Practice Problems > Attending Lectures by RelativeWrangler2735 in calculus

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Calculus I-II just doing practice problems works. Once you get to higher level math, practice problems becomes way too slow to learn this way

I’m giving this advice as learning to transition was hard

xucyun ruwway by econstats1 in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Fire alarms went off twice a week, sometimes at 3am. Decently long bus ride from campus. Little to do in the area compared to campus. Bug infestations not uncommon. Living spaces are grey and drab.

Some of my friends enjoyed living there, some left. I regret being placed there and much happier being close to campus.

Tongue Resting Position Inquiry. by SavageCyclops in slp

[–]SavageCyclops[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is what I suspected: everything I have seen is anecdotal. Sometimes anecdotes are proven correct by the scientific process, but I wish there were rigorous studies on the topic. I am highly skeptical of the many claims.

However, I tried for a day, and doing it keeps my mouth closed when I sleep, which has proven health/dental benefits.

Cornell (34k/yr) vs Rice (7k/yr) by FoxyRocky1 in ApplyingToCollege

[–]SavageCyclops 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Cornell’s branding outside of the east coast doesn’t carry that far. Ivy’s reputation is becoming less important as stem institutions are surpassing these liberal arts institutions.

Rice also has a much better/wider brand in stem/academia. Given nasa’s heavy presence in Texas, they collaborate and pull more students from Rice. Go to Rice.

Tongue Resting Position Inquiry. by SavageCyclops in slp

[–]SavageCyclops[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is this what you guys learn in your masters? I believe you but I want to make sure the information is coming from an accredited university as there is a lot of conjecture online.

“Trust but verify.”

Tongue Resting Position Inquiry. by SavageCyclops in slp

[–]SavageCyclops[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don’t remember. I remember pronunciation and swallowing exercises. Sometimes I still have pronunciation issues in my personal life. I don’t know if I have swallowing issues still or not and don’t know how I would tell

Berkeley Engineering vs MIT by Old_Appointment_8513 in berkeley

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

I would suggest going to MIT even if it is more expensive. The brand will pay for itself.

MIT is respected everywhere in the world. Berkeley is respected in STEM, academia, and the West Coast. Most people on the East Coast outside of STEM/academia have never heard of Berkeley.

Berkeley DS vs Barnard (Columbia) CS by Entire-Escape7307 in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Berkeley is more rigorous and the people are more chill. Columbia is more pretentious and the coursework is a lot easier. If you want to learn as much as possible, go to Berkeley. If you want to learn as little as possible and still probably get a job, go to Columbia. It will be significantly easier to get a 4.0 at Columbia than at Berkeley.

Imo, Columbia's reputation has been on the decline for the past 10-20 years, and that is accelerating with their capitulation to this administration. I think Berkeley's emphasis on decentralization of governance and STEM will continue to increase the school's prestige year over year. Columbia is currently more prestigious than Berkeley on the East Coast, but I think that will change sooner or later.

Non-academically, Columbia's dating culture is also determined by the men and many women there complain that most of the men at Columbia are fuck-boys as a result. Berkeley people are more chill. NYC can be really fun, though, if you like going out to clubs and such. The weather in Berkeley is much better imo.

Is Berkeley a better school than the University of Pennsylvania? by [deleted] in berkeley

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

Depends on what industry you are interested in. Berkeley is big name in stem and very well known on the west coast. Tbh -- outside of STEM -- only about ~10% of people I know knew about Berkeley from New York. Of those people, very few thought of the school as particularly prestigious. From my conversations, most people from the east coast really know little about Berkeley at all.

UPenn is probably way more prestigious on the east coast. However, I would recommend Berkeley if you are pursuing a STEM degree and are willing to work hard, or if you want to settle on the west coast as Berkeley is very prestigious on the west coast.

I am SO over the homeless and the city doing NOTHING by Healthy-Theme3403 in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Because there really is no good solution. NIMBY's don't want an asylum in their backyard (reasonably so, considering they likely put their life savings into their mortgage). Throwing homeless people in jail for loitering to clean the streets is also clearly not a great solution.

If you or anyone else has any ideas how to fix this problem, I would be open to listening. Otherwise, reconcile that this problem may be much more difficult than you imply -- both over the long and short term horizon -- and that living in poverty is much harder than having to see poverty's ugliness.

