starless_sea
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User ID: 1533
starless_sea
1yr ago
So I'm working on a hobby programming project, and I want to use these new ML bots that are all the rage to speed up progress. Is there a "how to code faster with GPT-4" guide somewhere? The state of the art is progressing fast, were should I go to make sure that I keep up to date with developments?
starless_sea
1yr ago
Related blog post: https://mtlynch.io/human-code-reviews-1/
I thinks it's good to have a more general discussion in the team on how to handle the more opinion-based comments.
This would fit better in the Friday Fun thread IMO (that's a compliment).
Some assumptions:
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The spaceship is going to an unpopulated planet. (If it is going to terraformed Mars, pop. 1 billion, you might as well have a less outlandish scenario like requing people from a sinking ship or a medical organ donation dilemma.)
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The planet is not a death-world full of monsters where physical prowess is crucial for survival. I presume that actual survival is easy when you don't have to compete with other humans and when the first generations have access to cool spaceship technology. (Given this assumption, none of the participants seem to have issues that strongly impacts survival ("physical disability" can be anything. Most disabilities are mild.).))
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If we are competent enough to design an interplanetary spacecraft, we are competent enough to send along a large sample of frozen sperm and the means of artificial insemination. This removes the worry about inbreeding other commenters bring up.
I want a thriving human civilization and reduced x-risk. Both requires us to repopulate as fast as possible. The optimal plan is then to pick the persons who aren't confirmed to be either men or non-fertile (i.e. everyone but 7, 10, 11 and 12).
(Culture could be important, but I expect culture to change drastically in a couple of generations anyway. The cultural values of the founding population seem secondary to the population growth goal.)
Solution: Send persons 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9 and a sperm bank. Boot person 1 (most likely to be a man) to make room for the sperm bank if needed. (Yes, person 1 is more likely a man than person 9: 13% of cops are women, women are as racist as men in most measures.)
starless_sea
1yr ago
Here's my proposal:
10% of what a kid pays in income taxes instead goes to their parents*. Kids can opt out of the program** and just pay regular taxes instead if the want to.
This aligns all incentives pretty well. There's a degree of luck in the program but it doesn't look like the kind of luck people dislike or feel is unfair.
*payments are in proportion to time spent being primary custodian during ages 0-17, to handle adoptees, strange family situations and avoid an adult-adoption loophole.
**opt-out is granular, e.g. you can chose to opt out your dad but not your mom.
starless_sea
1yr ago
My point is that the historical context helps with understanding, but that it doesn't really help me much on what action to take or what policy to pursue.
starless_sea
1yr ago
I can't really do anything with that information. I do get that there's historical bad blood (duh). In a way, it would have been better if the Jews hadn't been so ideologically commit to settle the region of Palestine. (But wouldn't that alt-history most likely end with more Jews staying in Europe for the Holocaust? That doesn't seem optimal either.) But in the world we live in, there was and is a significant amount of Jews with high ideological commitment to live in Palestine. They semi-legally "invaded" the territory (as did many Arab immigrants during the relevant years). After much turmoil, the Jew came out on top. It still seems bad to me that Jews are not allowed to pray on the Temple Mount, and that the Palestinian leadership rejected the 2000 Camp David proposals and went for a second Intifada instead. Knowing that people migrated in 1870 doesn't change my opinion much.
starless_sea
1yr ago
The settlement issue is a counterexample, this actually reflects badly on Israel when I dig down. I guess the settlements is a way to apply pressure to show that the Arab negotiation position is only going to get worse (beyond the obvious religious dimension that seems to be the main driver). But the ethical thing is to not press the winning hand, and relations would likely have been better today if the settlements on the West Bank had been limited.
This highlights a general disagreement I see. Pro-Palestine arguments are often based on high principles of human rights, international law, democracy, etc. Pro-Israel arguments are often based on pragmatism, political reality and a flavor to might-makes-right. The second kind of argument just clicks better with me, I guess this might be some moral foundation kind of thing. I can see the morally pure argument for fighting the Dane until he gives up all he has unlawfully taken. But the Dane seem to be well settled and well defended, and if your side would have won the wars of yesteryear, then you would be the ruler of Denmark today and you would be equally unwilling to give back to the Danes all that you'd taken from them, so at some point it's just time to accept reality and move on. (It's easy to claim the moral high ground and lofty principles when you are in a position without power.)
