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Patrick Collison's Questions

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Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#111

Post by paxys »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #108
paxys wrote: post #97

The infrastructure one really stands out to me, and I'm always astounded by it. Adding yet another example - The Golden Gate Bridge was built in 4 years for $1.6 billion (inflation adjusted), under budget and ahead of schedule. 11 workers died during construction, a safety record matching or surpassing most modern projects. In contrast, a project to install suicide nets around the bridge has been under development fo…

> 11 workers died during construction, a safety record matching or surpassing most modern projects. Do you have a source for that? 11 deaths seems like it would be shockingly high for a modern project.

The bridge's safety record was revolutionary at the time, mainly due to the introduction of hard hats and safety nets (https://www.history.com/news/6-things-you-may-not-know-about...). It's hard to find a comparison to an equivalent project in America today, but looking around the world the numbers aren't much better (e.g. 9 people died in 2019 building world cup stadiums in Qatar - https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/mar/16/q...). And construction is still in the top 3 most fatal job categories in America (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cfoi.nr0.htm).

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#112

Post by graeme »

ghaff wrote: post #56
kevindong wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've only been to Switzerland once and that was during a When I pay for something with an American credit card in Europe, the machine prints out a receipt for me to sign. I was buying a snack at a store in the Zurich airport and the clerk actually compared the signature on the back of my card to the signature that I scrawled on the receipt. That was the one and only time I've ever had someone do that. I generally don…

So they have an archaic system that requires comparing a signature? I'm pretty sure I couldn't match my credit card unless I were trying to do it while looking at the card signature. I hardly consider that a benefit. And I've been through Zurich. I don't consider it anything special better or worse than going through most major European or American airports. [Oh. I take that back. I had my luggage lost on the way the…

You perhaps didn’t go through the terminal for international transiting connections (terminal E?)

It is fantastic. Just about the best airport experience I’ve had. Easy to get from one point to another, nice lounges if you have access, and outdoor viewing decks.

The rest of the airport is just so so. And it’s confusing to get from one terminal to the next.

But terminal E is a marvel. Airports actually have internationally established minimum connection times for flights, based on how long transit is expected to be. Zurich’s is among the lowest.

The other comment covered the credit card issue so I won’t address that part.

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#113

Post by ipnon »

Anon4Now wrote: post #19

> Why are certain things getting so much more expensive? > * College textbooks I've always felt that textbook pricing is predatory and should be subject to price gouging laws.

It's a racket. Universities must use the latest textbooks to remain accredited. This is why syllabi will always list the latest edition of a textbook as the required text (and mentioning that the last edition is sufficient is always done parenthetically). Publishers can fix a few typos, change some example problems, and call it a new edition. Every university will have to recommend the new edition to their students. The students who bought the last edition last year will have to sell their now obsolete textbook for a fraction of the purchasing price.

Markets in everything: University textbooks are always priced to be marginally outrageous. If they were to cost something ridiculous like $1,000 a piece, there would be protests and riots on campus. Instead they merely fleece the students for $100 or $200. Enough people pay up that the system is deemed imperfect rather than inherently flawed.

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#114

Post by jfarmer »

ghaff wrote: post #31
ajju wrote: post #5

“ Is Bloom's "Two Sigma" phenomenon real? If so, what do we do about it? Educational psychologist Benjamin Bloom found that one-on-one tutoring using mastery learning led to a two sigma(!) improvement in student performance. The results were replicated. " Does anyone know if this also true of learning & development in companies? For example sales training or training

I assume the answer is... it depends. I've taken training/workshops that clearly depend on group dynamics. I've also had training presenting, skiing, individual projects in grad school, etc. that pretty much depend on 1:1 time and, to the degree you're in a group, it mostly means you just don't get as much attention (but it's cheaper).

Bloom's paper largely focuses on when/how students get feedback and less on the particulars of the assessments.

For example, maybe mastery learning works (in part) because it helps teachers pay attention in a group setting more like they would in a 1:1 setting. From Bloom's paper: https://share.getcloudapp.com/rRu7WJRz

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#115

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

paxys wrote: post #111
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 11 workers died during construction, a safety record matching or surpassing most modern projects. Do you have a source for that? 11 deaths seems like it would be shockingly high for a modern project.

