Categorie: Overig
Hoe een kleurenblinde jongen de allerbeste werd – Interview met Mats Valk
Het is een leuke party trick: het oplossen van een Rubik’s kubus, en dan het liefst zo snel mogelijk. Voor de 23-jarige Mats Valk, tweevoudig wereldrecordhouder en Europees kampioen speedcubing, is het echter wel meer dan dat. Wekelijks is hij urenlang bezig met het bijhouden en perfectioneren van zijn skills. In dit interview (dat wegens het Covid-19 virus via Skype plaatsvond) vertelt hij goedlachs over deze passie, het imago dat speedcubing als sport heeft en de link met econometrie. Laten we beginnen bij het begin: waar is bij jou de fascinatie voor het Rubik’s […]
Estimated reading time: 9 minuten
The shortage of appealing men
The shortage of appealing men is a melodrama that is one of the great riddles of social life. These available, sociable and genuinely attractive men are universally highly demanded in our society. Shouldn’t there be about as many highly eligible men as there are attractive, eligible women? Some men claim their love fortune has to to with becoming more attractive with age, but many women give the explanation that male faults have become easier to overlook. When women don’t find The One, they settle for the sociable but unattractive men, the attractive but unsociable or […]
Estimated reading time: 3 minuten
Is life a video game?
Reality is probably not what it seems. The simulation hypothesis proposes that all of reality, including the earth and the universe, is in fact, a computer simulation. This proposition is, in fact, based on fundamental principles of human reasoning. Billions of years have passed since the formation of the earth. Early carbon-based life forms have had compelling experiences, to say the least. Imagine for a second, that the senses we experience, the things we observe, are all but a simulation, in which we are the “sims”. Computational power is increasing at an unprecedented rate, unlike […]
Musical roads
Rumble strips are small bumps in the side of the road to alert drivers when they stray away from the middle of the driveway. Especially for people driving long roads at night, such a strip can be a life-saving instrument. If a tired driver slowly drowses away, he or she will be aroused by the annoying sound that the car makes when driving over these sleeper lines. Also people that are paying attention to their phone instead of the road may be stirred up by the strips. Did you know, however, that in many countries, […]
Estimated reading time: 3 minuten
The optimal rejection-phase of love
Do you need some help with finding the right lover or do you seek confirmation for your current love? Love is one of the most non-abstract phenomena one knows and as econometricians, there is only one thing we understand perfectly; mathematics. To help you understand love a little better, I will show you that equations and graphs can guide your love life. Lucky for you, Valentine’s day is this Friday, which will be the best opportunity to test if you understand the mathematics of love properly. Let me give you a hint: the magic number […]
Estimated reading time: 6 minuten
How algorithms can choose your date
Feeling spontaneous, the mayor of Groningen wants to help all singles in the city. He wants to do this by organizing a date for every single in town. Since he thinks that you are pretty smart, because you study econometrics, he gives you the job of making all the combinations for the dates. How would you do this? In this case, we assume that we know the preferences of everyone. So from every man, we get a list with a ranking of women he prefers and from every woman we get a list with a […]
Estimated reading time: 3 minuten
Written by AI
It was Sunday the 26th of January 10 pm, I had one day left to submit my article for peer review. I was contemplating. Not knowing what to write about. I was staring at my computer screen. No unfamiliar websites. Just websites I had searched for before. Time flew. But suddenly I realized something. Something peculiar. Something odd. I remembered reading an article a couple of days ago about artificial intelligence (AI). The article explained how organizations including The Washington Post, The New York Times, Reuters, and Associated Press, made extensive use of AI to […]
The math behind the English language
Like many other languages, the English language is based on grammatical rules. It contains all parts to make a basic sentence, such as nouns, adverbs and verbs. All of this has not stayed the same over time. Scientists have known for decades now that every language evolves in striking similar ways to adapt to the needs of its users. Not only the words, but also the grammar change and mutate over time, where new versions slowly rise to take over the older ones. This development is not a bad thing, since if English had not […]
The danger of quantum computers
The idea of a quantum computer first arose in the late century. Richard Feynman was the first person to think of using the special quantum properties to solve difficult mathematical problems. A lot of progress has already been achieved. “Let’s see what the future of quantum computers has to offer.” A basic understanding of quantum computers All computers work in basically the same way. They receive an input of data, manipulate the data in some way and finally give an output. Quantum computers are no different. But what makes them so special? Quantum computers […]
Oud en nieuw in andere landen
Anderhalve week geleden is het jaar 2020 ingegaan. Nederland kent voor dit feest zijn eigen tradities. Zo gaan krantenlopers bijvoorbeeld een paar dagen, voordat het nieuwe jaar ingaat, langs de deuren om iedereen de beste wensen voor het nieuwe jaar te wensen. Op 31 december bakken (en eten) veel mensen oliebollen of bedenken hun goede voornemens voor het nieuwe jaar. Sommigen besluiten om meer te gaan sporten; anderen besluiten om aan “dry january” mee te doen. Om twaalf uur vieren we vervolgens het ingaan van het nieuwe jaar met champagne en vuurwerk. En tot slot […]
Estimated reading time: 3 minuten
The truel
Imagine it is 1872, you are sitting in a saloon with Smith and Brown, two of your old friends. However, the three of you do not seem to get along as you did before. As time passes, tall tales turn into boisterous arguments. At some point Smith has had enough and challenges both of you for a truel, a triangular pistol duel. You hesitate, knowing that you are the worst shot out of the three and look at Brown. You both know that Smith has the best aim and Brown comes second. In fact, from the […]
Estimated reading time: 3 minuten
Are you smart enough to work at Google?
Google is known as the king of riddle recruitment and its insanely difficult puzzles often go viral online. Large companies use these recruitment puzzles to narrow down a huge graduate applicant pool to a select few. A coder googled the words “python lambda function list comprehension” and got “You’re speaking our language. Up for a challenge?” as an answer from the search engine. After the coder solved the “100 hats riddle”, he was offered a job at the tech powerhouse. The “100 hats riddle” There are 100 prisoners lined up by an executioner and they […]
Estimated reading time: 2 minuten