Gwern.net — Miscellaneous

Anencephaly Infant Organ Donation Survey · Gwern.net

Gwern — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 00:00:00 +0000

American public survey suggests meaningful support for organ donation from anencephalic (terminal) babies.

Why Is Microwave Tea Bad? · Gwern.net

Gwern — Tue, 22 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Microwaving water for tea makes it taste bad, for unknown reasons. Is it a lack of bubbles? Lingering CO₂? Comments and proposed experiments.

Tracking Phishing Bots Via Locations, by Gwern · Gwern.net

Gwern — Wed, 04 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Proposal: use an information leak from catfishing/thirst-trap bots of ‘their location’, which they set to a target’s location, to monitor their collective activities and infer their attacks.

Hacking Pinball High Scores, by Gwern · Gwern.net

Gwern — Wed, 28 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Illustration of how to think about security and reward-hacking by walking through many ways to fake a pinball high score.

Human Cannibalism Alignment Chart, by Gwern, Gemini-2.5-pro, GPT-4-o3 · Gwern.net

Gwern, Gemini-2.5-pro, GPT-4-o3 — Mon, 12 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Taxonomy of possible kinds of human cannibalism, in 3×3 form vs function alignment table. Surprisingly many cases to consider.

Research Ideas · Gwern.net

Gwern — Sun, 19 Mar 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Someone (who is not me) should do something: a wishlist of miscellaneous research or project ideas—free to a good home.

Catnip immunity and alternatives · Gwern.net

Gwern — Sat, 07 Nov 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Estimation of catnip immunity rates by country with meta-analysis and surveys, and discussion of catnip alternatives.

World Catnip Surveys · Gwern.net

Gwern — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 00:00:00 +0000

International population online surveys of cat owners about catnip and other cat stimulant use.

The Three Grenades and the Four Noble Truths · Gwern.net

Gwern — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

CMU game connected to error coding theory

On Stress · Gwern.net

Gwern — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Stoic meditation with reference to being homeless. Written to myself at a particularly low point; like many, I take comfort in considering how things could be worse.

Life contracts · Gwern.net

Gwern — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

How I reinvented longevity insurance, which provides payouts if one lives to a certain point and thus might run out of savings.

Barratry · Gwern.net

Gwern — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Re-inventing anarcho-capitalism in a French context.