Hacker News: happytoexplain

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 19:16:29 +0000

Guarantees are rare and not a realistic bar for action.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:32:13 +0000

There was never a mask. People have always cared more about their own country than their supposed political party.

If you made assumptions that turned out to be wrong, that might look like a "mask".

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:27:56 +0000

Yes, exactly. Without a hint of pettiness or subjectivity: To say that many of these individuals are bad at the job would be an understatement. They might as well be random non-English-speakers grabbed off the street and told "write a React app" or "administer this database" or "perform data analysis".

It's not their fault. But it's demeaning in the extreme to the experienced, dedicated natives who are forced to work with them.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:22:13 +0000

My experience and sincere belief is that your experience is not representative.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:19:21 +0000

>This is just a nativist, anti-immigrant move

Yes, but what is the implication of the word "just"?

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:15:57 +0000

I agree that the cruelty is disgusting and unnecessary, but you're going to have a very, very hard time convincing people that removing foreigners will not free up jobs for Americans.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:13:34 +0000

In real life, people speak to each other casually. I have heard the gendered version of the exact same sentence from a hiring manager at my (very large) employer.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:11:39 +0000

This violates the HN rule, "Assume good faith." I'm not a rules-absolutist by any means, but there is nothing materially here to reasonably validate an accusation of astroturfing. We simply can't know.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:06:18 +0000

This is one of those horrible moments that happen once every decade or two for me:

Somebody I believe is spiritually hideous, morally corrupt, and plain old incompetent, saying something I am in atomically perfect alignment with, using almost the exact same words I would.

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:03:06 +0000

Why can't it just be Netflix wanting to choose from a larger pool?

New comment by happytoexplain in "Trump administration is suspending Microsoft from a green card program"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 18:00:01 +0000

Yes, you are of course correct, lots of large businesses do this, and hopefully they extend this scrutiny to all businesses.

I'm not sure what about this made you question your intuition. Is there something about this story that made you think it might only be Microsoft doing this?

New comment by happytoexplain in "Why the AI future will be awesome"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 15:15:14 +0000

Exactly, I assume this is the kind of thing the author is thinking about. But going this far into the extremes of theoretical physics and calling it "hard, but possible" is somewhat misleading on their part. Commercial fusion power is "hard but possible", and even that's an understatement. Ship-mounted matter-antimatter power or whatever should not be implied to be within the same category.

New comment by happytoexplain in "'The eels were climbing out of the water to die'"

happytoexplain — Thu, 08 Oct 2026 14:45:41 +0000

What on earth are you even referring to? Everything written in the article seems relevant. Isn't the claim that this entire lake was killed due to negligent pollution from an upstream farm, and is one of many cases? Isn't the conclusion that these cases are caused by a lack of regulation/enforcement?

New comment by happytoexplain in "AI firm HUMXN offers free plumbing and HVAC service in Minnesota to train robots"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 17:41:07 +0000

Yes, "truly skilled" contractors get work entirely through word of mouth. All the best contractors I have discovered were through a relationship, and are always fully booked, frequently doing work on my home due to our relationship, and not due to natural availability.

New comment by happytoexplain in "AI firm HUMXN offers free plumbing and HVAC service in Minnesota to train robots"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 17:33:47 +0000

>I didn’t expect this kind of response

Sorry, but how?

New comment by happytoexplain in "AI firm HUMXN offers free plumbing and HVAC service in Minnesota to train robots"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 17:29:45 +0000

I can't believe I'm seeing this common low-quality "what do tradeys even do" fallacy as the top comment on an HN submission. It makes me want to cry that we are so fucked as a culture that we are scoffing at how much tradesmen charge (not that there aren't conmen in every single sector).

New comment by happytoexplain in "Sharing AI progress in mathematics"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 16:38:24 +0000

Only if you believe that subsistence is ideal.

New comment by happytoexplain in "AI firm HUMXN offers free plumbing and HVAC service in Minnesota to train robots"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 16:26:24 +0000

Yes, it's a similar situation (though with software, replacement of existing workers and augmentation of existing workers are both possible, while in the physical world, replacement is more natural, assuming robotics gets to that point). What are you implying?

New comment by happytoexplain in "AI firm HUMXN offers free plumbing and HVAC service in Minnesota to train robots"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 16:20:18 +0000

In all parts of society, there is a subjective spectrum between "making work more efficient" and "directly replacing significant numbers of workers in a period too short to adjust to avoid suffering". The closer you get to the latter, the more you are a "traitor". Use of LLMs for software development falls all over the spectrum, case-by-case.

New comment by happytoexplain in "AI firm HUMXN offers free plumbing and HVAC service in Minnesota to train robots"

happytoexplain — Wed, 07 Oct 2026 16:17:44 +0000

>When no one has a job we will figure out a way to make it work.

Mind-bogglingly casual acceptance of civil war when all you had to do was change the order to put "We will figure out a way to make it work" before "No one has a job".