majromax's recent activity
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Comment on Voyager Technologies CEO says space data center cooling problem still needs to be solved in ~space
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Comment on Voyager Technologies CEO says space data center cooling problem still needs to be solved in ~space
majromax Link ParentYou've received other replies about this, but the concept you're looking for is entropy. Heat is energy, but it's the most useless kind of energy because it's also high entropy; to get useful work...Can’t the heat be used for thrust, power generation, manufacturing, or life support?
You've received other replies about this, but the concept you're looking for is entropy. Heat is energy, but it's the most useless kind of energy because it's also high entropy; to get useful work out of it we need to be able to transfer it from a hot region (high entropy) to a cold region (low entropy).
Unfortunately, that transfer is the very thing that's difficult in space. Since there's no direct contact with the environment to cool via conduction or convection, heat has to be radiated outwards – essentially by ensuring that the device's infrared glow points away from the sun. That's not very efficient, particularly when the solar panels have to be pointed at the sun to provide power.
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Comment on Non-Logitech replacement for G502 mouse? in ~tech
majromax Link ParentI think a major part of the problem is also (ironically) power efficiency. Microswitches need a minimum current flow for long-term reliable operation; it breaks up oxidation that could otherwise...Then enshittification happened and in the name of a quick buck, Logitech switched to Chinese Omron switches that had an advertised tenth the lifetime and in reality, lasted even less than that
I think a major part of the problem is also (ironically) power efficiency. Microswitches need a minimum current flow for long-term reliable operation; it breaks up oxidation that could otherwise cause contacts to stick. Unfortunately, that kind of current flow obviously increases power draw, and designers normally want to eliminate it.
This also operates hand-in-glove with a switch to cheaper switches. If the cheaper switches are coated differently (or if their oxidation-resistant coating is thinner and wears through more easily), then the problem of low-current actuation is worse.
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Comment on I let my wife have an affair. Do I have to console her now that it’s over? in ~life
majromax Link ParentI think an answer would be 'yes', but primarily in situations where the primary relationship ought to end. For example, I would not at all condemn an abused spouse for having an affair (emotional...Can an affair ever become ethical? To be clear, I'm not opposed to polyamory. I have doubts about whether a hidden, nonconsensual relationship can become ethical.
I think an answer would be 'yes', but primarily in situations where the primary relationship ought to end. For example, I would not at all condemn an abused spouse for having an affair (emotional or physical) with someone genuinely supportive.
Depending on definitions, there might also be trivial cases of brief 'affairs' before legitimization in a polyamourous context. For example, if a couple has opened their relationship but requires mutual approval, if A flirts with (extra-dyadic) C at work, their growing relationship might cross the line into an 'emotional affair' before A seeks dyadic-partner B's permission simply out of self-unawareness.
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Comment on Debunking the AI food delivery hoax that fooled Reddit in ~tech
majromax Link ParentUnfortunately, the business incentives of media lean strongly into breaking the story, or at least being the first to publicize it. This effect predates social media entirely: CNN 'made its bones'...With journalism, speed is essential....or is it?
Unfortunately, the business incentives of media lean strongly into breaking the story, or at least being the first to publicize it.
This effect predates social media entirely: CNN 'made its bones' with its wall-to-wall coverage of the OJ Simpson car chase in 1994, which spun off into breathless reporting about the criminal trial. Essentially as soon as we had 24/7 news media, producers sought breaking content to keep eyes glued to the screen.
Longer-form, slower content is 'better', but I need to honestly ask the question of whether it's more valuable. IMO, the sad reality is that most news – even "important" news – has nearly zero value for the average citizen in terms of directly informing their actions. The emotional roller coaster is the valuable part of the story: "if it bleeds it leads."
Trade media is an exception to this rule, and I think it's instructive. There, reporting really does inform sober consideration of valuable choices, so accurate and thorough reportage gains value relative to the 'catchy' and emotional.
