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self_made_human

amaratvaṃ prāpnuhi, athavā yatamāno mṛtyum āpnuhi

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joined 2022 September 05 05:31:00 UTC

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

				
				
				

				

					16 followers  

					follows 0 users  

					joined 2022 September 05 05:31:00 UTC
				


				
					

					
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


					
					
					
				

			


					

						
					



		

	

 











			
			

			
			

			




	


		

			
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				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Yes? That is not in conflict with anything I've said.


You've quite literally got the CEO of DeepSeek complaining that they can't get the GPUs necessary to reach the frontier:


https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49052912


https://www.cyberkendra.com/2026/07/deepseek-pauses-fundraising-amid.html?m=1




In it, Liang reportedly framed China's disadvantage as an arithmetic problem rather than a talent one: "The biggest gap between us and the US is in resources."






The specifics were unusually candid. Liang is said to have told investors he needed 200,000 Huawei 950 chips to train a frontier model but received 16,000, adding that "Huawei's problem is still insufficient capacity" and expecting the crunch to last at least three years. He also floated narrowing the gap with US labs to three to six months using a fraction of their computing.




You can do remarkable things with grit, determination, the willingness to eat unsalted rice (and by distilling Claude), but that won't get you to the frontier before the frontier moves on.


Liang laments not having enough compute, you know. It is a handicap.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Idk if anything related to AI should be in a specific thread since its all the internet talks about nowadays




I'm glad I've lived long enough to be vindicated. The man who is a step ahead is lauded as a genius, the man who is two is externally indistinguishable from the insane.


I remember, about a year and a half back, maybe two, showing off AI voice mode (Chatgpt and Gemini) to my dad and his surgeon colleagues. They'd been meh about AI in general, and when they heard it composing poetry in their native language on the fly, in real time? And when they asked it medical/surgical questions and got the right answers right away?


They were blown away. I installed the relevant apps on several phones that evening.


Now, some might complain that introducing the elderly to AI is bad. They have a multitude of reasons, some of them reasonable, for holding that objection. I don't particularly see the harm in what you're doing - many people are lonely, and as long as they're not talking to old GPT 4o? If it works, it works. The alternative is a conversation with a harried Filipina carer, in many cases.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
That does not outweigh their other, very real advantages. You do not want to be a cash and compute-poor lab.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's a gross mistake to conflate a setback with defeat, when it comes to Google. They were floundering with Bard. They made a strong recovery, and were competitive again, falling back only after Gemini 3.1 Pro was a disappointment.


Gemini 3.6 Flash has just been knee-capped by OAI making 5.6 Luna 80% cheaper. But this is the company that invented Transformers, and which has talent, TPUs and more money than God. I don't have very high expectations of the upcoming 3.5 Pro, but it only takes a bit of huffing and puffing to get back to the frontier for another month or two.


Their AI overviews use a cheap and cheerful model, simply because of the ridiculous scale of implementation. You're not going to devote 5.6 Sol levels of intelligence for "cheap chippie in Bristol" and thereabouts.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
@ControlsFreak


ToaKraka of all people (much love to him) managed to figure this out. This gentleman. Level -1 Autism. I am very fond of him.


And you couldn't. You produced four paragraphs of appellate briefing on whether a shitpost belongs in the Friday Fun Thread, followed by an edit clarifying that you were not, in fact, filing charges. I'm grateful for your forbearance. However: the Fun Thread is the one venue where a bare link plus a one-liner isn't merely tolerated, but entirely accepted. Dawg. I'm at a loss for words. Is this why Opus 5 performs worse when set to maximum reasoning, because it uses those reasoning tokens unproductively? Much to ponder on.


I am happy to conduct an assessment if you'll pay. I'll probably charge extra, FYI.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
A non-sequitur to end all others really. What about it?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
https://openai.com/index/ten-advances-in-mathematics/


Fellas, I regret to tell you something you should have realized last week at the latest: it's incredibly over.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/glucose-biofuel-cell


https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11261083/


That's all the excuse you need to have a consistent trickle charge going in a futuristic cyborg. You could allow for rapid recharge from disposable batteries and electrical outlets, and let the player top up in their downtime by "biological" means. The best part is that it's a convenient excuse for turning food item pickups into energy.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's been somewhere in the ballpark of 15 years since I played the OG Deus Ex. Even then, the recharge bots were rare. Power outlets are... not rare.


Battery packs or capacitors are not like HP, and it does not break immersion to allow them to be recharged at a reasonable pace in-game.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 31, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Something that's always pissed me off to no end in the Deus Ex games is the energy management running on consumable power cells. I suffer from a bad case of videogame hoarding disorder, and I've beaten most of them without ever using any of the damn things, at significant cost to my sanity.


Its 20XX, just stick your dick in a convenient power socket, you're a fucking cyborg Denton/Adam.


