Steve Yegge quits Google in the middle of his speech [OSCON Data 2011] • Hacker News Board

Re: Steve Yegge quits Google in the middle of his speech [OSCON Data 2011]

#141

Post by dukeleto » Thu, Jul 28, 2011, 4:44 PM UTC

jacoblyles wrote: post #110

mad44 wrote: post #54

while listening to the talk, I took notes. (Not exact notes, I probably reworded several things, hopefully not twisting the meaning too much.) Here they are, if you don't have time to watch the talk. ----- Google, "where I work right now", they are doing great work to attempt to change the work. At least more than other companies. I work on compilers. I like to work on big data, learn about data mining. Because even…

It feels hard to get into Bioinformatics without a PHD. I would love to tackle problems in genetics, medicine, and etc. But I'm not going to commit 7 years of my life to breaking into a highly regulated sector before I get to "Hello World!". Is there a hacker scene in Bioinformatics?

There are a few Github orgs that you may want to look at:

https://github.com/GMOD https://github.com/solgenomics

Also, #bioinformatics on freenode is a good place to meet people.

Re: Steve Yegge quits Google in the middle of his speech [OSCON Data 2011]

#142

Post by polyfractal » Fri, Jul 29, 2011, 2:43 AM UTC

hirenj wrote: post #77

awj wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess my biggest question is: in what way can programmers outside that specific discipline pitch in and help out? Are there relevant open source projects that could benefit from someone with a lot of programming experience and a slightly-better-than-layman science background?

Bioinformatician here: First of all, I think it's got to be clear that a lone bioinformatician, or even a group of them isn't going to go about changing the world. Essentially, when you sign up for this, you're still a cog in a machine, albeit a slightly more altruistic machine. Here's my pet peeve in bioinformatics - If there's one thing that's poorly suited to science, it's the building of computational infrastruct…

This is a problem that is pretty endemic to acadamia in general. The revolving door of most academic labs means a lot of knowledge and tools are lost or not maintained. It is frustrating to see this happen in every single lab, but short of fixing the labor-mill mentality of acadamia, this will never go away.

Re: Steve Yegge quits Google in the middle of his speech [OSCON Data 2011]

#143

Post by polyfractal » Fri, Jul 29, 2011, 2:50 AM UTC

almightygod wrote: post #57

kbutler wrote: post #48

tl;dr Work on data mining and bioionformatics to change the world, rather than just seeking money by doing trivial things. Plus publicity stunt of quitting so you'll listen [at 14:15, sounded like quitting a cat-photo-sharing project, rather than quitting Google]. Plus implication that bio is the only domain that is world-changing.

I never heard him say "bio is only domain that is world-changing". But unlocking the genome would have unequivocal implications on quality of life and longevity for all of humanity, what is more important then improving someone's life?

sigh

People thought we were "unlocking the genome" ten years ago with the Human Genome Project. If that taught us anything, it is that biology is a lot more complicated than simply parsing data. Biology is messy, complicated and breaks every single one of its own rules. Repeatedly.

I'm not saying bioinformatics is unimportant or unnecessary, because it truly is important. I'm simply tired of people (particularly famous people who are grandstanding) boasting that XYZ will "cure cancer".

Re: Steve Yegge quits Google in the middle of his speech [OSCON Data 2011]

#144

Post by angrycoder » Fri, Jul 29, 2011, 5:49 AM UTC

queensnake wrote: post #108

angrycoder wrote: post #59

As someone who was originally a science major, then switched to comp sci, I always get a romantic tingle when I hear about bioinformatics. Most of the science I've learned is gone by now, but I am sure it still there somewhere. What are the good starting points for learning about bioinformatics?

amazon.com and university courses; what did you think? That there was an inside, easy track that you could find by asking HN?

Yeah, that is what I was looking for, an 'easy track'. Not a recommendation from someone in the field based on the fact that I am a programmer with a science background.

Thanks.