self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
I'm a transhumanist doctor. In a better world, I wouldn't need to add that as a qualifier to plain old "doctor". It would be taken as granted for someone in the profession of saving lives.
At any rate, I intend to live forever or die trying. See you at Heat Death!
Friends:
A friend to everyone is a friend to no one.
User ID: 454
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
7d ago
I saw a physiotherapist for the back pain, and he told me I had been handling it reasonably, and that my stated suspicion that I should go to the gym more and not baby it overly was the correct insight. Converting that into action? That's another matter. I have a lot on my plate. At least I only had to take a single day off sick, after hitting the daily limit of ibuprofen without making the pain manageable. It's better now. It'll just take longer to heal than I'd like. And I might have to do lower back exercises and fight the hoes for the leg press machine.
Anyway, I did push-ups last week, and I'll do more at some point. I'm surviving on cocodamol and the knowledge that I've got annual leave ahead of me. To be spent drinking and driving (not at the same time) and seeing the country properly while being the reasonably assimilated/integrated and wiser older brother.
Work hasn't been too bad. It's a wonder what mostly adequate staffing, sigh peers and seniors who like me can do, in terms of moving a bad workload somewhere to the vicinity of bearable. I continue not writing about the people who have asked me not to write about them, I continue being charming at pubs and making friends by engaging when attacked by feral extroverts. I have been kidnapped (with consent) in the middle of the night and driven to cities across the country on a weekend. I've made sure some very faded women in the back of an SUV driven by a bipolar gay man just barely processing heartbreak drank enough water - while making sure I sat behind an airbag. I continue, in other words, to have as much fun as a recently badly depressed and overworked psychiatry resident can have during an Indian British Summer.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
7d ago
Hook? Do I look like I've gone out fishing? I am known, on occasion, to write what (at least to me) are mildly entertaining accounts of things that have happened in my life. As I've said before, much more tersely, I don't have the time or spare energy to be writing effort posts in the immediate future. I can only say (with genuine polite intent and no sarcasm intended) that anyone who doesn't want to read my writing has a plethora of options. Including saying something isn't for them, which I am totally okay with. These days, I only optimize for popularity where it actually matters: IRL. The Motte gets what I want to give it, which is not always the same as what it wants.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
8d ago
Thanks for the reminder. I checked, and Starship is slated for the first transatmospheric flight, Flight 13 to be specific, sometime after July. It was intended to be a true orbital flight, but likely will get bumped down to a suborbital one after recent technical difficulties.
(At least according to https://starship-spacex.fandom.com/wiki/Starship_Flight_Test_13)
With the benefit of hindsight, I think I was too optimistic. 90% CIs should cover way more space/time than a 3 year forecast. Clearly I wasn't adjusting for Elon time even while trying to adjust for Elon time, though my comment notes that that guess was off the top of my head with no additional research. I'd give 70% odds of a proper orbital flight and recovery within 2 years, 50% within 365 days.
I still do not think the hype is unjustified. There is nobody else around that's at SpaceX's level, especially after BO's setback.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
8d ago
That is a comment, and this is a reply.
I accidentally on purpose ended up at a Korean BBQ restaurant. To my mild (or moderate dismay), I was confronted with an induction top and every indication that the dishes I'd want would need cooking. Normally, I'd assume that that service would be covered by a restaurant, but clearly they do things differently in Korean Scotland. East Korea?
I had very little idea what to do, and wasn't in the mood to learn how to use chopsticks on the field of battle. And I'd ordered ribeye and pork belly. It had arrived raw.
I was only pretending to be deeply distressed. There was absolutely no panic usage of ChatGPT involved. Quiet confidence all the way down baby. I tell myself that if my dad could teach himself laparoscopic surgery from textbooks at about my age...
I paid 37 quid for that meat. I could have fucking cooked it myself, or had about the same quantity at a regular restaurant. At least they didn't ask for a tip, given that this was taking self-service to a new level. Why not just present the cow next time?
On the walk back, I also experienced a sharp pain near my heel. A quick examination revealed nothing in my socks or shoes, but it did hurt quite a bit - exactly like being bitten or stung by a bug. There's a minor bump there now, so presumably we've got bugs with invisibility on the loose.
On the final stretch, I was video calling my brother. Last minute Apple Watch logistics, after the promised discount and creative accounting failed to materialize + confirmation that he'd finally had his appointment for the visa (uneventfully). I was interrupted by a gaggle of cute teenish girls and took out my earphones.
They didn't look like the Mormons who seem to accost me with regularity in those parts, so I asked them how I could help.
