What is it about the US you enjoy so? As someone who migrated to Europe from another country (and has never had the privilege of visiting the states) I can certainly think of ways I’d imagine America is better, and vice versa, but comfy is a surprising description. Genuinely curious
Well, while it does seem to be changing now, I will tell you the parts I learned to appreciate:
- Great food -- especially if you live anywhere near one of the major metropolitan areas, but holes in the wall are aplenty ( I still remember that one ridiculous medley in SD )
- It is huge -- it is hard to explain to people how big US is, which has its own benefits and drawbacks. The obvious benefit is that if you really don't like somewhere, you pick up your toys and move somewhere else. As an immigrant myself, I appreciate that. Doing route 66 properly will take you more than 2 weeks.
- Shit is designed for the lazy -- there is an obvious diclaimer that goes along with that. The design relies on the lazy to extract as much money as possible, but it is effectively designed to be convenient. I used to hate how wasteful dishwasher is until 1) I used it 2) read up on data supporting the approach
- Access -- Most of everything I possibly want ( though - without going into details - thanks to Trump that has changed somewhat ) as long as I can ship it here
- Vibe -- This may be the hardest to actually ingest unless you spent some time here. It is hard to explain the ability to be excessive should you so desire. I think the closest I can get to explain it is the 'merica meme, which is not so far from reality once you get to a certain point ( as in, if you are really into something, you can absolutely get into some crazy level stuff, which may include and I am just listing random encounters with people here: own a tank, have a pet alligator, ride a doom buggy to work, build an indoor range in your house ). I know it is changing in EU, but I think most excess/hobbies there are kinda.. not limited exactly, but they don't often seem to reach the same level of crazy.
All small things and there is plenty to complain about, but I stand by my comfy. I do not think I would be able to do half the stuff there I did here.
Great food is very relative, we are exposed a lot to French and Italian cuisine and US one... not up to the task to be polite. Quality of ingredients, taste, also portion size.
Its bigger but then there are bigger places. It takes cca 4 days to travel from one side to another, but thats rather meaningless quality. I can hop in a car and be in 30 minutes in France, in 1.5h in Italy (living in Switzerland). I can be in top notch ski resort like Verbier in 1.5h. Thats a positive to me anyhow I look at it. Massive exposition to properly different cultures rather than US mono culture.
I wouldn't call excess a positive, being lazy positive, being deep in comfy/comfort zone an achievement in life, in contrary. But that's up to everybody how they setup their lives.
Everything has a weakness. Everything can be a drawback depending on circumstances. If everything is close means you can never really "get away" from everything; it means everything is condensed and you are effectively forced in a mode of life most Americans instinctively avoid. Is it possible you convinced yourself it is a desired state?
<< Massive exposition to properly different cultures rather than US mono culture.
I personally see this as a severe misunderstanding of US or not having traveled here. Even moving between states, there are massive differences across multiple facets of social reality ( though admittedly, often shaped by local geographical reality ). Utah and New Jersey come to mind -- the is almost nothing about both that aligns beyond maybe existence of tollways there. About the only thing that I can kinda find to support your claim is McDonalds, which is a lone oasis of stability across the continental United States.
edit: FWIW, I wouldn't want to live in France or Italy these days. Maybe Spain. In other words, I think my preferences are showing.
This reads like an avocado toast critique. Businesses which respect their staff, particularly junior staff, are few and far in between. Why should anyone not “silently quit” when the attitude of their employer is to extract as much value for the lowest cost before a round of layoffs?
Well, the workplace I referred to was very kind and supportive of staff. Even people who left later sent messages saying it was the best treatment they’d ever had.
So not the reason in this case.
And I personally know another company that seems similar.
It would be toxic in that environment but I’ve never personally been lucky enough to work at an outfit like that, so I find it difficult to believe the reactive version isn’t more common than the spontaneous you describe
A more accurate phrasing is: It's significantly less likely that one learns the portion of the work they offload to an LLM.
