The Axon Terminal

5:19 AM

@StevenJeuris It's questions, but downvoting questions doesn't really do anything beyond -1.

6:08 AM

(Questions with -1 and no answers, regardless of answer votes, are deleted every week or so.)

@StevenJeuris I think I found out what those invisible review notifications are about: they're close votes that I started. That's why there are so many. :v

Christian Hummeluhr

7:39 AM

Comment system won't let me post it on my chat revival question, so pasting here instead.
Final note: On a personal level, I would especially appreciate it if some of the regulars (@AliceD, @mfloren, @MaríaAnt, @mrt, @Seanny123, @ArnonWeinberg, @user30295, @WillP to name a few) that have joined up during my inactive period would stop by and say hello. I hope this works, since I don't know any other way of reaching out to people over SE.

Steven Jeuris

9:12 AM

Hmm .. only when they were in chat before I believe.

Christian Hummeluhr

Darnit.

Krysta

12:11 PM

I'd particularly like the chance to say hi to @AliceD and @MariaAnt, they've been posting really high-quality answers.

Steven Jeuris

True ... how to entice them to enter chat ... :)

Christian Hummeluhr

I had a private chat with AliceD a while ago, but they never showed up here. :[

Krysta

There was a meta post on the mother ship recently about the need or lack thereof for PMs, and somebody pointed out private chats--I've never had good luck with them, though.

Christian Hummeluhr

I don't know how to use them besides engaging in a long comment thread.

Steven Jeuris

@ChristianHummeluhr You can create a private chat room (given sufficient rep), and then invite users to it.

Way too much work ...

Christian Hummeluhr

12:18 PM

Yeah, but I don't know how to do that. :p

Krysta

And it mostly requires you to both be on at the same time. Although I guess you could treat it as an asynchronous private message board, if it lives long enough.

Christian Hummeluhr

It sticks around.

At least the comment-spawned chats do.

@mrt as well.

Krysta

what are these comment-spawned chats?

also, good morning and hello!

Christian Hummeluhr

Good morning :v

Steven Jeuris

@Krysta After excessive comments underneath a post, the system suggests commencing a private chat. A simple click does that at that point.

Christian Hummeluhr

12:24 PM

^this

time to head out for some real late lunch

Krysta

Oho, I guess I've never hit that threshold. What is sufficient rep to start a private chat?

Steven Jeuris

@Krysta Chat privileges, which you most definitely already have.

Guess you just never ran into a comment thread with caseyr. :)

Krysta

I sure didn't! I am much too averse to talking to people and not public-spirited enough to engage with users like that.

Steven Jeuris

1:43 PM

Here's my attempt at the new close reason:

0

A: Proposed Reason for Closure: No Initial Reseach

I understand Jeromy's concerns: [...] the purpose of this site is not to help the person asking the question (helping the OP is a merely a nice side-effect). [...] the purpose of the site is to generate re-usable content that will help hundreds and thousands of people searching for an...

Christian Hummeluhr

2:11 PM

@StevenJeuris Much better than mine.

And haha, a comment thread with caseyr is also how I discovered the feature ...

Krysta

my only concern with @StevenJeuris' close reason is people might be confused about why motivation is relevant

(like I said in a comment)

Christian Hummeluhr

I did upvote that, but I like how concise it is currently, and I'm not convinced that another sentence will really help someone who doesn't already understand what "insufficiently motivated" means.

A relevant SE Meta answer about what common knowledge should be assumed: meta.stackexchange.com/a/210868/217374

Krysta

What it means literally, and why it would be helpful to the site, aren't quite the same thing. I think people will be clear on the former and less so on the latter.

Christian Hummeluhr

What I mean is that people who don't understand both of those meanings won't be helped by another sentence or two, I guess.

Krysta

There's no helping some people :-P

Christian Hummeluhr

2:19 PM

Well, no helping all people all of the time, maybe. :v

Krysta

Like PT Barnum but altruistic. . .

Christian Hummeluhr

Some things can't be explained, only taught or studied.

(I know this very well because I once had to learn linear algebra by proof after using nothing more complex than linear regression for about 6 years.)

Krysta

Oh gawd.

Christian Hummeluhr

2:34 PM

@Krysta What do you think of my subquestion about whether a computational system that fits what we simply assume the brain does in cogsci.stackexchange.com/q/9839/2868?

(The Tegmark quote about how many bits a fitting neural network could actually store.)

er, about whether such a system even exists in principle

Christian Hummeluhr

3:27 PM

@Josh If you want to be really depressed, take a look at that personalitycafe site

I've never seen so many people post about psychology :[

Krysta

whaaaat is personalitycafe? It sounds like a thing to be avoided.

Christian Hummeluhr

@Krysta Apparently it's the place to discover yourself: personalitycafe.com/forum

Krysta

Oh gawd.

Christian Hummeluhr

83% answered :]

Seanny123

3:45 PM

Sorry I couldn't make it to the hangout.

I have a big simulation due soon.

Christian Hummeluhr

Hey

Seanny123

It's the last milestone I need to clear so I can graduate.

Christian Hummeluhr

It's no problem, I literally pulled the time out of thin air. I'm happy it went as well as it did.

Seanny123

I'll definitly be down for more community building after this term ends.

Christian Hummeluhr

I take it you're making a NEF simulation?

Seanny123

3:46 PM

Yeah of the Wisconsin Card Sorting Task.

A surprising amount of stuff that can be done in a production system maps pretty well to the NEF and SPA.

Christian Hummeluhr

Why isn't the NEF a production system? It has a simulated arm or something, right?

Or am I asking a Babbage question here? :v

Seanny123

Yeah. So the NEF on it's own doesn't explicitly define how IF-THEN rules should be implemented. It only shows how to represent vectors and manipulate them.

You really need SPA to do production system stuff.

But I also don't totally understand production systems...

Christian Hummeluhr

Ah.

Seanny123

Like ACT-R stills seems quite magical to me.

Despite one of the people in my lab writing the Python implementation of ACT-R.

Christian Hummeluhr

The nuts and bolts are beyond me, to be honest, but I collaborated on some work where the AI people used it during my undergrad.

Josh

3:59 PM

@ChristianHummeluhr This is why your response is so useful. If you google 'dom-tert loops' now, the SE question is top 5, and hopefully a few more peple won't buy into pseudopsychology.

Christian Hummeluhr

That's a really good point. (And more motivation for me to practice negative answers!)

Steven Jeuris

@Krysta Agreed. It's the "why should I care?"/"what do I get out of it" side of things. I prefer optimistic phrasing in this regard as well.

Should be easily addressable though.

@ChristianHummeluhr Will read that post later.

@Seanny123 No worries. Nice to hear from you now! ;p

Christian Hummeluhr

5:25 PM

412 unanswered questions on the wall, you take one down and pass it around, 411 unanswered questions on the wall ...

Josh

@ChristianHummeluhr Only 146 more until the 90% mark...