admiral33's comments

admiral33 | 2 years ago | on: Show HN: Workout.lol – a web app to easily create a workout routine

I agree.

OP made a nice site for exploring different types of movements for a muscle group. That being said the simplicity seems geared towards those just starting out with training but the site surfaces too many (in my experience) accessory exercises and movements I wouldn't try without a PT guiding me.

If you are a true beginner and you are drawn to a site like OP's you're probably looking for a training program. You can find many comprehensive programs online [1] but when you're starting out the information is overwhelming. Whichever routine you choose keep in the back of your mind that the CDC recommends that you engage all major muscle groups in a muscle strengthening activity at least twice a week[2].

Targeting every muscle group individually takes too much time, this is why most resistance training programs include a handful of exercises that train many muscles at once. Those are called compound exercises. Look up each exercise listed in your program and determine if it is a compound exercise. Those are the foundation of your program.

You will probably fail your commitment to whatever program you've chosen in the next 2 weeks. Some days you will need to shorten your resistance workout for whatever reason. The compound exercises are the ones that you should still complete on those days. Some days you will skip the workout entirely. Still try to meet the CDC recommendation for the week by adapting your program and then recommit the following week.

Diet is a tangetial topic, but you will need adequate protein in order to progress your training.

Eventually you will notice a difference between the person you are when you're consistent with it and the person you are when you're not. At that point there's no going back. The workouts get more challenging, but regularly challenging yourself is something you look forward to.

[1]: https://thefitness.wiki/routines/strength-training-muscle-bu...

[2]: https://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/basics/adults/index.htm

admiral33 | 3 years ago | on: Improving Students’ Learning with Effective Learning Techniques

Yeah my comment wasn't clear. Creating the flashcards is a slow process but supposedly imparts 'deeper' knowledge for the creator. That is the claim I'm curious about. Anki has shared decks that anyone can download and study [1]. Say someone has an exam coming up that they need to prepare for. They have two choices: study flashcards given to them, or make and study their own flashcards. For the sake of this example the deck that would be given to them and the one they'd make are identical and contain sufficient information to achieve a perfect score. 3 hypothetical scenarios:

- A short length study period where a large proportion of time is used to create the cards allowing less time to 'test' their knowledge compared to if they had started reviewing right away.

- A medium length study period where the creation period is now a smaller proportion of the total time. Because they created the deck their self testing performance increases at a greater rate compared to testing with a deck given to them.

- A longer length study period where the creation period is now a negligible proportion of the total study time. The benefits of being the one who created the flashcards fade. Whether they created the flashcards or not matters less as knowledge of the deck is complete either way and studying the deck is done only for maintenence.

Either way this is just a question about the most effective way to 'download' knowledge. I'd always choose to make my own cards because I'd be able to make a more targeted deck and know how to use plugins to make the cards more interactive.

1: https://ankiweb.net/shared/decks/

admiral33 | 3 years ago | on: Improving Students’ Learning with Effective Learning Techniques

I've made plenty of flashcards during undergrad and creation can definitely be both high effort and low effort. Low effort copy and paste from textbook, high effort when using a plugin for anki can mean obfuscating multiple parts of an algorithm/tree. I'm proud of my best flashcards - but is there any evidence that creation + studying is more effective than studying alone over the same timeframe? Anki suggests that on their site but I haven't seen much evidence for it.

Study -> create -> study -> create is effective for us programmers using google but is study -> create -> study -> study ... more effective than study -> study... ?

admiral33 | 3 years ago | on: Work is work, in which returns diminish (2020)

This is the first time I'm seeing it. If resubmissions were forbidden I wouldn't have ever known of its existence. I'm not sure what the solution is, but I'd like to think removing it from my cognitive landscape for the sake of a forum host (a stranger) isn't it.

admiral33 | 3 years ago | on: Reducing methane is the fastest strategy available to reduce warming

Reducing global average warming is not the same as reducing global average temperature, although that can be the result over time if the rate of warming is reduced below 0. 'X will reduce warming' is describing a reduction to the positive rate of change.

It's also true that increasing global average warming can result in reduced warming and temperatures in some geographic areas so it is important to be specific with terminology depending on which aspect of the climate change debate we're talking about. You are right that the title is unintentionally misleading in this regard.

admiral33 | 3 years ago | on: MIT engineers fly first-ever plane with no moving parts (2018)

I agree - network effects predate the internet after all. As long as good universities keep producing talented graduates it will be hard to undermine their reputation. And I don't think ambitious people being driven towards certain universities for clout is a negative. I say this as someone who went to an increasingly recognized yet still underdog state school. Maybe instead of discarding MIT's reputation a nudge in the direction of increasing editorial oversight can suffice. Though sensationalism seems to be a prerequisite for visibility these days

admiral33 | 3 years ago | on: Snapchat’s product is booming

> For example, there may be individuals who have unauthorized or multiple Snapchat accounts, even though we forbid that in our Terms of Service and implement measures to detect and suppress that behavior.

Weird. If a person is not a bot, you'd expect that when they are making an nth account they are attempting to apply another use case for the service in their life. More time in app.

I'd also expect there are fewer incentives for creating bots on snap versus other platforms. Its a messaging app, people only use it with people they know.

admiral33 | 4 years ago | on: The Hacker's Diet

This is an area with so much noise that doing nothing can be immediately preferable to doing anything because that 'anything' might be suboptimal.

But something must be done - especially in a cognitively strenuous field. Exercise, nutrition, and 8 hours of sleep are the only consistent 'free-lunch' brain supplements a person can take outside of medication for disabilities and maybe the occasional sideways oriented substance depending on the person.

Most people want to be hot and feel good. A minority of people know how to make that happen safely. I think this is where software can really shine - by telling people exactly what to do, how often, and adjusting based on results. This site touches on the wide context of health in an 'easy to understand' yet shallow way. It leaves a lot to be desired (for example strength training) and will leave people better off but still deep in that sea of noise. Have any HNers had success with any apps or programs that they would recommend?

admiral33 | 4 years ago | on: Music is a negative superstimulus for speech (2020)

Have a group individually describe a series of simple images under a time constraint. Set a threshold for frequency changes in each description to determine 'more musical' or 'less musical' entries (voice to MIDI?). Shuffle the descriptions, have a second group individually listen to one description for each image and draw a picture under time constraint. Shuffle the drawings, display 2 at a time and the original image and have a third group individually vote for which comes closer to the source image. I've never designed an academic study just contributing - I'd assume drawing ability is a big weak point.

Or maybe show the original image in addition to similar images (with one key element different in each one) and have the second group select the image that most closely resembles the description.

admiral33 | 4 years ago | on: Ask HN: Cyber Monday Deals?

Tagging on because I'm shopping today - dumb TV and dumb monitor recommendations? Doesn't have to be on sale though that is always a plus.
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