Podcasts about ntk

Happy birthday to Bob Seger — and good luck playing his music on air! On this special Tuesday-after-Cinco-de-Mayo episode of the Need to Know Morning Show, Kevin and Alex dive into everything from sunny North Dakota forecasts to wild political proposals like reopening Alcatraz. Along the way, they chat with Fargo's retiring fire chief, Steve Dirksen, share a deep-dive agricultural update with Bridget Readel, and reflect on Trump's latest border ideas. Plus: NBA/NHL playoff chatter, Mother's Day plans, and yes — crepes Suzette. A true NTK classic! ⏱️ Standout Moments (Timestamps): [00:00] – No Bob Seger intro?! Celebrating Seger's 80th with a tech hiccup and an impromptu Main Street hum-along. [05:00] – Alcatraz as a migrant deterrent? Trump floats a prison revival and Judge Jeanine and Gutfeld weigh in. [20:15] – Fire Chief Steve Dirksen joins in-studio to reflect on his long career and shares insight on Fargo's fire evolution. [31:00] – Weather with Dean: a glorious stretch of May sunshine ahead — including an 86° Mother's Day. [35:10] – Taylor and Tevo segment: dissecting Trump's border policy, DHS incentives, and political messaging. [50:20] – Bridget Readel's ag report: pre-emergent herbicides, soil science, and why you should not skip your pre. [1:10:40] – Sports rundown with Big Game James: NBA and NHL playoff drama, plus local coaching updates. [1:25:15] – Listener texts, lighthearted banter, and the announcement of a Mother's Day giveaway featuring Chicago concert tickets.

The NTK crew is back and begins by addressing their two week absence (0:00) before sharing their dream podcast guests (13:53). Next, SaVon talks about his experience at a wine bar in Miami (23:32) and Pierre asks everyone where they go for the most authentic Chinese food (42:12) before the gang gets into some of the things they have missed while on break - 23andMe's DNA is up for sale (46:48), Marvin Sapp locking the doors at a church convention until he received $40K in donations (51:39) , Pop The Balloon inking a deal with Netflix (56:09), The Breakfast Club's recent drama (1:02:20), YG's “2004” (1:17:30), Will Smith's ‘Based on a True Story' (1:23:16). They also discuss Kanye West and Akademiks' conversation (1:37:13), gang members getting locked up (1:39:15) , Drake's “NOKIA” video (1:41:32), Justin Bieber's snippet (2:02:39) , Kevin Gates updates (2:07:53), and much more! Subscribe to our Patreon for exclusive access to "Curated Chaos" episodes every Monday, weekly parlays from SaVon, first access to 2025 merch and live events, and more! -www.patreon.com/NeedToKnowPodcast Visit https://play.underdogfantasy.com/p-need-to-know-network and use the code NEEDTOKNOW to sign up for Underdog Fantasy and receive up to $1,000 in bonus cash when you make your first deposit. Book your next podcast recording at Need to Know Studios TODAY -https://needtoknowstudios.com/ Join our Twitter/X Community to chop it up with us about all things Need to Know -https://twitter.com/i/communities/1777442897001910433 The Need To Know Podcast https://www.instagram.com/needtoknowpod/ https://twitter.com/NeedToKnowPod https://www.tiktok.com/needtoknowpod SaVon https://www.instagram.com/savonslvter/ https://twitter.com/SavonSlvter Alex https://www.instagram.com/balltillwefall/ https://twitter.com/balltillwefall Regi https://www.instagram.com/regi_nacho/ https://twitter.com/regi_nacho

Episode 300 is upon us, and SaVon, Alex, and Regi are celebrating with none other than friend of the show, Eddin. Regi kicks things off with some congratulatory voicemails (8:02) before the crew catches up with Eddin since he was last on the pod (15:41) and shares first reflections on 300 episodes (19:00). Later, more voicemails (33:33), the NYPD detective under fire for being a video vixen (46:42), and the things the cast judges about other people (58:47). The gang also discusses Drake's latest Instagram post (1:09:06), how Eddin got back in the fold with Rory & Mal (1:31:58), a final round of voicemails (1:46:11), the latest show on the network ‘Curated Chaos' (2:04:11), Eddin's game for the NTK cast (2:19:30), and much more! Subscribe to our Patreon for exclusive access to "Curated Chaos" episodes every Monday, weekly parlays from SaVon, first access to 2025 merch and live events, and more! - www.patreon.com/NeedToKnowPodcast Book your next podcast recording at Need to Know Studios TODAY -https://needtoknowstudios.com/ Join our Twitter/X Community to chop it up with us about all things Need to Know -https://twitter.com/i/communities/1777442897001910433 The Need To Know Podcast https://www.instagram.com/needtoknowpod/ https://twitter.com/NeedToKnowPod https://www.tiktok.com/needtoknowpod SaVon https://www.instagram.com/savonslvter/ https://twitter.com/SavonSlvter Alex https://www.instagram.com/balltillwefall/ https://twitter.com/balltillwefall Regi https://www.instagram.com/regi_nacho/ https://twitter.com/regi_nacho

The NTK crew reunites for SaVon's birthday and begins by recapping last week's episode with Elliott Wilson before commenting on Cam'Ron and Jim Jones' recent issues. Later, they discuss Fox Sports' Skip Bayless and Joy Taylor being named in a lawsuit by former employee Noushin Faraji, Drake's "Fighting Irish Freestyle" and Akademiks' speculation about a beef between The Boy and LeBron James, and SaVon not knowing that Jimmy Carter passed away. They also make sense of the devastating wildfires in Los Angeles, rumors that Kendrick Lamar will be featured on the upcoming Clipse album, LiAngelo Ball's hit track "Tweaker" and his new DefJam deal, Lil Baby's latest album 'WHAM,' Bad Bunny's 'DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS' and his performance with Jimmy Fallon in the NYC subway system, and much more! Book your next podcast recording at Need to Know Studios TODAY - https://needtoknowstudios.com/ If you're new here and enjoy this episode, join us over on Patreon where we release episodes EVERY MONDAY don't hold ANYTHING back - www.patreon.com/NeedToKnowPodcast Join our Twitter/X Community to chop it up with us about all things Need to Know -https://twitter.com/i/communities/1777442897001910433 The Need To Know Podcast https://www.instagram.com/needtoknowpod/ https://twitter.com/NeedToKnowPod https://www.tiktok.com/needtoknowpod SaVon https://www.instagram.com/savonslvter/ https://twitter.com/SavonSlvter Alex https://www.instagram.com/balltillwefall/ https://twitter.com/balltillwefall Regi https://www.instagram.com/regi_nacho/ https://twitter.com/regi_nacho

Over the past month, NTK has seen at least 100 members from various district units stepping down each week. Seeman, however, calls those who left 'weeds hindering the party's growth'.  

After a few months off, Taren and NTK are back to talk about where they've been the past few months and why they vanished.  Taren gets into details about why he's no longer Triathlon Taren, what parts of the industry led him to move away from his public presence... and some exciting things coming in the very near future! LINKS FROM THE PODCAST MOTTIV Training Show (longform) MOTTIV Show Clips (clips from the longform show) MOTTIV Training Shorts (short tips & tricks) And to train for free, give the MOTTIV training app a try at mymottiv.com

Pastor Linda Warren continues our series on  "A Prophet's Life: Lessons Learned From Those Called to Communicate God's Truth" with a message from Haggai 2:10-19. Pastor Linda mentions Brother Lawrence, as an example of someone who was passionate for the Presence of the Lord.  Click the arrow below, or if you're reading this in an email you can click this link, to play the service: This service is available for download free on iTunes, where you can also subscribe to our podcast. Search for "Westchester Chapel" on the iTunes Store. If you want to know more about starting a relationship with Jesus Christ visit www.WestchesterChapel.org/salvation.

In this week's episode, Dr. John Snyder and Teddy James engage in an imaginative discussion. What if we could bring back masters in their fields like J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, George Whitefield, Albert Einstein, or Hudson Taylor to teach us in Northeast Mississippi? If they were to offer tutoring near our homes, we'd do whatever necessary to be present and prepared to learn from them. As previously discussed, wisdom has called out to us. God Himself has promised to teach us His word. Sadly, we often approach Scripture unprepared, uninterested, and unwelcoming. Yet, there's no greater privilege in human life than meeting with our Creator. Therefore, we must come to Scripture filled with prayer, crying out to the One who is willing and able to teach us all we need to know. But how do we read and study well? John provides helpful tips on approaching personal Bible study. He and Teddy then discuss how to pray while studying Scripture to maximize its impact on our pursuit of holiness. We'll delve deeper into this subject next week. Resources mentioned: Hendrickson Commentaries https://www.accordancebible.com/product/bakers-hendriksen-kistemaker-nt-commentary-12-volumes/ New International Commentaries Old Testament: https://www.christianbook.com/page/academic/bible-commentaries/nicot?srsltid=AfmBOorKYTUSA9vqpFT4J28fPCsHtRUqdWc4Y6KgJKScSgsH33N0UkaS New Testament: https://www.christianbook.com/apps/easyfind?Ntt=nicnt&Ntk=keywords&action=Search&Ne=0&event=ESRCQ&nav_search=1&cms=1&ps_exit=KEYWORD|legacy&ps_domain=www&aq=NIC Geneva Commentaries: https://banneroftruth.org/us/store/series/geneva-series-of-commentaries/ John MacArthuer commentaries: https://www.gty.org/store/macarthurcommentaries Welwyn Commentaries: https://us.10ofthose.com/series/welwyn-commentary-series Want to listen to The Whole Counsel on the go? Subscribe to the podcast on your favorite podcast app: https://www.mediagratiae.org/podcasts You can get The Whole Counsel a day early on the Media Gratiae App: https://subsplash.com/mediagratiae/app

If enjoy this preview, join us over on Patreon where we release bonus episodes EVERY MONDAY don't hold ANYTHING back - www.patreon.com/NeedToKnowPodcast On this Patreon exclusive episode of the Need to Know Podcast, SaVon, Alex, and Regi begin by discussing their nutritional habits as children and how the marketing of food in the 1990s and 2000s is similar to how video games are marketed today. Later, they provide the unfiltered NTK mixer recap, Regi talks about moving her younger sister into college and asks the guys about their experiences leaving home for the first time, and more! Join our Twitter/X Community to chop it up with us about all things Need to Know - https://twitter.com/i/communities/1777442897001910433 Leave us a voicemail for a chance to be featured on next week's episode - https://www.speakpipe.com/NTK_Voicemail_Line The Need To Know Podcast https://www.instagram.com/needtoknowpod/ https://twitter.com/NeedToKnowPod https://www.tiktok.com/needtoknowpod SaVon https://www.instagram.com/savonslvter/ https://twitter.com/SavonSlvter Alex https://www.instagram.com/balltillwefall/ https://twitter.com/balltillwefall Regi https://www.instagram.com/regi_nacho/

How do you turn a passion for Direct Selling into a thriving multi-million dollar business? I'm thrilled to introduce you to someone who has done just that—Steven K. Scott. While speaking at a Direct Selling conference in Utah, I had the unexpected pleasure of meeting Steve. What was supposed to be a brief one-hour meeting turned into a six-hour deep dive into his life, business and heart.  Steve is the founder of Biotech Nutritional Sciences, also known as Neumi, and the co-founder of the American Telecast Corporation. He's also a New York Times best-selling author of fifteen books! Steve's passion for the Direct Selling industry and his commitment to helping others grow and reach their full potential is truly inspiring. During our conversation, I saw firsthand how deeply emotional and passionate he is about everything he does. In this episode, Steve shares his journey from humble beginnings to becoming the "infomercial king," offering invaluable insights into how to make a business soar. Whether you're looking to finesse your sales skills, generate more leads, or connect with people on a genuine level, Steve's story is packed with lessons learned through doing the hard yards. This episode is a must-listen for anyone looking to grow their business with heart and grace. Get ready to be inspired by the incredible journey of Steven K. Scott.    We'll be talking about:  ➡ [0:00] Introduction ➡ [7:03] Who is Steve Scott ➡ [9:01] The best resistance training in the world ➡ [10:50] What brought Steve back from retirement ➡ [13:38] A challenge that changes everything ➡ [15:54] Out of 15 important strategies, the most powerful strategy is… ➡ [19:07] What is vision mapping? ➡ [22:04] Diligence  ➡ [23:19] Effective partnering ➡ [26:07] Solving communication problems in business ➡ [29:13] Hooking  ➡ [30:59] Emotional word pictures ➡ [34:04] Teaching kids to persist through failures ➡ [38:23] The process of writing a book, Steve's way ➡ [40:11] The secret to a successful infomercial that works ➡ [48:00] Selling by telling the truth  ➡ [51:39] Knowing your value proposition ➡ [54:16] Trustworthy brand ambassadors ➡ [54:16] The first legitimate infomercial marketers ➡ [59:30] Steve's recommended book ➡ [1:00:23] Steve's dream superpower ➡ {1:01:04] Steve's favourite quote ➡ [1:03:07] Steve's advice to his past self ➡ [1:04:16]  A universal principle ➡ [1:05:49]  Final thoughts Resources:  Book Recommendations ➡ The Riches Man Who Ever Lived by Steven K Scott: https://bit.ly/4dDnDYN ➡ The Millionaire's Notebook By Steven K. Scott: https://bit.ly/46Zmpoe ➡ The Joseph Principles by Steven K Scott: https://bit.ly/3XgZuBv ➡ Library of Steven Scott's books: https://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/easy_find?N=0&Ne=0&Ntk=keywords&Ntt=steven%20k%20scott&action=Search&cms=1&event=ESRCG&nav_search=1&ps_domain=www&ps_exit=RETURN%7Clegacy  ➡ Steven Scott's podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/knowing-him/id1604997968  ➡ Gospel of John, Luke and Matthew  ➡ Book of Proverbs - Bible   Quote: ➡ “I didn't come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance”   About our guest: Steve Scott has spent his whole life searching for breakthrough products, purchasing the rights to those products, and marketing them on TV. Over the years, Steve has generated over $4billion in revenue. Some of his projects included Total Gym, Deal-A-Meal, Hair Care with Cher, and much more. Steve's success rate dwarfed anyone in infomercial history, and one of his strategies is only to market breakthrough products. After working for 30 years in the health & beauty industries, Steve was ready to retire until he found what he calls “the biggest breakthrough of his entire life”. Steve decided to come out of retirement to share this breakthrough with the world…   Connect with Steve Scott:  ➡ Steve Scott's website: https://stevekscott.com/ ➡ Steve Scott's Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elliotroemindcoach/ ➡ Steve Scott's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/steven-scott-19543b170/ ➡ Steve Scott's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/steven.k.scott/ ➡ Steve Scott's X: https://twitter.com/stevenkscott?lang=en   Connect with Direct Selling Accelerator: ➡ Visit our website: https://www.auxano.global/ ➡ Subscribe to YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/DirectSellingAccelerator ➡ Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/auxanomarketing/ ➡ Follow us on Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/StevenKScottSocialMedia/ ➡ Email us: grow@auxanomarketing.com.au If you have any podcast suggestions or things you'd like to learn about specifically, please send us an email at the address above. And if you liked this episode, please don't forget to subscribe, tune in, and share this podcast.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey everyone! Happy 4th of July to everyone who celebrates! I celebrated today by having an intimate conversation with 600 of my closest X friends

In this episode, join Colin and Mike as they prepare for their EURO 2024 journey! Chock full of hearty laughs as they make hilarious, but objectively terrible, attempts at pronouncing* German city names — who knew Gelsenkirchen could be such a tongue twister?! - this episode has everything you need to know (NTK) about inter-city travel and things to do ‘beyond the grounds' in each of Germany's host cities. Spoiler alert: there will be plenty of opportunities to drop into a biergarten! Foot(y)notes: Don't miss the official event guide for EURO 2024, with all the details you need for a successful trip There's also the Euro 2024 app and the UEFA Mobile Tickets app Check out Ben's FFT Travel Tip on Lindner Hotels in Germany *This episode was produced in partnership with Video Puppet's Narakeet 01:13 | Introducing 'Scottish Mike' 02:20 | FFT Introductions 06:23 | Travel tip: How to book cheap business class flights to Europe 09:29 | Travel tip: How to book cheap hotels with points in Germany 11:55 | Train travel discounts during EURO 2024 13:58 | Mobile apps you will need for EURO 2024 17:03 | Adam Belz of the Scuffed Podcast and their recent Euro-trip 25:19 | The Footy Travelers' complete (horrendously pronounced) out-of-grounds host city guide for EURO 2024   *RATE & REVIEW* Wherever you're listening, be sure to hit 'Follow' or 'Subscribe', leave us a star-rating, and if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, leave us a proper review to let others know what you think of the show!   *VISIT THE FOOTY TRAVELERS FAN SHOP* Head to our new fan shop to 'Kop' an exclusive Footy Travelers 'Away' jersey, or score a custom-designed supporters' scarf. Hurry though! Jerseys are nearly sold out and scarf supplies won't last long!   *SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS* Race2Adventure From the stunning scenery of Chile to the captivating allure of New Zealand – R2A invites you to join them on an exhilarating vacation around the world. Their 8-night adventures are tailor-made for fitness enthusiasts, explorers, and travel aficionados who crave more from their vacations. With R2A, you don't just visit a destination; you become a part of it.

