AntoniusBlock

Slightly offtopic, but there are other Fields Medalists on youtube too, such as Richard E Borcherds. He has some very nice videos on number theory and abstract algebra.

https://www.youtube.com/@richarde.borcherds7998

It was certainly the thing which made it click for me.

Stockhausen's Oktophonie did the trick for me.

I've been hearing American accents more and more in London over the past few years, especially over the past few months, so this lines up with my experiences.

CTFs are a fun way to get started. Here are some that I like: Pwn.college, PicoCTF, and PortSwigger WebAcademy.

Anything by David Attenborough should do the trick.

A more rigourous approach was tried after WW2, when Americans feared the Soviets were edging ahead mathematically/scientifically. It was called "New Math" [0]. For an example of the type of textbook high school students were taught from, check out Dolciani's Modern Introductory Analysis (the 1960s and 1970s editions only; the later editions were dumbed down, especially when Dolciani died) [1], which starts with set theory, logic, field axioms, and proof writing techniques.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Math

[1] https://archive.org/details/modernintroducto00dolc

The OU maths books are indeed very good. This is the way to go.

The only thing that US bases in the EU are doing at the moment is contributing to the local economies.

Some US bases double as spy bases. For example in the UK, RAF Menwith Hill is an NSA spy base, and RAF Croughton is a CIA spy base. One bargaining chip Europe has is to oust these spy bases from their territory. This would obviously negatively impact the US' global intelligence efforts. In any case, I see little point in allowing a hostile nation have spy bases on one's land.

RIP. My favourite Spassky game is this 24 move win against Petrosian and Petrosian was no patzer: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1106864

Most big cities in the UK have great clubs for all sorts of hobbies, and clubs are a great way to make friends. Do you like sports? Do you drink alcohol? Just wondering because pub culture is big here and it's an easy way to make friends.

Reposting some advice I gave to someone on HN a few weeks ago:

Here's some advice I've been given by maths professors that I've put into practise. This stuff really works.

-- Make sure you can do it cold, as in make sure you can do things without looking at notes, or looking at wherever you learned it from. For example, say I give you a calculus problem, you should be able to solve it without any outside help, just you, some paper and a pen. No notes, no Google, nothing else. If you can't, then you need to study more and do more problems.

-- Build a routine. Make sure you study whatever it is you want to study every day at the same time and you'll find yourself wanting to do it after a habit is built. And if you miss a session, for whatever reason, you'll feel quite bad about it, and want to try extra hard in the next session because you know you're "behind schedule".

-- Actively recall whatever you've learnt. You can do this by quizzing yourself (make your own problem sets, or do problem sets made by others), and by using flashcards/anki for the things you have trouble memorising. This is one of the best ways to retain info.

-- Don't stress or get angry. You'll just stop the learning process. If you find yourself stressed, or angry, take a break. Remain calm, happy and curious.

You can do it. I believe in you. Start today.

This is a great resource for self-learning mathematics: https://www.susanrigetti.com/math

I stopped using IMDB after they removed their message boards. What a strange move that was.

This is going to sound bad but another upside to charity shops is that often they misprice their books, so you can get some real bargains.

I just looked at my backlog book and apparently I did read the first half of LLPSI 2. I don't recall much from it though. I think after a certain point in the book, I found it too difficult straight after LLPSI 1, which is why.

I went straight into Hyginus and Caesar. Hyginus is not difficult at all. After LLPSI, you should be able to read this: https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/hyginus/hyginus5.shtml

Caesar is not too difficult either. The biggest problem I had with Caesar was that he used indirect speech a lot and LLPSI doesn't really prepare you too well for that, but you get used to it.

I started with LLPSI along with Oerberg's companion books (Colloquia Personarum, Fabellae Latinae, Fabulae Syrae). After that I read Hyginus' Fabulae and then Commentarii de Bello Gallico by Caesar. Since then I've read more Caesar, Nepos, Apuleius, Seneca, some Livy, some Catullus, some Cicero, and I'm currently reading Ovid. I did this by reading Latin for at least 1 hour every day since the first COVID lockdown in 2020, even if I was sick or not feeling it I made sure to get my Latin reading in. I did do a lot of grammar drills in the beginning, and I made an Anki deck for vocab. Grammar drills definitely help big time, along with jumping in head first with a book like LLPSI and reading from the get go is the way to go IMO.

Here's some advice I've been given by maths professors that I've put into practise. This stuff really works.

-- Make sure you can do it cold, as in make sure you can do things without looking at notes, or looking at wherever you learned it from. For example, say I give you a calculus problem, you should be able to solve it without any outside help, just you, some paper and a pen. No notes, no Google, nothing else. If you can't, then you need to study more and do more problems.

-- Build a routine. Make sure you study whatever it is you want to study every day at the same time and you'll find yourself wanting to do it after a habit is built. And if you miss a session, for whatever reason, you'll feel quite bad about it, and want to try extra hard in the next session because you know you're "behind schedule".

-- Actively recall whatever you've learnt. You can do this by quizzing yourself, or by using flashcards/anki. This is one of the best ways to retain info.

