deathgrips

Good article. On the last point, about delayed gratification when writing: one way, and perhaps the way to complete a long writing project is to enjoy what you are writing, which means you are writing the book that you would enjoy reading. I've tried multiple times to come up with a novel idea that would sell but I ended up never pursuing them. Once I started thinking really hard about a story that I wish someone else had already made, I got started and enjoyed the whole process.

A corollary to this is that you must know what kind of stories you like, which means you have to develop your taste. I don't mean "taste" in the sense that you have the same opinions as New York Times critics. I mean that when you watch a movie or read a book that you enjoy, try to understand what parts of it you enjoyed, what parts of it you didn't enjoy, and how you would change it to make it better. This doesn't just apply to literature. In developing your artistic taste, you could try to understand exactly what part of an awesome painting evokes feeling in you.

After I started thinking this way, I came up with a story that might not appeal to most people but sure as hell felt moving to me. I realized that the story could be told better in a visual format instead of in prose, so I started practicing art again. I'm a perfectionist who hated drawing when I studied art in school, but now that I have this idea in my head I feel very little inhibition in practicing. Instead of wondering how to make my story sell better or second guessing every mark I make, I move forward because if I hesitate I feel like I'm letting down the characters in the story I want to be told.

Good! This will reduce waste and allow firms to manufacture more at a greater marginal production cost.

Wrong. Demand for hand sanitizer increased because people thought the world was ending and hand sanitizer would save their lives. Hand sanitizer went from a tool that marginally increased your health to a tool that many believed would save their lives. If you can't call this a genuine rise in demand, I'm not sure what you could call a rise in demand. I haven't seen any real data that the effect of middlemen was anything but tertiary. Hospitals and governments buying up truckloads of hand sanitizer had a greater effect on the market than middlemen.

We know for sure that if we force Americans to stay at home, tens of thousands will kill themselves or be the victims of domestic violence as a result. An untold number of people will go hungry or become homeless. These are certainties. If you want to make a real cost benefit analysis (as opposed to a fear-motivated choice to stay inside), then provide some good data about the long term effects of covid19. Sorry, but saying "it could have terrible effects 5 years after you get infected" isn't good enough. Try again.

If you don't seem to react to the content of outside information and if we know what you're going to say before you say it, you're not thinking independently, you're just buying into someone else's beliefs.

I'd rather rent that small apartment than be homeless.

Would you propose banning knives too, so police don't have to be worried about pulling over someone with a knife?

Just stop. This guy has already made up his mind that the US is one of the worst countries in the world.

Thanks for contributing the stats! I appreciate it.

I was saying "Even if the US only incarcerated rapists and murderers"

This isn't legal advice, but I've only ever heard from lawyers and judges that you should never talk to police for any reason whatsoever.

Even if the US only incarcerated rapists and murderers, we would still incarcerate more than Germany. It's not so simple as you're implying.

We raised testing capacity exponentially, but weren't accurately tracking the spread until recently.

I've never read The Economist publishing something wrong about computer science and cybersecurity issues. My yardstick for measuring news source credibility is looking at how they report on AI, security, and CS in general. Do they make clearly incorrect statements about AI or hacking? Into the trash (Fox, CNN, MSNBC, and other mainstream channels all failed this. They're not news, they're entertainment). Do they regularly give questionable interpretations of the state of tech? Keep at arms length (BBC, NPR).

The Economist is the only news media I've found which makes 100% correct statements about CS every time I've read it. I figure that they're approaching other issues with that same commitment to accuracy.

Paranoia is thinking that lizard people are spying on you.

Find common instances where people regularly abuse power: child abuse, terrible bosses, emotional abuse of a spouse. The most common denominator is that people hurt others because they can, and those who couldn't will claim that they choose not to.

The most unsuccessful people also follow that strategy.

Everyone has enemies but might not know it yet because their enemies don't have the power to act on their malevolent desires.

It's basic microeconomics. Firms produce widgets until the marginal profit they get from the widgets goes down to 0. The marginal profit is based on the marginal cost of producing a widget and the current price of the widget. If the price goes up, the firm can now afford to produce more widgets. If the state introduces price controls to keep the price fixed during increased demand, the company cannot afford to produce more to meet this demand and shortages will result.

Normally shortages lead to increased price in the short term and in the long term lead to increased production and movement to the price equilibrium.

You'd be hard pressed to find a rewarding skill where you don't absolutely suck for at least a year when you start practicing it. If you pick up something and you don't fail immediately and often, it's probably trivial.

>Why is there no increased demand-driven supply on these things?

Most American states prohibit price hikes during a disaster, which prevents companies from producing more during high demand.

A protracted war benefits the military of the weaker side but I doubt their people would like it. Also, I can't recall the last time the United States was deterred from entering war because it would last too long.

That's the point of armies, to be as lethal and effective as possible. A protracted war benefits no one, and a powerful army acts as a deterrent. I think that if you think your country has the right to self-defense, you have a moral obligation to make it as lethal as possible. Ethics is not an excuse for inaction or abandonment of responsibility.

Comparing privacy advocates to anti-vaxxers is a bad-faith tactic that steers the conversation away from the technology.

Companies cannot perfectly measure your programming skill and most software companies don't conduct in depth algorithm interviews. Most of the hiring decision is based on your likability, social skills, previous job history (including job title and skills listed from that first promotion), and how you handle interview questions. You can bullshit your way very far in most of the software development world even if you're only 80% as good as your peers. If you have "junior developer" or "senior developer" on your resume but aren't as good as a "entry level developer", it's a moot point if you get called for an interview but the other guy doesn't.

The iron law of wages was based, among other things, on Malthus' demographic theory. Modern economists are highly critical of it. Supply and demand are sufficient to explain the wages of cooks and dishwashers: anyone can be trained in a couple weeks to be a minimally competent cook or dishwasher. The labor supply is roughly equal to the number of people who need any kind of work.

>The same thing happens with teachers, nurses, firemen, police

Maybe there's something different going on there since government salaries don't respond normally to market supply and demand. Perhaps a better way to track the true value of those jobs is by looking at private sector counterparts, such as security contractors or teachers at private schools.

Sounds like your company is dying if people who don't understand labor market economics are overruling managers on hiring decisions.

Right now restaurant work is too complicated for robots to do it as accurately and quickly as humans. There are hundreds of micro-skills that a prep and line cook needs to perform very well in a restaurant and most of those are specific to the individual restaurant. Mcdonalds will be the first to be automated since they serve the same stuff at every location in America, but expect regular restaurants to be the last places to be automated.

This only demonstrates that people with high status in academia can admit ignorance and get a good result. I can speculate that the author would get very different results if he professed ignorance at his first job--I think coworkers who followed "fake it til you make it" would get promoted faster.