NickM

40 ms·

421.
by NickM 8y ago
This looks really cool, and kudos to them making it free. However, this seems very much applied, and I'd really like a course that dives more into the math and theory of AI, neural networks, deep learning, etc. etc. Anyone have any rec
422.
by NickM 8y ago
Have you considered investing in assets that are less speculative and risky than cryptocurrency? I would strongly recommend you think about diversifying your portfolio so that you don't lose everything if it turns out we're in a c
423.
by NickM 8y ago
Maybe that would've helped for the Mirra, though I did tend to keep it at its minimum setting anyway, since I also found it rather uncomfortable. But the Embody and Freedom chairs have no removable lumbar support to begin with....
424.
by NickM 8y ago
Lieberman singlehandedly killed the public option, though. Obamacare would have looked very different if that had survived.
425.
by NickM 8y ago
Every Herman Miller chair I've tried (and several other brands of "ergonomic" chairs) seem to be designed in such a way that there's a big gap in support around the mid-back area, in-between the lumbar area and the shoul
426.
by NickM 9y ago
Occam's Razor doesn't say that the simplest explanation is automatically true; it just says that if we can't know for sure, and we have to choose between two equally valid hypotheses, then we might as well assume the simpler
427.
by NickM 9y ago
Obama promised "if you like your insurance you can keep it". However what wasn't said is "if hate your insurance you have no choice but to keep it". I don't like my insurance, but since I otherwise like my job
428.
by NickM 9y ago
I think they're trying to hammer home the point that autopilot is very much not level 5 self-driving. The media is constantly referring to "self-driving" Teslas, so of course it's easy for members of the public to get
429.
by NickM 9y ago
It doesn't matter. One big power plant is so much more efficient than a million little ICE cars that you typically end up with lower emissions and less pollution from EVs even if 100% of your electricity is from coal. That said, China
430.
by NickM 9y ago
Most folks would argue that the value people have derived from Windows and PowerPoint far outweigh any such downsides. Whether we can say the same about cryptocurrencies is much more easily debatable.
431.
by NickM 9y ago
Forget drugs, I wonder how many people have been killed by the additional emissions from all the extra electricity being generated to power Bitcoin alone. It's virtually impossible to measure something like that of course, but the WHO
432.
by NickM 9y ago
Measuring disengagements for pre-release autonomous vehicles seems like a terrible way to measure safety of what's actually available to the public now. Here's a better study from the NHTSA that measures the safety impact of Tesla
433.
by NickM 9y ago
We have the ability to remove it, yes, but not for free. Decentralized systems based on proof-of-work are inherently less efficient than centralized, trust-based systems. The question is, do the costs and downsides of cryptocurrencies out
434.
by NickM 9y ago
Not true. There are plenty of cities in the US where you can buy a very nice house with several bedrooms in the 150k-250k range. You can get by with even less if you're willing to start with a fixer-upper. Totally doable for non-millio
435.
by NickM 9y ago
While turning down the job is just fine, here's what happened instead.... Sure, if you're just looking at one job, then yeah someone else is going to come along and take it. But if enough people start feeling the same way as the
436.
by NickM 9y ago
Why would you call it silly? The headline basically implies "total fossil fuel generation has stopped growing, while renewables have grown substantially," which is both accurate and interesting. The fact that the coal/gas mix
437.
by NickM 9y ago
My understanding though is that these restrictions only apply to high earners (>157.5k single, >315k married), and even then the restrictions phase in gradually until you hit an even higher income. I would bet that most software devel
438.
by NickM 9y ago
Tesla has already started incorporating stationary storage into some of its supercharger stations to help cut down on peak load. This is not just an act of goodwill, it actually makes economic sense for them, since it cuts down on demand ch
439.
by NickM 9y ago
Owning a Bitcoin offers no value to the holder other than the ability to buy something with it, but in almost every case imaginable there is a better alternative to Bitcoin out there. Usually it's much easier and safer to just use a cr
440.
by NickM 9y ago
Layers of abstraction make complex tasks more reachable by a larger number of programmers by reducing the amount of specialist knowledge about those lower layers required to do the job. The more layers of abstraction you have, the less the
441.
by NickM 9y ago
Apple does have a great deal more leverage over their suppliers though, just by virtue of their size. It may not be the most efficient thing for Tesla to bring so much stuff in house, but it may be their only option if they don't want
442.
by NickM 9y ago
Perhaps, but I wonder if we won't see more countries go the way of Norway/France/Britain and ban gasoline cars altogether once electric vehicles become more competitive and mainstream....
443.
by NickM 9y ago
I'm not saying there's an 0.0001% chance of it happening, I'm saying that if you give enough people a chance to create an AI, eventually someone will do it, even if 99.999% of people would choose not to. Right now, nobody k
444.
by NickM 9y ago
I don't think that's the best defense, because even if 99.999% of programmers are perfect, ethical, decent people, all it takes is one psycho to go ahead and let the genie out of the bottle anyway. Imagine there's a big red &
445.
by NickM 9y ago
It's not the handful of climate change deniers that's the problem. It's the overwhelming number of people who want to say they're green, but still own two cars, never take public transport, eat meat daily, live in big h
446.
by NickM 9y ago
Reminds me of this excellent Radiolab episode: http://www.radiolab.org/story/what-dollar-value-nature/ Even people who care nothing for the irreplaceable beauty of nature ought to consider how much measurable econ
447.
by NickM 9y ago
Suppose I want to fight climate change, and I decide to make a documentary to raise awareness. The logistics of making a documentary is certainly going to result in some amount of additional carbon emissions being produced. I might be calle
448.
by NickM 9y ago
Fair point, but in practice we're not likely to get down to such a low population level any time soon (if ever).
449.
by NickM 9y ago
Climate change isn't a problem of having too many people on earth, it's a problem of emitting too much CO2 per person. If we got rid of 90% of the world population, we would still be dealing with climate change, it would just be
450.
by NickM 9y ago
The big problem I've had with Haskell is that even after gaining a pretty good understanding of the language (including monads and such) I still can't fathom how to do anything real with it. Exercises are great and all, but once I

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