September 2014 News
This is the September 2014c edition of the Gwern.net newsletter; previous was August.
This is a collation of links and summary of major changes, overlapping with Changelog. Thanks to my donors on Gratipay.
Writings
QS:
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Noopept experiment (no benefits)
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Treadmill spaced repetition experiment: expanded analysis to cover treadmill’s impact on successive reviews with SEM (no additional damage to recall beyond that implied by the original damage)
Statistics:
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anthology on how “everything is correlated”
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probability/gerontology problem: can one visit 566 centenarians before any die? No.
Technology:
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My window tracker/time-logger of choice is arbtt which records X window info for later classification and analysis; but one of the challenges is you don’t know how to set up arbtt or improve your environment or write classifications rules. So I wrote a tutorial.
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Time-lock crypto: wrote a Bash implementation of serial hashing time-lock crypto, link to all known implementations of hash time-lock crypto
Media
Links
Genetics:
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Everything Is Heritable:
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“Uncovering the Hidden Risk Architecture of the Schizophrenias: Confirmation in Three Independent Genome-Wide Association Studies”, et al 2014 ( press release)
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“Common genetic variants associated with cognitive performance identified using the proxy-phenotype method”, et al 2014; supplementary information (et al 2013 hits replicate some more; discussions: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5)
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“Substantial SNP-based heritability estimates for working memory performance”, et al 2014
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Politics/religion:
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“World population stabilization unlikely this century”, et al 2014
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“School Desegregation and Black Achievement: an integrative review”, Wortman & Bryant 198539ya (publication bias: “The 31 studies found to be acceptable [by our statistical criteria for our meta-analysis] contained only two published articles.”!)
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“Going, Going, Gone…” (The dilemma of polio research—amelioration vs cure—as a paradigm for aging.)
Statistics/AI/meta-science:
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“ImageNet Large Scale Visual Recognition Challenge”, “What I learned from competing against a Convolutional Network on ImageNet” (neural networks near parity with trained humans on ImageNet: “Based on the sample of images I worked on, the GoogLeNet classification error turned out to be 6.8% (the error on the full test set of 100,000 images is 6.7%). My own error in the end turned out to be 5.1%, approximately 1.7% better.”)
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“Yes We Canities! A quantitative analysis of the graying of Barack Obama’s hair”
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invoking spirits to control coin flips (p < 0.05): 1966 (This is an even better burn than it looks because Bakan is also illustrating optional stopping—he would have broken off the flipping if he hadn’t kept getting heads—which is routine among psychologists and makes his p-value incorrect; naturally, no one computes their p-value correctly to account for optional stopping…)
Psychology:
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“MH’s book review of Deafness, Deprivation, and IQ (Braden 199430ya)”, “The study of deaf people since Braden (199430ya)”
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“Induction of self awareness in dreams through frontal low current stimulation of gamma activity”, et al 2014 (causing lucid dreaming through tACS)
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“Towards Reliable Storage of 56-bit Secrets in Human Memory”, 2014 (tricking website users into memorizing secure passwords via spaced repetition)
Technology:
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The Codeless Code: Case 96: “Stateless” (can you spot all 3 FP concepts used?)
Economics:
Philosophy:
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“On the Pedagogical Motive for Esoteric Writing [in Western Philosophy]”, Melzer 200717ya; “Appendix: a chronological compilation of testimonial evidence for Esotericism”
Misc:
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survival of the flattest: “Viroids: Survivors from the RNA World?”, et al 2014
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“The World’s Heaviest People” (“…A contemporary poet has him declare that he aspired to end his days ‘on my back, lying on my many rolls of fat, scarcely uttering a word, taking labored breaths, and eating my fill’, for of all the ways a man might die, an excess of luxury was the only truly happy death.”)
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“How (not) to communicate new scientific information: a memoir of the famous Brindley lecture”, 2005
Books
Nonfiction:
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Nicholas Wade’s Troublesome Inheritance (review)
Fiction:
Film/TV
Anime:
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Steamboy (decent Victorian steampunk with a wholesome Ghibli sort of vibe)
Music
Touhou:
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“Poison Body” (TAM; Namida no Touhou Komoriuta {R10}) [classical]
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“Love-Colored Master Spark” (TAM; Namida no Touhou Komoriuta {R10}) [classical]
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“Love-Colored.” (Crazy Berry feat Ichigo; OSUSHI PROJECT 1 {C86}) [jazz/vocal]
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“Far East Fruits” (K2 SOUND; 詩夏 Si-ka {C84}) [instrumental]
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“櫻の樹の下には (Septette?)” (sisimai-3go; Tomodachi {R10}) [instrumental]
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“自制的な喜怒哀楽 (Cosmic Mind)” (sisimai-3go; Tomodachi {R10}) [instrumental]
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“櫻の樹の下には (Border of Life)” (sisimai-3go; Tomodachi {R10}) [instrumental]
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“Transparent” (Aizawa; Silver Scenery {C86}) [instrumental rock]
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“Phantom Ensemble” (CROW_S CLAW; THE FLAMES OF THE INFERNO {R10}) [instrumental rock]
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“竹取飛翔 ~ Lunatic Princess (2nd Spell -Fullmoon-より)” (xi-on; 東方志奏 Ex2 Spell -Regeneration- {R10}) [instrumental rock]
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“東方妖々夢 ~ Ancient Temple (5th Spell -Changing Times-より)” (xi-on; 東方志奏 Ex2 Spell -Regeneration- {R10}) [metal]
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“幻想の永遠祭—空の帰り道 ~ Sky Dream” (埼玉最終兵器 & Aether; Silent Stratosphere {R10}) [metal]
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“Dressed-Up Shadow” (Tim Vegas feat. 陽花; DANCE with WOLVES {C86}) [dance]
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“Twinkle” (ena feat. peЯoco; デジウィ DREAM {C86}) [Jpop]
Kantai Collection:
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“Sailing to the Horizon” (Yuri Yuzriha; 艦これパラドクス {C85}) [house]
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“Shigure 2nd Remodel Celebration!” (R E S T I A feat. Yumi Tanibe {2013-10-24}) [trance]
Doujin:
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“誰かの幸せ” (櫻井アンナ; 不思議の国の音哲樂 夢語り篇 {C86}) [vocal]
Vocaloid:
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“Hard-Disk Hide and Seek” (Avanna; nostraightanswer (Kenji-B); Hard—Disk Hide and Seek) [electronic]