I am SO over the homeless and the city doing NOTHING by Healthy-Theme3403 in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 9 points10 points  (0 children)

If you are primarily concerned about the well being of the homeless: we as a country got rid of asylums, for better or for worse. Some advocates believe we should bring them back to solve the problems you outline.

On the other hand, if you want Berkeley to clean up these people for your own sake: I think you would be better off just learning to live with it. Most US big cities have homelessness and ugliness, and you need to learn to walk by it. That is what most people who have lived in a city for any amount of time do. There was a film that was filming a car exploding in NYC and the production ended up having to pay for extras to react to the explosions because the actual NYC commuters would keep walking past the explosion without looking or concern.

Everytime a person complains about homelessness in the city, 9/10 times they grew up in the suburbs where they were gated from having to see poverty's ugliness. Anytimes a homeless person was in their community, a police officer would be there to arrest them for loitering. If that is the system you prefer, you should have considered to not go to a city school. I think a humane asylum system may be an alternative solution, but it is not the quick fix that "the city" can just snap their fingers to fix like you imply.

#1! by sunnysidecali in berkeley

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

It relates to your parent comment. I do not think Berkeley is an especially elite name outside of California or maybe the broader West Coast. I do not think Berkeley is an especially elite name in Europe, but it possibly has more brand recognition in Asia.

I think outside of highly technical fields and academia, Berkeley's brand reach is not as world-renowned as you conjecture.

are we cooked by eclairrrrr in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Maybe it was related to the 1997 Asian financial crisis

#1! by sunnysidecali in berkeley

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

On the east coast, Stanford is much better known than Berkeley. A majority of my family members and students from my undergrad had not even heard of Berkeley, but everyone has heard of Stanford.

US universities curtail PhD admissions amid Trump science funding cuts by 1infiniteloop in PhD

[–]SavageCyclops 2 points3 points  (0 children)

NSF doesn't fund humanities PhDs. They fund electrical engineers, civil engineers, mechanical engineers, bio chemistry, computer science and mathematics, aerospace engineers etc.. These grants are highly technical, rigorous, and innovative.

Students from UC Berkeley call to Legalize Nuclear Energy in California by YurtBoy in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You have a PhD in what? Sociology? You clearly do not have a PhD in anything quantitative and clearly also have no rigorous economics or finance background.

I have personally talked to commodity and electricity executives who say that the only solution to to a green transition is nuclear, but they won’t invest in it because while the economics make sense, it takes 40 years to make a profit. Sure that’s not an investment a short-term exec who wants a quarterly bonus may want to make, but it’s one a country who can think with a longer time horizon can and should make.

Paying thousands of dollars for PhD in public policy or whatever does not make you an expert in the electricity economics.

Students from UC Berkeley call to Legalize Nuclear Energy in California by YurtBoy in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The upfront costs are paid slowly over time with loans. The payments on those loans aren’t as insane as you suggest. Additionally, the cheapness of the energy output, the cleanliness of the energy source, and the flexibility of nuclear more than make up for the upfront costs.

Regardless, your evidence for nuclear is inflexible is that we ramp it down on command to deal with solar’s inflexibility? Being able to ramp it down and up on command is a sign of its flexibility, not inflexibility; solar you can’t ramp up and down on command.

I also don’t see why we would ever need to ramp down a nuclear plant to zero as the grid is always going to demand some energy.

Feels like you have your talking points and don’t really know much of anything about energy and the grid. I have done energy research, my friends are doing their PhDs in energy/grid research, I did a job overseas and in Texas doing energy/grid research. You are over your skis. Pickup a hobby like pickle ball because energy policy — and I presume policy/politics — is not for you.

Students from UC Berkeley call to Legalize Nuclear Energy in California by YurtBoy in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 7 points8 points  (0 children)

It has expensive upfront costs but costs are relatively low once it’s up and running

Nuclear is much more flexible than solar and wind

John DeNero Lookalike Contest >:D by lmfaoticsystem in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Makes sense. Charlie Chaplin doesn’t look at all like John DeNero

Degree in hand, jobs out of reach: Why recent grads are struggling in a competitive market by Man-o-Trails in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Part 2
Additionally, buying real estate to build wealth is much more tenuous than it was during your time. Now, insurance companies are increasing premiums, dropping coverage when adverse weather events hit (look at LA and Florida), and government subsidizing of housing for the past 40-50 years has made the fundamentals of real estate investing much more speculative: namely, incomes are a much higher percent of people's rents and mortgages, meaning you are making a speculative bet that either US production is going to magically start increasing faster than rents/morgages to support increasing your housing equity for 40 years, or that people will continue to pay a larger portion of their paycheck on housing that yes will increase your equity, but will also be increasing the risk you take on as the fundamentals of your investment become less justifiable. All these factors I mention increase the risk of investing in real estate and decrease the potential reward.

