brandon

joined 4 years ago
[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 weeks ago

Considering that parrots can have actual thoughts, I'd say LLMs are even less smart than that.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

I do think the Pacers bike share is pretty expensive. As I resident I do use the free rides occasionally.

I don't know how the fees for these things tend to be determined, but I'd be remiss to not point out that basically all the nice things Carmel is able to afford is subsidized by suburban wealth extraction from Indianapolis.

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 month ago

please please please make a program to lure mediocre and burnt-out software developers away from the US

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Look, maybe it's true that parents should be doing a better job here. The thing is, that's an individual solution. This is a systemic problem. How kids (and adults) interact socially and consume media is fundamentally changed over the last thirty years and we're going to have to find ways to adapt to that as a society.

Yeah, in any particular individual case you can probably come up with a list of things the parent could have done differently. The reality is that this is a problem for tens (hundreds?) of millions of parents.

You can hand wave away any problem that affects children with "parents should do a better job". It didn't work for obesity, it didn't work for child traffic deaths, it didn't work for fentanyl overdoses, it didn't work for school shootings, it didn't work for measles, and it's not going to work for this either.

I'm just going to copy/paste what I wrote in a previous comment in a similar thread:

Everybody is so quick to blame the parents in these situations. Maybe there is some truth to that, but people also need to reckon with the fact that kids (and adults) are being constantly inundated by Skinner box apps, and “platforms” full of engagement bait designed to be as addictive and attractive as possible. All run by corporations with functionally no regard for the safety of their users.

Yeah, sure, if you’re giving advice to an individual parent, they should probably be keeping a closer eye on what their kids are doing.

But there are systemic problems here that can’t be fixed with individual action. By laying the blame solely at the feet of the parents here, you are in effect putting individual parents up against dozens of huge corporations, each with armies of expert advertisers, designers, and psychologists working to build these products. It’s hardly a fair fight.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (10 children)

You can walk into any Walmart in America and buy a cheap smartphone for $30.

This approach is even less effective than "just don't give them drugs".

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 month ago (1 children)

A slightly related, but true, biology fact is that all mammals (with the exception of sloths and manatees) have seven neck vertebrae. So, humans and giraffes actually have the same number of bones in their necks.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

ah yes, Karl Popper's paradox of yumyucking.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Waiting tables at an understaffed yuppie burger place.

Sorry dude, I have literally no control over the price or portion size of the french fries, and you screaming at me is not going to change that. Plus I've got a line of customers to the door and a growing backlog of vegetable juices to make, so please kindly fuck off.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (6 children)

Your gaming PC is going to be terribly inefficient and draw 10x as much power at idle as a workstation PC.

Is this really true? Modern components have fairly robust power saving capabilities. Just because it's got a 750W power supply doesn't mean it's drawing 750W all the time.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago (3 children)

Not judging the software at all, but the fact that OnlyOffice is owned/developed by a semi-sketchy Russian corporation would probably preclude it from getting any endorsement from a Western government.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

Branston Pickle is pretty chunky.

Here in the US you can usually find it in the section of the supermarket with UK imports.

It's not just pickled cucumber though, if that's what you're looking for specifically.

 

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1608756

From the article:

The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that colleges can't explicitly consider applicants' race in admissions, a landmark ruling that will radically transform how colleges are able to attract a diverse student body.

There's also an article from the AP.

 

You can listen to the recording on the article.

From the text:

The recording, which first aired on CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360,” includes new details from the conversation that is a critical piece of evidence in special counsel Jack Smith’s indictment of Trump over the mishandling of classified information, including a moment when Trump seems to indicate he was holding a secret Pentagon document with plans to attack Iran.

 

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ml/post/1212709

I recently finished Moon Witch, Spider King, the second novel of James' fantasy trilogy after reading the first novel, Black Leopard, Red Wolf earlier this year. I'd love to hear if anyone else has any thoughts on these two books.

I was drawn into Jame's world building. The epic fantasy world he creates draws primarily from African folklore and culture. From the perspective of someone used to the ideology of Western fantasy, I was engrossed in the lore. The prose can be meandering--I had to go back and re-read paragraphs regularly ("wait, what did I just miss?"), but it's masterfully written.

The book is vulgar and incredibly violent. There are numerous scenes of graphic sexual violence, some of which was bad enough my immersion and had me questioning "does this really need to be in the book?". If you're sensitive about that, I would definitely avoid this one. I still feel uncomfortable about some of the scenes I read.

The plot of the books is centered around the same series of events (more or less), from different characters' perspectives. The first novel is narrated by Tracker--a mercenary with a supernatural 'scent', and the second by Sogolon, a misandrist with her own mysterious abilities. Both are unreliable narrators, and sometimes recount their stories in non-chronological order. By the end of the second book I was re-evaluating what I thought had happened from reading Tracker's tale in the first. I am sure the upcoming third novel will continue that trend.

Both books were fairly long, and dense reading, but they felt like only a short glimpse into the world of the North and South Kingdoms. I really want to learn more about that world, so I will probably pick up the third book when it arrives, even if I'm also still a little apprehensive about some of the more extreme scenes.

 

I recently finished Moon Witch, Spider King, the second novel of James' fantasy trilogy after reading the first novel, Black Leopard, Red Wolf earlier this year. I'd love to hear if anyone else has any thoughts on these two books.

I was drawn into Jame's world building. The epic fantasy world he creates draws primarily from African folklore and culture. From the perspective of someone used to the ideology of Western fantasy, I was engrossed in the lore. The prose can be meandering--I had to go back and re-read paragraphs regularly ("wait, what did I just miss?"), but it's masterfully written.

The book is vulgar and incredibly violent. There are numerous scenes of graphic sexual violence, some of which was bad enough my immersion and had me questioning "does this really need to be in the book?". If you're sensitive about that, I would definitely avoid this one. I still feel uncomfortable about some of the scenes I read.

The plot of the books is centered around the same series of events (more or less), from different characters' perspectives. The first novel is narrated by Tracker--a mercenary with a supernatural 'scent', and the second by Sogolon, a misandrist with her own mysterious abilities. Both are unreliable narrators, and sometimes recount their stories in non-chronological order. By the end of the second book I was re-evaluating what I thought had happened from reading Tracker's tale in the first. I am sure the upcoming third novel will continue that trend.

Both books were fairly long, and dense reading, but they felt like only a short glimpse into the world of the North and South Kingdoms. I really want to learn more about that world, so I will probably pick up the third book when it arrives, even if I'm also still a little apprehensive about some of the more extreme scenes.

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