I disappeared for a long time! It's because my hands were so broken from typing. For the last 8 months I have been unable to type, and a few months ago I finally admitted that I may never type again, and I certainly won't be using my hands for anything anytime soon. I'm in constant pain, but this week I managed to dictate (in LaTeX!) my research proposal for the next year of my PhD. I hope I can actually go through with this. Programming used to bring me so much joy. Now I do it by speech, and the frustration of it makes me want to die sometimes.

First I'll admit this is not my area of expertise.

China killed millions of people through deliberate famine campaigns and bad public policy, but it was more effective at isolating Chinese people from Western ideas. Eventually, when this isolation became untenable, China's government kept the title of "Communist" for its ruling party but quickly dismantled any policy that had exhibited anything like communist ideas. A focus on transforming the economy replaced the superficial exultation of the hardworking peasant that had been the norm since the Cultural Revolution. Remember Tiananmen Square? That was what happened when Chinese people first started being exposed to American ideas directly. The government was successful at continuing to suppress these ideas for longer, probably mostly because they were geographically isolated from the West.

Eastern Europe was always more of a focus for subversive activities and espionage from outsiders, because it's really, really hard for a white CIA agent to avoid notice in 1980's China. Because China's economy didn't have the diversity of the USSR's (read: people were poor), there was no angry middle class clamoring for sitcoms and Velvet Underground records. The USSR thought the American TV show Dallas would be safe because the villain was a wealthy capitalist, but it became one of the cultural artifacts that introduced the masses to the simple luxuries that Americans took for granted.

In short, China didn't follow the same trajectory in terms of its introduction to American ideas. By the time most Chinese people were exposed to American luxury, the government had already recognized them as aspirational and modified the economy in response.

As for "why communism", I can give a brief overview of my understanding of Marxist thought. Marx started from the premise that all value comes from labor. A person does not provide value by allowing use of their land, or of gold. Wealth and comfort acquired by access to materials is undeserved. When you see a handwoven silk tablecloth, that tablecloth is not valuable because silkworms are valuable, but because a human can make only a limited number of such artifacts in their life.

So start from this premise -- that labor is the source of all value -- and then look at the state of things during the Industrial Revolution. People were losing their livelihood and entering inferior arrangements. Artisans were losing value. Marx believed that human history started with people freely committing to creative work, but that work had been dehumanised by the rule of the wealthy and powerful. Workers were increasingly productive but only suffered as a result of it because their labor was dehumanized and they would never experience its fruits, so they were deprived of any purpose in their work. Marx considered such a system unconscionable and unsustainable.

A lot of people misunderstand what jobs are next to be automated. The service economy is safer than the support economy right now. It will be a long, long time before a robot (along with its maintenance) is cheaper than a burger-flipping high schooler.

Instead, modern automation is focused on replacing tech support helplines, teams of customer service representatives, armies of paralegals. Tech support, legal discovery specialists, and translators are made redundant by new technology. They are more expensive than burger flippers, and the tech to replace them is much cheaper than burger-flipping machines.

As it turns out, reading emails is a lot easier than folding towels.

I'm not interested in the content of an argument over the language that upset empty.

However, "My best friends are X" is never some trump card against "I am X". I understand that you feel empty hasn't earned the right to ask you to change your language to make them more comfortable. But this template of "my friends / family from Oppressed Group agree with me!" is generally one to be avoided.

Have you ever read an extremely misogynistic screed written by a person who insists that they get along fine with women, because their mother was one? Ever talked to someone who insists nobody reasonable could be offended by trivializing the Holocaust because their Jewish boyfriend is kind of into Nazi/prisoner roleplay? (I have encountered both scenarios.) That is how your "trump" reads to me. Mental illness in your family is a very personal connection, but it's not the most personal connection.

But a code, any real code would have being cracked long ago.

This is thin evidence, when real ciphers have garnered extensive attention and remained secure until 2011. Wouldn't a real language show stronger relation to other known languages?

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I want to go back to the east coast, too. I've got some regret, but not enough to cancel my impending move from the west coast to the European one.

I just miss my east coasters.

For four years I did mainly krav maga. On the side, I did Brazilian jujitsu and general groundfighting. Occasionally I did kickboxing (the cardio punch-the-air kind). About six years ago, I stopped and became sedentary, but this year I'm back on the krav maga wagon and I'm planning to pick up muay thai after I move. Feels good!

