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It's the nature of hobbies: the journey is important. Why dance, or play piano when there are people who can do it much better, and we can make machines to do it even better? Why people go fishing? Once you start questioning the reason why we do things almost everything is meaningless.

Solving Rubic's is enjoyable because the next time you break your own record is unpredictable. It's similar to gambling in one aspect and to playing 2048 in another: as you play more, the time between your "win"s increases, but so does your ability to focus, and push forward without success.

Which is why I can’t understand why people still put so much effort into it. It’s one of those things humans will never do better than a machine.

I can do Rubik's Cube. I can never beat a machine or many of the other people who can do it. It does not stop me enjoying the combination of memory and muscle memory and the satisfaction of the completed cube.

There are many things for which I will never reach a global maximum, but the maximums I do reach please me.

People won't beat robots at solving Rubik's cubes, but it doesn't make it a dead end. The idea is for humans to solve cubes with the constraints of the human body and mind. Optimizing movement for human hands, finding the most efficient algorithm considering the limited processing power of the human brain, etc... these are open questions and we didn't reach the limits.

Kind of like chess. Humans have no chance against computers. But it doesn't mean people stopped playing chess, quite the opposite actually, and computers are put to good use for training and analysis and human chess is improving probably like never before.

You can call human cubing and chess an "art" if you will, the way you spin the cube and move the chess pieces have some "soul". From a purely utilitarian perspective, both traditional arts and activities like solving cubes are useless, so they are also similar in that regard.

Like any game or sport, millions of people do it for a variety of reasons:

- The act itself is fun - Competing with others can be fun - Improving oneself in a measurable way is satisfying

Many people like doing what they are good at, and not everyone is good at art.

It’s for personal satisfaction. At some point, you can’t physically move the cube any faster, but rather you learn new algorithm to save the steps.

For example, you could solve the final layer by repeating 3 algorithms. Or you could learn about 100 algorithms for 100 permutations. At higher level, you would know that using A algorithm would be faster than B because the one next to it is easier to perform.

You could look in blind cube where you look at the cube, memorize it then solve it while blindfolded.

What type of activity will humans always be able to do better than machines?

Asking for a friend ...

Any action that requires the experience of humanity, I’d guess. I’ll leave it up as an exercise to the reader what sorts of activities that entails.

Vibes already doing good job ...

Getting creative inspiration when abusing substances and becoming wealthy from it.

Justifying anything by bending logic and doing mental gynmastics.

> Justifying anything by bending logic and doing mental gynmastics.

Well ., LLM already doing that. Try arguing LLMs that they are wrong on their hallucinations .

You are right. My apologies.

Building algorithmic trading models. Because the reflexivity of the markets.

Having fun, I think once machines get to the point they do things just for leisure, well that might actually be interesting.

Looking after children. If that is ever solved then it'll be time for the Matrix.

"Better" depends heavily on the parents.

Destroying themselves. (irrational behavior) /s

Converting pizzas into energy.

> It’s one of those things humans will never do better than a machine.

I think it's important to note that humans still arguably do better in this case. The robot seems fast, but it cheats compared to a human. It sees all four sides at once, and the timing does not include picking up the cube or setting it down.

I will be impressed when we have a robot that can pick up a cube, look at it with two cameras from the same direction, solve it, and put it back down in under ~3 seconds (which is the record for a human). I doubt very much we are there yet.

> It sees all four sides at once [...]

In human cubing competitions, humans have a few seconds to look at the cube before the timer starts.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/LL8pN96MHZs

I feel like I'm responding to the most clueless and ridiculous HN comment ever, but I assume it's because it's fun to improve your skills and also to compete with other humans. Do you not have a concept of this?

I'm sorry for the snark, but your comment is extremely sad to me. It's shocking how much digital ink is spilled on HN explaining really simple human feelings to people who pretend that they don't understand them. Comments like yours are among the worst things about this place.

I'd assume HN has a large percentage of neurodiverse people.

I didn't want to say it but yes, it feels like a large amount of the discourse I see on here is just people explaining things that are really obvious to me as a neurotypical person to people who seem to be autistic. I understand it's not really fair for me to complain about that, but it's naturally quite tiring to see constant explanations about the basic aspects of most humans.

I'd imagine you don't find the same in the world outside HN, so it probably evens out.

I welcome snark if it means engagement in the question: what “skills” are you advancing here? The skill to be able to solve a Rubik’s cube? Why?! Honestly: why.

I already said: because it's fun to improve your skills and also to compete with other humans. Rubik's cube is just one possible way to do this. Chess is another. Counter Strike is another. Running fast is another. Etc. etc.

Also: competeting with other humans is also a form of socialization. And most humans like that.

Same reason people climb Mt. Everest.

Why? Because the mountain is there. And it's a challenge.

Do you do anything for fun?

I mean it's better then "Ask HN: how to grind leetcode to get a FAANG job with TC over $400k, I want a million in the bank by age 25 latest?".

People do it because they like to, for reasons entirely up to them. Maybe they find it interesting. Maybe it’s therapeutic. Maybe it gives them a social opportunity. Maybe it’s fun to push your own limits, for its own sake. None of that is stupid or pointless.

If someone started looking at me do my hobby with my friends and decide I was a failure, that’s their perspective. But I think the response the kids give to that these days is “touch grass.”

> What’s the point of training to run faster?

Before my knee decided it wanted no part of my existence, my goal was to have all my "distance"[1] times within 200% of the world record. Seemed doable with some work (had some within, some just outside, others a way off.)

[1] 800m to 100k

If only someone had run a greyhound next to the runners in the Olympic games in ancient Greece. That would have killed it off fairly quickly and we could watch rubiks cube solvers instead of pointless track events this August.

The rubiks cube solvers are so fast there isn't anything to watch!

You must be fun at parties...

Some people do stuff just because it's fun, not to be the best of the best. If you only do something to be the best, why do anything at all?

> If you only do something to be the best, why do anything at all?

To be the best, I'd presume.

Some things don’t have a “best”. They have subjective evaluation where there really isn’t a “best”, just some general sense of “good” but nothing definitive in the category of #1.

However, you cannot beat a robot in Rubik’s cube solving and you cannot run so fast that time itself stops. So what are you doing.

Running faster than previously? The squishy meat blob that controls my body releases feel good chemicals when I do "better" than previously. Who the fuck cares about what other people are capable of?

anything worth doing is worth doing poorly

I think you are missing the point. People do stuff because they enjoy doing it. The fact that they enjoy doing stuff you don't is their business, and frankly it would be a boring world if we all liked the same things.

I’m not asking as a criticism. I’m asking from the standpoint of “what’s the end goal?” What does a person hope to achieve?

You said they enjoy doing it. But I have a hard time imagining someone laboriously perfecting something (but never actually doing so) as an enjoyable activity. In fact, it sounds like hell to me.

Really?? That sounds like hell to you? Well, to others that is the definition of a great and fulfilling life. In fact, you should see what happens when someone reaches the point they can no longer improve, where they finally do become the best. Then they often sink into depression and lose a sense of direction and purpose.

Constantly striving towards further and further unattainable goals (even if it's just after finishing one project having a further one to do and etc. etc. etc.) is basically the most fulfilling life possible for a human. It's a major reason people are often much less depressed when they are busy with their work or studies.

According to your logic, people who are deep in their working lives should be experiencing hell, while retired people should be extremely happy. Do you actually think this is true? I mean honestly I have no idea what you think because you're all over this thread demonstrating that you have little to no grasp of basic human psychology