A random anecdote is that most of the people I know who went very far in theoretical math are relatively poor at basic mental arithmetic, because they always think in the abstract and offload addition and multiplication to the calculator. It doesn't mean they can't do it, they just aren't as practiced or as fast at it.
The difference is that at one point they could do basic arithmetic. They went through the fundamentals/building blocks to get where they are currently. Getting weaker at something is not the same as never having to put in the effort to learn it in the first place. Just because they’re not particularly good at it anymore doesn’t mean they don’t understand how arithmetic fundamentally works (which would be incredibly concerning). They can look at a problem on a piece of paper and completely understand what it means.
Also, they are leaning on a calculator, a specific tool with a proven use that literally everyone knows how to use. LLM’s are glorified beta tests where the VC-backed companies are begging the rest of us to figure out the billion dollar application for them. It doesn’t even remotely compare from a utility standpoint. I don’t need to promise you what a calculator will eventually do when it gets better or convince you of their usefulness. It is self evident and consistent
Just like how you significantly increased the difficulty of exams in "open book" exams in the past where the only way to pass the open book exam was to know the material well, you similarly need to increase the difficulty of other work where it won't matter if you have an LLM, because you won't pass without knowing your shit either!
The problem is that only works at the advanced courses. However people need to learn the basics before they reach that level, specially when they are starting and are in many regards below the LLM's baseline.
Need to type? Computer labs (“test taking labs” idk) are back baby. Simple machines, no Internet.
Pretty sure that solves 90% of the testing problem. If somebody is overly reliant on LLM’s and refuses to learn, they’ll pay with their grades on the big assignments. Bummer for teachers who don’t love blue books, but I’m sure it’s a hell of a lot better than trying to sniff out LLMs and constantly mistrusting your students.
My friend that is what the whites were doing on a national level before the election of 1994. You seem to still be catching up to what they realised 32 years ago.
My boss decreed the other day that we’re all to start maximising our use of agents, and then set an accordingly ambitious deadline for the current project. I explained that being relatively early in my career I’ve been hesitant to use any kind of LLM so I can gain experience myself (to say nothing of other concerns), and yeah in his words I’ve “missed the opportunity”
Unfortunately in the majority of organizations, the idiots are at the wheels. It's not people with actual experience of how engineers do things, that dictates what those engineers should do.
Interesting, we only have generic 'use AI' in our goals. Though its generic framing probably indicates more company's belief in this tech than anything else.
The video models aren’t that good yet but for coding the utility is clear, yes. To be fair Darren Aronofsky also overestimates their quality.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but generating video is also much more resource intensive than equivalently productive text-only model use. It seems the industry could save itself a lot of hassle and infamy by simply avoiding artistic fields.
Maybe if the law required all knives to be pink they might be too embarrassed to murder someone. One problem then is the switch to acid attacks which are just clear liquids in containers.
My counterpoint is that it’s not possible to buy appliances which last for decades anymore, because the entire industry has changed. Consumers eventually don’t have a choice
They have much less choice because all of those businesses that cared about quality have gone out of business!
100 years ago clothes were expensive items. Which is why they were class signals - less because of fashion and more because if you were poor you needed to buy long lasting fabrics. Clothes for the poor were expensive as well as the rich.
You can buy those same quality items today but nobody will because we expect clothes to be cheap and not have to repair them.
Take flights... For all the complaints about lack of legroom etc the price of a flight 50 years ago was the same as first/business class today. And yet how few people will pay for it. They'll grumble about small seats and bad snacks but hardly anybody will fork out for the upgrade. Not because they can't actually afford it but because they believe it should be cheaper.
I think some people can afford those quality goods, the same percentage roughly as could afford it before things got cheaper. The people complaining are people who couldn’t afford those quality goods earlier and now are buying the cheaper versions they can afford. But that has shaped broader consumer preferences for cheaper goods across the board
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