balooga's recent activity
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Comment on Why do AI company logos look like buttholes? in ~design
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Comment on WordSafety: check a name for unwanted meanings in foreign languages in ~humanities.languages
balooga Link ParentAs a pre-LLM tool it’s a great idea, but ChatGPT has made it obsolete. Admittedly it took a bit of careful prompt engineering, but I was able to get vastly better results from it than this site...As a pre-LLM tool it’s a great idea, but ChatGPT has made it obsolete. Admittedly it took a bit of careful prompt engineering, but I was able to get vastly better results from it than this site could produce.
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Comment on Help me understand the phrase, "Elbows up" in ~society
balooga LinkI’ve never heard the phrase before so I can’t speak to that. @stu2b50’s explanation makes sense. But to your question about “why a society would glorify such a violent backed terminology” — the...I’ve never heard the phrase before so I can’t speak to that. @stu2b50’s explanation makes sense.
But to your question about “why a society would glorify such a violent backed terminology” — the past few years have really disabused me of any belief in modern society’s so-called enlightenment. Sure, there are plenty of individuals who reject violence and have nuanced personal ethics. And there are certain (rapidly disintegrating) norms in the political sphere about what kind of rhetoric is acceptable, and those trickle down to the zeitgeist too.
But by and large, I’m coming to realize, the “brotherhood of man” has always been a myth. The past was no better, we just sanitize it in the retellings. The mass of humanity we call “society” is not, as a whole, striving for knowledge or justice or virtue or empathy or any form of long-term betterment for itself or its planet. Arguments to the contrary are mostly wishful thinking or well-intentioned mythologizing.
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Comment on Ai 2027 in ~tech
balooga Link ParentThanks for the synopsis. I read the first third or so last week but haven’t made time to finish. It’s an interesting thought exercise! Though it sounds like the two conclusions (either utopia, or...Thanks for the synopsis. I read the first third or so last week but haven’t made time to finish. It’s an interesting thought exercise! Though it sounds like the two conclusions (either utopia, or annihilation) are maybe too much of a reach IMHO.
Stop me if this thought is already expressed in the full piece, but I think it’s going to be critical that we remove the “black box” factor from AI and create some tools for deep inspection of how exactly how inputs + noise = output.
As I understand it, the problem is that model weights are so dense and complex that no one can keep track of how they’re being used in the transformation process. But you know what’s really good at pattern recognition in complex data sets? AI! We need to train a new model, using a training set of existing model weights. Now this is all above my pay grade… but couldn’t that sort of “metamodel” be used as the foundation for a tool that can analyze specifics about the knowledge contained inside a model; edit that knowledge in granular, controlled ways; and explain exactly why an LLM produced the output it did in a given scenario?
If those assumptions are correct, creating tools like that will be vital for the future of AI safety, and they’ll help chart a safer course toward developing self-improving AI that leans closer to the utopia outcome than the annihilation one.
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Comment on US says it is now monitoring immigrants' social media for antisemitism in ~society
balooga LinkPreach!In a statement to NPR, Edward Ahmed Mitchell, the national deputy director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said: "The spirit of Joseph McCarthy is alive and well in the Trump administration, which has spent months dishonestly mischaracterizing legitimate criticism of the Israeli government's war crimes in Gaza as antisemitic, pursuing witch hunts into American colleges, and threatening the free speech rights of immigrants."
Preach!
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Comment on CSS Naked Day in ~tech
balooga Link ParentWell the problem isn't React per se, it's the crazy idea of building a complex, data-driven application with a robust GUI, which renders in a markup language intended for static documents. Tim...Well the problem isn't React per se, it's the crazy idea of building a complex, data-driven application with a robust GUI, which renders in a markup language intended for static documents. Tim Berners-Lee and Daniel Connolly never dreamed of GPU-enabled dashboards, drag-and-drop widgets, modals, tooltips, or async API queries when they wrote up the humble HTML draft in 1993. We can debate whether all this functionality SHOULD have been shoehorned into it in the first place, but here we are regardless. I don't think most would be willing to give up their Gmail, YouTube, TikTok, Slack and Discord, etc. All of these webapps are in the same boat — it wouldn't be possible to implement them without CSS.
