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deugtniet

710 karma · joined September 17, 2015

Post doctoral researcher in statistical genetics, Switzerland
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deugtniet··on The Dutch are filling gas wells with cement
The writer of this hasn't even talked to any of the local population who have been subjected to these earthquakes that destroys the local populations' houses.

Historically, the Dutch government has done extremely little to compensate the Groningers' damage. The Dutch are considered a bad example with regards to how the government is handling the proceeds of fossil fuels. So subjecting anyone to another round of house-destroying earthquakes is surely going to be well compensated this time. /s

deugtniet··on Show HN: Tea-tasting, a Python package for the statistical analysis of A/B tests
I guess I'm not very versed in website A/B testing, but wouldn't it be much better to analyze these results in a regression framework where you can correct for the covariates?

On top of this, logistic regression makes your units a lot more interpretable than just looking at differences in means. I.E. The odds of buying something are 1.1 when you are assigned in group B.

deugtniet··on The exponential growth of solar power will change the world
It's claimed in the source economist article and reuters also claims it [1]. It's unlikely that the Chinese government wants to say how much it subsidizes, as this will prompt tariff increases from importing countries.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/china-solar-industry...

deugtniet··on The exponential growth of solar power will change the world
The progress we're seeing in solar has made me the most optimistic about a de-carbonized future in years. I have no doubt that the decision the Chinese government made to heavily subsidize solar manufacturing will make this world a better place.

Already we're seeing that solar energy is more cost effective than all other forms of energy production [1], that the growth of solar has been consistently underestimated by very large players [2], and that solar democratizes energy production more than any other form of energy.

Distibution needs to be improved, but this issue also holds for other non-fossil energy sources. I predict a lot of these problems will be solved through hydrogen generation and storage [3].

[1] https://www.carbonbrief.org/solar-is-now-cheapest-electricit... [2] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-does-almost-everyone-unde... [3] https://www.iea.org/energy-system/low-emission-fuels/hydroge...

deugtniet··on How to get stuff repaired when the manufacturer don't wanna: take 'em to court
Here you go :-)

https://e-justice.europa.eu/42/EN/small_claims?SWEDEN&member...

This link also contains a reference for all other EU member states

deugtniet··on Physically healthy 28-year-old woman schedules euthanasia due to depression
Even if there were a cure in the future, there isn't one now. That's not the medical system giving up, that's being realistic. Having to wait while unbearably suffering is not something that can be expected of someone.

I prefer a system where there is a good procedure for death with dignity than one where we are not allowed to help someone end their prolonged and unbearable suffering.

deugtniet··on Physically healthy 28-year-old woman schedules euthanasia due to depression
The Netherlands have drawn their line, have a look at their laws [1]. This includes a procedure where multiple medical doctors have to agree to grant someone a death with dignity. I prefer this over unbearable suffering.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euthanasia_in_the_Netherlands

deugtniet··on Physically healthy 28-year-old woman schedules euthanasia due to depression
I'm very happy you're happy :-)

Unfortunately this is not the case for a very small minority of individuals who suffer without a cure. I prefer these people to go through their process with dignity, than to go for the other option.

deugtniet··on Physically healthy 28-year-old woman schedules euthanasia due to depression
Let's be absolutely clear, euthanasia is not widespread anywhere. It's legal in a few jurisdictions, and it's not something that is taken lightly by any party involved. It's extremely rare for a young person to be granted euthanasia in the Netherlands, and only when the individual suffers without any hope for remit.

This lady has tried to be granted euthanasia for years now, after suffering from a serious disease for all her life. Without any treatment that helped her. In all those years, she has tried to cure herself of the disease, but to no consequence. I think she deserves to get what _she_ wants with dignity.

deugtniet··on Physically healthy 28-year-old woman schedules euthanasia due to depression
This article is disingenuous by only referring to expert opinion from a Christian university, which is obviously against euthanasia. Experts from other universities would provide a more nuanced view on the subject. Furthermore when the article discusses an increase in numbers, they don't mention that 60% of euthanasia is performed for individuals who suffer from late stage cancer. Most others are generally very old, and will only suffer without remit for the rest of their lives.