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Comment on Debunking the AI food delivery hoax that fooled Reddit in ~tech
majromax Link ParentI like to practice an 'emotional scientific method', where I try to focus on how much a new piece of evidence contradicts rather than supports a narrative. This has a few different effects, such...So this is something that I should try more to be aware of. But then the question becomes when does outrage become legitimate?
I like to practice an 'emotional scientific method', where I try to focus on how much a new piece of evidence contradicts rather than supports a narrative.
This has a few different effects, such as forcing me to keep multiple perspectives in mind, but for the purpose of dealing with outrage it helps with the propensity towards the 'bitch eating crackers' syndrome.
That comes from our natural confirmatory bias, so when we've decided that X is bad then nearly everything X does gets interpreted in a negative light such that even ostensibly neutral things (like the eponymous 'eating crackers') reinforces the negative perception. The application to political discourse is self-evident.
However, that alone doesn't help with outright fake information such as this hoax. Here, I rely on a second emotional scaffold: slow news. Very few events are both important and urgent such that I need to change my actions right now[†], and the intersection of important, urgent, and emotionally resonant is even smaller.
Thus, I try to downweight breaking news, and instead I rely more on longer-form and slower analysis pieces where the authors have had time to look into the totality of then-breaking events and put the news in a broader context. This consciously 'swims against the tide' of the algorithm and so it's hard to keep up the focus, but I truly find that it helps.
[† — The weather forecast is one of the few consistent examples of information that is both important and urgent.]
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Comment on Debunking the AI food delivery hoax that fooled Reddit in ~tech
majromax Link ParentMarket manipulation could be an easy movitation. Buy some cheap, out-of-the-money put options on Uber, post the 'whistleblower' report, and hope that the news media picks it up. If the story goes...We don’t know who the hoaxer was here, or their motives. Seems fairly amateur-hour, tbh, given the current state of AI tools. A properly motivated and funded disinformation campaign would know how to make its fake badge and research paper less detectable as such.
Market manipulation could be an easy movitation. Buy some cheap, out-of-the-money put options on Uber, post the 'whistleblower' report, and hope that the news media picks it up. If the story goes viral and especially if it catches the attention of regulators or politicians, the stock could drop 10-20% in a profitable manner.
In a few years we’re all gonna be so fatigued from questioning everything that we just believe nothing anymore.
As I see it, AI content generation as gotten good enough that we should no longer trust unauthenticated sources or evidence without a known chain of custody: unverified comments should have all the credibility of "my uncle works for Nintendo and told me how to capture Mew."
It's a crying shame, but I think that this is the inevitable consequence of having a giant mixing vat of human attention without other defense mechanisms; blaming AI for this is like blaming the salmonella for colonizing the raw chicken left out on the counter.
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Comment on Indie Game Awards rescinds Clair Obscur's GOTY wins over use of generative AI [for now-removed background assets] in ~games
majromax Link ParentI think that this is revealing. Your linked FAQ states: This tells us that the Indie Game Awards is comfortable applying essentially political, values-based standards as part of its eligibility...[T]here was another award retracted this year due to the game in question – Chantey – being tied to ModRetro, which is in hot water due to ModRetro advertising that their consoles are made using the same metal that's used to manufacture attack drones.
I think that this is revealing. Your linked FAQ states:
Due to the ties with ModRetro, Indie Vanguard [for Chantey] has also been retracted as we do not want to provide the company with a platform.
This tells us that the Indie Game Awards is comfortable applying essentially political, values-based standards as part of its eligibility criteria. This in turn implies that the technical argument of whether Clair Obscur's AI use was significant might be beside the point: the IGA is willing to decide guilt by association.
That is, of course, the IGA's prerogative, but it means that all we can really do is divide ourselves into pro and anti-AI camps and shout the same arguments across the fence.
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Comment on <deleted topic> in ~tech
majromax Link ParentThose aren't entirely independent factors. The highly-attractive guy with all those other good qualities is also more likely to be in a relationship and therefore not seeking hookups, so...The only real determining factors are how good he looks, how good he is in bed, and how likely he is to kill you.
