Hacker News: gehwartzen

Land animals and ecosystems walloped in wake of end-Permian mass extinction

gehwartzen — Sun, 11 Oct 2026 09:16:59 +0000

Article URL: https://nhmu.utah.edu/press/land-animals-and-ecosystems-walloped-wake-end-permian-mass-extinction

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50041237

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

New comment by gehwartzen in "True Rate of Unemployment"

gehwartzen — Wed, 02 Sep 2026 04:24:48 +0000

Just because the economic system we have has always been shitty for a high percentage of our neighbors doesn’t mean it always has to be that way. Other top economic countries being similar doesn’t excuse it.

New comment by gehwartzen in "Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown"

gehwartzen — Tue, 25 Aug 2026 16:43:00 +0000

For those wanting more inspiration for similar builds, this reddit community is pretty good: https://www.reddit.com/r/shedditors/

New comment by gehwartzen in "Building a backyard office, the build and cost breakdown"

gehwartzen — Tue, 25 Aug 2026 16:35:46 +0000

Honestly, I would recommend just doing it yourself. Especially if you have a contractor pull in the electrical connection for it. I installed a pre-charged unit in a much more complicated attic setup (condenser mounted to outside wall on second floor, 20' of refrigerant lines run with lots of angles) and the whole thing took 6-8 hours with no experience. Mounting it to a shed where you're basically just cutting a hole in a wall and the indoor unit and outdoor unit are in more or less the same location should be extremely straight forward. The unit cost me less than $1k five years ago and has been running perfectly ever since.

New comment by gehwartzen in "Why skilled workers come to Germany and then leave again"

gehwartzen — Tue, 07 Jul 2026 19:23:34 +0000

One thing I will point out is that some of this partially due to coming to Germany with a US passport. Specifically, banks in Europe are increasingly weary of allowing US passport holders to open full account due to the international reach of the IRS and the additional bourdons it creates for banks. A US citizen living abroad still has a responsibilities with regard to reporting financial activities to the IRS. This is an extra liability and risk for foreign banks so in many cases they chose to simply not deal with Americans.

I was born in Germany and have a German passport. When I was a teen my family moved to the US and and have since also gotten my American citizenship. I have been considering moving back. I talked to my aunt who lives in Switzerland who told me not to bother trying to open a Swiss account it’s virtually impossible as long as you have a US passport. Germany is slightly better but at most there are 2-3 (mainly online only) banks where you might be able to get a basic (ie bare bones) account.

The IRS has the ability to compel foreign banks to freeze assets of US citizens living abroad or at least to make it a paperwork nightmare for them. I can understand why a company might not want to promote an individual to senior positions if banks are weary of dealing with them.

Murmur: A Speaker with a World Inside

gehwartzen — Sat, 27 Jun 2026 20:50:13 +0000

Article URL: https://www.murmur.living/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48701629

Points: 4

# Comments: 1

New comment by gehwartzen in "NASA announces 3 uncrewed missions to moon this year to prepare to build a base"

gehwartzen — Fri, 05 Jun 2026 07:33:59 +0000

50 years on and still perfectly apt:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=goh2x_G0ct4&pp=0gcJCUACo7VqN5t...

Taxicab Geometry

gehwartzen — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 06:22:19 +0000

Article URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taxicab_geometry

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48353259

Points: 5

# Comments: 1

New comment by gehwartzen in "Richard Dawkins concludes AI is conscious, even if it doesn't know it"

gehwartzen — Thu, 07 May 2026 03:24:20 +0000

Makes you wonder who our gods are ;)

New comment by gehwartzen in "America's Expanding Domestic Surveillance"

gehwartzen — Sat, 02 May 2026 17:54:53 +0000

When it comes to Flock in particular I’ve been seeing a lot more in terms of resistance and pushback in local Reddit communities. At least in my cities sub I see posts regarding anti-flock messaging or related activities at least once a week now.