The procedure for this woman to have been granted euthanasia is not something that is easy to get through. It is mentioned she has suffered from this disease for all of her life and there is no cure. Multiple medical doctors need to be in agreement before a request for euthanasia is granted in any case. There is even more scrutiny when it is about a young person as well as when the disease is mental in nature.

In all, I hated reading this article, because it's extremely far from the truth about how the Netherlands have implemented their euthanasia laws. I suggest reading up on it from more reputable sources than `the mirror`

deugtniet··on Extreme Value Theory (2009) [pdf]
Thanks for sharing! I was always wondering how climate scientists were able to identify if an event was due to climate change. Now I have a good reference!
deugtniet··on Which Airlines Are Not Flying the Boeing 737 Max?
There is a very strong reason why Airbus does not publicize mishaps of their competitors. Once airline manufacturers start slinging mud at each other it will damage the carefully built trust that they have gained over the years. Neither Airbus nor Boeing want this. Airbus has had it's fair share of mishaps as well, which Boeing has not publicized either.

This is post is not sponsored nor endorsed by Airbus or any other plane manufacturer for that reason. Note that airbus has not done so when the 737 max had 2 accidents that were due to lax regulatory oversight.

This post IS sponsored by a travel company that tries to market their service to a wary public that doesn't want to fly on a potentially badly manufactured airframe.

deugtniet··on Total cholesterol and mortality by sex and age:study of 12.8M adults
Scientific reports is read in many places, including in medicine.

Regarding your 'low-impact' comment I have a few thoughts. 1. Although this is a large study, they do not find any world shocking new insights that are otherwise found in other studies. Cholesterol phenotypes are very well studied. Changing a guideline is usually not done based on a study of a single population. 2. They do not account for medication usage which confounds results. 3. They do not find a causal relationship between cholesterol and mortality, only provide an association.

deugtniet··on Webb Mirror (2022)
If you're interested the Webb mirror, and the relationship between resolving ability, wavelength and mirror size I really recommend the deep dive Huygens optics did on the subject.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gOpbXBppUEU

The guy makes his own lenses, and loves to explain what he does

deugtniet··on Unapproved books now a felony in Manatee County schools
If anybody thinks this is a good idea, I'm looking forward to reading your opinions.
deugtniet··on US startup's bladeless VTOL can reach up to 0.8 Mach
I watched the video, and only (maybe) saw STOL, not VTOL.

Looks like they use two Dyson style fans for propulsion, which means the fan blades are on the inside of the fuselage, could be very interesting for an urban environment, as there is less risk of hitting something with your blades.

That being said, they mention a gas turbine is necessary for propulsion, so it probably won't be quiet enough for urban envirnoments

deugtniet··on Alien Truth
I guess I disagree that math and physics are universal truths.

For maths, I would say 1+1=2 is a pretty universal truth (although it takes a while to get there in the principa mathematica), but didn't we just invent complex numbers because they are useful?

Same goes for physics, the speed of light is the same everywhere, but how quantum mechanics work is still subject to many discussions.

Love to hear some thoughts on this, as claiming a whole field as universal truth is something I'm a little uncomfortable with.

deugtniet··on Automating cookie consent and GDPR violation detection
It's pretty well known that cookie-walls are rife with anti-consumer patterns. Going to something like formula1.com requires me to click more than a 100 times to object to the 'legitimate interests' of as many companies. Which is a pretty terrible anti-pattern when I don't want to be tracked at all...

After reading the abstract, it seems the authors try to classify cookies using a special browser extension called "CookieBlock" [1]. I hope they are successful, because I hate being tracked on the internet.

[1]https://github.com/dibollinger/CookieBlock

deugtniet··on Are Today’s Portraitists Better Than the Old Masters?
I tend to disagree with the assessment that the an artists technique has anything to do with how good an artist is.

Case in point: in Picasso's formative years, he was a great realistic painter. He became a great artist because he pushed the boundary of abstract art that is arguably easier to paint than his earlier work. To me, Picasso was so good because he built a story (myth) around his work that resonated with so many people.

The Mona Lisa is the most famous painting because of the myth around it. It's a beautiful portait, but is it really the best portrait ever? I think in the same wing of the Louvre there are better paintings of Da Vinci on show, even though there is no crowd around it.