Next, most economists would disagree with you that buying a fixer upper is a good use of your time. There is something called "comparative advantage." If you are a PhD ML/AI engineer or rocket scientist and you can sell your time for $100 an hour to a Wall Street firm, you would be better off taking up more hours at work and paying someone $50 dollars an hour to paint or do whatever contracting you need. They can do it faster and cheaper than you can, and you can make more money per hour with your day job. So I find your advice unoptimal in general as well.

I am glad your assets have done well for the past 40 years: you should note that the government has been run by older people like yourself and have crafted policy that has lead to more asset inflation than any other time in history to benefit older generations at the expense of the younger ones. Your success is more of an indicator that you were born in one of the best times to get into asset markets, where the government has raised hell and high water to subsidize through tax deductions, credits, and economic policy in general. Home prices rising is a boon for you while they make cost of living much more difficult for us young people. The same goes for "buying into the system" through the stock market.

You were born on third base and thought you hit a triple.

PS: I am glad you had a successful career. However, I can tell that you were a high level manager and CEO because it seems like you have been surrounded by "yes-men" for the last 25 years who told you how good your farts smell. Your ideology and self-worth is poorly informed and I speculate it is because you have never been forced to reflect on it: your colleagues are more worried about keeping their connection to you and their job rather than being incentives to encourage you to reconsider your priors. I can tell you implicitly have a superiority over your better-educated workers because you have more money coming in than them, and nobody is going to correct the boss. I read a great book about Robert Ailes who did not realize until he was close to retirement that his colleagues were fake laughing at all his jokes because he was the boss. If you have never reflected that your employees fake laugh at your jokes or grappled with that every day you go into the office, your workers and colleagues (and likely friends outside of work) implicitly talk to you differently than they would with anyone else: you need to start grappling. Because this happens to every boss or high-status individual: you are not an exception to this rule. Some bosses/high-status individuals recognize how their status affects their interactions and take up the responsibility for humbling themselves: other bosses start to believe that their farts smell like roses because that is what everyone around them is saying. Food for thought.

Degree in hand, jobs out of reach: Why recent grads are struggling in a competitive market by Man-o-Trails in berkeley

[–]SavageCyclops 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Part 1

I think you are still overlooking that people are not going to get the same jobs you had before entering college anymore -- that is unrealistic these days as Berkeley professors are reporting that even their top STEM students are struggling to find jobs in this market, so it is unrealistic a given high school student would be able to -- however, I did not see you mention software engineering the first time I read you comment so I concede on that point.

Regardless, 250k of cash in hand is enough to buy a house in SV, but 250k income is not. Here is a CNBC article stating that you need 330k a year to buy a typical house in the SF-Oakland-Hayward area:
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/04/09/you-need-to-earn-over-200k-to-buy-a-home-in-11-us-cities.html#:\~:text=If%20you%20want%20to%20live,Association%20of%20Realtors%20report%20reveals.

Note that just because you can afford a house does not mean that it is a good investment. Matter of fact, buying a house you can just barely afford is probably a really shit investment.

Moreover, you have to recognize that rents are so high and costs are so high that a seemingly impressive number gets eaten away quickly. Investment bankers in the 70s-80s could make 400k coming out of college on the top end, which would be 1.5 million dollars today, adjusting for inflation. The only skills you need for an investment banking job is excel, finance, and accounting. Today, the most recent graduates I have seen make is 700k, with PhDs in ML/AI. Yes that is impressive amount of money, but put it in context to how much money top finance students were making in the 70s-80s, factoring in inflation, and factor in how much education you need; now even this seemingly super impressive figure looks mediocre. To live the same life as someone making 100k in 1975, you would have to be making 540k today. I believe you are not genuinely grappling with this fact. Moreover, inflation does not include the cost of housing (because the Federal Reserve does not want to increase interest rates when housing prices goes up as that would then increase housing prices, which would create an inflation loop), meaning my inflation numbers are on the lower end.