Hasnain says:

Great read on AI, tech, and IP concerns.

“A few weeks ago, in an art gallery in London, I saw a Durer print that wasn’t a Durer print - it was a copy, made in around 1506 by Raimondi, a student of Raphael. Vasari tells us that Durer was furious and went to court in Venice. I treasure the idea of Venetian magistrates trying to work out how to think about this: their verdict was that Raimondi could carry on making the copies, but could no longer include Durer’s logo. That was a case about intellectual property, but the verdict is also a neat split between two ideas of authenticity. Do we care who made it, and why, or do we just want the picture? That's why some people are horrified by music generators or Midjourney, (or, 150 years ago, were horrified by cameras), and others aren't worried at all. “

Hasnain says:

“There are different types of progress in math and science. One kind brings order to chaos. But another intensifies the chaos by dispelling hopeful assumptions that weren’t true. The disproof of the telescope conjecture is like that. It deepens the complexity of geometry and raises the odds that many generations of grandchildren will come and go before anyone fully understands maps between spheres.

“Every major advance in the subject seems to tell us the answer is a lot more complicated than we thought before,” Ravenel said.”

Hasnain says:

“At one point in “The Hitchhiker’s Guide,” Adams introduces the architects of the Earth supercomputer. They’re powerful beings who have been living among us, disguised as mice. At first, they were motivated by simple curiosity. But seeking the question made them famous, and they began considering talk-show and lecture deals. In the end, Earth is demolished in the name of commerce, and their path to existential clarity along with it. The mice greet this with a shrug, mouth vague platitudes, and go on the talk-show circuit anyway. Musk isn’t peddling pabulum. His initiatives have real substance. But he also wants to be on the show—or, better yet, to be the show himself.

In the open letter, alongside questions about the apocalyptic potential of artificial intelligence was one that reflects on the sectors of government and industry that Musk has come to shape. “Should we risk loss of control of our civilization?” he and his fellow-entrepreneurs wrote. “Such decisions must not be delegated to unelected tech leaders.””

Hasnain says:

“Novo Nordisk’s U.S. sales of Ozempic and Wegovy have been so strong that it has had to convert dollars into kroner in unusually large quantities, raising the krone’s value relative to the euro, said Danske Bank director Jens Naervig Pedersen.

“Because the pharmaceutical industry’s exports have grown so much, it’s creating a big influx of currency into the Danish economy,” he said.

Denmark’s central bankers have responded by keeping interest rates below the European Central Bank’s, weakening the krone, said Pedersen. “

Hasnain says:

Yikes.

“Earlier this year, over a dozen agencies teamed up to bust UMI's unlicensed laboratory in Reedley, which is in Fresno County. The squalid lab was found brimming with lab equipment, refrigerators, freezers, incubators, and other machinery. It contained nearly 1,000 laboratory mice, which were allegedly kept in inhumane conditions. While some were dead upon discovery, the remaining animals have since been euthanized. Authorities also found hundreds of unknown chemicals and vials of biohazardous materials, including blood and urine. Testing by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention identified at least 20 infectious agents, including SARS-CoV-2, HIV, and a herpes virus.

Authorities in Reedley were first tipped off to the lab's existence after a local code enforcement officer noticed an illegally attached garden house in the back of the warehouse, which was supposed to be used only for storage.”

Hasnain says:

“Memory bandwidth is the limiting factor in almost everything to do with sampling from transformers. Anything that reduces the memory requirements for these models makes them much easier to serve— like quantization! This is yet another reason why distillation, or just training smaller models for longer, is really important”

Hasnain says:

Heartbreaking. Probably shouldn’t have read this first thing in the morning.

“Ashley doesn’t know anybody else who has a baby. She doesn’t want her three friends at school to find out that she has one now. Regina is working on an arrangement with the school so Ashley can start seventh grade from home until she’s ready to go back in person. Relatives will watch Peanut while Regina is at work. Is there anything about motherhood that Ashley is excited about? She twists her mouth, shrugs, and says nothing. Is there anything Ashley wants to say to other girls? “Be careful when you go outside,” she says. “And stay safe.”

There is only one moment when Ashley smiles a little, and it’s when she describes the nurses she met in the doctors’ office and delivery room. One of them, she remembers, was “nice” and “cool.” She has decided that when she grows up, she wants to be a nurse too. “To help people,” she says. For a second, she looks like any other soon-to-be seventh grader sharing her childhood dream. Then Peanut stirs in his car seat. Regina says he needs to be fed. Ashley’s face goes blank again. She is a mother now.”

Hasnain says:

“Marks also underscored the trap of mean reversion — the notion that what goes up must come down, and vice versa. This concept can drive investors to sell prematurely, securing small gains and hunting for the next underpriced stock. This relentless quest for low valuations can result in a portfolio filled with average businesses that could see a 30% uplift when market sentiment changes.

Meanwhile, transformative returns (in the thousands of percent) are usually found in long-term holds. The longer the hold, the less the exact entry-point valuation matters. What's more crucial is the choice of investment and the holding period.

In investing, just as in life, you often get what you pay for.”

Hasnain says:

This is bleak.

“For those at the bottom of our society, those low incomes translate into quasi-destitution: 2 million people report going without food for at least a day in any month. Malnutrition stalks our children – our five-year-olds are among the shortest in Europe. One in three children live in poverty. It is time to stop talking and thinking of Britain as a rich country. We are poor and living on the edge.”

Hasnain says:

“For many dermatologists, these lengthy regulatory battles and widespread issues with regular usage also underline a common recommendation that tends to go unheard by patients: Sunscreen is great, and sunscreen from Europe, Australia, and Asia may be better, but even the best, most cutting-edge SPF lotion is just one part of keeping your skin healthy. Floppy hats, big beach umbrellas, or loose, high-coverage clothing might not be your ideal beach look while you’re young, but if you can mostly cover up and stick to the shade, your elderly self will thank you.”