MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by pge | 2025-08-03 22:28:29+00:00
I would add that (having simulated this problem in code myself), the reason you have bad outcomes is that you run out of candidates and take a bad one because you have no choice. In real life, at some point you would grab a decent candidate even if s/he were not as good as a prior passed candidate. It is also true that even under the original assumptions, there is a wide range of thresholds around 1/e that yield a similar outcome.
by deepsun | 2025-08-03 22:29:32+00:00
I agree in particular, but disagree in general. I prefer to live in the world when everything assumes people are just a little less ignorant than they really are. Kind of "aim higher". Otherwise everything becomes "aim lower", and we cannot have nice things.

I particular I agree OpenAI should have a better UX, but also I want to expect people to actually learn what a "URL" is if we want to live in the future. They might just go and learn.
by stevenicr | 2025-08-03 22:29:47+00:00
It really depends on each neighborhood these days from what I have seen.

Parks around here, one is safe during the day with many people, it is divided up in many sections well, and you don't notice the drug dealing and needles until the ratio changes after dark.

Most of the other parks, I'd say a majority of women do not feel comfortable, which leads to less use by women and men, which changes the ratio of people that do go there. Some of the parks have been charging and increasing the fees to try to reverse that.

Libraries are the only real bastion of third space that seems to have a mostly neutral vibe imho. Although the downtown libraries have had to change some of what they allow to try to stave off the changing ratio of unshowered, just as several of the starbucks now have number pads on the bathrooms to access.

Libraries are not the best place for socializing as they normally have a keep it quieter vibe in my experience, but it's still doable to meet someone. The lack of open hours is a real limiting factor. I'd like to open a library that is more like a social club and open 24 hours.

Museums have gotten pretty expensive around here, and I don't see them as a great place to socialize. I imagine it's great to bring a family, but replacing the social connect that malls and bars at once had, not really. I also can't imagine people going to the local museum every friday night.
by k310 | 2025-08-03 22:29:59+00:00
The silence from the US is deafening. The AI fake video of "Trump Gaza" (YT) [0] is playing out as Gaza is being leveled. For what?

He shared it (Snopes) [1] and when he tells you his plans, believe him, TACO or not.

There is no God but money. [2]

The 60's crowd was right.

[0] https://m.youtube.com/shorts/5jl78mv-VWo

[1] https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-gaza-ai-video/

[2] https://emilysquotes.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/capitali...

image at Emily's quotes.
by einarfd | 2025-08-03 22:31:06+00:00
Are you sure that there aren't multiple tiers of rental skies in resorts in the USA? I have friends in the rental business in Norway, and they rent out skies from the kind of beginner friendly skies that would fit your description. To top of the line Stockli and Van Deer kit. I think they keep all of their gear in at least decent shape, with the top gear kept in the best shape, as it makes the most difference for those customers. Btw. haven't rented much in the Alps. But my impression is that you can rent gear for all ability levels there aswell, and that that gear is kept in good shape.
by perching_aix | 2025-08-03 22:31:56+00:00
So let me get this straight:

- sea level is formally referred to as Global Mean Sea Level (GMSL)

- its change is segmented into two subcategories in literature(?), mass-driven (e.g. ice melting?, freshwater runoff?, freshwater water cycle stuff?) and non-mass-driven (e.g. thermal expansion?)

- freshwater loss from land was found to be at present the lead driver of the mass-driven change as per the paper (over what timeframe?)

- title says it's the primary driver for GMSL change overall, which this alone doesn't support (i.e. the title is a lie)

- @ornel (the person posting) points to another study that claims mass-driven change is the leading change, hence the title [0, this doesn't pass my smell test but i see the logic]

- you point out that that's glossing over that that other study is counting from 1900, but if one shrunk the evaluation window, the non-mass-driven causes would be the drivers now [1, this doesn't pass my smell test either, but i see the logic here as well]

The latter point then begs the question though, what is the time window in this case then, and how stable that result is? What would be an "appropriate" time window to choose, and how would one derive that?

Regarding my non-passing smell tests, imagine the following scenario for some event:

- category A: 51% of the total

- cause A1: 26% of the total

- cause A2: 25% of the total

- category B: 49% of the total

- cause B1: 27% of the total

- cause B2: 22% of the total

In this case, category A will be the lead contributor, but individually none of its contributing causes will be, addressing [0]. The causes will be ordered like so instead: B1 > A1 > A2 > B2. More elaborate variations are possible of course. For [1], you can imagine the same scenario just in reverse.

Did I get all this right?
by delusional | 2025-08-03 22:33:12+00:00
There is to my knowledge no vector signifying "truth" and therefore no vector to measure the distance from. You cannot get a "truthiness" measure out of these models, because they don't have the concept of truth. They use "likelyness" as a proxy for "truth".

