pfdietz

14 ms·

391.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
That depends on the branch of math. Combinatorics is trick-oriented. Maybe this is why AI has done well in that.
392.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Public choice theory explains why irrational collective results obtain from individual rational behavior. To get rational collective results requires that people act altruistically, favoring the collective over themselves.
393.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Baal was an Ugaritic god. Ugarit is one of the cities that was famously destroyed in the LBAC. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugarit
394.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I'll add that it would make a lot of sense for these kinds of stories to be fictional, because they come through a religious infrastructure whose legitimacy is boosted by the stories. They are just the kind of propaganda one would cre
395.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Everyone, or at least almost everyone, acts according to personal interests. There's a whole branch of political science, Public Choice Theory, that deals with this. Where did you get this idea that altruism was common? https:/
396.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I wasn't referring to them directly, so I have plausible deniability.
397.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
One possibility I've wondered about is the emergence of a new crop pathogen. This might be addressed by looking at DNA of modern crop pathogens, and possibly looking if there was a change in the crops being grown before/after the
398.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
It's the result of politics, and that's not always pretty.
399.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
:)
400.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
The drought explanation seems particularly plausible for the Hittites, IMO. They had grain storage, but ~3 years of drought would exhaust that. So if the climate becomes just a bit drier the chance of such a three year run increases enoug
401.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
"Low probability very high consequence situation has never happened to me, therefore I needn't do anything." -- someone who doesn't understand expectation in probability.
402.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
This is one reason to always be wearing your seat belt tightly when flying.
403.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
So, AI images to maximally drive reward centers in the brain? What could possibly go wrong?
404.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I'm not big on static type checking in most situations -- adequate testing should find the type errors too -- but one place it looks very useful is avoiding data races in multithreaded programs. See Rust.
405.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I understand asbestos fibers literally get tangled with DNA, and that this can be demonstrated in vitro.
406.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
"Show me the incentive and I'll show you the outcome." -- Charlie Munger
407.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Yes, let's penalize entities for pre-crime. What could possibly be wrong with that? /s
408.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I would have expected guitar repair. One of my recent youtube channel finds was a young woman who repairs old guitars, rewinding pickups and such. Fascinating. I didn't realize one of the uses for Formvar (aside from films for use i
409.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I don't think you can view the horrific performance of MSFT's gaming division as an example of successful anticompetitive behavior. It is not in any way sustainable, as demonstrated by their slash and burn actions now.
410.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Things get squirrely when there are small numbers of buyers and great inherent uncertainty. But for a market with many millions of buyers, yes.
411.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
The way you measure that is by how much people are willing to pay for it.
412.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Error is rampant. I saw a quote saying the difference between a good business and bad one is the good one makes the right decision 60% of time, the bad one 40% of the time. So errors abound, and have to be subsequently corrected. This cor
413.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
The FTC isn't there to stop corporations from making mistakes. Subsequent events show concerns of monopolization were misplaced.
414.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Customers are willing to spend more money on it. How else do you define value?
415.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
It delivers more value to customers while consuming less resources. Why isn't that a better move than something that costs more and delivers less?
416.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
> at its best This looks more like simple corporate incompetence. They never should have made those very expensive acquisitions.
417.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
That sounds like an extremely lame excuse to preserve money losing activities. I'll counter by saying that pruning off failing things is not only good, it's the core of capitalism. Creative destruction, as Schumpeter called it.
418.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
The mistake isn't shutting stuff down, it was overpaying for the stuff in the first place. This most recent action is unwinding the earlier mistake.
419.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
Overall they are not selling at a loss, but parts of what they're selling are being sold at a loss. The market is telling them to slim the f- down and get rid of those money-losing parts. This is all normal and justifiable. Where is
420.
by pfdietz 4mo ago
I assume this is because of diffusion of materials at elevated temperature. The sensor would, I think, require a lower temperature than an electrolyzer, since the current would be much lower. But it would be best if lower temperature soli

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