MurphyA/hacker-news huggingface dataset:
by aNoob7000 | 2025-09-12 15:13:55+00:00
I had eye surgery three weeks ago. Prior to my eye surgery, I emailed and called my health insurance to get a total out of pocket cost, none could be given. The only thing I heard over and over is your deductible is X.

I spoke to to the eye surgeon's billing department and the same happened. How the F* can it be like this? To top it off, I just got a bill for $300 after paying $1300.

The system is completely broken.
by mindslight | 2025-09-12 15:13:59+00:00
> You can't get freedom through technology

I'd argue the opposite - if Bitcoin had been created with secure private transactions (untraceability) it would be in the same popular position it is today, but the attacks on it (chain analysis etc) would be failing instead of inevitably marching forward.

Your argument seems to rely on an assumption that the insecurity of Bitcoin has been legible and apparent to the [greater] government for most of Bitcoin's life, and so the government allowed it to gain popularity knowing those insecurities would eventually make it succumb to government control. But in general government sees any lack of identification/data as a problem to be rectified, and the popular wisdom for quite some time has been that Bitcoin is "anonymous". so I'd say the government acted as quick as it would have regardless of the actual security properties. It feels like any holding off had more to do with financial lucrativeness rather than an understanding of its long term security flaws.

Now that we're here though, Bitcoin does seem like a very strong inoculation against financial privacy technology. Government is now well aware that software/cryptography can be used for money, and the first question asked is why isn't your new niche system grokkable to chain analysis?
by throw310822 | 2025-09-12 15:14:19+00:00
Are you saying that if we had them, we would have given all our weapons to Ukraine? Lol.

Europe's aid to Ukraine is also limited by the fact that it doesn't want to be seen as an active part in the conflict, so it provides only arms with a limited range and that can be used only defensively. All this of course would not apply if it were attacked directly.
by jamestimmins | 2025-09-12 15:14:41+00:00
I always half-joke that I gave up on my hopes of being a child prodigy when I turned 30.

That was a major milestone not just for realizing that there was no future "grown up" version of me, but also seeing how much time had passed and how little was left. So I accepted that who I am is who I'm going to be, for the most part, and I might as well make the best of it. That opened up a lot of doors for personal interest that I hadn't even noticed previously.

So predictably I started woodworking.
by dtagames | 2025-09-12 15:15:18+00:00
Different cultures use different amounts of politeness and flowery speech. The English standard influenced American style, but it's very different from how people speak to each other in business in Poland, for example.

Like @NitpitckLawyer said, it's the resulting content that matters, not how it's presented. If a person anthropomorphizes an LLM in their mind (rather than just in their speech patterns), then they probably have pre-existing mental problems.

People used to also talk to burning bushes.
by VinegarChicken | 2025-09-12 15:15:27+00:00
I spent too much time looking for files, I had hundreds of duplicates, and it was an atrocious mess... I was going to write a simple script but I decided to take it further and I also wanted convenience because I knew full well I wasn't going to crack open command prompt to run the script every time I wanted to organize it. I wrote this project in rust because rust is the most amazing and sexy language and I will die on that hill. Im very happy with the end result since its very convenient and my files won't be cluttered. Will my computer end up a mess at some point ? Likely, but at least now it only takes a few clicks. This could help someone else so download it here.
by simianwords | 2025-09-12 15:15:37+00:00
My controversial belief is that the barrier to become a doctor is way too high. I think barriers need to be reduced.. I mean think about it - I learned software pretty much by being put into it and forced to learn.

I understand medicine is slightly different but my hunch is that any sufficiently smart person can do well enough as a doctor after 1-2 years of theory.

This might anger a lot of people because there’s a trend where we elevate medicine and doctors to a godly level.

Thankfully with the internet and AI, knowledge is not gatekept as much now.

I wish we allow more people to become doctors and intelligent people to become doctors. The type of people who choose to become doctors are not problem solvers, at least from my experience.

