Vassil Nikolov | Васил Николов

Radio specialist;
mathematician;
interpreter;
software engineer;
and jack of other trades.

Name pronunciation: vah-SIL nee-KOH-lov
Meridian time (offset from zulu time): +01:33
Blog, posts in English, some of them bilingual: https://vnikolov-lines.blogspot.com/search/label/language%3AEnglish
Blog, all posts: https://vnikolov-lines.blogspot.com/

Public Key

npub1eucypjwfhjzyazlphtgqx508aqz90yg3yd2m5dp5uszafxxsxmxs6gfkvk

NIP-05 Address

[email protected]

Profile Code

nprofile1qqsv7vzqe8ymepzw30sm45qr28n7spzhjygjx4d6xs6wgpw5nrgrdngpqqr26qlc

Publishing to

Author Public Key

npub1eucypjwfhjzyazlphtgqx508aqz90yg3yd2m5dp5uszafxxsxmxs6gfkvk

Show more details

Last Notes

2026-06-23 18:51:30 CEST

- reply

I only wish I had experience with Plan 9.
I have used `rc', though.
(I have used `es', too, for that matter.)
@npub1fp0…54p5 @npub1lym…fqe3 @npub1gnu…0jmx

2026-05-14 15:07:02 CEST

- reply

Hyperlinked to the adage about Algol being an improvement to its successors.
I forget the attribution, alas.
Perhaps someone of the caliber of Dijkstra or Kay.
@npub1fp0…54p5 @npub1vlc…mzqq

2025-09-16 21:28:28 CEST

- reply

I should have made a deep study of Conway and Smith's book,
and of your paper on octonions, too.
These are beautiful things.
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-09-12 06:43:17 CEST

- reply

Indeed, and worse than a quagmire.
Again, how many people think about the fate of science in Germany after 1933?
Some do, but are they enough?
This matter is bigger than physics,
but regarding the latter in particular,
was Smolin's _The Trouble with Physics_ about 15 years ago
a reasonable take?
@npub1p7u…kglz @npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-09-08 21:29:02 CEST

- reply

By the way, would you say that functional programming
has already become practical in this sense?
*
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-09-08 19:16:58 CEST

- reply

Would you clarify or qualify "co-opted", please?
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-09-07 21:08:46 CEST

- reply

Would you say that this matches the protests five years ago,
in the summer of 2020?
(Does it match them in participation?)
@npub1xw7…r9m5

2025-09-04 23:13:49 CEST

- reply

Thank you very much.
The significant part is just a single sentence at the end about an experiment just two years ago without details (I didn't follow reference 31), so I should "stay tuned".
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-09-04 19:12:54 CEST

- reply

Does this imply something about gravitational properties of antimatter?
For example, whether it's possible or impossible that gravitational force between matter and antimatter makes them repel each other.
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-09-02 15:20:00 CEST

- reply

Forgive me if it is obvious, just not to me, that the following is nonsense.
May I venture a non-educated guess that it can't be done in three dimensions, but maybe it can in four dimensions?
This doesn't match the problem,
just explains my thinking:
A can pass through B
and
B can pass through A,
if they are ellipsoids,
one "cigar"-shaped and one "disk"-shaped.
We can't make a triple with a third ellipsoid C in three dimensions,
but it ought to be possible in four.
@npub1nf4…nqe4 @npub12cu…d38p

2025-09-01 08:43:38 CEST

- reply

It's not a flaw, it's a tradeoff.
_Some_ tradeoff must be made here.
(Like in many other cases.)
@npub1326…gzqx @npub159a…j4zd @npub16hk…dqr9 @npub1unu…hpy6

2025-08-31 12:00:36 CEST

- reply

Indeed.
Now, how to make Jeff Atwood and those who listen to him take heed?
Regrettably, I don't know...
🙁
@npub1p09…m5vl

2025-08-28 14:20:53 CEST

- reply

I may want to find out if this is the same Prince Rupert as that after whom the tears of glass are named.
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-08-17 12:01:13 CEST

- reply

Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons interbred.
So it's the same with the birds, the bees—and the cats.
🙂
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-08-07 12:31:35 CEST

- reply

Right.
Seriously, fired clay (with the right additives!) is the oldest artificial material (eight thousand years, if not more) and still going strong.
@npub1nf4…nqe4 @npub12cu…d38p

2025-07-13 17:22:15 CEST

- reply

> Literally this means "Comrade Building the Nation". It's a joke about "Make America Great Again".
Yes, but I see more here.
"Build" was a keyword in Soviet bloc propaganda and I strongly suspect it has been more or less the same in China.
As in:
"We build for the Motherland."
"Let's keep building tirelessly, comrades."
"Build a new society."
Etc.
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-07-11 19:17:48 CEST

- reply

> unless you keep your mouth shut and don't do anything overtly stupid, which is its own kind of demonstration of intelligence
There is even an ancient proverb:
if you had remained silent, we would still think you were clever.
@npub1qnq…sy30 @npub1xw7…r9m5 @npub13f9…ech3

2025-07-06 13:49:24 CEST

- reply

> save some of your neighbors for a while
The last three words are key.
That would help only during the initial, milder parts of the harm of climate change.
When hundreds of millions of people start migrating, those measures won't prevent the crumbling of all of civilization, not just the one "we're used to"...
🙁
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-07-01 10:59:24 CEST

- reply

> This is not what I'd call "complete discretion".
No, it isn't.
However, this is product placement.
By the way, if a solution is proposed (either way), it will take a while to check it, won't it?
That won't stop interested parties from advertising it immediately as The Solution, I shouldn't wonder...
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-06-14 21:44:50 CEST

- reply

<">
a few pulses coming from below DON'T have their polarization flipped. And nobody knows what makes those! Enough explanations have been ruled out
</">
I suppose the latter includes ruling out that these pulses came from the opposite side?
@npub1nf4…nqe4

2025-06-05 11:28:14 CEST

- reply

> a collection of individuals each rationally maximizing their own utility
But what EXACTLY is _rational_ in this context?
An adequate, precise, explicit definition seems like it would require quite a bit of effort.
(I am even tempted to imagine it might require something on the order of an axiomatization of economics, though that is a grand but fairly useless image...)