Hacker News: golemotron

New comment by golemotron in "72% of the dollar's purchasing power was destroyed in just four episodes"

golemotron — Mon, 30 Mar 2026 16:06:53 +0000

The Gompertz function strikes again.

New comment by golemotron in "Show HN: I used Claude Code to discover connections between 100 books"

golemotron — Sun, 11 Jan 2026 17:58:43 +0000

That's true, but it can be a trap. I recommend always generating a few alternatives to avoid our bias toward the first generation. When we don't do that we are led rather than leading.

New comment by golemotron in "Perfect Software – Software for an Audience of One"

golemotron — Wed, 24 Dec 2025 17:23:39 +0000

Yet we see directors as artists. Kubrick, Coppola (both of them), Hitchcock, etc.

New comment by golemotron in "Perfect Software – Software for an Audience of One"

golemotron — Wed, 24 Dec 2025 01:36:51 +0000

Look at it this way. The carver doesn't have to grow the tree. Using an LLM for coding is a lot like being a carver. You can take broad or small strokes and discard what you don't like.

New comment by golemotron in "Classical statues were not painted horribly"

golemotron — Thu, 18 Dec 2025 19:07:23 +0000

I'm in the conserving camp. It's more truthful than the narrativization that accompanies attempts to restore. We should remember that we all had a reptilian vision of dinosaurs for decades (centuries?) before the latest feathered view. We would have been better with neither. Just display the bones: what we have. Everything else burdens the public with guesses.

New comment by golemotron in "Bring bathroom doors back to hotels"

golemotron — Thu, 27 Nov 2025 20:36:59 +0000

It's nice to see a passion project.

New comment by golemotron in "GPT-5.1: A smarter, more conversational ChatGPT"

golemotron — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 17:09:42 +0000

I would go so far as to say that it should be illegal for AI to lull humans into anthropomorphizing them. It would be hard to write an effective law on this, but I think it is doable.

New comment by golemotron in "Unexpected things that are people"

golemotron — Mon, 10 Nov 2025 21:37:29 +0000

Great article but disappointed that the monkey with the camera did not make an appearance.

New comment by golemotron in "YouTube Removes Windows 11 Bypass Tutorials, Claims 'Risk of Physical Harm'"

golemotron — Fri, 07 Nov 2025 21:53:05 +0000

And now 'physical' becomes as hyperbolized as 'violence.'

New comment by golemotron in "Cloudflare tells U.S. govt that foreign site blocking efforts are trade barriers"

golemotron — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 22:27:07 +0000

Sure, you can trade but it is a choice. Claiming that free trade is universally good is saying that there is only one right choice - no barriers.

New comment by golemotron in "Cloudflare tells U.S. govt that foreign site blocking efforts are trade barriers"

golemotron — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 16:24:38 +0000

There are many arguments but the most straightforward one is that a country may decide that preserving particular industries is in their security interest. That can be extended to culture as well.

Japan closed itself off from the world for centuries during the Edo period. One could say that they suffered economically due to that, but on the other hand, they ended up creating one of the more unique cultures in the world, developing in ways very different from others. It's an interesting kind of diversity.

New comment by golemotron in "Cloudflare tells U.S. govt that foreign site blocking efforts are trade barriers"

golemotron — Thu, 06 Nov 2025 16:12:21 +0000

This comes from the dated perspective that free trade is universally good. Nations create their own trade rules and they ought to be able to enforce them. I consider that far preferable than attempts to exert extraterritorial control over services from other countries.

If, say, Uruguay doesn't like content on Facebook, they are free to block it. In their opinion, they are protecting their citizens and that's ok. It should not produce legal action that could result in least common denominator style global content censorship.

In an ideal world, there would be no country level blocking but invariably laws will differ.

New comment by golemotron in "Why don't you use dependent types?"

golemotron — Sun, 02 Nov 2025 18:19:57 +0000

The juice isn't worth the squeeze.

New comment by golemotron in "You did this with an AI and you do not understand what you're doing here"

golemotron — Mon, 22 Sep 2025 12:16:09 +0000

Why do people want to signal their low status?

New comment by golemotron in "Generative AI as Seniority-Biased Technological Change"

golemotron — Tue, 16 Sep 2025 21:42:57 +0000

Isn't every advanced technology is seniority-biased?

New comment by golemotron in "Programming Deflation"

golemotron — Mon, 15 Sep 2025 18:49:35 +0000

..and regulation. The same with supersonic.

New comment by golemotron in "The Culture novels as a dystopia"

golemotron — Mon, 15 Sep 2025 17:04:37 +0000

All utopias are dystopias because they deny reality. With enough perception and wisdom you can find the good in an imperfect universe.

New comment by golemotron in "Second study finds Uber used opaque algorithm to dramatically boost profits"

golemotron — Wed, 25 Jun 2025 15:37:16 +0000

More businesses than the authors can imagine work this way. They really ought to sit down and have a coffee with some salespeople.

New comment by golemotron in "Large language models often know when they are being evaluated"

golemotron — Sun, 15 Jun 2025 14:36:38 +0000

If you know enough cognitive science, you have a choice. You either say that they "know" or that humans don't.

It's like the critique "it's only matching patterns." Wait until you realize how the brain works.

New comment by golemotron in "Corporation for Public Broadcasting Statement Regarding Executive Order"

golemotron — Fri, 02 May 2025 15:04:42 +0000

The idea that Congress can set up agencies that are outside the control of the Executive needs to be revisited. It leads to rogue, unaccountable bureaucracy.