Found in Peat

gehwartzen — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 03:06:33 +0000

Article URL: https://old.reddit.com/r/fossilid/comments/1sruf2q/found_in_peat/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47858401

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

New comment by gehwartzen in "Shares in shoe brand Allbirds rise 580% after it pivots from footwear to AI"

gehwartzen — Thu, 16 Apr 2026 19:00:38 +0000

The market in general has gone completely off the rails

New comment by gehwartzen in "Shares in shoe brand Allbirds rise 580% after it pivots from footwear to AI"

gehwartzen — Thu, 16 Apr 2026 18:59:10 +0000

“AlBirds, they are in fact real [shoes]!”

New comment by gehwartzen in "Trump administration releases new renderings of 'Arc de Trump' [pdf]"

gehwartzen — Sat, 11 Apr 2026 09:05:16 +0000

Third Reich vibes

Shared Genetic Liability Across Systems of Psychiatric and Physical Illness

gehwartzen — Thu, 09 Apr 2026 10:08:46 +0000

Article URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-69218-1

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47701553

Points: 1

# Comments: 0

New comment by gehwartzen in "Finnish sauna heat exposure induces stronger immune cell than cytokine responses"

gehwartzen — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 18:15:54 +0000

lol. They make formulations you can buy but I make my own. A cup of ground mustard seed, which I buy fairly cheap online, and a few tablespoons of baking soda, plus some essentials oils mainly to cut through the mustard smell.

Pour that in a warm bath and soak for 20 mins. Then get out and wrap yourself in a towel and continue sweating for 15 mins or so.

New comment by gehwartzen in "Finnish sauna heat exposure induces stronger immune cell than cytokine responses"

gehwartzen — Sun, 05 Apr 2026 20:36:26 +0000

This is one of the primary reasons I use a sauna; the cardiovascular benefits. I hate doing cardio exercises at the gym or elsewhere.

New comment by gehwartzen in "Finnish sauna heat exposure induces stronger immune cell than cytokine responses"

gehwartzen — Sun, 05 Apr 2026 20:30:04 +0000

I take a mild bleach bath sometimes and it’s quite invigorating. Seems to kill off a lot of skin surface bacteria which can sometimes be beneficial (there’s good and bad bacteria on your skin).

Not to be done too often but every once in a while I find it helpful. Not all that different from a strongly chlorinated pool.

Another cool one, especially if you don’t have a sauna, is doing a mustard bath. You will sweat like a stuck pig

New comment by gehwartzen in "OpenAI closes funding round at an $852B valuation"

gehwartzen — Wed, 01 Apr 2026 03:25:21 +0000

It seems pretty simple:

Funding Round A: VC “A” invests 200M (100M immediately and another 100M if sales grow 10% or whatever)

At 6 months the company will either get the other 100M automatically (meaning they grew sales 10%) or they don’t (meaning they grew less than 10%).

Assuming it’s the later they can then do another round during which they try to get the other 100M. In all likelihood VC “A” won’t be interested (or interested at a lesser amount). They could go ask VC “B” for an investment but it will likely be less than 100M as well because they didn’t grow as much as “the market” anticipated.

Nothing complicated at all.

I’ll give you $1 dollar for your banana today and another dollar in a week when it has ripened. If it’s rotten when I come to get my banana I won’t give you the other dollar. You have your original $1 and you can still try to sell your rotten banana to another HN reader but you probably won’t get another dollar this time.If instead you have a ripe banana I’m sure you could easily find a buyer.

New comment by gehwartzen in "1B identity records exposed in ID verification data leak"

gehwartzen — Thu, 12 Mar 2026 15:07:39 +0000

At this point I get about 1-2 emails a year telling me some company has exposed my private data in some way. It’s completely routine.

We need a law mandating the company pays at least $1k per exposed record per customer or absolutely nothing will change. The current cost of “here’s a years worth of credit monitoring” doesn’t even amount to a slap on the wrist.