Hacker News: dpig_

New comment by dpig_ in "Dubious Math in Infinite Jest (2009)"

dpig_ — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 22:38:43 +0000

I only read it once, in 2016. So the details are fuzzy. Hal's dad cooks his own head in the microwave, right? And Hal comments on how it smelled good or something?

New comment by dpig_ in "Dubious Math in Infinite Jest (2009)"

dpig_ — Tue, 10 Jun 2025 23:50:13 +0000

Not sure, but his dad's got a microwave for a head.

New comment by dpig_ in "Dubious Math in Infinite Jest (2009)"

dpig_ — Tue, 10 Jun 2025 23:48:07 +0000

At about page 300 it starts to pay off hard and you fly through the rest. I definitely recommend giving it another go.

New comment by dpig_ in "AGI is not multimodal"

dpig_ — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 21:32:57 +0000

I don't know how a materialist could answer anything other than no - you are obliterated. And if, despite sharing every single one of your characteristics, that individual on the other side of the teleporter is not 'you' (since you died), then some aspect of what 'you' are must be the discrete episode of consciousness that you were experiencing up until that point.

Which also leads me to think that there's no real reason to believe that this discrete episode of consciousness would have been continuous since birth. For all we know, we may die little deaths every time we go to sleep, hit our heads or go under anesthesia.

New comment by dpig_ in "Fingers wrinkle the same way every time they’re in the water too long"

dpig_ — Thu, 15 May 2025 00:57:31 +0000

I don't doubt that their claims are fantastic rubbish, but you're verifying this by.. feeling the difference with gloves on/off?

New comment by dpig_ in "The Fallacy of Techno-Feudalism (2024)"

dpig_ — Sun, 11 May 2025 04:48:46 +0000

I really don't understand what mechanisms could exist in an ideal free market to stop monopolies. What is a monopoly other than a hyper-successful agent on the free market? What kind of a free market is one that would restrict such a monopoly? It's incoherent.

New comment by dpig_ in "Why Archers Didn't Volley Fire"

dpig_ — Mon, 05 May 2025 11:23:55 +0000

In Warhammer we call it Fall Back in Good Order.

New comment by dpig_ in "Ask HN: Why do we celebrate AI-Copilots but reject AI–Generated art?"

dpig_ — Sat, 26 Apr 2025 21:16:22 +0000

Because art is the futile attempt by a conscious subjectivity at expressing their subjective experience. It's fraught and impossible and really beautiful. Meanwhile GenAI is not a subjectivity, cannot express anything.

New comment by dpig_ in "The complex origin story of domestic cats"

dpig_ — Wed, 23 Apr 2025 06:03:31 +0000

Like laptops, you can sometimes interface directly with them via touch, but it's usually not worth the trouble.

New comment by dpig_ in "Crows can recognize geometric regularity"

dpig_ — Mon, 21 Apr 2025 05:05:09 +0000

In the sense that my cat communicates by meowing at me when it's dinner time, sure. But so far I don't think apes are signing about remembered events, future plans, or descriptions of non-immediate reality.

New comment by dpig_ in "How to win an argument with a toddler"

dpig_ — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 04:26:29 +0000

In my experience the Y is often the even more profound disagreement between two people, and explicit discussion of Y could be enough to obliterate a relationship completely.

New comment by dpig_ in "I ditched my laptop for a pocketable mini PC and a pair of AR glasses"

dpig_ — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 02:39:18 +0000

I use Virtual Desktop over home WiFi. I don't even really tweak it beyond that, but I'll sit at an empty desk with a wireless kb+m and a few virtual monitors. Works well!

New comment by dpig_ in "How to win an argument with a toddler"

dpig_ — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 00:28:15 +0000

In a restaurant with no menu, name a soda you'd ask for.

New comment by dpig_ in "I ditched my laptop for a pocketable mini PC and a pair of AR glasses"

dpig_ — Sun, 13 Apr 2025 03:14:30 +0000

What software were you using, Virtual Desktop? I find it super clear in a Quest 3 and I often work for hours in it.

New comment by dpig_ in "Tried to Cancel Adobe. Got Ghosted. Now I Owe $500"

dpig_ — Fri, 11 Apr 2025 03:18:05 +0000

In the cancellation process, take the offer to switch to an alternative Adobe product, then you will be able to cancel that cleanly within a roughly 30-day window as it is considered a new transaction.

New comment by dpig_ in "NaNoWriMo to close after 20 years"

dpig_ — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 03:01:22 +0000

Publishing an AI-written novel is about as thoughtful as a doctor sending you an LMGTFY link with your symptoms.

New comment by dpig_ in "Honey has now lost 4M Chrome users after shady tactics were revealed"

dpig_ — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 00:45:49 +0000

I'd take that as an indictment on those podcasts. All the stuff I listened to / watched that used them in the past has dropped them for more than a year by now.

I think Johnny Harris may still run adverts for them? But I watch him mostly because he's such a suspicious character to begin with.

New comment by dpig_ in "Thoughts on ECS"

dpig_ — Sat, 29 Mar 2025 22:07:32 +0000

Forgive me if I'm wrong about this, still trying to get my head around ECS concepts, but isn't the whole point that data and behaviours are uncoupled? Whereas Unity's Game Objects both hold data and are composed of behaviours (rather than being data-only objects that are operated on from with-out by systems)?

New comment by dpig_ in "AMC Theatres will screen a Swedish movie 'visually dubbed' with the help of AI"

dpig_ — Wed, 26 Mar 2025 05:04:21 +0000

I'm learning a language, and I'd love to be able to filter Netflix titles by language, but they absolutely refuse to do it (I assume because allowing users to filter content would expose how bare the offerings are).

New comment by dpig_ in "US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted"

dpig_ — Tue, 18 Mar 2025 21:16:02 +0000

Well you misquoted the person you responded to by cutting their sentence short. They specifically said that computers don't have the human right to copyright. As in - the right that a human has under copyright law.