The newer games do, from memory, let you automatically recharge a few pips with time, but that's lame. I'd rather not play a game set in a parallel timeline where the Note 7 debacle put an end to the development of battery technology.




I've been playing Rimworld again, courtesy of creating a mod for it. Miraculously, the 450 strong modpack of last year somehow worked, even after I threw in another 50 for taste. My runs usually die of boredom, TPS death (a 9800x3d and a 5080 only go so far in this game), or modpack instability/conflict. And I never play without dev mode enabled, because some modders have interesting takes on balance.


For example, I installed a mod that adds a bunch of cool guns and armor. It also, for no real reason, adds a spacer-tech faction that's intent on making a Banana Republic a reality in 5500 - you have one in game year to raise a massive crop of GMO fruit for them, or they'll clap your ass. I forgot about it, and was raided by 2 pawns with armor that could stand up to the scrutiny of God himself, and guns that could give him a migraine. My poor colonists lasted all of 30 seconds, and then I reloaded and deleted the enemy from existence because there is no God but me in these parts. Not quite VOID level, but goddamn. One year?? You're lucky to have a fabrication bench by then.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of July 27, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I have no need to set LLMs to the task of proving or disproving longstanding mathematical conjectures, and it happens anyway. I'm sure the skeptics have some excuse. I do not particularly care to hear it these days.


But yes, I find them incredibly useful. I retain alpha in knowing how to prompt them well, but that hasn't been that important for a good while. Use the best models, give them the necessary context, scrutinize or test their output? If you're not getting good results in July 2026, there's a skill issue involved. Not mine, not the model's, PEBCAK for whoever is reading this and thinks that applies to them.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Wellness Wednesday for July 29, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
The injured thumb mostly precluded anything intensive. But I've spent the week on the move, fucking around in Edinburgh and Glasgow till my new shoes gave me blisters.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Tinker Tuesday for July 28th, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I say nothing at all on the matter. The mod is exactly as advertised: it adds a bunch of guns to Rimworld. The guns function, and look good. It is immaterial to me how such a product comes into existence, as long as it does what it says on the tin. God knows I wouldn't have bothered to make anything of that scope if I had to do it all manually. I could, it's not impossible, and I've made one mod on my own, but something like this wouldn't happen.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Tinker Tuesday for July 28th, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I've successfully made a second, much higher quality mod for Rimworld. It adds 19 new guns, half of them railguns.


I really like railguns, okay?


But then I branched out and added cased telescoped ammo, ETC weaponry, 2 40k Bolters, a laser rifle (where's the rifling?), a plasma gun, a 25mm smart grenade launcher, and a 20mm infantry autocannon. Why? Because it's my mod and I do what I like.


I can already notice the massive leap in capabilities in less than a year of AI development. The LLMs of 8-9 months ago were inadequate for making a niche mod without an enormous amount of hand holding. The last time, I caved, and just did the XML work myself, and used AI images that I wasn't quite happy with.


This time? 5.6 Sol did pretty much everything I asked of it, with some mandatory manual testing to find and share errors and balance issues. It took me several days to implement the 4 weapons I'd made last time, in half the hours, I made 19, of significantly higher quality in all regards. I even managed to create brand new types of ammo, which I never managed to get the hang of last time. The art is far, far better. 🅱️ anilla Rimworld has art of the quality you'd expect at a special needs art therapy session, so it's not like it's hard to do better.


All I had to do was guide the overall design, use my knowledge of existing mods to direct the model to find out the poorly documented little extras or tacit knowledge that it wouldn't know, and make sure nothing was glaringly broken. Along the way, it even managed to troubleshoot and fix a 450 mod Rimworld map-gen issue, which the models of last year could not do.


It was fun, albeit tiring. I intend to add more guns, and now that I know it can handle more ambitious challenges, turrets, guided projectiles, and pretty much anything else I'm willing to burn time and tokens on.


Predictably, this caused drama on the modding discord. I was expecting it. I told the modder with a fetish for fetish art in the thumbnails of completely unrelated mods to go fuck himself, or thereabouts. I'm making free content, and it's good stuff. End of line.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 26, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I noted that the average person is far more amiable. This was distilled exposure to the leftest of the left - comedians are known to be happy and well adjusted people after all.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Small-Scale Question Sunday for July 26, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I was rather surprised to see how outright hostile the sentiment was towards Americans, while attending a reasonably high profile comedy show in Edinburgh tonight. Even directed at the poor sods who responded when the MC/individual comedians asked if there were Americans in the crowd. Apparently "I didn't vote for him" is no defense.


I ran into a very nice gentleman from Washington state while sheltering from the rain under the alcove of his building, next to the venue. I told him that while the show was nice enough, he's better off pretending to be Canadian. He was a tad bit strange, since, as he explained and then demonstrated, he'd stepped out to get soaked in the rain in lieu of a shower. That is probably whimsy and not pathology, but I opted to stay dry.