Pastor Randy Solomon preaches from Daniel 1 and Daniel 2. He mentions The Insanity of God: A True Story of Faith Resurrected by Nik Ripken and Gregg Lewis. Click the arrow below, or if you're reading this in an email you can click this link, to play the service: This service is available for download free on iTunes, where you can also subscribe to our podcast. Search for "Westchester Chapel" on the iTunes Store. If you want to know more about starting a relationship with Jesus Christ visit www.WestchesterChapel.org/salvation.

The 10th commandment calls us to not lust after what our neighbor has.  In our modern day, our “neighbor” is far more than the couple that live next door, our neighbors are everyone we know.  Coveting after what they have, desiring it for ourselves leads only to harm and further sin.  Join us as we dive into this final commandment in Exodus 20.17. Outline: 01:19 - Exo 20.17 03:33 - Deut 5.21 04:35 - Word study on BlueLetterBible.org: Covet: ḥāmaḏ חָמַד: To desire, covet, to delight greatly, desire greatly 05:21 - who is my neighbor?  06:13 - Looking at pornography is coveting 08:12 - James 1.14-15 08:52 - 1 Tim 6.10 (2-10) 12:03 - 2 Kings 18.1-7 - Nehushtan 16:40 - Money is the root of all evil? 1 Tim 6.3-10 18:41 - Luke 12.13-21 22:27 - Mat 6.19-21 22:50 - Luke 16.9-15 Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced: Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Exodus. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002. https://www.christianbook.com/holman-testament-commentary-exodus-leviticus-numbers/glen-martin/9781433674259/pd/16102EB?product_redirect=1&search_term=holman%20max%20anders%20exodus&Ntt=16102EB&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP Barker, Kenneth L.. Kohlenberger, John R. III. The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Abridged, Old Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994.  Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/expositors-bible-commentary-abridged-edition-volumes/kenneth-barker/9780310255192/pd/54975?event=ESRCG  Courson, Jon.  Jon Courson's Application Commentary Old Testament Vol. 1.  Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. https://www.christianbook.com/coursons-application-commentary-genesis-revelation-volumes/jon-courson/9780310118312/pd/0118312?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

The 9th commandment calls Israel to “not give false testimony against thy neighbor.”  That command holds true for us today, not to lie but to speak truth.  A lie can be more than just not telling the truth, it can also be misleading or intentionally deceiving.  The Bible calls us to reflect Christ and He is truth! Outline: 01:21 - Exodus 20.16, “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor” Exo 23.1-2  Exo 23.6-8 Deu 17.6-7 Jhn 14.6 Jhn 8:31-47 Mat 26.57-68 14:17 - what is truth?  Truth is hard to define today. 18:12 - Tips from John Courson   Pro 10.19 - speak less Psalm 119.28-29 - pray this T.H.I.N.K. before you speak: Truth, Helpful, Inspirational, Necessary and Kind 21:34 - Eph 4.22-32 Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced: Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Exodus. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002. https://www.christianbook.com/holman-testament-commentary-exodus-leviticus-numbers/glen-martin/9781433674259/pd/16102EB?product_redirect=1&search_term=holman%20max%20anders%20exodus&Ntt=16102EB&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP Barker, Kenneth L.. Kohlenberger, John R. III. The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Abridged, Old Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994.  Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/expositors-bible-commentary-abridged-edition-volumes/kenneth-barker/9780310255192/pd/54975?event=ESRCG  Courson, Jon.  Jon Courson's Application Commentary Old Testament Vol. 1.  Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. https://www.christianbook.com/coursons-application-commentary-genesis-revelation-volumes/jon-courson/9780310118312/pd/0118312?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

The 8th commandment calls us not to steal. In this Bible study, we look at what the Bible has to say about possessions. We will also look at ways we steal, that we may justify as being fine. Lastly we will talk about tithing. Join us as we dig into Exodus 20:15. Outline: 02:39 - Ex 20.15 - “You shall not steal,” (NIV), “Thou shalt not steal” KJV Verses in Ex that deal with stealing: Exo 21.16; 22.1,7,12 Eph 4.28 (17-32) Gen 3.19 Mat 5.41 Psa 24.1 Jhn 1.1-3 Luke 19.1-10 18:47 - Tithing Lev 27.30-32; Num 18.21-28; Deut 12.6-17; 2 Chr 31.5; Mal 3.8-10 1 Cor 16:2 2 Cor 9.6-8 Rom 8.32 (28-39) Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced: Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Exodus. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002. https://www.christianbook.com/holman-testament-commentary-exodus-leviticus-numbers/glen-martin/9781433674259/pd/16102EB?product_redirect=1&search_term=holman%20max%20anders%20exodus&Ntt=16102EB&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP Barker, Kenneth L.. Kohlenberger, John R. III. The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Abridged, Old Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994. Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/expositors-bible-commentary-abridged-edition-volumes/kenneth-barker/9780310255192/pd/54975?event=ESRCG Courson, Jon. Jon Courson's Application Commentary Old Testament Vol. 1. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. https://www.christianbook.com/coursons-application-commentary-genesis-revelation-volumes/jon-courson/9780310118312/pd/0118312?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

What is adultery and why does God outlaw it in the 7th commandment?  What does the Bible say about marriage?  What is sexual immorality and how does it relate to marriage and adultery?  What is abstinence and is it honestly still an option in this day and age?  All this and more we discuss in this Bible study looking at Exodus 20.14. Outline: 01:49 - what is adultery? 02:04 - Foundational verses on marriage: Gen 1.27,  2.24, 5.2, Mat 19.4-6 05:17 - Bible verses related to adultery and sexual immorality:  Lev 20.10 Deut 22.22 Pro 6.20-33  Mat 5.27-28 12:01 - Is looking at pornography committing adultery?  1 Thes 4.3-8 1 Cor 6.9-20 21:43 - A word for parents: abstinence? 24:55 - Can God forgive adultery?  Jn 8.1-11 27:23 - King David & Bathsheba   2 Sam 11 & 12 Psalm 51 33:10 - Adultery is not unforgivable.  Sexual immorality is not unforgivable  34:42 - Homework: read Hosea 1-3 35:44 - What about those who aren't married?  What about those called to be single? Mat 19.11-12 1 Cor 7 Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced: Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Exodus. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002. https://www.christianbook.com/holman-testament-commentary-exodus-leviticus-numbers/glen-martin/9781433674259/pd/16102EB?product_redirect=1&search_term=holman%20max%20anders%20exodus&Ntt=16102EB&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP Courson, Jon.  Jon Courson's Application Commentary Old Testament Vol. 1.  Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. https://www.christianbook.com/coursons-application-commentary-genesis-revelation-volumes/jon-courson/9780310118312/pd/0118312?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

The sixth commandment seems pretty cut and dry, “You shall not murder” (NIV), “Thou shalt not kill” (KJV), but is it really that simple? Is capital punishment murder? Is killing someone during war murder? Is abortion murder? What does Jesus have to say about murder? All this and more we discuss in this week's through the Bible study of Exodus chapter 20. Outline: 02:31 - Exodus 20.13, “You shall not murder” (NIV), “Thou shalt not kill” (KJV) 02:52 - word study: rāṣaḥ רָצַח: to murder, slay, kill, dash in pieces, Gen 4.8 04:03 - Is capital punishment murder? Gen 9.6; Ex 21.12-14; Lev 20.2, Ex 21.22-25; Deut 17.6; Ex 22.2 08:24 - Is killing during war murder? Deut 20.1-4; Gen 15.13-16; Ezek 21; Isa 10.5 11:29 - Hacksaw Ridge staring Andrew Garfield as Desmond Doss. 14:09 - Is abortion murder? Gen 1.26-27 & 9.6; Jer. 1.5; Psa 139.1-14; 1 Jn 1.9-10 22:17 - What does Jesus say about murder? Mat 5.21-26; 1 Jn 3.11-15; Rom 13.8-10; Luke 6.45 Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced: Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Exodus. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002. https://www.christianbook.com/holman-testament-commentary-exodus-leviticus-numbers/glen-martin/9781433674259/pd/16102EB?product_redirect=1&search_term=holman%20max%20anders%20exodus&Ntt=16102EB&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP Courson, Jon. Jon Courson's Application Commentary Old Testament Vol. 1. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. https://www.christianbook.com/coursons-application-commentary-genesis-revelation-volumes/jon-courson/9780310118312/pd/0118312?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

What does it mean to honor your father and mother? What did it mean for the Israelites in Moses' day? What does it mean for us today? It may be an easy command for some, but not everyone is blessed with the best parents. Join us as we dig into Exodus 20.12 and the 5th commandment. Outline: 01:14 - Exodus 20.12 01:59 - A dividing point in the 10 commandments, 1-4 relates to our relationship w/ God, 5-6 is our relationship with others. Mat 22.36-40. (Deut 6.5 & Lev 19.18). 04:17 - What does it mean to honor your father and mother? Bible verses on honoring our parents: Ex 21.15, 17; Lev 19.3, 32; Deut 27.16; Prov 1.8; 16.3; 20.20; 23.22; 30.17 08:36 - What did it mean to Honor your Father and Mother to Israel in Moses day?Bible verses about blessings from following God's commands: Lev 26.3-13; Deut 28.1-14, Deut 4.40, 5.32-33 13:56 - What does it mean to honor your parents today? Bible verses about parents in the NT: Eph 6.1-3; Mat 12.46-50 & 10.21-39 15:23 - why was Ephesians written? 18:57 - Honoring your parents can be very hard for some. 19:36 - what is the amplified Bible? Books used or referenced: Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Exodus. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002.https://www.christianbook.com/holman-testament-commentary-exodus-leviticus-numbers/glen-martin/9781433674259/pd/16102EB?product_redirect=1&search_term=holman%20max%20anders%20exodus&Ntt=16102EB&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCPBigler, David. Pastor's Guide to the Bible, New Testament. Saratoga Springs, NY: Iron Sheep Ministries, 2023.For copies email info@ironsheep.org Courson, Jon. Jon Courson's Application Commentary Old Testament Vol. 1. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005. https://www.christianbook.com/coursons-application-commentary-genesis-revelation-volumes/jon-courson/9780310118312/pd/0118312?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

Taren and NTK are back for 2024!  We talk about the best time of day to train for fat loss, what to expect after a 70.3 race, how to move from run-walk to run-run, how to stack workouts when you're short on time, and some cool MOTTIV business updates! To submit your question to the podcast, visit mymottiv.com/ask and you'll get yours answered on a future podcast! 

For the first NTK of 2024 Sarah Muir and Alan Higgins go through the new year forecasts in search of optimistic outlooks. Are investors more easily seduced by pessimistic prognostications?

Looking ahead to season schedules for potential playoff seeding and who we need to win/lose for the Seahawks (who enter their ‘easy’ stretch of the schedule) to advance. 8:15 – NTK 8:30 – Brock & Damon’s playoff preview w/ Greg McElroy 8:45 – “ “

For the final NTK of the year, Sarah Muir and Alan Higgins discuss the US Federal Reserve's extraordinary pivot.  Plus we look at NTK's report card - when our contrarian instincts proved to be correct as well as lessons learnt from the past 12 months.

In Exodus 10 we see plagues 8 and 9 unleashed on Pharaoh and on Egypt. Plague 8 is the plague of locusts which decimate any remaining living vegetation in the land of Egypt.  The 9th plague is the plague of darkness which engulfs Egypt in 3 days of darkness you can feel.  God sets Goshen apart (the land where the Israelites live), providing them with light.  Pharaoh's heart is hardened by God to ensure His plan for Egypt and Israel unfolds (Exodus 10.1-3).  Outline: 01:21 - Exodus 10.1-20 - Plague 8 - Locusts 05:11 - Exodus 10.1-2 - The Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart.  “So that I may perform these signs… and you may know that I am the Lord.”  Exodus 10.2 - Reference to Generations.  What happens in Egypt is meant to be shared. 06:52 - who is God to manipulate Pharaoh's heart? Revelation 16 - “true and just are your judgments” -  Romans 3.23 - we have all fallen short, we have all sinned.   Romans 6.23 - the wages of sin are death.    We are all guilty and deserve death.  A dark opening, but there is a bright finish today! 10:30 - Locusts - overview, what are locusts?  Why do they swarm? 11:52 - Three (of many) major locust swarms in world history 11:57 - Albert's Swarm - 1875 Midwest-western locust swarm 13:12 - 1915 Ottoman Syria locust infestation 14:12 - 2019-2022 - East Africa Locust Infestation 15:11 - Joel 1.6-12 - a vivid picture of a locust swarm 18:48 - Exodus 10.13 - East wind & west wind (the locusts likely came from the Arabian peninsula)  20:22 - Exodus 10.7 - Pharaoh's Officials plead with him, “Egypt is ruined”  21:17 - Exodus 10.8-11 - Pharaoh is the swindler, the negotiator.  Compare this verse in different translations 26:08 - Exodus 10.11 - Moses and Aaron were driven out of Pharaoh's presence.  26:19 - Exodus 10.16 - “I have sinned - take this deadly plague away” 27:26 - Egyptian gods being challenged through the plagues  of Locusts (Nut, Osiris & Set) 28:41 - Exodus 10.21-29  31:20 - The Plague of Darkness Genesis 1.1-3.  God takes away the light of His creation    33:12 - What Egyptian god is attacked by taking away the sun? Ra the Egyptian sun god - a plague of darkness is an attack on Ra An attack on Ra is an attack on the Egyptian pantheon of Gods and on Pharaoh.  36:50 - Exodus 10.24 - Pharaoh is always the negotiator. 38:28 - Exodus 10.27-29 - Pharaoh sends Moses away with a warning. 39:48 - Context is key! Scripture on Darkness: Isaiah 8.22 - digging deeper Isaiah 8.22-9.2, then Matthew  Then they will look toward the earth and see only distress and darkness and fearful gloom, and they will be thrust into utter darkness. Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate  Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep  Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org  Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced:  Dave reads from an NIV (New International Version) of the Bible. Other versions used in this study: NKJV - New King James Version NLV - New Living Translation AMP - Amplified Bible Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000.  Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG  Walton, John H..  Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, Vol 1.  Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2009. Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/zondervan-illustrated-backgrounds-commentary-leviticus-deuteronomy/john-walton/9780310255734/pd/255734?product_redirect=1&search_term=zondervan%20illustrated%20&Ntt=255734&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

Pastor Randy Solomon continues our series on "A Prophet's Life: Lessons Learned From Those Called to Communicate God's Truth” with a message from Isaiah 6:8-13.He mentions the book, The Insanity of God, by Nik Ripkin. Click the arrow below, or if you're reading this in an email you can click this link, to play the service: This service is available for download free on iTunes, where you can also subscribe to our podcast. Search for "Westchester Chapel" on the iTunes Store. If you want to know more about starting a relationship with Jesus Christ visit www.WestchesterChapel.org/salvation.

