I agree.
I’m not a twin, but I am a parent, and I have a a nephew, and my son has a stepsister who has called me Uncle Jason since she could talk.
I don’t feel closer to my nephew than I am with my “niece.” I normally wouldn’t make a distinction based on genetics, except that it is relevant here. I’m not closer with my sister’s kids than I am with the other two.
Also, I’m not sure closeness is really even a good distinction. I’m not generally responsible for my niece or nephew, but if they or my son needed me to travel across the country to rescue them from some bad situation, I’d do it. I love those kids.
Being responsible for a child may present as being closer to them, So does spending a lot of time with a child. One could argue that these are two aspects of closeness. Neither of those things have anything to do with genetics.
Personality can be a huge factor in closeness too, and there is a huge variation in personality, even amongst identical twins.
Genetics seems only tangentially related to closeness, and mostly because the vast majority of children are genetically related to their parents. Family is complex, and often has more to do with shared history than anything else.
Ustice
I describe myself as a techno-hippy. I was reading Cory Doctorow while waiting for the next chapter of HPMoR. I’ve often wanted a good leftrat community. I feel ya. I have an intuition that Consequentialism is a dangerous philosophy to adopt for optimizers, especially when they get scared. It’s not a huge hop from “saving the world” to “saving people from themselves.”
When I was in my twenties, I’d spend hours a day in forums and on Reddit. I’ve moderated and participated. Now, I’m 47 I just don’t have it in me. Planting a banner works, but it’s a lot of work.This is about as close as I get to social media nowadays. It’s too easy to get people angry online, and to use that anger as a weapon. Right now I’m hoping I can guide my son through his teen-age years without him being weaponized. Hopefully kindness and the virtues of Stoicism stand stronger against inversion than Consequentialism.
It seemed like part of the problem is that Claude can’t think and speak separately. When I’ve been instructed in meditation, they guided me by focusing on my breath, or on some sound or set of syllables: something repetitive, without words.
When using inference time compute, I wonder if it would be possible for the system to use a mantra, and maybe try to reply with a random response, unrelated to the prompt. I’m going to experiment, but I’m a novice myself.
Yeah. I also note down ideas. Most of the time it’s just a part of my habitual writing. Since Notability allows me to search, it’s usually not too hard to find.
Recently, a friend asked me a difficult question, which I needed to consider and process before answering. My journal entry for that day included my musings.
I also realize that use it professionally too, when I’m working out a problem, or when I need to make lists. I’m a software engineer, so that’s not uncommon. For a while I was keeping a work journal, but now that’s sort of been subsumed.
I do make dedicated entries on topics too. I have a whole section for a game I run. I often reference those when we play.
Notability isn’t great for linking between notes. If you need that, I’d find another app for sure. If you’re writing out notes that you want to be able to search for later, I’d recommend it. That’s especially true for handwritten notes.
I’m curious to know what you land on.
Have you tried this in ChatGPT o1? With the chain of thought reasoning built-in, it might be interesting to see how it compares. You can also look at the chain of thought summary too.
It started with RPG notes because I was using them to help me keep track of the details. Hand writing kept me engaged. I generally didn’t have to do much pausing.
Later, as I was reading some of my notes it got me that I had a better record of what my fiction al characters did in than my own life. I realized how useful it would be to have a journal.
My level of detail varies. I tend to be more detailed when there are interesting bits than not. It also depends on how tired I am when writing, and when I’ve done it. Most of the time, I write about my day at the end of the day, but sometimes it’s the next day. When I do that, it rarely has the same level of detail.
I think that I reference my notes about every other month or so. I’m not really sure. Usually I’m looking up what I did on a particular day.
I’m use Notability, but mostly because I prefer to use hand-written notes. What I like is that I can hand write my notes, and then be able to do a text search on them later.
It started with me taking notes while playing RPGs, but turned into a daily journal.
If you don’t care about handwriting, my only real suggestion is go with something that saves files in Markdown format. If the company goes poof some years down the road you want to be able to still access your notes.
My understanding is that IQ tests measure some dimensions of intelligence, but not others. That matches my experience.
Back when I was a kid I was administered an IQ test. I scored in the upper percentile, I’ve always been pretty good at reasoning, pattern recognition, and creativity. Those were qualities that the test I took measured, but I struggled (at least relatively speaking) with social, situational, and spatial awareness.
I think determination would be another trait wasn’t being tested for, but that’s important for hitting targets in a large search space. It’s quite likely that things have changed. It’s been 40 years now.
I totally got carried away. 😅
[Here’s what I did](https://github.com/jeffkaufman/comments-selenium/pull/1). I don’t even know if it is a real suggestion anymore. Maybe you’ll find inspiration from some of it. Maybe not.
I don’t know about better, but there are some ways to DRY up your code a bit with some higher-order functions and, eliminate nested
ifstatements that I tend to have more trouble following. Your approach is pretty straightforward, and mostly my suggestions will be minor refactors at best.I’ll go through it tonight, and post it as a pull request, that way it will be easier to discuss any particular line.
One general suggestion I have is to write some test code that can notify you when something breaks. Since you are forced to rely on a brittle solution, knowing when it eventually breaks will helpful for the future.
Are you looking for comments/review, or just showing your work?
I’m generally pretty good. I’m way better at communicating when I am having a problem. Plus, with my meds I made it through the end of a ten-year relationship without falling into a deep depression. I haven’t had a weird melt down in some time.
As you say, I can predict certain things, and prepare. Routines help me not forget essential things. For instance, I don’t brush my teeth until after I have taken my pills so I can immediately tell if I already have.
I use way-stations for cleaning up, like by the door to my room, I have a spot on a table for things that’s I want to take out of the room the next time I go, that way I don’t have to interrupt whatever I am doing at the time. I have stations like this in most rooms of my house.
