First of all, although I do read a lot of medical research papers, I am not a doctor, and nothing I say here is medical advice. I just want to share some ideas and information that might help people better cope with the new coronavirus threat.
With my poker background, the current economic situation in North America strongly reminds me of what happens from time to time to nearly every competent poker player who starts out playing a solid game and winning, usually with some good luck along the way, then becomes overconfident and turns to playing more and more hands until the whole strategy goes out of whack. Then, once the luck changes, the losses start mounting.
When I talk to people, a lot of them seem to be confused about what’s been happening recently with the US stock market (and, consequently, with the Canadian stocks, since we are so tied up with each other). The unemployment is at the record low, the GDP is growing, then how can the stock market be falling during such a “roaring” economy? In this blog post I will try to explain what’s going on in really simple terms for those who do not have a background in economics. Of course, this is a huge topic, so I will just be focusing on a few of the factors in play.
I’ve been reading quite a bit of news lately, which is probably a sign that I need to get out more and do something besides work. When nothing much is happening, it seems natural to seek intellectual stimulation online. It’s not that I have a lot of free time, but doing just one thing every day gets kind of boring. I just need to find something to balance my work with which would be beneficial for me.
It’s been a month since I started my new job! I am working as a Senior Machine Learning Engineer for a small Vancouver start-up named Bio-Conscious. Our main product is Diabits, which is an iPhone app used to monitor and predict blood glucose levels in diabetic patients. My job is to make sure that the predictions are accurate, which is really important since people with diabetes really need to pay attention to their current blood glucose levels and correct those by eating or insulin injections if necessary. Being able to know what the expected levels are within the next hour should make it easier for the patients to plan their actions.
I haven’t written anything here in almost two months, but I have an excuse. I’ve been really trying to position myself to land a job in machine learning as quickly as possible by figuring out how to showcase my knowledge and abilities to potential employers. I think I have succeeded. I am supposed to receive a contract to sign sometime this weekend, so hopefully next week I will already be working for a company here in Vancouver! I also have some other inquiries from potential employers, but I believe I have made my choice. Anyway, I will write more about it once the situation resolves itself so as not to make any premature announcements.
I have just finished my first Kaggle competition, the 2018 Data Science Bowl! For this competition I teamed up with another guy from Vancouver named Mahmoud, who was also new to Kaggle. We did really well, placing in the top 1.7% of all entrants (60/3634). We will probably make a presentation about this competition for the Vancouver Learn Data Science meetup. If we do, I will post the presentation slides on my GitHub page.
I haven’t written much over the last few weeks because I’ve been really busy. As someone without substantial work experience in the field of machine learning, I need to come up with ways to prove to potential employers and/or customers that I am capable of solving real world problems. One of the best ways I see to achieve this goal is to perform well in online machine learning competitions with prizes. The site where most such competitions are held is Kaggle.
This article will mostly be about the mental state, but I will start with a physical example. I consider myself to be a fairly decent singer. When I was learning how to sing, I discovered that one of the hardest parts of good singing technique, as well as one of the most important ones, was to only use the muscles necessary to produce a good sound, while keeping the rest of the body as relaxed as possible. This not only prevents getting tired quickly, but actually results in better sound quality since other people can feel the extra muscular tension and it makes them less comfortable. The same idea holds true for many other skills, such as playing the piano or martial arts, to give a few. Learning how to stay relaxed and only exert as much effort as necessary to achieve the desired goal is one of the foundations of the proper technique in many areas of life.
When I first started in poker (back in 2004), I had never imagined that it would become my profession for more than 10 years. I had just gotten my Ph.D. in power electronics and was looking for jobs, but the economy was not the best, my area of research was too theoretical to be of use for most companies, also at that point I kind of sucked at job hunting and promoting myself, so the best I could find was a temporary adjunct professor position at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana which didn’t pay much. Since I had a student visa in the United States (in the stage of so-called optional practical training), I was not allowed to look for other employment. I definitely wanted to make more money though, so I was seeking legitimate opportunities. On most weekends, I’d go to local chess tournaments and usually win a few hundred dollars, which certainly helped but wasn’t enough.
© 2023 STAN KRIVENTSOV — Based on Hemingway theme by Anders Noren
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