Of course my argument doesn’t work exactly for surgeons but I think we should not artificially reduce their numbers.
by philwelch | 2025-09-12 15:15:42+00:00
> Jesse Owens example is literally one example

He wasn’t even the only black American gold medalist from that day’s track and field competition. Regardless, you made the claim that the term “American” was never used, without qualification, to refer to black people prior to 1945. One or two counterexamples is enough to disprove such a claim.

> I don't think it’s awkward or uncomfortable to emphasize someone’s race.

And I do. That’s part of the disagreement that we’re working through here.

> Tell me what do you think the civil rights issues were/are about? Nah, I’ll tell you: That "american" didn't actually mean all of us on a constitutional/federal/state level and even cultural level.

I already addressed this. Repeating for clarity: I'm not saying that racism didn't exist in 1936 or that Jesse Owens was treated fairly, but there was no inhibition against referring to him, or any other black American, as an American whenever it was relevant to do so.

You made the very specific claim that the term “American” was not used to refer to black people prior to 1945. Now that I’ve demonstrated that this claim is false, you are using figurative language to retreat to the claim that black people were not historically treated equally to white people. But I have never disputed this. You are the one arguing right past me and with some imaginary figure in your head.

Furthermore, as I’ve already said, this is exactly the reason that the term “African American” became popular at one point: because it emphasized that black people were also Americans. Contrary to your false claim that it was meant as a backhanded implication that they weren’t Americans.

> The culture warrior has ended themselves.

Uncalled for and unnecessary.
by TinkersW | 2025-09-12 15:16:46+00:00
On the CPU side, yes 64 bits is a good idea, but when transferring to the GPU you simply make the camera location 0,0,0, and transform everything relative to it, thus you can easily use 32 bit float and have no z-fighting or any other precision related issues(a logarithmic depth buffer also helps).

Regarding 64 bit double vs 64 bit fixed width, I don't think there is a really good reason to bother with fixed width, it adds more instructions, and will require a custom debug visualizer to inspect the values.

Bit shifts, at least in SSE/AVX2 etc, are only able to run on a single port, so they actually aren't such a great idea(not sure about scalar, I don't bother to optimize scalar code in this way).
by lukeschlather | 2025-09-12 15:16:46+00:00
I had a procedure done recently. I was given a bill, I opted for a more expensive treatment, it was a ~$1500 total, my insurance wouldn't cover an extra $300, I paid it since it seemed worth the extra money. I received another bill in the mail for $300 a month later that my insurance had additionally decided not to cover. What is this world you live in where American health insurance means you don't have to comparison shop? Healthcare is a huge expense and not only are the prices high, they change after the fact at the whims of the people I'm theoretically paying to handle the negotiations.
by docmarionum1 | 2025-09-12 15:16:56+00:00
An essay I wrote tracing the 80-year evolution from Vannevar Bush's 1945 vision of the memex to Geoffrey Hinton's contemporary warnings about artificial intelligence.

Shout out to the Advent of Computing podcast (https://adventofcomputing.com/) for finally getting me to read Bush's classic essay. As I read it, I was struck by the parallels in AI today.
by fngjdflmdflg | 2025-09-12 15:17:03+00:00
I have always heard that MSAA doesn't work well with deferred rendering which is why it is not longer used[0] which is a shame. Unreal TAA can be good in certain cases but breaks down if both the character and background are in motion, at least from my testing. I wish there was a way to remove certain objects from TAA. I assume this could be done by rendering the frame both with the object and without it there but that seems wasteful. Rendering at a higher resolution seems like a good idea only when you already have a high end card.

[0] eg https://docs.nvidia.com/gameworks/content/gameworkslibrary/g...
by dghlsakjg | 2025-09-12 15:17:04+00:00
It can scale to a whole province of 5 million people.

