On Dec 1, 2013, at 12:28 PM, Quincey Morris <quinceymor...@rivergatesoftware.com> wrote:
> Perhaps Graham will forgive me for putting words in his mouth, but his > position is something like this: “If the probability of a data-corrupting > collision is less than (say) one in a billion, then I’ll sleep well tonight.” > > It’s the presence of the “then” clause that makes this about intuition. I don't think that's accurate. I think that it's more like "if the probability of a corruption is less than one in 10^50..." And the confusion between "one in a billion" and "one in a truly astronomical number" is all about our intuition and its instinctive over-emphasis on small risks. If we could actually eliminate the risk of data corruption in a normally-functioning system, then there would be an argument for attempting to do so. But when the underlying physics guarantee some probability of data loss, then it's perfectly reasonable to evaluate other risks against that floor--and I do have more to say on that, but my internet connection is flaking, and I don't seem to be able to access most of the web right now, so cannot get the actual facts to use... -- Scott Ribe scott_r...@elevated-dev.com http://www.elevated-dev.com/ (303) 722-0567 voice _______________________________________________ Cocoa-dev mailing list (Cocoa-dev@lists.apple.com) Please do not post admin requests or moderator comments to the list. Contact the moderators at cocoa-dev-admins(at)lists.apple.com Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: https://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/cocoa-dev/archive%40mail-archive.com This email sent to arch...@mail-archive.com
