---
title: October 2023 News
description: October 2023 Gwern.net newsletter with links on TODO
created: 2023-01-08
status: in progress
confidence: log
css-extension: dropcaps-de-zs
backlink: False
...

October 2023's [Gwern.net](https://gwern.net/newsletter/2023/10) [newsletter](https://gwern.substack.com/ "'Gwern.net newsletter (Substack subscription page)', Gwern 2013") is now out; previous, [September 2023](https://gwern.net/newsletter/2023/09) ([archives](https://gwern.net/doc/newsletter/index)).
This is a collation of links and summary of major changes, overlapping with my [Changelog](https://gwern.net/changelog); brought to you by my donors on [Patreon](https://www.patreon.com/gwern).

# Writings

- ["‘CQK’ Is The First Unused TLA"](https://gwern.net/tla)
- ["Utext: Rich Unicode Documents"](https://gwern.net/utext)
- Idea: make an ['InvertOrNot.com'](https://gwern.net/invertornot) (a simple, useful, but missing web API)
- Idea: [lobby webserial/comic sites](https://gwern.net/idea#prefetch) to make more use of 'prefetch'/'preload' for faster reading
- ["Little's Law in the Wild"](/blog/2023/littles-law)
- **Gwern.net**: dropcaps: extended to support bitmap graphics, and randomized selection (used in Halloween & Christmas-mode, and for the new 'dropcats' dropcap set we made for cat-related pages); improved Halloween & Christmas-mode with generated logos; scrolling now disables popups temporarily

# Links

## AI

- ["Goodhart's Law in Reinforcement Learning"](https://arxiv.org/abs/2310.09144), Karwoski et al 2023

[Matters Of](https://www.reddit.com/r/mlscaling/ "'ML Scaling subreddit', Gwern 2020") [Scale](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_scaling_law):

- [Reward is enough](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/Y4rrwkopoigaNGxmS/a-mind-needn-t-be-curious-to-reap-the-benefits-of-curiosity#XeAmDn3NsMqdF6Mij "‘AIs May Not Need Sleep or Play’, Gwern 2023"): why AIs don't need animal-style drives like 'play' or 'sleep'
- [The Approximator's Counter](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/SCqDipWAhZ49JNdmL/paper-llms-trained-on-a-is-b-fail-to-learn-b-is-a#eKhSncieBquLsFTXZ): what is the criterion for LLM criteria?

## Genetics

Everything Is Heritable:

Recent Evolution:

Engineering:

- ["Some deaf children in China can hear after gene treatment"](https://www.technologyreview.com/2023/10/27/1082551/gene-treatment-deaf-children-hearing-china/) (Shanghai Refreshgene Therapeutics success in editing [otoferlin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otoferlin))

## Statistics/Meta-Science

- ["How Newton Discovered the Law of Gravitation"](https://gwern.net/doc/math/humor/1951-miller.pdf), Miller 1951

## Politics/Religion

- ["Take the Q train: Value capture of public infrastructure projects"](https://gwern.net/doc/economics/georgism/2022-gupta.pdf), Gupta et al 2022
- Large organizations are [both extremely competent & incompetent](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/foM8SA3ftY94MGMq9/assessment-of-intelligence-agency-functionality-is-difficult#kzz9CWYAjzdWBhnxp)

