Hacker News: virissimo

New comment by virissimo in "Ask HN: What Are You Working On? (April 2026)"

virissimo — Sun, 12 Apr 2026 20:37:28 +0000

I'm beginning to homeschool my kids in computing, and we are pairing up chapters of The Elements of Computing System (the Nand2Tetris book) with games that teach similar skills/kinds of thinking (Human Resource Machine, Comet 64, etc...), but we didn't find anything to supplement the first two chapters (where you build basic chips up to an ALU in HDL). I ended up starting creating a kind of browser based kata for those chapters here:

https://virissimo.info/build-your-own-alu/

LMK what you think.

New comment by virissimo in "How to Keep ICE Agents Out of Your Devices at Airports"

virissimo — Wed, 25 Mar 2026 15:39:47 +0000

The quote literally contains the string "Transportation Security Administration" in it.

New comment by virissimo in "Tim Bray on Grokipedia"

virissimo — Fri, 31 Oct 2025 22:39:20 +0000

Some left-coded popular conspiracies:

1. The Iraq war was a plot to steal oil reserves

2. World Economic Forum / IMF intentionally impoverish nations

3. Police across America are systematically hunting and executing Black men (thousands per year), but are protected by racist institutions

4. Trump assassination attempts were false flag operations

5. Big Pharma deliberately hides natural cures for cancer to protect corporate profits

New comment by virissimo in "SQL Anti-Patterns"

virissimo — Sun, 19 Oct 2025 00:32:18 +0000

There are ZIP codes that overlap a city and also an unincorporated area. Furthermore, there are zip codes that overlap different states. A data model that renders these unrepresentable may come back to bite you.

New comment by virissimo in "Menstrual tracking app data is gold mine for advertisers that risks women safety"

virissimo — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 23:06:21 +0000

While it's true that CNN ran an article like that, the underlying claim has been formally rebutted by the West Virginia Prosecuting Attorneys Association, who clarified that:

> Women who experience miscarriage are not required to notify law enforcement and should not fear prosecution…recent public statements do not reflect the consensus of West Virginia prosecutors.

https://wchstv.com/news/local/wva-prosecuting-attorneys-deno...

New comment by virissimo in "The Truth about Atlantis (2019)"

virissimo — Tue, 22 Apr 2025 22:33:31 +0000

Many European scholars did consider Troy fictional. For example, Jacob Bryant's "A Dissertation concerning the War of Troy" (1796) explicitly argued that Troy never existed as a real city and that the Trojan War was purely mythological. He thought Homer's place names derived from Egyptian and Phoenician religious vocabulary, so the entire Trojan War narrative should be interpreted as imported solar allegory without any historical basis.

New comment by virissimo in "Why hasn't commercial air travel gotten any faster since the 1960s? (2009)"

virissimo — Tue, 11 Feb 2025 00:11:46 +0000

Perhaps it's more likely at an American airport, but I've been asked to remove shoes in both the UK and Portugal when flying to other European countries.

Understanding the Tech Right

virissimo — Mon, 10 Feb 2025 04:55:20 +0000

Article URL: https://www.richardhanania.com/p/understanding-the-tech-right

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42997075

Points: 5

# Comments: 1

New comment by virissimo in "Why DeepSeek had to be open source"

virissimo — Thu, 30 Jan 2025 18:58:55 +0000

Your original claim was that "only European powers had the urge for colonization," but now you're citing Arab, Egyptian, and Phoenician examples. Do you see these as exceptions? If so, wouldn't that contradict your original claim? Or are you reconsidering your definition of colonialism—or using "European" in a broader sense (that somehow includes Arabs and Egyptians)?

New comment by virissimo in "Why DeepSeek had to be open source"

virissimo — Wed, 29 Jan 2025 18:15:24 +0000

> Only european powers had the urge for colonization, no other civilization in Americas, Africa or Asia really ever want to colonize, expand perhaps but not really colonize.

* Inca Empire: Relocated entire communities (the mitmaqkuna) into new provinces to cement imperial control—these were explicit colonies with an imposed administrative and cultural framework.

* Ancient Egypt: Occupied Nubia, built forts, stationed garrisons, and imposed Egyptian officials and religion on the local population.

* Mongol Empire: Installed governors across conquered regions stretching from Eastern Europe to East Asia, moved artisans and workers to bolster Mongol centers, and demanded tribute—hallmarks of a colonial system.

* Imperial China: Established commanderies in newly acquired territories (e.g., southern China), encouraged Han settlement, and superimposed its bureaucracy over local governance.

New comment by virissimo in "Who is Marcellus Williams: Execution in Missouri despite evidence of innocence"

virissimo — Wed, 25 Sep 2024 22:37:10 +0000

Prior convictions are evidence in the broad sense (because they provide information that could update one's belief about a defendant's character or likelihood of committing a crime), but not legally admissible evidence (in many jurisdictions).

New comment by virissimo in "Fast Crimes at Lambda School"

virissimo — Wed, 19 Jun 2024 17:09:40 +0000

I did a year of computer science, but ended up going to App Academy with an ISA, because I couldn't really afford another couple of years. If ISAs are indentured servitude, but are still better than going to university, then what does that say about universities?

New comment by virissimo in "Ancient Chesapeake site challenges timeline of humans in the Americas"

virissimo — Mon, 20 May 2024 16:16:37 +0000

A series of ordinary evidences can collectively make an extraordinary claim more probable than its negation.

New comment by virissimo in "Deaf girl is cured in world first gene therapy trial"

virissimo — Thu, 09 May 2024 18:32:00 +0000

Perhaps we should have different words for voluntary (choosing to regain your hearing, etc...) and coercive (forced sterilization, etc...) "eugenics", since almost all of the negative connotations of the word are (rightly, IMO) attributed only to the latter.

New comment by virissimo in "Daniel Dennett has died"

virissimo — Fri, 19 Apr 2024 19:16:25 +0000

jhbadger: But logicism, the idea that all of math can be reduced to logic, is itself a controversial philosophical thesis!

New comment by virissimo in "Sam Bankman-Fried sentenced to 25 years in prison"

virissimo — Thu, 28 Mar 2024 20:21:23 +0000

His likelihood of re-offending is low because he now has a near universally bad reputation and so is much less likely to be trusted with other people's money in the first place.

Whether that means he should have a shorter sentence depends on the purpose of criminal sentences. If the purpose is punishment or deterrence, re-offense probability isn't as relevant, but if it is merely to protect others while he is put away, it is the most relevant consideration.

New comment by virissimo in "Universal Basic Income Has Been Tried over and over Again. It Works Every Time"

virissimo — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 18:48:20 +0000

There absolutely is a tradeoff between defense and civilian spending: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guns_versus_butter_model

New comment by virissimo in "According to Plutarch, Julius Caesar was once captured by pirates"

virissimo — Wed, 06 Dec 2023 05:21:56 +0000

The books of Samuel and Kings from the Hebrew Bible predate Herodotus' Histories by quite some time.

New comment by virissimo in "Home schooling's rise from fringe to fastest-growing form of education"

virissimo — Tue, 31 Oct 2023 23:02:24 +0000

This scenario is most commonly found in prison.

New comment by virissimo in "Tesla union strike fails in Sweden as workers refused to walk out"

virissimo — Mon, 30 Oct 2023 16:52:38 +0000

The principal-agent problem is a fully general problem and is not unique to the USA.