I get where you're coming from, FWIW... I remember the old days of the CSS Zen Garden and I used to advocate for a clean line of separation between content and presentation. I still think it's a great idea for mostly static sites, blogs, etc. But it's not realistic for modern web apps. Composable UI is where it's at! My modern codebases still take care to separate the CSS from the business logic as much as possible, for readability and maintainability, but once those apps are compiled and bundled the resulting code doesn't look very much like something Eric Meyer would've written.
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Comment on CSS Naked Day in ~tech
balooga LinkThe thought of doing this to my company’s rich React-based web app gave me a chuckle. Thanks to WAI-ARIA and lots of careful work, our document structure is quite semantic and well-organized, but...The thought of doing this to my company’s rich React-based web app gave me a chuckle. Thanks to WAI-ARIA and lots of careful work, our document structure is quite semantic and well-organized, but that doesn’t translate to functioning without CSS.
It did get me thinking about how one would even implement CSS removal in a React context with a library of self-contained components. Just removing a
<link>element isn’t going to have much effect on a bunch of CSS-in-JS and dynamically applied inline styles. You might be able to build a stylesheet like this:* { background: unset !important; border: unset !important; color: unset !important; /* continue for literally every property in the CSS spec… */ }But even that wouldn’t override existing
!importantdeclarations in the codebase. Maybe there’s a way to strip those out programmatically, but I can’t think of it right now. Sounds like a headache. -
Comment on Loathe thy neighbor: Elon Musk and the American Christian right are publicly trying to discredit empathy in ~society
balooga LinkThe Belief it or Not channel on YouTube recently had a video on this general subject: The Sin of Empathy. The mental gymnastics required to maintain such a worldview are reaching never-before-seen...The Belief it or Not channel on YouTube recently had a video on this general subject: The Sin of Empathy. The mental gymnastics required to maintain such a worldview are reaching never-before-seen levels of flexibility.
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Comment on What are some examples of media that really captured lightning in a bottle? in ~tv
balooga (edited )LinkIt’s probably worth mentioning pro wrestling in this thread. It was never an interest of mine, but there was about a decade, maybe a little longer, starting in the late ‘80s, when it was...It’s probably worth mentioning pro wrestling in this thread. It was never an interest of mine, but there was about a decade, maybe a little longer, starting in the late ‘80s, when it was everywhere. Something about the hypermasculinity, pageantry, and spectacle of excess really resonated with the zeitgeist back then.
Like I said, I didn’t follow it at all but I still know about Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Ric Flare, Sting, Steve Austin, The Rock, and The Undertaker. Not to mention the drama around WWF/WWE, WCW, TNA, and NWO. You couldn’t escape wrestling’s gravity. I think in the years before the internet really took off there were a lot of people who still bought into the kayfabe and took it quite seriously.
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Comment on What are some examples of media that really captured lightning in a bottle? in ~tv
balooga Link ParentRoughly around the same time period, the Lord of the Rings film trilogy made similar waves. To a (slightly) lesser degree the Star Wars prequel trilogy was also coming out around then to huge...Roughly around the same time period, the Lord of the Rings film trilogy made similar waves. To a (slightly) lesser degree the Star Wars prequel trilogy was also coming out around then to huge hype. The Matrix franchise was also doing gangbusters in those years. Not just the sequel films but also the Animatrix and some popular video game tie-ins.
I’d say all four of these were the cultural juggernauts of that era.
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Comment on Microsoft launches generative AI-powered, Quake II “inspired” tech demo in ~games
balooga Link ParentI think an LLM-powered “narrative engine” could be really interesting, something that tracks story details and characters and generates compelling dramatic arcs in response to player actions. That...I think an LLM-powered “narrative engine” could be really interesting, something that tracks story details and characters and generates compelling dramatic arcs in response to player actions. That would go hand-in-hand with the dialogue idea you mentioned but take it a step further. I’d be open to that application of AI! Of course If all the games started doing it (if they were very similar, at least) that would probably wear out its welcome fast.
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Comment on Microsoft launches generative AI-powered, Quake II “inspired” tech demo in ~games
balooga Link ParentI haven’t tried it but I assumed it’s basically the idea behind the Doom and Minecraft demos that were going around a while back. Basically: technically impressive but not much of an actual game...I haven’t tried it but I assumed it’s basically the idea behind the Doom and Minecraft demos that were going around a while back. Basically: technically impressive but not much of an actual game due to the utter lack of coherence or logical systems.
