Hirom @ Hirom @beehaw.org

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76

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603

Joined

2 yr. ago

I wonder to what extent gambling addiction is fueling the growth of casual/social gaming.

Loot boxes in video games have been linked to problem gambling.

Candy Crush is using a strategy that is "known as a variable ratio schedule of reinforcement and is the same tactic used in slot machines".

Tianjin Huarong Aviation, has transferred four Airbus helicopters to Russia since the war began

Whoever sold these European-made helicopters should be worried. Whoever is in charge of sanctions and export control rules in the EU will probably look into this.

Update: Airbus has at least one helicopter factory in China, so these weren't necessarily manufactured in the EU. Anyway, still not looking good for people involved.

This was a peaceful endeavors from Russia that should be encouraged. There's no need to compare this specific mission to the invasion of Ukraine.

International scientific collaboration is one of the few things that can keep diplomacy going amongst rivals.

That make sense. Thanks a lot.

So overall income tax in Boston, MA for the highest bracket is 46%. That's comparable to many european countries. Although brackets are probably very different.

an additional 4% income tax on state residents' incomes above $1 million

The standard state income tax rate in Massachusetts is 5%.

Does that mean the highest earners have a 9% income tax in that area? Either that's very low, or this article isn't very clear on actual tax rates.

I wonder what would Sakharov say about today's Russia.

I played Watch Dogs 2 back when there were enough players to make it interesting, then Watch Dogs Legion but didn't enjoy as much as the previous one. Played a couple single-player video games since.

I wouldn't say the patriarchal or hierarchical structure is a blind spot of Star Trek. They were ahead of their time. But if looking back at episodes from 1960s with today's perspective, it does look dated and weak w.r.t representation of women and minorities.

Men are overrepresented in positions of power, especially in earlier series, but Star Trek has women acting as officers, captains and admirals.

Starfleet's structure is military-like and hierarchical however it's not depicted as a perfect structure. Captains or lower-rank officers regularly break orders, often get a pass afterward when their actions are justified.

Also, United Earth has a civil government, so does United Federation of Planets. The series focuses on the defense/exploration branch of the federation, which has a military structure. But it's not representative of the structure of government for the whole federation.

Did he just realize that a prompt to "write an article to defend position X or denigrate Y" can be entered into ChatGPT, rather than emailed to the newsroom?

We urge policymakers to instead draw on solid scholarship that investigates the harms and risks of AI—and the harms caused by delegating authority to automated systems, which include [...] damage to the welfare state and the disempowerment of the poor [...]

I got an example of that yersterday, when calling FedEx's over the phone to schedule a pickup.

Contrary to calls I've made in the past, it was answered by a chatbot instead of humans. This raise various problems, in particular for already-disenfranchised people who rely on customer service being available over the phone.

• A disclaimer says "This call may be recorded for training purpose", there was no asking for consent, no way to opt-out. Does that mean my voice and conversation will be fed into a database to develop DL/LLM AI systems? There's no simple way to know, or to refuse without hanging up (ie opt-out = being denied service).
• The chatbot had a hard time understanding my inquiry, forcing me to repeat/rephrase it multiples times. In the end it replied it's not possible to schedule pickups over the phone. This was possible back when humans were on the phone. Internet access is now required. Meaning disenfranchised people with no (easy/dependable) Internet are being left out.
• The chatbot used a generic greeting, didn't introduce itself properly, and was evasive when I asked "are you a human?". Not being forthcoming will confuse some old or non-tech-savy people who won't easily realize it's a robot, not a human.

According to this article:

Last year, the company wrongly predicted demand for chicken would be strong at supermarkets in November and December, King has said.

Also in 2022:

If our planet Earth is to continue feeding us in the future, rich countries must significantly reduce their meat consumption -- ideally by at least 75 percent

Meat consumption must fall by at least 75 percent, April 25, 2022

So it was not only poor foresight, but also betting people would be putting the environment at even more risk by increasing meat consumption.

Can't say I feel bad for Tyson. But sadly workers will suffer from plants closure caused by bad planning.

Good point on observational studies being of limited use.

People who eat nuts may be less likely to eat chips or processed food in general. So an observational study probably wouldn't tell whether the nuts themselves have positive effects or not. But it's probably not a bad thing unless you're allergic.

My takeaway is: Make sure your tetanus vaccine is current. Use disinfectant even for tiniest cut/wound. Hope prevention is enough, but know how to recognize infection symptoms.

If you're willing to setup a business for this, there are services that provide registered office addresses at different locations, basically a mailbox for registration purpose.

For conveniency pick a city relatively close, but not necessarily your city of residence. Lookup services in your country to get details and prices.

It'll have a cost, and it won't make it perfectly anonymous, company records probably will show your name, and the registration/hosting service know who you are.

It really depends who you want to prevent from having your identity. It's likely impossible to receive money while being perfectly anonymous from all involved parties.

It's a common pattern with headlines. When I see this I assume the headline was modified for clickbait sake, by an editor or someone who didn't write the article. And it probably make the author cringe.

It's odd that rail companies would fight safety measures so hard. Derailments must be bad both the specific company operating the train (lost property, injured workers, bad publicity) and the whole industry (shipment delays, increased insurance costs, harder recruitment).

I guess mindless cost cutting, and racing to the bottom could explain it. Still doesn't make it right. Not even sure that's economically sound.

Nice illustration, whoever design these is doing a good job.

Exactly, I meant chicken has less impact on the environment than beef. And chicken burger as an alternative to beef burger.

There's more preliminary results from other teams, including a simulation and an actual experiment.

Maybe there's some hope after all. Let's put the champagne in the fridge (not the freezer) in case it's real. It may take a while for the original+replication studies to be peer reviewed and published.

Classic plant-based recipes are usually better than the ones that try to replicate a burger with plants.

So I try to change habits and eat vegetarian recipes more often. Still like to eat burger, with chicken meat since it has a smaller impact on the environment.