It doesn’t sound like you’re applying online, so this might not apply but:
Write the most fragile resume parser you can. Now make it so your resume can be parsed by it. This made a world of difference for me last go around.
Readit Newsjoey_bob commented on OpenAI's board has fired Sam Altman openai.com/blog/openai-an... · Posted by u/davidbarker
funny, that's exactly what they told him when he started doing Kaggle competitions, and then he ended up crushing the competition, beating all the domain specific experts
This is comparing a foot to a mile
joey_bob commented on JAX – NumPy on the CPU, GPU, and TPU jax.readthedocs.io/en/lat... · Posted by u/peter_d_sherman
I honestly had no idea JAX was useful outside autograd, due to my own tunnel vision. I even used it with other libraries to do this kind of work. Is there a term for this type of mistake?
This reminds me of one of my favorite (due to its uniqueness) local laws in the US:
> In Kennesaw, Georgia, local law says that “every head of household residing in the city limits is required to maintain a firearm.” “If you're going to commit a crime in Kennesaw and you're the criminal – are you going to take a chance that that homeowner is a law-abiding citizen?” asked Kennesaw Mayor Derek Easterling
https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/06/us/kennesaw-georgia-gun-owner...
Almost every time I've heard this mentioned it's framed as "I live in such a backward place, they have a law that requires everyone to own guns."
In almost every country with a dictator and human right abuses, you will find a constitution guarantying civil rights and liberties of the individual...
[1] - "The Constitution of the Russian Federation"
Article 17
1. In the Russian Federation recognition and guarantees shall be provided for the rights and freedoms of man and citizen according to the universally recognized principles and norms of international law and according to the present Constitution.
2. Fundamental human rights and freedoms are inalienable and shall be enjoyed by everyone since the day of birth.
3. The exercise of the rights and freedoms of man and citizen shall not violate the rights and freedoms of other people.
Article 18
The rights and freedoms of man and citizen shall be directly operative. They determine the essence, meaning and implementation of laws, the activities of the legislative and executive authorities, local self-government and shall be ensured by the administration of justice.
Article 19
1. All people shall be equal before the law and court.
2. The State shall guarantee the equality of rights and freedoms of man and citizen, regardless of sex, race, nationality, language, origin, property and official status, place of residence, religion, convictions, membership of public associations, and also of other circumstances. All forms of limitations of human rights on social, racial, national, linguistic or religious grounds shall be banned.
3. Man and woman shall enjoy equal rights and freedoms and have equal possibilities to exercise them.
and so on...
The title is a bit inflammatory, but in this clip from Scalia's testimony relates the overall concept well.
joey_bob commented on 1.7M Hondas are being investigated for phantom braking arstechnica.com/cars/2022... · Posted by u/qualudeheart
I actually agree with your question, but allow me to play devil’s advocate, perhaps.
We only have 1 side of this story - that a few people have been surprised and had accidents. We don’t have the stats on how many people the active braking has saved from a collision. (BTW I have a CRV, and have experienced sudden braking myself, both with and without something in front of me, but it hasn’t caused an accident yet.)
ABS is a computer between the brake and the physics, and there’s widespread agreement about the benefits of this arrangement. So maybe the problem isn’t the computer, or the idea to use them in the loop. Maybe the problem is an incomplete understanding of people, or maybe it’s just a sensor defect or manufacturing issue. (Which, I would agree, absolutely should be considered when plugging things into a computer controller.)
We have lots of computers in the physics loop, and very few of them give any of us pause. ECUs are standard these days and are critical to fuel efficiency and reducing environmental impact. Self driving cars are on the way and are a whole new level of computer control. I think I’m still in favor of self-driving cars and the potential they have to reduce traffic, collisions, and environmental impact...
> We don’t have the stats on how many people the active braking has saved from a collision.
In the article, there were several links at the bottom with stats on the impact on Volvo cars in the US: https://www.iihs.org/topics/bibliography/ref/2111. The stats aren't directly equivalent, but I think it helps to support your argument.
joey_bob commented on Why won’t anyone teach me math? dailyprincetonian.com/art... · Posted by u/mathgenius
I agree. I'm a profesor in the first year of the University of Buenos Aires. We have no official list of answer for the exercises (but there are a few unofficial ones).
The students can ask me or the TA abut the exercises. We prefer to see what the student has attempted, and find the exact spot where the student made the mistake. It takes more time, but it's more helpful than a nice ideal solution.
We also may recommend to make another exercise from the official list and come back in 10 minutes with a solution attempt, or make some custom exercise on the spot that is about the same subject. (Exercises about derivatives are easy to invent, integrals and linear algebra is harder.)
What portion of student's would you estimate ask you or the TA about exercises?
joey_bob commented on Automation is reaching more companies wired.com/story/rent-robo... · Posted by u/geox
Every time I read one of the 'automation' pieces I think of the book Manna. If you haven't read it do so, great and short read available here:
Which part of Manna does this remind you of?
This is nearly a strictly American problem. Much of the rest of the world has realized that society requires and is capable of supporting advanced education for all -- after all we want humanity to be advancing, right?
America is still stuck in this alternate universe where it's a great privilege to have the opportunity to learn, which is of course true to some extent, but they really put it on a pedestal there.
Compared to the rest of the world, I think they over index on attending prestigious out-of-state and thus expensive, regardless of public or private, instead of building a really strong system for locals.
I think of my (non-US) classmates, maybe 1-2 per 100 were from a different region or country? I paid a total of $20k over five years which I easily covered with internships/summer jobs. Can you say the same in the US?
Our state has a program that covers tuition if you are in-state, received good grades in high school, and continue to maintain those.
Of my (undergraduate) classmates, I believe 60% were out of state, including out of country. Unfortunately, most that came from states with similarly ranked public schools did not have access to a similar program in those states.
My payments to the university totaled $60k for 7 years, undergraduate and masters. (I lost full tuition coverage my first year.)
The YC application is a sales pitch, and you're not selling your idea, you're primarily selling your charisma and capacity to spin vision and sell. Second, you're selling your chemistry with your cofounders and stability of your relationship. Third, you're selling your capacity to build, at least some usable prototype, but this a low bar.
At no point are you actually selling the concrete idea, unless you're doing something extremely specific that seems valuable and you're one of the few who can build it. For the rest, the idea is a rhetorical vehicle to sell the other things.