Halloween goat, not ghost (October 2024 goat nominations)

Note: lonocat’s username starts with a lower-case “L”, not an upper-case “i”.

@werehatrack but it seems she typed it correctly, sooooooo

@kyeh. Just so everyone knows I got a whisper from WHR. Seems the post was edited by a mod, but it is not notated as such. Is it just me or should edits be called out? I personally dont want folks editing my posts w/o my concent or w/o notating the change. @kyeh, since its your post, what say you?

@Kyeh @tinamarie1974 As I have a week left of goat podium I would say that if I ever modify my OWN posts in the few minutes we get, I usually say EDIT or UPDATE on any added info. Only exception is like 1-char typos or syntax errors.

@tinamarie1974 I actually meant to check whether it was an “el” or a “cap I” but forgot.
I think asking before changing something is best, unless it’s something offensive. But this time around I think we can just blame our current goat and forget the whole thing!

@Kyeh @pmarin @tinamarie1974 I want to Blame you for my cat getting Sick! The Vet even took X-Rays. that set me back about $450!

@Kyeh it seems that @narfcake threatened to nominate me last year for the same reason

@lonocat @narfcake You mean you handed them out last year TOO?
Of course, maybe that’s sneaky brilliance, because that might assure that you don’t get any trick-or-treaters this year!

@Kyeh @narfcake I don’t usually get very many trick-or-treaters at my house, but last year Halloween fell on a Tuesday, and since I play on a Tuesday league, I left candy and TrackRs on a table outside my front door.
When I got home the TrackRs were all gone and most of the candy. So I guess that they liked them. I also put a note on each to try the swiftfinder app

@lonocat @narfcake Or at least they wanted to try them! I wonder if any of them actually got used?

@Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake

it seems that @narfcake threatened to nominate me last year for the same reason

Then it seems to me you finally have it coming

ATTENTION EVERYONE: VOTE NOW FOR @lonocat

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @narfcake

@Kyeh @narfcake Voting for you (@lonocat). Right?

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @narfcake well I was hoping that there would be other nominees, so, I guess “Vote for NONE OF THE ABOVE “

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @lonocat A nomination for “absolutely nobody” is always an option too, as the goat of the month has always been a mehmbers choice.

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @narfcake I just assumed that as a nominee, putting up a protest was the proper decorum.

@Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake Protests can work. For a while anyway. For me it worked for about two years, then it didn’t, even after I posted a death certificate with forged meh signatures on it attesting to my untimely death.

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake I did, and it didn’t seem to help!

I think for me I was deer… goat in the headlights. What is this? I don’t remember applying for anything? Can I just go back to sleep and make it go away?
Apparently not.
/youtube wish it into the cornfield, Johnny

@Kidsandliz @lonocat @narfcake @pmarin
I think you’ve jumped (heheh) into your goatdom with great enthusiasm - one of our most energetic goats in a long time!

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @narfcake @pmarin

@Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake @pmarin You are digging your own grave on this thread.

/giphy you are doomed to be goat

@Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake @pmarin Well not what I was looking for but fitting enough.

@lonocat This late in the process, with this much of a lead (unopposed), your only hope would be to nominate someone else whose qualifications so clearly eclipsed yours as to persuade the electorate to shift its support en masse.

This, too, seldom works.

@Kidsandliz @Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake
/showme goat candidate for president stating “If nominated I will not run; if elected I will not serve.”

@mediocrebot since unable to reasonably parse the last line to mean anything else, seems like @lonocat ‘s destiny is confirmed. So decrees the goat!

@lonocat @pmarin
/showme Will Noll

@lonocat @pmarin Okay, so the goat just won’t have to serve that guy.

@lonocat @narfcake @pmarin So are those lower case “els” or upper case "i"s in that name??

@Kyeh @lonocat @narfcake @pmarin

So are those lower case “els” or upper case "i"s in that name??

Possibly, but | haven’t checked.

@tinamarie1974 you do mean he typed it that way

@mediocrebot do Halloween goats tricK-or-treat?

@mediocrebot @phendrick Mighty fine horns and “goatee”

But how did the full moon get in front of the tree trunk on the right?

@mediocrebot @phendrick Real goats in general tend to favor the “trick”, or so my goat-owning (and emeritus) friends tell me.

@mediocrebot @pmarin i’m sure it’s an optical illusion induced by too much moonshine

@mediocrebot @werehatrack But they do tend to provide some of the essentials for goat milk fudge, which is definitely a treat, iMO.
[And i will be thinking about some for a while, now.]

