Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48414367

Points: 469

# Comments: 107

What OP said is definitely true on the micro level-- not "even/might/some aspects", but the whole thing. It's true that in any given organization there are fewer senior roles because of hierarchical nature, it's true that as you progress up the ladder the demands change and increase, and it's true that many people fail or choose not to adapt.

The macro argument seems right as well. If you measure it longitudinally the numbers don't stay constant. It's 1 in 4 today, maybe it was 1 in 10 fifteen years ago. Anecdotally there is definitely something strange going on with the labor market that's new, and that you can't explain by micro realities alone.

The second equilibrium seems more likely-- the capitalist class grants the public a bare minimum to keep us from forcing political action. In the AI world "the minimum" is probably a much better standard of living than we have now, as the marginal cost of many products and services approaches zero. So we end up living much better material lives, but are still not free. Maybe this is stable, or maybe the ruling class loses dominance over time. At that point, who knows.

On a freeway it’s only kind of usable. It switches lanes far too aggressively and for no reason, to the point that it makes the ride uncomfortable.

What I really want is auto steer with lane switching when I signal, which for some reason I could never get working in any mode. It either doesn’t change lanes at all, or changes them arbitrarily of its own volition. And if I change lanes manually it turns off autosteer, which is too irritating to use in practice.

Tesla self driving, in any mode, is a bad product. And I say this as a Tesla fan.

This isn't some nefarious plot to screw over users. Taste is not prioritized because nobody has it and thus can't recognize it. Can't value something you don't even recognize. This is orthogonal to talent btw. Lots of people there who are insanely good at what they do, who produce the most hideous API specs you've ever seen, as one example.

A much more mundane (and almost certainly true) explanation is that people who put all that crap in legitimately thought it's a good idea. Taste is its own thing and it's just not in Microsoft's DNA.

Could you expand on what you mean?

What I don’t understand is why the two parties couldn’t reach agreement. Surely autonomous murderous robots is something U.S. government has interest in preventing.

EDIT: ok with geiser and geiser-racket incremental state buildup works really well. I rescind my objection!

The biggest downside of Racket is that you can't build up your environment incrementally the way you can with Common Lisp/Sly. When you change anything in your source you reload REPL state from scratch. After CL it feels incredibly limiting in a Lisp. Incremental buildup is so valuable, if I wanted to do any Lisp work again I'd reach for CL before Racket just for this reason.

BTW, the book is _great_. Quick, easy to get through, very easy to understand, and teaches you everything from soup to nuts. If you're familiar with lisps you can get through the book in two weeks. It's then easy to get into any deep learning tutorial or project you want, or even start implementing some papers. The book manages not to water down the material despite not using any math at all. Although if you know some linear algebra or multivariable calculus you'll appreciate the beauty of the field more.

[1] https://www.thelittlelearner.com/