They wanted to know how tall I was. Huh. I gave them the honest answer: a hair or two above six feet. They remarked that they were surprised, because I'd looked ridiculously tall from a distance, giggled, thanked me and went off while glancing back every once in a while.
I stood there with a good natured but very bemused smile on my face. They didn't stink of weed. The experience was neutral. The most parsimonious explanation is that the invisible spider that bit me added a few inches of height, which I can't complain about. It would explain the week of barely manageable back pain. If that isn't the case, I'm going to start wearing platform shoes while insisting I'm actually 5'8.
This has been a rather perplexing day, but at least I'm safely in bed.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
9d ago
There's the official EULA and there's handing the password away with a wink and a nod. I'll make sure to delete all the hentai games I do (not) own.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
9d ago
Huh. I should purchase something. God knows I don't play any of the games I buy, but I can pass it on to the grandkids. A slight pain is the fact that I've still got an account based in India, because it occasionally pays off in terms of geographical arbitrage. But at other times, it makes a quick spur of the moment purchase difficult.
Right now, I'd recommend anyone into tactics give Menace a whirl. It's still a while away from feature-complete, but the recent updates and a few mods make me quite close to booting it back up again. Got my money's worth with about 20 hours of playtime already, and it has the potential to provide hundreds.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
11d ago
Glad someone noticed.
The main takeaway? The competition was an absolute pain in the ass. Reading hundreds of thousands of tokens of AI generated prose and creating a working agentic harness + scaffolding was exhausting. It took dozens of cycles of iteration to find the right balance.
Funnily enough, what really made all the difference is that I ended up sharing a large corpus of my own text for reference - and it shows. The story I'm the most proud of is "The Bowl" (which is not nonsensical, at least to anyone who has or had a Labrador), but both my entries have clear self_made_human fingerprints. The Bowl made me sob while reading it for the first time, and I knew I wasn't going to get anything better than that. That's more than most human literature can ever say.
To the chagrin of people complaining about my use of AI assistance, at times, I know what I'm doing. Gwern, Roon, Alexander Wales and a few others think I know what I'm doing, and liked the output. Is it a surprise that I'm tired of arguing with idiots here when I could be off making money? $500 just about covers the effort, though I would have liked the full 10k. Ah well, I introduced myself as a dark horse candidate who might be worth giving a few hundred dollars in tokens just to see what he could do. And it worked.
Here's a public conversation I had with Gwern:
https://old.reddit.com/r/slatestarcodex/s/QiMdeD3OkG
I have plenty of additional thoughts, tips and things learned through trial and error plus bitter experience. Unfortunately, they're proprietary. Anybody who wants them better pay me for the privilege.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
14d ago
Basking in the glory of being an ACX finalist on my first and only entry - you fellas wish. Also dying of terrible musculosketal (partially psychosomatic pain). Hearteningly for my resolution, I've been doing push-ups to help with it so I hit my exercise goal? However, ibuprofen and paracetamol combined seem to do the trick. It's never been this bad, ever:
I had a lovely weekend that involved champagne (a gift, for clearing the Paper B). I was well rested and well fed. And yet, on Monday, I was as stiff as a board, half my muscles screaming at me to not go to the ward - the other half screaming to leave once I was there. But there is no problem that sufficient analgesia and stimulants can't solve, or there are, but I haven't found them quite yet. There are probably drugs for those too. At least I am spending my annual leave in bulk, and I fucking need it.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
16d ago
I have consumed plenty of Scotch in places that aren't Scotland, so no objections here. I'll see if we can fit it into the schedule. And I'll look up that museum, it sounds like the polar opposite of the Tate, and that can only be a good thing. Thanks!
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
16d ago
If you recommend it that strongly, I'll take a look! And thank you, I am easily bribed with alcohol, and I'm always happy to meet other Mottizens. I'll DM you if I'm in the area 👌
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
16d ago
Huh. That's very good to know, I'll look into seeing if we can just about squeeze it into our schedule. Thanks!
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
16d ago
Glasgow has excellent nightlife! I've already seen someone nick a traffic cone and carry it off proudly beneath their armpit, and I can only describe the experience as akin to accidentally walking into a fairy tale. It turns out I actually like the city, and not just because it seems like a promising place to be a senior shrink.
I have no specific interest in Loch Ness, so if you think Glen Coe is better or less of a tourist trap, I'll prioritize it instead.