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Comment on Legends of Broadway reprise their most memorable characters in ~arts
balooga LinkThat was a fun read, I loved Dick Van Dyke’s retelling and heard it in his own voice. He’s so spirited, I can’t believe he’s 99 already! Sad to say he’ll probably be my next big gut punch from a...That was a fun read, I loved Dick Van Dyke’s retelling and heard it in his own voice. He’s so spirited, I can’t believe he’s 99 already! Sad to say he’ll probably be my next big gut punch from a celeb whose number is up. Good on him for kicking around this long, and with such a smile on his face to boot.
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Comment on ‘A Quiet Place: Day One’ helmer Michael Sarnoski to direct adaptation of popular video game ‘Death Stranding’ for A24 and Kojima Productions in ~movies
balooga LinkI never played the game, didn’t look like my cup of tea. But oddly, I could see myself watching this, if the reviews are good.I never played the game, didn’t look like my cup of tea. But oddly, I could see myself watching this, if the reviews are good.
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Comment on Temporary 3D printed structures transform into a forest after use at Expo 2025 Osaka in ~design
balooga LinkHuh, looks like Guinness recognized these as the world’s largest 3D-printed biodegradable building (monolithic), which is weirdly specific but whatever. I wish I could find some better images of...Huh, looks like Guinness recognized these as the world’s largest 3D-printed biodegradable building (monolithic), which is weirdly specific but whatever.
I wish I could find some better images of how they’re going to be used. I found the Expo 2025 map and these are located inside the Grand Ring, in the promenade between the blue and orange areas (labeled “Foresting Architecture”). Looks like they’re just meant as little rest areas. The pics appear to show them unfurnished, with people sitting on the floor inside, and apparently always on concrete, which is strange for something that’s supposed to become a forest. The hole in the roof won’t make for a very good rain shelter. I feel like the moment these start to decompose they’re going to become pretty gross structures for humans to use. So I’m just left scratching my head wondering what’s the point?
The design is interesting and 3D-printed biodegradables sound like a wonderful idea. Maybe that’s all you really need for Expo purposes. I hope the tech gets put to good use elsewhere.
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Comment on Huis ten Bosch: Only Miffy can save us now in ~travel
balooga LinkI really want to see a Not Just Bikes special about navigating this place.I really want to see a Not Just Bikes special about navigating this place.
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Comment on How The Beverly Hillbillies changed everything - a retrospective in ~tv
balooga Link ParentAh, good point. I always forget that clicking on a tag in a post only shows other posts within that same group.Ah, good point. I always forget that clicking on a tag in a post only shows other posts within that same group.
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Comment on How The Beverly Hillbillies changed everything - a retrospective in ~tv
balooga Link Parent😳 Yikes! Not sure I’m gonna be able to commit to watching that but kudos to the channel for dedication. I noticed the long watch.very tag and thought that was fitting so I clicked to see where...42-hour
😳
Yikes! Not sure I’m gonna be able to commit to watching that but kudos to the channel for dedication. I noticed the
long watch.verytag and thought that was fitting so I clicked to see where else that’s been used. Just once, it turns out, for a prior post of this same video!I’m kinda shocked YouTube allows videos of this length, actually.
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Comment on Recommended podcasts by experts in their fields? in ~talk
balooga Link ParentI love this one! It’s always funny when he catches a guest (who is also an expert in the field) off-guard with a technical question they don’t know the answer to, and then proceeds to answer it...I love this one! It’s always funny when he catches a guest (who is also an expert in the field) off-guard with a technical question they don’t know the answer to, and then proceeds to answer it for them. At the very least it’s nice to hear a show hosted by a real scientist instead of a “science journalist” or “science communicator.” I’m usually in over my head when I listen, but it’s increased my appreciation for the work and I’m sure I’ve picked up plenty through osmosis.
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Comment on Donald Trump White House directs US National Institutes of Health to study ‘regret’ after transgender people transition in ~society
balooga LinkSeems to me that if anything’s going to make trans people regret transitioning, it’s the right wing’s deliberate efforts to make the world more inhospitable to them. Basically, “if you transition,...Seems to me that if anything’s going to make trans people regret transitioning, it’s the right wing’s deliberate efforts to make the world more inhospitable to them. Basically, “if you transition, you’re going to regret it— precisely because we will do everything in our power to make your life miserable.” They frame this as a friendly warning, but it’s really a threat.
It’s an aperture!