Description: In Exodus chapter 9 we look at plagues 5-7, the plague on the “livestock of the fields,” the plague of boils, and the plague of hail. The back-and-forth battle between God (through Moses) and Pharaoh continues as Moses requests the release of the Israelites and Pharaoh continues to have a hard heart. Outline: 03:19 - Exodus 9.1-7 04:26 - Plague 5 - Plague on the livestock of the fields 06:37 - Naturalistic explanation of the plagues 15:09 - Exodus 9.8-13 16:26 - Hebrew word study: Furnace, כִּבְשָׁן kiḇšān (kiln, smelting forge, brick kiln) Ex. 5.7-19. The soot/ash symbolized Egyptian slavery and oppression. 20:16 - Plague 6, the Plague of boils. What were the boils? 21:34 - Exodus 9.12 - first instance of the Lord hardening Pharaoh's heart. 22:46 - Judgment on the Egyptian Gods through the plague of boils: (Sekhmet, Sunu, and Isis) 23:34 - Judgment on the Egyptian Gods through the plague on the livestock: Egyptian goddess Hathor as well as Apis (the Apis bull) and on Ptah 26:17 - Exodus 9.13-35 29:48 - Plague 7, Plague of Hail and Lightning 34:12 - Imagine how extreme this storm was - illustration thunderstorm in Colorado. 37:55 - Exodus 9.31-32 - flax and barley - this plague hit in either January or February. 40:43 - Plague of hail may have been an attack on the Egyptian sky goddess Nut, as well as Osiris, and Set. 42:35 - Application. The hard heart of an unbeliever. Psalm 18.25-26, “to the faithful you show yourself faithful, to the blameless you show yourself blameless, to the pure you show yourself pure, but to the crooked, you show yourself shrewd.” Ephesians 4.17-19, “So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts. Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as to indulge in every kind of impurity, and they are full of greed.” Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Listen to the podcast: https://anchor.fm/ironsheep Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books used or referenced: Barker, Kenneth L.. Kohlenberger, John R. III. The Expositor's Bible Commentary, Abridged, Old Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1994. Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/expositors-bible-commentary-abridged-edition-volumes/kenneth-barker/9780310255192/pd/54975?event=ESRCG Enns, Peter. The NIV Application Commentary, Exodus. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2000. Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/exodus-niv-application-commentary/peter-enns/9780310206071/pd/0206073?event=ESRCG Peterson, Eugene H.. The Message, the Bible in contemporary language. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2002. Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/message-remix-softcover-bible-contemporary-language/9781617479496/pd/479496?event=ESRCG Walton, John H.. Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary, Vol 1. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2009. Purchase: https://www.christianbook.com/zondervan-illustrated-backgrounds-commentary-leviticus-deuteronomy/john-walton/9780310255734/pd/255734?product_redirect=1&search_term=zondervan%20illustrated%20&Ntt=255734&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCP Wiersbe, Warren W.. The Bible Exposition Commentary, Old Testament, The Pentateuch. Colorado Springs, CO: David C. Cook, 2001. https://www.christianbook.com/the-bible-exposition-commentary-6-volumes/warren-wiersbe/9786125030474/pd/030474?event=ESRCG --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ironsheep/support

In this episode, W.A and I discuss some helpful insights he has gleaned from his ministry experience, including the power of equipping others for ministry, avoiding being too busy, and finding balance in the mission of the church under your care. We dig into his background, call to ministry, discipleship in the local church, and resources that can help you no matter where you are in the discipleship journey.Quotes for Notes:“A pastor who is too busy to pray with other pastors is too busy.”“I discovered that the more I would equip the people; help them discover, develop, and deploy their ministry gifts, the more time I actually had to devote myself to prayer and to the ministry of the Word.”“I did try to balance those five purposes that Rick Warren writes about…. Worship, fellowship, mission, ministry, and discipleship.”Links:https://iphc.org/discipleship/summit/ https://www.amazon.com/Becoming-Pastor-Theologian-Possibilities-Leadership/dp/0830851712https://www.amazon.com/Preaching-Communicating-Faith-Age-Skepticism/dp/0143108719/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1L4LV94J3OY1L&keywords=timothy+keller+preaching&qid=1693790280&s=books&sprefix=timothy+keller+preachin%2Cstripbooks%2C139&sr=1-1https://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/easy_find?Ntt=purpose+driven+church&N=0&Ntk=keywords&action=Search&Ne=0&event=ESRCG&nav_search=1&cms=1&ps_exit=RETURN%7Clegacy&ps_domain=wwwhttps://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/easy_find?Ntt=pastoring+men&N=0&Ntk=keywords&action=Search&Ne=0&event=ESRCG&nav_search=1&cms=1&ps_exit=RETURN%7Clegacy&ps_domain=wwwhttps://www.christianbook.com/christian-conversation-about-issues-matter-most/patrick-morley/9780310361534/pd/361534?event=ESRCGhttps://www.amazon.com/What-Man-Dr-Joaquin-Molina/dp/0974632953/ref=sr_1_2?crid=3FEPXB9C7K1D&keywords=molina+what+is+a+man&qid=1693790424&s=books&sprefix=molina+what+is+a+man%2Cstripbooks%2C130&sr=1-2https://www.amazon.com/Called-Men-Western-Society-Stolen/dp/0578517671/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2QXUFTS92LRXY&keywords=called+to+be+men&qid=1693790457&s=books&sprefix=called+to+be+men%2Cstripbooks%2C130&sr=1-1https://iphc.org/discipleship/thejourney/

It's a solo-Taren show this week, as NTK is on a mini-vacation.  On the podcast Taren talks about how he thinks triathlon can be fixed, whether beet root juice works, and which distance of triathlon you should do next. To try our endurance training app for free:  mymottiv.com!

The Footy Travelers are on their way to Aotearoa New Zealand and Australia for the Women's World Cup 2023, and they have everything you need to know about the stadiums and cities hosting all 64 matches. Along the way Colin & Mike address ticketing updates, including the FIFA ticket resale platform, and a super secret, insider way to get tickets to the World Cup Final! Foot(y)notes: If you're still looking for tickets to Women's World Cup mathces, you can check the FIFA ticketing page for availability, or head straight to the ticket resale platform for better odds of scoring. This is a great resource for getting to know the stadiums themselves. Check out the official squad lists of all 32 teams. Everything you need to know (NTK) can be found in the tournament's digital fan guide.

Guest host Brady Henderson does NOT bring the honorable mentions // BUY OR SELL: DK Metcalf can make tuxedo shorts work (somehow) - Requires a tiny bit of eccentricity - Are we in on 'Hard Knocks' this season? - If it's up to Pete Carroll, the Seahawks will never be on Hard Knocks - Mike Jackson still a Seahawk by end of training camp? // NTK:  Mariners needed those insurance runs last night // Quandre Diggs told us the Seahawks are unveiling their throwback uniforms tomorrow! // RANKED: Top BRITISH (specific) bands of all time - Oasis, The Smiths, and then the reality of the list - NO BEATLES??? - However, Brady gets the top band correct (Pink Floyd) // Interview with NFL and ESPN commentator Jeremy Fowler - moves the Seahawks are making? See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

NTK's new exercise protocol is ridonkulous. What Taren would do differently in his race career if he could start over. To start training for free, visit mymottiv.com and sign up for a free training plan using our app!  And visit store.mymottiv.com to purchase awesome gear at a great price.

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Infinite-width MLPs as an "ensemble prior", published by Vivek Hebbar on May 12, 2023 on LessWrong. Summary: A simple toy model suggests that infinitely wide MLPs generalize in an "ensemble-ish" way which is exponentially less data-efficient than Solomonoff induction. It's probably fixable by different initializations and/or regularizations, so I note it here mostly as a mathematical curiosity / interesting prior. The analysis seems to be qualitatively consistent with empirical results on generalization vs width in small MLPs. Notes: The generalization behavior of these neural nets can be analyzed with the Neural Tangent Kernel, which is widely studied. This post is meant to probe the qualitative nature of this behavior through a toy model. I'm unsure whether my particular analysis exists elsewhere. The deficiency of the standard initialization at infinite width seems to be well-known and empirically supported in NTK-related literature, along with ways of fixing it. Core claims The standard initialization uses weights which are proportional to 1/√input_dimension. This has the effect of keeping the activations at roughly the same scale across layers. However, in the infinite width case, it ends up making the gradients in early layers infinitely smaller than those in the last layer. Hence, training an infinite-width MLP is equivalent to running a regression using the features represented by the last-layer neurons at initialization. These features never change during training, since the early gradients are all zero. If we train without regularization, we will tend to get something very "ensemble-ish", "smooth", and "dumb". I will first summarize this claim in a table, then spend the rest of the post going through the reasoning behind it. Solomonoff InductionInfinite width MLP, low L2-norm solutionBayesian update over programsLinear regression over circuitsPuts most of its weight on a small number of programs, each of which perfectly fits the data on its ownSpreads weight over a broad ensemble, including circuits which have only a small correlation with truthThe amount of data required to make the correct program dominate is O(K), where K is the program lengthThe amount of data to make the correct circuit dominate is O(2C), where C is some "complexity measure" (defined later). This is exponentially less data-efficient than Solomonoff induction.Calling it "superintelligent" is an understatementGeneralizes poorly on many tasksHighly amenable to "sharp" solutionsFavors smooth solutions, only creates "sharp" solutions if certain conditions are met by the training data. If we train an infinitely wide MLP from the standard initialization, only the last layer's weights change. So it is equivalent to a linear regression over an infinite set of random "features", these features being the activation patterns of the last layer neurons at initialization. If the MLP is deep enough, some of these last-layer neurons are contain the output of very intelligent circuits. However, if we train our infinite width MLP, these intelligent circuits will hardly be used by the regression, even if they are very useful. That is, the sum of the weights drawing from them in the last layer will be very small. The reason I believe this is the toy model in the next section. Toy model Let's call each last-layer neuron a "feature". As discussed earlier, their behavior never changes due to how the gradients pan out at infinite width. In a "real" infinite network, these features will be "useful" and "intelligent" to various degrees, but we will simplify this greatly in the toy model, by using just two types of features. The toy model asks: "Suppose that some features already compute the correct answer for every training datapoint, and that the rest of the features are random garbage. Will the trained network...

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Infinite-width MLPs as an "ensemble prior", published by Vivek Hebbar on May 12, 2023 on The AI Alignment Forum. Summary: A simple toy model suggests that infinitely wide MLPs generalize in an "ensemble-ish" way which is exponentially less data-efficient than Solomonoff induction. It's probably fixable by different initializations and/or regularizations, so I note it here mostly as a mathematical curiosity / interesting prior. The analysis seems to be qualitatively consistent with empirical results on generalization vs width in small MLPs. Note: The deficiency of the standard initialization at infinite width seems to be well-known and empirically supported in NTK-related literature, along with ways of fixing it. I'm unsure whether my particular analysis exists elsewhere. Core claims The standard initialization uses weights which are proportional to 1/√input_dimension. This has the effect of keeping the activations at roughly the same scale across layers. However, in the infinite width case, it ends up making the gradients in early layers infinitely smaller than those in the last layer. Hence, training an infinite-width MLP is equivalent to running a regression using the features represented by the last-layer neurons at initialization. These features never change during training, since the early gradients are all zero. If we train without regularization, we will tend to get something very "ensemble-ish", "smooth", and "dumb". I will first summarize this claim in a table, then spend the rest of the post going through the reasoning behind it. Solomonoff InductionInfinite width MLP, low L2-norm solutionBayesian update over programsLinear regression over circuitsPuts most of its weight on a small number of programs, each of which perfectly fits the data on its ownSpreads weight over a broad ensemble, including circuits which have only a small correlation with truthThe amount of data required to make the correct program dominate is O(K), where K is the program lengthThe amount of data to make the correct circuit dominate is O(2C), where C is some "complexity measure" (defined later). This is exponentially less data-efficient than Solomonoff induction.Calling it "superintelligent" is an understatementGeneralizes poorly on many tasksHighly amenable to "sharp" solutionsFavors smooth solutions, only creates "sharp" solutions if certain conditions are met by the training data. If we train an infinitely wide MLP from the standard initialization, only the last layer's weights change. So it is equivalent to a linear regression over an infinite set of random "features", these features being the activation patterns of the last layer neurons at initialization. If the MLP is deep enough, some of these last-layer neurons are contain the output of very intelligent circuits. However, if we train our infinite width MLP, these intelligent circuits will hardly be used by the regression, even if they are very useful. That is, the sum of the weights drawing from them in the last layer will be very small. The reason I believe this is the toy model in the next section. Toy model Let's call each last-layer neuron a "feature". As discussed earlier, their behavior never changes due to how the gradients pan out at infinite width. In a "real" infinite network, these features will be "useful" and "intelligent" to various degrees, but we will simplify this greatly in the toy model, by using just two types of features. The toy model asks: "Suppose that some features already compute the correct answer for every training datapoint, and that the rest of the features are random garbage. Will the trained network rely more on the perfect features, or will it use some giant mixture of random features?" Suppose we have d items in the training set, denoted x1,..,xn. Each has a label of either −1 or 1. Let's say...

On the podcast this week, Taren is solo as NTK recovers from COVID.  He talks about the super intense bike workouts he's been doing, and in listener-submitted Q&A, he's asked if he's going to go back to being "Triathlon Taren" and sharing his story (and racing) on YouTube! For more resources from MOTTIV including the MOTTIV training app, blog posts, and beginner's guides, go to https://mymottiv.com/ SPONSOR: Bambuwerx.com (CODE: MOTTIV20)

It's an update on MOTTIV this week on the podcast -- our new slogan, what's new with the app, and the direction we're taking the business.  Great chat with NTK and Taren! For more resources from MOTTIV including the MOTTIV training app, blog posts, and beginner's guides, go to https://mymottiv.com/

If you're someone who's been regularly jogging/running but you'd like to take your running up a notch, this episode is for you. On the podcast, Taren and NTK talk about the three steps beginner runners need to take in order to start getting faster in their running.  Particularly if they're looking to do a race like a half marathon or a marathon! For more resources from MOTTIV including the MOTTIV training app, blog posts, and beginner's guides, go to https://mymottiv.com/ SPONSORS: https://thefeed.com/teams/mottiv http://bambuwerx.com  (CODE: Taren)  

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Basic facts about language models during training, published by beren on February 21, 2023 on LessWrong. This post builds upon our last post on basic facts about language model internals and was written as part of the work done at Conjecture. We will shortly release all plots and animations (only a very small subset made it into this post) as well as the code at this repository. We are aware of there being some inconsistencies with the Pythia model suite due to different configs for different model sizes affecting the learning rate schedule. As far as we know, the team at EleutherAI is currently re-running the models. After thinking about the issue, we do not believe it is likely to be fatal to many of the macroscale points made in this post and so we post the results here provisionally using the old original models. We plan to update this analysis when the new model suite is finished. Until then, take some of the results reported here with a grain of salt as they may be subject to change. In this post, we continue the work done in our last post on language model internals but this time we analyze the same phenomena occurring during training. This is extremely important in understanding how language model training works at a macro-scale and sheds light into potentially new behaviours or specific important phase transitions that may occur during training which deserve further study, as well as giving insight into the origin of phenomena that we consistently observe in fully trained models. Throughout, as in the previous post, we do not delve into the details of specific circuits, but instead aim to provide a holistic macro-level view of the basic distributional properties of the LLM's weights, activations, and gradients across training checkpoints. Although seemingly basic, we are not aware of any similar analysis having been performed publicly, and we believe that understanding these distributional phenomena seems generally important in constraining circuit-level theorizing as well as provides empirical links to the theoretical constructs such as the neural tangent kernel and tensor programs that can prove facts about specific limits. To perform our analysis, we use the open source Pythia model suite which contains a large number of checkpoints during training and was trained by EleutherAI and aims to use interpretability analysis to understand how representations develop across training. We agree with this goal and are happy to share our own analysis code etc. The Pythia project trains models of different sizes on exactly the same data in exactly the same order so as to be able to understand how and when certain representations form both during training and across different model scales. The Pythia models we utilize range from 19M parameters to 1.3B. Each Pythia model has 142 checkpoints of stored weights, equally spaced every 1000 steps, which we sweep across to perform our analysis. Weights show a rapid phase transition from Gaussian to extreme heavy tails It was very helpfully pointed out in a comment on our previous post that the weight statistics were actually sharper and more heavy tailed than Gaussian. This is correct and we also found this when we fit histograms to logistics vs Gaussian distributions. Overall, we find that the activation distributions of GPT2 models are generally not Gaussian but somewhere in between the logistic e−x and the Gaussian e−x2, which indicates both heavier tails and a thinner bulk. This is extremely interesting since it means that the weight statistics must move away from their Gaussian initialization which implies a highly significant perturbation away from their original position. This is perhaps in contrast with some theories, such as NTK theory, which argue that for large models we should not expect the weights to diverge too...

