WhompingWindows

Within the VA hospital system, the data admins often got onto their "soapboxes" to dress down the 1400+ data analysts for writing inefficient SQL queries. If you need 6 million patients, joining data from 15 tables, gathering 250 variables, a beginning SQL user has the potential to take 15-20 hours where they could be pulling for 1-2 if they do some up-front filtering and sub-grouping within SQL. If you already know you'll throw out NA's on certain variables, if you need a certain date or age range, or even the way you format these filters: these all lead to important savings. And this saves R from being full on memory, which would often happen if you fed it way too much data.

Within a system of 1400 analysts, it makes a big difference if everyone's taking 2X or 4X the time pulling that they could be. Then, even the efficiently written pulls get slowed down, so you have to run things overnight...and what if you had an error on that overnight pull? Suffice to say, it'd have been much simpler if people wrote solid SQL from the start.

Alternative viewpoint: Everyone is hyper-stimulated by modern entertainment and lovable hobbies, therefore making friends at work is becoming harder to do because we're all bifurcated in our free time. Our interests used to be more basic, more shared, our community was tighter knit. Now, I feel the Internet and consumerism has allowed a massive blossoming of new hobbies, DIY, go it your own way, hang out by yourself activities. Either that, or something like online gaming, where you're finding a digital community.

Especially during the pandemic, I became very used to hanging out with only my partner, and I think our bubble has amplified my introverted habits.

How do you "lose all organic connection to the culture of your ancestors" simply by calling yourself Latinx? You're surely not suggesting they abandon the traditions, holidays, food, music, clothing, dancing, and all of the rest of their cultural connection, simply because of one label?

I am an Irish-American who plays the music, hates the food, but if I wanted to call myself of "European" ancestry, that wouldn't abandon all of my musical culture, it may just be a trendy label in the zeitgeist.

Hyperloop would be nice but it's not a proven technology. Amtrak already exists and could use improvement and maintenance. If Hyperloop is proven out in a more innovative place, I'm sure Americans will eventually get on board.

The first observations of mortality were observed in Kansas in March 1918, but then in April it was already in France, Germany, and the UK. The first recorded case was an army cook in Kansas, but researchers believe there were likely cases before this. So, it's hard to know for sure exactly where the index case arose.

As a primer for music theory, this post doesn't teach much. It's using Python to derive various sets of notes in scales and modes, which is already easily available via google search, and in a more learnable format than Python code.

The most basic aspect of Western music theory overlooked here is the relationship between tonic and dominant. If you know the "home" chord aka "the I" aka "tonic" is C major, the dominant will be G major, aka the V chord. Add just the F major chord, and you'll know 1-4-5 in a "basic" key: C major. 1-4-5 is the simplest chord progression, you can play amazing grace, you are my sunshine, even The Beatles, you'll be rocking with 1-4-5.

Next level, if you add in the minor 6 (a minor) and minor 2 (d minor), you realistically know 95% of the chords you'll ever hear in C major pieces. And on the piano, this is ALL white notes, so even someone with zero musical knowledge can "solo" over your chords by just plunking any white notes while you play these chords (kids LOVE LOVE this btw, highly recommend trying with a kiddo).

I wouldn't consider double-sharps and double-flats "basic" music theory. They really aren't needed for beginners, since they're relegated to keys like C# major where you'll occasionally sharpen a note like E# (aka F) into E## (aka F#). I didn't run into these until around 5 years into my piano training, playing Chopin's F# major nocturne Op 15 No 2, there's a bunch of double sharps in that piece.

In any case, don't worry about double-flats and double-sharps or the precise notes of various modes and scales. Just learn pieces you enjoy, preferably with a mentor or teacher who can suggest improvements based on their trained ear.

Humans are supposedly born with inalienable rights - life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. Our societies in the West are built upon this shared foundation of rights. To deprive any adults of the ability to procreate would be considered barbaric, as they want to pursue the creation of "life" with their liberty, and to support their own happiness.

Meanwhile, nature is just raw competition, we're used to talking about genetic evolution in natural populations. Natural creatures aren't deemed to have any right to their own life, liberty, or pursuit of happiness, or at least not by most humans outside environmentalists.

We have to educate the broader populace about the issue, then politicians will use the issue to gain political capital, win elections, and maybe change legislation and practices.

Google Earth may be one of the most wondrous things ever created. When else in human history can you zoom in on the entire geography of the Earth, and now the timelapsed geography of the Earth? Can you imagine what someone like Socrates, Newton, Galileo, or Darwin would say using this tool?