-- Don't stress or get angry. You'll just stop the learning process. If you find yourself stressed, or angry, take a break. Remain calm, happy and curious.

You can do it. I believe in you. Start today.

No Gaddis? What a shame. Everyone ITT should check out Gaddis' `The Recognitions' and `J.R.' (and his other books, of course).

Run a honeypot and see where most of the traffic comes from.

Check out Susan Rigetti's guide: https://www.susanrigetti.com/math

Some excellent contemporary Jungle producers, if anyone wants recommendations: Dead Man's Chest, Tim Reaper, Equinox and Coco Bryce. These lads are producing bangers better, or on par, with the producers of the late 80s and 90s.

Many routers use the MIPS ISA and they can be rooted to get shell access. That's what I did with an old Netgear router, which was like a very low spec SBC. If you have a PS2 lying around, you could try that.

You're right, but sometimes you gotta realise you're being trolled or the person you're arguing with is not arguing in good faith. Maybe that's what he meant.

Gargantua and Pantagruel by Francois Rabelais

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Lawrence Sterne

The Recognitions by William Gaddis

in that observation.

That's because your observation is absurd and not grounded in reality. The reality is that obesity rates are too high in the UK. Most of these people overconsume sugary foods and overly processed foods. This in turn puts stress on the NHS, which affects all tax-payers in the UK so it's not a `strictly personal impact'. Overconsumption of sugar leads to measurably worse health outcomes than sitting in a field breathing pollen. The tax is not arbitrary.

because sugar drinks have a strictly personal impact.

Not in this case, as the UK's NHS is tax-payer funded.

It had a great soundtrack too, especially its main theme:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LivLNdeHmww

I remember I saw some website which allowed you to select some 960 position and it would show like some commentary on how to proceed as either side and what should be prioritized and showcase past games with the same position, this was like a year or two ago.

Computer generated? If so, I wouldn't be worried. Besides, imagine this scenario: you search for a 960 game on Lichess right now, you or your opponent have 25 seconds to move. In 25 seconds, you can't input a 960 position into another site and learn theory for that very specific position. If you take longer than 25 seconds to make a move, Lichess aborts the game automatically. It's not possible. 960 is a completely feasible variant if you want to avoid opening theory. Also, a big 960 tournament will be played next year^, so things are getting exciting in the 960 world.

By middlegame theory, I meant that there is a lot of resources on Chessable that go into middlegame theory of an opening if both sides played early opening by the book, so even middlegame is quite covered in terms of variants and the otherwise general strategy ideas are actually incorporated as part of the theory and studied as such.

I have two things to say to this: 1. you should know the plans and ideas for the middlegames you get because these middlegames arise from your opening repertoire, which you should have already studied (pawn structures, best piece placement, common sacrifices, pawn breaks, etc). 2. as you say the theory is influenced by strategy (and tactics), so if you have a solid strategical foundation (and tactical), you will be fine as long as you're not playing an extremely sharp opening, in which you must know concrete theory. A book I found extremely helpful for strategy was: Mastering Chess Strategy by GM Hellsten.

As for endgames, I don't think the theory is too difficult but it's also been a situation where people are guided towards books like Dvoretsky's endgame manual and 100 endgames you must know and stuff like that which again is just thrown at you and told to go study it because a lot of the people read these books.

Those books are not for beginners, especially Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual. I agree with you. If I were to recommend an endgame book to a beginner, I would recommend Silman's Endgame Course by IM Silman. You're a strong player, though, so I think you could get a lot out of Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual (at least the grey/blue sections, which Dvoretsky's notes as being the most essential parts).

Now, generally, I agree, you can play Chess by intuition to a really good level but I've had games where my opponents just told me my moves were sound, made sense and in a way they were "good" but they fell to a part of their preparation theory that was like 8-9 moves deep

What was your opening repertoire?

^ = https://en.chessbase.com/post/freestyle-super-tournament-in-...*

Chess at the highest levels is drawish, but we're talking 2500+ FIDE. The vast majority of players aren't near 2500. Memorisation isn't even a problem for most people because most people won't ever be playing at the professional level and even then the amount of memorisation required isn't as much as you're making it out to be. For example: a close friend of mine is an FM and I saw his opening files. He has around 500 lines on the Benko, around 600 lines on the English (1. c4) and 700 lines on the Sicilian Najdorf (including anti-Sicilians). That's his entire repertoire, which he has been building up for 10 years. That isn't a crazy amount. As for 960 theory, please show me. I've heard of 960 principles, like developing bishops before knights because bishops, but not actual opening theory.

Middlegame theory

What do you mean by this? There are strategical principles, but I don't think I've ever heard of middlegame theory.

Endgame theory

Endgame theory isn't too difficult up to around 2000 FIDE if you know the basic principles (taking opposition, key squares, square rule, philidor position, other rook endgame basics, knowing which pieces you can mate with, etc) which can be learnt in an evening. You said you love calculation. Well, to me, even if you don't know endgame theory you can still be a good endgame player if you're a good calculator.

Anyway, I agree with your other points about there being no money in chess and chess leading to an unhealthy lifestyle.