Hacker News: mjreacher

New comment by mjreacher in "The exceptional Jordan algebra (2020)"

mjreacher — Mon, 17 Mar 2025 13:33:35 +0000

I wonder if there is any connection of this being on the front page today with this paper [0] being uploaded on arXiv today or if it's just pure coincidence.

[0]: https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.10744

Princeton. General Exams on Theory for Economics PhD 1953 Through 1972

mjreacher — Sun, 19 Jan 2025 20:19:38 +0000

Article URL: https://www.irwincollier.com/princeton-general-exams-on-theory-for-economics-phd-theory-1953-through-1972/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42761353

Points: 3

# Comments: 0

Tell HN: Happy New Year

mjreacher — Tue, 31 Dec 2024 19:06:14 +0000

2024 has been a wild year, both in technology and within the wider world, and 2025 could yet be crazier, so I wish everyone here on one of the real great forums of the internet the best successes in their aspirations and goals in the new year! Long live HN!

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42560976

Points: 3

# Comments: 0

New comment by mjreacher in "Klára Dán von Neumann"

mjreacher — Sat, 29 Jun 2024 17:56:23 +0000

Marina vN Whitman had the book in her possession so I suppose they visited her and got access to it that way. I emailed her back in 2022 about it and she said she was planning on sending it to Josh Levy at the Library of Congress to go with the von Neumann/Klara papers there but I don't know how that ended up going, perhaps the book might be there now.

In a similar fashion Vincent Ford, who was the Air Force colonel responsible for von Neumann when he was in hospital dying of cancer, published a manuscript, Twenty-Four Minutes To Checkmate, on the US crash program for ICBMs focusing on the 1953-1957 period, which obviously overlaps a lot with when von Neumann was involved in those topics. It's held in the Dwight Eisenhower Library in Kansas however it's also only available if you visit in person.

It would be a great boost to the history of science if both texts were either published or scanned and uploaded online to make them significantly more accessible to both scholars and interested laypersons.

New comment by mjreacher in "Klára Dán von Neumann"

mjreacher — Sat, 29 Jun 2024 12:45:37 +0000

I've seen her unpublished memoir, A Grasshopper in Very Tall Grass, quoted in quite a few places and it definitely seems worth publishing, such a shame no publisher has taken any interest in it yet.

In the Lab Oppenheimer Built, the U.S. Is Building Nuclear Bomb Cores Again

mjreacher — Tue, 25 Jul 2023 18:35:18 +0000

Article URL: https://time.com/6296743/los-alamos-lab-plutonium-pits-nuclear-weapons/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36867204

Points: 9

# Comments: 2

New comment by mjreacher in "Potential Links Between the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Origin of Covid [pdf]"

mjreacher — Fri, 23 Jun 2023 23:56:16 +0000

A short thread giving an overview of the report mandated by Congress:

https://twitter.com/jseldin/status/1672390899718840322

Potential Links Between the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Origin of Covid [pdf]

mjreacher — Fri, 23 Jun 2023 23:54:14 +0000

Article URL: https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/Report-on-Potential-Links-Between-the-Wuhan-Institute-of-Virology-and-the-Origins-of-COVID-19-20230623.pdf

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36453819

Points: 4

# Comments: 1

AI should be licensed like medicines or nuclear power, UK Labour suggests

mjreacher — Mon, 05 Jun 2023 21:52:26 +0000

Article URL: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/jun/05/ai-could-outwit-humans-in-two-years-says-uk-government-adviser

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36204408

Points: 4

# Comments: 0

World's spy chiefs meet in secret conclave in Singapore

mjreacher — Sun, 04 Jun 2023 16:54:59 +0000

Article URL: https://www.reuters.com/world/worlds-spy-chiefs-meet-secret-conclave-singapore-2023-06-04/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36187173

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

The World Beyond Ukraine: The Survival of the West and the Demands of the Rest

mjreacher — Wed, 10 May 2023 21:08:54 +0000

Article URL: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/ukraine/world-beyond-ukraine-russia-west

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35893556

Points: 3

# Comments: 0

New comment by mjreacher in "A New Theory for the Assembly of Life in the Universe"

mjreacher — Fri, 05 May 2023 18:52:34 +0000

By the sounds of that article there needs to be more work done on applying abstract notions of complexity to the real world and developing suitable methods for this.

New comment by mjreacher in "The military loved Discord for Gen Z recruiting. Then the leaks began"

mjreacher — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 18:27:12 +0000

Parent post doesn't distinguish between those. It just annoys to see people always talking about governmental or corporate bureaucracy but when it comes to intelligence agencies suddenly it's like they're immune to it and become perfect panopticons of information gathering and analysis.

New comment by mjreacher in "U.S. may change how it monitors the web after missing leaked documents for weeks"

mjreacher — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 18:16:50 +0000

> spying on allies

That is one of the exact purposes those agencies exist for in almost every country of the world.

> possibly misleading the public about casualty numbers

The numbers given in the documents are consistent with the numbers publicly stated by the US military.

> demanding an investigation

For what? I don't see how he is a whistleblower when he hasn't exposed any illegal activity. It's pretty clear from what he friends said that he was doing this solely to impress his friends, which is pretty clearly illegal.

New comment by mjreacher in "The military loved Discord for Gen Z recruiting. Then the leaks began"

mjreacher — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 18:09:31 +0000

Ukraine's Western supporters can propose a ceasefire but why would either side agree to one? Putin seems to be in it for the long haul, he probably knows Western support for Ukraine will gradually go down and then once Russia's military recovers a bit they can go back their original aim of taking all of Ukraine. For Zelenskyy there exists plenty of popular support for trying to take back territory, and unless the US says they'll completely throw them to the wolves and cut off all aid (which would make the US look completely terrible internationally), why would he agree to a ceasefire if he thinks Russia will go back to war once they recover anyway?

New comment by mjreacher in "The military loved Discord for Gen Z recruiting. Then the leaks began"

mjreacher — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 17:51:47 +0000

They literally openly admitted it last November. You can say the special forces part is new but that isn't the point being made by most, which is about US troop boots on the ground, and the military never says which specific type of troops are there anyway for operational security reasons.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/us-military-inspectors-...

New comment by mjreacher in "The military loved Discord for Gen Z recruiting. Then the leaks began"

mjreacher — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 17:49:01 +0000

If ICs were already all over major social media like Discord, then how did these leaks sit spread around unnoticed for almost half a year? I swear every time this comes up people's critical thinking just vanishes into thin air. Mythologizing intelligence agencies as these omniscient entities only benefits them.

Blundering on the brink: The secret history of the Cuban missile crisis

mjreacher — Mon, 03 Apr 2023 09:09:51 +0000

Article URL: https://www.foreignaffairs.com/cuba/missile-crisis-secret-history-soviet-union-russia-ukraine-lessons

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35420559

Points: 3

# Comments: 0

New comment by mjreacher in "Thinking hard makes the brain tired"

mjreacher — Sun, 02 Apr 2023 16:22:17 +0000

On the contrary, John von Neumann was not known to sleep much at all and he was well known for being the fastest thinker alive in his time.

Should scientific journals back political candidates? Probably not

mjreacher — Wed, 29 Mar 2023 09:19:33 +0000

Article URL: https://ananyo.substack.com/p/should-scientific-journals-back-political

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35354612

Points: 3

# Comments: 3