For most programmers, recursion seems to be a tool to completely -- but unpredictably -- blow out the stack. Cynical, I know, but that's been my experience.

Although I gotta tell ya, one of my favorite recursive things is a particular area fill routine for rectangular pixels. Simple and beautiful. Just elegant as all get out. Once I understood how it does what it does, it was like someone washed my mental windshield with Windex. That was a great day. :)

Yep. One of the things you discovered is that your school was one of the (many, many) schools that are horrible at teaching things, and in particular, math. Welcome to the real world. :)

So... how's your luck been in convincing employers (if you go that way) that your Coursera work is worthy of qualifying you for jobs?

I'm going to go with this:

The vast majority of programming is fairly simple manipulation of states and symbols, which are themselves a small subset of numbers. yes and no are 1 and 0, etc.

The way those manipulations work together quickly becomes very complex.

You can do a boatload of things with just that knowledge. Entire video games. Many types of process control and dedicated controllers. Most reasonable scripting jobs, most "webby" stuff, database stuff, etc.

But then adding some knowledge of math, in the purely technical sense, gives us more symbols to manipulate, and more ways to manipulate them, and this, like any major skills enhancement, definitely makes you a better programmer. Some mid-level math concepts -- very simple in nature, actually -- amplify what you can do so much it's just amazing.

I suspect -- I can't actually tell you because my math is only mediocre to fairly good, nor have I ever knowingly come in contact such a person -- that *really* advanced math skills combined with *really* advanced programming skills (which I can lay claim to) would combine to create a true monster programmer.

But...

I think there's something about the essentially concrete nature of programming, and the incredibly abstract nature of higher math, that makes these dual-facet powerhouses the rarest of the rare. In my experience -- admittedly, just one person's career -- serious math heads tend to be pretty lousy programmers. Lots of bugs, poor structure, little to no sensitivity to shortcuts and loading. Then really great programmers seem to be only sorta capable with math (although what they can do with what they have tends to be quite surprising.) Just an IMHO based on my experience. Something I've found interesting enough to contemplate many times. Having said that, I sure would like to meet Mr. or Ms. combination-o-both. :)

http://www.businessinsider.com...

While that is still part of the organization's core function, today less than half of the NRA's revenues come from program fees and membership dues.

The bulk of the group's money now comes in the form of contributions, grants, royalty income, and advertising, much of it originating from gun industry sources.

http://www.theatlantic.com/bus...

But around 2005, the group began systematically reaching out to its richest members for bigger checks through its "Ring of Freedom" program, which also sought to corral corporate donors. Between then and 2011, the Violence Policy Center estimates that the firearms industry donated as much as $38.9 million to the NRA's coffers. The givers include 22 different gun makers, including famous names like Smith & Wesson, Beretta USA, SIGARMS, and Sturm, Ruger & Co. that also manufacture so-called assault weapons.

Some of that funding has given the NRA a direct stake in gun and ammo sales.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/...

One of the NRA's 27 websites calls such donors "corporate partners," while another says the association is "not affiliated with any firearm or ammunition manufacturers or with any business that deals in guns and ammunition."

I'll grant that a plurality of the NRA's funding seems to come from dues, but the majority of its money comes from those with a direct or indirect financial interest in the sale of weapons and ammunition, as inconvenient that is to the NRA's projected public image.

The Virtuix Omni is basically an omnidirectional treadmill.

You use it in a VR environment and to move forward, you walk forward on the treadmilll.

This should solve the simulator sickeness issue.

Sure until you reach some stairs, or a ladder, or need to jump down from a ledge. Or crouch. Or do anything interesting with a portal gun.

And where do I put the keyboard and mouse? Or do I have to line up my shots with a toy rifle instead?

Thus being wasted by people playing in a chair with a keyboard and mouse, because I'm tired from running, and have gorilla arm from pointing. Hell, even the xbox controller crowd will finally have advantage over someone.

Not saying i don't think it would be cool I was actually on a VR setup with a treadmill like this years ago at a tech exhibition (Duke Nukem 3D was the game they used) and it was neat. But it was really neat as a 5 minute tech demo... and that's about it.

I think the poorly-written sentence (on Slashdot?) is trying to say that US and UK media generally isn't trying to pin the blame on one party or another (yet).

The NRA has its deep pockets and resultant clout not (necessarily) from numerous individual private members but from effectively being an arms industry trade group, the USCoC of arms manufacturers and dealers.

And so long as we continue to have the kinds of wealth disparities we haven't seen since 1929, catering to rich corporate interests (with varying levels of populist veneer) is the only way to get enough money to actually influence policy.

I think this is less about genetics and more about how "Evolutionary Biology" and "biological anthropology" are entire disciplines founded on the notion that present day sexual prejudices can inform the study of extinct mammals.

It's hard to take your point seriously when the only link you provide is to a webcomic.

And very unfortunately, such jerks are more likely to be able to grub funding for their research labs from government offices.

It's not about numbers. And it's not about validity. It's about manufacturing PC/media panics and distracting the public from real problems by fomenting pointless opposition on non-issues.

I'm all for open source women (girls, chicks, Ms's, whatever the PC term is today, sigh). I can think of just an issue or two I'd like to reprogram.

Wait, what? That's not...

Never mind then.

Well, let's see how "shocked" you are when the "well-reasoned, evidence-backed, meaty, professional arguments" result in your surfing becoming a lot slower, and any websites YOU decide to publish somehow don't get much traffic, because people won't wait on slow websites, as is well known. Yeah, I'll bet you'll just be happy as a clam with that, won't you? You won't see any evidence of the system being broken then, either, will you? Clearly, the problem will resolve itself you only just educate yourself a little more (presumably with what benefits the corps, and not you.)

Sure. Brilliant.

Which is exactly what he gave them. What is an engine rated in? Horsepower. Eats less hay, though, and doesn't crap directly on the street.

Yep. Just like the rest of the government. Citizen input is an illusion at best, and even then, only one that takes in the highly gullible and blindly nationalistic.

And to the mods: The A/C's comment was harshly sarcastic, but that is entirely appropriate in this circumstance. Modding the A/c (parent) comment down is stupid. It's topical, accurate, and to the point. Mod it back up. Mod mine down instead if you must mod something down just to vent your spleens, or whatever your problem is.