Nice! I haven't tried Merlin, but I been meaning to set it up in the yard.
I've been using Seek on my phone, which is part of inatural. Similar thing, but pictures and most life, not just birds. That is totally Pokemon for non-pokemon peeps.. gotta bust out my phone every time I find something I haven't 'caught' yet.
So instead of reverse engineering.. an llm/agent/whatever could simply produce custom apps for everyone, simply implementing the features an individual might want. A more viable path?
Look into something like flexwatt tape. Maybe run it during the day when your not sleeping. In my mind, they probably use something similar inside heated blankets with some kind of limiter/thermostat.
Do your research though!! I'm not sure if flexwatt tape could ignite your mattress, but you would definitely want to know for sure yourself beforehand!
There are ways to control heat though; I'm familiar with using flexwatt tape with reptile enclosures, hooked up to a thermostat with a probe in the habitat for temp control. Maybe some math, like desired_temp = watts_supplied * feet_of_fw_tape, where the watts_supplied is the independent variable you adjust based on the required feet_of_fw_tape for your mattress to get the dependent variable desired_temp. Probably include a fail safe, but I'm no electrician, proceed at your own risk.
They do sell self contained fire extinguishers you can hang on your ceiling that deploy automatically at a certain temperature, ideally putting out fire sources they are hung above. Nice to have around for things like this.
I do agree that changing policy is a separate, yet complimentary, step. But maybe the poor are disproportionately audited because the IRS doesn't have the funding to effectively target the rich and succeed? Maybe with better funding, they could successfully extract more tax dollars from the rich, incearsing the ROI of funding the agency?
I don't think further funding the agency is a completely nutty idea. Although if you truly believe the agency is broken, and that being broken isn't related to their funding, then I could understand your perspective. I lean more towards the idea that at least some, maybe even most, of the issues they have might be due to a lack of funding. That makes more sense to me than most of the criticisms I've heard of the IRS, which seem to mostly be on partisan idealism framed as otherwise.
Yeah. My favorite professor this semester constantly says "hey, if you rely to much on the robot, and can't do this yourself, you won't get a job." I know some people are just here for the paper, but that makes me feel better when I'm having a hard time finding a new role..
I feel the same way about monetizing my api reverse engineering skills. I taught myself to program by reverse engineering api's, and it's what led me to pursue computer science. I'm pretty good at it, but I can't seem to find a role to flex my skills.
This is one big point I've subscribed to, I'd rather write the code and understand it that way, than read and try to understand code I did not write.
Also, I think it would be faster to write my own than try to fully understand others (LLM) code. I have developed my own ways of ensuring certain aspects of the code, like security, organization, and speed. Trying to knead out how those things are addressed in code I didn't write takes me longer.
Yeah, as a cs student, some professors allow use of LLM's because it is what will be a part of the job going forward. I get that, and I use them for learning, as opposed to internet searches, but I still manually write my code and fully understand it, cause I don't wanna miss out on those lessons. Otherwise I might not be able to verify an LLM's output.
I get it, but had to move away from paper.. the simple fact that you cannot move stuff around without erasing stuff leads to disjointed notes.
For when I need to write by hand, I moved to a reMarkable digital tablet. For notes, I've been experimenting with obsidian/logseq, and it's been going good. For task management , I gotta recommend Super Productivity, it's just fantastic.
I just couldn't live the sticky note life anymore...
I've been using Seek on my phone, which is part of inatural. Similar thing, but pictures and most life, not just birds. That is totally Pokemon for non-pokemon peeps.. gotta bust out my phone every time I find something I haven't 'caught' yet.