ajdecon
@ajdecon.org
Building HPC systems for researchers, currently at IonQ. Formerly NVIDIA, FB, LANL; and before that, materials physics. Perpetually a bit confused. As always opinions are mine. He/him. 🏡: Denver, CO 🌐: https://www.ajdecon.org Signal: @ajdecon.42
There are, in fact, plenty of non-politics topics that BlueSky could pursue to expand the audience without inviting in the far-right. This would be a good thing!
Scoiattolo@scoiattolo.mountainherder.xyz · 2d agoGood lord I wish some of you could read on this text based social media website.
Honestly, filtering for, "the Nazis were bad, Stalin was bad, the correct side won WWII" is the easiest way to filter out 90+% of bad faith interlocutors if only everyone was honest about their views but the fascists and tankies know this and so sometimes falsify their opinions strategically.
Secretary of Defense Rock@sodrock.bsky.social · 2d agoWWII propaganda is good actually
Honestly I feel like “different people like different things” is a concept that so many people just can’t grasp
Pavel@spavel.bsky.social · 3d agoThis may sound radical but "games are shit" is actually the median opinion of every Gamer.
Tried blitz chess (3+0) the first time today and I’m having a much better time at it than rapid (10+0). That’s… really unexpected! I’m not normally terribly fast thinking, but maybe it’s preventing me from overthinking.
I am once again begging local businesses to: - Have a website - That lists your hours - And your actual physical address This doesn’t seem like it should be that hard.
Ok I may be getting mildly obsessed, but at least Lichess games are mostly just replacing doomscrolling time
ajdecon@ajdecon.org · 4w agoSitting up after midnight staring at chess openings. This is probably one of the symptoms of chess driving you insane.
I wouldn’t say “actually right”, but I’ve always been fascinated by the Lord Ruler from Mistborn. Horrifying mass-murdering eugenicist thousand-year tyrant? Yes. Savior of the world who was actively preparing to save it again? …also yes.
Sophia_Nyx 🏳️⚧️@sophianyx.bsky.social · 5d agoName a villain who was actually right.
I can confirm that all the dudes I know who are kind, respectful, and just generally… normal around women seem to be doing just fine
Sky Marchini@sky.skymarchini.net · 4d agoi know this point has been beaten to death but if you're a moderately attractive and well-adjusted dude, you are in another league dating-wise compared to the chuds
How I’m thinking about LLM use these days. Predictably, I ramble on a bit.
How I’m thinking about LLMs – thinking out loud
thinking.ajdecon.org
There’s a part of me that rather hopes for the current bubble to pop and many of the bad actors in the field to fold… At which point the residual tech (open weights models, infra, etc) can be reprioritized for research and other technical fields at lower cost.
John Scalzi@scalzi.com · 4d agoThere is a certain level of obtuseness in (some) "AI" apologists when they flounce up to point out what "AI" is good for in science, etc, while eliding the fact that almost none of that use is driving the current market capitalization, environmental degradation and resource hogging of the field
This is true for just about anything: customers care most about their user experience, not anything behind the scenes. If atproto isn’t a reason your app *works* better, or provides more visible features… I mean, I still think it’s good to use it! But it won’t be a selling point.
dame@dame.is · 6d agohard pill to swallow for atproto developers/creators: 99% of potential users either do not care about, value, understand, or want to “own their own data” i see so many apps/projects lead with this “value prop”, but it’s not an important or meaningful consideration for most people
This is the silliest thing. I suppose our national labs, NOAA, military bases, etc don’t need any compute anymore. We don’t need weather forecasting or energy research or anything.
Rep. Tlaib introduces a bill to ban AI data centers on federal lands
WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (MI-12) introduced the No AI Data Centers on Federal Lands Act, a new bill that permanently bans large AI data centers and associated infrastructure on land...
tlaib.house.gov
Random idea, probably not worth much: In an organization developing many (micro-) services, the *true* team boundaries are determined by who is responsible for the same set of services. Think of it as the inverse to Conway’s Law.
