Hacker News: RA_Fisher

New comment by RA_Fisher in "US and Iran agree to provisional ceasefire"

RA_Fisher — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 11:32:12 +0000

They’ll probably receive most if not all of Iran’s focus now.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Ask HN: How do you handle clients who don't pay on time?"

RA_Fisher — Sat, 04 Apr 2026 15:16:40 +0000

I limit the risk and insist on payment upfront.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (April 2026)"

RA_Fisher — Wed, 01 Apr 2026 16:43:17 +0000

Location: Brighton, MI, USA Remote: Yes Willing to relocate: Yes

Technologies: Bayesian statistics, econometrics, causal inference, experimental design, machine learning, AI systems, R (expert), Python (expert), SQL (expert), Stan/brms, PyMC, scikit-learn, tidyverse, PostgreSQL/Redshift, AWS, Airflow, Ansible, Terraform

Résumé/CV: https://statwonk.com/about/

New comment by RA_Fisher in "CEO of largest public hospital says he's ready to replace radiologists with AI"

RA_Fisher — Wed, 01 Apr 2026 13:30:44 +0000

That’s good, reducing healthcare costs will increase access and boost the our health.

Agree that AI should replace CEOs. They’re often biased in unhelpful ways that AI isn’t and it costs people wellbeing.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Walmart: ChatGPT checkout converted 3x worse than website"

RA_Fisher — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 14:47:01 +0000

True, though I don’t think they’re too different on that dimension.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman Equation: Reinforcement Learning and Diffusion Models"

RA_Fisher — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 14:45:53 +0000

AI makes it easier to catch up. :)

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Walmart: ChatGPT checkout converted 3x worse than website"

RA_Fisher — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 12:20:05 +0000

I use AI to shop and it seems easy for an AI to understand when that’s the case (they can do statistics and physics after all).

New comment by RA_Fisher in "US SEC preparing to scrap quarterly reporting requirement"

RA_Fisher — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 00:57:26 +0000

I think they'll keep the status quo of quarterly, bc if any announce switching I'd expect their stock value to fall (bc in my mind the decision would transmit more bad potential than positive potential for future earnings). ie- I don't buy that quarterly reporting drives too short-term decision-making (or that it's generally too short).

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Show HN: Prompt Enricher – paste a rough prompt, get a structured one back"

RA_Fisher — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 20:31:15 +0000

I built this after noticing how much variation there is in AI output depending on the quality of the prompt. Models matter a lot — but even the best model underperforms when the prompt is vague. Enriching the input is one of the highest-leverage things you can do.

Most prompts are drafted in 10 seconds and sent. They're missing context, constraints, a clear objective, examples. The model fills in the gaps with whatever it wants, which is why the output often feels generic or off.

Prompt Enricher scores your prompt across 5 dimensions (the YIELD framework: Your Objective, Input Context, Expectations & Constraints, Layout of Output, Demonstrations/Examples), then rewrites it with the missing pieces filled in. It also produces 4 variants — Packed, Quality, Concise, and Reliable — so you can match the enriched prompt to your use case.

The "Show Changes" diff view that highlights exactly what was added (green) and removed (red) — so it's immediately clear what enrichment actually did to your prompt.

Show HN: Prompt Enricher – paste a rough prompt, get a structured one back

RA_Fisher — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 20:31:15 +0000

Article URL: https://statwonk.com/prompt-enricher/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47328446

Points: 1

# Comments: 1

How Long Do Major Strait of Hormuz Disruptions Last?

RA_Fisher — Sun, 08 Mar 2026 22:45:46 +0000

Article URL: https://statwonk.com/hormuz-duration-model.html

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47302422

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

New comment by RA_Fisher in "Labor market impacts of AI: A new measure and early evidence"

RA_Fisher — Fri, 06 Mar 2026 09:52:57 +0000

Does that extra work bring in more revenue? I think that’s the key question.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "We tasked Opus 4.6 using agent teams to build a C Compiler"

RA_Fisher — Fri, 06 Feb 2026 19:40:20 +0000

Progress can be reviewed over time, and I'd think that'd take a lot of the risk out.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "How AI assistance impacts the formation of coding skills"

RA_Fisher — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:55:41 +0000

I’m a fan of using a variety of methods to teach, no issue with that. My issue is with teachers that don’t admit how the world is changing. Dinosaurs.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "How Jeff Bezos Brought Down the Washington Post"

RA_Fisher — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 00:52:15 +0000

What seems false?

New comment by RA_Fisher in "The Codex app illustrates the shift left of IDEs and coding GUIs"

RA_Fisher — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 23:16:14 +0000

I use them to probabilistically program. They’re better than me and I’ve been at it for 16 years now. So I wouldn’t say they’re superficial at all.

What have you tried to use them for?

New comment by RA_Fisher in "The Codex app illustrates the shift left of IDEs and coding GUIs"

RA_Fisher — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 21:57:37 +0000

Claude, Codex and Gemini can read code much faster than we can. I still read snippets, but mostly I have them read the code.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "How Jeff Bezos Brought Down the Washington Post"

RA_Fisher — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 20:55:24 +0000

Agree, if Bezos hadn’t alienated the readership, they’d probably be doing well.

I used to look up to him before he became an obsequious traitor.

New comment by RA_Fisher in "How AI assistance impacts the formation of coding skills"

RA_Fisher — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 21:27:11 +0000

Very fair. I think even more we underestimate our own sentimentalities. eg- the teacher that believes adding or multiplication has to be done a particular way (like the standard algorithm vs. partial products).

New comment by RA_Fisher in "How AI assistance impacts the formation of coding skills"

RA_Fisher — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 21:23:53 +0000

I think learning arithmetic is a good idea, but it’s only a part of computation. I don’t think we should get too hung up on a particular method of computation (bc there’s so many ways).