Hacker News: quantified

New comment by quantified in "Peter Thiel: The Education of a Libertarian"

quantified — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 17:04:45 +0000

> I stand against... the ideology of the inevitability of the death of every individual.

Ok. Stars die. This is insane.

New comment by quantified in "A missing underscore sent innocent man to prison for 18 months"

quantified — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 23:55:02 +0000

There was evidence. Just not pointing to him.

New comment by quantified in "A missing underscore sent innocent man to prison for 18 months"

quantified — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 23:52:51 +0000

It would take anyone reviewing the evidence noticing the double underscore. Part of what makes this infuriating is that it's the type of error we as individuals are prone to making or not noticing on some days.

As the defendant, I'd have been terrified that all this seems to be me yet isn't.

New comment by quantified in "US DOT deleting bike lane references"

quantified — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 22:29:24 +0000

Real Republicans do not bicycle. Plain and simple.

A missing underscore sent innocent man to prison for 18 months

quantified — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 22:10:15 +0000

Article URL: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/07/police-missed-one-underscore-and-sent-the-wrong-man-to-prison/

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49076116

Points: 385

# Comments: 249

New comment by quantified in "The Economist interviews Elon Musk"

quantified — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 18:39:07 +0000

That chain of events assumes that course correction loops don't occur. Producers won't overproduce for more than a fiscal quarter, maybe two. It'll be messier than that. And investors will pull their money out of anything unprofitable and put it somewhere else. There will be somewhere else.

Think about this social disruption: if money doesn't have meaning, what does the plutocracy do to stay relevant and keep their islands and relative wealth? How will those things be defined?

New comment by quantified in "Uncle Bob does not read the code anymore"

quantified — Fri, 24 Jul 2026 20:41:32 +0000

Beginning of another. Proper cusp here.

New comment by quantified in "The Economist interviews Elon Musk"

quantified — Fri, 24 Jul 2026 06:04:49 +0000

That's the argument, but everyone who runs a factory knows not to run it so hard that profits dip. No one will allow their profits to dip. As costs for some tbings decline, prices might decline or might not, depends on the mood. Eventually, the need for profits to eternally grow will make any "abundance" disappear.

Everything is still run for profit. To shift into abundance mode, we need to give up this economic system entirely. Become the Star Trek economy, not Star Wars or Dune. Maybe the path is to have every government, or the most influential, become so f'd up with things like debt that they decide to blow up the current system so they don't have to actually pay anything back? I mean, the ability to deficit spend shows that actually having money is irrelevant anyway.

New comment by quantified in "The Economist interviews Elon Musk"

quantified — Thu, 23 Jul 2026 20:59:40 +0000

Which he isn't. I will bet $1000 against him, choosing 10 years as my number for "few". Gains accrue to owners, and relatively few own things. By the same token, UBI is a non-starting concept, a government choked for funds by its own trillions of dollars of debt and everyone seeking to pay no taxes has nothing to offer in terms of support for its citizens.

No one can 3-d print their own food or land. Start there. Clothing for free? Huh? Solar panels and batteries (ie energy) for free? Etc.

New comment by quantified in "Did Trump Officials Rig High School Contest Against Sikh Finalist?"

quantified — Thu, 23 Jul 2026 00:41:10 +0000

Leadership of the country, corresponding to many but perhaps not a majority of citizens to say nothing of inhabitants.

That's all pedantic, of course.

The "we" you are referring to isn't the "we" pretending though.

New comment by quantified in "Data centers have united Americans of both parties in a shared hatred"

quantified — Sun, 19 Jul 2026 05:16:31 +0000

Brand new problem, not part of prior partisan or religious divisions.

Maybe other environmental issues will become non-partisan.

New comment by quantified in "Texas spent $4.5M in Spy SUVs that scan phones in 3 minutes"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 23:10:38 +0000

Which one? There are third rails aplenty when dealing with Israel. The "secret cabal running everything" runs into how obvious the political and technical-military influences are.

New comment by quantified in "The US grocery slowdown is real"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 22:37:45 +0000

Probably cuts back on some of the epic waste on the consumer side. Hope that ripples to cutting down waste throughout the system. Paying for stuff that isn't consumed is by definition waste.

New comment by quantified in "Flock CEO Apologizes for Calling Activists 'Terrorists'"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 20:45:10 +0000

And, let's face it: keys give good feedback. If you fumble getting in and fumble starting, you are too drunk to drive. The right friction is good.

New comment by quantified in "Flock CEO Apologizes for Calling Activists 'Terrorists'"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 20:44:02 +0000

They want to surveil widely though. Witness Ring and Amazon. Little Brothers more than Big Brother.

Beware the Ellisons, they're on record for Big Brother.

New comment by quantified in "CO2 overload, detected in human blood, suggests toxic atmosphere within 50 years"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 18:09:40 +0000

IF valid, there could be evolutionary advantage to those capable of calm and rational action in these conditions and, if they formed enough of a tribe, they could flourish.

New comment by quantified in "Truth Social to sell banks 'fastest' access to Trump's posts"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 17:43:06 +0000

Nothing to do with copyright, I bet. There is no SLA in transmitting info.

I think the problem started in Trump I when people accepted tweets as formal public statements rather than requiring a government channel.

New comment by quantified in "Truth Social to sell banks 'fastest' access to Trump's posts"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 17:40:39 +0000

What, like get off our comfortable asses and march on Washington? I mean, when we decry the action level of January 6 it makes it hard to justify actually doing anything.

New comment by quantified in "Something weird is happening with airline pricing"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 13:00:25 +0000

Wouldn't this be explained by customer convenience factor? You pay more for the convenience of a direct flight. You'd really see the difference if there were 2-stop options for that itinerary.

New comment by quantified in "Evidence of inconsistencies in evaluation process and selection of winners"

quantified — Fri, 17 Jul 2026 12:54:11 +0000

As a business plan, the "Uber for _" approach you describe does work sometimes to make money, distasteful as it seems. The Ur-Uber used it very successfully.