Or maybe I'm just unconsciously seeking out the arguments I like from the side I unconsciously want to like and the arguments I dislike from the side I don't want to like.
starless_sea
1yr ago
So you're making some kind of platonic case: It would be better for the Arab majority to mistreat the Jewish minority that the current situation where the Jews mistreat the Arabs? Even if that's true in some platonic sense, it's still unworkable, the Jewish side will never agree to become the mistreated minority because of pure platonic reasoning.
starless_sea
1yr ago
Given that, the only solution where the Arab residents of that land get to enjoy the benefits of being citizens of a liberal democracy, is that they are citizens of a liberal democracy jointly with the people who encircle them on all sides. And that means a one-state solution.
This seems totally unworkable to me. Why aren't you addressing the glaring counterargument: This would make Jews a minority with a high likelihood of mistreatment ("it can work pretty well" is hardly reassuring)?
starless_sea
1yr ago
So I was doing some reading on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict. I was vaguely pro-Israel before with disclaimers on how both sides are bad (like most others here I presume), but I just felt more and more pro-Israel the deeper I read (I'm not trying to astroturf, this is my true feelings on the matter). The Israeli demands during the 2000 Camp David Summit seem reasonable. The Palestinian leadership seem weirdly comfortable with ridiculous conspiracy theories about Israel trying to undermine the Al-Aqsa Mosque etc. The ban on non-Muslims from the Al-Aqsa Mosque, and the ban on non-Muslim prayer on the Temple Mount, are both reprehensible. Every nook I look into, it seems like I support the Israeli side and the "both sides are bad" cases that I expected to find is largely missing.
Has anyone else had the experience of their position markedly shifting as the read up on the issue? Are the Israelis just better than PR, cunningly doing bad things to the Palestinian side under the radar, while counting on that the Palestinian reaction will be performed with much worse optics? What's the best moderate Palestinian take on an acceptable solution for a workable two-state solution?
Also, what are your predictions for the evolution of the conflict. Say that the year is 2043 and condition on no end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it: what does the conflict look like then? It seems unlikely to cool anytime soon, and the long run seems like a race between Palestinian demographics and Israeli economy, where I think Israel has the upper hand, especially if they are liberal with technological mass surveillance.
Sure, we are mindreading: so is Hersh and everyone else in this discussion: It's a discussion about motives, thus we are mindreading.
And I can easily imagine a plan in which Germany caves during a hard winter, which again seems like the sort of thing Putin would like.
Putins plan likely looked like your scenario above (or even "Germany is weak and decadent and they won't cancel Nord Stream 2 to begin with"). Then Germany made it very clear that they wouldn't reopen Nord Stream 2 (hence the 5% on the prediction market) and they managed to stock up on gas and otherwise prepare for the winter much better than expected. Also Russia seems to have underestimated the west in all their plans everywhere (thus the fiasco of the invasion) so they might realize from that general principle that they have likely been underestimating Germany in this specific case. So Putin realized that this plan wasn't going to work, so he went for another option.
Your argument seems grounded on that Nord Stream 2 was viable after the invasion. I have tried to present evidence to the contrary but it seems I haven't convinced you. What evidence would make you change your mind? Do you have any evidence for your position, beyond "I can imagine it"?
You should of course listen to the actual podcast if you want the contrast, my bullets are cherrypicked (but not unfair IMO). You can check out the guys blog as well: https://radicalscholarship.com/2022/11/05/sold-a-story-continues-science-of-reading-misinformation-campaign-a-reader/
It has some interesting perspectives:
Let me start with a caveat: Don’t debate “science of reading” (SoR) advocates on social media.
Ok, so I suspect some of you will enter the fray, and I must caution that you are not going to change the minds of SoR advocates; therefore, if you enter into a social media debate, you must keep your focus on informing others who may read that debate, others who genuinely want a discussion and are looking to be better informed (SoR advocates are not open to debate and do not want an honest discussion).