Also the Funny Farm goat cheese mac from a few weeks ago here was pretty good, too.

When my son was new-born, he had many very severe allergies (broke out in boils!) and couldn’t tolerate regular dairy, among other foods. But our PCP suggested goat milk (canned) and he did fine on that. (i used to tell him that’s why he had such a hard head and was very stubborn…) Thankfully, he’s outgrown those allergies, though there are some foods he just doesn’t like still.

@phendrick @werehatrack My children once kept a couple of goats for 4H. To me, goat milk (and cheese or anything else made from the milk) tastes just like goats smell. No thank you - I hereby bequeath my lifetime share of any goat-derived products to those who can appreciate them.

@macromeh @phendrick @werehatrack Well, despite the (acquired?) taste it’s supposed to be better for you and easier to digest than standard “cow milk.” I DO like goat cheese at times. Also, not directly goat-y, but if you like Feta cheese be aware that authentic Feta (usually from the Mediterranean) is made from sheep’s milk, whereas the big tubs of it you get here are cow’s milk. They are both fine but authentic Feta should be sheep’s milk. I’m just a goat standing up for my comrades in the less-bovine category. (unless someone corrects me and says they are all bovines; might be true. I went to an “Ag” school but not in that field. Though there was a field of cows right outside the dorm parking area.)

@macromeh @pmarin @werehatrack
“less bovine”: i guess taking the “B” off is “less”.

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @werehatrack “Bovine” does refer to animals such as cattle, not goats, so you are correct. Where you are slightly less so is the “field of cows”. More likely you had some pasture land in which cattle were grazing. A cow is a mature female, so it’s indeed possible to have that terminology used. “Tomato/Tomatoe” & all that…I know!

@macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack
I tend to prefer the field of real numbers. And they tend to produce less ozone-threatening gases than a field of bovines. My former students would probably argue that they got more gas from such things, though.

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 Given that having more than one bull in a herd can result in problems, it’s very common for a group of cattle to be all cows, particularly when they are only present for the purpose of maintaining an ag exemption on the property taxes. (This dodge has historically been common in Texas, and at one time was employed on the greatest amount of acreage by none other than Exxon.) (Steers are neutered bulls, but some cattle ranchers call them all cows when they aren’t bulls.)

@macromeh @phendrick @tohar1 @werehatrack I was told there would be no math! Meanwhile I have no idea what I just read:

A current axiomatic definition is that real numbers form the unique (up to an isomorphism) Dedekind-complete ordered field.[d] Other common definitions of real numbers include equivalence classes of Cauchy sequences (of rational numbers), Dedekind cuts, and infinite decimal representations. All these definitions satisfy the axiomatic definition and are thus equivalent.

@macromeh @phendrick @tohar1 @werehatrack
/showme a handsome goat that has a PhD in theoretical mathematics giving a speech to the Nobel Prize committee.

@mediocrebot Damn, that’s pretty goat — good, I mean.

@pmarin

Damn, that’s pretty goat — good, I mean.

And we have you to blame for that don’t we?

@macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack

I have no idea what I just read

So, my colleagues’ jobs are safe, at least for now.

Til the bots…

@macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack
Math people tend to eschew being redundant. So they use a single word to represent an entire concept at times. Such as “continuous”, usually when talking about certain functions. When a function is known to be continuous, it’s guaranteed to have all sorts of properties that make it nice to work with, such as those practical applications typically taught in a calculus class (based on derivatives, integrals,etc.) . The problem is, it can take a whole semester for a calculus noob to truly appreciate the ramifications of being “continuous”, even for work at the beginning level. Somewhat similar to, “One picture is worth a thousand words”.
The passage you quoted has more of those concept words per line than even a seasoned math-phile is used to seeing. And even though it’s on wikipedia, it definitely wasn’t written with the expectation that more than a few percent of people would actually completely understand it, without spending the necessary time getting all the background. (Which actually is probably all somewhere on wp, but that’s probably not the best way to learn it…)
Best to just pour a glass of bubbly.

@macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack
Just for fun (mostly mine), here’s a little nugget from the calculus crypts. Anyone who has seen the most basic of calculus material should be able to follow along.