Pastor Jim Warren continues on our series about "What Happens When a Created People Walk Away from Their Creator?" with a message from 2 Peter 3:10-13. The Day of the Lord is real, reveals all, and restores.While waiting, live lives of holiness, godliness, and expectation of His return. Pastor Jim mentions this picture by NASA of the sun and My Daily Pursuit by A.W. Tozer. Click the arrow below, or if you're reading this in an email you can click this link, to play the service: This service is available for download free on iTunes, where you can also subscribe to our podcast. Search for "Westchester Chapel" on the iTunes Store.If you want to know more about starting a relationship with Jesus Christ visit www.WestchesterChapel.org/Salvation.

This week we look at the story of Joseph. We start by recapping his life to this point (Gen 37-39) then we dive into Joseph being thrown into prison, where “The Lord was with Joseph” and he prospered. This week we look again at this question of how we as believers are called to respond to adversity. Support Iron Sheep Ministries: https://Ironsheep.org/donate Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/3_sWSv_5-0I Contact Dave & the ISM team: info@ironsheep.org Be notified of each new teaching, join the email list: http://eepurl.com/g-2zAD Books referenced: Longman, Tremper III, The Expositor's Bible Commentary Rev Ed Vol 1, Genesis - Leviticus, Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 2008. https://www.christianbook.com/genesis-leviticus-revised-expositors-bible-commentary/9780310230823/pd/230823?event=ESRCG Anders, Max, Holman Old Testament Commentary, Genesis. Nashville: B&H Publishing, 2002. https://www.christianbook.com/genesis-holman-old-testament-commentary/kenneth-gangel/9780805494617/pd/94614?product_redirect=1&Ntt=Anders,%20Max,%20Holman%20Old%20Testament%20Commentary,%20Genesis.%20Nashville:%20B&H%20Publishing,%202002.&item_code=&ps_exit=RETURN|legacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCG

Kelly has touched grass and has something to say about Oreo-gate from Tuesday's episode before diving into a dream-guest filled episode with Kate from Naptime Kitchen.  The millennial word of the day today is ‘social battery.' Just another way that Gen Z and millennials say ‘I need some alone time.' Today's episode is brought to you by carmomofficial.com. Where you can find all of the vehicle tips, tricks, and tours to make your family's car shopping experience ah-ma-zing. Thanks to the Car Mom for always doing the most. In a sort-of driveway dump Kelly gives a nod to Jim from the office for his leaving-the-party-early hacks. Lizz places her bet on the 16th for Kelly's baby's arrival, Kelly guesses the 18th, and both marvel at the miracle of growing a tiny human. Lizz reports she felt her first little bubble kicks this week! Kelly's idol, Kate from Naptime Kitchen, who is also the most relatable mommy blogger is today's guest. You can find the NTK goods the gals talked about with Kate here: The Home Reset (how to make your home work for you) and here: The Able Bag. The great eight of Kate reveals what the most groundbreaking, shareable Naptime Kitchen hack or mindset is. Vying for the title are: the heating pad in bed, Christmas clothing bin for kids, pasta Monday, you don't have to only bring homemade stuff to people when you're bringing a meal to, shoebox lids for drawer storage, toy purgatory, cutting your beach sandwiches, and your most nutritious meal doesn't have to be dinner. The segment proves that Kate is the real-world mom missing in the influencer world. In industry news, we find out how Kate's minivan is working for her family of six. She shares what she drove before, why she decided to say yes to the Honda Odyssey, and why her family might outgrow the minivan down the road.  Today's ditch the drive-through from Kate is a ‘hardest night of the week' hack. Kate takes a look at her calendar and chooses the most low-energy, tight on time night of the week and makes it crock pot night, pasta night, or choose your own sandwich night. Lizz is here for good parenting while doing the least.  Kelly names her top Naptime Kitchen recipes to wrap up the episode: BBQ Chicken Quinoa Casserole Creamy Chicken Enchiladas Warming Chicken Curry → To share your ditch the drive-through recipe with us, call (959) CAR-POOL and leave us a message! → Want our advice on literally anything? Shoot us an email for a chance to get your questions featured on the show at hello@thecarmomofficial.com Follow the Carpool Podcast on IG Follow the Carpool Podcast on YouTube Follow Kelly on IG Follow Lizz on IG Visit thecarmomofficial.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Practical Tips for Daily Quiet TimeQuiet Time doesn't always have to be completely quiet.Consistency is helpful.Select a specific time each day.Establish rhythms and routines thorough out the day.Use transitions times to pray.Create a path of least resistance. Prayer Journal:https://www.christianbook.com/esv-prayer-journal-days-on-humility/9781433581939/pd/581936?en=google&event=SHOP&kw=christian-living-0-20%7C581936&p=1179710&utm_source=google&dv=c&cb_src=google&cb_typ=shopping&cb_cmp=1065616555&cb_adg=51462729079&cb_kyw=&gclid=Cj0KCQiAq5meBhCyARIsAJrtdr7edPjGbIKLjgc1C1UpkO1N_zoUpDuK88KOvqL9x7YfvBLYcMf--UsaAi9yEALw_wcBhttps://www.christianbook.com/before-bible-heart-postures-approaching-word/matt-smethurst/9781912373710/pd/373711?product_redirect=1&search_term=Before%20you%20op&Ntt=373711&item_code=&ps_exit=PRODUCT%7Clegacy&Ntk=keywords&event=ESRCPhttps://enduringword.comhttps://www.studylight.orgAlarmy AppYouVersion Plans: https://my.bible.com/reading-plans/13388https://my.bible.com/reading-plans/13452-finding-peaceSavor Moment:Grab a notebook and jot down a plan for establishing a routine to have a daily encounter with God. Share it with friend.

Jeffrey Wilson has worked as an actor, firefighter, paramedic, jet pilot, and diving instructor, as well as a vascular and trauma surgeon. He served in the U.S. Navy for 14 years and made multiple deployments as a combat surgeon with an East Coast-based SEAL Team. He and his wife, Wendy, live in Southwest Florida with their four children. THE THESIS: It's not a thesis, it's a fact: even our elite warriors do not battle flesh and blood. THE SCRIPTURE & SCRIPTURAL RESOURCES: Ephesians 6:1212 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.Matthew 17:20-2120 So Jesus said to them, “Because of your [a]unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. 21 [b]However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”THE NEWS & COMMENT:The newest book, Dark Fall is the third in the Shepherd Series. I high recommend you buy the series. https://www.christianbook.com/dark-fall/9781496451453/pd/451458?Ntk=keywords&Ntt=451458&event=ESRCP&item_code=&product_redirect=1&ps_exit=PRODUCT%7Clegacy&search_term=dark%20fall

