In the (is this shape fillable by 1x2 dominoes?) example given by EWD to demonstrate the power of formal reasoning methods, a slight change to the problem statement:
For the shape Q, instead of clipping opposite corners of the 8x8 square board, one (what would lay under a) white square and one black square, which are non-adjacent, are randomly removed.
makes the elegant proof argument fail.
Real world programming is usually like this, it is hard to cast the problem in the framework of a formal language, like first order predicate logic, and manipulation of uninterpreted formulae (i.e. the problem now mapped into the domain of first order logic) using the rules of first order logic might not lead to anything useful.
It seems to me that EWD is showcasing some example programming problems that are elegantly handled by his formal proof techniques, while ignoring the vast swathes of programming problems that might not be well handled by these techniques.
@dukeyukey, from these '_lot_ of studies', if we remove those that are directly or indirectly funded by the coffee lobby, are we left with the empty set ∅ ?
Could it be possible that the coffee lobby is behind this 'counter'-study?, since a relatively simple inference from the OP has catastrophic consequences for the coffee business:
Deep sleep is necessary for the slow electrical waves that clear the brain of waste including amyloid proteins. (Excessive) coffee intake reduces the quality and quantity of deep sleep, thus leading to a build up of waste products including amyloid, resulting in cognitive declines such as Alzheimer's etc. Therefore, coffee intake (indirectly) causes Alzheimer's.
Admitting that last part is suicidal for the coffee business.
Yudkin [1] must be chortling ;)
Warren Buffett, have your boys been slacking off? Somebody is gonna get really hurt...bad!
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pure,_White_and_Deadly