Hacker News: kkoncevicius

New comment by kkoncevicius in "System Card: Claude Mythos Preview [pdf]"

kkoncevicius — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 17:28:24 +0000

We can look at the same numbers in different way:

  Error with 91.3% = 8.7%
  Error with 94.5% = 5.5%

  Error reduction = 8.7% - 5.5% = 3.2%

So the improvement is 3.2% / 8.7% = 36.8%

Black-Hat LLMs [video]

kkoncevicius — Sat, 28 Mar 2026 23:16:55 +0000

Article URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sd26pWhfmg

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47558929

Points: 1

# Comments: 0

Moonless Earth Theory

kkoncevicius — Sun, 22 Mar 2026 22:48:34 +0000

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

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47483104

Points: 10

# Comments: 2

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Ask HN: Most beautiful personal blog UI you have ever seen?"

kkoncevicius — Mon, 09 Mar 2026 06:50:56 +0000

https://simonsarris.com/

Genome modelling and design across all domains of life with Evo 2

kkoncevicius — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 19:40:52 +0000

Article URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-10176-5

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47252735

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

Science should be machine-readable

kkoncevicius — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 21:00:01 +0000

Article URL: https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.01.30.702911v1

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46891694

Points: 2

# Comments: 2

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Ask HN: Is it just me or techno-optimism died in the past few years?"

kkoncevicius — Sun, 07 Dec 2025 14:51:09 +0000

A lot of art from the middle ages is anonymous. Painting itself is an extension of the artist, containing the intension of the person producing it and hence no name is necessary. This is a theoretical state of quality, where activity is not measured in numbers or on a scale but is seen as expression of a particular unique human being. Then comes the renaissance and painters begin to attach names to their works. Here starts a crucial shift - a turn from quality to quantity. Certain artists are better than others and hence quality itself is now measured (quantified) using a name of the person. After that the name becomes so prevalent that some works begin to be valuable only because a certain name was responsible in producing that work. Think - Picasso. Quantity starts to take over. Then comes film and comics and ads where the painter is expected to have no individuality, and he is praised for having a style and technique that is replaceable. Same is true for corporate software development by the way. Here the name (the intermediate state connecting quality and quantity) starts to disappear and is often replaced by a name of a "golem" - a corporation. Quantity dominates - more and faster is better, and the more "nameless" the better. Ten years ago one might think that this is the limit of dehumanisation and it cannot move any further. But now we have AI - where a work of art (or other kind of work) cannot be associated with any quality (cannot be given a name) in principle. And quantity (more, faster, cheaper) dominates. When you think in these terms, the "techno-optimism" is just a place somewhere in this arrow moving from quality to quantity. Or in other words moving from a qualitative anonymity (my work is an extension of my being) to quantitative anonymity (the work is not associated with any being). Hence, it is not a stable position.

New comment by kkoncevicius in "A new Little Prince museum has opened its doors in Switzerland"

kkoncevicius — Sun, 30 Nov 2025 13:23:33 +0000

Yes! I didn't understand why I always found the Little Prince story (and by extension "alchemist") so repulsive, until I read that book. Little prince is aimed at people who have lost their idealistic youth qualities and seek to get back in touch with that part of themselves. I had the opposite problem - I never fully left that place.

An unemployed gentleman scholar (2010)

kkoncevicius — Sat, 15 Nov 2025 14:36:34 +0000

Article URL: https://robertedgar.wordpress.com/2010/05/04/an-unemployed-gentleman-scholar/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45937742

Points: 1

# Comments: 0

Publication and Citation-Based Impact

kkoncevicius — Sun, 05 Oct 2025 19:34:19 +0000

Article URL: https://www.rosenberglab.net/impact.html

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45484500

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

Political Representation Gaps and Populism

kkoncevicius — Sun, 24 Aug 2025 12:47:59 +0000

Article URL: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4230288

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45003861

Points: 1

# Comments: 1

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Mark Zuckerberg freezes AI hiring amid bubble fears"

kkoncevicius — Thu, 21 Aug 2025 12:03:12 +0000

Even if they do not strike gold the second time, there can still be a multitude of reasons:

  1. The innovators will know a lot about the details, limitations and potential improvements concerning the thing they invented.
  2. Having a big name in your research team will attract other people to work with you.
  3. I assume the people who discovered something still have a higher chance to discover something big compared to "average" researchers.
  4. That person will not be hired by your competition.