I think this reflects the academic mainstream position. "The outgroup is not open to debate so I refuse to debate them."
Here's the other side:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/4z3bWxf2twThlc3xSmdTul?si=48EYBBJsTfuJklH8hRDw4A
I didn't listen to all of it but it seems to do a kind of Motte and Baily. Paraphrasing:
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"People are always complaining about teachers and schools, nothing new under the sun." (geh, I wonder why?)
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"The real problem is poverty."
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"No-one is saying that children doesn't need phonics instruction"
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"Whole Language is a philosophy, not a practice."
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"Whole Language will not work if we don't address class size."
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"If we put a good teacher with eighteen kids and give them time and space to do what they need to do, then all of these things will be successful."
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"Sold a Story is angry that people making money while making money for this journalist."
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"The market economy of the US depends on poverty to thrive, thus market forces will never overcome poverty."
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"Social reform must precede or at least be concurrent to in-school reform, while both must seek equity, not accountability."
Anyway, thought it would be good to have some contrast. It's hard not to snark though. I can see how the argument that teachers should be autonomous and free from commercial influence from publishers, big standardized tests and political silver bullets can be convincing to some, but it's so far away from how I see the world. In my world, lack of competition or accountability will cause stagnation and rot, and idealism isn't enough to prevent this.
starless_sea
1yr ago
That might have been Putins plan at the outset, but then (Wikipedia):
Scholz suspended certification of Nord Stream 2 on 22 February 2022 in consequence of Russia's recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk republics and the deployment of troops in territory held by the DPR and LPR.[40]
Now, the Germans might theoretically have realized that it was pretty weird that they were still buying gas but not approving this specific pipeline, but in practice, it seems very unlikely that that Nord Stream 2 would ever deliver gas while the war was ongoing. E.g. this Metaculus question goes down to 5% after Sholz announcement: https://www.metaculus.com/questions/5170/nord-stream-2-be-completed-before-2025/
starless_sea
1yr ago
https://twitter.com/BadBalticTakes/status/1623606025071783936?s=20&t=PXShQfsqToxfHV3qYYjzkg
Hersh himself acknowledges how the pipeline would be politically unviable during Russia’s full scale war. That means the continued existence of the pipeline is far more valuable only to someone who could replace Putin and change the course he wants Russia totally committed to. Putin’s top priority is remaining in power at all cost. He would sacrifice an incentive to replace him & end war.
starless_sea
1yr ago
"Russia" is not a monolith. There are plenty of Russians, some quite powerful, with lots to gain from destroying the pipeline.
Example from the study: 78% of men and 59% of women know that oil, natural gas and coal are examples of fossil fuels. If the YouTube videos above reflected this, they would have twice as many stupid answers from women than from men. They have about x3 as many women as men (quick check, it seems like more since the women gets more air time). But the disparity would increase as the questions gets easier, and the questions do seem easier than this, so maybe they do reflect a fair sample. I still think these kind of YouTube videos are full of bias and make bad models unless they seem really trustworthy in their methodology (which the linked ones don't).
For example: https://youtube.com/watch?v=g2oMv93EUpY or https://youtube.com/watch?v=Ufmcubp2szg or https://youtube.com/watch?v=wu7RXlIEbog
Eagle eyed viewers may notice that white men are not prominent in these clips, there's obviously a cherrypicking process where the people who answer correctly aren't included.
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It's common for youtubers to hire actors to give scripted answers in man-on-the-street skits, especially in skits were young, attractive women gets "humiliated". Seems like a certain demographic really likes this. So first I would like to verify that these are real people.
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Second, we don't know what the prep is like before the camera starts. "Hi, we're from YouTube, we are going to ask some questions, please give us your craziest funniest random answer!". So are these real answers that reflect the knowledge of the person asked?
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Third, it seems likely that the creator of these videos cherrypicked young women to interview since that's what gets the views (the right-wing audience who watches this right-wing YouTube channel doesn't want to see Bob the Redneck look clueless, they want black and Hispanic women draped in pride flags).
