Hacker News Reader

sbelskieon EPA to revoke endangerment finding, the basis for regulating greenhouse gases

> Since it was signed by then-Administrator Lisa Jackson in 2009, the finding has been used by the EPA to regulate sources of climate change-causing pollution from cars, power plants and other sources of transportation like planes, as well as oil and gas operations.

sbelskieon US AI Action Plan

So the government should step in to dictate what neutrality means?

sbelskieon What 'Project Hail Mary' teaches us about the PlanetScale vs. Neon debate

Yea that makes a lot of sense. The first Expanse novel (at least Miller’s storyline) fits here as well.

sbelskieon What 'Project Hail Mary' teaches us about the PlanetScale vs. Neon debate

If you don't read/like much genre fiction, I would say probably no. The pacing is well done and I genuinely find story compelling, but the writing while solid-ish is not exactly of high literary quality.

Additionally, in terms of genre I actually find Weir's books to be more like detective novels than sci-fi, though obviously lots of sci-fi elements in them.

sbelskieon Military doctors say they're not getting enough experience for combat care

> Only 25% of Army, 52% of Navy and 81% of Air Force emergency doctors were placed at locations where they directly provided care to patients.

Is there a way where this means something different than it sounds? Because that sounds pretty insane.

sbelskieon New US visa rules will force foreign students to unlock social media profiles

A plurality of those who voted, you mean.

sbelskieon California now has more EV charging ports than gas nozzles

By this do you mean that Chinese automakers are getting close to a charging rate that would be equivalent to the time it takes to pump gasoline for the equivalent energy? If so, do you have any sources on that?

sbelskieon California now has more EV charging ports than gas nozzles

You are likely correct.

> Of the 73,537 chargers added to the data set in 2024, 37,983 new chargers were installed in 2024. The remaining 35,554 chargers were installed before 2024 and identified through new data sources.

sbelskieon MLB says Yankees’ new “torpedo bats” are legal and likely coming

Is almost impossible to defend when done by a particular team. No other team has managed the kind of sustained success with it that the Eagles have. If it was impossible to defend surely other teams would be using it too.

Tom Brady also had similar success with the standard old QB sneak during his career and I don't recall attempts to ban that.

sbelskieon Why is zero plural? (2024)

Not in standard American English to the best of my knowledge, but it’s not impossible some dialects use this construction.

sbelskieon Who would have won the Simon-Ehrlich bet over different decades?

How do we “know” this?

sbelskieon 'AI-powered judge' takes boxing closer to brave new world it appears to seek

I believe the argument would be that humans are inconsistent, fallible, and gameable in idiosyncratic and individual ways not that they are less susceptible than AI.

sbelskieon MIT study explains why laws are written in an incomprehensible style

> “In the event that any payment or benefit by the Company (all such payments and benefits, including the payments and benefits under Section 3(a) hereof, being hereinafter referred to as the ‘Total Payments’), would be subject to excise tax, then the cash severance payments shall be reduced.”

> The paper offers this as a more understandable alternative, with the definition separated out:

> “In the event that any payment or benefit by the Company would be subject to excise tax, then the cash severance payments shall be reduced. All payments and benefits by the Company shall hereinafter be referred to as the ‘Total Payments.’ This includes the payments and benefits under Section 3(a) hereof.”

https://bcs.mit.edu/news/objection-no-one-can-understand-wha...

sbelskieon UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson fatally shot in Manhattan

https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/04/us/brian-thompson-united-heal...

> A gunman, who investigators tell CNN was waiting for some time before Thompson’s arrival, opened fire from 20 feet away firing multiple times, striking Thompson.

This from CNN makes it sound like it could possibly be targeted, though there are very few details at this time and sometimes these things are misreported in the immediate aftermath.

sbelskieon Air traffic failure caused by two locations 3600nm apart sharing 3-letter code

Can’t claim to be “mentally well”, whatever that might mean, but I definitely read it as nanometers.

sbelskieon US Senate to Revive Software Patents with PERA Bill Vote on Thursday

Is it? Tillis is the only one I see associated with the bill. Have any Democratic senators spoken in favor of it?

sbelskieon What's New in F# 9

So .NET and C# have moved recently-ish to yearly single digit incremented releases and I’m guessing F# is doing the same. Not sure if they intentionally made the switch when it would line up with the .NET version or if that’s just a coincidence. C#, for example, released version 13 for .NET 9.

sbelskieon How long til we're all on Ozempic?

Is there any evidence it’s effective?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_Kingdo...

sbelskieon Fed Cuts Rates by a Half Percentage Point

Why?

sbelskieon U.S. overdose deaths plummet, saving thousands of lives

The article does not appear to agree with that claim.

> We've almost tripled the amount of naloxone out in the community," said Finegood. He noted that one survey in the Seattle area found 85 percent of high-risk drug users now carry the overdose-reversal medication.

sbelskieon U.S. overdose deaths plummet, saving thousands of lives

One of the researchers mentioned is also on the team of the Opioid Data Lab (link below). They have links to studies that include Jupyter notebooks, GitHub repos, etc. Thought that might be of interest to this crowd.

https://www.opioiddata.org/

https://github.com/opioiddatalab

sbelskieon In unprecedented move, Ohio is funding construction of private religious schools

Not since the 14th amendment, no?

sbelskieon U.S. Added 818,000 Fewer Jobs Than Reported Earlier

I’m not making any claims about the quality or types of jobs added, just that they were. You can read the BLS publication for that kind of information.

sbelskieon U.S. Added 818,000 Fewer Jobs Than Reported Earlier

The US economy still added jobs during this period, just fewer than previously calculated.

sbelskieon Wyoming mayoral candidate vows to let an AI bot run Cheyenne

The elected candidate, who is a human, would clearly be responsible for whatever actions are taken, no?

sbelskieon Wyoming mayoral candidate vows to let an AI bot run Cheyenne

This seems like a questionable idea for all the obvious reasons, but I don’t really get the argument that it should be illegal. I don’t really understand how you would craft such a law. Someone can run for office and declare that they will make decisions based on horoscopes, tarot cards, oomancy etc. All bad ideas but obviously legal.

sbelskieon In ‘The Book Against Death,’ Elias Canetti rants against mortality

I don’t really have an opinion one way or another but why would we need to?

There doesn’t really seem to be any plausible practical or moral imperative to do so.

sbelskieon Australia starts peanut allergy treatment for babies

Sounds like Oral Allergy Syndrome. I also have it with almonds and stone fruits.

sbelskieon "Sugar rush" in children seems to be confirmation bias

Have you considered that your experience may not be universal? I don’t experience any of what you’re talking about.

sbelskieon Five people infected as bird flu appears to go from cows to chickens to humans

Doesn’t the anonymity reduce the incentive companies would otherwise have to hide or underplay infections?