Hacker News: astroflection

New comment by astroflection in "Widespread service disruptions reported as major platforms go down worldwide"

astroflection — Wed, 26 Nov 2025 20:09:11 +0000

Haven't noticed.

New comment by astroflection in "USPTO issues revised inventorship guidance for AI-assisted inventions [pdf]"

astroflection — Wed, 26 Nov 2025 18:05:02 +0000

"Artificial intelligence systems, regardless of their sophistication, cannot be named as inventors or joint inventors on a patent application as they are not natural persons.

...

Therefore, this guidance regarding AI-assisted inventions applies not only to utility patents and patent applications but also to design and plant patents and patent applications"

New comment by astroflection in "Voyager 1 is about to reach one light-day from Earth"

astroflection — Wed, 26 Nov 2025 15:18:35 +0000

Carl Sagan's reflection on the Pale Blue Dot( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pale_Blue_Dot ) image seem relevant:

"From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar", every "supreme leader", every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. "

New comment by astroflection in "Roblox is a problem but it's a symptom of something worse"

astroflection — Tue, 25 Nov 2025 20:12:46 +0000

> And Mojang itself is adding fuel to the fire by...

You mean Microsoft.

Vibe coding: What is it good for? nothing

astroflection — Mon, 24 Nov 2025 21:16:49 +0000

Article URL: https://www.theregister.com/2025/11/24/opinion_column_vibe_coding/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46039438

Points: 5

# Comments: 1

New comment by astroflection in "How Cops Are Using Flock's ALPR Network to Surveil Protesters and Activists"

astroflection — Fri, 21 Nov 2025 20:59:27 +0000

I don't know of a name for this but I would rephrase what you are getting at:

The state uses private entities to get around the constitution while those same private entities use the state to get around regulation.

It's a sick fucking symbiosis.

New comment by astroflection in "Basalt Woven Textile"

astroflection — Thu, 20 Nov 2025 17:27:42 +0000

I wonder how long it takes for the basalt glass to begin to crystalize?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devitrification#Devitrificatio...

New comment by astroflection in "The Banished Bottom of the Housing Market"

astroflection — Thu, 20 Nov 2025 17:04:10 +0000

> The people we now call “chronically homeless” were once simply low-income tenants, housed by the private market in cheap rooms rather than by public programs. Once that market was dismantled, the result was predictable: the homelessness wave of the late 1970s and 1980s followed directly from the destruction of SROs. Today’s crisis—nearly 800,000 unhoused people in 2024—is the long tail of that loss, compounded by decades of underbuilding in expensive cities and soaring rents. As one advocate put it, “The people you see sleeping under bridges used to be valued members of the housing market. They aren’t anymore.”

New comment by astroflection in "When grades stop meaning anything"

astroflection — Wed, 19 Nov 2025 20:08:24 +0000

Regurgitation ≠ learning

Regurgitation involves short term memory and micmicking. It does not build new neural connections.

Learning involves longer term memory, synthesis of new perspectives(in the learner), and integration of knowledge across multiple domains. Learning is the building of new neural connections.

I posit that you did not actually learn how to learn and thus just regurgitated your way through math.

New comment by astroflection in "How to stay sane in a world that rewards insanity"

astroflection — Wed, 19 Nov 2025 16:09:23 +0000

> Yet social-media personalities regularly do a 180° turn on some issue ... and still keep their following and ability to monetize it.

And they asserted that they were totally right the entire time. That's how. And the sheep kept on following them.

New comment by astroflection in "Raccoons are showing early signs of domestication"

astroflection — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 20:25:01 +0000

Yes. It's a nasty parasite: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baylisascaris_procyonis

Raccoons while cute, smart, interesting, etc., should not be considered as pets as long as this parasite exists.

New comment by astroflection in "Lawmakers want to ban VPNs"

astroflection — Fri, 14 Nov 2025 16:17:33 +0000

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Horsemen_of_the_Infocalyp...

New comment by astroflection in "Hemp ban hidden inside government shutdown bill"

astroflection — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 20:25:46 +0000

Too bad there are no technologies that would allow the citizenry to communicate nearly instantaneously and cast their votes in a pseudo-anonymous manner.

New comment by astroflection in "Human Fovea Detector"

astroflection — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 15:16:00 +0000

I get about 4cm wide at 50cm distance.

New comment by astroflection in "Digital ID, a new way to create and present an ID in Apple Wallet"

astroflection — Wed, 12 Nov 2025 18:44:48 +0000

Nope. I will continue to have a DL card so I can choose to leave my phone at home. When we are required to have our IDs on our person at all times I can at least not be tracked everywhere I go.

Be watchful for legislation requiring: * us to have our ID on our person at all times. * IDs to be issued in digital format only.

New comment by astroflection in "Fungus in Chernobyl nuclear disaster zone has mutated to 'feed' on radiation (2024)"

astroflection — Wed, 12 Nov 2025 16:33:29 +0000

https://archive.is/SGbVB

New comment by astroflection in "Think Weirder: The Year's Best SciFi Ideas"

astroflection — Mon, 10 Nov 2025 18:54:55 +0000

A few non-Amazon links for you:

https://www.alibris.com/Think-Weirder-Volume-1-The-Years-Bes...

https://www.betterworldbooks.com/product/detail/think-weirde...

New comment by astroflection in "Mark Zuckerberg Had Illegal School at His Palo Alto Compound. Neighbors Revolted"

astroflection — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 20:53:17 +0000

Or just get a secret tropical island.

New comment by astroflection in "Eating stinging nettles"

astroflection — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 17:21:37 +0000

I first tried nettle soup in Bulgaria. So delicious. FYI you can replace spinach with nettle in almost any recipe and vise versa.

New comment by astroflection in "Solarpunk is happening in Africa"

astroflection — Wed, 05 Nov 2025 21:19:25 +0000

The M-PESA transaction fees are high.

M-PESA helps fight poverty through the ingenious application of a thousand paper cuts.