> Then there's the weak, pathetic, scrawny dweeb who sits on a bench dressed up in fancy robes, who passes judgment on big strong men in handcuffs daily and sends them to prison for years. He may have some level of power, but he's Beta as they come. He was placed in power by an Alpha.
Whoa that's a lot to unpack. Most pressingly, why do you need to point out that judges are not "at the top"? They perform a duty with a lot of responsibility. And that is that. No, where I live judges don't get appointed by "alphas".
> Not everyone can be at the top of the bell curve.
This is me nitpicking and I understand you mean to say that "the alphas" are special. But "at the top of the bell curve" is where everyone is! The freaks are found down in the tails. Exceptional people will be in the middle with everybody else on most metrics that show a normal distribution.
I'd say you'll have to look at metrics that show a not-normal distribution to cluster "the alphas" together. But then I don't really know how "being alpha" is defined. So maybe there is a metric where humans distribute in a bell curve and "the alphas" crowd out one side of it? Got an example?
From my read you said something different from what OP said. They voiced that there was a wiping of preference that was noticeable, where you said "it does this all the time." Sure both can describe the same thing, but they don't have to be. Why double down instead of accepting that this time it might be different?
Because this exact conspiracy has been going on since the elections for 2020. And it's well known and documented. Are you essentially asking me why I wouldn't encouFrage a conspiracy theory based on the anecdote of someone who says they hardly use the platform they are suggesting is forcing propaganda/censorship on them?
There are polarizing events getting more coverage right now, by far, than anything else in the USA, and HN user infecto is subscribing to the idea that the algorithm isn't going to try to check if these important ongoing events interest them.
It's very unlikely that "this time might be different"; the far more likely answer is that this is run-of-the-mill algorithm exploration injection.
Infecto replied me I said "you are wrong". I didn't. My original comment was assuring, in good faith, made to let them know that TikTok changing theit FYP feed is normal. They hadn't yet mentioned they already knew about algo resets and that they were leaning in to the conspiracies. Their reply to me was not in good faith, and did not respond to the strongest possible interpretation of what I originally commented.
> There are polarizing events getting more coverage right now, by far, than anything else in the USA, and HN user infecto is subscribing to the idea that the algorithm isn't going to try to check if these important ongoing events interest them.
No conspiracy theory here. Long time user of TikTok. The sometimes part is that I am not hooked on it but I do use its regularly. I started using it after being a user on Douyin.
Like I already said I have no input on the censorship but just anecdotally to me something’s dis change that was out of the norm for my usage that I never experienced before. If you want to say that’s normal ok but I am suggesting it was out of the norm as a long long time user.
Not sure why you are lumping me with a conspiracy theory just sharing a datapoint that something did change weather on purpose or not.
Sorry to offend you but please don’t misread and lump me into a conspiracy! I explicitly said I had no opinion or datapoint on the censorship but there was a massive change in the feed. Wild how many hoops you are jumping through here. You continue to call out my own experience as wrong and now pump me into a conspiracy theorist. Nutty.
That's not how these words work. A reasonable person wouldn't think these phrases are interchangeable when taking about something addictive -- in this case TicTok. Someone who "smokes sometimes" and someone who "smokes regularly" are very different groups. This isn't an attack; I understand you now, I'm just trying to get you to see where I was coming from.
> Like I already said I ... that I never experienced before.
You had not said that yet, you just said I said you were wrong.
> this was entirely different and coincided in time with the complaints of censorship.
If you think this statement isn't reasonably interpreted as you implying and leaning in to, or in the very least encouraging, this conspiracy theory, then I think you are being disingenuous.
I was trying to provide helpful information by giving someone who only "sometimes" uses tiktok some assurance that these changes are typical.
Please stop backpedaling and attacking me. You don’t know me and you have not acknowledged the lies you have already used for absolutely no reason. I apologize my words upset you that was not my intent but I am concerned you continue going down this route.
You’re reading into my words far deeper than you should. I have used the App for a long time off and on but enough to know something changed whether intentional or not over the last week.
