top 20 hacker news stories for 2026-08-15

AI isn’t outthinking mathematicians, it’s out-remembering them

https://davidepiffer.com/p/ai-isnt-outthinking-mathematicians

2 months ago

2 changes
632 upvotes – 521 comments

Semaglutide linked to lower predicted dementia risk

https://alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/dad2.70432

2 months ago

2 changes
502 upvotes – 400 comments

Auto-research with codex: How I achieved a 232x Faster Kernel

https://sankalp.bearblog.dev/autoresearch/

2 months ago

457 upvotes – 93 comments

Super El Niño Keeps Growing as New Forecasts Reach Record Territory Ahead Winter

https://www.severe-weather.eu/long-range-2/super-el-nino-growth-accelerating-to-record-strength-fall-winter-2026-2027-forecast-impact-united-states-canada-europe-fa/

2 months ago

451 upvotes – 371 comments

The other Sean Byrne doesn't exist

https://conic.al/writing/the-other-sean-byrne-doesnt-exist/

2 months ago

391 upvotes – 189 comments

Abdominal fat predicts heart disease risk better than BMI

https://www.acc.org/about-acc/press-releases/2026/08/11/14/59/abdominal-fat-predicts-heart-disease-risk-better-than-bmi

2 months ago

2 changes
342 upvotes – 329 comments

Working with AI feels more like leadership than coding

https://allen.bargi.org/notes/working-with-ai-feels-like-leadership/

2 months ago

1 change
338 upvotes – 203 comments

Software Engineering fundamentals matter more

https://rhonabwy.com/2026/08/15/software-engineering-fundamentals-matter-more-than-ever/

2 months ago

322 upvotes – 247 comments

A 25-year-old video patent just expired, ending a legal headache for Linux

https://www.xda-developers.com/25-year-old-brazilian-video-patent-expired-legal-headache-linux/

2 months ago

318 upvotes – 178 comments

At-home test for infected ticks could improve Lyme Disease diagnosis

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/the-first-at-home-test-for-infected-ticks-could-improve-lyme-disease-diagnosis-180989235/

2 months ago

1 change
297 upvotes – 128 comments

A spectre is haunting Unicode

https://www.dampfkraft.com/ghost-characters.html

2 months ago

1 change
281 upvotes – 123 comments

Cultivating a state of mind where new ideas are born (2023)

https://www.henrikkarlsson.xyz/p/good-ideas

2 months ago

1 change
276 upvotes – 69 comments

Supersonic Trebuchet [video]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Co57SfcT-h0

2 months ago

256 upvotes – 116 comments

Magnitude 7.7 Earthquake – 68 km NNW of Ende, Indonesia

https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/eventpage/us6000tkt2/executive

2 months ago

224 upvotes – 56 comments

A controversial Alzheimer's surgery is said to reverse symptoms

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-026-02448-x

2 months ago

197 upvotes – 85 comments

AI in drug discovery – what it is, where we stand and the path forward

https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/so-how-ai-drug-discovery-doing-really

2 months ago

5 changes
187 upvotes – 93 comments

Engineers will do anything to avoid learning from history

https://horn.gg/blog/engineers-will-do-anything-to-avoid-learning-from-history/

2 months ago

176 upvotes – 115 comments

The Ploopy A+ Trackball Is Here

https://blog.ploopy.co/the-aplus-is-finally-here-499

2 months ago

149 upvotes – 70 comments

Simplifying and Refactoring Introductory Calculus (2018)

https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.03459

2 months ago

1 change
145 upvotes – 81 comments

The Dutch community where people live on strips of land in a lake

https://www.core77.com/posts/144869

2 months ago

1 change
142 upvotes – 62 comments
show: top 10top 20top 50%
go to date: prev next
sort by: datescorecomments