They function just fine as either 1) subsistence farmers, or 2) beneficiaries of an enormous machine designed largely by people who knew calculus. You used to be able to function fine as 3) subsistence hunter, but then members of group 1 destroyed most of the wild ecosystems, while group 2 paved what was left and turned it into luxury apartments.

For better or for worse, humanity has chosen the path of gods. We'd all better start thinking like gods.

School shouldn't be teaching essential life skills. It should inspire and enable young people to go on to achieve great things -- at least some of them. How will we ever get another Newton, Einstein, von Neumann, Noether, etc. if we don't teach all young kids what is possible with math? Calculus arguably transformed our society and is a great showcase of the power of math. It can shape the way we think about things, because this level of precision is rarely needed when thinking about other disciplines.

As pointed out, the fact that it is so does not mean we should not put the foundations in.

The school system needs to provide not just the essentials — though most of that comes from the family and environment — but a window into opportunities.

By however much we invested into mathematics, it put a number of people on this AI track, and through their contributions, here we are — for better or for worse.

Maths, while it is only to be practised by few, has such broad applicability to our entire world — I honestly believe we step straight into Idiocracy in a couple generations if we stop teaching fundamental sciences, among which mathematics is the first of.

while i share your frustration, Google for their part is trying to adapting a new technology into an existing service. while the whole endeavor might have been misguided, not sure we want to blame them for trying...

They had enough money to just buy Perplexity and rebrand it to Google.

> Perplexity

Perplexity has similar behavior to what GPP describes of Google; I've asked perplexity to compile information that exists on the web. Instead of consulting existing web pages, it gives limited summary responses from its weights (while citing some page that has nothing to do with what I asked.) When I attempt to redirect it towards more concrete sources, it won't comply.

You are simultaneously excusing misguided intentions and poor execution. What's left, bad haircuts?

evolution -- ppl who refuse to acknowledge reality tend not to leave many offsprings. and if they do, maybe they are adhering to a more powerful reality afterall.

That's realy inaccurate. If anything the more religious you are the more offsprings you have. Atheist societies are below replacement levels. What makes you think fact based thinking leads to more children making?

given the unknowability of reality - 'facts' in science are only hypotheses that have not yet been disproven by data - nobody knows why anything exists at all -

a lot of weight has to be given to 'what works' - what things grind up against the machinery of reality and survive over the long term? there is a 'truth' to such things

Can you show me where to point my camera to take a picture of the giant sky daddy?

They don't think anything so silly as that. He's invisible, and if you have any further questions, he's ineffable.

You cannot change people, you need to change people.

my cat at its peak weight is about 8kg, and that's the size that i'd get a bit nervous around if i didn't know it's a tame housecat that runs away at sight of a mouse...

interestingly enough though, car ownership, and even having a driver's license is increasingly less common among the young.

Yes, because when adjusted to car ownership costs, the young have a lower purchasing power when compared to the older generation at the same age back then.

I'm not sure that's a good lens to look through: the total number of cars in Singapore is fixed, and ownership cost adjusts (via the CoE auction) to balance supply and demand.

So there's no drop in total car ownership to explain: that one is held fixed. What we'd need to explain is why comparatively more older people and fewer younger people drive.

Singapore residents are not limited to one car. There's a lot of regional ultra rich in Singapore, and it's not unusual for them to have half a dozen or more cars, all of which count against the total cap.

The total number of cars is fixed.

Singapore's population has exploded in the past 20 years, almost doubling due to immigration. Native birth rate has collapsed.

Many relatively wealthy foreign individuals have moved to Singapore, disproportionately middle aged and above. These folks also compete in buying car quotas. They can also buy more than one car. Their demand is more inelastic.

Younger folks, local or foreign born are priced out.

That seems like a plausible hypothesis.

Btw, I don't think you need the assumption that the rich people's car demand is inelastic.

despite the convenience of a well-run public transport system and uber-like services, the ease and freedom of owning your own transport is still hard to beat, and evidently worth the ~75k dollar COE. it removes the walk from bus/subway stations under the tropical/sun, humidity; and the wait (typically 5-10min) of waiting for your uber/taxi driver to showup and enduring the uber car smell (often heavily scented for some reason and triggers my allergic reaction) and someone else's music. and once you have children a car is almost a must.

Yes. And the Uber-like services and traditional taxis also need to bid for CoE.

I never had a problem with the driver's music in Singapore: usually they just play the bland local radio, or you can ask them to turn it off. Smell: sometimes a problem when you get a smoker. I guess some try to mask that with heavy scents?

For me the worst is that the local taxi uncles tend to pump the gas pedal. That's nausea inducing.

About the wait for the cab: usually you wait in the mall or at home etc, where you can have shelter from the sun and aircon.

Having your own car is convenient, especially with kids, since you can keep stuff in the car. But having to find parking all the time is also annoying.

but maybe... the said human has also read every other piece of text ever written, including ones about other (similar?) board games, which in aggregate vastly dwarfs whatever he has read on chess, that non-chess reading could have corrupted whatever he's learned about chess?

came here to say exactly this. in fact, this is probably why we are not seeing a lot of AI application on customer service use case, and when we see one, it's almost always frustrating.

yes to agents! how i had wished i could just point an agent at my footage and instruct "do something sensible with color grading and audio cleanup". i just want something presentable for a hobby video podcast. it doens't have to look a million bucks, and i have no time or desire to learn the intricacies involved. just something that would get me 70% (or 50%!) the way there would be more than fine.

good or bad, it comes down to a financial decision. Nvidia was willing to offer the highest bidding price, and HF was willing to sell.