skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
Virtually everything you said "only a human can" is a religious belief. Robots will be able to write novels and make movies and craft plays and solve medical crisis (all of these are being done already in simplistic forms). Bitcoin is already an implementation of an algorithm governing people, you could go on forever making incorrect statements, but they'd still be incorrect.

> There will always be more opportunities for humans to be valuable.

This simply isn't remotely true. While there will always be a place for the smartest and most creative humans, most humans aren't that smart or that creative and won't be able to compete with AI labor. Stop thinking in anecdotes and see the bigger picture, in a world of thinking machines, there will be little need for human labor, certainly not enough need to keep most humans employed at the levels needed to support themselves.

> So while it's true automation can greatly help in all those endeavors, and eliminate lots of jobs in the process (and probably concentrate the value created much more than it was in the past), there will always be more opportunities for humans to be valuable.

Not as many as have been eliminated; that's the point you seem to miss, new jobs will not be added at the rate they're being eliminated in a world of smart machines because the smart machines will be doing those new jobs as well.

> I don't buy it.

It's true none the less.
Yeah, I have a feeling these super-commuters don't value their time especially well.
Roombas have been busy mapping our homes, and now that data could be up for sale
It is common for a typical western government to have domain specialists, working directly for them, to help write the contracts and requirements for their external contractors and vendors.
Suave Fable and Marten
- aphyr

- scott hansleman

- coding horror

- decyphering glyph

- eric lippert
If you really need money quick, in your position, maybe some shady practices might be okay to start with.
> Now she works at cafeterias with names like “Epic” and “Living the Dream”

It's like they went out of their way to come up with the most cringeworthy, Silicon Valley stereotype confirming names possible for their cafeterias.
Haha, good one! Yours is more a database than mine, indeed! :)
How to Escape the Cubicle
I am in the same boat, albeit a completely different field, still it might help. Have you considered becoming a news and information resource for nonprofits, trade associations, and small businesses? I am a lobbyist and grassroots advocacy manager. I work from home, have no network, and limited ability to do so. I stumbled on to some schools that were interested in public policy, and laws. I rang one of them up and offered to monitor the law and legislation for them, and let them know when things came up that they might find interesting. Very low price, about a grand a month. That one school told someone else, and now I've got four schools. Just enough to pay the bills and eek by. I focused on keeping the price way down to entice people, make it up in volume.
Many years ago I did just that on Elance (now Upwork) and RentACoder (now Freelancer.com). I started with a couple of jobs in below the $100, then some below the $1,000, and then some in the low thousands. Striving for excellent ratings is key.
Submitted the new installment of the Monokai syntax highlighting colors for Sublime Text (Monokai Pro) a month ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14611823

I got a good spike of traffic from Reddit and Medium, HN a bit less.
Personal attacks and political flamewar will both get you banned on HN, so please don't post like this again.

More generally, would you please only post civil and substantive comments here? You've done that a fair bit but you've also done the opposite some. In order for HN to have a hope of being slightly better than the nasty internet median, we all need to pitch in with the effort.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14842404 and marked it off-topic.
I would immediately update your posting with a CV, website, git, whatever.

You are on the front page of arguably the PREMIER network of people with access / need for technologists.
50/50 Tech and Healthy, Bidets Are Future Toilets
Who would’ve thought that the modern miracle of butt hygiene would be a stream of water? Well, most countries in Asia and Europe already have as bidet use in those nations is highest in the world. Asian nations in particular are pushing the envelope and stuffing their luxury bidets with all kinds of tech.

Personal hygiene tops the list for why anyone would want a bidet. You’re not going to find any science or research that denies this fact. Wiping leaves behind residues and these pockets of poop and other undesirables can be breeding grounds for bacteria. These microbes can cause all sorts of illnesses, especially if one is not washing their hands with SOAP AND WATER after! Why would you even want to put your hands down in the danger zone to begin with?

We have the tech to make butt cleaning better, but it’s all just gadget candy. It’s time to satisfy your sweet tooth.

Want hands free capabilities for your butt cleansing needs? No problem, many luxury bidets have remote controls. Want to take wiping 100% out of the equation? These high tech toilets can come included with heated air dryers. Is it a bit nippy in your bathroom in the colder months? No problem, many electronic bidets have heated seats, and they are niiiiiice.

Can’t stand it when the lid or seat is left up? Some bidets have hydraulic lids that can automatically open and close the seat for you. Worried about being blasted of the seat with a powerful bidet spray? Most of the high tech toilets come standard with an array of different nozzle sprays and patterns as well as temperature and pressure controls.

