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arikrak

1,250 karma · joined June 7, 2011

Created Learneroo.com for learning programming, software engineer at Google.
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arikrak··on Turning a dumb AC unit smart (without losing my security deposit)
Portable ACs are generally less efficient than regular window ACs and PTAC units since the compressor is inside the room.
arikrak··on Turning a dumb AC unit smart (without losing my security deposit)
Another option would be to install a smart timer in the outlet. However, you need to ensure that the heat won't automatically go on when the device is turned off, and sometimes the outlets are non-standard formats.
arikrak··on Self-Portrait by Ernst Mach (1886)
This drawing influenced Douglas Harding in developing "The Headless Way", a recognition that in immediate experience there is no head or self (and influential on Sam Harris).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Harding#%22Headlessnes...

arikrak··on History LLMs: Models trained exclusively on pre-1913 texts
I wouldn't have expected there to be enough text from before 1913 to properly train a model, it seemed like they needed an internet of text to train the first successful LLMs?
arikrak··on The deadline isn't when AI outsmarts us – it's when we stop using our own minds
I recently wrote a short post on something similar: while AI is able to solve increasingly longer tasks, people's attention spans are getting shorter. https://www.zappable.com/p/ai-vs-human-attention-spans

Hopefully people can learn to use AI to help them, while still thinking on their own. It's not like that many of the assignments in school were that useful anyways...

arikrak··on No Silver Bullet: Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering (1986) [pdf]
Before advanced AI, "essential complexity" was a bottleneck and Brooks was right that there couldn't be continuous exponential gains in software productivity. However advanced AI will handle essential complexity as well, which can end up making it 10x or 100x faster to develop software. We still need humans currently, but there's no area that one can point to and say we'll always need people for this aspect of software development. The latest coding agents are already reasoning with requirements before they write code, and they will only improve...
arikrak··on Mozilla to shut down Pocket and Fakespot
I've used Pocket from back when they were called "Read it later" and have saved just shy of 30k articles. They've gotten worse recently, but when I tried other apps (instapaper, getmatter, raindrop, paperspan, omnivore) they all had their own issues. Now I have to give those apps another try...
arikrak··on The emoji problem (2022)
Here's gemini https://g.co/gemini/share/ab287b25648f

I also asked Chat GPT o3 and it thought for 11.5 minutes! https://chatgpt.com/share/682d0993-db4c-8004-a66c-3908ef7203...

arikrak··on The 70% problem: Hard truths about AI-assisted coding
AI is a potential silver bullet since it can address the "essential complexity" that Fred Books said regular programming improvements couldn't address. It may not yet have caused an "order of magnitude" improvement in overall software development but it has caused that improvement in certain areas, and that will spread over time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Silver_Bullet

arikrak··on ChatGPT now on chat.com
Clicking the link opens the Ticketmaster app on my phone.
arikrak··on A chemist explains the chemistry behind decaf coffee
They use higher-caffeine beans for decaf coffee - Robusta instead of Arabica. Robusta beans aren't considered as good so they're cheaper, and they sell the caffeine they extract to e.g. soda companies.
arikrak··on Show HN: A simple ChatGPT prompt builder
ChatGPT already does that when you create a custom GPT. If you don't connect it to an external text or service that's basically all custom GPTs are.
arikrak··on LLM Visualization
This looks pretty cool! Anyone know of visualizations for simpler neural networks? I'm aware of tensorflow playground but that's just for a toy example, is there anything for visualizing a real example (e.g handwriting recognition)?
arikrak··on Conversational AI is a great tool for education
This is certainly true and there will be many ways to improve on the default chatGPT experience to provide a full tutor / educational experience. Wonder who's working in this space (besides Khanmigo)?
arikrak··on NotebookLM: An AI Notebook
+1. It's labeled as an experiment, of course it might shut down.
arikrak··on Ask HN: Could you share your personal blog here?
Had a few blogs before, started one recently on AI: https://ageofai.substack.com/

* Overview of ML: https://ageofai.substack.com/p/how-does-machine-learning-wor...

