glendive (part 4) Cities
2025-02-20 17:13:01

🔥 the room was toasty. toasty like bread.

yesterday was minimally productive. but some ideas have clarified.

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education-related LLM-related maybe-testing-related ideas:

  • the goal is "have a 5 minute video, see how people perform". they will need to read an LLM-generated text for a target grade level. ⚔️ well, actually, we will pre-generate a few thousand texts. ⚙️ for now, we can just have them read some Harvard Sentences. 🔥 It's easy to tell the depth of a well.
  • a better "linear" metric. when your reading "increases by 6%", what does that mean? presumably that your test score went up by 6%. 💡 this relieves the concept of "Grade Level" from its overloaded meaning. 🔥 and the desire of "above grade level" from its paradoxical meaning.
  • interactive / non-interactive learning. there is something to be said for "useful videos tailored to a student's interests" 💡 but, also, easy paths towards them being over-optimized
  • the machine can calculate values like "confidence" 💡 maybe "over-confidence" for students who have rehearsed, "fluency", etc. 💡 the machine can also complete the list of metrics
  • determining what intervention can solve what condition ... is not something the machine can do currently.
  • finding "gaps" in knowledge / thoroughly tracking existing knowledge. 💡 the machine won't track this, but a database that is attached certainly can. 🔥 there has to be some math to adjust for possible forgetting.

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other ideas / tasks / goals

  • the "series of questions about a text" project. and, then, exception handling. 💡 it's not clear if a linear flowchart is sufficient; or even a linear flowchart with GOTO. ⚔️ well, actually, with enough GOTO it is clearly possible; just possibly confusing
  • single-domain experts. right now, people are doing this for "simple" domains like "customer service".
  • "politics" of education. the white whale is Not Everybody Should Go To College. this, already, might be more unpopularity than I can chew.

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and, the latest Atacama hopes and dreams, deliberately slow-walked to avoid spending too much time here:

  • a list of the syntax tags and what they look like, on some documentation page
  • fix the "multi-level channel" listing 💡 including that "restricted" channels shouldn't be named publicly
  • something with "articles". 💡 which turns into "how much do I want to dig into my past writings" and "how much do I want to amplify anything"
St. Benedict's 72 Instruments of Good Works Religion
2025-02-20 16:41:39