Wish to hide your odor from sensitive nostrils who can’t handle your stank? These smart toilets can even come equipped with carbon deodorizers that’ll mask your shame. Need to run to the potty in the dead of night? How’s about a sweet night light built into your toilet so you don’t miss your mark?
We've banned this account for continuing to violate the guidelines after we've asked you to stop.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14832471 and marked it off-topic.
there are two kinds of people, the ones that want to learn how to do it "manually" and the script kiddies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_predictive_control

Of course imagining possible outcomes before executing is useful! And it has many uses outside deep learning. No reason to reinvent new words, really. At least without referring to the established ones.

Maybe there is a serious novel idea, but I've missed it.

Basically, if you need to control a complex process (i.e. bring some future outcome in accordance to your plan), you can build a forward model of the system under control (which is simpler than a reverse model), and employ some optimization techniques (combinatorial, i.e. graph-based; numeric derivative-free, i.e. pattern-search; or differential) to find the optimal current action.
And here from TechCrunch: https://techcrunch.com/2017/07/24/snopes-seeks-crowdfunding-...
I'd have to be pretty loaded to want to spend 500% the price for minor convenience. ;) Similar major discounts are available via Amazon Prime as well, if you can wait two days for it to arrive.
> Many people think it's an ethical requirement to pay artists for their work.

I don't think that way. Everybody deserves a reasonable income, but what these "artists" make is totally insane. The only reason I watch their movies is because with the help of their fans, they have created an artificial monopoly around their persona and I am basically forced to watch them. In a free market with intelligent consumers, these people would not make this much.
I would be absolutely amazed if any government actually agreed to dismantle their welfare states in return for UBI. There will always be pressure on politicians for one group or another to receive more money for one reason or another which will require all the government beurocracy to administer it.
Bidets: The Secret to Great Butt Hygiene
Bidets are the hottest new tech in the American bathroom market as many are rushing to their tablets, smartphones and computers and asking, “What is a bidet?” I would like to think that this sudden interest in butt hygiene is due to the dedicated work ethic of marketing managers like those at BioBidet, but it seems that many are jumping on the bandwagon after learning about their amazing benefits.

Besides the obvious perk of having a clean man or lady hole, many users might fail to realize the deep rooted improvements to their health that only the therapeutic effects of water can provide. Researching how to have a cleaner butt is something we all, especially Americans who still have toilet paper dependency issues, should be actively doing.

During these character building moments, where the beast is leaving you at a sultry temperature of lava, the idea of repeated uses of toilet paper might have you viewing it as sandpaper. In comes the bidet, washing away all your pain and shame with a stream of warm or cold water! Not only is the bidet spray a more thorough clean than using toilet paper, it’s far gentler too.

Just hit up biobidet.com where we have over 20 variations available. On a budget and freaked out over the stories of bidet units that are thousands of dollars? BioBidet has 7 units that are under $100. There’s no breaking the bank when it comes to providing people with a cleaner butt. However, the power is in your hands!
Also, if your machine is compromised, your the cookies used to authenticate you post-login can be stolen just as well. RTFA.
In general, U2F doesn't work on iPhones - so most sites offer multiple methods of secondary authentication (including Github, Facebook, and Google).

So, it is a bit of a convenience - but it also more secure because it matches hostnames.
That's not at all what you were talking about earlier. If you can't understand the difference, it's not worth explaining anything to you.
I see it as more of an opportunistic application of solipsism under the guise of skepticism. Using doubt and uncertainty as a weapon to avoid responsibility or accountability.

If the truth isn't on your side, attack the very concept of truth.
Moving costs money.

If you're scraping by as tightly as they are - how would one expect them to afford to move?

You need money to rent a u-haul to haul your stuff, some cash to rent an apartment, and then enough cash to provide a runway to find a job (which in a service industry role shouldn't take more than 6-8 weeks) - that still adds up to about 10k to relocate to a cheaper part of the country.
The people who own the local supply of housing.
Well in that case, simpler and cheaper can be achieved through the reduction of military expenditures and increases in marginal tax rates for high earners.
Also most dental insurance will only pay up to $10-5k total per year, so its not some unlimited spout of money you can abuse like medical insurance in the USA. Some dentists offer a direct subscription plan that costs around the same amount of costs as a dental plan directly as a result.
Yep. I only browse HN on my downtime before falling asleep now. Lack of mobile support is a massive turn off here.
You're quite wrong. It's happened to me.
Mind Constituted by a Rabbit Reading and Writing on Long Strips of Turing Tape?
If it's cheaper, doesn't that necessarily mean that people on welfare will be receiving less benefit? Actually much less since UBI will go to everyone, if it's cheaper in spite of that...
I second this.

We used to hire on Upwork regular for bigger projects and it usually was close to a gamble (for both parties). You get > 30 applicants easily if you pay decent wages and the cv's are usually quite non saying.
I think the biggest thing you can do is establishing credibility with potential clients. The easiest way to do that would to be an existing set of clients, which you don't have. That's fine, everyone has to start from somewhere.

