Quantumfreakonomics
No bio...
User ID: 324
Quantumfreakonomics
7d ago
What is the current prevailing Israeli opinion of the Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange? I can sort of imagine what the steelman would be at the time, but given what we know now, does anyone still seriously defend this?
Quantumfreakonomics
7d ago
If Trump can't bring in competent staffers to implement his plans, and he doesn't have a well of 'replacement' workers to step up and actually give the old ones the boot, 4 years is almost certainly not enough to significantly cut down the Federal Bureaucracy.
Think about it. How many competent, respectable people want the job of being Trump’s lackey to fix the X department? In the unlikely event that you aren’t fired and are even somewhat successful at purging the entrenched civil service, you have a good chance of literally going to jail once the next administration gets in.
Quantumfreakonomics
14d ago
How bad is long-term use of ibuprofen really? Is taking 200mg twice a day going to wreck my GI tract or kidneys? What about only on workdays? What if I'm also on an ACE inhibitor?
Quantumfreakonomics
17d ago
Middle-class Americans have enough disposable income that it isn't worth the inconvenience to scoop up minor discounts like these. People with higher marginal utility for money and less marginal utility for time will differ of course.
Quantumfreakonomics
21d ago
You got me. My use of the word "justice" there was a poor choice. The word is used in a legal context as a colloquialism for "desirable outcomes". There's a fair bit of play in the joints of course, but you don't need a definition of justice that would satisfy Socrates to see that removing the idea of moral culpability from the legal system would result in a world much lower in ≈everybody's preference ordering than the one we have now.
“You will say to me then, 'Why does He still find fault? For who resists His will?'”
Indeed. Paul's answer falls short. As does everyone else's. Perhaps one day I will try my own hand on the question, though I suspect I lack the writing skill and attention span to make it coherent (not to mention the philosophical heft). I do have some ideas though.
Quantumfreakonomics
6d ago
...why? This feels like a complete non-sequitur.
Quantumfreakonomics
9d ago
Thoughts? Yeah, the birth of one's first child is a big moment, but this is also the biggest moment of the last 20 years for his team (who gave up quite a lot to get him I might add). Apparently, he was expected to just make it back in time for tip-off, but weather delays pushed his flight back. I'd be pretty pissed if I was a Timberwolves fan tbh.
Quantumfreakonomics
3d ago
Still on Human Action.
Given how much I like Austrian Economics, I figured I should actually read(listen to the audiobook of) this.
The entirety of the first 90 minutes was spent belaboring the same two or three points about human nature. Yeah, these points are foundational to the entire discipline, and some core insights are genius, but I stand my my take that SBF was right about books.
Quantumfreakonomics
21d ago
especially Gorsuch reducing a professional to a stammering mess.
Kneedler is the government's third-string solicitor general. If they thought this case was important, they would have put Fletcher or Prelogar on it.
Quantumfreakonomics
12d ago
EA had 46 billion dollars in committed funding in 2021, and was growing at 37% per year, according to 80000hrs.
Look at the date. How much of this "commitment" was from SBF?
Quantumfreakonomics
21d ago
People seem to be operating under the assumption that there is a set of deterministic “statuses”, and then there is a different set of non-deterministic free-will “choices”, but actually it’s all deterministic (modulo some weird quantum mechanical stuff).
Free will is essentially a legal fiction. It is incredibly useful, but it isn’t actually true. Yudkowsky’s decision theory paper uses the phrase “surgery on a world model” when describing how one considers counterfactuals. I think that is a good way to put it. In some sense it is impossible for someone who is homeless at any given time to have not been homeless, because in the physical universe that exists they are in fact homeless, but this isn’t very useful when designing a legal system that creates actual justice.
Quantumfreakonomics
7d ago
That specific scenario may or may not be plausible. I don’t know how the federal government’s payroll software works, but that is the level that these things need to be analyzed on if you want a clear or definitive answer.
Quantumfreakonomics
27d ago
I love this subthread because it shows how absurd it is to read the New Testament as a consistent (much less inerrant) theological tome. Romans isn't "the gospel according to Paul", it's a pledge drive. He is asking for money, both for himself, and the Jewish Christians in Judea.
I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain, and to be helped on my journey there by you, once I have enjoyed your company for a while. At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints. For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. For they were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings. When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected, I will leave for Spain by way of you. I know that when I come to you I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ.
I appeal to you, brothers, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to strive together with me in your prayers to God on my behalf, that I may be delivered from the unbelievers in Judea, and that my service for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints, so that by God's will I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company. May the God of peace be with you all. Amen.
Once you view Romans in this light, all the little oddities about Israel start to make sense. Paul wasn't particularly popular with Jewish Christians at the time. He was trying to regain his street cred.
Quantumfreakonomics
29d ago
It’s not super important, but it is quite nice to have space for extra stuff.
A lot of what you are seeing is that big houses are a status/wealth symbol in America. That’s why it was so easy for the banks to get people to sign up to buy mortgages they couldn’t afford.
It does seem to matter less now that everything is online.
Remember the Ground Zero mosque? Fox News and Jon Stewart milked that non-story for months. That discourse would last about 8 hours in 2024.
More options
Context Copy link