I already stated in the very beginning that I have no comment or opinion on the censorship. That’s not my corner of the world but was sharing an anecdote that something most definitely changed in my feed around the same time. Could be related or not but it coincides with the timeline. Even with the timeline similarity it may simply be a bug in the recommendation engine. I was only sharing an anecdote and no it was not exploration injection. The anecdote was just that my experience and saying it follows the same timeline is not suggesting a conspiracy is happening but that yes something happened/broke in the feed and it aligns with my timeline.
Please stop attacking me. I have apologized for my words already they carried no ill intent but still amazed how you continue to invalidate my experience while also attacking me. Maybe you should take some of your advice.
"I said you were right" is not doubling down, and looks like an accurate description of the conversation to me. OP got hostile for no good reason. If it's different, they can talk about how it's different instead of going on the attack against someone that listened and tried to provide information.
No hostility just amazing how I can share a datapoint as a long time user that something did interrupt the feed engine in a negative way and I get told it’s normal when in my experience it’s not.
Sloppy analogy time: Imagine you came in and said your vacuum cleaner broke and someone said "Yeah, that brand loses suction after six months, it's obnoxious." They're telling you it's normal for that type of vacuum, but they're not calling you wrong, they're trying to agree with you. If your problem is different, go ahead and correct them, but they're not denying your lived experience!
(And don't say they should have inferred you knew about that behavior and known you meant this was different. That's too close to expecting someone to read your mind. Especially when your original post didn't mention you were a long time user with enough dedication to notice that.)
I usually try to steer clear from replying to your full time posting but cmon. I am saying this experience has nothing to do with exploration injection. Could I have replied differently, sure but they also are whipping up some wild conspiracy theories and I have no time to be associated with that.
> I am saying this experience has nothing to do with exploration injection.
Yes.
But the guy you're talking to had no way to know that, and you shouldn't have taken insult at what he said.
> wild conspiracy theories
What?
Edit: Also for your first sentence, have we been in an argument or something? But apparently I've made 5 comments a day all-time and 7.6 comments a day in the last year. If that's full time then I need to become a brand promotion contractor ASAP.
I'm curious what scenarios your imagining. Because I can't think of a single situation where a track limit should not be applied automatically, at least to trains with passengers on them.
I realize that this may not be an appropriate comparison, but I was thinking of cars; there are absolutely scenarios in which driving faster than the speed limit is the correct decision (i.e. trying to get someone to a hospital).
I guess they'd argue that the people in China don't count, because people in China don't get to choose Google. But yeah, the stats they use from "StatCounter" are clearly not representative for what the world uses.
Market share is based on factual consumption numbers however subsidized or regulated by a government not free will.
Choice/Free will is an arbitrary line in the sand, one could argue how much choice we have about consuming google search when it is "85-90"% monopolistic business with well documented anti-competitive practices.
Chinese consumers perhaps have more choice than we do, Baidu is only about 60% market share. They do get to choose, it more that Google is not one of the options available to them, it is not like if not Baidu then it is a Phone Book.
You can argue that people outside of China don't get to choose something other than Google. Sure, there are recent pushes with default search engine choices and similar initiatives, but there is a reason why Google is paying hundreds of millions of dollars to be the default search engine.
Haha I can read some casual Turkish and this made my day!
Funny how the case system of Turkish is both strong and standardized enough for this to work well. I don't know any other language where flexible argument order would work so well.
Finnish case markers vary a lot from word to word, because of not only vowel harmony but other features of the word stem, and consonant gradation which is a weird feature of Uralic languages.
For the subtraction example, some numbers would be 50:tä 5:llä and others 6:tta 3:lla. Of course you could encode for all those possibilities and successfully parse them, but it would feel weird for a compiler to reject an expression because it's ungrammatical Finnish.
Also it would feel weird if you first write (vähennä muuttujaa 256:lla) but then realise you made an off-by-1 and have to change it to (vähennä muuttujaa 255:lla) but that doesn't compile because it should be 255:llä, so you have to remember to change two things.
But on the other hand, that's just how it is to write in Finnish, so in prose we don't really think about it. In natural language, it's normal to have to change other stuff in a sentence for it to continue making sense when you change one thing.
> I don't know any other language where flexible argument order would work so well.
What kind of sample size is that? A case system and flexible argument order are largely the same thing.
