cdb's recent activity
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Comment on What was the best job you ever had? in ~life
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Comment on Reddit reports 69% jump in revenue, topping analyst estimates in ~tech
cdb Link ParentI don't understand this comment. Could you please elaborate? You have to use a certain writing style or word choice or something? What subreddits does this apply to?I don't understand this comment. Could you please elaborate? You have to use a certain writing style or word choice or something? What subreddits does this apply to?
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Comment on Lost/losing the drive for friendship in ~health.mental
cdb Link ParentMy interpretation in this case is... Id: Inherent automatic thought Superego: Learned automatic thought Ego: Conscious thought So for this situation is maybe your id makes you not feel like going...My interpretation in this case is...
Id: Inherent automatic thought
Superego: Learned automatic thought
Ego: Conscious thoughtSo for this situation is maybe your id makes you not feel like going out to some event because the unknown can be scary, your superego makes you not feel like going out because you developed an aversion to social events after avoiding them for several years, so your ego needs to say "shut up, stupid automatic thoughts, socializing is the rational decision so I'm going."
Personally, I am so bad at this. I end up staying home often. It's a relatively new standing rule in my household that my partner and I should accept any invitations to hang out with friends unless there is a legitimate conflict.
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Comment on The great 2028 Olympic ticket crashout, explained (gifted link) in ~sports
cdb Link ParentYeah, nothing in this article seems unexpected to me. You could probably use this as a good case study for an intro to microeconomics class. This article details things relating to: scarcity,...Yeah, nothing in this article seems unexpected to me. You could probably use this as a good case study for an intro to microeconomics class. This article details things relating to: scarcity, opportunity cost, supply/demand, market equilibria, elasticity, utility, budget constraints, market structures, etc. (Yes, I referenced a list of typical curriculum topics).
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Comment on What’s the best 3D-printed thing you have? in ~talk
cdb LinkI have a cheap FDM and a cheap resin printer and have printed a few figurines, but I've been too lazy and unmotivated to really get into modeling my own stuff, so they mostly sit unused. Probably...I have a cheap FDM and a cheap resin printer and have printed a few figurines, but I've been too lazy and unmotivated to really get into modeling my own stuff, so they mostly sit unused.
Probably the best thing I've 3D printed is repairing a crack in my garbage bin and adding plastic numbers using a 3D printing pen, which seems to be holding up, surprisingly.
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Comment on What are your go-to meals that you cook? in ~food
cdb LinkI've been trying to eat relatively lower carb during the week, because I tend to go out and eat a lot of unhealthy foods during the weekend. So, weeknight dinners usually consist of air fryer...I've been trying to eat relatively lower carb during the week, because I tend to go out and eat a lot of unhealthy foods during the weekend. So, weeknight dinners usually consist of air fryer vegetables with some kind of protein with pan sauce.
Air fryer vegetables are just cut up and tossed in olive oil, salt, and pepper. Put it in the air fryer at 400-450F or so until slightly charred. The high heat and char are very important to me. Works with a large variety of things: carrots, onions, potatoes, broccoli, brussels sprouts, squash, cauliflower, bell peppers, asparagus, etc. It sounds really simple, but I honestly prefer this type of preparation over something more complex or highly seasoned, especially if the veggies are fresh and in season.
Protein can be pork chops, boneless chicken thighs, steak, whatever is on sale in the meat department. Sear hard and pan fry until done (a meat thermometer helps). Make a pan sauce with ingredients that are salty, sour, and sweet to varying degrees, plus a little water if necessary. For example, I might cook some chicken thighs then deglaze with soy sauce, lemon juice, a little sugar, and enough water to just cover the pan. Cook the sauce down until it starts to thicken and immediately pour on top of the chicken. Or maybe pork chops the deglaze with red wine vinegar, fig jam, salt, and a little butter thrown in at the end. I guess for amounts, about a tablespoon of each is a good place to start (not the salt though). I just go by feel for balance. You can always taste and add more, so just try not to overdo the stronger ingredients.
