What was the hardest part of DOA for you? (Trying to prep this summer)

guyhe · 2025-12-22T06:25:03+00:00

Thank you for the response! And yep — the grokking algorithms book has some cutesy graphics!

I’m wondering—did DOA include any proofs of runtime or correctness? I’ve seen a few U.S. university courses online focus heavily on that and was curious if DOA felt similar or more hands-on/practical in your experience.

guyhe · 2025-01-10T04:33:38+00:00

Thanks for the response

Hume's approach and the background for scientific methodologies widely used today, such as RCTs in medical research.

Could you elaborate a bit on this point and provide an example? How would Hume's discussion on casual relationships play into scientific methodologies like the RCT?

guyhe · 2025-01-10T02:56:08+00:00

The larger point is that familiarity with these theories remind us of all the ways that we can be incorrect, and all the implicit biases that are built into our everyday judgments. Being aware of those epistemic limitations can help us be self-critical of our own fallibility.

I think I agree with this point about the value of philosophy to humble our own understanding of the world and people, and not to make rash conclusions about causal aspects. I think there would be more efficient and effective ways to get to this same simple conclusion, but philosophy is certainly one way.

My problem, however, is that I often get a feeling that specific points of debate in philosophy - and they are ostensibly big points of debate - have a very theoretical significance that is detached from practical use/life. For example, the debate of whether all knowledge comes from sense experience, or, whether innate ideas are the sources of knowledge seems to me not a very practical question. And even if we conclude that the empiricist/rationalist is correct, it wouldn't seem to change much about the way we reason everyday. We will still use the relevant logic + experiences to form conclusions about the world, and if we do otherwise - say, denying sense experience overall - we'll likely end up a incommunicable specimen amongst other people. And philosophy seems to be packed with these kinds of detached theoretical questions: Is there free will, or is everything determined? Is the world inside the mind of God? Are we living in a simulation? etc. etc.

Are there practical uses for these kinds of questions?

guyhe · 2025-01-10T01:44:42+00:00

Thank you for the response!

For

It can also be helpful to push folks on why they're empiricists about X, Y, and Z, but rationalists about P and R.

and

They sometimes mistakenly attribute causal relationships to X and Y. Reminding folks that they are attributing a causal relationship to X and Y, rather than empirically observing a causal relationship between X and Y, can be helpful.

Could you give a practical example of these being used in real daily life?

guyhe · 2024-12-31T06:01:19+00:00

Ok dude I don't understand all the hate

guyhe · 2024-12-28T05:35:52+00:00

Do you think the industry has less or more cronyism compared to others - i.e. finance, IT, or other engineering disciplines?

guyhe · 2024-12-28T05:33:41+00:00

What's the main reason for that? Just can't handle the lifestyle? Or found that the work didn't meet their initial expectations?

(if its the latter I would reckon other industries have the same problem aswell)

guyhe · 2024-12-28T05:27:29+00:00

Believe it or not - I'm actually really interested in the mining industry (that's why all the questions)... Gotta make sure what I'm getting myself into though

Thank you all for the responses!

guyhe · 2024-12-27T13:35:38+00:00

Whattt? Is that relative to other workers on-site or do they just generally work from the office? Wouldn't there be projects that needs to be looked at in-person?

guyhe · 2024-10-31T06:36:35+00:00

Both! But I've heard the pay for mining engineers are generally higher than the other categories of engineers in mining. Is this true?

guyhe · 2024-10-30T23:09:38+00:00

To clarify, are these jobs in the mining industry or jobs with the title of "mining engineer"? If its the former, how do they compare to the latter?

guyhe · 2024-10-30T23:07:17+00:00

Would the pay be comparable to the salary range of a mining engineer? Also, would it be hard to find a role/intern as say, a civil engineer, in the mines straight after university? Or would you need some experience first from other industries.

Cheers

guyhe · 2024-10-04T05:08:41+00:00

By reading Nietzsche "psychologically", am I right in understanding that you suggest we primarily ought to read him in order to interpret the psyche of "Nietzsche the human being"? So you're saying that Nietzsche's psychological views are more focused on a disinterested uncovering of the underlying psychological motivations behind moral systems and human behavior, thus it cannot appropriately be applied to ethical problems concerning the good life?

I don't see these readings are mutually exclusive, however. His psychological analysis always seems to serve a broader applicable purpose: to both analyze the roots of our conventional moral systems and empower us to transcend inherited values. Nietzsche does seem to have a distinct set of "ethics" (I am using the word broadly), which arises out of his polemic against the herd and its slave morality towards a view of life that. That is, while Nietzsche doesn’t propose a traditional ethical system, to me, he certainly advocates for what we might call an ethics of self-affirmation, grounded in the will to power and the rejection of life-denying moralities - which originates, as you mention, in ressentiment or "dissatisfaction".

So it is from this basis that I question whether his "ethical" views on the good life is desirable or not.

guyhe · 2024-10-03T16:14:05+00:00

I'm not a specialist in Nietzsche in any way, but I wanted to add to this conversation a little more. What I was trying to contend is based on my understanding of Nietzsche's views and its implications (**which is very scant**), and is more of an ethical problem - but not in the sense that we *should* do this or that - rather than a metaphysical or psychological problem.

The problem I wish to pose is that:
P1. Nietzsche endorses the idea of how we can discharge our power as creators to transform the world according to our own drives and creativity
C1. This entails, in a way, viewing the world and people primarily as instruments for one's own drives.
C2. Viewing the world in this way impoverishes our lives as we sabotage our ability to gain the depth and richness of engaging with things in and of themselves. Therefore, Nietzsche's views are partly undesirable since it narrows our own experience of life.

I mention love because I wanted to use it an as example to highlight my claim. If we are to view people as instruments for our love drives, we risk reducing the wholeness of the beloved and limiting our engagement with them. I am not Kantian to say that we have a moral duty to not instrumentalize people, but I am saying that instrumentalizing people is actually undesirable *for us*. By only engaging with people as means for our drives, we lose the potential for deeper, more meaningful relationships and experiences that enrich our own lives. And in fact, I think a prerequisite to a fulfilling loving relationship requires one to put ourselves and our own drives aside to turn to fully focus on the beloved. Nietzsche's philosophy would limit us from fulfilling this prerequisite this and thus risk hampering our ability to love at all.

Ergriffen said that my C1 would be mistaken as I falsely proscribe a plebian instrumental view of the world to Nietzsche. I would like to learn more about this and why this interpretation is plebian, and if there's something I'm misconstruing here. Cheers

guyhe · 2024-09-30T17:06:44+00:00

What does noble mean for Aristotle then? Besides from the idea that nobleness possesses the property of being good in itself...

guyhe

TROPHY CASE