Note also that flexible argument order is a robust phenomenon in English:
1. Colonel Mustard killed him in the study at 5:00 with his own knife.
2. Colonel Mustard killed him at 5:00 in the study with his own knife.
3. Colonel Mustard killed him in the study with his own knife at 5:00.
4. Colonel Mustard killed him with his own knife at 5:00 in the study.
5. Colonel Mustard killed him at 5:00 with his own knife in the study.
6. Colonel Mustard killed him with his own knife in the study at 5:00.
But if you insist on looking in other languages, there's a famous Latin poem beginning Quis multa gracilis te puer in rosa perfusus liquidis urget odoribus grato, Pyrrha, sub antro?
Translating this as closely as possible to a one-word-for-one-word standard, it says What slender boy soaked [in] liquid odors presses you among many rose[s], Pyrrha, beneath [a] pleasant cave?
(Notes: rosa is singular for unclear reasons. There is nothing corresponding to the in of "in liquid odors"; the relationship between the odors and the soaking is expressed purely by case. There is also nothing corresponding to the article in "a pleasant cave"; Latin does not mark definiteness in this way. Location inside a cave is expressed with "beneath"; compare English underwater.)
Anyway, the actual word ordering, using this translation, is: What many slender you boy among rose[s] soaked liquid presses [in-]odors pleasant, Pyrrha, beneath [a-]cave?
I've heard that Russian poetry is given to similarly intricate word orderings.
Yeah sure there are other languages where the cases allow flexible argument ordering. I should have written "another language" not "any other language" because I meant the languages I know. I can see how it'd work in Latin. Though poetry takes a lot of license with language, so by quoting from poetry, we're at the extreme end of what a language can do. From what little I remember in Latin there would be examples where one couldn't distinguish the cases.
The only variation in your English examples is with the prepositions. English is a language where you just do not get that kind of flexibility. Unless, again, you do poetry. Can't even put the inflected pronoun first even though it would be unambiguous:
Him Colonel Mustard killed.
Let's look at this contrived example:
The policeman bites the dog.
Notice how in English I can't reverse them easily. Have to get creative:
The dog the policeman bites.
Stilted and prone to get misunderstood isn't it? In German, this is possible:
Den Hund beisst der Polizist.
Though if you do that, people think you made a mistake and will misunderstand you. The cases are rather weak in German. No comparison to Turkish:
Köpeği ısırıyor polis.
They do it for emphasis as part of everyday speech. You can put the subject first or last or in the middle and there is no confusion. Though admittedly that example is stretching it :-)
> Can't even put the inflected pronoun first even though it would be unambiguous:
> Him Colonel Mustard killed.
You can do that. It's called fronting, and it's not rare in English.
It's not a case of the argument order being flexible, but what you said is just plain false.
> The only variation in your English examples is with the prepositions.
So?
> English is a language where you just do not get that kind of flexibility.
You mean the kind of flexibility I just illustrated? Or something else? You have a verb with 5 arguments. Two of them go in fixed locations. The other three don't go in fixed locations.
It's not a coincidence that the arguments that are free to wander around the sentence are the ones that bear explicit markings of the nature of their relationship to the verb.
> The dog the policeman bites.
> Stilted and prone to get misunderstood isn't it?
Not really. It's not a sentence, though; "the dog the policeman bites" is just a noun phrase referring to a dog. There's no verb. (Bites is a verb, but it's inside a relative clause.)
I'm talking about how language can be used without misunderstanding. In what instances would you front a personal pronoun in English?
> It's not a coincidence that the arguments that are free to wander around the sentence are the ones that bear explicit markings of the nature of their relationship to the verb.
The thrust was that Turkish allows more liberties than other languages. Yes that is due to the Turkish language having more strict markings. What are we disagreeing about?
Fusion will be its own extinction event as things go. At our development level, if we develop fusion, we'll have to live underground after boiling the oceans to generate crypto tokens and undress videos.
The general idea is that Iran would be more effective as a regional power if it wasn't ruled by islamists. And that at least the current government of Israel likes incompetent neighbours that make them look good.
Not a difficult argument in my view. Unless you're stuck believing what they say instead of observing what they do.
Help me out here, the article starts from a premise I don't follow: Eventually the state of Estonia was restored and thus Soviet rule can de discounted. Many must have wished not living in the Soviet Union, but why should the eventual winners get to revise history?
I heard of countries where parents are fond of having firearms around.
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