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theoriginaldave

Re:Someone behind the software on Sunday October 18, 2026 @02:04PM (#50143618)
Isn't this the premise behind the movie Tron?
This isn't really sci-fi.

This is a normal trip to the emergency room with search and replace for sci-fi terms.

Re:Kagi Magic on Friday June 12, 2026 @04:38PM (#48509173)
Me too!

It's a night and day difference.

If you don't try kagi for a while, you won't realize how much you've given up with Google.

I get so frustrated by finding the exact phrase I'm looking for on the third page of results after 99 paid results.

Or if I search for a specific brand and the first sponsored link is their competitor.

With kagi that all disappears. And you get search results that are ranked based on how well they match your search query.

Also, be sure to try their LLM research tools, and you'll get a taste of how great it could be.

Re:The purist's guide to phở in Hanoi on Tuesday April 21, 2026 @09:05AM (#47848246)
He did speak a little distainfully of taking pictures of your pho or having your phone handy while eating.

I think the lack of pictures emphasizes focusing in the moment and enjoying the experience and then remembering it fondly later.

I for one can't wait to be a confident CodeSpeak programmer /sarc

Does this make it a 6th generation language?

Re:Parental Controls Aren't for Parents on Friday January 02, 2026 @07:07PM (#46471121)
I think it's an abdication of parental responsibility to let a child use Internet-connected devices without adult supervision.

Nothing connected to the Internet can protect children from seeing information they couldn't see (as determined by culture/familial mores), meeting potentially exploitative strangers, being exposed to a highly curated stream of marketing content and targeted AI messaging (including social media feeds).

I believe that Internet sites and apps should not have age controls.

I believe that physical Internet access (computer, phone, TV, etc) should require an adult ID to purchase (but not logged, like cigarettes, alcohol, etc) l and the the owner of the device is responsible for its use.

If they hand it over to a minor and they are harmed, then the original adult is liable (like alcohol).

This holds someone with material motive accountable. And it becomes jurisdiction-specific accountability (location of the device).

And in the case of parents, if they allow their kids to use one of the parent's devices then they are responsible for how the kid uses it. And directly responsible for how it's used, what's allowed and what's not.

You can't trust a mega+corp with protecting your kids.

Does anyone remember the movie Brainstorm?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainstorm_(1983_film)

Re:Maintaining weight loss on Wednesday July 30, 2025 @03:46PM (#44738722)
Back to the OP, the hunger and satiety signals are very complicated and only partially driven by the digestive track.

I'm a fatty. I've lost a lot of weight but my body knows I used to be fat and it wants to be fat again.

A very potent signal for hunger or fatigue is when your fat cells get small i.e. you've burnt a lot of fat, and your little fuel cells are feeling empty. Each shrunken fat cell sends out a chemical "feed me" signal. And they are very very persuasive.

And the kicker is that when you fill them up, they want to be maintained at full. But if they're full too long, or get too full (persistently increase body fat by a few percent(, it triggers mitosis and you now have two half full fat cells who are both shouting "Feed me"

To add insult to injury when you lose weight, you don't kill off fat cells, you just have a bunch of really hungry fat cells shouting for a cheeseburger.

The nice thing about the GLP1 drugs is that they quiet the shouting. So you just don't get the demonic urge to feet all your wilting fat cells.

The bad thing about it is that the shouting is still there, and as soon as you quit the drug, you can get overwhelmed and go back to overeating and your weight and percent body fat go right back up

Re:Maintaining weight loss on Wednesday July 30, 2025 @03:31PM (#44738571)
I think when you're in an energy deficit (aka losing weight), your body will attempt to reduce energy demand by metabolizing materials from the body.

It prefers to power the body from stored glycogen (carbohydrates), next it will try to metabolize stored fat, next it will go for protein sources (muscle and other tissues). In extreme deficits, it'll even start consuming material from the digestive track and other important stuff.

Many people lose weight, get stronger, get faster and surprisingly lose muscle mass at the same time.