Does anyone with ADHD want to comment about audiobooks? I have moved 90% of my pleasure reading to audiobooks, since I can get through SO much more material during chores, driving, etc. I do zone out from time to time, so I'll have to rewind a couple minutes, but it's nbd, I'm there for pleasure. I'll even re-listen to a book a month later if it was great, and I find my retention is pretty great if I listen to a book a few times.

The best way is practice -- you simply get used to anything the more you do it.

When I was in HS, I joined debate club, where we spoke for 5-10 minutes at a time in front of anywhere from 5-20 club friends or opponents. When you do this repeatedly, for most people, your anxiety and nerves eventually go away, and it's just "what you do" now.

The same was true of musical performance: I hated performing until I did it about 50 times. Then I got comfortable and my average performance was no big deal.

Another idea: which language are you native in, and which are you using to speak confidently? If it's not your primary, that could be part of it. There's also focus-related disorders, if you have ADHD or similar, then your symptoms would make sense.

My Pet Peeve: Some people will interrupt others conversationally, and it's not nice. Conversation should be back/forth, not interrupting. You can always say "Let me finish my thought first". You can also have default responses to buy time: "Thank you, that's a great question" gives them a nice compliment and buys you 5 seconds to think.

And questions are a GOOD thing: they force you to really know the pitfalls, the details, and the trade-offs of your engineering strategy. People aren't trying to "getcha" and one-up you, they're trying to improve your approach, that's great for you if you can handle it emotionally :)

Good luck, you'll do well!!

Can you give a rough estimate of what fraction of space waste is due to differing orbits of satelites? Like very low vs low vs geostationary? I don't know the gradations between those either.

I'm responding to the parent, who states "earners" which means income, not wealth. I may agree that someone with 300k may lose 40% to taxes, then they spend 1/3 of what's remaining on expensive housing, another few hundred on student loans and a new car payment-- suffice to say, life can be very expensive for those in SV or SF or NYC.

But still, having 300k coming in pre-tax earnings puts you in the top 0.2% of earners globally, not 5%, which was the original point in question.

Why do I stress this point? Because we need to realize we're not just the top 5% here on this forum. Globally speaking, we range from well-off to EXTREMELY well off, and we should have the humility to post the proper stats about ourselves.

Why not allow the majority of YTers with a legit posting history to post videos as they wish? You wouldn't have to wait days or weeks for these folks, they are trustworthy already. The vast majority of channels I care about wouldn't need moderation, they're hobbyists like woodworkers, musicians, etc. with dozens of posts already.

Tangent: Your 5% guesstimation is wildly off. In the USA alone, assuming 50% of your bonuses go to taxation, your 300k income is going to put you in the top 2% of earners.

Globally, 300k USD income would put you in the top .2%, so you're richer than 998 out of every 1000 other people in the globe.

You looked a bit too quickly, you linked to "Income equality" there. Look here at Wealth Equality and sort by 2019 Gini: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_eq...

Weird phrases and jargon are a burden in healthcare. There are literally thousands of terms you can learn that don't have applications elsewhere. As a healthcare IT specialist, you're spoken to in this language of doctors and medicine, and must take diligent notes and learn what all those 3 letter acronyms are so you can get the right diagnoses or drugs in your analyses.

Paul Graham's articles always shoot immediately up to the top of HN, but I agree with you, they're generally cursory and pithy thoughts which don't convince my skeptical mind. I don't know, can someone explain why his work is so popular?

Think of all the amazing writers across our civilization whose work is linkable, and we're worshipping these decent but not amazing blog posts?

Never ascribe to malice what can be ascribed to incompetence.

Consider: you may become depressed, unfulfilled, and unhappy in this life. I had a position that was around halfway to what you want, government database coding, and I was miserable. I think becoming fully "chilled out" is ideal, because being "half chilled" and half "in-the-hotseat" gave me whiplash a few times. I developed lazy habits over time, my work output suffered, and all that free-time on my hobby wasn't as great as I envisioned.

You know the story, it's Christmas, you're the only one in the office this week because you're new and your PTO is garbage, you're young and have no family to go back to anyway. You stroll in an hour late through the side door, check emails briefly, okay no one is here, then you fire up the YT clips or the novel reading or whatever it is. By 3pm, after 5 hours of pure faffing around, you surely deserve the christmas cookies left in the break room. By 315, you're pooped, time to head home, sneak back through the side door, and you're off to use the screen at the apartment.

Is there some nagging feeling in your stomach? That you could've explored the database, you could've dived into that long-term project you've thought of. You could've been writing up a research proposal, searching for new grants, or helping someone at a volunteer organization. Instead, you're "half on" so you're half-assing your life, not fully relaxing, not working at all.