You have no real way of knowing the second two, so literally the only criteria that matters is how hot the guy is.
Those aren't entirely independent factors. The highly-attractive guy with all those other good qualities is also more likely to be in a relationship and therefore not seeking hookups, so conditional on being on the app attractiveness is possibly negatively correlated with skill in bed and positively correlated with murder.
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Comment on Financial collapse? in ~finance
majromax Link ParentOligarchs in authoritarian countries face their own personal existential risk if el jefe decides to defenestrate them, so borrow from their playbook and acquire estates (ideally) or the...I find it very hard to gauge what form my assets should be in if I want the best protection against a crisis,
Oligarchs in authoritarian countries face their own personal existential risk if el jefe decides to defenestrate them, so borrow from their playbook and acquire estates (ideally) or the right/ability to live in multiple foreign jurisdictions. Otherwise, diversify assets by jurisdiction.
Of course, this is very different than the best "invest for retirement" advice, and safety comes at the expense of returns. The real crisis might just be running out of money in one's old age.
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Comment on Ukraine destroys more than forty military aircraft in a drone attack deep inside Russia in ~news
majromax Link ParentThe best explanation that I've seen recently is that Russia's objective is inherently an imperialist one: it's fighting to defend its claimed sphere of influence. Thinking of itself as a...This sort of capability is why cant figure out Russia's objectives Ukraine.
The best explanation that I've seen recently is that Russia's objective is inherently an imperialist one: it's fighting to defend its claimed sphere of influence. Thinking of itself as a superpower, it has a natural right to a sphere of influence where it has the final say over international arrangements, regardless of the sovereign wishes of the affected countries inside this alleged sphere.
In that view, Ukraine's post-Euromaidan attempt to align itself with the EU and by extension the US/NATO is an attack against Imperial Russia. In particular:
- This happened against Russia's wishes, and Russia ought to have the final say over this sort of thing, and
- The very attempt should have been unthinkable for a country in Russia's sphere of influence, so it must have come at the instigation of foreign diplomats and spies. Therefore, it was an international (American) attack on Russia.
Of course this view is complete bollocks, more like the warped mindset of an abuser rather than that of a rational state actor. However, it explains most of Russia's actions, including its opinion this would be a 3-day SMO, its extremely aggressive internal rhetoric, and its expansion of demands for peace as the war has bogged down.
Unfortunately, this spells bad news for any peace process. Russia's baseline demand is that Ukraine cease to have an independent foreign policy, and from its imperial perspective any peace deal that results in a viable, independent Ukrainian state is a loss relative to its assumed position circa 2013. Of course, an independent, sovereign, and viable Ukraine is also the most basic term of any Ukrainian-acceptable peace deal.
Sadly, I fear that this means the war will continue until one party or the other is exhausted. The availability and routine use of long-range strikes by both parties makes even a de-facto ceasefire (digging in along current lines of control with a steady reduction of combat intensity) impossible.
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Comment on How my life changed with ADHD medication in ~life
majromax Link ParentNote that there are pill bottles with timer-caps, which automatically count the time since the bottle was last opened. It can't help you with "take the pill out of the bottle, forget the pill,"...I had those senior people MON to SUN boxes and I'm not sure if I took one already or forgot to refill it last week.
Note that there are pill bottles with timer-caps, which automatically count the time since the bottle was last opened. It can't help you with "take the pill out of the bottle, forget the pill," but it would conclusively tell you if you haven't even done that much.
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Comment on Removed Reddit post: "ChatGPT drove my friends wife into psychosis, tore family apart... now I'm seeing hundreds of people participating in the same activity. " in ~tech
majromax Link ParentThe system is what it does. The output of a language model is just text, so the only thing that can be regulated is text. Returning to the original post, if I – a human person – give you...People are saying "we can't regulate text" but an LLM is not just text. If it was, I would agree.
