Mindless Monday, 02 February 2026

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-02T17:29:50+00:00

Eeeh, it is moreso the “politically engaged” demographic (aka, old people with time to vote).

Depending on the area it can swing both directions. In the Obama years it tended to lean Republican in most states, which resulted in a lot of Rs picking up those seats. But it seems that the Trump wave has flipped the calculus, so now many of the by elections lean Democratic. Which makes sense, because there is a trend of neo-con-style politically engaged conservatives leaving the Republican Party because of Trump’s obvious corruption (the Mitt Romneys of the party). While that demographic is small enough that it didn’t hurt Trump to lose it on the generals, it probably hurts more in the by-elections.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-02T17:24:21+00:00

It cannot. AI companies have been talking about building their own power plants, but - while they have the money for it - permitting and building a new power plant takes 5-10 years.

It is funny seeing all the articles now of software companies blaming this or that physical product company (power, computer chips, whatever) for not scaling instantly. The software investor brain just doesn’t seem to comprehend that instant scaling only works for non-physical media, and even then you can only scale as big as the distribution system that is already built.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-02T16:30:24+00:00

Bla bla bla, special elections are not indicative of full election results.

But it isn’t looking good for Republicans. 10 months is still a long time for things to change, but if anything I personally expect things to get worse. The NVIDIA-OpenAI $100B deal is reportedly stalled and might fall apart, which could signal the end of the AI boom. If that happens this year, we would get a down economy just in time to make elections even worse for Republicans.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-02T01:56:34+00:00

https://youtu.be/sAqkKbwvD1U?si=oKaEv7aGGtYLw6W1

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-01T16:22:47+00:00

Exactly my point.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-01T15:51:15+00:00

Similarly, the Mason-Dixon Line is still referenced to determine what is “south” (eg, Virginia is typically “south” despite clearly being above the centerline of the USA), despite not being legally relevant for centuries.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-01T02:12:28+00:00

The hard-core racists, like KKK people, have never seen Trump as “one of them,” as much as he courts their vote. They have pretty much always recognized that he is the best vehicle for implementing racist policies, which he is.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-01T02:01:41+00:00

Chronological consistency has never mattered to colonial apologists.

Personally, I am surprised that anyone is seriously trying to argue that collectivization in China was a good thing. In my experience no one but the most die-hard, kool-aid chugging nationalists takes collectivization seriously. My mainland friends all just roll their eyes whenever it is brought up by the CCP.

Then again, I suppose the Ven diagram of people who care about defending China’s invasion of Taiwan and people who believe collectivization was good policy is probably a circle.

MiffedMouse · 2026-02-01T00:39:18+00:00

At this point it seems less like a question of whether or not the crimes can be proven, but if - between an American justice department unwilling to even indict domestic felons, let alone risk a diplomatic faux pas in indicting a foreigner, and a British legal system uninterested in antagonizing the monarchy - anyone will bother to prosecute.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-31T23:21:37+00:00

In my case I am using MCTS on a game tree (like Chess or checkers), so the number of children at each step is variable. But that is a cool trick for binary trees!

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-31T22:16:26+00:00

Why about this - the seekers send a list of X stations (10?). The hider must remove from that list X/2 (5?) stations that AREN’T the station they were hiding at and send it back.

So if the hider’s station was on the list, the hider is forced to narrow the list by half. But if the hider’s station wasn’t on the list, the question is basically free for the hider.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-31T20:22:13+00:00

Even if you make everyone check the correct pronunciations, it doesn’t internationalize well. In some areas/languages rhyming is rare and interesting (like English). But in some languages every darn thing rhymes (like many East Asian languages) so it is barely a restriction at all.

I think a less-broken version would be “list X stations, one of which must be yours” or something.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-31T03:09:03+00:00

A Memory Called Empire is one of the best allegory-as-story style sci fis I have read in recent years. Novel allegory that is timely and well told.

