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Topics /
Life, Learning & Writing
The most popular blog posts about life, learning & writing on Hacker News. 8,937 posts.
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The Zizians and the rationalist death cult
What is the deal with Rationalism and cults?
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Is there any point to the 12 times table?
Jon McLoone on why we learn times tables, whether knowing them to 12 is better than to 10, approximation multiplication, & education recommendations
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I think I hate the internet
I’ve just finished reading Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams and was equally parts shocked and unsurprised by the events she witnessed at Facebook / Met...
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My class required AI
(Spoiler alert: it has been very successful, but there are some lessons to be learned)
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Real Chilling Effects
A extraordinary pattern of government censorship and threats to speech
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Another Week with Bad Software
In the midst of my September job hop I headed to Kazan for the weekend. I don't know exactly why — probably because I could. I had a hotel booked via booking.com, but once I arrived there the receptionist told me it was the first time he's heard of my booking, and he told me that they had no more rooms, and he told me…
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How much can you earn creating content on Youtube?
Truth time! I love transparency because it takes away the uncertainty and illusions. It helps and inspires people to plan and execute based on facts, not bullshit.
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I lost my data trying to back it up
This is a story about how I lost my data when trying to prevent it by backing it up.
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Ennui: How to Overcome Chronic Boredom
Ennui (pronounced on-wee ) is chronic boredom that involves weariness, apathy, dissatisfaction, and lack of fulfillment. Some people experience a general sense of ennui in life, whereas others experience it in a specific domain, like their hobbies or work. For example, someone might experience ennui when it comes to a…
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"Attrition is a group statistic. It doesn't apply to me."
10 years ago I sat down with my brother. He was about to attend a high attrition special forces course. The vast majority of candidates drop out. Aren't you concerned about the failure rate? ...
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Tricky Programming Concepts Aren’t
What Teachers do Wrong Teachers use subversive language. They say things like “this is a bit tricky” before introducing a concept. It’s in...
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Oral microbiome sequencing after taking probiotics
Recently, a friend recommended BioGaia Prodentis to me. It is a DTC oral probiotic you can buy online that is supposedly good for oral health. I thought it would be interesting to do some sequencing to see what, if anything, it did to my oral microbiome.
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What is GPT-3? written in layman's terms
Daily, snackable writings to spur changes in thinking. Building a blueprint for a better brain by tinkering with the code.
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Your work matters – Build your schedule accordingly
About halfway through Laura Vanderkam’s sharp new productivity guide, Tranquility by Tuesday, we’re introduced to Elizabeth, an education professor who, worried about her ticking tenure ... Read more
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My phone replaced a brass plug
Porting a 2012 OpenCV paper to YOLOv8 and CoreML on iOS to score rifle shooting targets from a photo - replacing the brass-plug scoring gauge with on-device computer vision.
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Advice for young scientists and curious people in general
In Advice to a Young Scientist, Nobel Prize-winning biologist Peter Medawar shares practical advice for people planning to embark on a career in the sciences—and curious people in general. Here, we summarize some of Medawar’s key insights.
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Gut microbes eat medication
The first time Vayu Maini Rekdal manipulated microbes, he made a decent sourdough bread. At the time, young Maini Rekdal, and most people who head to the kitchen to whip up a salad dressing, pop popcorn, ferment vegetables, or caramelize onions, did not consider the crucial chemical reactions behind these concoctions.
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I was stuck on a side project for 5 years – how I finished it (2020)
A few months ago, I stumbled upon this post where someone spent 9 years making a shed . No knocks on them, but it’s not even a particularly good-looking shed.
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A Moss Girl’s Guide to Japanese Moss Viewing
Predictive Intelligence for the Future of Crypto. AI-powered analytics for Web3.
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Tor in Google Summer of Code 2014
Interested in coding on Tor and getting paid for it by Google? If you are a student, we have...
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Infidel goes wild
Planetfall was yesterday's public release, but of course I've spent the past few weeks concentrating on Infidel. A couple of days I came across the most egregious bug I've yet seen in an Infocom game. This bug is extremely difficult to detect ...
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To listen well, get curious
When I’ve listened the most effectively to people, it’s because I was intensely curious—I was trying to build a detailed, precise understanding of what was going on in their head.
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18' Canoe from One Sheet of Plywood
The prospect of building a one sheet kayak, as presented in the original Prism section , has aroused some interest. The original "maximum volume" kayak Prism would not be suitable for a kayaking beginner, however, unless he or she was equipped with excellent balancing abilitites. This design is an attempt to overcome…
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I work for The Internet now
I have an interesting problem: How do I shoehorn "hired by The Internet for a full year to work on Free Software" into my resume?
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Requiem For A Roommate
And, when he shall die, Take him and cut him out in little stars, And he will make the face of Heaven so fine That all the world will be in love with night And pay no worship to the garish sun. Wil…
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The laptop that won't die
My $200, 12-year-old Thinkpad has outlasted two high-end Macbooks