I had Kaiser Permanente when I was in the US. Now that I'm in BC, Canada, it is very similar. I walk into any hospital in the province and every doctor and specialist in the building are part of the same system (technically they are broken up into three geographic subunits, but to the patient it basically doesn't matter). If I need some sort of treatment that hospital doesn't offer, they can immediately refer me to the correct hospital. For emergency cases the provincial ambulance service will transport you to another hospital by road or air at no cost.

There are still independent specialists and doctors outside of the hospital system, but they have access to the same records systems and the billing is so seamless that I suspect that most people don't realize it is happening since it never involves the patient outside of providing your ID.
by atmavatar | 2025-09-12 15:17:05+00:00
> Americans treat our bodies like garbage bins for sugar and fat.

Even this isn't so simple. Foods in America are engineered explicitly to increase consumption, often (but not exclusively) by increasing fat, sugar, and salt. A good example of this is bread, as most breads sold in the US would be classified as cake in other countries due to the added sugar.

The only way to avoid this is to make your own food by scratch, which simply isn't viable for a large population living paycheck to paycheck.
by rkomorn | 2025-09-12 15:17:07+00:00
Honestly at this point it's not so much about money as it is about whether or not this particular case/setup/components combo is salvageable with minimal effort.

The CPU fan is rarely an issue (it mostly just goes bananas when IntelliJ gets its business on with gradle on a new project XD).

The GPU is the main culprit and I'm not sure there's any solution there that doesn't involve just replacing it.
Show HN: DWS OS, a Plan 9 Inspired Web “OS”
by tdubey | 2025-09-12 15:17:09+00:00
Hi HN,

I've always loved the aesthetic, quirks, and concepts of Plan9, and I wanted to see how far I could vibe-code a web desktop/OS that resembled it. The result is DWS OS.

My goal was to reach a point where I could build "userspace" apps for this OS, in the OS. DWS OS has a virtual filesystem, an approximation of the ACME editor, file browser, internet browser (just an iframe for fun), and a few other apps to discover.

The environment supports uploading and downloading data from the virtual filesystem, along with support for JavaScript programming within ACME and an API for building GUI apps within DWS OS and interacting with the OS DOM. Lastly, you can export and import the state of your OS as a JSON to share with others! Check out the `examples/` directory!

I'd love to hear your feedback and suggestions and see if you build anything interesting within the OS, thanks!
by shadowgovt | 2025-09-12 15:17:19+00:00
Details vary but from time-to-time, yes, things do go this wildly off the rails.

You could argue that the entirety of Europe declaring war on itself over the death of one royal (and not even a reigning monarch; an heir-apparent) is such an example; tens of millions dead over something as transient as birthright rulership. Others that come to mind are much of the reign of Henry VIII (everyone knew he was dangerously paranoid, nobody with the potential to do so mounted an overthrow of his power, and his son was shaping up to be worse and England was narrowly spared his reign by the luck of his own bad health). Then there's the French overthrow of a monarchy to replace it with a bloody civil war that liquidated, among others, most of the people who overthrew the monarchy (and replaced it with an empire).

Power consolidation begets perverse effects.
by cratermoon | 2025-09-12 15:17:25+00:00
> was it always this stupid?

Excellent question. There are two easily readable sources I know of covering historical events of the sort you're asking about. The first is Barbara W. Tuchman's The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam, where the entire premise is that stupid people did stupid things and then doubled down on stupidity as they went along. The second is Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, in which Hannah Arendt details just how dull and unimaginative Eichmann was. She writes, "it was difficult indeed not to suspect that he was a clown", and suggests that Eichmann was not especially different from anyone he worked for, right up to the top.

History doesn't seem clownish because of the way it is recorded and taught. Even Arendt's writing is cool and formal compared to the histrionics we see on social media and many news outlets.

> Was there a Napeolonic era equivalent to a media figure known for making light of school shootings, getting killed in a school shooting, a second after again making light of school shootings?

