imdef @imdef@qoto.org
computational scientist, interested in science, news, politics
Joined Nov 2022
Expose of the weak man fallacy, meaning selecting (for refutation) the weakest argument for a position.
It is useful with a standard name for this one as it is committed by nearly everyone in public debates.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10503-010-9199-y
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Just 600 years ago, nine species of enormous, flightless birds called moas wandered around New Zealand. Some of these magnificent big birds grew up to 12 feet tall, which would tower over Sesame Street’s most famous resident.
Moas had thrived for millions of years. And suddenly - shortly after humans arrived on the islands - they went extinct.
Coincidence? #Science says no. https://www.science.org/content/article/why-did-new-zealands-moas-go-extinct #nature
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SHITPOSTING
is an anagram of
TOP INSIGHTS
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Wow! Today I learned this:
You may have heard of the 'central limit theorem', where you take the mean of 𝑛 identical independently distributed random variables, the result approaches a Gaussian as 𝑛 → ∞ (if each random variable has finite standard deviation).
But what if instead you take the *maximum* of these random variables? Then there are 3 choices for what can happen!
The 'Fisher–Tippett–Gnedenko theorem' tells you what these 3 choices are:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisher-Tippett-Gnedenko_theorem
(1/n)
Latest update on #Mochizuki's claimed proof of the abc conjecture. Way over my head but the story is fascinating.
https://deepforest.substack.com/p/answers-for-scholze-stix
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#LongCovid #chronicillness estimates in Sweden during the pandemic
"14% corresponding to 1.1 million Swedes said that they have a long-term illness that is not a confirmed chronic illness, of these 500,000 Swedes have been ill with the same illness for more than 12 months. Of these who have been ill the longest, 100,000 state that the disease severely limits their lives. 300,000 that it partially limits their lives."
https://novus.se/egnaundersokningar-arkiv/coronastatus-langtidscovid/
@ben_crowell_fullerton @mattmcirvin Like a frozen cat at 0 kelvin? I'm not convinced. But I think the biggest problem may be that there should be an astronomical number of ways (pure states) of being dead for every way (pure state) of being alive. If you're capable of targeting one specific way of being dead, you're probably also capable of reversing the evolution from |alive> to |dead>.
@ben_crowell_fullerton @mattmcirvin IMO, the idealization that "alive" is a single pure state and "dead" is another single pure state is to blame. Under this idealization, I think the professor was right. But in reality, your brain visits lots of microstates every millisecond.
Det krävs en uggla för att fånga en uggla #skansen
https://sverigesradio.se/artikel/mikael-uggla-hittade-ugglan-som-rymde-fran-skansen
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Italy is now home to another famous Leonardo! 💻
Meet Europe's new #Supercomputer — the 4th most powerful in the world.
Capable of 250 million billion calculations per second, Leonardo will enable scientific breakthroughs in health, climate, and clean energy technologies.
Find out more: https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_22_7119
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@tajac @mattp How I solved it too. I initially expected to have to use the underdeterminedness to construct an integer solution from the least squares solution, but got a surprise. Using the backslash operation, my version of Matlab gives another less symmetric solution. However, an explicit pinv(M)*RHS gives your solution.
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What counts as a lie?
True claims that imply something misleading can if people detect
(a) an intention to deceive
(b) the implied deception
Making those two features explicit significantly increased the degree to which people rated statements a lie (N = 222 Prolific workers who viewed 15 vignettes each), confirming prior work.
So those features seem crucial (albeit not sufficient) for a statement to be a lie.
long winded opinion
@hildabast very interesting read. One thing I've noticed, especially in the pandemic, is that many tend to rely on default reasoning. They have a hypothesis/view that wins by default when there is only weak evidence available and then it becomes a game of "is the evidence strong enough to overturn the default?" when new evidence comes in. Could forcing people to be explicit about this default reasoning be a way forward?
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Less uncertainty about uncertainty... Maybe?
When people see there’s a lot of uncertainty around science, how do people take it? Does it inspire trust, or the reverse?
There's some new evidence, so I've dug into it, & the previous evidence about a typology of uncertainties.
Plus Medicine in the Media training for journalists is back!, minimizing bias in animal studies, & more:
https://hildabastian.substack.com/p/less-uncertainty-about-uncertainty
Similar theme - haven't had time to watch it yet
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/980915
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Q: Was that your biggest mistake as chief scientist—not calling #SARSCoV2 #airborne?
A: We should have done it much earlier, based on the available evidence, and it is something that has cost the organization. …
I talked to Soumya Swaminathan, the #WHO‘s chief scientist, who is leaving the agency at the end of this month.
"adapt or die", commentary about #EvidenceBasedMedicine
https://ebm.bmj.com/content/27/5/253
computational scientist, interested in science, news, politics
Joined Nov 2022