Let's talk #machinelearning please. Hell, and #statistics, #math, #linearalgebra ...

I've developed an RSI. But I JUST KEEP TYPING. I want a cortisone injection but I'm too busy moving. Halp. Hands hurt.

Second on #martialarts! What kind do you practice?

The court has ruled, and I said we'll accept it. And guess what, I just went to a wedding of a friend of mine who happens to be gay. Because somebody doesn't think the way I do, doesn't mean that I can't care about them or can't love them. So if one of my daughters happened to be that, of course I would love them and I would accept them. Because you know what? That's what we're taught when we have strong faith.

I had an opportunity to bring resources back to Ohio, to do what? To treat the mentally ill. Ten thousand of them sit in our prisons at $22,500 a year. I’d rather get them the medication so they can lead a decent life.

Economic growth is the key. Economic growth is the key to everything. But once you have economic growth, it is important that we reach out to people who live in the shadows, the people who don’t seem to ever think that they get a fair deal. And that includes people in our minority community; that includes people who feel as though they don’t have a chance to move up.

Maybe it's just that he was standing next to a pack of clowns, but he seemed to be an actual adult. I was particularly surprised that anyone on that stage was willing to endorse much-needed prison reforms.

Was anyone else weirded out by how reasonable all of the things Kasich said were? It's like he didn't get the memo that they were putting on a madhouse show.

Does he have some horrible beliefs that I'm missing as context for why he's in the GOP?

Is this that Canadian debate that CSPAN played while everyone's drinking games were focused on Fox?

OH MY GOSH YOU BEAT ME TO THE SOCKS TAG. I was going to start #sockski. :(

Suppose it turns out that Oliver lives in a region where conspiracy theories are rife or that he is under the influence of friends who are committed conspiracy theorists. Wouldn’t these be perfectly viable situational, non-character explanations of his beliefs about 9/11? Only up to a point. The fact that Oliver is easily influenced by his friends itself tells us something about his intellectual character.

Anyone who thinks they are not easily influenced by the opinions of friends is more delusional than the hypothetical Oliver. I believe strongly in global warming -- but why? I don't have a significant background in earth science beyond my limited high school science education. I have no truly well-understood argument in favor of my position. It's entirely based on my trust of scientific authority, but there are many authorities that others trust which I don't. For example, I'm very skeptical of many famous, well-regarded economists. Some of them have won Nobel prizes. This skepticism is heavily influenced by arguments I've heard from friends and from other authorities whom I've chosen to trust more.

The point is, nothing in that paragraph is remotely convincing in refuting the idea that people believe in conspiracies because of the peers they associate with. Whether you befriend conspiracy theorists may say something of your intellectual character, but there's no real evidence or compelling argument in this article in favor of the direct causal effect it's advocating for.

Ah yes, and my advisor gave me the following essay as reading material a while back, which I just remembered:

Ten Lessons I Wish I Had Been Taught

It's short and it's not about how to handle the start of grad school. But it is good advice in general for academic careers, and in particular for careers in math.

Uh oh. Many professors are like that. I'm sure you'll be very productive. ;)

I actually started in the US, but when my advisor moved to the UK, I took a terminal Master's. Now I'm starting a 3-year PhD in the UK. I'm pretty excited, though it was quite a curveball when my advisor announced he was leaving!

My problem is that I'm already researching. I have a poster session and paper due for a conference in December.

This is common! (I had presented some posters by the time I started grad school.) But I assume that you're switching schools, in which case your research will be interrupted. This process of getting into a project that your advisor is excited about is a good opportunity to get the groundwork you're missing, because soon you'll be expected to prioritize research over coursework even more.

Classmates will be primarily focused on coursework, which should definitely take priority over research.

At least in my field, this philosophy is pretty roundly rejected. It was even common to hear advice to first-years like, "If you're getting all As in coursework, you're not focusing enough on research."

I'm skipping an MS and going straight to PhD.

In the US, going straight into an MS/PhD is common (at least in my field). In most European countries, students have to start with an MS, and a PhD is a three year program with no coursework at all. I went straight from undergrad into a combined MS/PhD program, but because I'm following my advisor to the UK, I'm entering a PhD program that assumes a Master's degree background and has no coursework.

