Hacker News: Argonaut998

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Emily Wilson to retranslate the Odyssey from scratch"

Argonaut998 — Wed, 02 Sep 2026 08:02:00 +0000

Just a grift. Incredible timing. No different from a new Bible translation that comes out every year.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "US removes Syria from terrorism sponsor list, lifting major investment obstacle"

Argonaut998 — Wed, 26 Aug 2026 12:12:31 +0000

Europe’s own fault for not protecting their borders.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Moderna reports first positive Phase 3 for mRNA neoantigen therapy in melanoma"

Argonaut998 — Tue, 25 Aug 2026 11:06:51 +0000

Until when? At what point? Where exactly? The Astra Zeneca (Oxford) vaccine is relevant because it was taken off the market almost immediately after the effects were found. The technology behind it is utterly irrelevant to the point that I am making.

How am I a conspiracy theorist when I literally pointed out what the study said. Is it not a fact that the Oxford vaccine was taken off the market almost immediately after effects were concretely found.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "How Europe is killing makers and micro-entrepreneurs"

Argonaut998 — Mon, 24 Aug 2026 15:20:38 +0000

I agree. I say this as a eurosceptic myself. HN and Twitter make it seem like the EU is borderline third world that is moments away from collapse.

Germany is the third largest economy in the world. The EU as a bloc is the second largest economy in the world.

While lagging considerably behind the US and China in services, it still is among the leaders in energy and manufacturing.

It’s in decline, but it’s really not anything that can’t be fixed.

Certainly not anywhere HN/Twitter like to make it out to be.

The EU is facing a two-front information war. A strong EU doesn’t benefit the US, Russia or China. Having said that, a lot of US criticisms that are propagandised against the EU are mostly fair criticisms, the EU makes it easy for its adversaries to propagandise low hanging fruit (such as the bureaucracy on display here)

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Canada will match US tariffs 'dollar for dollar' as trade talks break down"

Argonaut998 — Sun, 23 Aug 2026 19:11:28 +0000

This is definitely going on in the background. Mercosur and another EU trade deal with India. Canada and China (which was struck down but I imagine it will be rekindled with this). Just wait for some EU + Canada deal soon enough.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Moderna reports first positive Phase 3 for mRNA neoantigen therapy in melanoma"

Argonaut998 — Wed, 19 Aug 2026 15:59:22 +0000

>In men younger than 40 years old, the number of excess myocarditis events per million people was higher after a second dose of mRNA-1273 than after a positive SARS-CoV-2 test (97 [95% CI, 91–99] versus 16 [95% CI, 12–18]).

From your own study you linked. The first comment I ever posted on HN was regarding a similar study where there was no control group whatsoever for unvaccinated people.

I can’t get over the sunk cost reaction to this vaccine. No one who was not immunocompromised should have ever taken it. Period.

And this is just regarding your study.

Remember how the AstraZeneca vaccine (it was called the “Oxford vaccine” before that bad PR) was taken off the market instantly after reports of blood clots.

One can go on endlessly.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Advancing the price-performance frontier with GPT‑5.6"

Argonaut998 — Thu, 30 Jul 2026 21:41:29 +0000

Thanks, I was looking for something like that

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Italy Blocks Reproductive Health Websites Women on Web and Women Help Women"

Argonaut998 — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 16:32:43 +0000

Because if you believe this fetus to be a human life then it follows believing that if it is terminated, it is akin to murder/infanticide.

I don't know why people are being so (deliberatively?) reductive ITT.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "GTX 1080s: Testing a Legend"

Argonaut998 — Sat, 18 Jul 2026 18:01:00 +0000

Mine is still going strong, it can run Gemma 4 26b. It can still play all the games I care about at near max settings at 1440p at 60 FPS (like Elden Ring).#

My PC did coincidentally die today (not GPU related) so I think it's time for an upgrade, what do you recommend?

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Trump administration is dictating access to frontier AI models"

Argonaut998 — Sat, 18 Jul 2026 09:44:13 +0000

I wonder when the Anthropic and OpenAI bailouts will be? Maybe they’ll successfully lobby the US to enable drastic protectionist policies against foreign models.

Anthropic have a lot to answer for. Not even Altman was that bold.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "EU to legislate about Chat Control behind closed doors"

Argonaut998 — Sun, 28 Jun 2026 18:03:25 +0000

They’ll just criminalise private encryption for communication afterwards.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "EU to legislate about Chat Control behind closed doors"

Argonaut998 — Sun, 28 Jun 2026 17:55:41 +0000

The problem with the EU is that there are many levels of abstraction, and the more links in a chain the more susceptible to corruption it is.

This becomes immediately obvious when you vote for a party who fails to fulfill, or even go against their policies. Then for the EU there’s an additional level of abstraction for the commission. At this level, the voter is far removed from their initial vote and are completely powerless.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "EU to legislate about Chat Control behind closed doors"

Argonaut998 — Sun, 28 Jun 2026 17:52:58 +0000

There is nothing redeemable about this union anymore.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "U.S. government will decide who gets to use GPT-5.6"

Argonaut998 — Fri, 26 Jun 2026 07:27:19 +0000

That’s not true at all. While not as good as proprietary models they are still very good and can do A LOT, certainly more than their cost would make it seem.

It’s only a matter of time before companies start to acknowledge the huge cost of tokens and look for a cheaper alternative with basic cost-benefit analysis.

My F500 company is getting local infrastructure going to host open models and I’m sure many will just switch to bedrock + the best open models.

It’s foolish for companies to let three companies dictate the price of tokens, I just don’t think they are aware of this now by and large.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Banned book library in a wi-fi smart light bulb"

Argonaut998 — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 13:41:28 +0000

By your logic any book in existence can be banned at any point in time. It's a meaningless designation.

New comment by Argonaut998 in "US and Iran reach cease fire agreement"

Argonaut998 — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 07:56:17 +0000

This is massively humiliating for Trump (and the US). None of the US' objectives were accomplished aside from "Iran never having a nuclear weapon" which was already established through the JCPOA, which Trump tore down and never ceased to remind everyone how terrible it was and how Obama was an abysmal negotiator.

Which begs the question, why didn't Trump just try to recreate the JCPOA without going to war? Pride?

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Switzerland wil have a referendum to cap population at 10M"

Argonaut998 — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 10:54:33 +0000

On paper

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Switzerland wil have a referendum to cap population at 10M"

Argonaut998 — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 20:17:00 +0000

Vindictive in preventing trade agreements. Vindictive like France doing nothing to stop the immigrants going through the channel

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Switzerland wil have a referendum to cap population at 10M"

Argonaut998 — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 20:01:20 +0000

The entire human population can fit within Los Angelas. It’s not a good metric in general. Pressure on public services, resources and housing is far more useful

New comment by Argonaut998 in "Switzerland wil have a referendum to cap population at 10M"

Argonaut998 — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 19:55:05 +0000

You are assuming there won’t be free trade agreements. People need to stop saying what happened with Brexit will happen with Switzerland. Two completely different countries governed in two completely different ways.