If you are there for the cliffs more than the castle
The best part of the castle was ignoring it, or at least the argument about medieval laws around monogamy that I won
A castle loomed over the harbor like a very large, very literal metaphor about who was in charge of what. My friend and I debated whether owning a castle in medieval England gave you street cred or just a crowded calendar. This prompted a brief, speculative argument on medieval sexual economics. He posited that the local lord must have had a hundred wives. I countered that, as a Christian noble, he was likely constrained to one official wife for appearances, and ninety-nine plausible deniabilities, likely undocumented liaisons with the wives of the local fishermen. We failed to resolve this.
I've been to York, but haven't really explored it. I'll put a pin in that and Bath, though I'd prefer a shower. Appreciate the suggestions!
Honestly speaking, my brother is a homebody, just like me. As long as we see scenic places and drink plenty of booze, we'll be content. All the more so if we can do both at the same time.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
16d ago
These are excellent recommendations. You're right that trying to fit in a tour of NI in that time frame would be difficult, but I'll see what we can manage. Thanks a lot!
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
16d ago
Very kind of you to offer, and I'll let you know if I ever head that way. Always wanted to see what was up with the [REDACTED] Car Bombs.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
17d ago
That would be doable, but it would involve applying for a Schengen visa. Downside of having a meh passport. I've been too caught up to do that, and it's even more of a headache for my brother with the little notice that he has. Something for the future.
There's still more than enough to do in the UK to eat up a fortnight. It's small but dense with history and architecture.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
17d ago
I have my brother coming over for two weeks next month. It's somewhere between a much needed vacation for the poor sod (he's just finished his internship and is about to discover that life as a doctor is no fun) and a welfare check. I definitely need the vacation myself.
So I'd appreciate travel advice. The current rough concept of a plan:
- Spend 2-4 days in Edinburgh and Glasgow. Take him to the ridiculous gay pubs, bars and clubs I've seen to expand his horizons. Too late for Pride, and too early for Fringe, but that saves us money anyway.
- A day or two in the Highlands. Hitting up distilleries, swatting away midges, and pissing in Loch Ness. I see little point in showing him Aberdeen, Dundee or Inverness.
- Towards the end, we need to be Good Indian Boys and spend a few days with miscellaneous relatives in Manchester and London. As little time as we can get away with, since I do need to show him London.
- Heading down to Dover for a day. I loved the cliffs.
We're not particularly outdoorsy, or touristy, for the matter - we're not looking to go for scenic hikes or to see every tiny castle around. I'm focusing on nightlife as well as a quick visit at the Greatest Hits. The typical day involves some walking, sightseeing, drinking and nice meals - followed by more drinking. We will probably rent cars where it's reasonable to do so (not London or Edinburgh).
Any suggestions?
Well, I am glad you haven't called the place quits. And while I can respect your decision to not ask for or accept special privileges, I would also prefer that you put extra effort into being polite. Yes I know we have more than our fair share of idiots, but my approach to bad takes on AI these days is to chuckle sensibly and drink a beer instead of engaging.
Ah. After Fable came out, and I had the fortune of using it for a while before it got yoinked? I can't be arsed about GLM 5.2 or Mistral Baguette or whatever else came out last week. I experienced that rare state change of experiencing something clearly ahead of the pack, just right on time. The trend lines on log-linear curves remain steady. What it felt like using GPT 4. o1/o3. Where you don't even have to look at the benchmark scores to know what you're looking at is something else. I read the whole whitepaper for Mythos in a single evening, and it made my heart pound. I presume Fable will be back, at some point, or something of comparable general capability will come out of OAI or DM (I know 5.5 Pro is about as capable on cyber security, but that isn't my primary interest). About time the latter did something, Gemini 3.1 Pro is shoddy and wasn't that impressive when it came out. But Google is Google, now that they're awake, they're probably cooking.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
19d ago
At least it's not the other kind of AIDS, but I presume that's an American excuse for a beer that could potentially spread it around.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
20d ago
Thank you. I'd call you a bby girl too, but must settle for a more dignified "young lady". And sending kisses your way might be taken the wrong way.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
20d ago
I am fond of money. I made an amount that's nothing to sneeze at through writing, unless you have hay fever. But I have a day job that keeps me up at night. I also have too much dignity to tweet.
Anyway, I've never claimed that I am gone for good. And unfortunately, I am still a mod (and paid well for it) so I can't just start calling the people I particularly dislike retarded and spin up an alt. @Amadan would catch me.
The thing about Britain is that the Summer always ends, and at some point it’s cold and grey (worse up where you are) and there really isn’t anything better to do on a quiet sunday morning than argue here.
You don't have to tell me. It was 36 degrees in Manchester a day or two back, and even Scotland is above thawing. I swear I almost felt a warm breeze, but it could have been someone farting on the bus.