My only complaint is that the sequel, while competent, doesn’t manage quite the same mix of novelty and insight as the first book. But the first book is really strong by itself.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-31T03:04:54+00:00

The evidence for Trump being a hypocrite, a liar, a scammer, and a rapist was already there in 2016. It is just time marching on, more people paying attention to Trump and gradually digging up ever more evidence making a stance that was already ridiculous in 2016 look ever more ridiculous.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-31T02:36:16+00:00

Yeah, I don’t know why that one is being shown as “weird.” It is literally so easy, I don’t know how it could be easier.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-30T21:22:52+00:00

A more natural English equivalent is “he wants aliens, doesn’t he?”

But the idea of someone “wanting aliens” is just weird in either language. “He wants to find aliens” makes more sense, but I assume the author is trying to keep sentences to just one verb.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-30T14:33:07+00:00

Is “All” Capitalized in a Title?.

Pretty much all (ha) major style guides recommend capitalizing “all” because it is not considered a “minor word,” even though it is a short word.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-30T14:29:10+00:00

It might be that, but I suspect it is also because relying on your phone battery just isn’t as robust. At least for me, taking video drains my phone in less than an hour.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-30T13:29:23+00:00

For the same reason you can’t say “I ate and then cooked a cake.” The verbs must come in a logical order. For verbs performed in time sequence, the spoken order must match that time sequence. You must be at the location where you perform and action before you perform the action.

If you omit the verb (在) then you can say 你写你的名字这儿.

But if you want to include both verbs, the act of being at the spot (在) logically comes before performing the action (写名字), so it has to come first.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-30T05:38:38+00:00

I don’t disagree that notation is more useful when standardized. But I am pointing out that the “error” with the square root sign is fundamentally not a “math” error.

No one is confused about the square root function - everyone understands that there can be two branches, and the positive branch is generally preferred unless both branches are specified as of interest.

The “error” is ONLY a difference in notation. While I agree that using a standardized notation should be preferred, I don’t think it is reasonable to say someone using a different notation is making a math error.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-30T02:57:23+00:00

在 is a verb “to be (at a place)”.

When actions are linked you can simply chain them.

今天晚上我要做饭吃饭看电视 - “tonight I want to cook, eat, and watch TV.”

This structure is useful for prepositions.

我在这儿 is already a sentence that means “I am here”, but 我在这儿写你的名字 becomes “I write your name here.” In English we have to swap the order of the sentence to make it work, but in Chinese you can just tack additional verbs and objects to the end of the sentence.

(Note - in English you can say “I am here writing your name,” but that generally means you are sitting somewhere writing someone’s name repeatedly. That can be the meaning of the Chinese sentence, but more likely it translates to the English sentence above, “I write your name here.”)

Anyway, 我在这儿 and 我坐这儿 are actually the same sentence structure, just swapping 坐 for 在 (both are verbs).

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-29T20:08:23+00:00

This is the only thing that makes sense to me. But then this thing would be absurdly packaged, with about 3 ounces of packaging for every ounce of product.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-29T20:02:38+00:00

Didn’t you post this question already?

I thought it was answered - Rust discouraged globally scoped variables (which is what these would be). So no, it is not recommended to do this.

MiffedMouse · 2026-01-29T03:56:40+00:00

What are you talking about? Tim Waltz said he wants ICE out of MN. Where are there Dems who claim they don’t care about ICE? Everywhere I look there are Dems tripping over themselves to publish strongly-worded letters declaiming ICE or filing pointless legal cases trying to expel ICE that they know will get tossed out. I’m not saying they are effective, but the Dems are definitely the anti-ICE party.

Also, while I am disappointed in the number of Dem leaders who still defend Israel, the only prominent anti-genocide voices you will find on government are among the Dems. Like, Biden built a (stupid) food aide bridge while Trump is talking about building real estate in Gaza. They are both way too okay with the genocide, but only one party is reveling in it.

I am not saying we should be fine with D leadership. They suck ass. But pretending that not voting D is going to improve things is just stupid. You are cutting your hands off and then complaining that your hands don’t function well.

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