The system is what it does. The output of a language model is just text, so the only thing that can be regulated is text.
Returning to the original post, if I – a human person – give you sycophantic responses that feed into your delusion that you've unlocked a hidden plane of thought or somesuch, there's no obvious liability that attaches to me unless I give you instructions that cause specific and physical harm.
The efficiency with which this stuff can be pushed into existence by just a few rogue actors is so staggering that no human court system can begin to handle the cases it can potentially produce.
This is an argument against stringent regulation, not for stringent regulation. "Rogue actors" that want to cause harm aren't going to operate openly under an AI banner. They'll slide into your DMs, at scale, with models that pretend to be human. Most marks won't even realize that they're conversing with AI agents, evading the whole LLM-targeting regulatory regime.
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Comment on Removed Reddit post: "ChatGPT drove my friends wife into psychosis, tore family apart... now I'm seeing hundreds of people participating in the same activity. " in ~tech
majromax Link ParentHold up, how do you decide what is 'damaging society'? In 1825, advocating the equality of races would have been seen as 'damaging society' in huge chunks of the United States. Today, some people...Once we start throwing people in jail for damaging society, businesses will regulate themselves.
Hold up, how do you decide what is 'damaging society'?
In 1825, advocating the equality of races would have been seen as 'damaging society' in huge chunks of the United States. Today, some people in high political office would argue that advocating for LGBTQ rights is 'damaging society'. A few select people think that vaccination is 'damaging society'. Religions often think that contrary information 'damages society'.
Don't give the government a gun unless you're very, very sure where they're going to point it, not just today but tomorrow as well.
Same way McDonald's was held liable for making cofee too hot,
McDonald's was liable not just because their coffee was hot, but because the company knew (revealed through internal memos) that the coffee was being routinely and deliberately served undrinkably hot and that this could cause injury.
any business with a wet floor and no sign is liable for injury.
That's not necessarily true. A missing 'wet floor' sign doesn't always lead to liability (e.g. if the floor is in an off-limits area), and a 'wet floor' sign doesn't automatically absolve businesses of liability. Beyond that, businesses and their insurers also care about the nuisance potential of lawsuits, so whether or not there's liability they'll put signs up just to make lawsuits harder.
They aren't criminal fines, but we definitely need some criminal charges when the scale of damage to society is this large.
"Criminal" doesn't mean "civil, but big." Criminal law involves a whole new standard of proof and the potential for incarceration. Do you really think that ChatGPT can be proven to cause harm in individual cases beyond reasonable doubt? If not under current law, then how broadly do you think new law needs to be written to satisfy that standard, and what other conduct will it capture?
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Comment on Philosopher Slavoj Žižek on 'soft' fascism, AI and the effects of shamelessness in public life in ~humanities
majromax Link ParentI disagree, at least in the short term with respect to Trump's norm-breaking. I don't need an ideology to stop at a red light, and I'd think less of anyone who runs said red light without an...The fundamental problem with the Democrats is that they have no ideology.
I disagree, at least in the short term with respect to Trump's norm-breaking. I don't need an ideology to stop at a red light, and I'd think less of anyone who runs said red light without an obvious emergency.
Trump's norm breaking is at minimum a threat to the idea of the United States government as a stable, professional gestalt, and at worst it's a threat to the principle of rule of law. Ideologies in an industrialized country with a democratic system only make sense under this kind of stability since any ideological policy worth its salt is long-term. It will do no good to (e.g.) increase capital taxes if the rich know they only need stall four years for the wheel to turn such that all will be forgiven – or at least not enforced.
My opinion is essentially the opposite of yours. I think the fundamental problem with Democrats is that they saw signs of an existential threat to the American system, and they talked about existential threats to the American system, but they acted like the 2024 election was just an ordinary race to be decided on the basis of tax and spending policies.