But you can prevent that by eating enough protein, adding strength training, not overtraining or extreme deficit, fueling your workouts with carbohydrates, getting high-quality sleep, and minimizing non-meal, non-workout related simple carbohydrates.

#TLDR When you walk down the street, your body is doing all these things mostly carbs, some fat and a little protein. When you start pushing yourself, you burn more energy but in similar ratios. After about 90 minutes or at higher levels of effort, you'll shift to burning more fat and even more protein if you reach ketosis, as your body conserves remaining carb stores for important stuff like thinking.

AND as you exercise, especially as you reach your strength thresholds, you incur damage in your muscles. When you have your recovery meal/drink with carbohydrates after your workout , especially when resting, the insulin spike, triggers your body to consume protein to rebuild your muscles and add more mass/strength.

But if your workouts don't include enough strength training, your body may not get the anabolic muscle building signal, and it may instead focus on reducing weight (via fat and muscle), or increasing nutrient and oxygen flow to the muscles (building hemoglobin, growing capillaries), increasing muscle activation and engagement (new neural pathways), and/or increasing energy creation capacity (growing more mitochondria or expressing more efficient chemical pathways).

Which is why you can get faster, stronger with smaller muscles.

So my recipe for building muscle while losing fat: * Strength train each muscle group in sets of about 10 for 80 reps per week (I shoot for 2 days, whole body, 4 sets of 10 reps). * Prepare for every workout with some carbohydrates and electrolytes * For workouts lasting more than 90 min, especially cardio/endurance, begin consuming carbs at 30 min and consume 90-12g/hr for high intensity (Zone 3 or higher) * Try to consume 2g of whole protein per kg of target body weight. Or 4g per kg of lean body mass. YMMV. these are all rules of thumb. * Wake up at the same time every day, and prepare for bed 9-10 hours before you have to wake up (have a last snack, some water, turn out the overhead lights, start relaxing) so that by the time bedtime rolls around you can fall asleep quickly and get 7.5-9.5 hours of quality sleep

If you're really hitting it hard and you've induced severe muscle fatigue, bump up the protein intake and get more rest and recovery time.

Re:The story behind Caesar salad on Saturday July 05, 2025 @08:25AM (#44472317)
Microplane for the win, and get the minced garlic into the oil as fast as possible. Once the crushed garlic is exposed to air it's flavor starts to change quickly. Planing directly into the oil and stirring it in to coat the particles as quickly as possible preserves the bright spicy flavor of the garlic.
Re:Eye Contact on Monday January 27, 2025 @12:27AM (#42837722)
Yes, just like those convenient parking spaces and seats in the tube
Same.

I don't even think that's a dark pattern, just a stupid pattern

Re:Ask HN: Create audio software akin to physics engines? on Thursday June 20, 2024 @03:58PM (#40742675)
I know companies like Siemens sell very enhanced acoustic modeling and simulation tools. The software is commercial, but if they use standards or open libraries you might be able to make use of them, at least as a starting point for research. https://plm.sw.siemens.com/en-US/simcenter/simulation-test/a...
Re:Ask HN: What was your most humbling learning moment? on Monday June 03, 2024 @09:30AM (#40562449)
Easily, this Ted Talk!

How to tie your shoes https://www.ted.com/talks/terry_moore_how_to_tie_your_shoes?...

I had randomly had shoes untie all my life. I had to teach myself to tie them consistently the same direction.

I can't believe I was never taught this, much less learned it on my own.

Re:Ask HN: How do I balance all my 200 interests in life? on Wednesday May 29, 2024 @08:42AM (#40511350)
Relax. I think with the exception of a passionate few, were all that way.

I would say try something like invest a third of your time and stuff that will help your career.

And invest a third your time in learning new stuff.

And use a third of your time pursuing things that are keeping your interest.

The other piece that I think is really important is you don't have to do all 200 at the same time.

You gave the example of woodworking, it looks like you had a fun time doing it and you enjoyed the work. But you got to a point where it's not your primary passion. That's okay. You can always pick it up later.

I try to take the time to do one or two things in depth as a current interest. But when it ceases to be fun I set it aside.