On this Friday show, we present Part 2 of the Hacks & Wonks 2022 Post-Election Roundtable which was live-streamed on November 15, 2022 with special guests political consultants Dujie Tahat and Kelsey Hamlin. In Part 2, the panel breaks down election results for State Legislature seats in the battleground districts of the 26th, 30th, 44th, and 47th LDs, where Democrats prevailed despite fears of backlash from passage of police accountability bills in 2021. They then dive into how the King County Prosecuting Attorney's race embodied many of the election cycle's themes - how fearmongering and punitive approaches to public safety lost to positive messaging about addressing root causes, and how the media and editorial boards attempted to drive narratives out of touch with the nuanced conversation voters are ready to have. Finally, the roundtable wraps up with a look at how established organizations and their history of relational organizing won successful initiatives to bring ranked choice voting to Seattle and a higher minimum wage to Tukwila. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-hosts, Dujie Tahat at @DujieTahat and Kelsey Hamlin at @ItsKelseyHamlin. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources Hacks & Wonks 2022 Post-Election Roundtable Livestream | November 15th, 2022   Transcript [00:00:00] Bryce Cannatelli: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Bryce Cannatelli – I'm the Post Coordinator for the show. You're listening to Part 2 of our 2022 Post-Election Roundtable, with guests Dujie Tahat and Kelsey Hamlin, that was originally aired live on Tuesday, November 15th. Part 1 was our last episode – you can find it in your podcast feed or on our website officialhacksandwonks.com. You can also go to the site for full video from the event and a full text transcript of the show. Thanks for tuning in! [00:00:43] Crystal Fincher: Okay, okay, okay. Did you do work in any legislative races? I know you did a lot of work, but I don't know if you did any legislative work. [00:00:52] Dujie Tahat: We didn't do legislative work this year. [00:00:53] Crystal Fincher: Okay. [00:00:54] Dujie Tahat: Yeah. We weren't even planning on doing really a bunch of any electoral work and then, you know, suddenly we got a phone call. Yeah, exactly - it was like August and then we got six phone calls and I was like, oh, yeah, all right - sure. [00:01:10] Crystal Fincher: Nice. In these races, there were some interesting ones. One, legislatively, the 10th Legislative District, which is still too close to call - the lead flipped yesterday, it flipped again today. That one of the legislative districts there got a little dramatic in one of those races. Dave Paul actually looks safe in that race - I think it's safe to say that he is going to win. But whether Democrat Clyde Shavers or Republican Greg Gilday carries the day is still to be determined. Another huge district, battleground district, and one that people were not at all clear on how that was going to end up was the 26th Legislative District - out in Pierce and Kitsap County, with Emily Randall in a race defending her Senate seat against Jesse Young, who was a Representative. And it looks like Emily Randall has won that race. I would definitely put Emily in the category of people who are in community, connect with community, and leading boldly - not afraid to say where she stands, not afraid to make the case, and take the case to people in her district - and talk with people who agree with her, talk with people who may not agree with her. But I think what we saw there, and what she found, was that she was able to find places of agreement. And people understanding that she's operating in good faith, and even if they don't agree with everything that they heard from her - on the Republican side, that they know that she listens and is willing to act and is willing to fight for a lot of things that just benefit everybody, that don't really have a Democrat or progressive label on it, but just wanting to get people cared for and healthy in the district is a big deal. That certainly was one, but a lot of people were not sure how that was going to end up, but ended up turning out well. The 30th legislative district and the 44th - two interesting races - full disclosure, did work in those legislative districts, but saw - I think what I noticed in the 30th District especially - this is in South King County, this is mainly Federal Way, some of Auburn in the 30th Legislative District. But you had Jamila Taylor there and you had Kristine Reeves running for the seat that Jesse Johnson ended up leaving. Both were successful, but Jamila actually had a Federal Way police officer running against her in that office - and Federal Way is the city where Jim Ferrell is the mayor. He was certainly - him running for King County Prosecutor - unsuccessfully - but really talking about that punitive - as they call it, law and order - but really punitive punishment-focused rhetoric and rallying against some of the accountability measures that the Legislature took, trying to really blame that on Jamila and others there. And that really just seemed to fall flat - and pretty solid, comfortable victories there for all three candidates in that district - Senator Claire Wilson, Kristine Reeves, and Jamila Taylor. So that was an interesting one where people were wondering - okay, is there going to be a backlash? I saw an article today, I think from Scott Greenstone, where he wrote about - hey, that backlash that people were wondering if it was going to appear, just related to public safety, very much did not appear. And the 30th Legislative District was one of those districts where they really tried to hammer the Democratic candidates with that and make a case on the Republican side, and it just didn't seem to come through. Similarly in the 44th Legislative District, but had an interesting result there - John Lovick, previous representative, now won his race to be the senator there, along with Brandy Donaghy, who was appointed to the seat, was running for this new term, as well as April Berg, who is a continuing representative there. But again, in that district that used to be a swing district - that used to be the district of former moderate Senator Steve Hobbs, as well as John Lovick, and for years they insisted that - hey, it takes a moderate to win this seat, this is a purple district, they won't elect a progressive Democrat. And then April Berg came along and said, Really? Watch this. And then it seemed to have continued, and what was once a purple district now seems to, as you both talked about before, now seems to be pretty safely blue for the time being. And just an interesting development there, because there was so much in flux at the beginning of the cycle, and now it just seems to be so definitive that they're there. [00:06:57] Kelsey Hamlin: Can I - oh, okay. Go ahead. I was going to say, because you touched on it a couple of times - around leading boldly with Emily Randall. And for that matter, like Jamila - and the races really that you just went through - these candidates who lead boldly actually are the ones that get the turnout, that get the motivation from voters that we were talking about earlier. And at the end of the day, they're also being a person, they go and talk to people, they're not just relying on ads that show up on people's TVs to just get people to feel one way or another. But you had mentioned this backlash narrative around, ultimately, police accountability measures that were passed two legislative sessions ago, and a lot of the narrative was - ooh, is there going to be backlash during this midterm? Is this going to impact electability of sitting legislators? And as a result, because that question was even posed, because we're operating from a place of fear, because we're not willing to lead boldly, except for the few great folks of, some of which you just named - that actually really, really impacted the immediately next legislative session, this early 2022 one that just finished. And so those bills were rolled back - all in the name of electability politics - but at the end of the day, when you look at the races of the people who are not involved in that rollback, who in fact opposed it, those are the folks that really pulled the ticket, brought it home. So I'm just really curious around your take of just even the framing of backlash in general, about who we're giving power to for actually taking bold action. Is it backlash, if we're actually doing what is clearly voters' will? So I'm just curious around that conversation in general, because it's played over the course of the past two to three years. [00:09:11] Dujie Tahat: Can I also add a follow-up question, because I think I was going to ask a similar question - in terms of backlash - because I think there's also the relationship, I think, between sort of local politics, local elections, and then the nationalization. So I think we can definitively say last election cycle last year, when it was all city and county races, was a kind of backlash to - elected a bunch of conservative city council members and city attorneys. And at least in Seattle, in the Seattle area. I'm curious if there's a difference, if there's a meaningful difference between how voters behave in an off-year versus a not-off-year, and then particularly, like the voting for a state legislator versus voting for your mayor in the context of public safety and crime and police, in particular. [00:10:08] Crystal Fincher: Okay, a few things. One, so even on just last year - and certainly for people in Seattle, they felt that there was a backlash because of the mayoral race and the city attorney race - I think that there were some other fundamentals and pretty clear fundamentals at play. And the other issue is that when you look in the suburbs, we had a number of suburbs elect some of the most progressive city council people that they ever have before. And so I think really what we had was a story of candidates. And I think that especially in the City of Seattle, where the media plays a role in elections in a different way than they do in some of the suburban and rural areas, that that also impacted some races. I think that fundamentals pretty well favored Bruce Harrell, right? I think just looking at voter communications, spending on direct voter communication - the Nicole Thomas-Kennedy race and some of the other races - they were just massively outspent and outdone with direct voter communication. So anytime that there's that much of a lopsided communication delta, it is hard to prevail in that situation. And then when you have unknown people who - it's up to you to define yourself or the opponent to define you - and in those situations, the opponent had a lot more resources to try and define those, that that impacted those races in a different way in Seattle than we saw in some of the suburbs. But I do think that when it comes to the backlash narrative - our public conversation, the media conversation about public safety is in a very different place than people on the ground. In 2020, with the King County Charter Amendments that brought forth more accountability measures and offices, in addition to appointing instead of electing the sheriff - that wasn't just the only thing that brought forth accountability measures. And despite those charter amendments being dramatically outspent and there being opposition against them, they were passed. And they were passed in just about every council district in the county, right? So this was not - this never has been, as sometimes it is characterized, as well - just those super lefties in Seattle care about like comprehensive public safety and addressing root causes of crime and issues like that. Over and over again, we have seen at the ballot box and in polling - that voters across the county do care about accountability, that whether or not they want more police or not, they all - and I'm using the term all in a near literal sense - 80+ percent when folks at the ballot box are saying, but we also want alternate responses. We understand that - hey, even if I have no issue with an officer, and I think that it's appropriate to call an officer at some period and at some point in time - that when it comes to an issue of someone having a behavioral health crisis, or if someone is unhoused, or if someone is dealing with complex family issues - that sometimes an armed police response is - they're just not equipped to do that, right? And I think that the public conversation in the media has been - well, is it defund or not? Do you back the blue or not? - and it's very binary, shallow conversation. But most voters recognize that it's not an either or most of the time it's an and situation. And what we have done is invested a lot in some portions of the necessary public safety puzzle and have starved other areas. And so we better get to taking action on addressing some of these root causes, on enabling appropriate response. Just yesterday, there was someone near where I lived, clearly having a behavioral health crisis, right? And there's this helpless feeling that calling the police on this is not - it won't help anyone. It won't help anyone in this situation. But there isn't anyone to call, there is not a resource available to appropriately handle this - and it's frustrating. And it makes you feel helpless. But that's what's missing. And I think lots of people see and feel that and understand that we need to buffet our infrastructure. I think being very defensive and playing into that shallow conversation - is it defund or is it not - that is such an elementary point to start the conversation. Because there's such broad acknowledgement that we do need other things, that we better pay attention to that. So painting that as some controversial lever of what side are you on, does not represent where most people in the public are at. And over and over again, they keep saying - we want you to deal with this more comprehensively. We want to do the things that evidence shows will make these issues better and not keep trying the same failed solutions. We seem to have a few leaders who are dead set on just doing the same old things regardless of the failed continued results. And some media who seem to be very interested in pushing that narrative. I think it is really hard to do that credibly right now, given - once again - the results that we saw so conclusively in the King County Prosecutor's race, the judicial races, some of these county races, these legislative races. And I do think that people understand that - really - public safety is a local issue. And Tiffany Smiley trying to blame Patty Murray just clearly fell flat. But people understand that Patty Murray isn't deciding whether or not to deploy your local policeman, right? That's a local decision. But I also think that the part that's missing is that people have to be held accountable for results there too. And then as we look at the effectiveness of some of these alternate response projects and pilots, and we're looking at metrics, and whether there's a dashboard available and what are they doing - we better be doing that with all of our emergency response, police response and making sure that we're getting out of it a justification for the money that we're putting into it. And if we're not, let's do something that's actually more effective. People's safety is at stake. And I just feel that this political conversation that has enabled a perpetuation of these failed policies that have not stopped people from being victimized are just hurting us all. That was a very long-winded answer, but I have feelings about that. What are your feelings about that? [00:18:06] Kelsey Hamlin: I also do think there's a level of accountability that needs to happen, even on the consultant side. Who told our legislators that enacted police accountability that was complex, that was like - hey, let's not do vehicle chases anymore at really high speeds because people pretty much always die and you almost never catch anyone. Who decided that that's the thing we want to roll back? These aren't these binary conversations that led to these laws happening in 2020, 2021 and then getting rolled back in the very next year. And getting rolled back in the name of electability, right? Who is using their power to tell our legislators that they should actually in fact hold back on their boldness, that they should not enact these rather complex and very clearly data-driven laws behind not just police accountability, but public safety in general. At the end of the day, it comes down to - hey, let's maybe kill less people this year. [00:19:06] Crystal Fincher: That was always bad advice. I don't - clearly there was some advice given with that, but - look, Democrats, Republicans are going to call you lawless, criminal-loving, all of that - regardless of what you do. And as - we talked about it on the show before, I think lots of us have talked about this - it was absolutely predictable that even though they did roll those back, Republicans attacked Democrats as if there was no rollbacks and as if nothing had happened. So instead of acting defensive and scared of what you are doing, do the right thing. Make the case for doing the right thing. Take the case to the voters. If you are actually connected to community, you can do that with credibility, right? And with success. But just looking at a poll and going - uh oh, this looks scary, we better backpedal and - yeah, that was a frustrating thing to watch happen. [00:20:17] Dujie Tahat: And now to take it back to the start of this conversation, it's like - you didn't need to do it. We didn't need to do it because we increased majorities, despite all of the contextual historical indicators pointing to us losing majorities. We actually gained them - so we didn't need to do it. [00:20:37] Crystal Fincher: Didn't need to do it. And yeah, that was very unnecessary. I hope there are lessons learned from that. There need to be lessons learned from that. Just wrapping up some of these legislative races, we talked about the 44th. The 47th, which we actually did quite a bit of work in, was an interesting race. And I think the 47th Legislative District holds a lot of lessons for a lot of people there. This was a district - and it's part of Kent, Covington, part of Auburn, Maple Valley - that area in South King County. But there was - starting off - two Black Republicans - one - and then a third running in that district who was a Ukrainian refugee. There were two open seats, an open Senate seat, an open House seat, and then one incumbent running - Debra Entenman on the Democratic side. On, for the Democratic challengers, we had a primary with Carmen Goers that - it was a Black woman who was a Republican active in the Chamber of Commerce against Shukri Olow and Chris Stearns on the Democratic side in the primary. And in the Senate seat, you had Bill Boyce a Black Republican, who's currently a Kent City Councilmember, running against - in the primary - Claudia Kauffman and Satwinder Kaur. Claudia Kauffman had formerly been a Senator and then Satwinder Kaur was a sitting Kent City Councilmember. And so just - this was interesting - it's in South King County, one of the most diverse areas in the country, an area where the school district has more languages spoken than almost any other district in the country. But what we saw here was the Republican Party making some inroads with non-white candidates, at least. And the Republican Party being active on the ground and active in school board races and active in faith communities, whether it's mosques or gurdwaras or churches, and activating on the ground in a way that I don't think a lot of people have been paying a lot of attention to. But we need to, and we need to be showing up in those areas as progressives if we want to continue - to engage and continue to win and continue to advance policy in these areas. This manifested in - during, in the school district races, we have had votes in the Kent School District from people who called themselves Democrats to ban books with queer content, right? This is a weird time and a weird kind of mishmash of people and issues and interests. Fortunately in this race, Claudia Kauffman wound up prevailing on that side in the primary. In the one House seat, that open seat, a Republican actually didn't even make it through - there were three Republicans who did not make it to the general election, the two Democrats did. Chris Stearns ended up winning that race. So this was a district where candidates ran hard. There was a lot of money spent in this district, a lot of electioneering going on. But - and it wound up still fairly close in that Senate race. And so the help and the village was needed, as it is in so many areas, to get this race across. But this is - this turned out well, but we cannot take our foot off of the gas. We can't take our eye off of the ball - because the Republican Party is organizing in ways that we're used to seeing the Democratic Party doing. And we can't take that for granted and need to be in all the spaces - and not cede faith spaces to Republicans and not cede rural communities to Republicans. And to make sure that what we're talking about helps and brings value to those people in those places, as well as everywhere else. And so just an area where good things happen - I think this is another district that moving forward is going to be more reliably blue. But it's not going to be - I think in most of these - they're going to continue to need work. These aren't places where we can be - ah, we won, we're safe. We don't have to do anything else. This is when the work begins and when action is needed - I think that is the case. Any other thoughts on the legislative races from either one of you? With that, I just want to talk about the King County Prosecutor race for a moment. What did you see here, Kelsey, in terms of this race and why it turned out, how it turned out? [00:26:05] Kelsey Hamlin: Oh my goodness. I think everything we've talked about tonight is - was culminated, more or less, in that race, right? Whether you want to go look at the media and the narrative going on there - and this just false take that Ferrell was going to be as high and mighty as he was prophesized to be. And whether you're looking at polling, or whether you're looking at media and some articles that came out on him, or whether the framing is the backlash that's going to happen - is literally Jim Ferrell culminated in real-time with the person. And at the end of the day, I just - I didn't see his work as fruitful. I didn't see it based in community. I know Leesa Manion's been showing up in spaces continuously - she's not a new face to me. And it just didn't - the narrative writ large didn't really track with what I felt in my gut. And it's always interesting to see it play out, given the context of NTK as a prior race - it happened locally and how big of a deal that was. And so it's really satisfying to see it turn out the way that I had felt it in my gut. And it - yeah, I just think the boldness is where it's at. And as long as you make your values clear, as long as you're clear about it and you're a real human being to fellow people - the job is not as hard as we make it out to be - if you just try and get those things there. Dujie, what was your take? [00:27:52] Dujie Tahat: Yeah, I think for me - I'm really struck by King County voters just generally being happy with King County, like the government of King County. Leesa Manion represents an extension of the current prosecuting attorney and people seem really happy with Satterberg. And I think to our point of having, being able to hold two competing thoughts at once and not giving into the binary, I think Satterberg is actually a pretty good exemplar of somebody who's started off as a Republican during the era of punitive - just punitive - policy, to someone who is advocating very much for diversion programs. And you're seeing this also coming off of a King County electorate that just passed a bunch of charter amendments to improve policing in 2020. So you're seeing, I think, an electorate that is primed to have these nuanced conversations in a way that is totally divorced, I think, from the coverage. Like you pointed out, the narratives are what they are, but the electorate is continuing to have a more nuanced take and make it really, really abundantly clear that it actually - it's not even either-or, and it's not even really all that close, right? I don't, I can't think of - this is the closest race that I can think of at a county level that has to do with the criminal justice reform, or the executive, or the prosecuting attorney. People, I think, are just like generally pretty happy. [00:29:34] Crystal Fincher: Yeah - it's really - this is interesting. This is also a race that we did work in with our firm. And I don't know that the - that voters were really happy with the way that things are, but they're definitely unhappy and do not like the punitive approach. And are really saying - okay, I hear from, I'm hearing one thing from Jim Ferrell - very punitive, very punishment-based, but punishment does not equate to safety. And really, it seems like voters do want action that equates to safety and have come to the conclusion that just punitive punishment does not, as the evidence shows. And I think what helped Leesa was an articulation of an expansion of some stuff, an expansion of some strategies from where they were - with the city attorney, with the prosecuting attorney's office for quite some time - but really an articulation of - okay, we are moving forward there, we do want to keep people more safe. But we're going to have to address some root causes of these issues and just throwing people in jail is not, as we have seen, is not going to get the job done. So we better have some other strategies to address gun violence, to address intimate partner violence, to address just the range of things that we're seeing and dealing with - from property crime to violent crime. And I think that she just articulated a vision that was closer to what King County voters feel is the solution. So I think - I think there were just two different visions and voters made a clear choice of where they want to be and what they want to see. And I think - also in this one - now it's time for action. And I know that she's planning on hitting the ground running, has - is very familiar with the office and this role. I also think that people valued just the familiarity and experience there. And understanding what it's going to take to make some of these changes and shifts within that office and managing people and going through that was helpful. But I think that - I really do hope that just in the media ecosystem overall, that there is an acknowledgement that clearly we have some media entities that were really hoping for the punishment narrative to take hold, but it just hasn't, it's not a thing. Can we please move on and talk about all of the different issues, all of the different possibilities and solutions now - because there's a ton to talk about, there's a ton to explore. And if we start covering that, exploring it - we're all going to be better off and help everyone understand where we're moving, and where we can move to, and how to make people more safe. [00:33:00] Kelsey Hamlin: Yeah. And let's name too, that it's not even just media at large, but specifically editorial boards and these columnists - that are sticking with that status quo punitive narrative that doesn't actually resonate with people, and still trying to drive that home where it's not there. I'll also name too, 'cause editorial boards have a lot of power, but I'll also name too that Leesa's message was just positive - more positive about change - and Ferrell's was the exact opposite. But that's a messaging statistic and stat and tactic that we know very well - that if you just have a more positive message, it will resonate more with people. [00:33:42] Dujie Tahat: And I think that you are also touching on - you've made more clear what I meant, which is - it is not that maybe people are happy with the conditions as they are right now, as much as I think the county is more primed to have the conversation of where we go from here, as opposed to some of the narrative setters - I think that people generally - people have voted, specifically voters in King County, because of what has been on the ballot lately - understand that there is a more nuanced set of choices and that there's actually an alternative to the sort of binary punitive or abolish everything. [00:34:19] Crystal Fincher: Yeah. I think you are exactly right. And so now I want to talk about a big City of Seattle election that you two had a little bit to do with there - the choice before Seattle voters to change the way that they voted. And if they did want to change the way that they voted, was it going to be approval voting or ranked choice voting? How did this play out and how did ranked choice voting prevail? [00:34:57] Dujie Tahat: I think people wanted it - I think that's ultimately at the end of the day what happened, right? I think people understand that our democracy is not working as well as it could be. I think people in Seattle have a history of willing to make improvements that strengthen our democracy, like Democracy Vouchers and stronger campaign finance laws. And despite everything editorial boards can do to throw barriers at not changing the way we do things, people still saw through that and voted for it - not for nothing. Editorial boards were wrong on democracy - The Seattle Times editorial board was wrong on Democracy Vouchers too, they were wrong on ranked choice voting. The position that our democracy is just fine - we shouldn't do anything to tinker with it - is at best intellectually dishonest. And I think a lot of people understand what ranked choice voting is - over 50 jurisdictions across the country already use it - Alaska just elected a Democrat because of it. New York City elected a mayor and the most diverse city council it's ever had. It's pretty obvious and intuitive. The process was maybe a little complicated, and it was - it was frankly, complicated - but that shouldn't be a reason to not do the right thing, which was so often the sort of biggest argument against the campaign. [00:36:32] Crystal Fincher: Now in this, you talk about editorial boards - you had both The Seattle Times and The Stranger editorial boards recommending a No on the first question - saying don't change the way things are voting. I think The Urbanist recommended Yes and for voting for ranked choice voting, but The Seattle times recommended a No vote and just leave the second choice about which one blank. The Stranger said a No vote, but choose ranked choice voting. Urbanist had a Yes vote and ranked choice voting. So in that kind of a situation where you have, especially entities like The Times and The Stranger that have been so consequential in elections with how they've made their choices, how did you fight against that and prevail? [00:37:30] Kelsey Hamlin: Yeah. I think a component of it is RCV as a kind of movement and a - RCV being ranked choice voting - as a kind of movement and thing that's come up from the ground across the country, it's not just in Washington, has had the benefit of having just an organic group of people already there waiting. This isn't as if it popped up out of nowhere, at least on the ranked choice voting end. There's the same people that have advanced mail-in ballots, that have fought for same-day voter registration, that fought for Democracy Vouchers - are the same exact people that are behind the campaign asking for ranked choice voting to be on the ballot for voters to choose. A lot of that groundwork was already there and that helped us out at the end of the day. The margin isn't the biggest margin in the world for that first question about change. It's funny to me the way the endorsements landed because, just on the common sense front, it - the question is, yes, do you want change or no, we don't want change - everything's fine, democracy is fine - not crumbling at all. Like writ large it's silly on its face, but at the end of the day, the process question - the one and two - we haven't seen since - someone had pointed out today - since 2014. It's that preschool question of you have to vote Yes, and then you have to vote which thing you want. And that's really the only kind of comparable instance that we have to compare how we did to another instance that had the same setup. It was a confusing layout, but RCV itself is not confusing - Dujie has movie nights with his kids all the time, and it's always - hey, let's pick our first, second and third choice for which movie we want to watch tonight. And then you phase them out and have another go around - it's not hard. You can do it with kids. We do it intuitively when we go to any ice cream shop, or restaurant, or go to the grocery store. At the end of the day, there was a lot of organic movement in the first place that helped us out. And there was a lot of field efforts across the board, thanks to that organic volunteer presence and people that were ready, where we did a lot of field effort across Seattle and not just centric to one area that we thought was strong or not. As far as patterns go for the results, I find it painfully accurate that a lot of the pro-ranked choice voting crowd, pro-let's-improve-our-democracy folks and votes tend to be with renters - it's with younger folks and with renters - that's the strongest demographic that had voted for ranked choice voting. And it also matches the core arterials that you see on land use, the multifamily zoning that you see in land use. And we see this pattern over and over again in a place like Seattle, where the more progressive voters are with renters, are in those districts that are more dense and not exclusive and more affordable. So you see this really multifaceted thing coming out in the voter results if you try to take a closer look at it. [00:40:46] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. [00:40:49] Dujie Tahat: And to get at what you're saying, Crystal, in terms of what do we do once we have these endorsements that are - malpractice, to put it nicely, I think for us it became about - okay, we have more voices than the editorial board has to make a better case for the editorial boards. And we basically wanted to overdrive, to flood the ecosystem with really good op-eds basically and LTEs to sort of supplement the paid voter contact we were already doing, to supplement the organizing that was happening. And I think - we placed a lot of them in the last in the last 10 days of GOTV, and I think that those are really meaningful and really important - because in terms of - we've been having a conversation all night about narrative setting and who gets to set narrative. And I don't, personally and just as a firm, I don't think that shouldn't be left to editorial boards, right? Especially if what we have and the issues that we're representing and the communities that are going to benefit from the solutions we're proposing has a greater set of people, then what we're going to do is flood the ecosystem with those voices. And we'll do everything we can to shift that narrative. We're not maybe going to have the same symmetrical set of powers, but it's certainly - it's certainly important - we don't show up, we should. Or we don't - we don't not show up. [00:42:17] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, absolutely. There is one last initiative, as our time is coming to a close, that I did want to talk about, that was very exciting, and I thought was very well executed. And that was the Raise the Wage Tukwila initiative to raise Tukwila's minimum wage. As you watch this play out, what were your thoughts about it? [00:42:42] Dujie Tahat: I think that this is another sort of example of where fundamentals really bore out, right? I think that - and it's a continuation of - the Fight for $15 happened in South King County, it's only natural that South King County pushed that even further. You had the Transit Riders Union, Washington CAN - organizations who had been organizing, just doing relational organizing for years, not just showing up for this single campaign - turn on their networks for this one campaign that is a part of this broader set of things that they're advocating for. And I think, again, related to the conversation we've been having, it's like how much - people, I think what I love about our conversation, is that we all recognize that voters are pretty smart and they all actually know that if you're just showing up this one time because of a moment of self-interest, or if you're here every single day to talk to me about what my life is like, and that you're offering a solution that will actually meaningfully impact that. And that's where, how that campaign ran. I'm really interested in, and this was also a little bit modeled in the RCV campaign, but there's a distributed organized canvassing model. And trying to see how that model might apply in different parts of the state and how that might scale - I haven't had a chance to look at the numbers yet. I think there's a really interesting promise there too, and implications for other races. But all of that too is only made possible by the years of relational organizing and showing up every single day too - that's not a thing you can just build in August for your GOTV operation in six to eight weeks. [00:44:24] Crystal Fincher: Completely agree. What'd you think, Kelsey? [00:44:28] Kelsey Hamlin: Yeah. I mean, this - just like Dujie said, had come up after the Fight for $15. I also believe there was a SeaTac fight for wages as well, right before that. And so I think this is just a culmination of a lot of work on the ground that had already been there in the first place. So again, just like we've been talking about when you're in community, when you're showing up, when you're present and you're listening to people and not just telling them - that is when people will show up for you in return - because it matches, because it lines up, because you're on the same page. And at the end of the day, like the fight for wages and the discussion on inflation, the discussion on abortion rights, and this discussion on unaffordability and housing - these things are all connected at the end of the day. And people, voters realize that - and a lot of campaigns that oppose changes like this and even opposed ranked choice voting and don't want a minimum wage - I remember Seattle Times way back, when it first started, was very skeptical even after a study came out on it. A lot of the people that pose these types of things - one, pop up out of nowhere and then two, aren't connecting the dots between just these issues that in our real lives we experience every single day. And that's just the connection that we have to be making when we're talking to people on their doorstep. So yeah, I think it's a really great celebration and a fight that deserves a lot of applause on behalf of the organizations that are involved in them, especially Seattle Transit Riders Union and Washington CAN - they've been around for a very long time and I'm very proud of them. [00:46:15] Crystal Fincher: I agree and well said. And with that, the roundtable comes to a close. I want to thank our panelists, Dujie Tahat and Kelsey Hamlin, for their insight in making this an engaging and informative night. To those watching online, thanks so much for tuning in. If you missed any of the discussion tonight, you can catch up on the Hacks & Wonks Facebook page, YouTube channel, or Twitter where we're @HacksWonks. Special thanks to essential members of the Hacks & Wonks team and coordinators for this evening, Dr. Shannon Cheng and Bryce Cannatelli. If you missed voting in the election, or if you know someone who did, make sure to register to vote, update your registration, or find information for the next election at myvote.wa.gov. And as a reminder, even if you have been previously incarcerated, your right to vote is restored and you can re-register to vote immediately upon your release, even if you are still under community supervision. Be sure to tune in to Hacks & Wonks on your favorite podcast app for our midweek interviews and our Friday week-in-review shows or at officialhacksandwonks.com. I've been your host, Crystal Fincher - see you next time.

