Hacker News: Nomentatus

New comment by Nomentatus in "Anduril announces Roadrunner, jet-powered VTOL drone"

Nomentatus — Sat, 09 Dec 2023 05:24:54 +0000

What I've read says that this is a modular system, likely some variants will launch small air to air missles, and others use large shotgun shells to take out drones.

New comment by Nomentatus in "USB inventor explains why the connector was not designed to be reversible (2019)"

Nomentatus — Tue, 10 Oct 2023 05:18:02 +0000

The plug didn't have to be reversible - it could just have had a trapezoidal cross-section. No significant cost.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Thomas Edison, Tinkerer"

Nomentatus — Fri, 26 May 2023 19:49:17 +0000

Terrific. Maybe not the most alluring framing.

Could be titled "Hate Elon? OMFG would you have hated Edison! He was way worse!"

Scientists didn't start getting in the way of progress yesterday. It's a tradition:

When the dynamo prototype was finished, it operated so contrary to existing best-practice that Edison was mocked for it. John Tyndall — the physicist to whom discovery of the greenhouse effect is often attributed – wrote in the Journal of Gas Lighting, ‘It is difficult to adequately express the ludicrous inefficiency of the arrangement; but one thing is abundantly certain, and that is that the person who seriously proposed it was wholly destitute of a scientific knowledge of either electricity or the science of energy.’

New comment by Nomentatus in "High Z: Metal Foams Shield X-Rays, Gamma Rays and Neutron Radiation (2015)"

Nomentatus — Thu, 18 May 2023 04:13:57 +0000

Multilayered mirrors are another approach. https://inis.iaea.org/collection/NCLCollectionStore/_Public/...

New comment by Nomentatus in "Searle's Chinese Room Argument"

Nomentatus — Mon, 15 May 2023 23:08:53 +0000

The closest real world example of the Chinese Room I know about is Richard Feynman's adventures teaching physics in Brazil. His students memorized the textbooks and could manipulate the symbols, and answer test questions correctly,"because they were "almost exclusive teaching and learning by means of pure abject memory." They also never tested their knowledge against that of their friends in discussions, for fear of losing face.

Therefore, when it came to any experiment or application in the real world, the students were as hopeless as if they knew nothing. They had just been playing a symbol-swapping game.

http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/46/2/LatinAmerica.htm

New comment by Nomentatus in "Chinese Room Thought Experiment"

Nomentatus — Mon, 15 May 2023 22:58:22 +0000

Also posted 12 days ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35808792

New comment by Nomentatus in "Wearing an eye mask during sleep improves episodic learning and alertness"

Nomentatus — Wed, 03 May 2023 22:25:18 +0000

Someone needs to sue any manufacturer that uses blue leds on anything that might have to be on at night.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Wearing an eye mask during sleep improves episodic learning and alertness"

Nomentatus — Wed, 03 May 2023 22:24:28 +0000

I might mention that, believe it or don't - a living skull is translucent, and our brains can detect light all by themselves. So a mask is good, but not nec a whole solution.

In old experiments, just the light coming in under a door diminished melatonin in mice.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Wearing an eye mask during sleep improves episodic learning and alertness"

Nomentatus — Wed, 03 May 2023 21:49:22 +0000

Right. But a dark room is a room in which, if you put your hand in front of your face, you don't see even the faintest outline of a hand.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Could we stop Yellowstone from erupting with a giant geothermal power plant?"

Nomentatus — Tue, 25 Apr 2023 20:23:43 +0000

How poignant, that the obvious solution is the worst "solution" of all, due to human nature.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Could we stop Yellowstone from erupting with a giant geothermal power plant?"

Nomentatus — Tue, 25 Apr 2023 20:20:13 +0000

Not to mention the wooden beams, under the portico, which are also original. They of course, are out of the rain; so are a solution to a lesser problem, where aging is concerned.

New comment by Nomentatus in "SVB Hall of Shame"

Nomentatus — Fri, 17 Mar 2023 04:53:19 +0000

The famous example illustrating PD created by Albert W. Tucker does have no communication - so that parties don't coordinate and cooperate with each other - but in this case with thousands of parties, there was no way to coordinate them all, or communicate with them all in time, or trust them all, so it still counts. It's possible to set up prisoner's dilemmas with communication, say in cases where it's a one off and the parties have every reason not to trust each other's word.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Tri-wing aircraft startup claims to reduce fuel consumption by 70%; CO2 by 80%"

Nomentatus — Tue, 28 Feb 2023 01:56:08 +0000

Taking the fuel out of the wings and thinning them makes sense. You couldn't make this fly in 1959; but I'm willing to bet that you can now with computer control. We should all be ashamed for not having thought of it, I suppose.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Organic molecule compositions in samples of asteroid Ryugu"

Nomentatus — Sun, 26 Feb 2023 20:41:28 +0000

For that to happen, it can't be gravity that keeps a single molecule near long enough for that to happen - dipole forces at a fairly large distance in vacuum over enough time... maybe... at enough distance from the sun. Maybe. Maybe.

Static electrical field from the asteroid, stoked by the sun?

New comment by Nomentatus in "Multiple Sclerosis discovery could end disease's chronic inflammation"

Nomentatus — Sat, 25 Feb 2023 18:37:55 +0000

This fits with a previous study showing that soluble fiber altered biota and reduced symptoms. https://www.inverse.com/mind-body/diet-rich-in-beans-legumes...

FWIW, other research shows that without soluble fiber, we can't absorb choline; we need a bacteria in the gut to transform it into a bioavailable form, apparently.

Choline is getting a lot more attention recently, from researchers.

Notoriously, MS is a disease of the last couple centuries, so far as we can tell, it simply didn't exist before that.

New comment by Nomentatus in "What Mary Didn't Know (1986) [pdf]"

Nomentatus — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 06:05:43 +0000

It is different - not metaphysically or entirely, but... echolocation for humans is rather long-wave (although it's experienced as vision.) You can't - I couldn't - see a door edge wise so I could walk into doors pointed right at me. But bats want it for insect location, I'm betting. Much more precise, much higher frequency.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Intel is fighting for its life"

Nomentatus — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 18:41:13 +0000

Kinda fact-free. Intel is just now going EUV - why decide in advance that Intel is going to faceplant when they do?

New comment by Nomentatus in "Did David Hume retract 2 essays on immorality to avoid religious controversy?"

Nomentatus — Sat, 04 Feb 2023 19:34:56 +0000

I've done this. Re Occam's Razor when that principle was sacrosanct. Wouldn't do it again, I think. Those willing to reword what I wrote more strongly, got the credit, for one thing.

In the end if any one view got me kicked out of Philosophy, it was prematurely defending String Theory - just as a possibility. Politics and my being drugged and assaulted by a Professor were larger factors, though.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Did David Hume retract 2 essays on immorality to avoid religious controversy?"

Nomentatus — Sat, 04 Feb 2023 19:31:42 +0000

Both views are true, his first philosophical book got no traction. Then his Histories made him very famous, and a rewrite of his philosophical views was much better received.

New comment by Nomentatus in "Unconditional Love"

Nomentatus — Sun, 29 Jan 2023 05:10:03 +0000

These days the topic falls under "Secure attachment" as part of "Attachment theory." The phrase "unconditional love" proved thorny and IMHO ill-judged, misleading.

https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-attachment-theory-27953...

My experience raising children is that you're golden if the child knows you're on their side, putting their interests above your own. Helping them learn, not putting any moral puzzles in front of them that they can't easily solve, together with lots of misbehavior play so they can learn boundaries without actually misbehaving.

"Unconditional love" was just bad philosophy.