6 ms·

> with an annual contribution of €13.61 and a real rate of return of 3%, 400 years of annual compounding would be over €7 million. With a rate of 4% it would be

> with an annual contribution of €13.61 and a real rate of return of 3%, 400 years of annual compounding would be over €7 million. With a rate of 4% it would be €280 million. Reminds of Futurama with billionaire Philip J Fry after unintentionally leaving 93 cents in the bank for 1000 years.

dgfitz 2y ago
I asked a bot to do the math for me (if anyone was as curious as I was): 93 cents would turn into approximately $17.88 trillion with compound interest of 3% over 1000 years. 93 cents would turn into approximately $4.28 billion with compound interest of 2% over 1000 years. 93 cents would turn into approximately $19,482.22 with compound interest of 1% over 1000 years.
- scubbo 2y ago
  Is a bot really necessary in order to calculate 0.93*(1 + n%)^1000?
  - dotancohen 2y ago
    Not if you know the formula. I suspect that GP didn't.
    - dgfitz 2y ago
      I had a tab open and asked a question. It was simpler than running the calculation 3 times. I do in fact understand basic math. Merry Christmas!
      - dotancohen 2y ago
        Happy Hanukkah!
  - antihipocrat 2y ago
    The bot does the trivial things well, still need a brain to actually apply these trivial things to solve complex problems - much like a calculator
    - scubbo 2y ago
      > The bot does the trivial things well Clearly not, since all the answers were incorrect; two of them by an order of magnitude: * 0.93((1.03)^1000) is 6.393E12, not 1.788E13 * 0.93((1.02)^1000) is 3.7E8, not 4.28E9 * 0.93*((1.01)^1000) is 19,492, not 19,482 ...on a whim, I just tried asking ChatGPT "What would 93 cents accumulate to over 1000 years with 3% compound interest?", and the answer (179.74) was staggeringly wrong because it thought that 1.03^1000 was approximately 193.48. How timely that https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42484937 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42484937 was posted today.
      - dgfitz 2y ago
        To be fair, I qualified the whole thing with “I asked a bot” so I can say I learned a valuable lesson as to the value of LLMs. I doubt anyone reading this will believe me, today is the second day I have ever tried using an LLM. Talk about a backfire.
        scubbo 2y ago
        Personally, I can say that I just gained a whole _ton_ of respect for you for your ability to learn a lesson, to admit that you made a mistake, and not to double-down on insistence that LLMs are Good, Actually. I hope my message didn't come across at too unpleasantly confrontational - I'm not annoyed at _you_, but rather at the over-reliance of these hallucination machines in our industry which is supposed to prize hard data and accuracy. I'm glad I was able to help someone gain a bit of reasonable skepticism for them! All the very best to you and yours for this holiday season!
    - Pooge 2y ago
      I like the Compound Interest Calculator on Investor.gov.[1] [1]: https://www.investor.gov/financial-tools-calculators/calculators/compound-interest-calculator https://www.investor.gov/financial-tools-calculators/calcula...
  - dgfitz 2y ago
    Is this a rhetorical question? The answer is clearly yes. I never studied organic chemistry.

dgfitz 2y ago

I asked a bot to do the math for me (if anyone was as curious as I was): 93 cents would turn into approximately $17.88 trillion with compound interest of 3% over 1000 years. 93 cents would turn into approximately $4.28 billion with compound interest of 2% over 1000 years. 93 cents would turn into approximately $19,482.22 with compound interest of 1% over 1000 years.

scubbo 2y ago
Is a bot really necessary in order to calculate 0.93*(1 + n%)^1000?
- dotancohen 2y ago
  Not if you know the formula. I suspect that GP didn't.
  - dgfitz 2y ago
    I had a tab open and asked a question. It was simpler than running the calculation 3 times. I do in fact understand basic math. Merry Christmas!
    - dotancohen 2y ago
      Happy Hanukkah!
- antihipocrat 2y ago
  The bot does the trivial things well, still need a brain to actually apply these trivial things to solve complex problems - much like a calculator
  - scubbo 2y ago
    > The bot does the trivial things well Clearly not, since all the answers were incorrect; two of them by an order of magnitude: * 0.93((1.03)^1000) is 6.393E12, not 1.788E13 * 0.93((1.02)^1000) is 3.7E8, not 4.28E9 * 0.93*((1.01)^1000) is 19,492, not 19,482 ...on a whim, I just tried asking ChatGPT "What would 93 cents accumulate to over 1000 years with 3% compound interest?", and the answer (179.74) was staggeringly wrong because it thought that 1.03^1000 was approximately 193.48. How timely that https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42484937 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42484937 was posted today.
    - dgfitz 2y ago
      To be fair, I qualified the whole thing with “I asked a bot” so I can say I learned a valuable lesson as to the value of LLMs. I doubt anyone reading this will believe me, today is the second day I have ever tried using an LLM. Talk about a backfire.
      - scubbo 2y ago
        Personally, I can say that I just gained a whole _ton_ of respect for you for your ability to learn a lesson, to admit that you made a mistake, and not to double-down on insistence that LLMs are Good, Actually. I hope my message didn't come across at too unpleasantly confrontational - I'm not annoyed at _you_, but rather at the over-reliance of these hallucination machines in our industry which is supposed to prize hard data and accuracy. I'm glad I was able to help someone gain a bit of reasonable skepticism for them! All the very best to you and yours for this holiday season!
  - Pooge 2y ago
    I like the Compound Interest Calculator on Investor.gov.[1] [1]: https://www.investor.gov/financial-tools-calculators/calculators/compound-interest-calculator https://www.investor.gov/financial-tools-calculators/calcula...
- dgfitz 2y ago
  Is this a rhetorical question? The answer is clearly yes. I never studied organic chemistry.