Another easy one is nabe. Buy thinly sliced beef then put it in a pot along with some napa cabbage, green onions, enoki mushrooms, dashi powder (enough for 2 cups of broth per directions), a few tbsp soy sauce, a few tbsp sake/cooking wine, then water to cover halfway. Cook on stove with lid on until the meat is cooked through, about 10 minutes. Eat with rice. I often fill out my rice with some cauliflower rice to sneak extra veggies in there, one cup cauliflower for each cup of dry rice. I just chuck it all in a rice cooker, and it turns out pretty well.
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Comment on Invincible Season 4 finale discussion in ~tv
cdb Link ParentI started thinking this way for a bit, but then I started accepting that it's a comic book and lots of things won't make sense. I guess you could say that for choking, it's more about cutting off...I started thinking this way for a bit, but then I started accepting that it's a comic book and lots of things won't make sense. I guess you could say that for choking, it's more about cutting off blood flow to the brain than cutting off air. That's why you can choke someone unconscious in a matter of seconds even if they can hold their breath for minutes. There's a ton of complaints I could make about consistency of rules in this universe, but I'm enjoying the show overall so I'm setting those thoughts aside. Season 1 was great. Seasons 2 and 3 were noticeably worse for me, but I really enjoyed Season 4.
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Comment on “60s lounge” and Laufey in ~music
cdb Link ParentIt reminds me of some of the music from 60's Bond movies. So, it might be worthwhile to look into some of those soundtracks. Maybe You Only Live Twice would be a place to start. However, I also...It reminds me of some of the music from 60's Bond movies. So, it might be worthwhile to look into some of those soundtracks. Maybe You Only Live Twice would be a place to start. However, I also think there's a lot of bossa nova influence. It's probably more accurate to say that it was inspired by a variety of styles.
Maybe it depends on your background. If you've grown up hearing a lot of american instrumental music, you might notice the bossa nova aspect as more distinctive, and vice versa.
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Comment on OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s home targeted with molotov cocktail in ~tech
cdb (edited )Link ParentI guess that depends on whether we can find more uses for code or other AI outputs. It seems like excel didn't decrease accountants too much, just increased the amount of accounting we're doing....I guess that depends on whether we can find more uses for code or other AI outputs. It seems like excel didn't decrease accountants too much, just increased the amount of accounting we're doing. Maybe we don't necessarily decrease the number of programmers so much as increase the amount of programming/coding. I'm seeing some of this happen in research. People are applying coding approaches to a lot more situations than before since the barrier seems to be lower. Who knows how the balance of jobs will shake out a few years from now?
I'm reminded of the post from a bit ago with the perspective that AI models won't let us work less, just do more with less time. It seems to me that this is a pattern that has held up through history. As long as we feel like there are gains to be made, we'll think of jobs for people to do, until AI and robotics clearly outperform us in every aspect. Despite the hype from people like Altman, I don't think we're particularly close to that point so far, although people may need to be adaptable to stay employed, depending on how industries shift.
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Comment on OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s home targeted with molotov cocktail in ~tech
cdb Link ParentYeah, I've been using Google Antigravity for a few projects, and I'm impressed. It's significantly better than trying to code by just having a conversation with a chatbot and copy pasting in and...Yeah, I've been using Google Antigravity for a few projects, and I'm impressed. It's significantly better than trying to code by just having a conversation with a chatbot and copy pasting in and out. At its core, it's not that much different from a manual chatbot approach, but the ease of use and automation of gruntwork feels significant to me. It's not a magic bullet. I still have to iterate on the roadmap, then iterate on the design docs for each element on the roadmap, then iterate on the implementation plans for each element on the design docs, then iterate on corrections for shifting goals or things that went wrong. However, you can get to some good results on platforms/languages you don't know just by knowing fundamentals of programming and software engineering. I made a Chrome extension recently that seems to work quite well, despite the fact that I've never programmed in JS. I can't speak for professional software engineering, but for people like me who deal more in data analysis, one-offs, and hobby projects, it's been great.
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Comment on OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s home targeted with molotov cocktail in ~tech
cdb Link ParentI used to get a lot of fillings due to poor oral hygiene, maybe one or two a year. This meant longer sessions at the dentist or sometimes a separate appointment to perform the extra work. Then I...I used to get a lot of fillings due to poor oral hygiene, maybe one or two a year. This meant longer sessions at the dentist or sometimes a separate appointment to perform the extra work. Then I got gingivitis, which scared me into consistently brushing and flossing ever since. Haven't needed a new filling in almost 20 years. My dentist has even suggested that I don't actually need to go to them twice a year since they usually don't find much. Although I still go to the dentist twice a year, fillings and other dental work would be a significant addition to the typical maintenance work.
Toothbrushes obviously aren't an alternative to ALL dentistry, but I'm sure that the fact that toothbrushes are cheap and widely available means less work for dentists in aggregate. If we didn't have toothbrushes we'd need more dentists. That's just in a vacuum though. I think the number of dentists in reality is more influenced by economics and culture than any measure of overall dental health in the population.
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Comment on Vaping likely to cause lung and oral cancer, Australian researchers find in new review of evidence in ~health
cdb LinkThe studies linked by the Guardian article are really weak evidence. Two of them describe case studies that claim to link oral cancer observations with vaping, but neither of them have any...The studies linked by the Guardian article are really weak evidence. Two of them describe case studies that claim to link oral cancer observations with vaping, but neither of them have any evidence to establish a causal link between vaping and these observations, even though it's reported as such. This screams bias and agenda to me rather than evidence. The mouse study I've read before, and it's pretty bad. The mice were subjected to 4 hours of daily vapor exposure, which is completely unrealistic. The calculated exposure seems invalid because it only takes inhalation into account and not the fact that the vapor can deposit on the mice and everything in their living area. Then it turns out that the increased incidence of tumors is not even statistically significant between nicotine vapor and the fresh air control group (p=0.15). The high p-value is in one of the main tables, but the fact that they mention other p-values while this one is never mentioned in the text discussion or conclusion sections is highly suspicious.
I haven't reviewed the whole study itself since the link isn't working for me, although I see someone posted an archive version, so I'll take a closer look later. I'm not a big fan of qualitative studies making fairly bold conclusions about risk like this one does though. Also, the concluding statement about how ecigs can't be said to be less risky than cigarettes is a serious misrepresentation of the linked study, because that study actually shows that ecigs were less risky for asthma, COPD, and oral disease.
After saying all that, I'm not particularly pro-vaping, especially not for minors, and I think it's clear that it's not risk-free. However, I am a former vaper, and it's become a topic of interest to me how much slander and bias there is about it in media and society overall, even relative to smoking. It seems like there's often a major drive to show that it's just as bad as smoking, even though the data doesn't seem to support that. I can't point to direct evidence, but I don't think it's that much of a conspiracy theory to suggest that it's likely due to pressure from tobacco companies.
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Comment on Are there any small Android phones comparable to the size of an iPhone 12 mini? in ~tech
cdb LinkYou can try searching by dimensions with gsmarena's phone finder. Looks like there's not a ton of options, mainly the smallest galaxy s phones and some other fringe options....You can try searching by dimensions with gsmarena's phone finder. Looks like there's not a ton of options, mainly the smallest galaxy s phones and some other fringe options.
https://m.gsmarena.com/results.php3?nYearMin=2024&nHeightMax=150
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Comment on AI was eroding trust in my classroom — so I got rid of typed papers and bought my students notebooks instead in ~life
cdb (edited )Link ParentWhile it's less exciting than a dedicated typing device, I think you can pretty much get the desired result with a managed chromebook in locked mode. If that's not sufficient, then it's just a...While it's less exciting than a dedicated typing device, I think you can pretty much get the desired result with a managed chromebook in locked mode. If that's not sufficient, then it's just a software problem to solve.
