https://mastodon.social/@tef/112763581163648202

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Erd%C5%91s#Personality

His colleague Alfréd Rényi said, "a mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems", and Erdős drank copious quantities

After his mother's death in 1971 he started taking antidepressants and amphetamines, despite the concern of his friends, one of whom (Ron Graham) bet him $500 that he could not stop taking them for a month. Erdős won the bet, but complained that it impacted his performance: "You've showed me I'm not an addict. But I didn't get any work done. I'd get up in the morning and stare at a blank piece of paper. I'd have no ideas, just like an ordinary person. You've set mathematics back a month."

https://kolektiva.social/@sidereal/112764385284252961

They were called the "greatest generation" because they collectively had far easier access to stimulants than anyone before or since

Random showerthought time:

The war on drugs, medical skepticism, stigma, and other factors caused stimulants and medications, especially those useful for treating conditions such as ADHD, to become less accessible. This adversely affected the people who needed or would otherwise benefit from these stimulants and medications, and scientific progress and society more widely has suffered because of it.

There are many tips or techniques that are strongly recommended for cooking, but it's hard to know which are evidence based and which are just passed along because that's what people always do.

Which are the tips that need more evidence?

Here are two that I struggle with, about stainless steel pans:

1. Water drop test / leidenfrost

People say that if you get your pan hot enough to get the leidenfrost effect and then add the oil you'll have less problems with sticking. My problem with this is that it means the pan gets very very hot - much hotter than it needs to be for most uses. My other problem is they all say "Look, I'll cook eggs and they won't stick" and those videos either have a ton of cuts, or the eggs stick and you can see the person pushing with a spatula to get rid of the stick, or their "scrambled eggs" is really a chopped omelette.

2. Heat the pan before adding oil. I don't understand this. Again, people say it helps prevent sticking, but they use some argument about "pores" which just feels hokey. I add cold oil to a cold pan and bring it up to temperature before adding food so the pan and oil are both at the right temperature, and food sticks and then releases, because that's how stainless pans work.

I'm aware I could be completely wrong here and that there may be a good evidence base for these, but they don't seem to work based on how I cook.