retsibsi

35 ms·

451.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Discussing the proper response to a problem with someone who denies its existence is rarely productive, so people might have saved some time if they had known your position from the beginning.
452.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Better to encourage it then, surely. If rich people are doing good things in order to win praise, what's the point of denying it to them? If enough of us react that way, we won't diminish the power of the rich people, we'll j
453.
by retsibsi 7y ago
I think this is mostly true for me, but I wonder if the best approach involves a little bit of the 'semi-random' too. The internet is an amazing way to discover books and authors, and I feel like I'm exposed to a pretty eclec
454.
by retsibsi 7y ago
I'm not sure what Google should do, but someone else made a good point that I think applies here: 'Google says X' probably has much greater propaganda value than 'this local company that is clearly under our government&#
455.
by retsibsi 7y ago
When the dispute is only formal, yes, it's a subjective question whether both parties are important enough for us to take the dispute seriously. But when a border is disputed in the 'troops and border skirmishes' sense? Ignor
456.
by retsibsi 7y ago
This reminds me that Youtube used to have a star rating system, but as you say, it was effectively treated as thumbs up/thumbs down, so they eventually made that official. Interestingly though it wasn't quite a simple five stars&#
457.
by retsibsi 7y ago
I'm not so much worried about how the experts interpret this number behind closed doors, but how everyone else reacts to it. This thread began with someone confidently saying that the 2% death rate will decline as we get better data, a
458.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Sorry, I only saw this today. I don't think I fully understand your question, though -- can you clarify? I'm not quite sure what you mean by 'keeping the effects strongly tied to their causes'/maintaining 'stri
459.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Yeah I agree that that is a bigger problem. (And not just confidence, but concentration -- even if you know you can't trust the car, it must be a lot harder to stay properly alert when you have nothing to do 99% of the time.) I didn&#x
460.
by retsibsi 7y ago
> Everything points to this thing having a mortality similar to the seasonal flu. Can you justify this? I want to be convinced, because at the moment I think it's very optimistic. (There are different estimates for seasonal flu mort
461.
by retsibsi 7y ago
This seems dangerous, if it leads to unwarranted complacency among those who take the number seriously. Do you know the rationale behind reporting a number known to be skewed in this way -- is the idea that it is roughly canceled out by oth
462.
by retsibsi 7y ago
There are degrees of uncertainty, and ranges of plausible severity, even when we haven't actually nailed these down quantitatively. We already have enough information about COVID-19 to raise it far above the threat level of a random vi
463.
by retsibsi 7y ago
> Serious cases and mortality (2%) will be adjusted downwards safely in the coming weeks, as the detection of mild cases increases. There are factors that could move that number in both directions. Yes, presumably there are many mild cas
464.
by retsibsi 7y ago
I think the important questions are how people actually interpret it, and (if we want to judge Tesla) how they could reasonably have expected people to interpret it. I don't know exactly how they presented it to the public, but it defi
465.
by retsibsi 7y ago
> NAND to Tetris The book version is also great, and suitable for self-study if you prefer to learn that way: https://www.nand2tetris.org/book
466.
by retsibsi 7y ago
On Windows 8.1, when I want to run Paint.NET I have to remember to accept the suggestion before typing the full name; it guesses correctly until I finish the .net, at which point it decides I want to open a web page. (Honestly though I&#x27
467.
by retsibsi 7y ago
> I would have gone for Atherosclerosis instead of lung cancer personally. Okay, but that isn't fully within anyone's control either, and you're still ignoring the diseases that are predominantly genetic, the ones that hap
468.
by retsibsi 7y ago
It's consequentialist reasoning, not necessarily utilitarian. And you don't have to be a thoroughgoing consequentialist to agree that in a world full of preventable misery, it's best to focus on actually preventing it, rather
469.
by retsibsi 7y ago
It just comes from a focus on marginal effects (my replacement at evilcorp will probably do roughly as good a job, and probably not give a large fraction of his/her income to charity) and caring about actual outcomes for the people you
470.
by retsibsi 7y ago
The major disease most strongly associated with a known, avoidable risk factor that I can think of is lung cancer. And Wikipedia tells me that > The vast majority (85%) of cases of lung cancer are due to long-term tobacco smoking.[4] Abo
471.
by retsibsi 7y ago
> Most medical problems are arguably preventable as well. That's a huge stretch. You could say that for most illnesses we have some idea how to reduce the risk, but there is still an overwhelming amount of luck involved. (And that&#
472.
by retsibsi 7y ago
One reason it's so good is that while it would (I think) work for the stereotypical grandma or curious youngster, it's also really interesting for readers who aren't complete novices. It assumes no pre-existing knowledge, and
473.
by retsibsi 7y ago
L'esprit d'escalier by proxy, 15 years after the fact... I like it :)
474.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Seconded. He did an amazing job of combining accessibility and depth. The book opens with, iirc, the scenario of two neighbouring kids who want to communicate with each other from a distance -- how can they encode and transmit their message
475.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Which is the point of this app, right? You don't want to let down your friend, so you're not going to cancel in the normal way; but in the case where the commitment no longer really suits either of you, it would be nice to take a
476.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Does that extend to backing out of a social engagement at very short notice, simply because you no longer feel like it, without fear of causing offense? I think a lot of people make plans with friends in all sincerity, but sometimes end up
477.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Similar to the problem with the 'secret crush' version of the same idea -- people can insincerely tick every box, simply to see which of their friends has a crush on them. I guess the same caveat applies: only use this app with pe
478.
by retsibsi 7y ago
I mean, you can't prove that anyone you meet face-to-face isn't a p-zombie or a projection of your own mind either, but I doubt you're an actual solipsist. And I don't think you honestly have much trouble telling the dif
479.
by retsibsi 7y ago
> Bullying falls under intent, so that isn't really on point. As a response to you, true. It was just one of the most obvious disproofs of the 'sticks and stones' adage. > Who defines what insensitive means in a public
480.
by retsibsi 7y ago
Yeah, it's a saying, but unfortunately it's nonsense. Non-physical bullying can drive people to suicide, or traumatise them for life. And insensitive discussion of painful topics can dredge up old trauma, etc. You're free not

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