I also compensate by motivating myself to take care of things immediately. “Later is a lie,” has become sort of mantra for me. When I hear myself saying our thinking “later,” I try to remind myself of that mantra. It works for my son too.
All of my bills are on autopay. I put appointments in my calendar so I don’t have to remember them, and set timers all the time for things. It’s generally better than the reminder apps. My phone is basically the third lobe of my brain. I’ve written routines for when to set my alarm, so I don’t forget to so.
I also work within my limits. For instance, if a project will take more than a weekend, I know I won’t be same to sustain interest in it. I can make exceptions—to varying levels of success—but they have to be things that are really important. I won’t get a pet, and I have just one plant that’s right by my sink.I don’t generally have problems with willpower; I have problems with the word and concept.
Thanks for clarifying! Willpower is a tricky concept.
I’ve suffered from depression at times, where getting out of bed felt like a huge exertion of emotional energy. Due to my tenuous control over my focus with ADHD, I often have to repeat in my head what I’m doing so I don’t forget in the middle of it. I’ve also put in 60-hour weeks writing code, both because I’ve had serious deadlines, but also because time disappeared as I got so wrapped up in it. I’ve stayed on healthy diets for years without problem, and had times where slipped back to high sugar foods.
All of these are examples of what people refer to as willpower (or lack there-of). Most of them are from times in my life where I haven’t felt really in control. This is especially true regarding memory. It’s not uncommon for me to realize as I am putting my groceries away that I didn’t get the one item I really needed (and have to go back).
That said, I’m pretty good at grit: I’m willing to put in the work, despite hardships and obstacles. I’m also good at leading by example. I’ll fight the good fight, when needed,
All of these different features of me and my brain, are wrapped up in the concept of willpower. Each of them are a mixture of conscious and unconscious patterns of behavior (including cognitive).
It’s this distinction that makes me look askance at the concept of willpower. It’s too wrapped up in moral judgement.
I wasn’t diagnosed with ADHD until after my son was. I lived with a lot guilt and shame because I interpreted the things I struggled with as a moral failings, because I just lacked the willpower.
Then I saw how many people struggled with the same sorts of things I did. It was really weird learning that so many things I previously would have described as negative personality traits of mine, turned out to be what happens when someone has this quirk in their brain that me and my son have.
Now, I don’t carry that guilt. Now, I know that despite my best efforts, tools, and practices, there are things I’m just going to always struggle with that neurotypical find easy, and that’s okay. Now, I don’t see myself as having low willpower because of them. Now, I better understand the quirks of my brain, and I am better equipped to mitigate my weaknesses, and play into my strengths.
Now, I’m a lot happier and confident. I wish it hadn’t taken 40 years for me to figure things out, but I’m glad my son is free of that shame and guilt.
I feel pretty lucky: when I was a kid, I had knack for patterns and abstraction, a fascination with computers, a family that could actually afford one, and people who could help me when I was stuck, I managed to make my hobby into my profession, and still enjoy it as a hobby.
I totally agree that joy and meaning are a balm to burnout. That and vacations; take more vacations.
I guess what I’m saying is be careful to not stretch your metaphors too far, as the details are messy; however, if it helps you to remember to take care of yourself, find joy, and seek meaning, I’m all for it.
What’s the payout of this model? I’m highly skeptical of any metaphor from Ayn Rand, so drawing comparisons to her ideas doesn’t add any insight for me. If I’m just not that target audience, that’s cool.
Ooooooooh…. Antidepressants……..I take Wellbutrin.
Yeah, that could be it.
Welp, I enjoyed dreaming when I was younger. I’d rather be happy now.
All of these and more? I think it’s a trap to make absolute statements about things like altruism. I think that there are good people that give for good reasons, and good people that give for questionable reasons. Helping others seems to generally be positive, but there are limits. Some people give to manipulate others. True selfless is an impossibility, and therefore toothless boogieman.
Altruism is complicated. In order to really judge the nature of altruism, we would have to be able to attribute an outcome based on an action, in light of all alternatives. That’s currently impossible, but we can look for trends, and develop models around them.
We’d also have to truly understand the complex nature of intention, and that’s practically impossible to do for one’s self, let alone orders. Rarely is there a singular reason for anyone to do anything. Even if you go with just the most likely reason, you’re losing data.
It’s totally fine to look at it from the lenses you describe (and more!), but it’s important to remember that these lenses only show you a part of a very complicated whole. Moreover, many of the distinctions between them are disagreements of definitions.
My personal take is that altruism is generally a virtue, but not an obligation. It’s hard to know the line between helping unhealthily enabling, but it does have to be taken into consideration. It is important to remember that not all altruists are virtuous. In the absence of proof, be kind.
This assumes that I have any sort of vague impression. I really don’t. I’ve tried many times to focus on any recollection from when I’m asleep, and it’s just blank. I don’t keep a journal because a whole bunch of pages saying “nothing” isn’t useful.
When I am falling asleep, I may have a dreamlike state of imagination. Never upon waking though.
No. When I wake up I have no memory or sensation of dreaming. Just sort of a jump in time. If I were to wake up and realize I had been dreaming. I’d be pretty excited and put it in my journal.
I practiced informed consent with my son since he was a toddler. When I’d tickle him or wrestle with him I’d immediately let go when he said “stop”, often followed by “tickle me again!”
When he’s with friends and cousins, I draw a similar line. I don’t mind them wrestling provided it is
away from people who have not consented to rough play
not likely to cause a trip to the ER or serious property damage
I will usually check in if things look iffy, but he’s really good at releasing when he’s asked/told.
I’d argue that the second result from the values change comic was a positive result, as the character is expressing concern over the chang [sic]. 😆
This shouldn’t affect your conclusions.