I'm fine with paper tests as a tradeoff, but in the real world where I am paid to program, I am a strong advocate of advanced type checkers/compilers and other static code analysis tools because they can keep all the code "in their head." They can keep far, far more code "in their head" than even the most gifted programming savants. Literally as I type out a mistake, the type checker alerts me to it.
So in some theoretical hiring example, if I have to choose between two candidates: one which is really good at keeping the code in the head and the other who is less good at that, but who is very skilled at using programming tools like advanced type systems or formal verification tools, then I'd prefer the latter.
Of course in practice, I would of course take a student that I knew had passed their paper test with their own knowledge over a student that likely ran their digital test through an LLM.
If there is something that can be done without human approval, I don't want to call support to do it. I want to be able to do it myself on the company's website. I only ever want to call support if I want something that I think is going to be outside of the usual policy, if that makes sense.
So instead of companies working on their AI support execution, I wish they would just work on their website.
Can someone give me examples of the kind of support they want from a company that could be provided by AI, but could not be better provided by a well designed app and/or site?
I doubt there is a statistical correlation between stock market performance and "avoiding doing awful things," though obviously we would need some way to quantify "avoiding doing awful things" before we can evaluate this hypothesis.
If the definition of "awful" is broad enough, I imagine most public companies will fall in the "awful" bucket, probably with the same distribution of stock performance as the whole market. If "awful" is going to mean something truly extraordinarily bad like dumping mercury into a well or whatever, I would still guess there is no correlation as I've read horrifying stories of corporate behavior at companies with unremarkable stock performance.
That's fair, but I think your original comment could be much more clearly written.
"There was a spoils system in the late 1800s. It sure would be great if we could go back to that time." Technically these can be interpreted as unrelated statements (as apparently the statements are in your original comment), but most people would infer from that they were related and that the reason it would be nice to rollback to the earlier time was the aforementioned spoils system.
Your comment suggests you think cronyism was in some part responsible for America's rise as a global power. Common sense would indicate that we became a power despite the cronyism, not because it, and you've provided nothing to support your wildly counter intuitive claim.
This is your comment basically:
People really need to read their history. When America definitively surpassed the UK in 1880 as the richest country in the world (per capita), tuberculosis was a leading cause of death: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuberculosis
The advancement of antibiotics did not happen until the mid 20th century, which significantly postdates America's rise to the top. It would be a great idea to rollback science to that time when we didn't have all these life saving vaccines and antibiotics.
I would argue that PE often makes things better for the consumer in the sense that they often buy businesses that are going out of business.
When the 65 year old sole proprietor of a local HVAC business sells it to a PE firm, the other option was likely winding down the business. If the owner had children that were interested in running the business, no doubt they would give it to them. But usually that is not the case. So the owner needs to sell. And if there were capitalized, enthusiastic local entrepreneurs that could buy it, no doubt the owner would consider them. But again, this is quite rare.
So the choices usually come down to: close up shop or sell to a PE firm. All other things being equal (which they never are), I think a market with more businesses is going to be more competitive and pro-consumer than a market with fewer businesses. Further, some economists have found that PE activity encourages business formation, perhaps partially explaining why the US has more small businesses per capita than Europe (where they have far less PE). So it's a double whammy: PE causes less businesses to close and more businesses to open.
It’s only natural to want to defend one’s preferences with these things. Because unlike with some other preferences, such as what IDE, operating system, or terminal emulator you use, version control systems must be shared.
If it is like you say and different people are just inherently more or less suited to different paradigms, then not everyone can be happy.
> What it achieves, is that the quality of people who assume office sinks even lower than it is today, since anyone with a modicum of competence, would never divest a business for a low paid, public job.
Unless of course those with a modicum of competence desire to be true public servants. Read about the character of some of our great leaders like Washington, Lincoln or Eisenhower to understand the mentality of a true public servant. Something someone like Kash Patel knows nothing about.
I don’t think this level of virtue is all that rare, though it is rarely rewarded at the ballot box.
I don’t disagree with your post but I’m still unclear on how you envision gatekeeper should work.
You want the ability to choose a different “authorities” that verify and sign binaries? That makes sense to me but is unlikely to relieve any of the issues in the post.
Also what do you mean by “even yourself?” What would that option look like?
The charges could be very serious but I’m not sure what that has to do with anything, because being charged (or even just arrested) is not the same as being convicted. The author of this post claims both of their charges were dropped.
So, what, let’s torture anyone that _might_ have done something “serious?” No judge, no jury, just if a cop thinks you might have done something, straight into a psychological torture cell for weeks and months while they think about your case? wtf
Also, your description of their experience as “not pleasant” just kind of blows my mind. Like it was a long line at the DMV or something.
I linked that study because it is particularly interesting because they run the mass spec test on archived blood samples.
But there are other studies and meta analyses which cover other countries and come to the same conclusion.
I think many of the studies claiming to find significant population level decline are older and overstate the issue due to the methodological errors outlined in my previous post. If you are thinking of a particular one, please share a link.
I am not familiar with the research on testosterone levels in animals. In humans, while not conclusory, I do think the evidence suggests that increasing rates of obesity and metabolic syndrome are the proximate cause of testosterone decline.
> testosterone levels have dropped without a solid explanation
There is a solid explanation.
First, before the adoption of mass spec, studies used a less accurate method of measuring testosterone that overstated testosterone levels.
Also, the studies showing the population level decline in testosterone generally controlled for obesity (which naturally lowers testosterone) using BMI. But BMI is a very crude measure.
When studies control with better methods like BMI + waist circumference, and only compare samples using the mass spec measurement method, the unexplained population level decline goes away. After fixing the measurement method, what remains of the decline can be explained by BMI + waist circumference. In other words, modern men are more prone to obesity and metabolic syndrome, which naturally reduces testosterone. Case closed.
> I'm GenZ, my parents were Silent Gen (WWII vets) and my kids are Millennials.
My understanding is that Gen Z comes AFTER millennials, so if you are Z, your kids can't be millennials. Maybe you are Gen X? Also, if your kids are 25 now, then they would be gen z, not millennials.
P.S. Don't shoot the messenger, I didn't make up this dumb system or these dumb names ^_^
I agree with everything in your top level comment.
They fund more than 10k research grants a year. These grants are for research into basic, unapplied science that would be extremely unlikely to get funding from the private sector. But this research is the foundation for the applied science whose breakthroughs power our economy.
Basic science also increases our understanding of the world and universe, an admirable goal in its own right.
So in some theoretical hiring example, if I have to choose between two candidates: one which is really good at keeping the code in the head and the other who is less good at that, but who is very skilled at using programming tools like advanced type systems or formal verification tools, then I'd prefer the latter.
Of course in practice, I would of course take a student that I knew had passed their paper test with their own knowledge over a student that likely ran their digital test through an LLM.