Recently, the myth builders have been (maybe they still are) Jeff Koons and Damien Hirst, I think that's what makes them great artists.

deugtniet··on 3MF file format and why it’s great (2019)
I think 3MF has some real practical benefits as outlined in the article. It may take a lot of file space, but that can be solved in a new version, specified in the header files, in the same way it was done with STL.

As with any format, the tooling needs to develop, and then C++ is not a bad idea to write a library in I think.

I guess there's space for both file formats tbh. If you are sure your STL is correct, and are sure about the dimensioning, go for it. If you want to be a little safer, go for 3MF, with the drawback of a little larger filesize.

deugtniet··on Total Cookie Protection
Mozilla is really fighting the good fight for the users privacy. I've been using Firefox for as long as I can remember, even when there were faster and more fancy alternatives available. Their ideology and service to the user is what makes me loyal to them
deugtniet··on What can Seattle learn from Dutch street design?
Great to see Groningen represented so much in this video. I think about 50% of all traffic movements are by bike in this city. This includes walking, so IMO it's pretty special.

The urban planning in this town has been the product of decades of bike and pedestrian friendly planning. Making the city really nice to live in.

It probably takes decades to convert a car centric city like Seattle into something like Groningen. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't strive for it. It makes a city much more friendly to live in, makes the population healthier and is more sustainable on the environment.

deugtniet··on Electric cars make up 54% of cars sold in Norway in 2020
For European standards, Norway's petro; and diesel prices aren't that crazy. When touring through the fjords on a couple of vacations, I've found them comparable to what you have in Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands.

Especially considering that Norway's average income is leagues ahead of those countries.

deugtniet··on Electric cars make up 54% of cars sold in Norway in 2020
Volkswagen has majorly invested in EVs. One important model Volkswagen has made is the ID.3 . Similar in size to the golf / rabbit. This is an attainable car I'm interested in buying.
deugtniet··on Stan is a state-of-the-art platform for statistical modeling
I've dabbled in Stan, and it's really good and state of the art for Bayesian inference. Starting using Stan is a bit difficult though, as it has a C like programming language that is difficult to master initially. Especially since statistics is usually done in languages like R, so the learning curve is a bit steep for beginners.

I've personally liked PyMC for simple models and relative ease of inference, as it's more integrated with the Python language. That being said, if you want the latest in inference methods and statistical alchemy, Stan is the place to go.

deugtniet··on Pfizer submits Covid vaccine to FDA for approval, to distribute in December
They do stagger the release, these people do not have a billion doses available right away. The next step is a limited global release. Stage 4 of the medication begins, and the safety is tracked in the global release. Later in the year, there will be more doses available, and everyone will be able to get vaccinated.

Furthermore, these are considered normal trial sizes it's been tested on tens of thousand of individuals. Every test subject remains tracked. Up to now, there are no permanent adverse effects found in the population that was tested.

deugtniet··on America's True Unemployment Rate
I think the definition of unemployment has been contentious for as long as it exists. Axios is choosing to go with the definition of 'People looking for work or working while earning less than 20,000 USD per year'. The employment numbers are naturally going to be higher than when the definition is just 'People earning nothing and looking for work'.

If one takes the living wage as a measure of unemployment, it should also include place of residence IMO. I heard living wage in the bay area is > 100K USD.

I'm not advocating for anything and have no stake. But all these statistics are proxies for how citizens are doing. In general, hardships increase as unemployment goes up, whatever way you measure it. It's usually better to look at all of them jointly, and focus on differences instead of the absolute rates of a statistic.

deugtniet··on Cells are fast and crowded places (2011)
Actually, the rotation of the ATPsynthase motor was observed under the microscope to be proven. The investigators attached a very small copper rod to the rotor to show that it indeed made a full rotation.
deugtniet··on Congressional inquiry faults Boeing and FAA failures for deadly 737 Max crashes
Even if the republicans are right in how the process was performed, it doesn't make the democrats wrong.

Sounds a lot like whataboutism to me

deugtniet··on Next-Generation IBM POWER10 Processor
Our institution runs multiple HPC clusters for all kinds of scientific use cases. I remember reading about the head of the HPC department making the switch from INTEL/AMD to IBM because it had a much larger memory / storage (I can't remember which) bandwidth in some astronomy application. This made the project feasible without having to invest in custom hardware.

It's good to see that POWER still excels in important use cases.

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