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Joined 3 years ago
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Cake day: June 11th, 2023

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  • wow, no.

    none of what you said is actually true.

    • “gridlock” happens in non-grid layouts too, the english name is just taken from american road patterns.
    • “show me…” no. YOU made a claim (that local information suffices, which is a VERY bold claim), so it’s on you to prove that local information suffices.
    • roads are absolutely NOT “like wires”; they are like pipes. which is why civil engineers commonly use fluid dynamics to simulate traffic.
    • the rest of what you said is irrelevant to everything else.

    seriously, if you make a claim contradicting both the very premise of the post, and common knowledge on the topic, then at least provide a source for that claim, lr explain WHY you think your claim is true.

    “all the information is there” is not enough information to verify the claim; it’s a wild guess without evidence to back it up.

    if shit where THAT simple, we’d have it figured out 50 years ago… it’s almost like this isn’t the simple problem you desperately want it to be…




  • I’m extremely sceptical about local data being enough to properly guide traffic…

    the problem is that intersections are connected.

    one intersection influences others down the line, wether that is by keeping back too much traffic, thereby unnecessarily restricting flow, or by letting too much traffic flow, thus creating blockages.

    you need a big picture approach, and you need historical data to estimate flow on any given day.

    neither can be done with local data.

    could you (slightly) improve traffic by using local traffic flow to determine signals? probably, sure.

    but in large systems, on metropolitan scales, that will inevitably lead to unforseen consequences that will probably probe impossible to solve with local solutions or will need to be handles by hard coded rules (think something like “on friday this light needs to be green for 30 sec and red for 15 sec, from 8-17h, except on holidays”) which just introduces insane amounts of maintenance…

    source: i used to do analysis on factory shop-floor-planning, which involves simulation of mathematically identical problems.

    things like assembly of parts that are dependant on other parts, all of which have different assembly speeds and locations, thus travel times, throughout the process. it gets incredibly complex, incredibly quickly, but it’s a lot of fun to solve, despite being math heavy! one exercise we did at uni, was re-creating the master’s thesis of my professor, which was about finding the optimal locations for snow plow depots containing road salt for an entire province, so, yeah, traffic analysis is largely the same thing math-wise, with a bit of added complexity due to human behavior.

    i can say, with certainty, that the data of just the local situation at any given node is not sufficient to optimize the entire system.

    you are right about real-time data being important to account for things like construction. that is actually a problem, but has little to do with the local data approach you suggested and can’t be solved by that local data approach either… it’s actually (probably) easier to solve with the big data approach!








  • that’s because they are forced to by the yt algorithm: you flat out cannot run a business on yt without resorting to clickbait titles, stupid thumbnails, and a bit of sensationalization, because the algorithm will deprioritize your video and unfairly limit your viewership if you don’t do those things.

    Steve’s videos are generally very much dry, factual reporting using fairly neutral language; or in other words: really decent reporting!

    if you want to complain about some tech youtuber doing the exact things you complain about, look at linus and jay…

    there’s some good reasons why steve is one of only a handful of tech channels i still subscribe to…



  • it’s about being able to read emotions:

    a large portion of autistic people have trouble reading emotions in others.

    that’s why they’re often drawn to things like books, comics, animated content, theater, and, like in this example, robots that clearly express their emotions.

    speaking for myself (diagnosed ASD), it’s the ambiguity that bothers me more than anything. i like it when things are nice and clear, neatly organized, and generally don’t require a lot of attention to interpret.

    interpreting the environment is taxing enough, adding a lot of emotional interpreting on top can quickly get overwhelming, which leads to poor mood, performance, and ultimately just straight-up headaches…again, this isn’t a hunch, it was part of the ASD diagnostic test.

    so i can imagine how much easier it is for kids with similar problems to relate emotionally to something that shows it’s emotions in clear, easily recognizable ways, rather than having to guess constantly. that constant guessing gets real tiring, real quick…





  • that’s the important caveat:

    it does NOT work on everyone, but that’s irrelevant.

    if it works on even 1% of people, but has zero effect on everyone else, companies would still use it everywhere anyways.

    a 1% difference over even just a couple thousand customers adds up over time.

    so, no, it doesn’t work on everyone, and it doesn’t have to.

    it just has to work on some people, and not deter any more people than it works on.

    if anyone wonders when it does and does not work: like most of these psych-tricks the effect mostly disappears when you point it out to people or otherwise make them actively think about what they’re buying.

    same for the change-the-layout-of-the-store-all-the-time thing: doesn’t work on all people, doesn’t have to.