One of my hobbies that I really enjoy is bicycling. There have been times in my life where I spend 10 hours a week. And there are times in my life where I kind of let it lapse, but I'm back to doing it again and I'm enjoying it.

In general, we live a long time, and the stuff we're interested in will change over time. And the stuff you learned today, will always provide a foundation for your future interest tomorrow.

So give yourself a pass. You don't have to do it all at once. Interesting stuff isn't going away.

Re:Ask HN: Discuss ADHD and your use of medication on Friday May 24, 2024 @09:58AM (#40466349)
I've struggled with ADHD my whole life. And based on my behavior, you'd think it was obvious. I have the inattentive flavor. When I'm "locked-in" on a task or subject, I can focus on it completely, and be completely inattentive to the rest of the world: the house might be on fire, but I've only got one more piece of code to finish.

Also, if I did manage to interrupt my fugue, it was almost impossible to finish the task: for a fossil collection that was half of my natural science semester grade, I spent a weekend walking a creek and limestone quarry and collected 500 fossils, twice the required, but after going home, I never sorted and labeled them, even though I knew what they were when I collected them. I ended up failing the class because of lack of 1 hour of cataloging.

This continued through the rest of school. I entered university with 29 credits due to testing (I can ace any test), but dropped out after two semesters because projects and self-study just didn't happen.

I got lucky in a job as a troubleshooter. Fly into a factory with a software problem, work 18 hour days to find and fix it, and leave a hero. Great for the career, but I would lose a fortune, because I would wait so long to do expense reports and pay credit cards.

This type of ignoring things that you desperately need to do, in lieu of the current easy to focus things is one of the major diagnostic distinctions between being lazy or unmotivated, and ADHD.

I was formally diagnosed with ADHD at age 42, and prescribed Adderall. And it was like shining a light on the world.

I'm 53 now and still taking Adderall.

There was definitely an Adderall honeymoon, but the lasting effects are also apparent.

I now 100% pay my bills on time, I maintain my car on schedule, I keep the house clean. My credit score went from about 500 (poor) to about 800 (excellent).

I still accrue debt and then have to work to pay it off, and lose money on interest, when had I planned I could have just paid cash.

And I'm still constantly harassed (good naturedly) by my Managers to do expense reports (they know I have an issue and accept it and are willing to work with me).

Probably with the right coaching, methods and strict oversight I could have done all these things without drugs, but I would have hated it.

I think the drugs improve my quality of life, and reduce the stress in my life immeasurably (I could probably measure it by stop using them for a year, but I'm not gonna!)

So I think the test needs to be:

1. Does ignoring the things you need to do make you miserable and feel like a failure?

2. Is your quality of life suffering?

3. Do you lose jobs,Relationships, because of these failures?

4. Does it prevent you from doing the things that would make you happy in life?

Re:I'm an Old Fart and AI Makes Me Sad on Friday February 16, 2024 @11:20AM (#39399056)
I share some of the same sentiment.

In Roger Williams's "The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect", a scientist didn't understand the statement made by his pet AI, so he opened up the debugger to see the decision tree and set of axioms that led to the decision, and was able to debug it, prune the logic and make adjustments.

I wish I could do this with ChatGPT. The way human beings reason is as opaque as ChatGPT.

When creating learning systems, I think it should be required to include the capability to visualize the thought process which leads to a result. As much to debug the system as to glean insights into reasoning in general.

Re:Rebecca Solnit: How to Comment on Social Media on Tuesday February 13, 2024 @05:39PM (#39363838)
From the perspective of the typical commenter it could be either lol
Re:Falsehoods programmers believe about time zones (2020) on Tuesday February 13, 2024 @05:37PM (#39363823)
Yes, but for user input for times they normally don't include offset. So if I have a regularly scheduled event at 01:30 on February 29 should it happen at 30 min before 2:00am (2:00am only happens once or 31 min after the first 12:59 am. I can choose one or the other (or both)
Re:Falsehoods programmers believe about time zones (2020) on Tuesday February 13, 2024 @04:10PM (#39362864)
There is not always an unambiguous conversion from one TZ to another.

