In the philosophy of mind, the hard problem of consciousness is to explain why and how humans and other organisms have qualia, phenomenal consciousness, or subjective experience.[1][2] It is contrasted with the "easy problems" of explaining why and how physical systems give a (healthy) human being the ability to discriminate, to integrate information, and to perform behavioral functions such as watching, listening, speaking (including generating an utterance that appears to refer to personal behaviour or belief), and so forth.[1] The easy problems are amenable to functional explanation—that is, explanations that are mechanistic or behavioral—since each physical system can be explained (at least in principle) purely by reference to the "structure and dynamics" that underpin the phenomenon... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_problem_of_consciousness (more)

Entering a New Phase of the Web, with Citation Needed’s Molly White. Welcome to Dotsocial, the first podcast to explore the world of decentralized social media. Each episode, host Mike McCue talks to a leader in this movement, someone who sees the Fediverse's tremendous potential and understands that this could be the internet's next wave. Today, Mike is talking to Molly White, a researcher, writer, and software engineer who cares deeply about free and open access to high-quality information. (more)

Google smart-watch for Android https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixel_Watch (more)

Simon Willison: llamafile is the new best way to run a LLM on your own computer. On my M2 Mac it runs at around 55 tokens a second, which is really fast (more)

british TV series https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who (more)

Martin Cagan: Good Product People. Recently Shreyas Doshi published a reminder that the vast majority of the best product people are not likely to be spending their time on social media. His point is that the best product people are busy practicing the craft of product, and not trying to attract followers. (product manager) (more)

Lenny Rachitsky: The art of the pivot, part 1: The definitive list of successful pivots. For part one (this post), I’ve spent the past few weeks combing through my podcast episodes, newsletters, and online interviews to put together the most definitive and detailed breakdown of startup pivots you’ll find anywhere. For 30+ successful pivots (more)

Benedict Evans: Looking for AI (GenAI) use-cases. ....in the last 18 months, as I’ve experimented with ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and all the other chatbots that have sprouted up: ‘this is amazing, but I don’t have that use-case’. (more)

AI chatbots are intruding into online communities where people are trying to connect with other humans. A parent asked a question in a private Facebook group in April 2024: Does anyone with a child who is both gifted and disabled have any experience with New York City public schools? The parent received a seemingly helpful answer... Both of these responses were lies. That child does not exist and neither do the camera or air conditioner. The answers came from an artificial intelligence chatbot. (more)

PostHog: How we found our Ideal Customer Profile. Creating an Ideal Customer Profile is one of the most important things we've ever done at PostHog (more)

PostHog: Creating an Ideal Customer Profile transformed our company. Defining our ICP is the most important thing we ever did (more)

Nextra: on LLM Agents. ...involve LLM applications that can execute complex tasks through the use of an architecture that combines LLMs with key modules like planning and memory (more)

Cows (meat) are being fed chicken shit and the FDA has done nothing to stop it. ...some of these farming methods are more than just unappetizing: they could be deadly. One practice in particular could allow for the spread of bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, the gruesome and fatal neurodegenerative disorder more commonly known as mad cow disease. (more)

aka Gerald M. Weinberg. http://www.geraldmweinberg.com/ Here's a longer bio. Died 2018. (more)

Nate Silver: The 2 key facts about US Covid-19 policy that everyone should know. The goal of this post is to convey two related facts that make for politically inconvenient bedfellows (more)

Open Source Relational Data Base engine. Known for simplicity and speed. http://www.mysql.com/ (more)

Influence or influencer may refer to: Social influence, in social psychology, influence in interpersonal relationships; Minority influence, when the minority affect the behavior or beliefs of the majority; Influencer marketing, through individuals that have influence over potential buyers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence cf persuade, persuasion

SideGig http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Hustle (more)

The Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards are regulations in the United States, first enacted by the United States Congress in 1975,[1] after the 1973–74 Arab Oil Embargo, to improve the average fuel economy of cars and light trucks (trucks, vans and sport utility vehicles) produced for sale in the United States... The original CAFE standards sought to drive automotive innovation to curtail fuel consumption, and now the aim is to create domestic jobs and cut global warming.[3][4] Stringent CAFE standards together with government incentives for fuel efficient vehicles in the United States should accelerate the demand for electric vehicles. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_economy (more)

In sociology and social psychology, an ingroup is a social group to which a person psychologically identifies as being a member. By contrast, an outgroup is a social group with which an individual does not identify. For example, people may find it psychologically meaningful to view themselves according to their race, culture, gender, age, or religion. It has been found that the psychological membership of social groups and categories is associated with a wide variety of phenomena. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingroups_and_outgroups (more)