@gwd3.bsky.social
Reading Matthew Sadler's "Game Changer" (2019), analyzing AlphaZero chess games against Stockfish 8, and seeing what Stockfish 17 makes of the games. In key moments, Stockfish 8 and 9 never see AlphaZero's moves (in the book); but so far Stockfish 17 always does.
December 1, 2025 at 12:21 PM
Reading Matthew Sadler's "Game Changer" (2019), analyzing AlphaZero chess games against Stockfish 8, and seeing what Stockfish 17 makes of the games. In key moments, Stockfish 8 and 9 never see AlphaZero's moves (in the book); but so far Stockfish 17 always does.
More than once:
My son: "My dad punched a window and got stitches"
Adult, confused and visibly concerned: "Um, really?"
Me to my son: "How old was I when I did that?"
My son: "Seven"
Adult, visibly relaxing: "Ah, I see."
My son: "My dad punched a window and got stitches"
Adult, confused and visibly concerned: "Um, really?"
Me to my son: "How old was I when I did that?"
My son: "Seven"
Adult, visibly relaxing: "Ah, I see."
November 27, 2025 at 9:34 PM
More than once:
My son: "My dad punched a window and got stitches"
Adult, confused and visibly concerned: "Um, really?"
Me to my son: "How old was I when I did that?"
My son: "Seven"
Adult, visibly relaxing: "Ah, I see."
My son: "My dad punched a window and got stitches"
Adult, confused and visibly concerned: "Um, really?"
Me to my son: "How old was I when I did that?"
My son: "Seven"
Adult, visibly relaxing: "Ah, I see."
Dating apps have a perverse incentive: if you find the love of your life, you stop being a customer. What if the dating app was instead a loss-leader, feeding into a relationship-building app or community? One that would gain the most money from you reaching your 50th wedding anniversary?
November 26, 2025 at 10:18 AM
Dating apps have a perverse incentive: if you find the love of your life, you stop being a customer. What if the dating app was instead a loss-leader, feeding into a relationship-building app or community? One that would gain the most money from you reaching your 50th wedding anniversary?
I mean, on the one hand I'm glad the case is robustly dismissed. But I'm afraid it gives the pro-Trump people the ability to delude themselves that Comey and James were freed on technicalities. Having the charges fall completely flat in court would have been more vindicating for both of them.
NEW: Indictment against LETITIA JAMES has also been DISMISSED because of the unlawful appointment of Lindsey Halligan storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...
Order on Motion to Dismiss – #140 in United States v. James (E.D. Va., 2:25-cr-00122) – CourtListener.com
ORDER AND ADJUDGED as follows: (1) The appointment of Ms. Halligan as Interim U.S. Attorney violated 28 U.S.C. § 546 and the Appointments Clause of the U.S. Constitution. (2) All actions flowing from ...
storage.courtlistener.com
November 24, 2025 at 8:33 PM
I mean, on the one hand I'm glad the case is robustly dismissed. But I'm afraid it gives the pro-Trump people the ability to delude themselves that Comey and James were freed on technicalities. Having the charges fall completely flat in court would have been more vindicating for both of them.
QotD: "Facts don't care about your feelings." This is true, and IMO what makes them so limited in persuasive power. --Jon Bauman
November 24, 2025 at 2:03 PM
QotD: "Facts don't care about your feelings." This is true, and IMO what makes them so limited in persuasive power. --Jon Bauman
For the last decade or so of his life, one of my uncles became a sort of radicalized conservative. He was a white American, but lived in SE Asia. So those MAGA Twitter accounts based in Indonesia or Japan might be fake; but they could also simply be expats. #TryingToBeRational
November 23, 2025 at 9:55 PM
For the last decade or so of his life, one of my uncles became a sort of radicalized conservative. He was a white American, but lived in SE Asia. So those MAGA Twitter accounts based in Indonesia or Japan might be fake; but they could also simply be expats. #TryingToBeRational
Just "6-7"-ed by my 5-year-old son for the first time today.
November 21, 2025 at 10:11 AM
Just "6-7"-ed by my 5-year-old son for the first time today.
QoTD: If you want a symbolic gesture, don't burn the flag, wash it. -Norman Thomas, minister and social reformer (20 Nov 1884-1968). Courtesy of A.Word.A.Day
November 20, 2025 at 3:36 PM
QoTD: If you want a symbolic gesture, don't burn the flag, wash it. -Norman Thomas, minister and social reformer (20 Nov 1884-1968). Courtesy of A.Word.A.Day
What I saw early this morning: Jupiter and its moons, a long meteor, lots of satellites, gamma-Virgo (the major star closest to 3I/ATLAS at the moment).
What I didn't see tonight: 3I/ATLAS.
What I didn't see tonight: 3I/ATLAS.
November 20, 2025 at 6:27 AM
What I saw early this morning: Jupiter and its moons, a long meteor, lots of satellites, gamma-Virgo (the major star closest to 3I/ATLAS at the moment).
What I didn't see tonight: 3I/ATLAS.
What I didn't see tonight: 3I/ATLAS.