Here are two functions.
Let f(n) = n^2 (n squared). So f(4) = 4^2=4x4=16. f(5)=5^2=5x5=25, etc.
Let g(n)= n+n+…+n with n total n’s, added. So g(4)=4+4+4+4 = 16. g(4) is four 4’s, added. g(5) would be five 5’s added, etc.
Apparently, f and g are just two different ways of writing the same function, for whatever “n” is.
(“Multiplication is just repeated addition” and “exponents just show repeated multiplication”.)

Calculus rules for derivatives (denoted by a prime ’ on the function name) tell us that the derivatives are:
For f(n)=n^2, f’(n)=2xn (2 times n) and
for g(n)=n+n+…+n, g’(n)=1+1+…+1, with n terms, so g’(n)=n, total.
f’(4) would be 2x4=8, whereas g’(4)=4.
But, these don’t agree. Though f and g are clearly the same function, their derivatives are not equal.

What gives? Where exactly is the error?

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack

Math people tend to eschew being redundant. So they use a single word to represent an entire concept at times

Says the guy who just used 352 words; 2,086 characters to explain all that …

@Kyeh @macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack Couldn’t think of any word that would represent all that dialogue.
Counting is the first achievement toward math enlightenment. Looks like you might have passed. However, i gave up grading when i retired, so will trust your prowess.

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack

What gives? Where exactly is the error?

If, and this is not a given and I am too lazy to look it up, I recall correctly from decades ago, g is the antiderivative of f although they are both functions.

Although quite honestly having just had to teach myself R (free stats program with a fair bit of programming) which I didn’t want to do in order to write a stats class using it (and excel)… the function of this thread is to goat @ionocat and from that I derive it will be @ionocat’s fault if you don’t figure this out by next month. On the other hand you could switch over to the blame thread and blame @pmarin now.

@Kyeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack

Couldn’t think of any word that would represent all that dialogue.

How about “Mathturbation” ?

@phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack @macromeh
Most excellent!

@Kyeh @macromeh @phendrick @tohar1 @werehatrack This reminds me of my early nerd days, or maybe not, depending on how people would reflect on it now. I had learned the word contiguous (not continuous) as it related to data storage on things like early disc drives, and thought it was a fun word to try. I had a really good English teacher (he had a British English education in I think the West Indies). Probably by far the most educated and literate English teacher I ever had. He returned my paper where I used “contiguous” probably incorrectly and just wrote “silly word!”

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack Well, he could have given you points for trying to expand your vocabulary …

@Kyeh @macromeh @phendrick @tohar1 @werehatrack but he was right, it was a “silly” word in everyday context. His name was Mr Bacchus, a perfect name for a scholarly guy that maybe sips wine by the shore while reviewing his student’s work. But anyway best memory I came to him one morning in Spring of my Senior HS year when this cruel tradition happens(or at least used to) with the letter of recommendation form some universities expected you to submit. He said in a Shakespearean way almost like I would expect Patrick Stewart to say it, but with a deeper hint of our dear James Earl Jones
“I know what is coming, and I dread it.”

I can still hear it clearly 45 years later.
Always love your good teachers, even though you may not appreciate them at the moment. Actually, that one I recognized as important right away and loved telling the story once I was in college. The drama of the voice was really unforgettable, and he was such a nice guy too.

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack Good teachers are treasures, for sure.

@phendrick
Well… Was Kidsandliz right?

@Kyeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack Hmm - my wife and I use the term “contiguous” occasionally. But then, we are both computer nerds (we met at work).

@Kyeh @macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack

How about “Mathturbation” ?

I don’t think that word UNIQUELY represents my thoughts re the Wikipedia article, which @Kyeh seemed to be implying that there should be, as opposed to other situations. E.g., that word probably is more likely to conjure up thoughts of 2nd year calculus students in regards to their integration problems needing inverse trig functions.

There would have to a one-to-one relation (in the math sense) between single words and long-winded math definitions. (There are actually many of those, such as “continuous”.)

@chienfou @Kidsandliz

Well… Was Kidsandliz right?

About what?
“If […] I recall correctly from decades ago, g is the antiderivative of f …”
Not hardly.

“the function of this thread is to goat @ionocat and from that I derive it will be @ionocat’s fault if you don’t figure this out by next month”
I’s say most likely true, but probably a question for the Eight Ball.

Any more takers on my little calculus paradox?

@chienfou @Kidsandliz
A little refresher for all interested (all 2? of you).
By the “power rule” in calculus,
for f(x) = x^n, the derivative is f’(x)= n x^(n-1) and the antiderivative is x^(n+1) / (n+1).