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and subsequent events leading to the start of the First World War, were filled with errors and stupidity, so much that history mostly lumps them all under the term "July Crisis", and rarely goes into detail. If you're familiar with the Abilene paradox, you have a framework for how the Great War started as the result of collective actions by soldiers, diplomats, and national leaders.
by timr | 2025-09-12 15:17:38+00:00
> From where I sit, the US, which has an unusually high exposure to the real costs of healthcare among peer states, also has the highest cost of healthcare. That sort of goes directly against what you are saying

The US has the highest cost of healthcare primarily because nobody knows what healthcare costs. Even your doctor has no idea -- try asking sometime! I routinely point out to my primary care doctor that the medicine/test/whatever they're recommending is expensive and low-quality, and he looks at me like I'm an alien. Statistically, I am.

You're not wrong that you can get caught in a circle of hell after you get the bill, and that insurers are an opaque barrier to purchase decisions, but that's just saying the same thing a different way -- you have no ability to shop for what should be a commodity service.

> I have never heard of an insurance policy in the US that allows you to consume as much, and whatever type of healthcare that you want.

...and that's one of the few good things about our system, though I agree that the US implementation is maximally stupid. You should have to evaluate the cost and benefit of going to a (rare, expensive) specialist! While I agree that insurance companies suck, it's telling that the debate around this issue has devolved to indignation that someone should be acting to control costs by limiting the freedom to choose expensive things.
by munchler | 2025-09-12 15:17:41+00:00
Just FYI: Rudolf Steiner was a pusher of pseudoscientific nonsense. He was anti-vax and his views on race were problematic, to say the least. He was a fervent German nationalist and a critic of Einstein's theory of relativity. I could go on, but you get the idea.

More importantly in a modern context, I know that Waldorf schools seem harmless, but they are religious "Anthroposophy" schools at their core.
by xnx | 2025-09-12 15:17:55+00:00
This raid was probably a bad idea and not in the US interest, but how much of this work could be done remotely? I'm sure it's much faster to have someone on site, but couldn't someone in Korea (or even someone from Korea in Canada) supervise someone on site via high fidelity video feed? This would be clumsy, but would ensure some knowledge sharing.
by cootsnuck | 2025-09-12 15:17:59+00:00
It's the "secret" that kind of flies in the face of much of the type of grit-your-teeth-motivation type of self-help and advice.

There's nothing broken, nothing wrong with our current selves. In fact, we already have good internal compasses and we should listen to them. Go to the gym or park for a few minutes, stay as little or long as we want. See how we feel. Take it easy if we want. Push harder if we want.

It's this slight tweak in perspective that I think is pretty significant. It's an acceptance of the idea that we are not some kind of deficient ball of mess that requires carrots and whips to even know the right direction to our own wellness or happiness. That we don't actually need external pressures and motivation bearing down on us.

We're allowed to just want things because we do. And we're allowed to not want things because we don't. Feels like getting back to simpler times as a child where we could just act on our own emotions and internal state without such gripping regard for the external (e.g. comparison, external ideals, external validation, etc.).

It's been vital for me lately to engage in this...type of "non-striving" form of exercise too. (I now go to the park almost daily for a good walk.) I started doing it just because I wanted to. There were no plans to keep doing it, no routine or regimen expectations, no goals. Just allowing myself to to engage on my own terms. The most important benefit for me has been just been feeling more ownership over my own self-concept.

It's much simpler, quite freeing, and also resistant to commodification.
by fsflover | 2025-09-12 15:18:11+00:00
It might be slow for the megacorps, which don't even try to follow laws, but

> Google

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40133976

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30347719

> Meta

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30186326

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44210689

> Apple

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11034071

And

Linux Reaches 5% Desktop Market Share in USA (ostechnix.com)

1021 points by marcodiego 58 days ago | 620 comments

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44580682
by nerdjon | 2025-09-12 15:18:48+00:00
The framing of this article I find quite disappointing from NPR. Sure employers are not about to just hand out free money are going to try to spend as little as possible but to put your employer in the same space as the others or even the government is a... wild interpretation of the problem.

I was half expecting there to be something in here about the average that employers were spending going down to justify the headline but that was nowhere to be found.

