Ilverin · HackerTrans

Ilverin

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há 2 anosdiscuss

Progress isn't inevitable because the government can stop it sometimes. Nuclear power is regulated to be forty times safer than natural gas (the safest natural gas) (the factor of forty is ignoring the additional climate costs), and that's why we don't have abundant nuclear power.

há 2 anosdiscuss

This is the case today for ai chess engines

há 3 anosdiscuss

There are plenty of good scientists and engineers who do psychedelics. If what you say were true, I think at least one of them would have figured out what the sense data is caused by in the environment and have set up a demo such that they can reliably react to a signal sent by a skeptical tester who turns the demo device's power switch off and on, in order to provide evidence to skeptics of their superior perception ability.

há 3 anosdiscuss

Openai employees had extreme leverage because they were (or at least appeared, by the number of signatures on the letter) united. They could just leave for another company (Microsoft or other) where they would not be at all controlled by AI safety people.

Openai investors had only the leverage of "we won't invest more and you're running an operating loss", they did not actually have a case in court. The investment contract they signed stated "view your investment as a donation" and "this investment confers no fiduciary duties from the board".

The board had the leverage of "you employees and investors value your stock holdings, and if the company fails, those stock holdings to to zero".

The resolution I think was (could be wrong) just to initially reduce the size of the board to three. So it isn't completely guaranteed which side won the battle for control: it's not impossible that the AI safety people might still control the board. Maybe one or both of the new board members is secretly convinced by the AI safety movement.

The battle for public opinion is a different battle, and it looks extremely likely that the AI safety people lost that battle. Maybe it was still worth it for them, if they did in fact win or at least stalemate the battle for control of openai.

há 3 anosdiscuss

You may be right, so I edited my comment.

há 3 anosdiscuss

The expansion of the universe is accelerating. At some point, the number of galaxies in the visible universe will stop growing and the light received from distant galaxies will grow more and more redshifted. However, it's possible that the redshifting will accelerate faster than our technological ability to detect more and more redshifted light.

há 3 anosdiscuss

A complication is that the employees who work in the nursing homes are likely to bring covid in if it is spreading in the community and the community is acting normally (eg parties are happening). Not to say that your plan wouldn't be overall better (I'm not sure), but just saying it would likely result in more death.

há 3 anosdiscuss

A)11.36 million acres refers to the land leased for either fuel or non-fuel minerals. So if you wanted to compare the size of the royalties to the annual fees for the land, you would need to figure out what percentage of the land was used for fuel versus non-fuel mining.

B) The $165 is per 20 acres, not per acre. "In FY 2022, the BLM collected a total of almost $94 million in fees associated with nearly 489,100 active mining claims on Federal lands"

há 3 anosdiscuss

The article the commenter linked is almost entirely about debit cards. The bank has to make money somehow to pay for things like fraud and auditing.

há 3 anosdiscuss

Well you need peer reviewed papers in highish impact journals to get tenure. For some people, the only way they're getting that is by cheating.

há 3 anosdiscuss

A) at the time this was written, Scott lived in the Midwest B) Scott worked at a hospital at the time, which selects a bit against those who are creationists. In my opinion, probably 40% of the nurses in such a hospital would be creationist, but maybe Scott disagrees with me about that assessment C) in terms of socialization outside of work, Scott is not an extrovert, so I can imagine arbitrary levels of selection and that it is plausible he did have 0 creationist social acquaintances (maybe the quote is only even talking about his social acquaintances, not his work ones)

há 3 anosdiscuss

That's basic finance. Higher interest rates are about loaners (also known as savers) getting paid more, and borrowers paying that. If you are amassing wealth (rather than amassing debt), then you are a saver and can loan your money to be paid an interest rate. (Note: this is about real interest rates not nominal interest rates)

há 3 anosdiscuss

Altman doesn't have equity in OpenAI, so that's a bit of evidence that he believes ai could be valuable or important to him or humanity even without his gaining value in equity.

há 3 anosdiscuss

llm summary

The article tells the story of how two former spies and enemies, Frederick Russell Burnham and Fritz Duquesne, joined forces to promote the idea of importing hippos from Africa to Louisiana in 1910. Their plan was to solve the Meat Question, a crisis of meat supply and demand in America, and also to get rid of the invasive water hyacinths that were choking the rivers. They had the support of a Louisiana congressman, Robert Broussard, who introduced a bill to fund their project. The article explores the historical context, the personalities, and the motivations of the main characters, as well as the challenges and opposition they faced. It also examines the cultural and ecological implications of their proposal, which was ultimately rejected by Congress.

my question to llm: why did they want to kill each other?

answer: They wanted to kill each other because they were spies on opposite sides of the Second Boer War in South Africa. Burnham was an American who fought for the British Empire, while Duquesne was a Boer who fought for the independence of his people. They had several encounters and attempts to assassinate each other during the war, but none succeeded

há 3 anosdiscuss

The large banks are more heavily regulated. Trump raised the limit at which a bank is called large from 50bil to 250bil. The small banks value their freedom from regulation more than they would value full FDIC coverage. The fed would love to make that trade:more regulation of small banks in exchange for full FDIC coverage for small banks.

Canada is dominated by five enormous banks, they are closely regulated, and Canada has had a better experience than USA with both fewer bank failures and higher real interest rates paid to customers.

há 3 anosdiscuss

It's unreasonable because the large majority of the research has shown it to be wrong, like mentioned in the article.

há 3 anosdiscuss

Stylized example of how the game works:

Bet on every number but 0 on a roulette wheel

Not 0: you and your investors make 3 billion this year

0: you and your investors lose your 20 billion you have invested, and the government bails out your depositors who kept 200 billion with you

This stylized bet is a good deal for the investors and management and bad for the government. Sometimes investors lose everything but it's still a very good bet in expectation. This stylized example is a case of "privatized gains, socialized losses".

Then the question is: was SVB reckless? They could have been less reckless by covering their interest rate exposure, but the fed has an equity to deposits ratio requirement, and getting any equity to invest requires a return. IMO they should have either diversified their business or stopped opening new accounts for tech companies because when depositors are uninsured and concentrated in the same industry, that is risky.

há 3 anosdiscuss

Jupiter has some moons that really do go the "wrong" way: the Carme, Ananke, and Pasiphae groups.

há 3 anosdiscuss

It proposes 100 sites over a 1200 square mile area. Each site would be at least 3 miles away from any other site. Energy generation, except nuclear, either uses a fair bit physical space or causes pollution, and doing energy generation in Yellowstone means other areas of the country don't have to.

há 4 anosdiscuss

Well the bank can't get your future earnings or other assets if you default, but they can get the house. So if the house is worth zero dollars (never true) then you are 5 to 1 leveraged.