Jeffrey Wilson has worked as an actor, firefighter, paramedic, jet pilot, and diving instructor, as well as a vascular and trauma surgeon. He served in the U.S. Navy for 14 years and made multiple deployments as a combat surgeon with an East Coast-based SEAL Team. He and his wife, Wendy, live in Southwest Florida with their four children. THE THESIS: It's not a thesis, it's a fact: even our elite warriors do not battle flesh and blood. THE SCRIPTURE & SCRIPTURAL RESOURCES: Ephesians 6:1212 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.Matthew 17:20-2120 So Jesus said to them, “Because of your [a]unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,' and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you. 21 [b]However, this kind does not go out except by prayer and fasting.”THE NEWS & COMMENT:The newest book, Dark Fall is the third in the Shepherd Series. I high recommend you buy the series. https://www.christianbook.com/dark-fall/9781496451453/pd/451458?Ntk=keywords&Ntt=451458&event=ESRCP&item_code=&product_redirect=1&ps_exit=PRODUCT%7Clegacy&search_term=dark%20fall

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: QAPR 4: Inductive biases, published by Quintin Pope on October 10, 2022 on The AI Alignment Forum. Introduction This is week 4 of Quintin's Alignment Papers Roundup. The current focus is the inductive biases of stochastic gradient descent. For most datasets and labels, there are many possible models that reach good performance. "Inductive biases" refers to the various factors that incline a particular training process to find some types of models over others. When the data under-specify the learned model, a training process's inductive biases determine what sort of decision making process the model implements, and how the model generalizes beyond its training data. I'd intended to publish this last week, but it turns out that there's a lot of work on SGD's inductive biases, and it's very technical. I kept finding new papers that seemed relevant. That's why this roundup has 16 papers, in place of the usual ~9 or so. Papers Eigenspace Restructuring: a Principle of Space and Frequency in Neural Networks Understanding the fundamental principles behind the massive success of neural networks is one of the most important open questions in deep learning. However, due to the highly complex nature of the problem, progress has been relatively slow. In this note, through the lens of infinite-width networks, a.k.a. neural kernels, we present one such principle resulting from hierarchical localities. It is well-known that the eigenstructure of infinite-width multilayer perceptrons (MLPs) depends solely on the concept frequency, which measures the order of interactions. We show that the topologies from deep convolutional networks (CNNs) restructure the associated eigenspaces into finer subspaces. In addition to frequency, the new structure also depends on the concept space, which measures the spatial distance among nonlinear interaction terms. The resulting fine-grained eigenstructure dramatically improves the network's learnability, empowering them to simultaneously model a much richer class of interactions, including Long-Range-Low-Frequency interactions, Short-Range-High-Frequency interactions, and various interpolations and extrapolations in-between. Additionally, model scaling can improve the resolutions of interpolations and extrapolations and, therefore, the network's learnability. Finally, we prove a sharp characterization of the generalization error for infinite-width CNNs of any depth in the high-dimensional setting. Two corollaries follow: (1) infinite-width deep CNNs can break the curse of dimensionality without losing their expressivity, and (2) scaling improves performance in both the finite and infinite data regimes. My opinion: The NTK lets us directly compute the inductive biases of a neural network near a particular point in parameter space. The NTK's eigenfunctions give us possible behaviors, and its spectrum tells us how easy it is for the network to learn each eigenfunction. This paper uses the NTK to compare the architectural inductive biases of convolutional networks to those of multilayer perceptrons. It seems like a promising approach for better understanding what sorts of behaviors different architectures are inclined to learn. However, this paper makes two major simplifying assumptions: It assumes the infinite width limit, thereby ensuring the NTK remains constant through training (and also preventing any feature learning). It assumes that input data is uniformly distributed across a manifold formed as a product of hyperspheres. This paper's discussion of inductive biases focuses a lot on the frequency biases of neural networks, rather than things more related to alignment. It is very hard to use the NTK (or any mathematical formalism) to talk about inductive biases towards or away from "intentional" / high-level concepts, such as values, deception, corri...

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: More Recent Progress in the Theory of Neural Networks, published by jylin04 on October 6, 2022 on The AI Alignment Forum. Thanks to Dan Roberts and Sho Yaida for comments on a draft of this post. In this post, I would like to draw attention to the book Principles of Deep Learning Theory (PDLT), which I think represents a significant advance in our understanding of how neural networks work . Among other things, this book explains how to write a closed-form formula for the function learned by a realistic, finite-width neural network at the end of training to an order of approximation that suffices to describe representation learning, and how that formula can be interpreted as the solution to a regression model. This makes manifest the intuition that NNs are doing something like regression, but where they learn the features appropriate for a given dataset rather than having them be hand-engineered from the start. I've condensed some main points from the 400-page book into an 8-page summary here: Review of select results from PDLT (Other good places to learn about the book, though perhaps with less of a focus on AI-safety-relevant parts, include this series of five lectures given by the authors at a deep learning summer school or this one-hour lecture for a non-expert audience.) For those who have been following the discussions of ML theory on this forum, the method used in the book is to go to the next-to-leading order in a 1/width expansion. It thus builds on recent studies of infinitely wide NNs that were reviewed in the AF post Recent Progress in the Theory of Neural Networks . However, by going beyond the leading order, the authors of PDLT are able to get around a key qualitative shortcoming of the earlier work in that infinitely wide NNs can't learn features. The next-to-leading order formula also introduces a sum over many steps of gradient descent, getting around an objection that the NTK/infinite width limit may not be applicable to realistic models since in that limit, we can land on the fully trained model after just one fine-tuned training step. I think that this work could have significant implications for AGI forecasting and safety (via interpretability), and deserves to be better appreciated in this community. For example, In AGI forecasting, an important open question is whether the strong scaling hypothesis holds for any modern architectures. (For example, the forecasts in Ajeya Cotra's Bio-Anchors report are conditioned on assuming that 2020 algorithms can scale to TAI.) A longstanding challenge for this field is that as long as we treat neural networks as black boxes or random program search, it's hard to reason about this question in a principled way. But I think that by identifying a space of functions that realistic NNs end up learning in practice ( the space of all neural networks with finely-tuned weights!), the approach of PDLT gives us a way to start to reason about it. For example, despite the existence of the universal approximation theorem, I think the results of PDLT can be used to rule out the (strawmannish) hypothesis that feedforward MLPs can scale to AGI (see my review of the Bio-Anchors report for more on this point). As such, it could be really interesting to generalize PDLT to other architectures. In mechanistic interpretability, a basic open question is what the fundamental degrees of freedom are that we should be trying to interpret. A lot of work has been done under the assumption that we should look at the activations of individual neurons, but there's naively no reason that semantically meaningful properties of a dataset must align with individual neurons after training, and even some interesting counterexamples . By finding a dual description of a trained NN as a trained regression model, PDLT seems to hint that a (related, but)...

Taren and NTK are back, this week talking about running using Heart Rate.  HR running is one of the best ways to get faster at running, but there's a lot of confusion surrounding it.  On the podcast this week, we talk about everything beginner runners need to know about running using heart rate including: how to figure out your personal zones how to track your HR (which devices are best) what to do if you can't seem to keep your heart rate down what you can expect if you dedicate yourself to HR running, and other common problems and questions runners have about heart rate running MōTTIV Training App: http://mymottiv.com SPONSOR: athleticgreens.com/taren