> "It's kind of hidden, because [premium deductions are] coming out of your paycheck and if you're not paying close attention, it may not be obvious,

I have to ask, who the hell is not looking at the amount that is coming out of their paycheck when it comes to open enrollment? Sure you may just accept it since what is your choice, but I think the systems I use generally show how much it is going to change.

Am I just becoming more sensitive to clickbait that outright lies or are headlines getting worse? Nothing in this article justifies any blame to your employer.
by varispeed | 2025-09-12 15:19:15+00:00
Chat Controls will inevitably lead to concentration camps and mass killings once the power learns what people actually talk about. They become paranoid and afraid. They will try to nip dissent and perceived threat in the bud. We are on the slippery slope and people should stop seeing EU as roses and fluffy bunnies. They are corrupt autocrats and if you think they are not, you are rejecting evidence of your eyes and ears.
by cedws | 2025-09-12 15:19:35+00:00
I have followed Japanese politics a bit and the rising anti-foreigner sentiment is something I took into account when considering whether I should stay longer term. I disagree that Japan’s problems are on the same scale as the UK’s. Quality of life there is far higher. The safety made me feel much less anxious.

I think the grass is greener syndrome is something that happens when on a few weeks visit, but I was there for 6 months. I made a fairer evaluation and still felt like Japan was better for me.

Everyone values different things in their life. Japan is closely aligned with the things I value most. Respect, safety, convenience, cleanliness, and so on.
by epolanski | 2025-09-12 15:19:52+00:00
Small(ish) OT, but after years and years of leaning in favor of a private healthcare system I have completely reversed my opinion.

I will spare you the ethical and moral reasons, and give you a practical one.

Private healthcare, being a business, cannot afford the investments of public one. Instead it operates following the Pareto principle where 20% of services and treatments cover 90%+ of patient needs.

Now this works with much joy over most of your life, but there are just too many edge cases over a life time where this will screw you.

E.g. A close friend of mine gave birth in a private clinic. The most luxurious one with almost a dozen people following her.

All of this: pointless. Her child had complications minutes after birth, and no single private hospital in our country has a pediatric intensive care unit, or, to label it more correctly a pediatric _reanimation_ unit.

The only private hospitals that do? University ones, as they operate on slightly different financial basis and incentives.

This goes beyond this example I have. It doesn't matter if you're in a country with good private healthcare (e.g. Switzerland) or a crap one, public healthcare is accepted to be a money loser for the greater good and will cover more services. Always.

Mind you, I'm not saying that a single public hospital will offer everything and private is bad, just stating that there's many situations where it's easier to find the service offered in public rather than private health care.
by kragen | 2025-09-12 15:19:59+00:00
This article doesn't provide enough information to be useful. Is "thousands" a lot? It depends on what kind of drones we're talking about. Ukraine produces on the order of ten thousand military drones per day, as does Russia. So the UK sending "thousands" one time might be insignificant. On the other hand, thousands of properly equipped Reapers would be enough to allow Ukraine to defeat and possibly conquer Russia—but nobody has or will ever have thousands of Reapers, which would cost on the order of 3% of the GDP of the UK.

So the description in the article is so ambiguous that it covers the full range from "insignificantly small" to "implausibly large".

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45223912 ballparks the program at US$10M.
by ceejayoz | 2025-09-12 15:20:13+00:00
> This is what my SO did when leaving Vietnam - her med school tuition was around $6k/yr in a country where median household incomes are $2-3k per year and she'd end up working for $700-800/mo working 70 hour weeks and best case $2k/mo in 5-7 years. Unsurprisingly, she chose to leave just like the rest of her peers, because you can't even buy a house in a tier 4 city in Vietnam without spending $100k anymore.

I mean, people in the US pay $250k+ tuition, median income $65k/year, work $35k/year for a while, and eventually make something like that $250k/year. A house in many US markets is $300-500k.

It's pretty much the same balance between each item, just more zeroes on the end of each number.