ggdG (u/ggdG) - Readit News

ggdG commented on Kimi Released Kimi K2.5, Open-Source Visual SOTA-Agentic Model kimi.com/blog/kimi-k2-5.h... · Posted by u/nekofneko

motoboi · 2 months ago

What amazes me is why would someone spend millions to train this model and give it away for free. What is the business here?

ggdG · 2 months ago

I think this fits into some "Commoditize The Complement" strategy.

https://gwern.net/complement

ggdG commented on Phoenix: A modern X server written from scratch in Zig git.dec05eba.com/phoenix/... · Posted by u/snvzz

dismalaf · 3 months ago

I said build on top of wlroots, not DWL. And I only brought it up as an example of a small Wayland compositor/window manager because the poster I was replying to wants to build their own anyway. DWL is more interesting as a learning exercise than something to use.

ggdG · 3 months ago

> I said build on top of wlroots, not DWL.

Turns out, the wlroots API is so volatile atm that even the developer of the super small compositor DWL has to throw in the towel for now.

> DWL is more interesting as a learning exercise than something to use.

The same is said about DWM, its xorg counterpart, but I, for one, am a happy user of DWM.

ggdG commented on Phoenix: A modern X server written from scratch in Zig git.dec05eba.com/phoenix/... · Posted by u/snvzz

dismalaf · 3 months ago

So build on top of wlroots or something. DWL for example is super small...

ggdG · 3 months ago

Current status:

> 2025-08-16: dwl IS CURRENTLY UN-MAINTAINED. AT THE PRESENT TIME, I (@fauxmight) DO NOT HAVE THE TIME OR CAPACITY TO KEEP UP WITH wlroots CHANGES.

https://codeberg.org/dwl/dwl

ggdG commented on A New Geometry for Einstein's Theory of Relativity quantamagazine.org/a-new-... · Posted by u/jandrewrogers

ggdG · 8 months ago

FTA:

> [Einstein's General Relativity] tells us that the universe is expanding

Does GR really tell us that though?

The way I understood it, GR's differential equations will produce solutions for many different constraints and initial conditions you throw at them. Including the constraints & conditions informed by astronomical observation.

ggdG commented on Woolly mammoth 'de-extinction' is nearing reality livescience.com/animals/e... · Posted by u/Brajeshwar

timoth3y · 2 years ago

They are not operating from the full DNA, but "enough DNA to piece together functional genomes."

However, even if we had pristine copies of mammoth DNA we could not re-create a mammoth.

Complex organisms like mammoths (or humans) are not fully defined by DNA. They are an ecosystem of bacteria and smaller organisms. We don't know the number for mammoths, but about 40% of the cells in the human body are not human. They don't have our DNA. Without them, however, we could not even process food. We get those organisms, not from DNA, but from other humans and the environment around us.

These scientists may be able to create something, and hopefully something that will not suffer horribly, but de-extinction is not nearing realty.

ggdG · 2 years ago

You're ignoring the elephant in the room: frozen mammoth dung.

To restore the gut health of humans, there is this thing called "fecal transplant" [1]: use another person's poo to bootstrap the growth of your own gut microbiome.

There is an abundance of mammoth dung in the northern permafrost. When thawed, its microbiome becomes active again, producing methane. [2]

So resurrecting the woolly mammoth as a species is the hardest part. Equipping the first individuals with a proper gut biome will be really easy.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fecal_microbiota_transplant

[2] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/melting-permaf...

ggdG commented on Astronauts stranded, multiple issues w Starliner – return flight window closing livescience.com/space/spa... · Posted by u/bookofjoe

Sohcahtoa82 · 2 years ago

> I’m probably gonna get banned for this

Not likely, it seems it takes a LOT to get banned from HN.

But still, the assumption that every non-white person hired is a "diversity" hire before even looking at their qualifications is incredibly racist.

ggdG · 2 years ago

> the assumption that every non-white person hired is a "diversity" hire before even looking at their qualifications is incredibly racist.