I would like to think that a simpler dedicated word processor device could be cheaper, but the more I think about it the more I think in reality it's probably hard to beat the economies of scale of chromebooks. I think even a dumber device ultimately ends up having most of the components of a laptop anyway. Using a worse display, processor, battery, and storage doesn't reduce the cost that much, since you still need them, and chromebook components are already cheap. Although the existing modern Alphasmart clones are tailored towards a more premium design and audience, they're a lot more expensive than chromebooks. Other existing cyberdecks seem about as cheap as the cheapest chromebooks. My guess is the price of a system with all the needed functions probably can't be reduced to be significantly less than a chromebook.
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Comment on What are you reading these days? in ~books
cdb LinkFinished Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. I guess I don't have much more to say about this book beyond what I posted last time halfway through. I feel like most of the point of the book was...Finished Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood. I guess I don't have much more to say about this book beyond what I posted last time halfway through. I feel like most of the point of the book was already made before the ending was revealed, which was not much of a surprise. It seems like the apocalyptic result was due to a society with higher technology but lower morals and lower checks and balances than ours. In the book, most of the damage was done by an individual, but in modern times I think it's hard to get anything significant done without a large team working together in multiple stages. It looks like the current state of tech isn't empowering individuals to do society-level damage, but I wonder if future technology will eventually change that.
Currently reading The Alignment Problem by Brian Christian, about halfway through. It's about aligning AI systems with human values and brings up some ethical dilemmas introduced by AI models. Although it's from 2020, I think it's modern enough to remain relevant.
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Comment on What’s your preferred work monitor setup? in ~comp
cdb LinkIn the past several years I've gone through the following configurations: one 27" 1440p 16:9 one 35" 1440p ultrawide two 35" 1440p ultrawides stacked vertically (probably the best option) one 42"...In the past several years I've gone through the following configurations:
- one 27" 1440p 16:9
- one 35" 1440p ultrawide
- two 35" 1440p ultrawides stacked vertically (probably the best option)
- one 42" oled TV with one 35" 1440p ultrawide on top
- one 40" 4k ultrawide with one 35" 1440 ultrawide on top
For productivity moving to two ultrawides was helpful, but going larger on my primary monitor hasn't been that helpful. The oled TV was good for gaming, but not great for text clarity and window management. Even after trying for a while, I haven't managed to make good use of the extra height of the 4k monitor. It's mostly the width that helps in most cases for me. The 4k ultrawide is pretty good on its own in terms of real estate, but there are not many affordable options. So, I think two stacked 1440p ultrawides are probably the sweet spot in terms of having a large amount of area without overspending.
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Comment on What are some bands you regret not seeing live (or, just never had the chance to see in the first place)? in ~music
cdb Link ParentI saw Hiromi with Stanley Clarke, and I would definitely regret it if I hadn't.I saw Hiromi with Stanley Clarke, and I would definitely regret it if I hadn't.
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Comment on Is higher education still valuable? in ~life
cdb (edited )LinkAs far as I can tell, the advice to just go to college and figure the rest out later has never been correct. There's a lot of discourse about how nowadays a lot of college majors aren't worth it,...As far as I can tell, the advice to just go to college and figure the rest out later has never been correct. There's a lot of discourse about how nowadays a lot of college majors aren't worth it, but the narrative was the same 25 years ago for people paying attention. They were publishing stats on average income by major showing that many degrees were not worth the money back then too.
What has changed is the trend to require more and more education over time, but I guess that's an expected result as society and technology evolve and the complexity of valuable work increases on average.
I think the best thing to do is the same as before, although even more important to consider as educational requirements increase:
- Pick a path that seems to interest you.
- Do some research on what jobs that type of degree moves the needle on, whether they're hiring, and what expected salaries in those positions are.
- Do the math yourself on whether the degree is worth your time and money.