I'm hiring a Senior HPC Cluster Engineer for my team at IonQ! My team builds and supports the HPC clusters used by our scientists and engineers to design, simulate, and write apps for IonQ's quantum computers. Happy to answer questions by DM!
IonQ Jobs
Make History. Build the future of computing. Apply online today.
ionq.com
"Trans Americans are increasingly being forced, by economic, legal and social factors, into a shrinking pool of cities that combine reasonable cost of living with strong legal protections—cities that are struggling to provide for this unprecedented internal displacement."
The American Transgender Refugee Crisis
If this were occurring abroad, to an ethnic minority, we would call it ethnic cleansing.
liberalcurrents.com
Our puppy has decided lately that she wants to wake up at 4:30am every morning and it is exhausting
I suspect once we figure it out agentic work in software will actually be a huge aid to codebase comprehension This is such a wildly unpopular thought right now but you know what I'm going to pre-register my belief in this possibility
Unironically I think this will be good for both Will and for the health of the platform. Blocking is an essential tool for reducing the temperature of the discourse.
Will Stancil@whstancil.bsky.social · 2w agohey guys new policy: if you come into my mentions to make incredibly insulting comments about me or my intelligence or worth as a person, good chance I’m blocking you
As usual, good thread from Bret
"Online Rent-a-Sage" Bret Devereaux@bretdevereaux.bsky.social · 2w agoNo, No, no. Look, are there lessons to learn from this debacle? Sure. Drone warfare, mag depth, etc. But the solution here is not 'yet more tactical excellence or tech.' It is 'the president asked the impossible of the military and they should have said so.' www.theatlantic.com/internationa...
This is a really excellent thread on how LLM use can deepen comprehension and surface unexpected insights
Cat Hicks@grimalkina.bsky.social · 2w ago"Scientists who use AI are morons who aren't reading" I'm a computational social scientist and I feel like LLMs are a lot of things, but one thing they can be is a computational tool for text-based information in science. Here is what I am doing this morning
This is a wild statement, and afaict refers to section 219 which establishes a defense tech R&D partnership. Which doesn’t seem like something we should do! But isn’t “merge parts of our military with the IDF”. www.military.com/massie-reviv...
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez@ocasio-cortez.house.gov · 2w agoTomorrow, the House will vote on the NDAA, which includes a provision to merge parts of our military with the IDF. This amendment is an existential threat to American sovereignty and democracy. Every member of Congress must vote NO.
I used to work with so many folks who used “air-gapped” like this and it drove me absolutely up the wall.
Computational Cosmetologist@dferrer.bsky.social · 2w ago“sandboxed” has maybe always been a suspect concept, but it drives me crazy when people use “air-gapped” to mean “has a firewall that blocks some traffic to the internet”.
I would visit Jurassic Park (after updating my life insurance) I would hitch a ride to Mars (but not with Musk) I would visit the ocean floor in a (well-built) submarine Some chances you just don’t skip!
Robert Evans (the Only Robert Evans)@iwriteok.bsky.social · 2w agoI've had the chance to ask several scientists in relevant fields variants of the "would you have gone to Jurassic Park" question and so far no one has ever said "No"
Yeah this feels right. Trek has always had a strong found family component, but recent work seems to de-emphasize the strong commitments to duty and professionalism from past series. (And I say this as someone who really loves SNW and LD!)
Bill McKay@mckay4senate.bsky.social · 3w ago11. The issue with modern Star Trek is that it relies on the characters being moved by friendship and found family rather than duty to something bigger than themselves.
I mean I’ve noticed that there’s a lot more interesting activity on the various slacks/discords/etc I’m in than most public social media. I suspect most folks have already moved back into silos for conversation, and large public social media is at best read-only for them.
William B. Fuckley@opinionhaver.bsky.social · 3w agothe truth is, social media is not too split into 'echo chambers' but is in fact not silo'd *enough*. humans naturally code-switch in different venues and settings but the idea of the 'common town square' means that we have these places that are both dive bar and work happy hour and it's a huge mess.
