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dysfun@treehouse.systems ("gaytabase") wrote:
what do i mean that benchmarks teach you intellectual honesty?
take two libraries and compare their performance. the operations available don't exactly match up, so one will be paying more in some places because the benchmark doesn't treat them equally. you can make one look better than the other fairly easily if that's your goal.
the real goal of course is to get as close to actual data as you can. and benchmarks are terribly noisy on the small end, but you don't have a chance unless you start from a position of intellectual honesty.
it's called 'computer science' and while we have a lot to learn from real scientists, maybe we could start with trying to prove ourselves wrong?