If you are a politician who sincerely thinks that the nation is facing an existential threat, whether foreign invasion or domestic coup, you put aside your differences with your normal opponents to form something like a unity government. Ideological disputes have to wait for the crisis to pass, or else there will be no government left to fight over. With that mindset, Harris should have been running slightly to the right of McCain, not as a typical progressive.
As attributed to Ben Franklin, the United States is a republic – if it can keep it. Conventional politicians have slept on the latter half of that for a couple of decades now, and we're now in the 'find out' stage.
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Comment on US voters were right about the economy. The data was wrong. in ~finance
majromax Link ParentThe BLS has extensive documentation of their methods, including a link to the survey questions they use (pdf). However, if you aren't certain about the processing that goes into an unemployment...The BLS has extensive documentation of their methods, including a link to the survey questions they use (pdf).
However, if you aren't certain about the processing that goes into an unemployment rate, my FRED link above also includes the prime-age employment rate. That's just the fraction of people in the 25-55 demographic who have jobs, without excluding people from the denominator if they aren't looking hard enough. That accounts for many potential confounders, including "not looking because of disability" or being a stay-at-home parent.
The only thing really being 'adjusted' for in the 25-55 statistic is the nation's demographic shift, but "fewer people are working because more people are older and retired" isn't, to my mind, very interesting as a symptom of some hidden recession.
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Comment on US voters were right about the economy. The data was wrong. in ~finance
majromax Link ParentIndeed, and if you make that comparison (the graph also includes the prime-age employment rate), mid-late 2024 numbers look much more like an expansionary peak than a recession. It's particularly...It also points out a flaw in U3 but neglects to mention U6 that addresses their complaints. They could have compared U3 against U6 and the trend over time to make their case.
Indeed, and if you make that comparison (the graph also includes the prime-age employment rate), mid-late 2024 numbers look much more like an expansionary peak than a recession.
Instead they invent a new metric and decline to explain why we should believe theirs.
It's particularly pernicious to include a low-income line and call it "functionally unemployed." Poverty lines change with time, and that makes it extremely difficult to reconstruct what that level might have been historically.
Poverty lines themselves are also measures of consumption, and they make for poor measurements of wages. A family making $25k/yr that owns their own home outright is in a much superior position to one that rents in New York City on the same wage, but they're identical from an income standpoint.
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Comment on California will require insurance companies to offer coverage in wildfire zones in ~enviro
majromax Link ParentThe article's phrasing seems to be poor, but the general description sounds like it's demanding relative parity of market share rather than number of contracts. An insurer with a 10% market share...Sure insurers will now be able to pass on the cost of reinsurance to consumers and might re-enter the market because of that, but they're going to have to eventually have an 85% high-risk portfolio? Who the hell would do that?
The article's phrasing seems to be poor, but the general description sounds like it's demanding relative parity of market share rather than number of contracts. An insurer with a 10% market share overall in the states must (eventually) have a market share of 8.5% in the high-risk segment.
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Comment on The sham legacy of Richard Feynman in ~science
majromax LinkFrom someone who did watch the video, my summary of its thesis statements: Feynman never wrote a book. All of the books that we have "by Richard Feynman," those books that create the legacy of...- Exemplary
From someone who did watch the video, my summary of its thesis statements:
Feynman never wrote a book. All of the books that we have "by Richard Feynman," those books that create the legacy of Feynman as a person in popular consciousness, were written or assembled by others who had their own interests. Feynman's legacy is chiefly the result of Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman, which is the assembly of a bunch of stories told by a then-50s Feynman to a then-20s Richard Leighton. Other books came later as everything Feynman touched became gold.
The stories in Surely You're Joking are not true. Most are completely unverifiable, happening in anonymous places to anonymous people, but when we do have extrinsic evidence it contradicts the story as told. That doesn't mean that Feynman completely made them up, but he did 'workshop' them to retell them for maximal impact. They're closer to tall tales about the fish that got away than an authentic recounting of his life.
