Slashdot Mirror

Perk? Maybe not, but caffeine improves focus, cognition, and memory recall. At least that is what these studies show, and most of them account for withdraw.

http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=21812869
http://www.springerlink.com/content/y414x83288221635/
http://www.stormingmedia.us/28/2891/A289133.html
http://www.springerlink.com/content/yj8v0h54w05x222q/
http://arno.unimaas.nl/show.cgi?fid=7943
http://heldref.metapress.com/app/home/contribution.asp?referrer=parent&backto=issue,6,9;journal,31,55;linkingpublicationresults,1:119922,1
http://www.springerlink.com/content/a7k04226627g6326/

it already happened

With the flood of patent applications coming in from everyone, patentability checking is a thing of the past. Here is a brief description of some such patents. There are patents on obvious ideas, non-trivial ideas, previously-implemented ideas, etc.

You don't have to prove much of anything to get a patent.

I vote for Claude Shannon and E. F. Moore's 1953 analog Hex-playing computer.

Unlike tic-tac-toe, which is so trivial that a tic-tac-toe-playing computer is only entertaining because it is a computer doing it, the Shannon and Moore machine put up a genuine challenge to a human player, on a game that was not fully analyzed at the time, and that was interesting enough to human players to have been released as a commercial board game.

Of course, I have also wondered whether Link trainers, full-sized flight simulators of the 1930s, were ever "flown" simply for entertainment. Knowing human nature, I bet they were. In fact, speaking of bets, I'll bet pilots placed bets on the outcome of competitive Link-trainer contests. (That's entirely speculation on my part). The Link trainers probably qualify as analog computers, even though the computations were, I believe, performed by pneumatic bellows and other non-electronic devices.

I have a Palm T|X and regularly play the solitare game that comes with it but also like Chess Genius, which on the T|X is much more challenging than it was on my m505, which had an older processor.

I also like Space Trader, though it may grow a bit stale after a few playings.

If anyone here has any suggestions for good Palm games that keep you coming back, I'd love to entertain them. Lots of my former monochrome games for the older Palm OSs break under the new one.

I've read a number of books to my kids using my Fujitsu Stylistic and have several GBs of ebooks and texts on it. The kids like it, and it's very convenient (no wondering where the book is, or what place I was at since the reader (I use ybook (.txt) and mu-book (.html) and the Adobe (formerly Glassbook) eBook Reader (.pdf))

Take a look at sites like http://www.tabletpcbuzz.com/ and you'll find lots of people using tablets for lots of reading and studying.

And look at John Mark Ockerbloom's Online books page for an exhaustive list of what's freely available.

It's unfortunate that innovative things like Corbis' Leonardo CD-ROM w/ its cool translating, mirror-imaging magnifying glass didn't stay the course for when tablets became available (reading the Codex Leceister from this on a tablet is an amazing experience). For a glowing review see: http://www.businessweek.com/1996/49/b350428.htm c.f. http://www.mmi.unimaas.nl/people/Veltman/articles/ leonardo/Review%20Leonardo%20da%20Vinci.html for a more even-handed review (it's not a perfect experience, and I really wish it wasn't hard-coded to run in 640 x 480)

Voyager had the right idea with their ``Expanded Books'' it's just that they were a couple of years early.

William
(who really needs to find the time to get his wife's copy of _The Manhole_ running in a Mac emulator on his tablet)

But this is all kid's stuff. Such experiments can be much more interesting nowadays, with the power of computers as we have now. A student of mine studied the evolution of morals in a similar society. His program isn't online yet (will be soon, I guess), but his thesis is.

His name is Eric van der Werf.

a professor at the University of Maastricht

He is not a professor. He was a Ph.D. student. He received his Ph.D. title January 27 of this year.

in Holland.

That should be "The Netherlands". Holland is part of The Netherlands, but Maastricht is not located in Holland.

At about a quarter of the full-board version, 5x5 go

That's about 1/14th of a full board (25 points as opposed to 361 points).

is miniscule, similar in scale to "solving" 2X2 chess.

It is similar to solving 5x5 or 6x6 chess.

The fact that a programmer

Calling Van der Werf a "professor" is a bit too much, but calling him a "programmer" is not enough.

would even consider this a noteworthy challenge is itself a remarkable testament to the game's complexity.

