HNHacker News
TopNewBestAskShowJobs

elil17

7,812 karma · joined July 25, 2016

submissionscomments
elil17··on A robot I didn't expect to build
I'm not asking "why add legs ever." I get that there are situations where you'd want a robot to have legs, and you might even put legs on many robots just to handle those situations.

The question is why legs now - when the top half of the robot still can't complete most basic tasks.

elil17··on A robot I didn't expect to build
Or that they needed to show people that they were making progress
elil17··on A robot I didn't expect to build
No, I understand. But if you have a pair of arms and hands that can't do that long tail, why add the legs? Especially when you know others have already gotten legs to work, but no one has made a robot that can just do any task in arms reach.
elil17··on The Robot I Didn't Expect to Build
I don't think anyone is having trouble making a robot walk. They've been very good at that for several years now. It's doing other stuff that's hard.
elil17··on A robot I didn't expect to build
I once again wonder why companies are building bipedal robots. Is it just for show?

If you want to build a general purpose industrial robot, surely a wheeled base with arms/hands is a better starting point. Cheaper, much easier to increase payload weight, and no risk of having it fall over onto someone.

If you want to build something which can navigate general terrain, then surely a robot dog is a better solution.

90% of use cases don't need both, and once you've solved building a general purpose industrial robot I promise you won't have trouble finding funding to add legs to it.

elil17··on AfD Leak: What 421,179 Hacked Emails Show about the German Far Right
I assumed that what you wrote was intended to be relevant to the thread, and that you meant to imply that if you're calling AfD Nazis than you might as well be calling everyone Nazis (I disagree with this because the AfD are actually fascists).

If you literally just meant to say that the Nazi label shouldn't be applied indiscriminately, without commenting on whether you think it should be applied to AfD, then of course I can't argue against that statement.

elil17··on AfD Leak: What 421,179 Hacked Emails Show about the German Far Right
My thoughts: Far right doesn't just mean "bad" or "likes human rights violations." It's a specific modern political movement, one which is contiguous with the actual Nazi party and parties who were sympathetic to the Nazis prior to and during WW2.
elil17··on AfD Leak: What 421,179 Hacked Emails Show about the German Far Right
Just because you don't like the fact that someone is being called a Nazi does not mean that they aren't a Nazi.
elil17··on AfD Leak: What 421,179 Hacked Emails Show about the German Far Right
As we all know, any popular political party in Germany can never turn out to be literal facists
elil17··on The insider trading you're allowed to do
How many people think this way, jump ship, and end up being wrong?
elil17··on Delta’s Biscoff cookies were supposed to be temporary
It's not physically possible for the smell of peanuts to cause any kind of allergic reaction, as explained by the link above. That doesn't mean that the feeling you're getting isn't real, but it's caused by the (rightful) fear that you have about peanuts.
elil17··on Delta’s Biscoff cookies were supposed to be temporary
Is that risk really any different from anywhere else in society? Yes, if you have a truly severe peanut allergy, you may have to wipe down every surface you touch. Being on an airplane vs. anywhere else doesn't change that.
elil17··on Delta’s Biscoff cookies were supposed to be temporary
Even sweetened peanut butter like Jif is pretty healthy. It's something like 90% peanut butter, 9% sugar, and 1% other oils. Total composition is like 50% fat, 20% protein, 10% fiber, and 10% sugar.

Biscoff spread is more like 40% fat, 35% sugar, and 20% other carbs. No protein or fiber.

elil17··on Delta’s Biscoff cookies were supposed to be temporary
I mean, a hoagie is a broodje, just the bread is not as good. The quality difference in mayonnaise outside of Belgium insane too.
elil17··on Delta’s Biscoff cookies were supposed to be temporary
Dog food is probably particularly prone to creating particles that she could breath because it is essentially pellets of powder
elil17··on Tesla Roadster
BYD has made the more practical cousin of this, and you can actually buy it. They have a car which jumps over potholes automatically: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIKAn8yDkpA
elil17··on Improper redaction reveals Google Data Center water and electricity usage
> minus water evaporated from leafs

They varies wildly between different crops. Ideally, farmers in drought prone regions should be choosing crops that don't just dump all the water into the atmosphere (but current economic incentives/excessively cheap industrial water mean this is not happening).