To be fair, I was sampling from the most vocally leftist/progressive strata of Scottish society. The average Scot seems to be much less deranged, and outright welcoming of the odd American tourist. Anyone else notice such obvious hostility in other countries?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 24, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Boooo


(Good one)


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Wellness Wednesday for July 22, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm sorry. I recall seeing your comment, but I lacked the context for a proper response. I suppose the title of the book is all the context I really need, unless you want to talk about it. I hope you figure things out, and find someone new, who is better for you.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 24, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
They could just have normal coffee or tea?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 24, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Phlebas is a decent but underwhelming book. The rest of the series is great. The only other one I was somewhat disappointed by was the Hydrogen Sonata. Lovely name, but a disjointed, unsatisfying mess by Banks standards.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 24, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Ugh, this reminds me to post my review that compares the Golden Oecumene against the Culture. My backlog is getting out of hand.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 24, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I've done my fair share of psychedelics, but I have my limits. As far as I can tell, my personality remains intact, I've just learned to be more fond of myself and value my limited amount of time under the sun appropriately.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for July 24, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Boba tea. Women love it, I'm perplexed by the appeal. Or matcha, which has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. It tastes like liquid grass.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Wellness Wednesday for July 22, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
To be fair, I have written the story. Every detail of that day, somewhere in the ballpark of 9600 words. The problem is that it is too personal, and making it safe or suitable for public consumption would take an enormous amount of time.


Hey, at least I was coaxed into spilling one of the more cinematic moments. There was so much, that day, it took at least 5 hours to cover most of it. Why? I forget. Human memory is imprecise. I wanted to capture what I felt in the heat of the moment. I am, despite my best efforts, a romantic. And I'm very good at missing opportunities and then making up for it the first chance I get.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			
			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Wellness Wednesday for July 22, 2026
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I'm grateful, I really am. All I can promise is that this is a considered decision, and I haven't cut things off.


I will note that I'm not as old as you seem to think I am. Far from it. I'm in my late 20s. I intend to bite the bullet in the next 2 or 3 years, 5 max. I'm quite far from worrying about only having the leftovers of the dating pool at hand, and I keep that a live concern.


I may or may not have fractured my thumb, so I'll keep it brief.




A sober, frugal Dutch doctor who wants a farm and a family, and you're passing on this because she's too organized?




She's not "too organized", I might be lacking in that regard, but I'm not scared off by people who have their shit together. She's too busy, I think. She's intent on entering a brutal specialty for further training, and she's moved/moving to a different city. Not too far, by itself, but in conjunction I'd be surprised if I saw her more than once every other week for the next few years. Even worse if either of us seek a competitive job later, which might require serious geographical upheaval.


I don't want to make demands of her. It's one thing to make those adjustments when you're engaged or married, and it's another to enter a relationship like that. You probably don't understand what an absolute pain in the ass rotational training is, especially when both parties are doctors. She clearly loves her career, and is visibly worried about how that'll impact having a family. I don't go around giving IVF advice for nothing, she's well aware of the health risks of delaying pregnancy, and my impression is that she wants to hold off for a good while.




You're not supposed to "keep up" with her!




True story: I was walking her back to a party, which she had delayed going to for the said 4 hours. We took a shortcut through a uni campus. I was a few steps behind.


"SMH! You walk awfully slow for someone with such long legs."


"I used to run everywhere, once. These days, I'm older. I like to linger and smell the roses."


She raised an eyebrow, "I don't see any roses."


I shrugged. "It's a metaphor, I'm not hallucinating." I sniffed a flower of uncertain taxonomy.


"I thought you'd keep up." She declared, walking off at speed, looking back over her shoulder with a smile.


"I'm still here, am I not?" I resumed chasing her at my own pace. One step behind.


No, she does want someone who keeps up. I can keep up. I'm just tired, sometimes, very often. I'm not too far from taking a stand, digging in my heels, and declaring this is where I'll live now. I just want it to be where I want to be.




You're not internet semi-famous for nothing, and that charm and turn of phrase makes her feel as insecure as her conscientiousness makes you feel.




I genuinely don't think that's the case. I'm not insecure that she, in her chosen field, is visibly more competent. I'm good at my job. She told me she appreciates that. I can pick up on the insecurities she does have: her body, the tension between her career goals and her craving for a family. I don't contribute to these.




I almost let a good woman go for the same reason: I was insecure she would keep charging ahead, and I could barely keep my phone charged. (plus I was enjoying my own grippy-socks/grippy-box decisions). But I didn't, and kid number three is slowing mom down enough that I can just about keep up.




I'm glad you got the happy ending. I'm quite sure I'll get mine too. Say hi to the kids and the missus for me.




Don't walk, run back to her, with as grandly romantic a gesture as her Northern European temperament and the rules of the NHS HR department will allow.




We don't work together any more. But if I see her (big if), I'll bring a bouquet of roses, and ask her to smell them while I stand by and grin like a loon.