So I don't think these videos show anything without a lot of additional context. These videos are not scientific. They are made for entertainment, and the algorithm is strong. The "obvious cherrypicking" you notice is likely an editorial choice.
starless_sea
1yr ago
To anyone who has discussed the issue with pro-Putin people.
Why do people support Russia fighting against Ukraine, with a strange militaristic fervor, instead of supporting ending the war by bringing the troops home?
Some points:
-the war is severely impoverishing Russia due to sanctions
-the war is destroying Russia ( population + infrastructures / institutions)
-continuing the war increases the chances of a world war
Is it cheering for the possible destruction of Ukraine?
Something to do with the current leadership of Ukraine, pro-LGBTQ, "western values"?
Notion that 'if we don't stop NATO expansion now they will never stop no matter what'? Is it something about broadly standing up against NATO expansion of one state vs another, supporting the 'underdog'?
The issue with that one is that Russia has nuclear weapons and NATO expansions doesn't change the MAD calculus.
Sending another 100k Russians to the meatgrinder for that end seems a little bit harsh coming from people with very little skin in the game.
Just signaling what they are told is the correct opinion?
Is it about saving face, sunk cost at this point?
What would be the best case scenario for a Russia/Alt-right victory?
To my understanding, Zelensky is not the most radical or dangerous politician in Ukraine, and an Russian occupation of Ukraine would cause similar problems to the US occupation of Iraq. Ukrainians for example would not appear very Russia-friendly once 'liberated' by Russia.
Not only that, but economic crisis in Russia could generate additional security risks.
starless_sea
1yr ago
Thanks for your take. I think you're mostly right. I'm still confused by the social rank of some of the revolutionaries, but I just need to lower my opinion of people in general.
starless_sea
1yr ago
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So "larp" is colloquial and sloppy. With things like these, that seem to have little chance of success and members that are quite detached from reality, it's often inferred that the reason these guys are loading up on guns and talking about coups is not that they actually want to do a coup, but instead more that they want to be the kind of person who does a coup. Hence the "larp". I guess there's danger in psycho-analysing people through the news though. Still, I would imagine that ex-special forces guys know a thing or two about coups and wouldn't plan something that's obviously doomed to fail. But maybe I'm just overestimating the jarheads.
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Seems like the likely scenario.
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I guess I just assume people are rational and intelligent and that people with strong political convictions take reasonable steps to reach their political goals. I just need to downgrade that prior, when I read it aloud I myself realize it's stupid.
starless_sea
1yr ago
I was gesturing at the exit idea. Updated post to clarify.
So what about the German right-wing conspiracy that got busted? On one hand, they seem pretty crazy with conspiracy theories and actually believing that the German people would support a coup. On the other hand, they don't seem like random nobodies but the kind of people you would want on your coup if you were to do a coup.
Link to news story: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63885028
Some random thoughts:
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Was this conspiracy realistic? Or was it just a big larp? (Are all coups big larps?)
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How strong were the Russian connections? Are the arrests a blow to Putin?
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Why do the conspiracy thing when you can just do normal politics in AfD and actually get power the true and tried way [insert reference to well-known, democratically successful German right wing leader]. Or if you insist on conspiracy, you can at least march trough the institutions, it seems like the better option? And if you really need power nownow, why not just take the exit option (e.g. move to Russia and make your own auth-right comune there?)?
I'd be happy for someone who has an actual take or an interesting perspective on this to create their own top level thread.
Economy+politics 101 question for someone who knows: Let's say that the central bank of country A raises the interest rate a little bit. Which groups gain and which groups loses from this? What if the reverse happens and the central bank lowers the interest rate, are the winners and losers reversed as well then? It seems self-evident that people with lots of loans and few assets (e.g. new families with unpaid student loans who just took on another loan to buy an expensive home) would lose from higher interest rates, is that correct? What's a fuller picture of the interest rate special-interest groups?
Let's say I'm a young professional with a good wage, some minor investments and no major loans. For purely selfish reasons, should I want interest rates to go up or down?
(Much of the media discussion about monetary policy centers on what's "good for the economy", I think we should discuss the redistributive effects more. Does that make sense?)
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