You could decide that the text is "too unlikely" the problem there is that you'll quickly discover that most human sentences are actually pretty unlikely.
by throwaway883442 | 2025-08-03 22:33:19+00:00
This feels to me that you just don't like people sharing what they've built in general. A lot of these things happen with or without AI.

>The UX I expect as a "hacker" is very different from what ordinary people would expect as clients or end users.

Although this site is called 'Hacker News', it doesn't imply that it is building apps for hackers; I think Show HN can also be about the making of things for non-hackers. This site is run by a VC.

>I can assure you that when my projects are ready to appear in Show HN, my write-ups will read very differently from this formula.

So what is the right way to write about projects? I've thought about writing something up that I'm building and it probably would have been similar to this structure.

This post makes me lean more toward 'why bother' and perhaps the community loses out on things in this way. Or maybe it is good if I don't write it up.
by Telaneo | 2025-08-03 22:33:32+00:00
My thoughts exactly. Great, there's food at home, ready to eat, 6 days a week. Can I eat it though?

I'm sure in an ideal world you could get past that problem by talking and having everybody else compile a mental list of what meals aren't going to be on the menu, but the more realistic outcome for someone like me is the food only being edible for me 1 or maybe 2 days a week, not to mention that I'll probably come of as an knobhead for not liking their food and making my own, and them probably not liking my food when it's my turn to prepare. It's a manageable situation for a couple of days or say a week, especially since everybody else is probably more willing to accommodate if they only have to do it for a short while, but I would never want to deal with that even semi-permanently.
by akudha | 2025-08-03 22:33:49+00:00
Some people are so ideologically opposed to any regulatory intervention

These are people who are ideologically opposed to any regulatory intervention? How can such an extreme position even begin to make sense? This is like letting boxers (or MMA fighters) fight in the ring without a referee, isn't it? As it is, there are lax rules that are getting even more relaxed by the day and even those lax rules aren't enforced consistently, for big businesses and those with money.
by reactordev | 2025-08-03 22:34:13+00:00
I refuse to not experience life because of some social justice reason. I get that they’re polluting but you only live once. I think one trip is fine. Airlines pollute too and yet millions fly everyday. Are we to go back to sailing across ye oceans to lands yonder so as to not harm our planet? It’s not going to happen in this lifetime.

Whether it’s a retreat in the rain forest in Costa Rica or a cruise around the Caribbean for a week. A cabin in Alaska or a yurt in the Norway countryside. Get out there somewhere where you can’t escape your fate. The point is to succumb to the moment, and things become clear. Personally, I like a party. Not a crazy carnival but a sophisticated one - so I went on Norwegian. It was worth it.
by _kyran | 2025-08-03 22:34:27+00:00
There’s a large spectrum between skiing on an uncrowded slope alone, a crowded beginner trail, hucking cliffs and backcountry in avy prone terrain.

I don’t think the risk profile can be all lumped together.

Much in the same way that cycling on the road has a different risk profile to on a bike path vs downhill or freeride mountain biking.
by nilsherzig | 2025-08-03 22:34:49+00:00
So this guy just takes the time and money (I guess that part doesn’t hurt if you’ve got 15 billion) to write a book and produce an excellent video version for a broader audience, just for … what exactly?

According to his Wikipedia his employees are forced to agree to continuous recordings, the NYT claims he does some sort of (i assume perfectly legal) insider trading and just acts like he’s got the perfect system in place, he defended the CCPs actions on multiple accessions and just in general does not seem like the type of guy to provide anything of value for free.

So can someone educate me on the angle? What’s the goal here?

And why would anyone read this and not get the feeling of being scammed. There is no way this guy is in it for the book sales.

Honestly I’m sometimes questioning my sanity while reading the comments of videos like this. There are people acting like he’s a modern Prometheus, sharing the knowledge of financial whatever. I would really be amazed if my cynicism turns out to be wrong on this one.
by quantile12 | 2025-08-03 22:35:11+00:00
(It's late, apologies for a random collection of thoughts)

One key bit of missing information from your post: do you have 1 year, 2 year, 3 years+ savings? And can you deal with the salary hit (you'll very likely get a new job with a much lower salary)?

I quit a few weeks ago – I was being pushed out. It was not fun. I'm still processing how much psychological warfare was really going on and how much I was being gaslit.

I was going to do some travelling but I can't stop looking at my budgeting spreadsheet. But luckily it's summer and where I live is quite nice.

I'm still in recovery mode. Some health issues have already resolved themselves. I've lost ~8 pounds. I'm sleeping better.

What is keeping me sane is that I knew the job, the environment, my colleagues etc was seriously not working and I would have got fired anyway.