Also, a lot of water evaporates from the soil before it ever gets sucked up by the plants.

elil17··on Anthropic reported diary entry to police, woman faces felony charge
I suppose since Anthropic's T&Cs allow them to have a person read your chats, that makes it violate the law. Of course, if Anthropic didn't have that in their T&Cs, it wouldn't have been illegal to write.
elil17··on NASA asked several former SR-71A staffers to help secret restart
The SR-71 wasn't randomly retired, though. The tactical need to go really fast at a high altitude disappeared because you can now get the same intel from satellites and stealth aircraft. The real question is why do you suddenly need that capability again?
elil17··on The darker side of being a doctor
>The average med school debt is half that and only 30% of borrowers end up owning $300k or more.

Right, because they are paying for it out of pocket

elil17··on What California is learning from solar panels built over irrigation canals
> My state has tried this (very low sentences, often just a few days in jail, if that) and it doesn’t help the repeat offender rate

Doesn't do anything unless you also get consistent about catching people

>Likewise, virtually everyone poor has access to mental health services, healthcare in general, addiction help and so on.

Really? If so, that's amazing. What state in the US has actually given all people access to mental health services and addiction help.

> Reprioritising enforcement for drugs hasn’t helped either. It just means fentanyl is everywhere.

Fentanyl is a thing because strict enforcement necessitates drugs that are more compact/easier to hide. Many other countries still have heroine.

>As far as “make police enforce visible plates” - that simply leads to more high conflict situations where the person they pull over is going to run; do you want more police chases ending in a violent arrest?

I would suggest focusing on impounding vehicles rather than chasing people.

elil17··on The darker side of being a doctor
You get the same problems in the US with the attitudes of doctors.

In the US, medical school is extremely expensive (like $400,000 expensive). There are many people who are excellent doctors who are just priced out of the profession. If we could make medical school less expensive (by subsidizing it and by reducing the amount of instruction), we would probably get many more excellent doctors.

elil17··on What California is learning from solar panels built over irrigation canals
My thoughts:

- Harsh prosecution and punishment of corruption and white collar crimes, combined with publicity around these efforts. How can you expect someone to respect the law if they routinely see those in power over them (the police, their employer, their senator, etc.) get away with criminal activity?

- After setting up safeguards to enforce privacy protections, vastly increase the use of camera-based traffic enforcement. For example, create separate traffic enforcement agencies so that police don't have access to camera data. Use trajectcontroles (Dutch word for a system where multiple cameras on highway entrances/exits track your license plate and ensure your average speed was below the limit), cameras that detect texting while driving (pioneered by the UK), microphone-linked cameras in residential areas that detect modified exhausts (pioneered by Taiwan), and HOV-lane enforcement cameras. Keep traffic officers focused on ensuring that everyone has a valid/viewable license plate. The result should be a system where committing small traffic violations is not normalized.

- Reduce the punishments for most crimes. Large punishments are cruel, expensive to dole out, and less effective than consistent enforcement + small punishments.

- Set high expectations for police officers and create a culture of accountability. Fire those who are playing on their phones and arrest those who are committing crimes. You probably need independent oversight agencies to be able to do this.

- Make police highly visible - bright yellow high-vis vests and cars (pioneered by Antwerp) ensure that police are there to deter crime rather than hide and catch it.

- Provide actual public services so that people have a chance to succeed. A variety of unpleasant behaviors (e.g. public defecation, being disruptive/yelling in public, public drug use/intoxication) are things that no one wants to do - they are driven by a lack of, for example, homeless services, mental health services, and drug treatment services.

- Reprioritize enforcement (looking at you, drug task forces). Expand the legal definition of entrapment and stop doing so many B.S. sting operations.

elil17··on Singapore’s National Library Board offers micropayments to build reading habits
Surely the reasonable metric is per year rather than per lifetime given that adult immigrants don't use education and childhood services.
elil17··on US Military had close call after using AI for hallucinated intelligence report
Well said
elil17··on US Military had close call after using AI for hallucinated intelligence report
Was WMD "hallucinated" or a lie?
elil17··on ER visits for gambling disorders doubled after expanded online gambling market
If all you're saying is that it needs the right legislation/thoughtful legislation and not just a blanket ban, then I guess I agree. The base of this thread was someone saying that all gambling should be state owned, which seems like a reasonable thing to me.
elil17··on Waymo in Singapore
Because privately owned vehicles kill literally one million people every year.
elil17··on ER visits for gambling disorders doubled after expanded online gambling market
Why wouldn't it be addressed with legislation? What is legislation for if not to solve societal issues?

Also, gambling is empirically much more addictive and leads to worse outcomes than extreme sports - hence why many feel it needs to be limited.

elil17··on Introducing System One Models and Jev
What we would want to see if a confidence value that is in line with the actual correctness. If the value is 0.9 for 1000 different answers, then approximately 900 of those answers should be correct.
Page 1 of 34Next →