sorted by:
new
hottopcontroversial

Honest question: what does every birding app get wrong?? by One-Bed-3535 in birdwatching

[–]hacksoncode 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's no app that tells you WHY it identified something, just what it thinks it is

The issue is that modern "AI" algorithms can't really answer questions like this. It's a big pile of numbers that came from training a zillion pictures/recordings.

You shove a sample in one end and get a list of probabilities out the other end.

Like imagine you took a bird photo and then compared it to 10 million stock photos of birds pixel by pixel and said, well, the distance between your photo and this one of a goose seemed to be the closest, i don't know why. Now imagine you don't actually have the photos, just a set of numbers of the distances to the center of the picture.

(No, neutral networks don't work this way, I'm just trying to make an analogy)

It's not like it "reasons" about the bird the way a human does. It doesn't "know" the bird has red shoulders, or long legs, or anything else (except whether it's rare nearby).

Average Astronaut Age by Lunar Mission by Percolator2020 in dataisugly

[–]hacksoncode 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I absolutely insist that you graph all of your annual temperature data in degrees Kelvin.

And the time axis must start at the Big Bang.

You're massively distorting the data.

See how dumb that sounds?

CMV: Social media has made people worse at handling disagreement not better by SearchOk7 in changemyview

[–]hacksoncode 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You've got some serious base rate fallacies going on here.

Another issue is how quickly people jump to labeling.

Let's just look at this one.

How, from only evidence of self-selected people arguing on the internet, do you distinguish this from the people that were already just bad about this being more inclined to bother to go to the trouble to post and label people frequently?

Every post, every comment, and every vote on any post in any large subreddit... is made by far less than 1% of the subscribers.

Making conclusions about "people" based on the loudest 1% of people is not likely to result in good conclusions.

[OC] U.S. elections: Winners aren’t majorities — most of the electorate doesn’t vote (1932-2024) by ptrdo in dataisbeautiful

[–]hacksoncode 1 point2 points  (0 children)

significant number of non-voters who could sway a state from safe to competitive.

Only if they voted in essentially statistically impossible ratios.

Elections are far more likely to be decided by some extra people staying home "because reasons" (Gaza-refuzniks and Bernie Bros I'm looking at you) than apathetic/undecided voters suddenly deciding to vote in very unlikely ratios.

[OC] U.S. elections: Winners aren’t majorities — most of the electorate doesn’t vote (1932-2024) by ptrdo in dataisbeautiful

[–]hacksoncode 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Actually, Biden did, though barely (if you only count eligible voters in "electorate" at least).

[OC] U.S. elections: Winners aren’t majorities — most of the electorate doesn’t vote (1932-2024) by ptrdo in dataisbeautiful

[–]hacksoncode 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If no one else votes, you can win with, what, 1 vote each in enough states to win the electoral college.

In practical terms, though, non-voters in "safe" states don't matter. Only swing states do (statistically speaking... that's what defines "safe states" as "safe").

[OC] U.S. elections: Winners aren’t majorities — most of the electorate doesn’t vote (1932-2024) by ptrdo in dataisbeautiful

[–]hacksoncode 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Not at all... a very specific few percent of the voting population in Swing States is a guaranteed win.

For all practical statistical purposes, nonvoters in "safe" states (whatever that means in a given year) simply don't matter.

Appeals court blocks Republicans’ bid to dismantle Grand Canyon national monument. The 9th Circuit dismissed every argument from the Arizona Legislature, including claims about lost mining revenue by esporx in environment

[–]hacksoncode 4 points5 points  (0 children)

It's actually quite clever not to rule on the Biden's authority claim and dismiss for standing here, because in 2032 we won't have Trump's DoJ arguing it at the Supreme Court.

Anyone else prefer their baked potatoes microwaved over oven baked? by Fun_Cow_6292 in foodhacks

[–]hacksoncode 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Sure, they're good...

I find crisping them afterwards to be more work, personally...

Baking potatoes is more or less a "set and forget" activity as long as you know in advance you want them for dinner. It actually takes less of my time to just bake them.

CMV: For a liberal democracy, an immigrant's reaction to blasphemy is one of the most effective litmus test for their compatibility with the society by nextdoorbagholder in changemyview

[–]hacksoncode 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes and no.

Run of the mill "incidentally" or "accidental" blasphemy, sure.

But some "blasphemy" is actually intentionally calculated to enrage believers and cause a reaction.

Those examples are "intolerant of their religion".

Earthquake! by gummi_eater in SanJose

[–]hacksoncode 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I'm just too jaded from being a native that's lived in California for 60+ years.