## Psychology/Biology

- ["Tirzepatide after intensive lifestyle intervention in adults with overweight or obesity: the SURMOUNT-3 phase 3 trial"](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02597-w), Wadden et al 2023
- ["A Comprehensive Meta-Analysis of Money Priming"](https://gwern.net/doc/statistics/bias/2019-lodder.pdf), Lodder et al 2019 (small effect in unpublished studies, zero in pre-registered studies); ["Limited evidence for the effect of red color on cognitive performance: A meta-analysis"](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7704521/), Gnambs 2020 (more priming effects driven by bias)
- ["Understanding a Mutually Destructive Relationship Between Individuals With Borderline Personality Disorder and Their 'Favorite Person'"](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9806505/), Jeong et al 2022
- ["Book Review: _Going Infinite_"](https://thezvi.wordpress.com/2023/10/24/book-review-going-infinite/), [Zvi Mowshowitz](!W)
- ["The Sound and Taste of Materials"](https://gwern.net/doc/food/2014-laughlin.pdf), Laughlin & Howes 2014 (should you get gold-plated spoons for ice cream? maybe)
- [A simple 'wrist mobilization' exercise](https://gwern.net/doc/exercise/2023-08-27-juliepitois-protocolsportsystems-wristmobilizationexerciseforyogaorpushuppain.mp4) for wrist pain under compression (eg. pushups/bench press/yoga---I was surprised how much this helped my bench press. I was limited by my wrists more than I realized.)
- ["The characteristic response of domestic cats to plant iridoids allows them to gain chemical defense against mosquitoes"](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7817105/), Uenoyama et al 2021
- Commentary on the Trump classified papers scandal: they are ['narcissistic trophies' for 'narcissist supply'](https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/open-thread-296/comment/41146211)

## Technology

- ["Maintenance of pig brain function under extracorporeal pulsatile circulatory control (EPCC)"](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-39344-7), Shariff et al 2023; ["William and Mary"](https://gwern.net/doc/fiction/science-fiction/1960-dahl-williamandmary.html), Roald Dahl 1960
- ["Scrollbars are becoming a problem"](https://artemis.sh/2023/10/12/scrollbars.html) by pervasive creation of [illusion of completeness](https://www.nngroup.com/articles/illusion-of-completeness/) (in 2021, I almost skipped COVID vaccination because every time I checked the official government mobile app, the morning slots were full and there were no others; actually, there were *plenty* of slots---except the scrollbar was invisible! I hope they fixed it after I emailed them, but I wonder how many elderly people were boxed out... In other cases, users have reported to me 'broken' PDFs missing half the pages---which had two-page spreads whose existence was hidden by the disappearing scrollbars, to the point where it fooled me and I wasted half an hour checking every step in my PDF pipeline trying to figure out where the pages were being deleted.)
- ["The Pattern of Streets"](https://gwern.net/doc/technology/1966-alexander.pdf), Alexander 1966

## Economics

- ["Effectiveness of an Over-the-Counter Self-fitting Hearing Aid Compared With an Audiologist-Fitted Hearing Aid: A Randomized Clinical Trial"](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaotolaryngology/fullarticle/2803832), De Sousa et al 2023
- ["The stock market speaks: How Dr. Alchian learned to build the bomb"](https://gwern.net/doc/economics/2014-newhard.pdf), Newhard 2014
- ["_Catṡlechta_ and other medieval legal material relating to cats"](https://gwern.net/doc/cat/2007-murray.pdf), Murray 2007 (cf. [Berry 2010](https://www.animallaw.info/article/detailed-discussion-legal-rights-and-duties-lost-pet-disputes) on damages in American law)

## Philosophy

- ["My Left Kidney"](https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/my-left-kidney), Scott Alexander (on donating his kidney to a stranger)

## Fiction

- [Studio Ghibli sold to Nippon TV](https://variety.com/2023/biz/news/studio-ghibli-miyazaki-hayao-ntv-1235730638/)

## Miscellaneous

# Books

**Nonfiction**:

- _A Stress Analysis of a Strapless Evening Gown: Essays for a Scientific Age_, ed Baker 1962

**Fiction**:

# Film/TV

**Live-action**:

**Animated**:

- _Back to the Future_ trilogy: _Back to the Future_/_Back to the Future II_/_Back to the Future III_
- _Basic Instinct_

# Music

[**Touhou**](https://www.reddit.com/r/TOUHOUMUSIC/search/?q=author%3Agwern&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all):

[**Vocaloid**](https://www.reddit.com/r/Vocaloid/search/?q=author%3Agwern&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all):

**MLP**:

**Doujin**:

**Misc**: