Month: September 2009
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Software defect costs
In my persuit of software engineering data, I’ve recently been poring over a 2002 report to the US Government on the annual costs of software defects. The report is entitled “The Economic Impacts of Inadequate Infrastructure for Software Testing“. Ultimately, it estimates that software defects cost the US economy $59.5 billion every year. Modelling such…
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The colloquium
An “official communication” from early June demanded that all Engineering and Computing postgraduate students take part in the Curtin Engineering & Computing Research Colloquium. Those who didn’t might be placed on “conditional status”, the message warned. A slightly rebellious instinct led me to think of ways to obey the letter but not the spirit of…
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The right to die
The story of the end of Christian Rossiter has been in the news recently, and serves as another hook into the euthanasia debate. Euthanasia is one of those controversial subjects where the politics seems stubbornly opposed to what people generally regard as sensible. I’m not unreservedly committed to the right to die. I consider myself…
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The American hypothesis
I have a hypothesis on politics – a somewhat unfortunate hypothesis given its implications. Roughly speaking, it’s this: the workability of democracy diminishes with large populations. I’m not talking about the logistics of holding elections, but about the ability of society to engage in meaningful debate. My reasoning goes like this. Insofar as I can…