Communications of the ACM
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How the “Frontier” Became the Slogan of Uncontrolled AI
Artificial intelligence (AI) has been billed as the next frontier of humanity: the newly available expanse whose exploration …
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
If you are serious about climate change… stop attending conferences?
We know that spending energy tends to release carbon in the atmosphere. In turn this warms up the Earth in the long run. This change might be detrimental. Being...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Are regular folks doomed?
I have been telling all my colleagues about Cowen’s latest book: The average is over. I really enjoyed the book. Cowen goes on in his new book to explain that regular...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Not all citations are equal: identifying key citations automatically
Suppose that you are researching a given issue. Maybe you have a medical condition or you are looking for the best algorithm to solve your current problem. A good...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Life is short: pick good ideas!
Some of us work hard to generate new ideas. All of us train on how to implement ideas. But our days look like this: I have 100 ideas. I write down 50 of them. The...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Who plays nice? Who plays rough?
I have a confession to make. I am one of these people who can’t watch a TV show like Games of throne because there is too much evil. In fact, I generally cringe...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Infinite storage: we are almost there…
Two years ago, I wrote a blog post called What is infinite storage? The blog post was a response to a Physics professor and colleague of mine who objected to my...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
People who make you feel stupid…
In his latest book, David and Goliath, Gladwell points out not everything is as it appears with respect to prestige and strength. For example, when you look at...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
We need more than spam filters: we need bona fide assistants!
I don’t know how other professionals behave, but if you email a researcher at 11pm or even 2am, there is a good chance he will get back to you within two minutes...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Toward Star Trek economics
Characters in the Star Trek universe often claim that their future Earth has abolished money. Everyone gets what he needs and nobody works for money. Unfortunately...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
What are the genuinely useful ideas in programming?
The software industry is probably the most dynamic and innovation of all industries. However, many people also try to convince us to adapt new ideas despite their...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
The written word took over the world
Whereas human beings are geared genetically toward spoken languages, written languages are an acquired ability. In this sense, it is a high-level ability. For centuries...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Why can’t you find a job with a Stanford computer science PhD?
To many of my older colleagues, the idea that you possibly couldn’t find a job with a good degree, let alone a PhD, is unthinkable. And what about a promising young...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
What do computer scientists know about performance?
Scientists make predictions and are judged on these predictions. If you study global warming, then your job is to predict the climate for the next few decades....
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
To solve hard problems, you need to use bricolage
People who think that they can design efficient solutions in the abstract, effectively believe in Oracles. That is, they somehow believe that from their desk, and...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Are 8-bit or 16-bit counters faster than 32-bit counters?
Programmers often want to count things. They typically use 32-bit counters (e.g., the int type in Java). But what if you are counting small numbers? Maybe a 16-bit...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
To succeed, adopt the post-industrial view
From time to time, students ask me wether such degree or certificate in computer science will help them get a good job. There is no shortage of studies showing...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Funding science: When bureaucrats get out of control
Throughout most of the world, scientists are almost entirely dependent on one source of funding: their government. So every few years (or more often), professors...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Picking N distinct numbers at random: how to do it fast?
To test my algorithms, I like to generate synthetic data. To do so, I often need to generate distinct randomly chosen numbers from a range of values. For example...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog
Privacy and the Internet: Is Facebook evil?
For several of my classes, I open Facebook groups so that my students can exchange online. In some instances, it has worked great. Facebook tends to do a better...
From Daniel Lemire's Blog