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twoslide

465 karma · joined December 9, 2015

http://2sli.de
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twoslide··on Claude users are mad that Anthropic's new watermarks will catch them using it
Summarising a reddit discussion counts as news nowadays?
twoslide··on Ask HN: What are you working on? (January 2026)
The Rankings Game, a satirical simulation of university management: https://rankingsgame.com/
twoslide··on Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (Nov 2025)
https://rankingsgame.com/ - A strategy game simulating management of a university
twoslide··on A Philosophy Professor's Final Class (2023)
In addition to a touching personal tribute, this article also illustrates the jobs crisis for PhD graduates. Someone who started his career in the 1950s works into his eighties, teaching from hospital, and dies less than a week after retiring. This is not a good model, and a good argument for mandatory retirement ages.
twoslide··on US: Real GDP grows at an annual rate of 5.2% in Q3 vs. 5.0% expected
While this is an important trend, GDP is not the same as wealth. You could have the same reported trends with a static, declining or GDP.
twoslide··on The AI revolution already transforming education
This article has very little that hasn't been said many times before, for example in The Atlantic back in Dec:

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2022/12/chatg...

twoslide··on Show HN: Any text read by AI and delivered as a personal podcast feed
Sorry, it's google's Captcha3 library (it thought you might be a robot). If you have time to try again, I'd be grateful for feedback!
twoslide··on Ask HN: Alternatives to The Economist?
I think others have given good recommendations, but will add the Atlantic and New Yorker.

Also agree that a problem with The Economist is that it is always overtly pushing a particular view of the view world (rooted in a faith in the rationality of markets), which is coupled with fairly strong advice/prescriptions in much of the writing.

twoslide··on Catalytic process with lignin could enable sustainable aviation fuel
I believe it's not actually contrails specifically but rather the effects of releasing exhaust (CO2) at a high altitude (which would happen whether the contrails form or not).
twoslide··on Linode EU-West (London) is out again
Not perfect, but twice in two days is too much! I have other servers on digital ocean that have had no issues, so will probably put all my eggs in that basket!
twoslide··on Linode EU-West (London) is out again
I'm going to be looking to leave in the next couple of months.
twoslide··on Twitter Sues Elon Musk
Most views I've heard are that it is quite impossible to force someone to buy a company, but rather there will be settlement to exit the deal.
twoslide··on The War for Talent (1998)
Since it was written in 1998, competition from FAANG was minimal
twoslide··on An accidental experiment that saved 700 lives
If you read the paper, it is not an accident at all. It was an intentional program where 14% of households fined under ACA received a letter to tell them how to enrol. A little sad the US Govt fined the rest but didn't provide this info to them.
twoslide··on Wuhan market was epicentre of pandemic’s start, studies suggest
Your comment is factully incorrect. The article cites three studies, only one of which (Gao et al) is based in a Chinese institution. The other two have lead authors at University of Arizona [1] and UC San Diego [2].

Note that [1] is specifically titled "The Huanan market was the epicenter of SARS-CoV-2 emergence"

Mischaracterizing the evidence and/or article really doesn't strengthen the "Occam's razor" argument.

[1] https://zenodo.org/record/6299600 [2] https://zenodo.org/record/6291628

twoslide··on Swedish study finds discrimination against men in female-dominated occupations
Education is completely the same: compare teachers to principals or education professors (and within universities, assistant to full professors)
twoslide··on Show HN: Long Range E-Bike
That's not the law in the UK. A throttle electric bike is still an electric bike, as long as it has pedals that can propel it:

https://www.gov.uk/electric-bike-rules

twoslide··on My students never knew’: the lecturer who lived in a tent
In the UK, international fees are deducted from the standard fellowship. While already low, it then becomes a poverty wage. This practice should really be banned, if funding someone the university should do it a livable level.
twoslide··on Small e-scooter: the new mini-scooter even fits in the backpack
Looks great if you live in a world of cast concrete and tiles. I would need some convincing that it could handle the dips/cracks/bumps in UK pavements (sidewalks). The video mentions a suspension system, but it is a vague, and the wheel diameter may pose limits to how much this can accomplish.
twoslide··on PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49
Would you propose a national price cap on transaction charges? It would be hard to justify intervening in this way, given that there is plenty of competition and rates are not very different. Any transaction (even cash) has associated costs.
twoslide··on PayPal raises fees for most domestic transaction types to 3.49% + $0.49
It's a bit of a stretch to equate Paypal with "all American transactions." There are of course Visa/Mastercard (variable but about 2%), debit cards, Venmo, and older bank transfer technologies (ACH).
twoslide··on Death of the Calorie (2019)
You are right that your body can burn muscle as well as fat. However, decreases to energy consumption ("metabolism") are minimal. Our bodies are evolved to use energy efficiently, if it were possible to do everything we do (or even some semblance of it), with far lower energy consumption, we'd already be doing it.

A good analogy might be fuel consumption in a car. Some savings can be made through efficient driving techniques, but ultimately there is a core amount of energy needed to transport the car across a given distance.

twoslide··on Death of the Calorie (2019)
A calorie is a measure of energy used, for example there is a direct conversion to kWh. If your body uses more energy than you eat, it must burn fat (weight loss). Our bodies aim to be efficient and won't expel energy, so if you eat more than you burn, you will gain weight. This is true regardless of macronutrient composition.

Calories are therefore at least a necessary consideration in diet and a healthy weight, but calorie consumption alone is by no means a sufficient measure of a healthy diet.

twoslide··on Deaths involving Covid-19 by vaccination status, England
I didn’t say “not enough samples,” only that the population size of fully vaccinated people is not known, and that it changed in the observation period. Therefore, computing mortality rates is not possible, no denominator
twoslide··on Deaths involving Covid-19 by vaccination status, England
I think the age of the vaccinated population is a confounding factor, I am sure vaccination has a big impact on mortality, just hard to say how much.
twoslide··on Deaths involving Covid-19 by vaccination status, England
I'm definitely not saying there are 640 participants, just that the size is unknown. Non-Covid deaths is a poor proxy of the population size, as that population is older because of how the vaccination programme worked. I don't think I'm making an interpretation, just pointing out the unknown
twoslide··on Deaths involving Covid-19 by vaccination status, England
There is a bit of a statistical artifact here: the number of person-days of people with both doses in the UK is very small during this period. Most adults had no doses or one dose for most of this period.

Vaccination is still great and I encourage everyone who can to get vaccinated, but the 640 people is drawing upon a much smaller population and time period.

twoslide··on Effect size is significantly more important than statistical significance
> when you’re on the cusp of a new thing, unless you’re super lucky, the result will necessarily be near the noise floor. Real science is like that.

That's not necessarily true in social sciences. When you're working with large survey datasets, many variables are significantly related. That doesn't mean these relationships are meaningful or causal, they could be due to underlying common causes, etc. (Maybe social sciences weren't included in "real science" - but there's where a lot of stats discussions focus)

twoslide··on World’s Top Beef Supplier Approves Methane-Busting Cow Feed
I don't eat any animal products and still enjoy food immensely. Enjoyment of food is based on circumstance and is relative: I lived in Nepal for a few years and saw farmers enjoy plates of rice and lentils more than most Westerners would enjoy a steak. It is entirely possible to enjoy food without destructive livestock such as cows.
twoslide··on World’s Top Beef Supplier Approves Methane-Busting Cow Feed
55% reduction in methanse is good, but its still a destructive and inefficient way to produce protein. Wish people would give up on beef and look into alternatives.
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