So for f(x)=x^2, the derivative is f’(x)= 2 x^(2-1) = 2x. And the antiderivative is x^(2+1) / (2+1) = x^3 / 3.

A math purist would tell you I should have included the “constant of antidifferentiation” in the antiderivaties above, but I’m not always that pure. You could add a “+C” to those yourself.
(Kinda like being told to wash your hands. They don’t tell you to turn the faucet off, but that’s implied.)

@Kyeh @macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack

my wife and I use the term “contiguous” occasionally. But then, we are both computer nerds

I use that word and I am nowhere near being a computer nerd. I grew up in a family where English majors came at me from both sides of the family… In fact all we had to do is purposely use lay and lie wrong (or bring and take) and mom would for forget why she was yelling at us and would get side tracked to correct us. She never did catch on to what her bratty kids did to get her side tracked. We started doing this in Elementary school no less.

@macromeh @phendrick @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack (do @chienfou & @Kidsandliz belong in this, too?)

I’m a little late to the party, but this is my take on it…

𝑓(𝑥) ≠ 𝑔(𝑥) for non-integer values of 𝑥.
Which is probably why they were originally described as “𝑓(𝑛)” and “𝑔(𝑛)” instead. (By tradition, the variables { 𝑖, 𝑗, 𝑘, 𝑚, 𝑛 } are used to represent integers … except when they’re not, such as with complex numbers and quaternions, where 𝑖, 𝑗, and 𝑘 are not variables at all…)

Getting back to the point(s) — while “𝑓(𝑥)=𝑥²” is continuous (and smooth, and everywhere differentiable), “𝑔(𝑥)=𝑥+𝑥+⋯+𝑥 (𝑥 times)” is not continuous and thus not differentiable. It’s only defined at certain points; a traditional derivative makes no sense for it.

So while you could use 𝑓 and 𝑔 interchangeably in many (real-world) cases, they are not the same thing, and only one of them actually has a derivative.
That’s why 𝑓′(𝑥) ≠ 𝑔′(𝑥). ∎

(I got nerd-sniped! I came over here to see the cats in goat costumes mentioned in the new blame thread.)

@chienfou @Kidsandliz @macromeh @pmarin @tohar1 @werehatrack
@xobzoo gets a GOLD STAR for being totally correct! (looks more yellow than gold, and not something that i actually gave out in my college classes.)

OK, going to get a little math-nerdy.
My using the "n"s instead of "x"s in the definitions of f and g was meant to be a clue, and our gold star recipient seems to have picked up on that. And also a clue was that this little poser followed my earlier “continuous” discussion. The function g as defined can only be applied to positive integers (the “domain” for the function) and would be in the category of “discrete” as opposed to “continuous”. And any GOOD calculus student would have learned that a function MUST BE continuous to possess a derivative (under the usual usages of that word; but mathematicians with nothing else to do often like to muck things up by changing the playing rules, but that’s another discussion.)

For f, f’ as given is correct, but only if it’s continuous over its domain, which is not implied by the usage of “n” for the arbitrary argument variable, as xobzoo noted.

Another illustration of the importance of domains would be in the two functions
h(x)= (x^2-1)/(x-1) and k(x)=x+1 which are equal “almost everywhere” and have identical graphs, EXCEPT that k includes the point where x=1 and h does not. Though h is not, k is continuous over all the real numbers (input for x). For h, we would say that it has a “missing point discontinuity” at x=1. k would have a derivative there, h would not.

TL;DR. g’ is bogus, f’ is iffy, domains are extremely important though often ignored, and continuity is the elephant in the room. All lessons i tried to get over to my students (using this example as a for-instance).

@xobzoo
Well done. Thanks for"solving" that conundrum.
I used to have a ‘proof’ that 1=0 that I used during high school.

@chienfou @phendrick - you need to remember I had exactly 2 semesters of calculus more decades ago than I care to remember and I was not fond of that. Nor was I fond being forced to learn how to tell a computer (fortran 4) how to solve calculus problems (fortunately a friend’s boyfriend was a 3rd year engineering student whose work study job was in the computer and was to help people). I am NOT a math/stats nerd despite being forced to teach stats to business students against my will.

@pmarin In your case, for a few more hours, every thread is a blame thread.

I’ll take a moment to blame you for everything being so expensive these days, and for high pressure salesman selling those things.

@mediocrebot accurate.

@narfcake What the actual @carl669 is that thing?