On this Hacks & Wonks week-in-review, Crystal is joined by defense attorney, abolitionist and activist, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy. After reflecting on a tough news week across the country, Crystal and Nicole turn back to local happenings with a look at last-minute entries into Seattle judicial races and a breakdown of why these downballot positions are important. They then discuss how cities like Edmonds, Mercer Island and Seattle exacerbate the issue of homelessness by criminalizing camping in public spaces without actually providing adequate shelter or services to those already struggling. The show wraps up with Seattle City Council putting over $1M more towards police and Councilmember Andrew Lewis watering down his own bill to ensure app-based workers are paid a minimum wage. As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Find the host, Crystal, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find today's co-host, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy, at @NTKallday. More info is available at officialhacksandwonks.com.   Resources King County Elections - Who Has Filed - 2022 Candidate Filing: https://info.kingcounty.gov/kcelections/Vote/contests/who-has-filed.aspx   “The Hunger Games of Housing” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2022/05/24/73946179/the-hunger-games-of-housing   “Edmonds passes law criminalizing camping in public spaces — but lacks local homeless shelter options” by Greg Kim from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/homeless/edmonds-passes-law-criminalizing-homelessness-in-public-spaces-but-lacks-local-shelter-options/   “Mercer Island restricts camping on public property in near-unanimous vote” by Paige Cornwell from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/eastside/in-near-unanimous-vote-mercer-island-restricts-camping-on-public-property/   “Encampment at Woodland Park swept on a rainy Tuesday” by Tobias Coughlin-Bogue from Real Change: https://www.realchangenews.org/news/2022/05/18/encampment-woodland-park-swept-rainy-tuesday   “The Seattle City Council Authorizes SPD to Spend Over $1 Million to Hire More Cops, With Millions More to Come” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2022/05/24/74009467/the-seattle-city-council-authorizes-spd-to-spend-over-1-million-to-hire-more-cops-with-millions-more-to-come   “Seattle City Council OKs more than $1M for police incentives, recruitment despite opposition” by Sarah Grace Taylor from The Seattle Times: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/seattle-city-council-oks-1-5-million-for-police-hiring-incentives-despite-calls-more-law-enforcement-reforms/   Crosscut-Elway Poll - 2022 Seattle Public Safety: https://crosscut.com/sites/default/files/files/crosscut-elway-poll.pdf   “Councilmember Andrew Lewis Guts His Own Policy, Excluding Thousands of App-Based Workers from a Minimum Wage” by Hannah Krieg from The Stranger: https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2022/05/26/74095030/councilmember-andrew-lewis-guts-his-own-policy-excluding-thousands-of-app-based-workers-from-a-minimum-wage   “Report shows Seattle's ‘app gap' in gig worker pay” by Tobias Coughlin-Bogue from Real Change: https://www.realchangenews.org/news/2022/05/25/report-shows-seattle-s-app-gap-gig-worker-pay   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Today, we're continuing our Friday almost-live shows where we review the news of the week with a cohost. Welcome back to the program today's co-host: defense attorney, abolitionist, and activist, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy. Hey! [00:00:52] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Hey, thanks for having me again - I appreciate it, this is fun. [00:00:55] Crystal Fincher: This is fun - appreciate having you back. We just got done talking for a long time - that could have been a podcast and we're like, we should probably get started recording. There is a lot to talk about - obviously we are here in a week with so much news that is ridiculous and depressing. We generally focus on local politics and policy, but certainly - what can be said about the continuing rash of gun violence, racist violence - just it's a lot, it's a whole lot. And I don't know what to say about it that hasn't been said, but I'm just so, so exhausted and infuriated. And either people need - either policies need to change, or people need to change until we get people who will change policies. That's just where I'm at. [00:01:52] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, absolutely. I think everything has been - everything gets watered down to the status quo on the Democrat side a lot of times, or the moderate side - it's the status quo. But the right just keeps pushing things further and further right, both in rhetoric and policy, and I think there was a time when people would be upset - George Bush got a second term, and I remember people saying - I'm gonna move to Canada, I'm going to get out of here. But then also not - there wasn't a connection with everyday life in the United States, I think, the way there is now. And so a lot of people that have been yelling about these conservative policies, or things taking effect that don't seem to have any material effect immediately are now all coming to fruition. And yeah, it's, it's really, really overwhelming. [00:02:55] Crystal Fincher: It is overwhelming. So, totally get that y'all might be having a rough time just making it through the day and keeping focused and handling all the responsibilities that just don't stop. 'Cause I'm feeling a lot of that too, but we do have other things to talk about today. In a continuation - filing week was last Friday, it concluded last Friday, there were a lot of candidates. It actually concluded at the end of the day - we record the podcast at the beginning of the day - and so there were a couple of late entries that I found very interesting, that we didn't have the opportunity to talk about. And they're in races that are often really overlooked - judicial races are so important, and a lot of times there are just incumbents who are never challenged. Occasionally a challenger will pop up, but information about them is so sparse, hard to understand exactly what they do have control of, what kind of a difference do they make. Why are judicial races so important? [00:04:11] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Judicial races are important because there is - obviously judges have a huge amount of power in how they sentence, basically more or less, and also how they rule over trials. And I'm just talking about from a criminal perspective, but there are judges who are just basically like a second prosecutor in the room - that's how a lot of them are - that will help the state make their case, overlook a lot of their mistakes. And a lot of them get overturned on appeal and it's this gigantic time-waster, it's a waste of resources, but then also people are convicted in the meantime and have to - once something's overturned on appeal for, especially for a misdemeanor trial, that person's already served the sentence. It's good that it's - it's just a huge waste of resources. And judges could be doing so much more, but they're not for the most part. And also most of them are former prosecutors. [00:05:24] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, and just being limited to that one side of law - it's one perspective, but it's missing a lot of perspectives, whether it's a defense attorney or an advocate in other parts of the court system. Having a variety of perspectives and experience and background only helps in how you understand and are able to deal with the people who are appearing before you. And there's just a lot of discretion that people have. Some great follows on Twitter are those who live-tweet court proceedings, and it's really eye-opening to see the disparity between landlords who own a lot of properties and they're routinely in the court evicting people - and they have a great rapport with the judge, they know who they are, the other people in the court - they're all like pal, pal, buddy, buddy. And then there's someone who is obviously in a very hard time in their lives, a tough situation, oftentimes has never dealt with anything like this before, it's an intimidating process - and they feel like an outsider and lots of times they're treated like an outsider. And so it can just make such a huge difference. So there are two races, City of Seattle Municipal Court Judge Position 3, where the incumbent is Adam Eisenberg, has a challenger in Pooja Vaddadi who is actually an exciting challenger and filed at the very end of filing week. I saw that she just received the King County Democrats endorsement, is certainly talking about an approach to justice that respects and defends the law - but sees people for who they are and understands that the goal is to have an outcome that works for everybody and that makes everybody whole, keeps everyone safe, and is not just focused on punitive solutions that sometimes really backfire when it comes to making people safer, making people whole, and getting people, everyone back on the right track. What's your take on that? [00:07:37] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: When I think about judicial elections, I think back to when I was in law school and someone said to me - well, everybody in law school is rich, right, because law school costs a lot of money. And I was like - whoa, incredible. And, but it, to some degree, it's true - a lot of people I went to law school with - their parents were lawyers or, you know what I mean? That's just the way of things, and especially when we're talking about the commissioners who oversee housing stuff or the municipal court judges who only oversee misdemeanors, there is no understanding a lot of the times of what leads to these situations. So it always ends up being a personal failing, when what we're seeing is actually a systemic problem. But if you've never dealt with any of those systemic problems - if you've never had a car towed and it's been potentially catastrophic, then you don't understand why this is a problem. You don't understand why - you just don't understand a lot of things. There's no way to - and as defense attorneys, we spend a lot of time trying to explain that to judges. But I think to them, to a lot of them, it just sounds like excuses - and so to have a judge that has some life experience, that has worked with clients, the type of people that would be appearing in front of her - I think it's hopeful. And it's just something that we don't have - we don't get it very often. And it's so hard with judicial elections to get any real information because no judge in Seattle is going to come out and say - Everyone gets the max, that's my policy - that's not going to be a winning proposition in Seattle. So especially in a race for Adam Eisenberg's seat - Judge Eisenberg talks a lot about and has developed alternative programs for different things, but at the end of the day, if you don't appear in front of him all the time, you don't know that he criminalizes addiction, that he's not progressive, that what he's doing is actually harming people. And what he's doing is actually making sure that we have a system in place that can keep harming people. And that he is - operates like a second prosecutor in the room, helping the state constantly. There's just no way to know those things, and so that's what makes judicial elections really difficult - is because nobody's going to say that they stand for injustice, and so it's hard to parse out who has that experience and who doesn't. But I'm really excited to see that she jumped into the race. [00:10:32] Crystal Fincher: As am I. There is another contested race on the Seattle Municipal Court in Position 7, with Damon Shadid the incumbent being challenged - and I'm not sure how to pronounce her name, so apologies if I do mispronounce this - Nyjat Rose-Akins is the challenger. Now this is a bit of a different challenger than the last one, it appears. This is an attorney from our current, an attorney within our current City Attorney's office - meaning she's working for Republican Ann Davison right now. And all indications are - that office and those aligned with it are moving in a different direction than a lot of other folks in Seattle, has been a little different than most people are willing to accept within Seattle. So it's just going to be interesting to see what she says - I've actually not heard her speak yet, or seen much from her. So it will certainly be interesting to examine the record, to hear how she compares with the incumbent Judge Shadid - who has been a proponent of Community Court and of diversion and trying to do things that help reduce the chance of people re-offending, and that have a better record of reducing the chance that people re-offend. So running against that would seem that you're running against those things that may not be jail, but that are proven to be more effective in keeping people from committing further crime and getting on a positive path in their life. So that is certainly one to pay attention to. And so I just encourage us all to be aware, to talk to friends about it - 'cause these races often don't have a lot of money associated with them, they're at the very bottom of the ballot, lots of people overlook them, with so many being unopposed some people just miss the spots on the ballot where they do have an opponent. And these are really, really important decisions, particularly if we care about how things are turning out when it has to do with public safety and our criminal legal system, particularly in the City of Seattle. So those were definitely on my mind to look at and pay attention to. Another thing I wanted to talk about this week was a couple of developments in cities' policy towards the unhoused. We had a week where Edmonds passed a law criminalizing camping in public spaces, even though they don't have any local shelter options. And Hannah [Krieg] with The Stranger actually wrote a really good article this week titled, The Hunger Games of Housing. What did that talk about? [00:13:38] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: That talked about how, while the mayor or city council - whether it's Seattle, whether it's Edmonds - is constantly talking about people refusing shelter, but that shelter is actually non-existent. She lays out pretty carefully in the article that, in King County, there's about 40,000 homeless people and without shelter, and in order to get someone into permanent housing, most outreach workers want to get them into temporary shelter first because they have to get an ID, they need documents, things like that. And the sweeps that they're doing actually make getting people housed so much more difficult. So there's this intermediary step of temporary shelter, but 40,000 people without shelter, 3,000 temporary shelter beds. And so when there's this idea that - oh, everybody's just refusing housing, they're refusing housing - and that it doesn't exist. It just doesn't exist and it's a lie. And it always has been, and it's not just housing too - it's services. They say - oh, they're refusing services - but those services, they don't include inpatient mental health treatment or inpatient drug addiction or an alcohol treatment - these are not the things that people are being offered. We don't have these services. We don't have this housing. Those are things that we defunded a long time ago. And pretending as if it's just the problem of people refusing, I think just sets the stage for further abuses of people who already have nothing. And it's pretty - it's not just horrible, it's also making the problem worse. Because as people get pushed around the City, they're losing things - and I had this with - when I was a defense attorney, I would have a person who was already unsheltered and then they would be in jail over a misdemeanor for a week, a few days, or whatever it was and they would lose everything. And so then they have to go back to DESC, get a new sleeping bag, get a new tent, get new IDs, get a new EBT card - everything about it just made things so demonstrably worse, not just for that person but also for everybody else. The outreach workers that I speak to are - they're exhausted. The sweeps keep - there's just this constant churn that they're dealing with these emergency situations all the time. And at the same time, they don't have anything to offer people other than tents and things to keep them alive, and I think it's a really huge failing on everybody's part to buy into this narrative, but also I really hope people understand that people are not camping because it's a good time - it's not an urban vacation. People don't have places to live, and not just because they don't have money even - we don't have places for people to live. And she talked about how, for permanent supportive housing, one or two beds come up and there's 30 case managers with 70 people on their, or 70 case managers with 30 people on their list and everyone's clamoring for those two beds. It's really - it's a nightmare out there. [00:17:22] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, it is a nightmare and there are so few spots and just imagine that. You are right - there are 70 case managers, each with 30 people that they're trying to get housed. Two spots open up and these things don't happen often. It's not - okay, let's wait until next week when the next two spots open up. This is not a frequent thing. They term it - this happens once in a blue moon - and so does that count as the offering of services and the refusal of services - if all of those people vying for those two spots - hey, this spot is available, try to get you in it. And all of those people except two don't win that lottery. It was referred to as the Hunger Games of Housing, which it truly is. And we just are moving this problem around and making it worse as we do. And even with the Woodland Park sweep that we saw last week and the excellent Real Change article about what happened there - it happened with a lot of fanfare, Mayor Harrell was there, city councilmembers were there saying - this is the model that we want to use for sweeps here. We got people on a list, we connected them all to services, we were successful with just about all of them. This was a success. What wasn't talked about is that they started that list when they first got there - and I want to say 50 people, I need to double-check that number - so they had those people on the list and they did work that list. What they didn't talk about is - as soon as they got someone out and connected them with housing, that spot was backfilled by someone coming to Woodland Park who had been swept from another location in the City. Except this time, now that they've been destabilized from where they were at before, they're in even worse shape and they're not on a list. They weren't taking any additional names on the list. So you just had a situation where we're backfilling faster than we're pulling people out of the queue. It really is like trying to take a bucket to the ocean and it's just not working. We're just sweeping people from one location to another. 'Cause it's not like they're going home when you tell them to get out of - when you tell them to get out of a spot, they have nowhere else to go. So yes, they're going to another spot where they can be. And so it's just such a challenge and we see more cities - Edmonds acted this week, Mercer Island acted recently. And lots of people had questions, as did I - okay, well, there's this federal ruling saying that you can't outlaw homelessness, essentially - outlaw sleeping in public areas, living in a public area because you have nowhere else to go, if there is nowhere for them to go. And so these cities seem to be trying to get creative and saying - well, people are either refusing services, or there are services available in another city and maybe we'll just put them on a bus and ship them out there - which I always find really, really interesting because those are the same people who always talk about - homeless people are just coming there because - this is Seattle's problem. And it's not - these are people who were in that community. Meanwhile, they're making their community's issue that they have responsibility to solve some other city's problem. [00:20:56] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: And I'm sure the City of Everett will bring that up. I'm sure the City of Everett will be like - well, now we have to absorb all of Edmonds' people that they're sending to us as well. But it's just - it's all - it's the same, it's the same thing. It's just moving the problem around and getting it out of certain people's eyeline - is really the goal of things like that. It's not - there's no solution there. You know what I mean? And it's not even masquerading as a solution. There's a solution to the problem of - I don't want to see this - certain people don't want to see this and they shouldn't have to. That's the problem that's being addressed - it's not addressing how many unsheltered people there are, it's not helping people get shelter. It's just saying I don't care as long as I don't see it. And it's - [00:21:49] Crystal Fincher: That's exactly what it is. It's exactly what it is. And I cringe every time I hear someone characterize the problem as "visible homelessness" - we need to solve visible homelessness. The visible part is not the problematic word in that sentence, it's the part where people don't have a home - let's actually solve that. Because we only make both of those problems worse if we don't address getting people into housing. So we will continue to pay attention to that. The country is continuing to invest more in policing and Seattle is actually not an exception. So on the day before [after] the anniversary of George Floyd's death - in Seattle, the City approved over a million dollars in police hiring incentives and recruitment efforts. This has been part of developing conversation related to - hey, these bonuses for signing up or retention bonuses don't seem to have much data behind them to show that they're actually effective in keeping police there. Even for people who believe there should be more police, who want more police on the street, this actually is not appearing to be an effective way to accomplish that goal, but it is a substantial expenditure. And it's interesting, particularly in the City of Seattle and the overlooked poll that we talked about last week, where when Seattle residents were asked - hey, if you could tell the City where you wanted more of your tax dollars spent, what would you say? Over 90% of people said - when it comes to public safety, the number one thing I want you to invest my dollars in are addiction treatment and recovery services. 