The bridge's safety record was revolutionary at the time, mainly due to the introduction of hard hats and safety nets ( https://www.history.com/news/6-things-you-may-not-know-about... ). It's hard to find a comparison to an equivalent project in America today, but looking around the world the numbers aren't much better (e.g. 9 people died in 2019 building world cup stadiums in Qatar - https://www.theguardian.com/glob…

So, in other words, your statement "a safety record matching or surpassing most modern projects" is something you made up.

Bringing up the stadium in Qatar only further highlights that point: I remember that building project getting tons of press outlining how shockingly bad the safety record was compared to what should be expected.

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#116

Post by HarryHirsch »

sudhirj wrote: post #27
ajju wrote: post #5

“ Is Bloom's "Two Sigma" phenomenon real? If so, what do we do about it? Educational psychologist Benjamin Bloom found that one-on-one tutoring using mastery learning led to a two sigma(!) improvement in student performance. The results were replicated. " Does anyone know if this also true of learning & development in companies? For example sales training or training

Feels like the Khan Academy apps do something like this. You progress through a tree of knowledge and can’t move to any next node until you master the one you’re on, demonstrated by solving problems. It also gives you all the help you need to achieve that mastery.

Not sure if I'd agree. Khan Academy is firmly rooted in the American tradition, it teaches facts, but it's like Feynman in Brazil, it does not integrate the concepts. For that you need problems tailored to your level. A good tutor can do that.

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#118

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

counter_point wrote: post #107
swyx wrote: post #53

i wonder what pc thinks of https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/ - is this a cherrypicked statistical fluke or is this an actually important long term economic trend worth exploring?

One thing I have found about HN in general is a refusal to ponder the meaning of money itself. 1 Why is a small amount of inflation considered a "good thing"? In just one generation, inflation targets reduce the purchasing power by nearly 50%. What if you knew that assumption lead to all kinds of terrible outcomes, but they only surfaced after 7-8 election cycles? 2 Why is a gold standard considered impractical? Afte…

It’s very challenging to ponder these questions in a public forum, because so many people hold uninformed or nonsensical views on them. Whenever I’ve tried to discuss them, I’ve had to fight off very basic misunderstandings like:

* The Fed prints money by giving free gifts to banks. That is, QE for $500 billion means banks are $500 billion richer.

* The first person to get a new dollar has an unfair advantage, since they can spend it before the rest of the economy knows about the extra dollar.

* Inflation is a deterministic function of the money supply. There wouldn’t be inflation if we didn’t create more money.

I’m sure you understand the problems here, and I certainly don’t hate educating people about them. But it’s hard to have a deep discussion punctuated by constant breaks into monetary theory 101.

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#119

Post by nugget »

donw wrote: post #11

It is interesting that the real cost of medical care and hospital services didn't see any sort of inflection change with the introduction of the ACA. One the key reasons for implementing the ACA -- which I supported, mind you -- was to control rising healthcare costs. Costs might still rise, but the rate of rise should be lower than before. This graph doesn't seem to show that. What am I missing?

You need 2 things to bring down health care costs (without resorting to rationing): first, introduce price transparency so that consumers can find the low cost providers, and second, provide an incentive for consumers to balance cost vs quality of care and seek out the lowest cost provider for the care needed. This doesn't work for all procedures needed but for huge segments of health care like imaging, this seems to be the best bet.

Re: Patrick Collison's Questions

#120

Post by jariel »

paxys wrote: post #97

The infrastructure one really stands out to me, and I'm always astounded by it. Adding yet another example - The Golden Gate Bridge was built in 4 years for $1.6 billion (inflation adjusted), under budget and ahead of schedule. 11 workers died during construction, a safety record matching or surpassing most modern projects. In contrast, a project to install suicide nets around the bridge has been under development fo…

"11 workers died during construction, a safety record matching or surpassing most modern projects."

????

No, this is not a safety record 'matching or exceeding modern projects' - this is abysmally wrong.

Modern bridge builds generally involve 0 deaths.

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