Laptops, Algorithms and Commitment

Monday 23 February 2009 | Labels: , | 1 comments |

We live in time and space; a choice is made at a point in time and we live with it.

So, I need to replace a broken laptop.

But I'm seriously afraid of buyer’s remorse. You can’t rush in to it and I don’t want to spend too much. I know 1-2 months from now, prices will drop and new models will come out. I'm afraid that I'm at the cusp of a price cut or new deal. 

What if a new deal pops up tomorrow after I buy?  So I search and wait.

The predicament is great.  Like many things in life, it’s about choices.  I think buyer’s remorse is really a fear of commitment.  

Hmm… commitment.

This reminds me of dating and how we go about choosing a spouse. 

During school I learned about the stable matching problem (from mathematical graph theory):

Given n men and n women, where each person has ranked all members of the opposite sex with a unique number between 1 and n in order of preference, marry the men and women off such that there are no two people of opposite sex who would both rather have each other than their current partners. If there are no such people, all the marriages are "stable"

Various algorithms to solve this problem can be read here

Of course the men and women can be substituted with applicants and universities, residents and hospitals, and other things in life.

Life as we know it boggles the mind.  In hindsight, I suppose you can think of all the permutations of your actions... and lose your mind over it.

“You just stop looking”, my wife would say. I agree in regards to the laptop. 
But does that imply I was just 2nd best!? or 3rd? 

Oh my...