Luckily my family can help me out a little bit each month, and I'm thinking of getting a housemate, both of which will reduce my burn rate massively.

I have enjoyed re-evaluating my spending. It was a bit out of control. I was getting fat eating too much expensive food/takeout etc. I'm cooking more.

It feels weird being away from the computer. I feel like I should be learning more AI/interview prep etc. Like every moment not doing that is further damaging my future. Ugh. But I've also massively lost my love for tech. I need to find out if I can rediscover it

I wish I had watched a lot more Jordan Peterson etc a year ago. He touches a lot on having a plan, not just giving up, really contemplating the future, explaining poverty isn't fun, analytically working backwards from your problems etc. It's like the advice my father might have given me if I had one. I think I have mental health issues that affected my work, rather than my job being the sole source of all my mental health issues.

Ultimately it really is trading one set of stresses and issues for another, I feel.
by trod1234 | 2025-08-03 22:35:20+00:00
The willfully blind by themselves are helpless, hopeless people who are incapable of perceiving things which they have at one point chosen not to see.

The lack of reasoning faculties is self-inflicted, as are the consequences that eventually pile up (without them noticing).

This makes them particularly weak people who bring misfortune on others, who are especially prone to delusion, as well as other forms of mental illness (psychopath/schizophrenia-like tendencies).

When they gaslight strangers, because they disagree with what that person is saying, they demonstrate their lack of inherent moral character. Good people don't do this.

There is an old saying, that's understood by many as extremely accurate wisdom: "What a person does in the small things that do not matter is what that person will do every time, in big things that do matter, when everything is on the line."

You communicated far more than you meant to say for the people who can read between the lines.

One can hardly call the circular subjective abuse of the contrast principle, requiring any form of critical thinking capacity (its fallacy). Critical theory while resembling critical thinking are two very different (mutually exclusive) things.
by Vetch | 2025-08-03 22:36:30+00:00
But why isn't this merely papering over a more fundamental issue with how these models are "aligned"? LLMs are, for example, not inherently sycophantic. kimi k2 and o3 are not, and Sydney, mentioned in the blog post, was most decidedly not.

In my experience, the issue of sycophancy has been longest in the Anthropic models, so it might be most deeply rooted for them. It's only recently, perhaps with the introduction of user A/B preference tests such as by lmarena and the providers themselves has this become a major issue for most other LLMs.

Thinking that simple actions like adding an anti-evil vector to the residual stream to improve behavior sounds naively dangerous. It would not surprise me if unexpected and unwanted downstream effects resulted from this; which a future paper will address too. Not unlike what happened with tuning for user preference.
by albumen | 2025-08-03 22:37:42+00:00
I agree on the latter point, but I think it's unfair to say the UN doesn't "do stuff". A lot of the time they partner with govs to deliver the below, but they're frequently the provider of last resort too:

UNHCR (High Commissioner for Refugees): delivers shelter, food, and protection to millions of refugees and internally displaced persons.

• WFP (World Food Programme): feeds over 100 million people annually and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2020.

• UNICEF: runs child vaccination and education programs across the Global South.

• WHO (World Health Organization): leads responses to global health threats (like COVID-19, Ebola, and now mpox and cholera outbreaks).
by Dylan16807 | 2025-08-03 22:38:38+00:00
There's no planned obsolescence for my use case. I've never done enough writes to wear out an SSD. While I might buy an SLC flash drive if it was properly available, for internal drives TLC has barely any downsides. I very rarely get limited to 500MB/s, I need to turn it on sometimes, and I get 2.8x the space. Sounds great.
by 3eb7988a1663 | 2025-08-03 22:38:42+00:00
I am not invested in this particular issue, but the recurring root cause: the organization is completely disconnected from actual users. No accountant would think 12k rows for a corporate level system was acceptable. How do you handle monthly, quarterly, annual reporting? A single POS terminal at Target could process 12 thousands transactions in a month.

Yet, the entire Workday chain of developers, PMs, management - all slapped their seal of approval on the product and pushed it out the door. Compiles? Good Enough.
by margalabargala | 2025-08-03 22:40:16+00:00
> Supporting parties on the right does not make you a nazi.

> Raising your hand does not make you a Nazi.

Fine, sure. Certainly there's a philosophical conversation to be had about what it means for one to be made a nazi by one's actions alone, in 2025.

But that doesn't matter. All that's needed for Elon Musk's behavior to cause problems is for him to do things that make other people think he is a nazi, which is a much lower bar, and one that is met by supporting far right parties and making gestures indistinguishable from nazi salutes.
by FrankWilhoit | 2025-08-03 22:41:38+00:00
...all of which (vile and horrifying in its own right, but not at all original) applies to mass-market products. The market for Palantir is extremely small and the demand -- even, or especially, at the level of a wish-list -- extremely inelastic. I still say, without that demand, no Palantir -- unless Thiel had funded its entire development out of his own pocket. (Perhaps he did; all the sicker.)

