home > factoids

My uneven collection of facts, quotations, and other miscellaneous scraps, that don’t naturally fit anywhere else. I used to keep them in a shoebox, until I discovered the Web.

• abstract • abstract data type

• Ackermann’s function

• Ada • adjective order

• affordance

• algebra • Algol

• and • P. W. Anderson • antisymmetric relation

• APL

• ASCII art • Asimov’s laws • asymmetric relation

• atheist

• autopoeisis

• awk

• B

• Babbage • Francis Bacon • bag • BASIC

• BCPL

• Samuel Beckett

• big numbers

• Bliss

• Niels Bohr • Boltzmann constant

• Tycho Brahe • Jacob Bronowski

• Edmund Burke

• C • c • C++

• calculus

• censorship

• G. K. Chesterton • Chill • Church-Rosser • Winston S. Churchill

• circle

• Clarke’s laws • class • classification • Clean • Arthur Hugh Clough • CLU

• Cobol • Samuel Taylor Coleridge • Comal • Compton wavelength • Confucius • continuum hypothesis • Coral

• CPL

• cradle

• Charles Darwin • data abstraction • Richard Dawkins

• delegation • Augustus De Morgan • denotational semantics • Antoine de Saint-Exupery • René Descartes

• Edsger W. Dijkstra • Paul A. M. Dirac • divisibility tests

• Dynamo

• e

• Arthur Stanley Eddington

• Eiffel • Manfred Eigen

• electron mass/charge • George Eliot • ellipse

• Ralph Waldo Emerson

• energy equivalents • English

• equivalence relation

• estivate

• Euclid (language) • Euclid’s proof • eugenics • Euler ian path • eumemics

• evolution

• exploratory programming

• Richard P. Feynman

• Fibonacci series • figures of speech

• fleas

• Forth • Fortran

• Anatole France • Benjamin Franklin • Freeman’s commentary • Robert Frost

• Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic

• G

• German

• Charlotte Perkins Gilman • Ginsberg’s theorem

• Goldbach’s conjecture • googol(plex)

• Graham’s number • gravitational constant • grok

• Gypsy

• h

• Ernst Heinrich Haeckel • J. B. S. Haldane • Beatrice Hall • Monty Hall problem • Hamilton ian path • Richard W. Hamming • Handel-C • Leslie Poles Hartley • Haskell

• Patrick Henry

• hibernate • history • Hite’s rule

• Hofstadter’s law • Horace • A. E. Housman

• Icon

• immortality

• incompetent • Robert Ingersoll • inheritance • Internet

• irrational number • irreflexive relation

• William James • Java • JavaScript

• Thomas Jefferson

• Benjamin Jowett

• Julia set

• k

• John Keats • Lynne Kelly • John F. Kennedy

• Martin Luther King, Jr. • Rudyard Kipling

• Herbert Kroemer

• languages • Pierre-Simon de Laplace • laws

• leap year • Stephen Leacock • Le Verrier • C. S. Lewis

• liberty • speed of light • line printer art • Lisp • J. E. Littlewood

• logistic mapping • logistics • Logo • Lojban

• Lucas-Lehmer primality test • Lucid

• Mandelbrot set • Andrew Marvell • Matlab

• meddle • Mega • Megagon • Megiston • H. L. Mencken • Mersenne primes • metonymy • Bertrand Meyer

• John Stuart Mill • millennium • Miranda • Mitochondrial Eve

• ML

• Modula • model • Monty Hall problem • Moser’s number

• multiple inheritance • multiset

• network

• Martin Niemöller • Friedrich Nietzsche

• Barry Norman

• Oberon • object • object based • Objective-C • object oriented

• occam (language) • Occam’s Razor

• only • ontogeny

• operational semantics • OPS5

• orthogonality

• C. J. Overbeck

• oxymoron

• Thomas Paine • Blaise Pascal • Pascal (language) • pattern

• pedant • perfect numbers • Perl

• Pilot

• PL/1 • Max Planck • Planck constant/length/mass • Plato • pleonasm • plurals

• Political Correctness • polymorphic type • Pop • Alexander Pope • Karl R. Popper • PostScript

• Terry Pratchett • prime numbers • primitive recursive function • probability paradoxes • programming languages • Prolog • pronunciation • proton mass

• Pythagorean triple • Python

• quotations

• rainfall • random • Random Boolean Network

• Eric Raymond

• reflexive relation • rewrite rules

• Theodore Roosevelt

• Ruby • Bertrand Russell

• SAS

• Bruce Schneier

• self • self-organisation • semantics

• William Shakespeare • George Bernard Shaw • Percy Bysshe Shelley

• Simple • Simpson’s paradox • Simula

• Skewes’ number

• sleep

• Smalltalk

• solar power generation

• Snobol

• species • specification • spelling • split infinitive

• Peter Steiner • Robert Louis Stevenson • Tom Stoppard • strategy • strongly typed • Sturgeon’s law

• subclass • superclass • superellipse • superformula

• Jonathan Swift

• syllepsis • symmetric relation • synecdoche

• tactics

• Tcl

• TeX

• Dylan Thomas • Henry David Thoreau

• transitive relation

• Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky

• Turing

• Mark Twain

• Tycho Brahe • type

• Lao Tzu

• Unix

• violence • viscosity

• Voltaire • John von Neumann

• Booker T. Washington

• Web • Rebecca West • Hermann Weyl

• Alfred North Whitehead • Walt Whitman • who/whom

• Eugene Wigner • Ludwig Wittgenstein

•

• William Butler Yeats

• Frank Zappa

• Zeppelins • zeugma

• John Ziman