Whyvert

Inquisitive and harmless wyvern. Interested in human nature and patterns of history. Otherwise known as Paul Cossins.

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Link:
https://t.co/5ukVksmrPV

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Gwern proposes Guardian Angels LLMs.
Personalized LLMs which emulate the user's preferences to enhance productivity and cybersecurity.

[Jake 🇺🇸 @omni_american]

The cover for Virtuous Nonsense: Progressive America's Epistemic Crisis, my new book with Lawrence Eppard (of @UtterlyModerate Podcast) and @PsychRabble. Pre-order at the link in the next tweet!

[True Discipline @TruueDiscipline]

1/ Short thread. How major demographics of major European world cup squads changed over time:
France: (did not compete in 1970, 1974, 1990 or 1994)

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Farewell to the Harrier.
A great aviation success.
Lots of people in the 60s tried to build a vertical take-off and landing military jet.
Only the Harrier and the USSR's Yak Forger succeeded. The latter didn't stay in service long so it must have been flawed.

[Air Power @RealAirPower1]

The Harrier has officially left the building. VMA-223 "Bulldogs," conducted the final USMC AV-8B flight today at Cherry Point, closing the book on one of the most unique airframes to ever fly from an LHA. It’s all F-35B from here!

So long Jump Jet!

[More Births @MoreBirths]

A new global fertility table has been released by @birthgauge, with many additions including Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Oman.

Not counting foreign workers, fertility rates in the Muslim world are 2x higher than in Europe and 3x higher than in East Asia.

[Whyvert @whyvert]

@arcticinstincts Some of the most prominent older Hong Kong billionaires had several wives.

[Whyvert @whyvert]

@arcticinstincts Hong Kong retained the Qing laws for marriage until the 1970s. Polygamy was legal.
It became richer than China a lot more quickly.
So I'm doubtful of this thesis in any strong form.

[Jon Hartley @Jon_Hartley_]

From 1985 to 2023 MIT administrative staff headcount increased 189% while faculty only grew 9%. This trend is everywhere across US universities. The rapid growth of administrative staff (versus faculty or students) is one of the largest underdiscussed problems in academia today.

[Mark Cummins @mark_cummins]

Our second round was rough. I think I pitched every VC on the planet. Some of the weirder ones:

- I arrive at a Chinese VC firm on Sand Hill Road. The building is locked, lights off, nobody inside. I wait 10 minutes after meeting time. A car pulls up. The partner emerges, she has a large pack of toilet paper under one arm. She unlocks the building, turns on the lights, leads me inside. She disappears into the toilets with her rolls of paper. Then, toilets attended to, we start the pitch.

- Offices of a small deep tech investor. Receptionist greets me and leads me to the meeting room. I set up, wait, wait, wait. Eventually someone walks in, invites me to start. Something feels a bit off. It gradually dawns on me that I am pitching the receptionist. The partner had double-booked herself and apparently decided this was preferable to rescheduling.

- Pitching a London VC. He tells me he likes me as a founder but my business will never work. I've never had someone say this before, usually VCs like to preserve optionality. But he's very explicit. "You might close this round, but you will just waste a year or two of your life and then fail, this idea can't work"
A month later, I get a message from him. "I hear (big name) invested, can we get into your round?". Dude, seriously?

- Another London VC. I'm chatting to the associate while we're waiting for the partner to arrive. He tells me about one of their portfolio cos that needs a bridge round, he's working on squeezing them as much as possible. He's quite direct about it. Eh.. thanks for the transparency I guess, you seem like a great firm.

- The all time weirdest. A French VC with a London office. The associate meets me, as we're going up to the meeting he says something about how the partner can be a little unconventional. We start the pitch.
"What did your father do?" the partner asks me in a thick French accent. OK, this is a new one. I say he trained as a theoretical physicist, but then went into business. "Aha! Your father was a failure!"
"What did your mother do?" I say she was a biochemist and then became a school teacher. "Also a failure!" he exclaims. The associate is visibly dying inside. Is this some strange test, or is he just an asshole? I have a hundred employees and we need funding. "Would you like to hear about my company?" I ask him.

[Whyvert @whyvert]

@sociologyWV Insurgents continue to avoid open battle and use raiding hit and run tactics. Often successfully.

[Ben Alfred @Ben_Alfred_]

Here’s an expanded list of Jewish share of prize winners for a variety of awards. Jews tend to be extremely overrepresented amongst eminent computer/information scientists, mathematicians, and economists. Less so amongst eminent fiction writers and poets.

[True Discipline @TruueDiscipline]

Guess the chart:

[Jonatan Pallesen @jonatanpallesen]

Great article from @tomaspueyo about the cost of mass immigration (especially to Europe).

Has a lot of figures, even some some that I hadn't seen before.

https://t.co/7IS6Zjb2Zq

[Whyvert @whyvert]

This article explains how Ukraine is on the upswing and Russia on the down (though still immensely potent)
https://t.co/wWQwaRIQvD

[Jack Watling @Jack_Watling]

Ukraine Turns the Tide: Why a Cease-Fire Is Now a Real Possibility, I write for @ForeignAffairs on the growing disconnect between the Kremlin's battlefield prospects and its aspirations: https://t.co/YGFRlPGzdQ

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Interesting new phase of the war in Ukraine.
Russian meat waves have declined. (Lack of manpower?)
Ukraine has air superiority at the front and behind it due to drones.
Russia trying city attacks.
Ukraine getting better at long range drone strikes.

[Roy🇨🇦 @GrandpaRoy2]

“There's no talk of ‘meat waves’, which were an absolute norm seven or eight months ago, even in the most critical sectors of the frontline now.
5/

[arctotherium @arctotherium42]

Thread with excerpts from Richard Pipes' Property and Freedom (1999). Pipes is a historian of Russia, and the thesis of the book is that private property, as something distinct and protected from public power and sovereignty, is indispensable to human freedom.

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Link:
https://t.co/FqdMp2pW76

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Africa has lavish funerals.
High kinship intensity. A family displays its cohesion and collectivism with an extravagant funeral.

[Whyvert @whyvert]

Professional dancing pallbearers. One expense of African funerals.