This place has had me when I'm depressed and have no time to spare but spared it anyway. Now I'm less depressed (but brittle), and I don't really want to spare the time. I can make bad puns at work that people don't want to laugh at, but end up wheezing to anyway (it's hay fever again). I can comfort the dying. I can flirt with the grannies and their still-too-old-for-me daughters and pick flowers that catch my attention and present them to someone I like, who unfortunately has asked me not to write about her. Maybe I really should just get married, there are a few promising candidates. And then I'll be right back here, to avoid my wife of course.
Yup. Becoming a dad will solve my problems. Or swap them out for new, more exciting ones. Soon enough. They got stale.
self_made_human
amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi
20d ago
Ahem. I get laid most of the time. Even when depressed (it's therapeutic).
I am aware. If I wanted people to have a front-row seat to my life, as I have in the past, I would have written about it. At most, I let you guys look through the cracks when I open up the blinds.
I will be brief, and vague, because the details are for those who actually know me. Oh dear, on an edit pass, it seems we must settle for merely vague.
Just over 2 months ago, I was a wreck. A high-functioning, white knuckling wreck. But very close to falling apart. Many reasons, all of them valid ones. I do not make it a habit of worrying about what's not worth worrying about. I had my exam, brutal work, a seemingly terminal case of impostor syndrome because I have been treated very badly at an earlier placement.
I would say that I am a reasonably competent psychiatry trainee. I am also unreasonably against seeing a doctor if I can help it. If I was begging for an urgent psychiatric review, you can imagine it was bad. Bad enough to cut through the depression and exhaustion and akrasia and despair and beg for help. I got... not fuck all, something more than nil. Approximately about as much as I could expect from the NHS, which is why I got a lot of blood tests and investigations done on my own dime, on vacation time, before returning to work like a man walking to the noose. And that's why I'm going to be spending a small fraction of my psychiatry trainee wages on appointments with more senior psychiatrists, at some point. That's a circular economy for you.
I realized, to my despair, that I would have to work on fixing my own issues in my own way. It worked, or at least I have avoided ending up on the other side of the couch. And it had a strong helping hand from actual people, IRL, telling me, with actual sincerity and gratitude, that they appreciate me for who I am and what I can do. I won a decent amount of money through a rather challenging contest with big-name panelists you've heard of. Might talk about that one at some point. I am, of course, a finalist in the ACX book review contest. I had/have excellent, talented and supportive colleagues who went out of their way to make my life easier - while showing me they care. I have a good boss, an experience I didn't expect given that the last couple have been useless as an asshole after a colostomy. A rather thankless job, where I end up getting thanked by my patients on a regular basis anyway. I am not lying about the compliments, I have better things to do than make up things on the internet for clout. I have been doing exactly those things.
And, of course, my dreams/hopes/nightmares are coming true. AGI is right around the corner. Am I allowed a "I told you fuckers half a decade in advance?". Is it here? No. But it's gone from knocking on the door to shimmying the locks or preparing to kick down the door. I am not sure I can achieve everything I've wanted to achieve before it kicks it down and makes itself at home on my couch.
So I'm having fun, and making hay while the sun shines. I've been present in reality. The parasocial engagement of arguing with idiots on an Underwater Basket Weaving forum has lost much of its charm. Not all of it, clearly, since I was here yesterday, and show up every week when @FtttG pings me in this thread. As the Scots would say, I cannae be arsed to deal with some of you. Your boos mean nothing to me, I've seen what makes you cheer.*
I have a job, a social life, responsibility, and a beautiful summer to enjoy and photograph. I was incredibly stressed, running on fumes and quiet desperation till I ran out of the fumes. I'm now only moderately stressed, and grimly determined to have a good time anyway. Life's actually good. Very far from perfect, but I'll take the scenic route. You have seen me severely distressed, close to breaking point, solving my own problems instead of bitching about it, and now doing what I like, when I like it. How queer.
*This is not a personal attack on you, most of the people here are fine. I'd call a handful actual friends. I was just never kidding about feeling sympathetic towards @DaseindustriesLtd when he picked up his ball and went home (or was shown the door for a while, wonder if the ban has expired) . I have no interest in flaming out, I'm not saying I'm going anywhere, but I genuinely do not care about this place as much as I used to. I lack the spare time, or the spare energy, and my Ritalin is well-employed getting me through my job with little spare to write essays on the shitter. My priorities are finally about as straight as I am. Good luck to the rest of you.
That sounds very interesting. I'll look into it, thanks. Though I have to concede that looking at the internals doesn't cure back ache.
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