician who is most famous for designing APL. This was the name of his programming language, and it cleverly stood for “A Program…
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A bestiary of algorithmic trading strategies
One of the things which confronted me when I got interested in quantitative finance is the varieties of different kinds of quant. Now I realize this is pretty simple. Quants come in three basic var…
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Maze Generation: Eller's Algorithm
Algorithms, circle mazes, hex grids, masking, weaving, braiding, 3D and 4D grids, spheres, and more!
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Nobody Understands Probability
The goal of this post is to give an overview of Bayesian statistics as well as to correct errors about probability that even mathematically sophisticated people commonly make. Hopefully by the end …
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Why I left math
Reading how shocked Doron Zeilberger is at the state of modern mathematics reminded me of why I left the subject. Math departments regularl...
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Colorized Math Equations
Years ago, while working on an explanation of the Fourier Transform, I found this diagram: Most ideas aren't inherently confusing, but their technical…
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R.J. Lipton - A proof that P is not equal to NP
A serious proof that claims to have resolved the P=NP question. Vinay Deolalikar is a Principal Research Scientist at HP Labs who has done important research in various areas of networks. He also h…
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The Categories Were Made for Man, Not Man for the Categories (2014)
I. “Silliest internet atheist argument” is a hotly contested title, but I have a special place in my heart for the people who occasionally try to prove Biblical fallibility by pointing …
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The calculus of caffeine consumption
Your life is the best story! Just start your blog today!
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Insanely deep fractal zoom
I was really into fractals in college (I know…) when I was making rave flyers (I know!) for a friend’s parties in Iowa (I know! I know! Shut up already!). Anywa
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Do C compilers disprove Fermat's Last Theorem?
(You probably already have realized this.) The reason the compiler produced code that terminated was based upon the fact that the values being altered (i.e., a, b and c) within the “while” loop are never referenced again after the loop. But, once you added code which printed the resulting values it was forced to…
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Galactic-Scale Energy (2011)
[ An updated treatment of this material appears in Chapter 1 of the Energy and Human Ambitions on a Finite Planet (free) textbook , and also appears as part of an article in Nature Physics in 2022.]
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Functional Geometry
Peter Henderson wrote an article about a method to describe pictures with functional programs. I've implemented it in Lisp. An updated version of the article uses curves and different shapes and has some references to other applications for this method, like "An Algebra of Music".
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Confessions of a Math Idiot
A blog about computers, functional languages, Lisp, and Scheme.
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A critique of The Black Swan
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Quines: self-replicating programs (2005)
A “ quine ” (or “ selfrep ”) is a computer program which prints its own listing. This may sound either impossible, or trivial, or completely uninteresting, depending on your temper and your knowledge of computer science. Actually, it is possible, and there are some interesting ideas involved (in particular, writing a…
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Detailed review of MIT's OCW course "Introduction to Algorithms", Part I: Analysis of Algorithms and Asymptotic Notation
I just finished watching the last lecture of MIT's "Introduction to Algorithms" course. Having a great passion for all aspects of computing, I decided to share everything I learned with you. This is the first post in an article series about this course. As I wrote earlier, I am very serious about watching video...
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Math Every Day
Math Every Day Stevey's Drunken Blog Rants™
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Regular Expression Matching in the Wild
The first two articles in this series, “ Regular Expression Matching Can Be Simple And Fast ” and “ Regular Expression Matching: the Virtual Machine Approach ,” introduced the foundation of DFA-based and NFA-based regular expression matching. Both were based on toy implementations optimized for teaching the basic…