80% of people were like - absolutely want you to address root causes of crime. And further down the list, about half the people were also like - and we want more cops. One thing that I notice in these conversations is that - the conversation about public safety, it's just bigger than policing. And so, itit gets flattened when peopl - well, do you want to defund or not fund? Do you back the blue or are you just on the other side? And what is a disservice is that a lot of times in the public sphere, in major media publications, our elected leaders are just talking in those pretty binary terms. But as polling continues to show, regular people understand that even if you're like - you know what, I'm happy with a cop coming down my street. They're also saying - but I know they don't have the tools to address everything. And what I see you doing is exclusively addressing policing and hiring while ignoring all of these other things. And we're begging you - there aren't that many things that poll at 90% ever, the fact that 90% of residents when asked specifically about where you want to spend more of your tax dollars and they gave you a list of ideas and interventions - that also happen to be backed by evidence and science. The conversation is just so much bigger. And even for folks who are just fine with our police and who want more police to come, and they'll get here eventually, it's not an immediate solution, it's going to take a while for them to get there. They're like - but also, we've got to address these other things. And when are we going to start investing in that? I'm asking you, I'm begging you to invest in that. My safety is depending on you investing that, I want to do everything in our power to prevent people from being victimized instead of waiting until they are to then respond. That seems like a pragmatic, logical thing to do that regular people are demanding. Extremely popular things are like background checks for gun purchases and investing in the types of services that help people address their root causes of disorder, dysfunction, all of those. So I just grow frustrated because we are not having a conversation about public safety when we only are having a conversation about policing. And no matter how you feel about policing, we're not covering half the ground if we're leaving out all of these other things. And there have been plenty of police officers who themselves have said - we don't have the tools to address someone who is in a mental health crisis. We actually don't have the tools to effectively intervene in an intimate partner violence situation. And we're not the right people to deal with people who are unhoused, but that's all on our plate. And so we're acting, we're investing in this, but we're not getting the outcomes that we want. It just seems like such a common sense thing that the public is almost entirely behind. And it's invisible to the folks in power - that's what's frustrating to me. [00:27:14] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah. Agreed. And it is that - it's that sort of confusion of police with safety, that the binary flattened thing that you were talking about, where it just doesn't leave any room for anything else. You're right - police say I don't want to be a marriage counselor, I don't want to be a social worker, I'm not trained to do this. And it's great - then let's not have them do it. Then let's not have them do it. But in order for that to happen, we need people who are going to do it, and we just don't invest in those things. And Washington state, I think, is third in the nation for highest-paid police. And Seattle is number one in Washington for highest-paid police. What more do they need? There is a nationwide shortage of officers, people don't want to be cops anymore. And so, just constantly throwing more money, more money, more money at a non-solution is just so frustrating. And to know that's what our money is paying for - nothing that's going to actually prevent something happening to me or my family, but just this performative optics of - since so many people do confuse police with safety, if we just go with that narrative and just get more cops, do whatever we have, then that problem is solved. And it's - nothing could be further from the truth. And I really wish there was more political will to stand up and speak back to that. Because to me, that's what people in leadership should do - is not kowtow to certain interests of the people who have the loudest voices, but really try to figure out how to solve problems. And that's just not what we're doing here at all. And it's - yeah, I agree, it's very frustrating, [00:29:09] Crystal Fincher: We will see - and so with an issue like that, where a million dollars can accomplish a lot in a lot of different places. And so it was - these dollars are available for us to invest in public safety. And all of these other areas that our residents have identified and are begging us to invest in - that are currently suffering from a lack of investment - we're ignoring once again where we do have evidence and data to show that this actually does make people safer. Instead, we're spending it in a way that doesn't have any kind of a track record of accomplishing what they're saying it's going to accomplish. And so, in a conversation that I recently had on the show with Deputy Mayor Monisha Harrell, she talked about - hey, we're undergoing a rigorous review of our partners in the City who are standing up alternative responses to help make people safer. And we're evaluating how effective they are, and basically they need to prove that they're making a difference for them to earn any more funding. I just want to take that approach across the board. And if something is working - yes, let's invest in it. Absolutely. And if it's not, let's move it to where it is working. So that seems like a common sense approach, that seems like it shouldn't be controversial, that doesn't seem like it's a progressive or conservative approach. Just what makes sense and how we usually go about our daily business when we're making decisions on what we're going to spend on, what we're doing at work - same type of thing. So I just, I find myself continually frustrated and like you, it does seem like there just isn't the political will, and there is a detachment that some folks in power have that we're not talking about the entire gamut of public safety, that we do have to talk about more than policing. And even if policing is part of it, we've got to talk about more than that. Even for people who think that, it's not the only ingredient that is necessary to keep people safe. [00:31:31] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah - I don't know that I've ever talked to someone who was like - I don't want to invest in preventative measures. I'm not interested, I'm fine being the victim of something as long as the cops respond to it. I've never heard anyone say that thing, and so - but it just gets so obscured, I think, in the very simplified conversation that we have. [00:31:59] Crystal Fincher: It does and you bring up a really good point in that - people don't talk about - people are, again as polling reinforces, people are open to that. And when regular people have conversations, and you've had a ton of conversations with people, residents in the City of Seattle about public safety. I've had a number of conversations with residents in Seattle about the same. And when they talk about it, they're not talking about - well, how many officers and what is the bonus? Usually when regular people are talking about this, they're just saying - hey, my car was broken into and I don't like that, I don't want that to happen again. Or I am really uncomfortable going out at night, I'm scared. How are you going to help me? Or I'm worried about my kid walking to school and even being in school with school shootings and violence going on. They're just concerned about their safety, and they're looking for you to do something to keep them safer. Policing is certainly visible and most associated and known for public safety. So lots of people do acknowledge that, but they also acknowledge - yeah, but that doesn't keep me from being victimized and that's what people want most of all - is not to have to deal with it at all. If they need to - yes, they want someone to respond to their call, but they would rather not have to make the call. And if we engage in that conversation, and starting with - what are people really asking us for? What are people really worried about? Instead of getting caught up in these numeric conversations that are really driven by people invested, one way or another, in our current system and keeping it that way instead of centering the residents in the City and what they're asking for, and just trying to do all you can to keep them safe. And that is a range of things that has to be done. So we could have this conversation for hours - we've had it before. There's developments every week that talk about it, but I do think that it's worth continuing to talk about this and to put this in context in the City, because it's missing - a lot of context is missing in a lot of these conversations that we see and hear in major media, and I do think it's important just to understand where the residents of Seattle are coming from, and what they're demanding, and what they're very clearly saying they want from the mayor, from the Council, from their legislators, from leaders across the board. They want people to keep them safe and use all the tools at their disposal to do it. [00:34:46] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Right, yeah. I've talked to so many people, and the thing that I ran into a lot is that people thought that the common sense thing to do, whether it's someone stole a sandwich, so maybe they're hungry, let's address that problem. Or addiction issues or mental health issues - I think a lot of people have this idea that the common sense solutions are already taking place, and so the problems that we're seeing are - people have already been dealt with, they've already been offered this - it's the same as the services conversation. People support common sense things, but also don't realize that those, like I said, they've been defunded a long time ago. We don't put money into those things. And so, to keep throwing more money at policing instead of those programs that have a proven track record - it just, it's really sad. It's really sad, because I don't want to be the victim of crime, I don't want my daughter - nobody wants that. Literally nobody wants that, so why don't we do things that will prevent that from happening? [00:36:04] Crystal Fincher: I'm right there with you. Well, another thing that happened this week was Seattle City Councilmember Andrew Lewis wound up gutting the bill he was originally a proponent of, which had the result of excluding thousands of app-based workers from a minimum wage. This was a proposal that would have helped a lot of workers in the City. This would help out a number of workers - whether it's DoorDash, or Rover, or Uber Eats, just a variety of app-based workers - who currently, because of some of the wiggling between regulations that these app companies have, are making much less than minimum wage. When all of their responsibilities and obligations are considered, the cost of gas is going through the roof as everyone knows. A lot of times tips are supposed to supplement a lot of the salary, and it just winds up not happening and they're making less than the minimum wage. This proposal was supposed to fix that, Andrew Lewis was a proponent of it. But late in the process, he actually seemed to back away from that and put in a really significant exemption that took a lot of workers out of this policy and is leaving them in the same situation that he seemed to acknowledge it was critical be fixed. What's going on? [00:37:34] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Yeah, it's a little bit mind-boggling. But at the same time, I feel like that's how sort of an incremental moderate politician works - is getting forward - it just never gets to the root of who are the people that are most affected? Who have the least protections? Those people are almost always cut out of everything. And I said before, when Sara Nelson got elected to the Council - to me, I saw that as the end of a progressive council, because we know how Juarez is going to vote, we know how Pedersen is going to vote. And I know Andrew Lewis, and I know that he's going to go whichever way the wind blows. And so now that there's more conservative people than progressive people on the Council, he's going to go with the popular, what seems popular in the circle that he's in. So it's really, really not shocking to me that this happened. [00:38:37] Crystal Fincher: We're always getting spicy with NTK in this. This was action taken in the Public Safety and Human Services Committee, so this was a five-person vote. This will go for - but in this, just five people - and so Andrew Lewis actually aligned with Councilmembers Alex Pedersen and Sara Nelson. And this article by Hannah [Krieg] in The Stranger referred to as "the council's corporate bloc." But this had been stakeholdered - this had been worked on with input by workers, by these app companies and platforms. This didn't just appear upfront, and while there are concerns that no one had ever heard before, and therefore we need to make a change - these companies were at the table, along with the workers, in these situations. It's like - hey, we need to do this. We don't want to create any undue burden, but we do need to make sure people are getting a minimum wage. The concerns that were brought up are not new. Some of the platform-based services that are a little bit different than some of the app services that allow workers to negotiate directly, like a Task Rabbit, where I'm hiring someone to do a specific task and there's more interaction between the worker and the person requesting the services. It is a bit of a distinction between something like Uber Eats, where you're putting in your order and basically everything about how that job is going to be performed is already decided and dictated by the app company. And so the exemption was saying - well, on these other platforms, these marketplace workers, where there is more interaction between the end user and the worker - they might need different rules, this may penalize them too much, this may be too harsh for them, and they're different. They're different enough that they should qualify for some tweaked rules that really don't do the same thing and enable people to receive a minimum wage. Working Washington, an organization that is working with workers was like - whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, hold up - wait a minute. No, everyone deserves a minimum wage. And this exemption is something that these companies specialize in modifying their business models to achieve. And what it appears is that this exemption does not say you have to only have a marketplace model, but just if marketplace services are in your portfolio as an app. So there could be, and there is an app that does have mostly non-marketplace services - they have a few marketplace services that would qualify them for this exemption, from how my understanding from how this is being covered. So it just seems to set up a pretty significant loophole. [00:41:46] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: And loopholes are what are always exploited by business. That's considered good business - is exploiting those loopholes and finding ways to get around paying taxes and paying workers and paying for all sorts of things. That's what people consider to be good business. And so, writing in a loophole - writing in just a loophole you can drive a truck through - it just doesn't make any sense. Gig workers are some of the most vulnerable workers in our city, and when the most vulnerable are not protected, it ends up sort of externalizing to the whole community. It's hard for the whole community to have people who are not making enough money to live. It causes all kinds of other problems and strains on other services and things like that, so it really would have benefited the entire city if this had not been done. And it's just - yeah, it is puzzling as to why, after everything, this happened at the last minute. [00:42:54] Crystal Fincher: Now in a conversation with The Stranger, Andrew Lewis did give a few reasons for why he took this action. One was, "I'm not saying we won't do them. I just don't want to do them in this bill," signaling that there was another bill that maybe he could incorporate this in. There is no date for when that other bill is come up. He also said it's basically a "moot point," 'cause this bill won't even take effect for another year while the Office of Labor Standards gets its ducks in a row. He's like - it's not like immediately these apps are going to have certain rights and the marketplace workers won't - that is literally what he voted for. And as with most laws, unless there is usually some emergency clause, they don't take effect initially, this is the standard course of legislation - so it's interesting to hear that - hey, it's not a big deal. This doesn't take effect immediately - when, if it's something that is popular, they're saying it's a really big deal, even if it doesn't take effect immediately. He also had said - that these companies and other people were saying, these companies currently have not - hey, this happened in New York too. And these companies didn't change their business model after this exemption was passed in New York - they're really good corporate citizens and we can trust them to continue to do the right thing. I would note that we see so many times that they are on their best behavior while legislation is getting passed. And if they know this is up for a vote in subsequent cities, oftentimes they're on their best behavior. We've seen this in California with some app-based bills that impact employment, and who's considered an employee and a contractor. And then once legislation is all on their side, then the change is made. We've seen that a lot of times. This is one of the reason, the reasons why corporate profits are skyrocketing and incomes are doing nothing to keep up with the rate that corporate profits and executive compensation - how that's been skyrocketing - and income inequality is largely due to not regulating these companies and ensuring that they're all playing by the rules and meeting the minimum standards of pay and worker conditions that we expect from people. So this was - it was disappointing for me to see, it was disappointing for others to see - this was a close vote. It was a 3-2 vote. And Andrew Lewis seems to have been the swing vote here, and for him to be such a proponent of this and then just change his mind on this at the very end - he's reading as - hey, we'll get to it, it'll be fine. I don't know that people who are counting on this money and who this would provide immediate relief to, whether it's paying for gas or making their rent or paying for their insurance, it feels like a big deal and it feels like we did not center the people who are closest to harm and crisis. And we did center people who are in a relatively comfortable position. And adding an exemption to a baseline standard, usually doesn't turn out well - there's a reason why we set standards and why we have baselines - it's so we don't go beneath them and so we don't allow exemption. So I do hope that Councilmember Lewis delivers on his promise to incorporate this into an upcoming bill. I hope that happens quickly. And I hope this is able to get resolved for the impacted workers. [00:46:47] Nicole Thomas-Kennedy: Same. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it's deeply unsatisfying to hear - oh, I just didn't want to do it in this bill, or it's not even going to take effect. It feels like giving up before anything's tried and that's not what we need from people in positions of power. We need someone championing the rights of workers - they don't have the lobbying power, they don't have all the power, they don't have all the money. And so there needs to be champions, worker champions in our City government and our State government - at all levels of government. Because these corporations are not going to do the right thing because it's the right thing to do. The way a corporate structure is set up, their only obligation is to the shareholders. So there is actually not much of a legal option to just do the right thing. That's why we need regulations. That's why we need standards and we need a floor and things like that. And the erosion of so many of those things - unions, protections, regulations - over time have led us to this place where we are right now. And we need people to be strong in their positions. And so, yeah, this was sad to see. [00:48:06] Crystal Fincher: We do and it's a deeply popular position. As we see, there is a workers' rights movement that is just spreading across the country, like wildfire locally, absolutely. If there's one thing that people are actively cheering on and that seems like a really bright spot in the midst of so much negative news, it's that so many workers are standing up for their rights and securing better working conditions for themselves and bringing just some - a little bit more of an element of fairness into this. And that the profits that would not be possible without them - that they are entitled to some of them and they shouldn't have to rely on public assistance or wonder if they can pay their most basic bills, while others are working on financing their third house and second yacht. It just doesn't seem to make sense. So I do hope that action can be taken soon - look forward to Councilmember Lewis making himself a champion on this issue because the people need it. And with that, we thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks on this Friday, May 27th, 2022. The producer of Hacks & Wonks is Lisl Stadler and assistant producer is Shannon Cheng. And our insightful co-host today is defense attorney, abolitionist and activist, Nicole Thomas-Kennedy, who is always a pleasure to have on. You can find Nicole on Twitter @NTKallday. You can find me on Twitter @finchfrii and now you can follow Hacks & Wonks on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever else you get your podcasts - just type “Hacks and Wonks” into the search bar and be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday almost-live show and our midweek show delivered to your podcast feed. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

Rose is back today with more wisdom from the “Little House” books... but this time she focuses on the lessons for us moms. It'll make you want to read these classic books all over again. Little House Audiobook version: https://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/easy_find?Ntt=little+house+on+the+prairie+audio+books+cherry+jones&N=0&Ntk=keywords&action=Search&Ne=0&event=ESRCG&nav_search=1&cms=1&ps_exit=RETURN%7Clegacy&ps_domain=www I would be most grateful if you would take a moment to leave me a review on whatever platform you use. Thank you so much!

Don't we all remember and love the "Little House" books? Today my daughter Rose talks about introducing them to her young children... a journey filled with delight and important lessons for her kids. Little House Audiobook version: https://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/easy_find?Ntt=little+house+on+the+prairie+audio+books+cherry+jones&N=0&Ntk=keywords&action=Search&Ne=0&event=ESRCG&nav_search=1&cms=1&ps_exit=RETURN%7Clegacy&ps_domain=www I would be most grateful if you would take a moment to leave me a review on whatever platform you use. Thank you so much!