Honestly, it wasn't for me. I want to feel fully into what I'm doing, and having to half-ass my way through a boring job was causing serious depression. I'd only recommend this if you can use less of your ass, preferably remotely, and if you're sure you won't have a crisis of meaning in life.

Management doesn't even need forum posts to force everyone, they will do it just for their own job security.

Devil's Advocate: We don't have all the information about OP. He claims he wants to work hard for 2 hours in the morning and then do what he's really passionate about. He mentions hobby materials. For all we know, he could be a genius painter or woodworker in the making. Who is it for us to say that a master craftsmen should spend 40 hours a week on tech if they truly care most about their art? If they can contribute good value for 10 hours a week, enough that their employer is still happy paying them, who are we to criticize that?

Where is your evidence of this overstated claim? "The very worst problem...overwhelmingly used to 'treat' normal behavior"...I studied ADHD pharmacology in graduate school and I saw no evidence of this in the dozens of articles I read. I think you lack a scientific understanding of ADHD.

Do you know WHY boys are more likely to be diagnosed as "combined type" ADHD and treated than girls? It is primarily because their motor-dominant brains develop differentially: the dopaminergic systems in their motor cortex make them move more and disrupt more than girls.

Girls, whose motor-cortex and executive function develop differently, are much more likely to be the primarily-inattentive subtype, which leads to day dreaming and aloofness, but not to the disruptive behaviors that boys with ADHD exhibit. Therefore, girls fly under the radar and are missed because boys simply move more and have less control over their movement.

Nevertheless, your post is a bit reckless in my opinion. Add some real scientific evidence to your generalization. These are children who have less friends, abuse drugs more, are more likely to have depression or anxiety, and are far more likely to kill themselves. This neurodevelopmental disorder really matters, it's not a flippant case of drugging boys whose parents didn't raise them right.

Thank you for your post! Your description matches what I've read, that dopaminergic function is like a bell curve. If you're already in the center of the curve, stimulants will push you over into dysfunction; whereas, if you're at the left tail of the curve, stimulants will push you to typical.

If 5 college freshmen take Ritalin together, four may be bouncing off the walls and struggling to direct their attention, whereas the fifth may be having a revelation: is this what normal thinking is like? Did I have ADHD this whole time?

I've heard a few personal accounts of people sobbing their eyes out once their medication actually works...they think of all the times they struggled with ADHD, and that this pill could've helped them chart their desired course more smoothly.

It will most likely be "non inferior" to the standard of care, since that is the bar for new drugs to clear in any disease area. The issue with that designation is the FDA could compare it to stimulants or to the non-stimulant atomextine, which like Viloxazine is a norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor.

Atomoxetine was preferentially used in those cases with added anxiety, since it was found to have anxiolytic effects. Stimulants were sometimes not recommended for anxious patients, since they might contribute to anxiety and sleeplessness for some kids.

Why do we have to make anyone into the enemy? I legitimately do not hate any American leaders, even the leaders of the opposing party who do the most to prevent "my" policies. They are human beings too, and we'd all be better off without hatred.

Which history book? Many history books would tell us that high levels of income and wealth inequality lead to social unrest (French Revolution, for instance).

In my view, taxation comes down to a judgment of "fairness" and this is very hard to agree upon. Given the rise of COVID, it's even harder to fairly allocate the more limited revenues in big cities now.

The solution for artists and writers is to work consistently. Obsessing about whether or not you're "in the zone" isn't productive. Instead, just get started, work every single day on your field. Seinfeld had a calendar and he had to write an X on every single day after he wrote jokes. I don't see why any high-functioning individual in any field couldn't learn something new every day.

There will be no single differentiator because the auto market is very diverse. Everyone sees their car like potential energy, what could it do for me? For some people, they need to get from point A to point B slowly, others love speed; some need to haul gravel and logs, others want interior storage; parents may want to have 4 children in the vehicle, singles may want just their partner.

Thus, there will always be a diverse set of EVs to choose from, catering to different market segments.

The problem with nuclear is that it's expensive AND that it relies on oversight and regulation to be fully safe. What to do with the waste, how to prevent accidents like Chernobyl, Fukushima, etc.: that's the problem with nuclear. Ask yourself if you want nuclear plants in all of the dysfunctional governments around the world, given the risks we know exist. Then compare to solar and wind, which are cheaper and safer, it's not hard to see why mostly solar/wind are dominating new power additions.

I have no problems with nuclear personally, I think we should keep safe reactors running as long as our replacements would be LNG. I do think new-build nuclear would largely be deployed too slowly to help with climate change in the short run, but long-run I think it'll be an amazing source of huge amounts of power. Maybe we can have specialized reactors on-site which deal with the waste from our older reactors or from new reactors...not to mention new designs that are passively safe.