When my wife was breastfeeding, I was told my grandfather was quite old fashioned in his views on breastfeeding (it should be done in private. At a family gathering, my wife went off to another room, to not make him feel uncomfortable. Shortly afterwards, we realised my grandfather had noticed she was missing, and went to keep her company. He would rather feel uncomfortable himself than let my wife feel pushed out. (He was completely unaware of the previous discussions)

It is. Unfortunately, no-one has come up with a viable self teaching system. They are trying to brute force it, but have run into a wall. Without a knowledge engine, you can’t close the loop. Without closing the loop, self reflection is impossible. Without self reflection, hallucination filtering is almost impossible. Such a system can’t understand the difference between a discussion down the pub, and a lawyer’s legal brief. It can see the difference, and mimic it’s structure, but not understand the why, and account for it.

Humans can turn information into knowledge. AI can only extract predigested knowledge. That’s why they need such large data sets.

This is also why AGI is still a pipe dream. Most of the subsections already exist, but without a knowledge engine at its core, it’s like a person with a massive concussion. It sounds reasonable to simple conversation, but goes off on weird tangents.

I always find it fascinating to watch children learn and grow. The mistakes they make are often completely logical, they just have holes in their knowledge, and lack critical information. It leads to wonderful conclusions, which are also completely wrong.

It’s worth noting that I think both should exist.

No software dependence at all if possible, just a basic microcontroller and firmware.

Agreed, I just want a ZigBee endpoint as well.

As for the smart home stuff, I already have it in place, so it’s no additional expense.

Control wise, your method would be fine for someone techie and motivated. It would annoy the hell out of some non techies, particularly if they had vision issues (think OAP). It would also close down the option of relatives helping out by monitoring it remotely.

As I said, different target audiences. Both have their places. I just wish the smart option did its job properly, rather than the half baked options we keep getting.

To each their own. I prefer having the ability to adjust things from 1 central source. I’m prone to losing remotes.

Also, how would you do such a remote. You would also need a screen for feedback etc, which puts you back at square 1.

Also, a remote would be considerably more expensive than the extra cost of a ZigBee/Wifi enabled microcontroller.

I’m a fan of both, but fully accept that fission is now too late to be useful. We also have fusion right on the tipping point of viability. That could likely fill the use cases of fusion quite well, with far less issues.

FYI, nuclear produces 3 sorts of nuclear waste. High activity is nasty, but short lived. Put it in a pool for a few years and it decays away. Low grade is the stuff like lab waste and contaminated pipes. You don’t really want it going in normal landfill, but it’s not going to kill anyone with radiation (heavy metal toxicity is another matter). It’s only the last type, medium activity that is problematic. It lasts a long time, while still putting out enough radiation to cause potential problems. Unfortunately, older “power” plants, were actually bomb factories. They were intended to make plutonium, and so produce a lot more of the medium activity waste than they could.

Ideally yes. However some meals aren’t suitable for toddlers, others that simply don’t like. Particularly for exhausted parents, having a healthy, tasty fallback can be a sanity saver. Doubly so when on trips.

Treat them like the toddler equivalent of a McDonald’s. OK for 1 off meals, a problem when they become the default diet.

The ability to play with it, without having to fiddle with tiny switches is a big feature to many. Often these are used by people with mobility issues. The ability to add an extra feed, due to exercise, or adjust the timings to account for changes in life plans are a godsend to many.

Smart home devices are a balancing act. The extra control means more can also go wrong. Minimising that is a big part. The most critical is making it behave sanely when it suddenly goes offline. E.g. smart light switches become dumb ones, when the central hub goes down.

More a replacement brain for an EV. Compared to an ICE there is far less to manage in a hyper time critical manner. It’s a lot more viable to design a drop in replacement. Particularly if the battery bank already has its own monitoring, that just reports upwards.

You would end up with a modern EV, with many of the desired features. However, the manufacturer would no longer be able to reach in and extract data, either remotely, at a mechanic, or after an accident.

I’m hoping that someone does some reverse engineering on the engine management computers of EVs. EVs internals are a lot simpler. An open source, drop in brain is definitely not unachievable.

All the advantages of an EV with none of the corporate tracking.

Why do you think they are suddenly pushing the pervert glasses again? They are trying to get more learning data, by any means possible.

They need to convince the people living there to actually vote for them. MPs areas are generally small enough that a local grass roots campaign can counter someone just pouring money in.

While the UK does have political parties, there is less blind party voting than the US seems to have.

He has a certain charisma to a subset of people. It’s a similar effect as trump in the US, only to a smaller subset of idiots.

The things he claims don’t hold up to scrutiny, but that doesn’t matter to some. They just hear the surface promises, and don’t think deeper.

A bucket of sand is fine for a static location, but not very portable.

A perfect solution that is unused is a lot worse than a mediocre one that is easy to implement.

If you’re going that route, you want 2 buckets, 1 1/4 full. You dump the failing battery into the 1/4 full one, then dump the other over the top. That covers you till it gets outside into open space to burn out.

I was camping at an event. I had recently finished recharging a large lipo battery (3S 9000mah). The battery went from normal to nuclear in a second or 2.

Thankfully I had it clear of flammables and in a lipo bag. Even so, it started 3 grass fires in the time it took to get it out of the marquee and wet enough to extinguish it. The event volunteers were there within 40 seconds, with fire extinguishers. Thankfully we already had it under control by then.

Lesson learnt, always use a fire resistant container to charge in e.g. an ammo can or a cooking pot. Also assume it can turn into a fireball with absolutely no warning, and plan accordingly.

First off, good on you from the rescue!

As a parent, I get both sides. It’s absolutely horrifying, but so easy to lose focus. You can start chatting, and not realise you’re not tracking the child. You can also both assume the other has eyes on them.

It’s better to assume problems like this as systematic, rather than personal failures. If a small child has access to the water, they should be explicitly monitored. If you can’t (as a group) do that, then they shouldn’t have easy access to the water. You can also train children in water safety from a young age. Babies can be taught self rescue from around when they can crawl.

It’s so easy to lose focus. It requires constant concentration, at a time when your life has been turned upside down, and you are often suffering from sleep deprivation. A (apparently) calm ‘normal’ situation and your brain can relax back and switch off from parenting mode.

I think superfoil is the generic name (or possibly another brand).

I used suction cups, with thumb screw threads to attach them. Just poke a hole and push it through on each corner. It also holds it slightly clear of the glass. Suction cups also mean you can apply it either inside the glass, or outside (better, but harder).

Sometimes you want to keep ALL the energy out. The films also act to trap thermal energy in too.

I’ve personally used superfoil, it keeps all the light energy out. 42°C outside, in a double glazed UK home, and I still didn’t need the Aircon until mid afternoon.

Some relatives of mine were in that very boat, in Spain. It required some admin, and annoying coordination of appointments (they weren’t there all the time), but wasn’t THAT difficult.

It’s been obvious for years now that British living in Europe would need to deal with the loss of EU access. Most EU countries made it as easy as they could to comply.

I would hope that the host country would still show some flexibility. However, I can also see a retired Ex-pat ranting at the official, and so burning any goodwill that would have got them any rule bending to dig them out of the hole they made.

Could you use a long rifle as a stick for a protest sign?