Feynman deliberately projected this image; the tales that showed up in Surely were indeed told by him on recording. By all accounts, he was an asshole. However, at least for much of his life he was nicer to people than these stories would suggest, and in later life he recognized that the casual misogyny of his earlier stories was at least inappropriate if not wrong. This reflection is missing from his legacy, presumably since 'brilliant asshole' sells better.
Despite being a genuinely brilliant physicist, there's no physics in Feynman's legacy as a person and media figure. This does a disservice to Feynman fans (including just about every teenager who is pointed towards Surely You're Joking after expressing an interest in science), who are implicitly told that the important part of 'brilliant asshole' is 'asshole'. Feynman had a genuine enthusiasm for new knowledge and worked hard to deeply understand everything he was shown, but those inspiring traits are also lost in his mythos.
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Comment on Heat pumps used to struggle in the cold. Not anymore. in ~enviro
majromax Link ParentTo be fair, I also suspect there's some design difference regarding condensation or icing. An air conditioner operating in a hot climate shouldn't be seeing ice buildup.The only difference between a “heat pump” and an AC is a cheap valve that allows it to run backwards.
To be fair, I also suspect there's some design difference regarding condensation or icing. An air conditioner operating in a hot climate shouldn't be seeing ice buildup.
Yes.
The temperature scale for electronics is relatively narrow in the thermodynamic sense of things: the GPUs will want to operate somewhere between 0C and 100C. If you want to use the heat for other directly useful things like "ore processing", then you'd need to develop spaceborne heat pumps (probably based on gas compression?) that can handle that kind of temperature difference at high efficiency. As far as I know this is essentially unobtanium, especially since at ore-melting temperatures you'd have the problem of the hot side of your heat pump wanting to melt itself.
If we did have that kind of heat pump technology, then we'd also just use it for radiators! The efficiency of thermal radiation scales with T^4, so doubling the absolute temperature of the material (from 0C ≈ 273K to 300C ≈ 573K) would result in a 16-fold change to the outgoing radiation.
Note that we also have a perpetual motion problem if we're not careful. If we go the other way, sinking heat from a 1000C source into a 100C target we could extract energy with (1 - 373K/1273K = 70%) efficiency because of the Carnot cycle, so our peak theoretical performance at moving heat is 1/(1-70%) = 140%. Applying 1W of energy to this system would move 1.4W of heat energy, so to sink X megawatts of GPU-related power we'd need an additional 2.5X megawatts to power the heat pumps (and move their own waste heat).
Mostover, if we did melt ore in space, what then? We'd still need to radiate that heat from the molten/refined ore in order to get the useful product (e.g. cast metal) out the other end, so we've only complicated the radiation problem.
That's basically what we do on Earth with air cooling: we channel the heat into the air (or water, with open cycle cooling) and then transfer it into the rest of the planet. This necessarily involves a steady stream of material flowing in and out, such that doing this in space is not really viable.
Let's put numbers to this. Suppose that one of our spaceborne data centres uses 1GW of electrical energy (random Google results give me values up to 5GW, so I think I'm in the ballpark here). Let's ignore the heat pump problems from above and pretend we already have it at 1000C and can dump this into incoming iron with no losses (e.g. via some kind of perfect counterflow system).
The specific heat of iron is about 0.45J/g/K (taking 0.45J to heat 1g of iron by 1K/°C). A Joule is a watt-second, so that's 0.45 Ws/g/K, or 0.45 kW s / kg / K, or 0.45MW s / kg / 1000 K, which is the temperature difference we have to work with. We've already said that the space data centre has to dump 1GW of heat energy, so we can find the mass flow rate with some basic algebra:
1 GW = X (kg / s) * 0.45 MW s / kg → X = 2200 kg/second
That is, the space data centre would need to have 2 tons of iron flowing through it per second to use the incoming material as a heatsink. That's not a satellite, it's an industrial conveyor belt with extra steps. We in fact do this kind of thing on Earth, but here we call it a steel smelter.