The Rock Art of Serrania De La Lindosa

kkoncevicius — Sat, 09 Aug 2025 18:22:45 +0000

Article URL: https://www.earthasweknowit.com/pages/serrania_de_la_lindosa_rock_art

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44848821

Points: 29

# Comments: 2

New comment by kkoncevicius in "3D Line Drawings"

kkoncevicius — Tue, 05 Aug 2025 10:08:34 +0000

I was dazzled with the drawing itself. Then by accident I discovered you can zoom in and out too. And on top of that - you can also rotate 360 degrees around the object.

Too far out of my field for me to understand how impressed I should be - but I am impressed.

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Ageing accelerates around age 50 ― some organs faster than others"

kkoncevicius — Sat, 26 Jul 2025 19:07:17 +0000

The average life expectancy was low because of more deaths during childhood and wars. But the natural lifespan was more or less the same as it is today. For example, take a look at famous philosophers or politicians from Ancient Greece. Majority of them lived to about 70-80 years of age.

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Ageing accelerates around age 50 ― some organs faster than others"

kkoncevicius — Sat, 26 Jul 2025 19:05:24 +0000

Such arguments go both ways. For example, if aging is accumulation of damage and not programmed, then why don't we see lucky people who live 5 times longer. Also how come the patterns of aging are so similar between individuals and even between different species (wrinkly skin, grey hair, fragile bones).

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Ageing accelerates around age 50 ― some organs faster than others"

kkoncevicius — Sat, 26 Jul 2025 18:13:22 +0000

This would be an optimistic scenario and introduce a possibility for the "scheduled gene program" to be controlled or turned off. The current thinking in the field seems to favour the idea that aging is a complex combination of programmed changes, stochastic damage, as well as various adaptations to help cope with the damage.

New comment by kkoncevicius in "Alto turns your Apple Notes into a website"

kkoncevicius — Fri, 25 Jul 2025 02:59:16 +0000

> I use apple notes a lot but never thought of making it into a website. Is this homepage a notes app site?

Same question. Is there an example of how the final website might look like?

New comment by kkoncevicius in "The 90% Gravity Problem: Why We Tend to Quit Right Before the Finish Line"

kkoncevicius — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 08:58:03 +0000

I am writing to add two other possibilities.

Within myself I notice that the project becomes boring when there is nothing new left to be learned from it. Depending on the project this could happen at 50% completion or 90% completion. Take scientific research for example. For me there is a lot of motivation to figure things out, to fill the gaps, to make sure everything is solid. But then there is the mundane part of putting it into text and publishing. And my energy is not in there. I already know what will go into that paper, I know getting it out will count as "success" and I know it should be shared. But my libido is not in it.

Another thing - the end of a big project signifies a big change. If you worked on something for a long time, what will you do once it's finished? Norman Finkelstein in one of his interview put it like that (paraphrasing): "I think some people genuinely don't want to end the conflict [between Israel and Palestine] because they built their whole life around it. In the past it was a problem for me as well. I have spent my whole academic career writing about this conflict. I read enough books to fill this room. Literally. If the conflict ends tomorrow - what am I going to do with my life?".

New comment by kkoncevicius in "DNA floating in the air tracks wildlife, viruses, even drugs"

kkoncevicius — Fri, 20 Jun 2025 12:36:42 +0000

I think there is a general over-emphasis on DNA. There is no process in nature that builds a cell out of DNA. Instead DNA is just part of the cell and the cell can slice-and-dice its own DNA however it wants. Neutrophils even throw their DNA outside of the cell in order to build traps for bacteria.

https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/getting-over-the...