That's not an assumption that GP makes.

ggdG commented on Harvard Tramples the Truth city-journal.org/article/... · Posted by u/neverrroot

ggdG · 2 years ago

So this is about epidemiologist Martin Kulldorff being fired by Harvard for doggedly sticking to the evidence regarding covid immunity.

Some excerpts:

> With a genetic condition called alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency, which leaves me with a weakened immune system, I had more reason to be personally concerned about Covid than most Harvard professors. I expected that Covid would hit me hard, and that’s precisely what happened in early 2021, when the devoted staff at Manchester Hospital in Connecticut saved my life. But it would have been wrong for me to let my personal vulnerability to infections influence my opinions and recommendations as a public-health scientist, which must focus on everyone’s health.

> Since mid-2021, we have known, as one would expect, that Covid-acquired immunity is superior to vaccine-acquired immunity. Based on that, I argued that hospitals should hire, not fire, nurses and other hospital staff with Covid-acquired immunity, since they have stronger immunity than the vaccinated.

> For scientific, ethical, public health, and medical reasons, I objected both publicly and privately to the Covid vaccine mandates. I already had superior infection-acquired immunity; and it was risky to vaccinate me without proper efficacy and safety studies on patients with my type of immune deficiency. This stance got me fired by Mass General Brigham—and consequently fired from my Harvard faculty position.

ggdG commented on Stories removed from the Hacker News Front Page, updated in real time github.com/vitoplantamura... · Posted by u/Robin89

CamperBob2 · 2 years ago

You can find a meta-analysis to prove anything you want.

It is an extraordinary claim that wearing a mask properly does not reduce transmission of viral particles. You'll need to come up with a physical basis for this unintuitive hypothesis if you want to be taken seriously. Then you can point to studies whose results are explained by that hypothesis.

ggdG · 2 years ago

>You can find a meta-analysis to prove anything you want.

I'm not trying to prove anything. I just rely on the judgement of domain experts.

In this thread I cited Cochrane, The Lancet, SciAm and Science Magazine. If you have more reputable sources, please share them here.

>You'll need to come up with a physical basis for this unintuitive hypothesis if you want to be taken seriously.

It's only unintuitive if you stick to the droplet model. SARS-CoV-2 however spreads like smoke through the air, as I documented already extensively in this post:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39234677

ggdG commented on Stories removed from the Hacker News Front Page, updated in real time github.com/vitoplantamura... · Posted by u/Robin89

Workaccount2 · 2 years ago

You sure?

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/article-abs...

When the medical field phases out masks because they "have no benefit" I will believe that masking was useless. Also keep in the mind that the primary reason for studies showing masks not working is that people don't wear it correctly or at all.

ggdG · 2 years ago

>You sure? >https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/article-abs...

That's just one RCT. The Cochrane meta-analysis looked at a bunch of them.

>When the medical field phases out masks because they "have no benefit" I will believe that masking was useless.

You're putting the cart before the horse. In an ideal world, guidelines for the medical field are based on scientific evidence. But there's always a delay.

You better consult the scientific evidence to make up your mind.

When it comes to covid and masking, policymakers will wait as long as possible before aknowledging the evidence, because they know the public hasn't forgotten the draconian masking of school kids yet.

ggdG commented on Stories removed from the Hacker News Front Page, updated in real time github.com/vitoplantamura... · Posted by u/Robin89

felixgallo · 2 years ago

literally quoting from that meta-analysis, which does not include many clinical trials that have demonstrated an impact:

"Key messages We are uncertain whether wearing masks or N95/P2 respirators helps to slow the spread of respiratory viruses based on the studies we assessed."

Example very large study published in a reputable journal: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abi9069?cookieSe...

ggdG · 2 years ago

>literally quoting from that meta-analysis, which does not include many clinical trials that have demonstrated an impact:

Yes. To their credit, they only looked at randomized controlled trials.

>"Key messages We are uncertain whether wearing masks or N95/P2 respirators helps to slow the spread of respiratory viruses based on the studies we assessed."

In other words: the RCTs don't show an effect to a significant degree.