Juan Orbea

You have about 80,000 hours in your career: 40 hours per week, 50 weeks per year, for 40 years.

6 discussion topics on which David agrees with Taleb:(1) [p. 286] The sterilized randomness of games does not resemble randomness in real life; thinking it does constitutes the Ludic Fallacy (his neologism). This is exactly right, and mathematicians should pay attention. In my own list of 100 instances of chance in the real world, exactly 1 item is... See more

Pebble fuel: Typically used for HTGRs, fuel pebbles are meltdown-resistant small, solid pellets that encase uranium fuel (typically HALEU). The pellets retain fission products under all reactor conditions and are structurally more resistant to neutron irradiation, corrosion, and high temperatures than are traditional reactor fuels. TRISO... See more

Existential issues are usually not the most efficient place to add your efforts, but efficiency isn’t a priority when the walls are crashing down around you. You should swarm to existential problems, but if a problem isn’t existential then you should be skeptical of adding your efforts where everyone’s already focused. Folks often chase... See more

Team BTC (meaning, both actual Bitcoin maximalists and US rightists in general) has some positive values, but their outright hostility to collective action and order means that they are incapable of building anything.