So, for your personal situation, what are your plans for that stats degree? I'm in a similar situation myself, getting an MS in CS despite not working in software. For me it's half hobby and half for professional development. Work is paying for it, so there's not much consideration as far as monetary cost for me, just the consumption of my spare time. I'm starting to angle myself as a person with domain knowledge that also understands things about AI and computing in general, which might result in good opportunities as companies sink more investment in use of AI techniques. On the other hand, if it doesn't result in a huge impact to my career immediately, Plan A to get a reasonably valuable degree, then a job in that field, has worked out fine so far. That path was not as linear as I hoped it would be, but that's another story.
edit: To kind of argue against my own point, the unemployment rate for recent college grads is pretty high relative to historical values, while the unemployment rate for all young workers is historically low. Underemployment seems fairly steady though. So, if you can get a job, the degree is probably still worth it. I think this might support my point that a blanket statement on whether more school is worth it, and a personal analysis is more important than ever, though.
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Comment on Anthropic drops flagship safety pledge in ~tech
cdb Link ParentFrom the Axios article linked elsewhere in this thread: I'm not a big fan of the government making threats like this either. I don't know if it's implied or not, but the article makes it seem like...From the Axios article linked elsewhere in this thread:
How it works: The Defense Production Act gives the president the authority to compel private companies to accept and prioritize particular contracts as required for national defense
The law is rarely used in such a blatantly adversarial way. The idea, the senior Defense official said, would be to force Anthropic to adapt its model to the Pentagon's needs, without any safeguards
The Pentagon is also considering severing its contract with Anthropic and declaring the company a supply chain risk, which would require a plethora of other companies that work with the Pentagon to certify that Claude isn't used in their workflows.
I'm not a big fan of the government making threats like this either. I don't know if it's implied or not, but the article makes it seem like it is two clear threats, which are both very serious. Either be compelled to do the DoD's bidding, or get cut off not only from DoD contracts, but from contracts with any company that works with the DoD.
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Comment on Anthropic drops flagship safety pledge in ~tech
cdb (edited )Link ParentI think the issue with type of thinking is trying to apply a human model of cognition to a machine. If we're talking about humans, it makes sense to say that if a human can't even do tasks using...I think the issue with type of thinking is trying to apply a human model of cognition to a machine. If we're talking about humans, it makes sense to say that if a human can't even do tasks using elementary school level thinking, they are probably not good at tasks requiring more complex thinking. AI models are different, though. They might have some trouble with arithmetic or counting the number of R's in the word "strawberry," but they can do better than most humans at some more complex tasks, requiring either wide-ranging or esoteric knowledge.
For instance, this week I asked copilot to put together a study guide to understand the technical and contextual aspects of a specific meeting discussing research based on the accumulated slides and meeting minutes from the past two years. This was to aid onboarding and to help experienced people address gaps in knowledge. This would be an impossible (or very very long) task for someone not knowledgeable about this type of research and a labor-intensive task for an experienced person, but it spit out a really good outline in about a minute. I don't know if it's perfect, but it's really good (I'm the experienced one trying to help a new hire). I haven't used the guide a bunch yet, but asking it to explain the first point also resulted in a good and useful answer. It's possible that it missed a few items here or there, but if you understand 80% of everything happening in this meeting, that's probably higher than average. Point is, there are a lot of questions that humans aren't great at answering that AI models can do as good or better at.
I'll try to take a slightly different tack than others with this one. I'm an introvert who didn't grow up with very good social skills. Although it was difficult for me, the best job for me and my long-term success in life was working as a leasing agent at a large group of apartment complexes during a break from college. I'm not sure how someone like me got a job like this, but I had to talk to people all day every day. If I wasn't handling walk-ins or leading model home tours, I was making calls to follow up on leads or schedule more tours. It's surprising how many issues one can overcome when their income and survival depends on it.
I was only at that job for about half a year, and most of the confidence at that job hasn't translated to other situations in life. Some of it did, though. I still have some anxiety when it comes to phone calls or talking to groups of people, but I still sometimes think back to that time in my life, which gives me a bit of confidence.