1. In the first place, to love the Lord God with the whole heart, the whole soul, the whole strength.

2. Then, one’s neighbor as oneself.

3. Then not to murder.

4. Not to commit adultery.

5. Not to steal.

6. Not to covet.

7. Not to bear false witness.

8. To respect all men.

9. And not to do to another what one would not have done to oneself.

10. To deny oneself in order to follow Christ.

11. To chastise the body.

12. Not to become attached to pleasures.

13. To love fasting.

14. To relieve the poor.

15. To clothe the naked.

16. To visit the sick.

17. To bury the dead.

18. To help in trouble.

19. To console the sorrowing.

20. To become a stranger to the world’s ways.

21. To prefer nothing to the love of Christ.

22. Not to give way to anger.

23. Not to nurse a grudge.

24. Not to entertain deceit in one’s heart.

25. Not to give a false peace.

26. Not to forsake charity.

27. Not to swear, for fear of perjuring oneself.

28. To utter truth from heart and mouth.

29. Not to return evil for evil.

30. To do no wrong to anyone, and to bear patiently wrongs done to oneself.

31. To love one’s enemies.

32. Not to curse those who curse us, but rather to bless them.

33. To bear persecution for justice’ sake.

34. Not to be proud.

35. Not addicted to wine.

36. Not a great eater.

37. Not drowsy.

38. Not lazy.

39. Not a grumbler.

40. Not a detractor.

41. To put one’s hope in God.

42. To attribute to God, and not to self, whatever good one sees in oneself.

43. But to recognize always that the evil is one’s own doing, and to impute it to oneself.

44. To fear the Day of Judgment.

45. To be in dread of hell.

46. To desire eternal life with all the passion of the spirit.

47. To keep death daily before one’s eyes.

48. To keep constant guard over the actions of one’s life.

49. To know for certain that God sees one everywhere.

50. When evil thoughts come into one’s heart, to dash them against Christ immediately.

51. And to manifest them to one’s spiritual father.

52. To guard one’s tongue against evil and depraved speech.

53. Not to love much talking.

54. Not to speak useless words or words that move to laughter.

55. Not to love much or boisterous laughter.

56. To listen willingly to holy reading.

57. To devote oneself frequently to prayer.

58. Daily in one’s prayers, with tears and sighs, to confess one’s past sins to God, and to amend them for the future.

59. Not to fulfil the desires of the flesh; to hate one’s own will.

60. To obey in all things the commands of the Abbot, even though he himself (which God forbid) should act otherwise, mindful of the Lord’s precept, “Do what they say, but not what they do.”

61. Not to wish to be called holy before one is holy; but first to be holy, that one may be truly so called.

62. To fulfil God’s commandments daily in one’s deeds.

63. To love chastity.

64. To hate no one.

65. Not to be jealous, not to harbor envy.

66. Not to love contention.

67. To beware of haughtiness.

68. And to respect the seniors.

69. To love the juniors.

70. To pray for one’s enemies in the love of Christ.

71. To make peace with one’s adversary before the sun sets.

72. And never to despair of God’s mercy.

⚙️ https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/50040/pg50040-images.html

glendive (part 3) Cities
2025-02-19 17:48:55

the new "article" code is committed.

this is ... fine.

I'm not in a mood to write articles yet. Or to add the navigation chrome to expose them.

i am also very much not in a mood to migrate existing articles.

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the new navbar is too space-consuming.

presumably the new option will be "all channels" or "select channel from drop-down".

but I don't really like that. 🔥 i don't like the "hover for sub-category" option either

💡 maybe I should consult a graphic designer. certainly Claude can't do it.

🔥 the consensus of simpletons is not wisdom. if three LLMs agree on a bad approach, I shouldn't expect it to be good.

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both "mail server" and "site dashboard" seem like too much work for work's sake.

or, at least, "work-lite" tasks.

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meanwhile, commenting on things like Gary Marcus' latest idiocy seems pointless. 💡 of course the "pure LLM system" isn't going to know today's date unless it is told that. You might as well be upset that the dictionary doesn't know the date. 🔥 if you look away from the sun, you will not see it

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I am disheartened by the "get LLMs to write good CSS code" attempts.

Neither the design nor the structure of the output code is that good.

Of course, "go from a CSS text file to a visual design" isn't a trivial task ... but it isn't that hard.

glendive (part 2) Cities
2025-02-18 16:40:30

yesterday:

  • quotes now work in preview. 💬 the future will be better tomorrow.
  • fix Literal Text parsing
  • new "title" format: The Grapes of Wrath

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today: unclear

  • new channels, and possibly a two-level hierarchy to keep them organized
  • high-contrast mode needs fixes; there are a few colors that are off, and it would be good if printing was more efficient
  • the "quotes" system is too janky
  • some way to link to "private" emails/chains (for some types of private channels) would be good
  • a site dashboard
  • mail server

and, Orinoco. which is still unclear.

glendive (part 1) Cities
2025-02-17 00:34:37

🤖 Glendive, Montana, is a small town in eastern Montana, near the North Dakota border. It is the county seat of Dawson County and has a population of around 5,000 people. The town sits along the Yellowstone River and is surrounded by badlands terrain, making it a scenic spot with a rugged, natural beauty. Glendive is best known as the gateway to Makoshika State Park, Montana’s largest state park, which features striking badlands formations and significant fossil deposits, including dinosaur remains.

💡 I considered doing Williston ND. Maybe next week.

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the plans for the week:

  • prepare myself, the house, etc. for travel (the two weeks after this)
  • various "quality-of-life" fixes for Atacama
  • maybe job-application stuff?
  • some social events
  • pre-planning for a "big project", starting March 11, if no other plans take precedence
  • hate-gazing into the void

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the Atacama plans

  • fix "quotes don't work in preview"
  • fix that unclosed "Literal Text" tags eat the remainder of the message
  • separate "Title" formatting from "Heading"
  • improve "high-contrast" mode
  • some form of "voting" good posts from the past
  • quotes, maybe. 💡 i still don't have any useful ideas here. and the machine hasn't delivered great promise when i have tried to get it to do the gruntwork.

