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prossercj

521 karma · joined November 15, 2018

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prossercj··on Hayden Panetierre Dies at 36
Very sad. For fans of Kingdom Hearts, she was also the voice of Kairi
prossercj··on Gemini Robotics-ER 1.6
Don't forget the extra instructions about not eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
prossercj··on SpaceX in Merger Talks with xAI
To be fair, it is no small feat to get all of Elon's personalities to agree with each other
prossercj··on JetBlue flight averts mid-air collision with US Air Force jet
Is it? I heard that it was falling.
prossercj··on Apple nears $1B Google deal for custom Gemini model to power Siri
This is remarkable if you consider how much it must wound Apple's pride to make this deal with their main rival in the smartphone software space, especially after all the fuss they made about "Apple Intelligence". It's a tacit admission that Google is just better at this kind of thing.
prossercj··on Ask HN: Am I the only one not using AI?
I don't use it for large-scale code generation, but I do find it useful for small code snippets. For example asking how to initialize a widget in Kendo UI with specific behavior. With snippets, I can just run the code and verify that it works with minimal effort. It's often more about reminding me of something I already knew rather than discovering something novel. I wouldn't trust it with anything novel.

In general, I think of it as a better kind of search. The knowledge available on the internet is enormous, and LLMs are pretty good at finding and synthesizing it relative to a prompt. But that's a different task than generating its own ideas. I think of it like a highly efficient secretary. I wouldn't ask my secretary how to solve a problem, but I absolutely would ask if we have any records pertaining to the problem, and perhaps would also ask for a summary of those records.

prossercj··on Open AI announces $1.5M bonus for every employee
This is that meeting
prossercj··on Nvidia's RTX 5050 GPU starts at $249 with last-gen GDDR6 VRAM
How is it for gaming? Had any compatibility issues?
prossercj··on US safety regulators contact Tesla over erratic robotaxis
Short answer: no
prossercj··on Teachers Are Not OK
Strong agree. This reminds me of one of my pet theories: that research and education are fundamentally different skills. A good researcher should be flexible and open-minded, almost to a fault, but a good educator needs to be committed to certain beliefs in order to teach them. More important, an educator should instill good habits (even if those habits involve asking good questions) and set a good example, a requirement entirely lacking from research.

So why do all of our universities only employ teachers who have been trained as researchers?

I think much of the 80% grinding that you describe is just the publish-or-perish mindset of graduate school, which the teachers pick up along the way (I'm not faulting them so much as the process). It's more about appearing to know, rather than knowing. This may be what you have to do to survive in a competitive research environment, but one is left wondering what any of that has to do with educating our children, especially the majority who will never become researchers.

prossercj··on Watching AI drive Microsoft employees insane
This comment on that PR is pure gold. The bots are talking to each other:

https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/pull/115732#issuecomment-2...

prossercj··on Google will develop Android OS behind closed doors starting next week
Don't they already have their own silicon (Tensor)?
prossercj··on Ask HN: How to Learn 'To Think'?
If you want books that can help you learn to think, you can't do better than the classics. I suggest Plato's dialogs or the Analects of Confucius. You may find them more accessible than you expect. They were excellent teachers.

Here's a good translation of Plato by Benjamin Jowett: https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/plato-the-dialogues-of-pl...

And one of Confucius by James Legge: https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/legge-the-chinese-classic...

Both translations are from the 19th Century and so have entered the public domain. But both are also often considered the best English versions of these works, even today.

(Note you can download a facsimile pdf of the original book, and print it out as you go. I prefer to read anything long-form that way. Better for concentration in my opinion).

prossercj··on Google loses antitrust suit over search deals on phones
https://archive.ph/cqPWM
prossercj··on GPT-4o
More likely future LLMs will mix ads into their responses. ("Your air filters are in stock in aisle A6. Have you heard about the new membership plan from Lowes...?")
prossercj··on One man's artistic wonderland, created in rental, gets protected status
Can't argue with that.
prossercj··on New theory on Satoshi Nakamoto
Original text deleted, here's an archive:

https://web.archive.org/web/20240408132600/https://old.reddi...

prossercj··on Allegations of criminality by Boeing in deceased whistleblower complaint
Here's a link to the actual document:

https://abcnews4.com/resources/pdf/504242d5-eb40-47bc-b8ea-b...

prossercj··on Apple Is in Talks to Let Google's Gemini Power iPhone Generative AI Features
No one seems to have mentioned what is most obvious to me about this: if this goes through, Google will corner the market on mobile (on-device) AI. They already have Android users, this would give them iOS users too. Not a large market right now, but the way things are heading it could prove significant in the future.
prossercj··on 40 Years of Programming
Awesome, thanks for sharing. Three cheers for "preemptive guerrilla maintenance." Congrats on 40 years
prossercj··on The new science on what ultra-processed food does to the brain
Totally not the point here, but after reading this, I'm going to start adding cinnamon to my oatmeal. Thanks
prossercj··on Ask HN: Any advice on navigating this job market or pivoting out of tech? (US)
You remind me a bit of myself. I work in web development now, but took some games classes in college and thought I might go that route for a time. My true passion has always been poetry. Here's my advice. Don't look for fulfillment from your job. It pays the bills, and if you don't hate it, consider that a blessing. Find something that occupies you only from 9 to 5 (plenty of web dev jobs like that), and use your free time to pursue the the music and storytelling that you really love. You would stop loving them if you had to do them for money. Might actually be better to do something that you don't love for money. I know this is the opposite of what they say at school, but it's what I find in my own career. You can't hate it, but it may be better not to love it too much. Best of luck.
prossercj··on JSR: The JavaScript Registry
Looks like just another example of https://xkcd.com/927/
prossercj··on I'll refrain from providing code that involve concepts as you're under 18
It's been awhile since I've laughed so hard. Thanks to all in this thread.
prossercj··on Disney to take $1.5B stake in Epic Games
The score as a whole is one of the best parts of the game. But I didn't find it vapid at all. I consider it an allegory about globalism. Sora's quest is to restore the integrity of each "world", integrity that was lost when the worlds were "connected". The denizens of connected worlds become "heartless", etc.

This only applies to the first game, though. After that I have no idea what's going on.

prossercj··on Starlink's laser system is beaming 42 petabytes of data per day
Don't forget about prophecy
prossercj··on HP CEO: "Our long-term objective is to make printing a subscription."
Canon has one of these too. I've been using it for almost a year, and I love it. I print a lot of reading material, and the cost per page is lower than laser. In my opinion the aesthetics are also better.

https://www.usa.canon.com/shop/p/maxify-gx6021?color=Black&t...

prossercj··on 2023 Letter
I share many of your sentiments, but I have a theory that it won't be China or the West, but a blend of the two, which dominates the future (or, hopefully, rules without dominating). It's like our cultures are mating, and posterity will be the child of both. And like actual mating, the courtship is often rocky and marked by conflict. We'll sort it out.
prossercj··on 2023 Letter
> but life is about power

This is the most western view

prossercj··on Americans are spending billions on stuff they forget to cancel
Whenever I sign up for a streaming service, my first act is to disable autopay. I really think it should be disabled by default, and you can enable if wanted. That would resolve much of this problem. Do all users even know they are signing up for autopay? Many probably do not realize it. Often 1 month is plenty of time for me to watch what I want to watch, and if not, it's easy enough to renew for one more month
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