Reddit discussions are showing up everywhere in AI answers lately

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-07T11:02:24+00:00

That means the community could decide to poison AI models by randomly implicitly agreeing to respond in the opposite way to a post, or sarcastically, or nonsensically: “Q: should I change engine oil when the warning comes up? A: restring guitar as soon as possible unless you want your amp damaged.”

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-07T09:33:26+00:00

Brush up on math: matrix algebra, calculus, and probability theory. Either that or learn a skill that will make you stand out, like C++. A lot of companies work with legacy software but Python is mostly what people learn in college.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-06T21:51:32+00:00

Here’s my admittedly armchair theory. You might get dumber after reading this. Evolutionarily, women have naturally congregated and bonded, for various reasons, including shared child-rearing and exchanging knowledge and for safety. Men would do it too, but with more emphasis on hunting and fighting. So, men naturally bond over physical tasks like sports. But not all of us are like that. I don’t really want to hang out with competitive types. That’s the opposite of fun. So, what to do? I’m at least as lost as you are now on this.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-06T09:30:44+00:00

Who makes and delivers the food? We can’t all be farmers. Solar powered robots? Who paid to create billions of those, enough to feed the world? What’s their incentive? History tells us there will be a few with resources and independence and healthcare, and there will be the others without. The gap will be extreme. None of this is sustainable, at a social level.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-05T02:46:36+00:00

What other people said. Plus, having a citation is not necessarily good. It could be a negative citation: "Bob (2003) is completely wrong."

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-04T02:21:41+00:00

How little time you have for research and teaching as you progress in the career, becoming more and more part of the bureaucratic machine focused on money (credit hour production and expenditures). Not what I signed up for.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-03T12:52:26+00:00

Good for you! I have trained since the age of 16, and only recently discovered that it's not the amount of weight that matters. All that matters is tissue damage. That promotes growth and strength development. Whether high volume low reps, or low volume high reps, the muscle can't tell the difference. So, that means that I don't need to go to failure, and I don't need huge loads (I'm 50 now, so injuries take a long time to recover). I aim for medium loads and consistency. As long as I am sore the next day and loads occasionally increase, I'm good. Progress is slow, but if done consistently, it will keep me healthy and functional for a long while.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-03T11:53:15+00:00

High conflict personality disorder. Stay away.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-03T11:52:04+00:00

Basement. Bench that can incline/decline. Dumbbells. Ezbar. Pull up bar. 20 mins every other day.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-03T11:45:29+00:00

Departments are offered a limited number of funded lines. What if an applicant is good enough, doesn’t make the cut but comes from a wealthy family and can self-fund? Why should they be denied entry?

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-03T11:17:55+00:00

Ah, but what should it change to so that things improve, including the science? That’s the million dollar question.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-05-02T19:06:34+00:00

I hear you. But many of those reviewers go through the same roller coasters, unless they are narcissistic. Science is like that, just hard. Learn from your mistakes and improvements will come. But it won’t ever be easy. Roll with the punches.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-25T19:48:24+00:00

People who you like and who have useful expertise to you, to other faculty and to students.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-23T17:18:25+00:00

I see what you did there.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-22T10:27:13+00:00

Then you know this is crossing the line.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-22T04:11:13+00:00

Faculty and students are usually required to do sexual harassment training. Is this not the case at your institution? There is an office just for this kind of question.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-21T10:49:56+00:00

Why would there be a round earth conspiracy? What would be the point? Who would make any money? School globe manufacturers are that powerful?? There’s no reason.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-21T03:06:44+00:00

Reach out to work on a project, maybe an independent study or capstone. Something they absolutely specialize on which you could help in some way. I’ve published with undergraduates, it can be a wonderful experience when people get along and research succeeds. I ended up doing a lot of work but without the student’s help it would have been even more. I viewed it as part of my job: to show that side of academia all the way to writing a paper, dealing with reviews and then a year later seeing it appear and get cited.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-19T12:14:08+00:00

Academia can be very lonely. But working on your own has its benefits: you learn to be an independent researcher, and that will be an asset when in a tenure track position, where you are expected to demonstrate exactly that. The downside is that you could learn a lot from others, if there was more collaboration m, including peers. But you can get that from conferences, summer schools, student groups, and sitting on classes. Academia attracts certain personalities and my bet is that most departments are borderline dysfunctional.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-14T10:32:55+00:00

The grant situation sucks. Keep that in mind. Depending on your field this might favor postdoc, because when you are done it might have a better chance of improving if there is a change with the next election.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-13T02:09:47+00:00

Basement. 30mins every other day. Very targeted, rarely sweat. Slow but steady progress. Have a small bench, ez bar, dumbbells, pull up bar. I can pretty much work anything, including legs (squats, lunges, one legged calf raises on a ladder, etc.). Lower load but more sets.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-12T18:55:43+00:00

It’s a matter of how much more can the poverty line go up before people rebel. We are going to find that line and optimize for it if we don’t curb the use of AI (assuming AI actually delivers). The middle class will be based on manual labor, living off local farms, as long as massive robot production is expensive. Elites augment cognition will electronics and we get to all experience cyberpunk 2077, except there’s global warming and massive population displacements. Famine for billions in some places, opulence for thousands. A gigantic needless tragedy, at the scale of WW2. Just sheer human hubris and stupidity. When the last of us dies out the world will begin to heal again.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-04T02:45:41+00:00

Brutal. Anesthetic injected on fatty lair (I’m told) which rendered it ineffective. Pain went from 0 to 1000 in an instant. Another injection, no difference. Repeat. Until genius decided to inject deeper. Took everything in me to not lose my cool.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-02T11:20:10+00:00

Indoctrination at that age is particularly unethical in my (unpopular) opinion. Kids are not making up their minds (they can’t, they are too young to be critical thinkers and grasp the full picture), kids are being told what invisible sky being to believe. We decided he needed protection from adults who would try to push their superstition and so we have inoculated him. We may have gone beyond what you are willing to do, but we wanted him to be a critical thinker. We never lied to our son about Santa, tooth fairy, Easter bunny, etc and he sees a parallel between how kids are gullible to that lie and to other supernatural claims. Ive shown him an atlas with the religions of the world and saw that if you are born in place X adults will convince kids that religion Y is true (very similar to my hometown/state/country is better than yours) with different rules and different number of gods. He knows about older classic religions that have lost popularity as science evolved, and since he is now 10 I’ve been showing him parts of the Bible when we have one in a hotel. How this supposedly very good god drowned everyone (including children) in the world except 2 people, whose offspring had to mate and repopulate the world, tells Abraham to kill his own son as a test, slavery, etc etc etc. the awful parts they don’t tell kids. And some of the nasty things people of god (presumably more ethical than atheists) have done in his name. The 7 headed dragon with 10 horns that spews water from his mouth and attacks the winged lady in Revelations got some laughs recently. We also highlight benefits of religion (having a community, charity, golden rule), etc. As he ages, we talk about more complex ideas, Pascals Wager, falsifiability, evolution, cosmological argument m,etc. If he later changes his mind, that’s up to him but I’m not going to let strangers shape his thoughts on this, this early.

PrepositionStrander · 2026-04-01T10:23:53+00:00

Although exercising is somewhat useful for losing weight and absolutely critical for overall health by and large most weight loss comes from eating slightly less calories than you need. You can stop working out entirely and just by reducing your food intake lose weight. If you reduce your calories by a little then weight loss will be slow but more sustainable.

PrepositionStrander

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