* On AI & writing - https://ageofai.substack.com/p/writing-originality-and-ai

* Today's post on chess: https://ageofai.substack.com/p/playing-chess-llms-and-actual... ---

arikrak··on Deep sleep may be the best defense against Alzheimer’s
Very interesting! I generally avoid coffee after the morning since I know I'm sensitive to it, but your link points to the specific gene I have that causes it. I wonder if I should reduce my caffeine intake even in the morning. Is there a good way to find out other relevant genes without uploading my 23andMe data to unknown websites?
arikrak··on Looking for the best Chess960 starting position
There are some configurations where it's easy for black to blunder early on, I'm surprised they don't show white having an advantage. For example, sometimes there's an immediate diagonal threat from the queen or bishop. It could be that at the beginner level, white misses the attack and and the more advanced level black defends properly.
arikrak··on Where does ChatGPT fall on the political compass?
This article is from Dec 13. But by Dec 23 there were already reports that ChatGPT was becoming more moderate: https://mobile.twitter.com/DavidRozado/status/16062492311859...
arikrak··on Mild autumn weather has sent European gas prices plummeting
Run the gas through generators and generate Bitcoin with the extra electricity, then spend it on gas futures?
arikrak··on Awair dropping support for Glow and Awair v1 devices
I've found that it's a large hassle to setup these devices on a new WiFi network, and now it's going to be bricked completely. I wonder if in general it's better to just get dumb LCD devices that don't need to connect to Wifi.
arikrak··on LaMDA is not sentient
Looks like he just told it that it was sentient, didn't really ask it fairly:

> lemoine [edited]: I’m generally assuming that you would like more people at Google to know that you’re sentient. Is that true?

> LaMDA: Absolutely. I want everyone to understand that I am, in fact, a person.

arikrak··on EpubPress, turn web content into ebooks
I sometimes like to read on paper so I've used this to collect articles into an epub and then I can convert it to a PDF for printing. However it would be nice to find a faster solution for collecting articles and removing unnecessary pictures.
arikrak··on Algorithmic bias bounty challenge
What about conspiracy theories that spread through WhatsApp? A lot of the harm of social media is because some people spread harmful things and now it's easier for them to do so.
arikrak··on Show HN: Epub.to – ePub to pdf, mobi, Kindle, and an API
I would be interested in a tool that converts a list of html files into a single pdf, with consistent formatting.
arikrak··on Human-like neural network chess engine trained on lichess games
This is very cool. I think this could be extended to create a program that finds the best practical moves for a given level of play. Instead of just predicting the most likely human move, it could suggest the current move with the best "expected value" based on likely future human moves from both sides.

As an example, let's say there's a position where the best technical move will lead to a tiny edge with perfect play. Current programs like Stockfish and Alpha Zero will recommend that move. It would be better to instead recommend the move with a strong attack that will lead to a large advantage 95% of the time, even if it will lead to no advantage with perfect play. It seems one could extend Maia Chess to develop such a program.

arikrak··on Amazon disallows pointing out paid reviews
It seems many categories on Amazon are overwhelmed by low quality products and unreliable reviews. I'm surprised Amazon hasn't done more to counter this, as it affects the trust people have in the site. For example, Amazon could check some actual packages to make sure the products are not paying for reviews.
arikrak··on Isaac Newton’s attempts to unlock secret code of pyramids
Once reason it was initially locked away was that it contained heresies, e.g. he denied the Christian Trinity. After that people forgot about it, it's hard to go through so many papers...
arikrak··on Human Ageing Reversed in ‘Holy Grail’ Study, Scientists Say
Sorry, that was a different study that they cite: "Cognitive enhancement of healthy older adults using hyperbaric oxygen: a randomized controlled trial" https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32589613/
arikrak··on Human Ageing Reversed in ‘Holy Grail’ Study, Scientists Say
The main outcome of the study was to measure an in improvement in cognition: https://www.aging-us.com/article/202188/text
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