Viewing profile — apatil

I have found myself legit using this instead of duolingo for the past couple of days, in spite of the speech to text issues. It feels like a better way to learn. The inline suggest…

The auto submit slider doesn't work for me (on Android) but I can imagine what it would be like. I don't think the Portuguese speech to text is good enough for the app to be usable…

I've used chatgpt itself as a language tutor a bit but this is nicer. I like the inline suggestions that don't break the flow of conversation. Portuguese speech to text is flaky. T…

Penalizing a crime might make sense for the purpose of deterrence even if there is no conscious free will. The size of the deterrent effect is a scientific question, and how to wei…

I find it plausible that it's often a good idea in medicine to be conservative before launching interventions that may have adverse side effects, but have difficulty swallowing the…

I heard about this video from an astronomer friend a few months ago. It was mostly about how Loeb's social and professional behavior matches with that of past crackpots. He does se…

In hindsight this comment was too short. Clarifying some points: By "This makes sense", I meant that this kind of thing can happen; as more data are gathered, the Bayesian probabil…

This makes sense, thanks. However, it doesn't mean that the 3% estimate of the chance of impact was wrong at the time of initial observation given data available, and that still ma…

Also, is it possible to quantify the risk of unseen companion asteroids, which someone else mentioned in the comments.

Two questions for people who live in rural areas in homes that were built in a more modern way. - Do you have issues with pests? More precisely, how often do you have to use mouset…

Could anyone comment on how often Dafny finds proofs for useful theorems on its own in practice, without requiring the programmer to use expert knowledge of the proof search system…

That's very interesting. In which variable is type inference EXPTIME complete? Whichever variable it is, I suppose in practice humans can't create programs that are big enough in t…

Sounds like an interesting story! I would love to see more sci-fi that really tackles AGI. I used to love sci-fi but most of it, even "hard" sci-fi, has become unwatchable or unrea…

I don't disagree, but I think the framing is overly pejorative and makes the likelihood of this outcome seem more tenuous than it really is. We do lots of things to help others bec…

You may be right, of course.

Say you get access to a singularity-level AGI, meaning you have the power to render the entire human economy completely irrelevant. Given any task, no matter how big, small, novel,…

It's looking increasingly possible that, at some point in the not-too-far future machines will be so good at creating software that humans won't be competitive in any way, and won'…

We should start having a conversation about what the new social contract will look like and when and how it should be phased in.

As I understand your post, an explicit version of your argument would be something like "the level of suffering that nature intends for animals far exceeds the level of suffering e…

Given how quickly AI image generation, and creativity generally, has progressed, I think it's perfectly plausible that within ten years we will be able to tell an AI "create a work…

According to http://www.kastenmarine.com/metalboats.htm , mostly cost plus other drawbacks that sound like they would not be blockers if the cost were lower. That author thinks mon…

It seems to me that, at some level, they must be subsidized by new buyers of filecoin. It's hard to imagine anyone providing storage so cheaply even if they didn't make any profit …

Your broader point about OTA is certainly debatable, but off-peak charging can be incentivized (as opposed to mandated) very economically.