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Life, Learning & Writing

The most popular blog posts about life, learning & writing on Hacker News. 8,927 posts.

Any year
1145

Wordle is pretty damn smart in many subtle ways

I love Wordle. I play it pretty much every single day. I also play the portuguese version immediately afterwards too. It is now part of my morning routine. Wordle is one of those ideas that just click and immediately have you wishing you were the one to have them. If you don’t know what Wordle is, just click here and…

1147

The End of an Era

We knew this day would come. Some of us have known for decades, have been writing and pontificating about this since Ken Jennings lost at Jeopardy and Kasparov lost at chess. The writing was on the wall, and now the writing is everywhere. Literally. Artificial Intelligence is writing about as well as humans — at […]

1153

And then the men with guns tell you to do it anyway

In early February 2011 Egypt was in the middle of a political revolution. One morning, everyone's phones suddenly pinged with an alert. The Armed Forces asks Egypt's honest and loyal men to confront the traitors and criminals and protect our people and honour and our precious Egypt. A series of messages arrived all…

1159

"Nothing like this will be built again"

I've just had a really amazing experience: a guided tour of the nuclear reactor complex at Torness on the Scottish coast. What made this tour unusual is that the tour guide in question, Les, happens to be one of the reactor engineers (as well as a friend) -- and he showed me (and a couple of other friends) right…

1161

Teaching with AI

We’re releasing a guide for teachers using ChatGPT in their classroom—including suggested prompts, an explanation of how ChatGPT works and its limitations, the efficacy of AI detectors, and bias.

1166

Early-Retirement Update

I’ve had a difficult time finding a way to create a new entry on a blog that has essentially been dead since 2015. Yet, I have had a persistent feeling that I owe my readers an update.

1170

The Egg (2009)

It was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless. You left behind a wife and two children. It was a painless death. The EMTs tried their best to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered you were better off, trust me.