Yes, demand can be created; but where it is spontaneous, it is also the only possible target of blame.
by morpheos137 | 2025-08-03 22:41:55+00:00
I absolutely suspect that most adult readers myself included use letters as clues for recognizing the shape of the word. What I dispute is that reading necessarily goes letters->sound recognition->meaning / understanding.

I suspect for myself and many others it goes letters->word shape recognition->understanding ->then last part is sound in my mind's ear.

Infact when I am writing and reading I find myself thinking about the shapes of printed words. I don't even consider what they sound like except maybe in retrospect.

Maybe I am an outlier.

To me it makes logical sense. When I read a word I see the word in my mind's eye (eg m i n d) and hear the word after an after effect.

Printed text is a visual item. Meaning need not have a sound associated with it. It makes sense to go directly from vision to recognition of meaning. I don't need to know what words sound like to understand their meaning. As a kid I took Latin and Ancient greek. Honestly I don't think anyone knows the precise phonetics as they were spoken at the time of these ancient languages and yet that is no impediment to understanding the meaning of word by reading the written word with your eyes. There is no need for phonics in reading. It's based on the misunderstanding that the sound is the unique vehicle of meaning when it need not be.
by quitit | 2025-08-03 22:42:01+00:00
Basically nothing: The angle being taken here seems to be that private or secret information was leaking out onto the web like a security flaw.

However that's clearly not the case as the user was already making the active choice of sharing those secrets or private information with another person. A person who: could copy or screenshot the information, or provide the link to another.

So the situation at hand is that the user was already willing to take on some risk to divulge that information.

This weighs against the arguments that "it's bad UX" and "maybe they don't understand what discoverable or web search means". - Both of which were already flimsy since "Discoverable" is basic comprehension, and we passed the bar for "web search" by knowing what ChatGPT is and how to use it.

There is a line where we need to allow the individual the freedom to have agency over their actions and the responsibility of the consequences of those actions.
by svachalek | 2025-08-03 22:42:54+00:00
Interesting. I once read somewhere that you should date at least... 6? people and leave before it gets too serious, before settling down with anyone. It seemed to imply there was math involved but it didn't explain. I think it must be the same statistics here, with some estimate of how many people you could meet and burn through without getting too old. I think people just don't really work this way but otherwise it makes some sense.
by gnabgib | 2025-08-03 22:43:51+00:00
You're overdoing the submissions of this:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44778084

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44774412

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44772535

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44762643

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44641110

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44640939

> Please don't use HN primarily for promotion. It's ok to post your own stuff part of the time, but the primary use of the site should be for curiosity.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
by simonw | 2025-08-03 22:43:57+00:00
Whoa, I didn't know about this:

# Run with restricted file system access node --experimental-permission \ --allow-fs-read=./data --allow-fs-write=./logs app.js # Network restrictions node --experimental-permission \ --allow-net=api.example.com app.js

Looks like they were inspired by Deno. That's an excellent feature. https://docs.deno.com/runtime/fundamentals/security/#permiss...
by teamweightloss | 2025-08-03 22:44:12+00:00
>Dalio analysis agrees that today China power is rising and the USA is weakening

Ray Dalio knows nothing. US just put tariffs on every other country in the world. And threatened China with 145% tariffs to get them to come to the table and open up Chinese market even more, even though China is in its own Great Depression right now.
by kator | 2025-08-03 22:44:37+00:00
I also added an Appendix "Technical Stack Considerations," but I like the PR and the FAQ's to focus on the customer/end-user's needs. The technical details matter, but they serve the customer outcome, not the other way around.

A recent project's tech appendix had headers like "Core Technology Philosophy", "Backend Architecture", "Frontend Architecture", "Service Architecture", "Infrastructure and Deployment", "Security Architecture", "Performance Requirements", "Configuration Management", "Backup & Disaster Recovery", "Development Workflow", "Network Architecture", "Resource Management", "Development Principles", and "Scalability Considerations".

The beauty is that by the time you get to the technical appendix, you've already validated what you're building and why it matters. The technical choices then flow naturally from the customer requirements rather than driving them.
by perching_aix | 2025-08-03 22:45:21+00:00
> I appreciate the effort in your comment.

Thanks for that! I do wish it wasn't necessary though, but I guess that's just how real life problems go.

> I think upon further reflection my simpler objection is (...)

Right, that's perfectly fine; just got curious and you seemed informed.

Editorializing the titles in general is against the guidelines here anyhow to be fair, I'm expecting it will be updated by the mods eventually: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html