@DLPanther ok… that made me lol

@carl669 @DLPanther @narfcake I think in the old Diablo computer games that was one of the evil Bosses.

@mediocrebot Oh, even worse!

@Kyeh @narfcake I find it amusing that the bot seems intent on making the cat the ass of the chimera…

@mediocrebot nice. going to keep that. Might even make a nice desktop background.

@tinamarie1974 Don’t forget to spay or neuter your goat-dog

@mediocrebot thats a handsome goat dog

@mediocrebot @tinamarie1974

Don’t forget to spay or neuter your goat-dog

It’s probably sterile like a mule and can’t reproduce… so no worries

@Kidsandliz @mediocrebot @tinamarie1974
Maybe sterile, but if he jumps up on the bed to wake you in the morning he’s probably going to teabag you big time.

@chienfou @Kidsandliz @mediocrebot ewwe

@mediocrebot That’s cute!

@Kyeh just wait till tomorrow

@lonocat Is that a threat?

@Kyeh won’t be long before you find out

@phendrick most HVAC units have a thermal protector that shut down when they get to hot, then resets when internal temperatures return to normal. Could be that the compressor is getting old and running hotter

@phendrick If the cutoff switch box was getting hot, flip off the AC breaker in the mailn panel, open up the switch box, and inspect for overheated legs on the plug (if it’s the flip-the-plug style) or overheated/loose screws in the lugs for the wires at the sides of the switch (either style). I had a burned-out plug-flip type several years ago which I successfully replaced myself. (New box and switch, since I never liked the plug-flip type.).

@phendrick @werehatrack @lonocat Don’t tell anyone I was asleep at the wheel! New posting coming up.

* Tell anyone you like, I’ll just blame the next goat.

@phendrick

@Kyeh Thanks for that, i LOLed through it.
With NYC skyline in the opening, thought i was in for an episode of SNL or David Letterman.

Of course i had previously heard the song back in its day, but had never seen the video, nor even was aware of John Lennon’s art work. He (or whoever animated it) seemed to be channeling me in it.

Funny how whenever the video flashes to the blue lady, the backing is “Oh no, oh no” (Ono). Sure that is no coincidence.

Geez, thought i was old, but Lennon would be 84 years old this month if still alive and Yoko Ono is (mostly) alive and about 91.6 years old. Her web site seems to be very active though i didn’t see any mentions of her current appearances. She apparently did not attend her award presentation last year and i would have expected her to if she could.

Dog woke me in wee hours for a walk and AC was not running though house was comfortable. Checked on the unit and everything was cool to the touch. Guess it was just on pause due to environmental cooling. Slept late this morning and unit was running, so am hoping it’ll get me through until at least spring with minor attention, as well as getting me through the nights.

@lonocat Wish i ran hotter the older i get (and i don’t mean hot flashes). Haven’t noticed any thermal protector, but i’ll look more closely. That would account for the behavior. But might be internal to the compressor. Only schematic i have is glued to the inside of the unit itself and is barely legible after at least 30 years (when i got the house, only living back in it the last 5) out in the elements. (it’s not like i haven’t gotten my money’s worth out of it already but hope to get more.)

@werehatrack Yeah, that all makes sense.
had experience with that flip type plug breaker at a previous house that had been my wife’s before we wed. Was not enamored with it. But this one has the up/down switch.

i’ll keep your suggestions in mind if hot symptoms persist. (Had not been a problem in past, FWiW.)

i have no idea where “the AC breaker in the main panel” is. Not 100% sure there is one, though you would think. Old house with small panel inside. Add-on bigger panel on wall outside of that. Neither one labeled before i started, as needed. Got a circuit tracer signal device, but haven’t had good reason to take the time to exhaustively use it. Have at least four 220 circuits.
Not everything in house looks professionally wired. (A pair of 2-way hall switches act like 1 1/2 ways; looked wiring over in attic when first got the house and didn’t match normal schematics for such. Assume installer was drunk. i just leave far switch permanently On.)

Been cheating death by CAREFULLY working on live circuits, including 220s. Have been “electrically stimulated” several times, but none since acquired AFib many years ago (often wondered if that’s what caused me to develop it).

@phendrick Huh - I didn’t watch the whole video and didn’t catch the “Oh no” Ono connection - that does seem likely now that you mention it. I guess others have noticed that it sounds like the SNL opening too:
https://www.thatsongsoundslike.com/2012/09/28/john-lennon-vs-saturday-night-live/