There are some long lists of false beliefs that programmers hold. isn't because programmers are especially likely to be more wrong than anyone else, it's just that programming offers a better opportunity than most people get to find out how incomplete their model of the world is.
I'm posting about this here, not just because this information has a decent chance of being both entertaining and useful, but because LWers try to figure things out from relatively simple principles-- who knows what simplifying assumptions might be tripping us up?
The classic (and I think the first) was about names. There have been a few more lists created since then.
Time. And time zones. Crowd-sourced time errors.
Addresses. Possibly more about addresses. I haven't compared the lists.
Gender. This is so short I assume it's seriously incomplete.
Networks. Weirdly, there is no list of falsehoods programmers believe about html (or at least a fast search didn't turn anything up). Don't trust the words in the url.
Distributed computing Build systems.
Poem about character conversion.
I got started on the subject because of this about testing your code, which was posted by Andrew Ducker.
The people cited in this article say you're wrong about that. (The article is on a site that makes no particular pretence of neutrality or objectivity, and the author likewise doesn't, but the reports they've collected from representatives of police departments etc. in places where such rules have been introduced are evidence regardless.)
B is not just a restatement of A; one is a matter of bodily appearance, one is a matter of clothing, given name, preferred mode of address, etc.
C is not a restatement of your assertion that the person is deluded or bullshitting, it is a restatement of what you explain that way (namely that they consider themself female).
Here is a thought experiment (important note: it is intended as an informative thought experiment, not a claim about what is actually happening in the brains and bodies of trans people). Imagine that after a few decades of scientific advancement it becomes possible to transplant brains into different bodies, even somewhat differently shaped bodies. Your brain is transplanted into a woman's body and given no more changes than are necessary to wire up the different bits of anatomy. Are you now a woman? If you say yes: Your brain is now transplanted into a chimpanzee's body with, again, minimal necessary changes. Are you now a chimpanzee?
I suggest that in the second case you're clearly still you and clearly not actually a chimpanzee, for most purposes. If you agree, then I think you should agree with me that what you are depends on internal "mental" factors as well as anatomy and external appearance. This suggests to me that the best answer in the first case is probably that you are still a man. What factors actually make you so? They seem like exactly the sort of factors that might in fact be different in trans people as compared with cis people of similar external anatomy.
(Actually, I think the best answer in the first case is that you get to choose whether you're a man or a woman. Again, I am not claiming that this case is precisely analogous to that of trans people, but it's suggestive.)
Remember the context here: we're looking at your statement that they're wrong about what "similarity cluster" they're in. If you define similarity in anatomical or chromosomal terms, do you really think typical trans people are deluded about their anatomy or chromosomes?
There seems something very unsatisfactory about being sure they're deluded about something, but unable to say clearly what it is they're deluded about. (Not necessarily wrong; I can imagine situations in which it's reasonable to be sure someone is wrong about something but unsure what. But unsatisfactory.)
Well, first they might have been selectively collecting them, if not engaging in worse fraud. Second these policies have been in place for less than two years, it takes time for perverse incentives to manifest. The mo... (read more)