When you want to align the finderscope on your Dobsonian, so you train it on a bright-looking start, and it turns out to be Jupiter
November 20, 2025 at 6:25 AM
When you want to align the finderscope on your Dobsonian, so you train it on a bright-looking start, and it turns out to be Jupiter
Before synthesizers, people would try to minimize things like "string noise" (sound of fingers sliding across strings) from recordings. After, they became evidence non-generated content. I expect quirky / sub-optimal tics are going to do the same to mark non-LLM writing.
November 17, 2025 at 11:15 AM
Before synthesizers, people would try to minimize things like "string noise" (sound of fingers sliding across strings) from recordings. After, they became evidence non-generated content. I expect quirky / sub-optimal tics are going to do the same to mark non-LLM writing.
Modern iPhones don't come with a music playing app. They come with a music store, which you happen to be able to upload your own music into. But it's not structured to help you play your music; it's structured to sell you an Apple Music subscription.
November 7, 2025 at 9:47 PM
Modern iPhones don't come with a music playing app. They come with a music store, which you happen to be able to upload your own music into. But it's not structured to help you play your music; it's structured to sell you an Apple Music subscription.
QoTD: "We care centrally about the thought process behind words—the mental states of the mind and agency that produced the words. If you publish LLM-generated text as though it were written by someone, then you're making me interact with nothing." - User TsviBT on lesswrong.com
November 3, 2025 at 10:45 AM
QoTD: "We care centrally about the thought process behind words—the mental states of the mind and agency that produced the words. If you publish LLM-generated text as though it were written by someone, then you're making me interact with nothing." - User TsviBT on lesswrong.com
REALLY fascinating stuff. When injected, it may say something like (e.g., if ALL CAPS), "I notice what appears to be an injected thought related to the word LOUD or SHOUTING"
Emergent introspective awareness in large language models
Research from Anthropic on the ability of large language models to introspect
www.anthropic.com
October 31, 2025 at 10:00 PM
REALLY fascinating stuff. When injected, it may say something like (e.g., if ALL CAPS), "I notice what appears to be an injected thought related to the word LOUD or SHOUTING"
Three stages of comprehension reading the following selection from the Greek NT:
καὶ τὸ κοράσιον ἔδωκεν αὐτὴν τῇ μητρὶ αὐτῆς.
1. "And the <kosarion> gave it to their <mitri>" -- whatever a "kosarion" and "mitri" are.
καὶ τὸ κοράσιον ἔδωκεν αὐτὴν τῇ μητρὶ αὐτῆς.
1. "And the <kosarion> gave it to their <mitri>" -- whatever a "kosarion" and "mitri" are.
October 31, 2025 at 2:47 PM
Three stages of comprehension reading the following selection from the Greek NT:
καὶ τὸ κοράσιον ἔδωκεν αὐτὴν τῇ μητρὶ αὐτῆς.
1. "And the <kosarion> gave it to their <mitri>" -- whatever a "kosarion" and "mitri" are.
καὶ τὸ κοράσιον ἔδωκεν αὐτὴν τῇ μητρὶ αὐτῆς.
1. "And the <kosarion> gave it to their <mitri>" -- whatever a "kosarion" and "mitri" are.
"Gradually, then suddenly" applies to completing new features as well. "Make the change easy, then make the easy change" means lots of thinking and infrastructure work with no obvious results; but once the infrastructure is there, things often come together very quickly.
October 3, 2025 at 11:22 AM
"Gradually, then suddenly" applies to completing new features as well. "Make the change easy, then make the easy change" means lots of thinking and infrastructure work with no obvious results; but once the infrastructure is there, things often come together very quickly.
Reposted
Gary Kasporov, Russian world chess champion, dissident who stood up to Putin and now exiled in America, wrote this about how media censorship in Russia was central to their descent into dictatorship.
I Saw How Russia Killed Media Freedom
Censorship is central to the story of Russia’s descent into KGB dictatorship.
open.substack.com
September 19, 2025 at 4:38 AM
Gary Kasporov, Russian world chess champion, dissident who stood up to Putin and now exiled in America, wrote this about how media censorship in Russia was central to their descent into dictatorship.
Wow, I kind of want to learn Georgian just for the script:
ყველა ადამიანი იბადება თავისუფალი და...
ყველა ადამიანი იბადება თავისუფალი და...
Georgian language - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
September 19, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Wow, I kind of want to learn Georgian just for the script:
ყველა ადამიანი იბადება თავისუფალი და...
ყველა ადამიანი იბადება თავისუფალი და...
Reposted
a black cat watches a gymnast on a tv
ALT: a black cat watches a gymnast on a tv
media.tenor.com
September 15, 2025 at 10:53 AM
So you know that literary device where someone gets amnesia, and has to try to piece together what some past version of themselves was doing from bits of mostly-working machinery, random sketches, and tantalizingly obscure notes?
That's normal life for developers working on a very large codebase.
That's normal life for developers working on a very large codebase.
September 14, 2025 at 9:09 PM
So you know that literary device where someone gets amnesia, and has to try to piece together what some past version of themselves was doing from bits of mostly-working machinery, random sketches, and tantalizingly obscure notes?
That's normal life for developers working on a very large codebase.
That's normal life for developers working on a very large codebase.
How on earth to decide what to post about first...
September 11, 2025 at 10:17 AM
How on earth to decide what to post about first...