DST will always give you an ambiguous localized time. If you take input in local time, and it's in the repeating DST window (01:00<=t<02:00 for spring in USA).

Don't get me started on start of day or start of week in multi-TZ /culture environments. If you think times are bad, look at calendars.

Re:Falsehoods programmers believe about time zones (2020) on Tuesday February 13, 2024 @03:24PM (#39362380)
US ET
Re:"Because the I in UI meant 'intent' all along." on Wednesday February 07, 2024 @05:45PM (#39295357)
I'm having trouble because I read the headline "I is for _indent_."

I made it all the way to the caret position before I realized my intent was completely wrong.

Re:Rebecca Solnit: How to Comment on Social Media on Wednesday February 07, 2024 @05:34PM (#39295244)
Basically she's worse than King Jam I'll (that Korean guy)
Re:Rebecca Solnit: How to Comment on Social Media on Wednesday February 07, 2024 @05:33PM (#39295225)
And this will be my first reply of eleventy, calling out the OP as wrong and callous and makes Hitler look like a saint in comparison.
Re:Google Crimes on Monday January 29, 2024 @09:47AM (#39176826)
With uBlock set to kill and no JavaScript, it's just an ugly list of links
I second this.

If the data is available on the open market, it's available for purchase by any legal entity.

How it's used can be criminal but purchasing it is a valid scenario for any entity.

If we're concerned about the NSA using it, we should be concerned about anyone using it.

So I think the bigger debate is why is all of this personally identifiable information available on the open market?

Scratch itself can be fun for kids just making characters and objects move around like an animated cartoon, then add game elements like navigating the character through a maze, then adding stuff like kicking a ball through a goal.

You can probably get that far in a day or two. And if interest persists, advance to customized Minecraft or Roblox.

Re:Ask HN: What will your kids be proud of 10 years? on Monday January 15, 2024 @01:42PM (#39004410)
My mom was an attorney and my dad was an electrical engineer cum real estate agent.

What I'm most proud of is that despite divorce in my family,I never heard my mom nor my dad talk bad or disrespect each other.

When times were really bad and we didn't have much money, I'm so proud of my mom for taking time to take us to parks and find cool water fountains in our town, despite studying for school and working nights.

I lived away from my dad, but I am so proud that I could call him anytime day or night and he would drop what he was doing to talk to me.

By thoughts, words and actions my parents made us kids feel like their priority. And I'm so proud of them both for that.

My mom and dad both were very good at their jobs. But I'm proud of them most for how they were as parents.

I've always told myself that I could be a good man,a good friend, a good partner and a good father whether I'm making French fries or brokering world peace.

And I would be proud of my parents for the same reasons, whether they were flipping burgers or building cathedrals.

Re:Ask HN: Should I medicate my ADHD? on Wednesday December 27, 2023 @09:46AM (#38782405)
I was diagnosed with ADHD in my 40s. I had pretty good coping mechanisms and like you I was fairly successful.

I always thought the hyper focus that comes with inattentive ADHD was my superpower. And I was a successful troubleshooter, because I was good in a crisis. I could easily detach from whatever else was going on to solve the puzzle in front of me.

But I had challenges, poor credit record, hard time paying bills on-time (or overpaying), filing taxes, performing many life maintenance tasks,and of course the attendant self-esteem, clinical depression and imposter syndrome issues.

I worked with a psychiatrist and my general doctor, mostly to edducate myself and to learn why my symptoms worked the way they did.

I started taking medicine for it 10 years ago. It has a very short half-life so you don't have to take it every day. And if you don't like it you can quit cold turkey and try a different therapy.

My credit score is excellent now (more than 200 points improvement), I'm more successful and productive at work (even when I'm bored), my depression is basically gone. I still sometimes feel like I'm a fraud about to get caught. And it's still damn near impossible for me to do things like timesheets or expense reports.

But I think for my experience, the combination of medical and psychological therapy has improved my quality of life immeasurably (except for the above measurable improvements).

Wasn't that a quote by Hagbard Celine in the Illuminatus! Trilogy by Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea

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