ben_w

28 ms·

511.
by ben_w 2mo ago
If it was that easy, Ukraine would have already brought Russia to its knees. Because the Russian government is still telling themselves they can win and don't even bother trying to negotiate with Ukraine but instead the USA, this must
512.
by ben_w 2mo ago
And that, unlike most politically active billionaires, he's so publicity-seeking we've all heard of him. I can't even remember the name of the eBay people in e.g. this without actively re-reading the story, though we all know
513.
by ben_w 2mo ago
A trait I share with dictionary editors is a preference for linguistic descriptivism, so for me it's not a real problem that the common definition of "sex" and the scientific use are different. Unfortunately, reality doesn&#x
514.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Gradual improvements in performance can look like jumps, when you go over critical thresholds. Combustion engines improved gradually, each year. One year they got better than horses.
515.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Mmm, quite. > I don't know what we want to call this, but in my opinion, having to convince your tools is not computer science. My vote is "machine psychology".
516.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Men and women are both made of atoms. It is objectively physically possible with sufficient effort to rearrange atoms* to turn one human into any other of equal or lesser mass regardless of gender**. The only question is: what's the sm
517.
by ben_w 2mo ago
In fairness, Marxism–Leninism is the official ideology of the actual Chinese Communist Party. I leave it as an exercise for the reader if they're just saying that.
518.
by ben_w 2mo ago
> All I hear about Claude, GPT, Gemini, etc., are how terrible they are, yet any discussion of Grok seems to always revolve around sensible, but confident, assertions that it's actually a great product and every new release is the p
519.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Yes but also no. On the one hand, yes: the UK is demonstrably "this is fine" when it comes to mass surveillance. On the other: the government is almost pathologically bad at joined-up thinking. To illustrate the latter: I have bee
520.
by ben_w 2mo ago
> Methane breaks down to Co2 in the atmosphere on average in 9.6 years. Despite which, over a 100 year period it has 25 times the warming impact as the CO2 it turns into. > The problem we should be focusing on is fossil fuels. Everyon
521.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Mean != distribution. The mean human has approximately one ovary, one testicle. A few hundred million Indians refusing all meat is compatible with the others not doing that.
522.
by ben_w 2mo ago
It's not *that* hard to prosper with even a vegan diet in the modern world, I know several who do fine. Hardest part is knowing implicit animal ingredients you might not otherwise guess, which almost tripped me up when I visited the US
523.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Supplements if you're vegan, there are vegetarian sources. Just looked up the Wikipedia page to check on vegan, and… looks like all the animal and plant "sources" actually ingest the stuff from elsewhere? Since only bacte
524.
by ben_w 2mo ago
> Also, let's not forget that the Trump admin is a problem of 2.5 years at most. If he invades Greenland, the US not only loses all NATO allies, but may be at actual war (rather than merely trade war) with them; the Asian allies are
525.
by ben_w 2mo ago
> When I ask people, "When did you first remember feeling conscious?" and receive nonsense replies - mostly people respond with their first memories and make no reference to the feeling of consciousness. Mm. My answer would be:
526.
by ben_w 2mo ago
> The UK’s decline has taken centuries, though, and there are many events that one can point to. I think I agree with the grandparent’s comment about grandparents, about the arrogance of how things will continue to be a certain way. I do
527.
by ben_w 2mo ago
From my read of the Manifesto… while I may not have been impressed by the writing, that is from my perspective over 150 years later. We got a lot of the things Marx was calling for. Of the 10 point plan near the end of section 2, we got: -
528.
by ben_w 2mo ago
In addition to what Qem said, some people don't have much control over their job opportunities, take whatever they can get, and in those roles do whatever they're ordered to do. Amazon piss bottles come to mind. Even without malic
529.
by ben_w 2mo ago
I get the vibe, but I wouldn't say shocked, merely disappointed. The Black Swan's point would fit on the book's cover even if printed in the font used for the author's name, the work felt to me like 99% was just garrulou
530.
by ben_w 2mo ago
Sleep is less surprising for me to see people defend than death, to the extent that I'm not sure if I myself have or not done so. I mean, I can directly feel the benefit of a good sleep that refreshes me in the morning, whereas there&#
531.
by ben_w 3mo ago
Not sure how the quoted examples fits with your link, TBH. https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/descriptive-vs-presc... Prescriptively, a "model weight" weighs nothing. Descriptively, this is stupid: a new
532.
by ben_w 3mo ago
Grandparents telling about their grandparents is a very different timescale than two presidential terms with a gap of just one between them. The "what changed in the 1970s?" meme graphs are the kinds of timescale for forgetting wh
533.
by ben_w 3mo ago
Indeed. But, as people have been saying since shortly after "Big Data" was the buzzword whose shoes AI now fills: it's not "big" data if it fits on my laptop. Even if the team does care, 10k users just isn't a
534.
by ben_w 3mo ago
I think that would work better in The Animatrix; putting it in 3 would be a tonal shift, plus a sudden human victory would feel a bit Mary Sue or Deus Ex (ironically) Machina to me. But in The Animatrix, you could get away with that, plus w
535.
by ben_w 3mo ago
The point is to give you empathy for those you disagree with here.
536.
by ben_w 3mo ago
> But this is an unquestionably good thing right?. The more open source software out there the better. I say no to both. Of the things we've made on purpose, but excluding where we were actually trying to make them opaque like e.g.
537.
by ben_w 3mo ago
May be high up the list, but there's purer evil even than that. Even if he is openly courting a Bond villain image and talking up his "robot army".
538.
by ben_w 3mo ago
I'd also argue React is on the "harm" side. :P
539.
by ben_w 3mo ago
Communication is not a one-player game. For example, if I was being pedantic: > nobody seems to care about using the right words in only this context. "nobody" would include you. And then I might complain about we use the word
540.
by ben_w 3mo ago
Still say Matrix 3 would have been better if the cliffhanger at the end of 2 had been that "the real world" was just another nested layer of the Matrix for those who rejected the primary fiction. I mean, why bother sending an army

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