Your clients could or could not know much about the software development life cycle, and how to evaluate if you have the skills to meet whatever needs they may have. Perhaps you could network with existing freelancers who are too busy to take on new clients.

Spitballing here, but maybe working on or creating an OSS project could give you credibility to those freelancers. Or maybe you could work under a successful freelancer to establish yourself in the space. Maybe the site you built will lend you credibility to others.

Alternatively, if you have business ideas you'd like to try out, you could try working for yourself and creating your own income. Also, it doesn't hurt to sign up for LinkedIn. It might not be immediately beneficial, but once you find your first client, maybe they'll write you a glowing review.

> having worked remotely for the past 5 years has really limited my ability to build a network. I don't have LinkedIn and even if I did, it's more meant for building a network than for finding a quick gig.

Yeah, it's hard to build a network. Time to start putting in the effort. I sense a tinge of can't-do attitude here (but obviously, the tone interpreted in written communication is subjective) -- I don't know if it's the case or not, but a can't-do attitude is not what you want to have for freelancing work. Your lack of a network, or having an expansive one, is ultimately the result of your personal decisions. You have to be willing to give it a shot. If networking sounds not fun, or like a chore and otherwise unpleasant, you're probably better off just working for a big tech company. Personal skills are far more important in freelancing and entrepreneurship when compared to standard full-time employment.

Best of luck. Now go out there and kick some ass.
Thanks so much! I've been looking for something like this for Asana.
relatedly, Max Tegmark tried to do some estimates of Phi values of neural networks in his paper "Consciousness as a State of Matter" https://arxiv.org/pdf/1401.1219v2.pdf

And while he seems to take IIT pretty seriously, his conclusion sure seems like a refutation of the idea that IIT's definition of Phi means anything:

> Information stored in Hopfield neural networks is naturally error-corrected, but 10^11 neurons support only about 37 bits of integrated information. This leaves us with an integration paradox: why does the information content of our conscious experience appear to be vastly larger than 37 bits?
How meta! I submitted my side project http://www.bookeyes.co/. Though it was simplistic and still is BookEyes was well received. I got feature ideas I'm in the process of implementing.
You have to love the people in the comments section there. Few seem to understand that one of the major points of electric cars is decoupling the energy generation and expenditure. Sure, if your country generates all its electricity with coal then of course electric cars aren't going to do anything for you at first. The whole concept is that you reduce the number of sources of pollution so that you have less things that you have to replace in the future.
No, because neural nets do not work that way, even when they output actions. Making things More Neural doesn't make them better, and AFAIK, not everything good can be made More Neural.
> ... have about two years of freelance work ...

Doing what? Demonstrating what skills? In what domain? Front-end? Back-end? Big-iron? Embedded? Languages?

Also, why do you not have contact details in your profile page? Why is there no CV? No link to GitHub? No personal web site?

How are you trying to find leads?
"And yes, I still miss my 1/8" jack on my iphone. Every single day. And stay off my lawn, you whippersnappers."

Interestingly, my teenage sons use the phrase "pass the aux", meaning let me drive the music we are currently listening to over the party speakers with my phone.

So yes, Apple's attempt to kill the aux jack was definitely premature, even among young tech savvy people.
That's the point of UBI in most people's minds, it's a better way to redistribute wealth and once in place should be the only way needed. Of what purpose is a food stamp program when we can simply make sure the UBI is enough to live on? UBI is about dealing with a world where we don't don't have enough jobs for everyone, that already covers the poor. Want more redistribution, raise the UBI. It's one program that can replace the entire welfare state. UBI would be a better and more efficient use of the existing welfare money as well as new funds so it can be given to everyone. It makes no sense to have UBI and a welfare state at the same time. And yes, you don't need a minimum wage when you have UBI, UBI is a minimum wage.
LedgerX to Begin Trading Cryptocurrency Derivatives
> In a private system they have the capability of accumulating generational wealth. In the public system they do not.

How sure are you about this?

"Social Security already provides an inheritance benefit in the form of survivors benefits, which account for nearly one-fifth of all benefits that Social Security pays. When a worker dies, Social Security pays survivors benefits for a number of years to the worker’s minor children as well as to the worker’s spouse if the spouse is raising children who are under 16 or the spouse is 60 or older.[1] The Social Security actuaries have reported that for a typical family with two young children in which a worker dies before reaching retirement age, the survivors benefits can be the equivalent of inheriting $400,000, a much larger sum than most workers could accumulate in a private account."

https://www.cbpp.org/research/social-security-and-inheritanc...

> Or is your goal to keep them under your thumb, poor, and beholden to the state?