Congrats on starting! I'm technically about to be a first-year PhD student, but I'll be in the UK, which splits up the Master's a PhD portions of the US combined MS/PhD. Meaning I'm actually in my third year of a PhD program. :)

The number one thing I'd say is: If there's something you think is important to understand, sign up for a class in it your FIRST semester. You won't be a super productive researcher then, so it's your best shot at understanding all that really hard stuff you're dreading. I put off filling serious gaps in my math background -- gaps I knew I'd have to tackle eventually -- until my second year, and I really regretted it! I got to learn WAY cooler stuff once I had that extra background. Your first year is for filling in gaps and exploring. :)

Goodness! I'm sorry about that ending, but it sounds like an all right train journey. I've only been on a train during a pedestrian death once, but they're not rare. Lots of rail workers have PTSD because of them. The NY MTA has to provide special mental health services to drivers, because most of them have played a role in someone's death.

I've actually done the Coast Starlight SF-LA in coach myself, and Portland-SF in a sleeper. The first class / sleeper setup is pretty fantastic. Until very recently, there were complimentary champagne and cheese tastings in first class. Now the federal government has specifically banned serving complimentary alcohol to rail passengers, so it costs $5 or something nominal. The wifi in the first class lounge is decent, as train wifi goes (better than the Northeast Corridor, anyway). There's a movie theater downstairs as well, though it mostly plays terrible Adam Sandler movies.

I'm sorry you had that experience, but I hope you get to see Kevin again. Thanks for reporting!

http://33.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m81tt8p5If1rn95k2o1_250.gif

Ah, I didn't even think of Anime Girls Classification! Is there an Anime Girl Type that is equivalent to the standard American romantic comedy heroine? The one who Has It All and is successful or at least smart in a fetishistic way, but is also a Cute Clumsy Girl?

EDIT: Oh, and could you explain the thing about typing by functions? I assume it's something like a probability distribution on each letter, rather than a binary class. Is that the idea?

I standardly test as ENFP but when you break it down, I'm borderline INFP but I'm indifferent because I know I'm an ambivert (sometimes recharged by people, sometimes recharged by being alone).

Even though I'm an ambivert by any measure, it's a word I tend to roll my eyes at because it's one of those terms (like "sapiosexual") that can easily describe pretty much anyone. On the other hand, it's way better than me saying "I'm even split Introvert/Extrovert" every time I describe myself in one of these things, so maybe I should cave, huh?

Yeah, but have you heard the voice some people use to say "Jew"? If people hate a group enough, they can make any label contemptuous.

Yeah, I've seen it, too! I think the reasoning, if any, is the same sort used to claim "cisgendered" is a slur:

I've never had to refer to my own category with specific words! It makes me uncomfortable. Why not just say "Jews and normal people"? I don't like being labeled with an identity that I've never thought about, and since I don't like it, it's a slur.

Or possibly:

Well, whenever I say "Jew" I mean it as a slur, so how could "goy" be innocuous?

Old fashioned space scifi! I read Old Man's War a while ago, and it was pretty great. I've been vaguely intending to hit all the sequels, but I have a much longer reading list than attention span and not a lot of free time. (I have to get through some Iain M. Banks first ...)

The big space scifi I've been hitting lately is Ancillary Justice, which is space scifi but I wouldn't exactly call it old fashioned. It's pretty brilliant speculative fiction, and probably the last Hugo winner we'll ever see that isn't written by a white supremacist. At least it went to a great work.

I'm also reading Mary Roach's "Gulp". It's a pop science treatment of the digestive system, and it's as funny and gruesome as one would hope for.

#4 is super subtle and lovely. Second place goes to #1.

- Optimization and linear algebra. Super useful for my work.

- German and Hebrew. Germany and Israel are the two non-Anglophone countries I spend the most time in, and I'm looking to spend a lot more time in both (when I move to Europe in about a month). I'm kind of embarrassed by how utterly monolingual I currently am. I half-assedly started German on duolingo, and Hebrew is coming to the platform soon as well.

- Accordion. I've mentioned it before, but what an awesome instrument! I can be my own band! :)

- Driving. I'm too old not to have a driver's license. I've been holding out for self-driving cars, but I'll get sick of my limits about visiting wilderness and countryside well before those regulatory hurdles are defeated.

- Yoga. Every time I've attended a yoga class I've come out with good posture for about a day. My problem is that yoga is hella boring! It's not like martial arts, which I find really fun. I really need it, though, because I don't really know how to move or hold my body right now.