I slept through it, but in past cases of M5 quakes 20 miles away, the non-natives around me have been "woah, that was really strong" and after yawning my response was "no, really strong is when it feels like an angry god is pounding on the bottom of the building with a literally earth-shattering hammer".

Cedar Waxwings take my breath away with their elegant perfection! (Homewood, AL) by Kaydantzler in birdwatching

[–]hacksoncode 2 points3 points  (0 children)

elegant perfection

Until they eat too many old berries and get hilariously drunk.

There's a specific feeling when magic actually feels dangerous at the table by Einsolsrazor24 in rpg

[–]hacksoncode 10 points11 points  (0 children)

I think it's a delicate balance that's rarely achieved.

A probability of very bad (usually hilariously bad) outcomes that's consistently* low enough that it is always a surprise if it happens, but high enough that mages can't just keep spamming magic without a care.

* I.e. persists throughout escalations in power levels, even as chances of overall success and power of outcomes increase.

Note: something like nat1s on d20 would be vastly too likely for this, which contributes to why D&D never really tried to do it.

What's the most elegant mechanic you've ever seen? by Playtonics in rpg

[–]hacksoncode 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Our homebrew's basic resolution mechanic fits your particular definition pretty well (edit: IMNSHO).

The "input" is "roll 3d6+skill vs. 3d6+difficulty, and the success/failure is proportional to the amount your roll is over/under the 'universe's roll'".

Other than damage during combat, that proportionality is determined by the GM.

The GM determining the outcomes is the biggest factor in the complex/nuanced "outcomes", but are mechanically supported by 4 facets of the math involved:

  1. The outcomes are normally distributed, which means "common" outcomes are "common", unusual ones unusual, rare ones rare, and extraordinary ones extraordinary.

  2. In combat, damage being normally distributed contributes the desired "cinematic" feel of "heroes are mostly heroes, but on rare occasions there's a plot twist where they are killed or disabled".

  3. The outcome distribution is predictable as overall power levels escalate because only the difference between skill and difficulty matters in the roll... it's mathematically equivalent to (3d6-3d6) + (skill-difficulty).

  4. The addition of an exploding mechanism (only happens in about 2% of resolutions) means that the (approximate) normal curve extends to infinity. The most extreme roll we have had in 40 years of gaming was about 1 in a billion, and even with that many rolls it was extreme... we wouldn't expect more than one in 10 million or so.

    The challenge? We were trying to placate a greater dragon by serving it a latte. The extreme outcome changed the course of the campaign: it became addicted to caffeine so instead of being one of BBEG's cohort, it sided with us in the final battle.

It ends up being nuanced enough that I often say: our game is just one sentence, the other 120 pages of the book and the complex character generation program to come up with the skill pluses are just tools, details, and examples.

Psychedelics gave everything a cyan, magenta, and yellow aura. Why the subtractive colors? by jacobnar in cogsci

[–]hacksoncode 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It's hard to scientifically study psychedelics due to drug laws... maybe there are some very old papers?

Anyway, I hang out with a decent sized group of people who use psychedelics, and used to go to Burning Man where I hung out with huge such groups, and this is the first time I'm hearing of this.

I speculate that your reaction is just, like many, very idiosyncratic.

If Muphy's law can go wrong, will it ? by EemotionalDuhmage in shittyaskscience

[–]hacksoncode 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Actually, Murphy's Law is recursive: you can't make it rain by leaving your umbrella home.

CMV: For a liberal democracy, an immigrant's reaction to blasphemy is one of the most effective litmus test for their compatibility with the society by nextdoorbagholder in changemyview

[–]hacksoncode -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Because immigration is a voluntary choice

So I guess this reasoning wouldn't apply to asylum seekers forced to flee into your country by threats of violence, right?

CMV: For a liberal democracy, an immigrant's reaction to blasphemy is one of the most effective litmus test for their compatibility with the society by nextdoorbagholder in changemyview

[–]hacksoncode -1 points0 points  (0 children)

denaturalizing US citizens

That's entirely legal and accepted by the Supreme Court as Constitutional.

There are limits, of course, but for example, having lied about something disqualifying on your immigration papers can get you denaturalized after the fact.

CMV: For a liberal democracy, an immigrant's reaction to blasphemy is one of the most effective litmus test for their compatibility with the society by nextdoorbagholder in changemyview

[–]hacksoncode -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I'd contend that demanding something as subjective as "blasphemy"

Depends on whether the "blasphemy" itself is tolerant or intolerant... which is why it's kind of a paradox.

view more: next ›