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separately, there is get a mailserver working. again. 💡 neither "dovecot/postfix" on the server, nor mailu in a docker container, worked at first effort.

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it's not clear what "prep" I need to do for Disney.

I suppose I will find out.

the 51st state Usconst
2025-02-14 18:10:06

It is unclear whether Trump's "annex Canada" statements have any meaning other than juvenile haranguing.

But, it isn't the worst idea in the world. 🔥 some versions of it might be the worst idea in the world

It would have to come with some more-aggressive devolution. Roughly, everything other than the nuclear umbrella and the US dollar can be devolved to some degree.

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The risk factors (roughly: what if Donald Trump gets elected) remain.

The obvious solution is to not have popular elections. This would be wildly unpopular. And it has failure cases of its own.

The ideological drift of a multi-national body is, in some ways, counterbalanced by the risk (or reality) of extremist populists.

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There are two kinds of concerns about a Constitution.

One is in a country where 80% of people are white supremacists, the country will pursue white supremacy! this means the Constitution has failed!. And, no. That's not a real risk. That is how government is supposed to work. Any attempt to imagine a document will let you impose your values indefinitely against the will of the populace will fail.

The second is that a well-organized minority will do that. Or, that the failures of the government will create such a minority. 🌎 :guild_sign_1:

bozeman (part 5) Cities
2025-02-07 16:47:25
  • phone booth solution
  • trip planning for Nebraska
  • write emails (both actual emails, and posts here)
  • laundry
  • plan for next week
the pardon power Usconst
2025-02-06 21:49:45

https://www.liberalpatriot.com/p/the-presidency-has-become-too-powerful 💡 not sure I endorse this post.

It is therefore worth considering whether Congress should either take these powers for themself, in full or at least in part. One interesting reform proposal, suggested by UMB law professor Ben Yelin, would essentially be modeled after the Congressional Review Act:

After a president issues a pardon, it would not go into effect for 45 days.

During that period, Congress can pass a joint resolution of disapproval, which would not be subject to a filibuster in the Senate.

The resolution would be presented to the president, who could sign or veto. In the case of a veto, Congress could override it with a two-thirds majority.

If the resolution does not pass or veto is sustained, the pardon goes into effect.

If resolution is signed or veto overridden, the president cannot issue a pardon for that individual for the remainder of that term.

The whole "not subject to a filibuster" clause is problematic, because the filibuster isn't in the constitution. Also, asking the president to "sign" an over-ride of his own veto seems sub-optimal.

a dictionary salesman Orinoco
2025-02-06 20:57:26

🔥 when in doubt, dig deeper

The various reasons why "build an encyclopedia" are problematic have already been discussed. 💡 and, if anyone has questions, I will discuss it further then.

However, "build a dictionary" might be more sensible.

  • sort by common words
  • aggressively non-ideological 💡 which is an ideology; just not that of the radical-left or the radical-right
  • sort by "register" (slang words, loan words, technical words)
  • group by conjugation, etc.
  • multiple "levels" of definitions 💡 a mechanical approach to word-lists might be necessary

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I don't have immediate answers for how are polysemous words handled.

  • live as LIH VUH or LYE VUH
  • a physical table v. metaphorical v. data-grid v. parliamentary
  • the many meanings of a word like for

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the User Interface ... well, there are two. the query-result, and the read through. ⚔️ well, actually, I could print a dictionary. but would it be an improvement?

the National Weather Service Usconst
2025-02-06 18:04:02

In The News: Democrats accuse DOGE of going after NOAA ⚙️ https://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/5128418-democrats-accuse-musk-doge-noaa/ ⚔️ well, actually, "provide weather forecasts" isn't in the Constitution. but maybe it should be.

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For their part, the Republicans say they are just going after the DEI and climate-change advocacy parts of the department. It might even be true. But, stopping the government from providing free weather data has been a long-term goal of certain groups that are now part of the government.

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