Thread by @patio11

I really like the design of this HTTP library's API and will probably try it out in personal projects in the future: gitlab.com/honeyryderchuc…

(You get parallel requests "for free" without having to muck up your code a lot or implement promises/event loops/etc.)

h/t HN

When I think of language HTTP design I remember something one of my professors wrote way back in *1997*:

If a main task of programmers is accessing the Internet then the language design should support generating HTTP requests about as naturally as it does addition.

c.f. web.archive.org/web/2013080823… for the whole memo, which was designed to convince schools principally teaching Java that their undergrads should be taught scripting languages (for AI specifically, Dr. Loui's specialty, but argument generalizes).

Incidentally, this memo is one of the most salient examples I know of something I have seen many times in life:

Some people are called crazy for getting the next big thing about 40% right while the consensus estimate of the rest of the world is less than 1% right.

They're called crazy when they make their call and, when the future rolls in, people say "Anybody could have predicted the future, which was obvious, except for this person who got it 60% wrong."

After you start looking for this pattern you'll see it a lot, and I think it should inform:

a) how to be an instrumentally successful "crazy person"
b) interpreting the work product of crazy people
c) one's humility on estimates of future
d) praise awarded to critics.

Being instrumentally effective while being crazy:

a) Operationalize crazy beliefs and win with them. Winning reduces the sting of being made fun of.
b) Pick what subset of beliefs to share; establish a track record of being right on the lower-risk portion of your craziness.

Interpreting the work product of crazy people:

a) Try to rigorously evaluate arguments, particularly post-hoc, and determine "Was somebody right by accident or did they see something the rest of the world didn't?"
b) Know a few more crazy people than seems useful.
c) Find the 40

c) One's humility on estimates of future

The degree of success expertise has versus craziness in any one instance is formidably huge and the track record of success expertise has against all craziness is extremely low. Weight estimates (your own and others') accordingly.

d) Praise awarded to critics

The value created by, and therefore the correct amount of social esteem awarded to, successfully calling the results of an experiment after the experiment has been concluded is, to a first approximation, zero.