Hacker News Reader

runsWphotonson Deepmind Alphadev: Faster sorting algorithms discovered using deep RL

how automatically generated was the code that wrote the code

runsWphotonson OpenAI's plans according to Sam Altman

Asking for regulation soon after your company has gained a substantial (but probably transient) lead in a market sets off people's villain detectors, especially people who have seen the same things before. Sam may not be a villain and may believe in everything he is advocating for pure reasons, but it is right for people to be critical and skeptical. Sam will be okay, he can handle some haters.

runsWphotonson In vitro biological system of cultured brain cells has learned to play Pong

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04269-6.pdf

This is an example. Epigenetically driven evolution in arabodopsis, which protects certain regions from mutation. In a very limited sense, evolution might be said to "care" about something here, as it is kind of taking direction from the environment, not simply acting on uniformly random mutations. Nothing like this is known in animals or most anywhere else afaik.

runsWphotonson In vitro biological system of cultured brain cells has learned to play Pong

At least in plants there is some evidence that mutations produced and then acted on by natural selection are not fully random. It is a long held assumption this should not be possible, but there are interesting lines of evidence suggesting it may be. It would open the chance of there being a kind of (limited) underlying logic.

runsWphotonson Induction of a torpor-like state in rodents by ultrasound

This is interesting. Do you have links to any of the other papers?

runsWphotonson In vitro biological system of cultured brain cells has learned to play Pong

it is possible this is not quite true

runsWphotonson Ask HN: Who got hired from HN?

How many problems do you need to grind to get hired

runsWphotonson Automatic emergency braking should become mandatory, feds say

I have had more problems with such driving tech than it has ever helped. I wonder how the data to justify this is collected.

runsWphotonson Tackling plastic pollution: ‘We can't recycle our way out of this’

When the turbine gets old they crush up the blades and put it in concrete for roads and bridges. They also make them into plastic pellets which get put into alloyed things like manhole covers, so you are wrong. Not sure why the downvotes and aggression.

runsWphotonson Lawyer cited 6 fake cases made up by ChatGPT; judge calls it “unprecedented”

i keep getting it to write code that works but then its example usage makes no sense. i point out the code is write but the example it gives is wrong and it can almost never fix it. version 4.

runsWphotonson Tackling plastic pollution: ‘We can't recycle our way out of this’

Apparently this is what they do with wind turbines in Europe.

runsWphotonson Japan will try to beam solar power from space by 2025

Lets say Im not very interested in practicality but just the theory of this. How does it work? How can I send power from one side of my room to the other if I don't care about paying more.

runsWphotonson The Never Married, a New Normal

This is everywhere. Google something like "childfree environment" and see floods of articles and testimonials. People will also say this in person, or at least express reticence over it, but I also find that less so than I see it online or YouTube. As to what percent of people actually follow through with not having kids with this as the true primary motivation, Idk.

runsWphotonson Japan will try to beam solar power from space by 2025

Are there any research papers on the details?

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

"The last several years have seen significant progress toward the development of an artificial womb which would facilitate the survival and growth of prematurely born fetuses from approximately 23-24 weeks gestation onward."

Seems a long way from eliminating the need for surrogacy.

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

Among other things, this vastly increases the potential for artificial selection of embryos using PGS, for which there are already companies operating publicly (and dark groups operating privately). Concern over this isn't just "navel gazing" and should be weighed against the positives. There are a hundred of other questions which are valid concerns and your original comment seems dismissive of these. Yes some of us jokes about stealing celebrity DNA but it is hardly the only question.

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

Most surrogates are not selfless--- they get paid for what they do...in the US often $60,000. Some jurisdictions do require that women choosing surrogacy have to do it altruistically, receiving only reimbursement for medical expenses. This causes a shortage of surrogates compared to market demand. People looking for surrogates often then travel to jurisdictions where the laws are different to obtain them (I know people personally who have done this). The US is not the only destination, and there are less protections in other markets than in the US. Surrogacy is certainly not prostitution, but poorly regulated markets exist and pose similar issues.

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

Getting eggs from women is hard because the current technology is very invasive and expensive, and there are challenges storing and maintaining the eggs. A technology that allows the creation of as many eggs as you want from skin samples totally changes all that, and removes the limitations for many reproductive technologies.

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

This technology goes way beyond that. I don't see why we should dismiss the many valid ethics questions because it is something that some gay people want. That may be a slight positive to weigh against all the other questions.

runsWphotonson Southern accents could cost job seekers a 20% wage penalty, study finds

Much of the "old money" in the south is northerners. People who came after Civil War to open factories and textile mills.

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

Yes this is possible. Gwern wrote quite a lot about this several years ago I think.

runsWphotonson Creating a sperm or egg from any cell?

Imagine how many brad pitt babies

runsWphotonson The False Promise of Imitating Proprietary LLMs

yeah this is insane thinking haha

runsWphotonson Germany Falls into Recession

They are normal basically everywhere but USA I think.

runsWphotonson Psychiatric detentions rise in first year of 988 hotline

Money really doesn't seem to be a problem for the US government at all. I really don't think it is the taxation, but how they decide to spend all the money they have.

runsWphotonson PyPI Was Subpoenaed

It doesn't seem that clandestine.

runsWphotonson Ice loss from Greenland and Antarctica hits new record

Yeah this is cool

runsWphotonson Europe’s CEOs Eye Shift in Spending Plans Toward North America

This is true of some countries in Africa and bot of others, so depends where.

runsWphotonson Black holes might be defects in spacetime

This is a tongue in cheek response to your interesting reply: it is certainly possible now scientifically for virgins to give birth to sons.

runsWphotonson Bakhmut Is Gone: An Aerial Look at the War’s Destruction

I had in mind the entire 30 year history since independence during which certain factions have been pushing for NATO presence and eventual membership. The person below who says Putin "had already won on NATO" is wrong, from Putin's perspective, since his win condition was a guarantee that Ukraine would never join. This exact point was a sticking condition in the failed negotiations before 2022.

I think the poster has some point though, in that it is not all Ukrainian factions that have been pushing for this, and was perhaps not them as much as western powers which prevented this concession (their policy is influenced by their more powerful neighbours and backers!)

In the present, the secretary general of NATO Jens Stoltenberg has said "Let me be clear: Ukraine’s rightful place is in the Euro-Atlantic family. Ukraine’s rightful place is in NATO. And over time, our support will help you make this possible."

I never "justified" Russia's actions.