Do you really want to bring questions about our motives into the scope of discussion? I don't usually find that a productive line of conversation. And at this point, looking back over the discussion, what do you think a perceptive audience is more likely to believe: that my goal is sinister enslavement via social security check, or that your championing of an entirely privatized retirement system owes more to some other motive than concern for the struggles of manual laborers?

> My preference would be to remove the FICA from the rest of your income, bringing income taxes and capital gains taxes into parity.

FICA taxes don't have to be gospel. The question is how you're going to replace the revenue they provide for Social Security and Medicare, or if not that, with the opportunity that revenue funds. Perhaps you could do it by raising long term capital gains taxes. But if the line of discussion points towards elimination of those programs, well, so far, I haven't seen any credible evidence or argument that if we eliminate SS+MC, the people for whom those specific taxes turn out to be regressive would have the opportunity to get a hold of a vehicle that would provide better benefits/returns, not to mention the balance of incentives to put money into it.

I think it's likely enough concerns about any regressive side to those taxes are better addressed by considering how the rest of the income tax code is (or might be) progressive and in the quality of the public benefits. Or bringing the bracket system to that side. Or holidays like the one in Tax Relief Act of 2010. Really, there's a lot of tools in the box.
By VPNing into content, you aren't really paying artists. You pay Netflix, but Netflix doesn't license the content. So really you are just paying Netflix for stuff you are effectively pirating. Skip the middle man.

It's like buying stolen art.
Yes Yes Yes.

If Microsoft is listening 'PLEASE, do not remove Paint. I use it every day for doing very simple tasks, and it JUST WORKS!'
>except Edge and IE //

Any ideas why?
They were surprised to find malware that wasn't written by a nation-state, which is kind of depressing.
http://legis.delaware.gov/json/BillDetail/GenerateHtmlDocume...

^ Full text
It presumes that it will because it has so far. We've already seen lots of automation and the "jobs per month" numbers have held up.

A better critique of the argument is about the quality of the jobs, not the numbers.
Verizon is trying to extort Google by getting them to pay for interconnects and Google wants nothing to do with it.

I don't think that's right.

At its most basic, an interconnection agreement says “You carry some traffic for me, in return for which I’ll do something—either carry traffic for you, or pay you, or some combination of the two.”

With Netflix and Google, both were basically saying, "we're not going to pay you (Comcast/Verizon) for access to your network, because we're important enough that we shouldn't have to." They don't have their own ISP networks to exchange traffic at the same rate, all they have is their services, so they don't have anything to offer the ISP in return.

So it's disingenuous to say that service providers (Google, Netflix), are extorting anyone. They don't see themselves as ISPs, but they are setting up their own interconnects to provide faster access to customers, so they assume they are exempt from what were traditionally informal interconnect rules.

[1]http://www.interisle.net/sub/ISP%20Interconnection.pdf
I know, now those of us who do not make wages indexed to cost of living in the bay area are being pushed out.
Yeah you're probably right that it doesn't affect me, I guess I'm just pointing it out.
As TFA mentions, the authors have been cut off from the ad revenue. So it may be producing a lot, but only the hosting company is getting it, if the article is to be believed.
In some ways that's true, though the more recent areas tend to cooperate/elaborate, not replace.

E.g., both the superior colliculus in the midbrain and the frontal eye fields in neocortex are responsible for making eye movements, but the FEF doesn't override the SC. Even in this case, it's not like eye gaze/movement info is dispersed throughout all the cortex, it's limited to a short list.

We also know that the receptive fields (which part of a scene a neuron fires in response to) increase in size as you go up the visual hierarchy. V1 neurons will response to tiny parts of a scene, whereas V4/MT and V5 will response to huge swathes of your vision, indicating they become less location-sensitive. Object-identifying neurons may well respond to the object anywhere in your vision, suggesting they're not location-sensitive at all.

I guess Hawkins might argue that it's different neurons in association cortex columns that encode location, but frankly, the argument from biology is poor. There are cortical areas mapped out like this... but I can't imagine why Hawkins thinks this is a governing principle for the whole cerebrum.
As if the system for compensating artists was in any way equitable for them. We're better off with piracy, at least noone is pretending to support them... right now the economics are just downright predatory.
I think that's quibbling. If votes to abolish the rule for a case are available, it's reasonable for a single suspension vote to be possible to.

Both sorts of actions decrease the power of individual senators. If anything, abolishing for a whole category reduces senator's power more - if you also read the article, the basic point is the action indeed altered the power dynamic, what those considering individual senator power are worried about.
Probably not. Nonetheless, "business application" is still pretty vague, IMO.
If we need to keep minimum wage, then UBI needs to be increased until we don't need minimum wage.
If you're already into Bitcoin the hardware wallets also can be used for U2F
That’s exactly what I do.

I pay for Netflix and Amazon Prime, and still pirate all the content.

I’m on Linux, and they only provide 144p video for me, so pirating is easier for getting access to content I paid for.