Basically, it was not done before, and could be done with a couple of weeks computation time. That's not to belittle Eric's work; it is only a small part of his work. Read his thesis to see what he has done for the field of Go research.

Van Der Werk's

Again, it is "Van der Werf".

approach is described in detail in an article at the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NOSR).

That should be NWO, not NOSR, and the approach is not described in detail in the article. For details, visit Eric's website.

The actual details are available at Erik van der Werf's homepage at the Universiteit Maastricht, and in particular on his publication list.

The actual details are available at Erik van der Werf's homepage at the Universiteit Maastricht, and in particular on his publication list.

It is actually not that difficult, but many people are enormously impressed by the results.

Brian Sheppard wrote the Scrabble-playing program Maven. Maven consistently beats human Scrabble world champions. And the fun part is: the program is based mainly on statistical values for letter occurrences. This means that the English Maven can be converted into a foreign-language Maven, simply by loading the dictionary and let the computer generate the statistics for the dictionary. At his Ph.D. defense, Sheppard demonstrated this by loading a Dutch dictionary into the program, and let the program play against the Dutch Scrabble champions. The humans were wiped off the board.

For me, this only goes to show that Scrabble is not a very interesting game...

I do a Ph.D. in an AI-related field at the moment, and all I can say is: Don't hold your breath. While it is true that AI has made significant progress, a few remarks are in order.

First, the "I" in AI really shouldn't be there. When people talk a diffucult decision problem (e.g. some pattern recognition problem), there comes the point where somebody will say, with a solemn voice: "So, what if we use Neural Networks?" (you can practically hear him pronounce those capitals, while he's creaming his pants at the mere thought of his new awsome intelligent system). People often assume that, because a neural network is a very simple and poor analogy of the brain, that it must have some "intelligence".

Guess what? A neural network is a simple nonlinear function. Period. Training such a thing is nothing more than estimating its parameters by minimizing some (usually quadratic) cost criterion. When you put something in, you merely evaluate a rather simple nonlinear function. There is no intelligence involved!

And then people say: "Yeah, but we have different things as well, such as clustering methods, radial basis function networks, Bayesian (belief) networks, support vector machines, evolutionary algorithms, etc,". They too, do nothing more than estimating parameters (of selecting representative examples) based on the statistics of the problem at hand.

There is a good reason for the fact that "AI" researchers themselves often refer to their field as "machine learning", rather than AI. If anything, I'd call AI "AS", for Applied Statistics, because most of the methods we use are either pure of augmented statistics.

That said, machine learning has achieved some nice things. We can do some simple decision-making, pattern recognition (e.g. face detection) and emulate some limited insect behaviour. There even are some limited commercial applications. But we should be very aware of the fact that most "spectacular" results are merely lab results. I work on face detection myself, and I can tell you that "the real world" (natural photos for me) is a bitch as far as applying methods is concerned.

Seriously, that's old. I'm a computer vision Ph.D. student, and there now are much faster methods. I'll just refer to my old comment.

A demo can be found here. You can contact me for more details...

Current really fast methods use cascades of very simple classifier that are very weak themselves, but very strong when combined. The work of Viola & Jones is what most of the stuff is centered around nowadays.

Do your own here:

http://argus.cs.unimaas.nl/fddemo

Parent: +6 Insightful

I'm a researcher in AI, and I can do nothing but backup the parent's claim (sad as it is). When we use AI, we would expect a robot to be able to perceive its surroundings (analyzing sensory inputs), make decisions (reasoning) and act (generating actuator outputs).

I can only comment on the first, since I'm a Ph.D. student in Computer Vision. And the general picture is, to be quite honest, depressing. Forget all you've seen in e.g. Terminator (e.g. the robot analyzing its visual input, and all the nice text in the image): it ain't gonna happen for a long time! Although space missions are (presumably) less complex in terms of sensory inputs, the state of affairs in dealing with normal natural images gives a nice idea of what's currently (im)possible:

I'll provide an example here. I'm doing Computer Vision (face-detections), and the current state of affairs is about this: When finding faces in 800x600 images, this can be done in about 1 second (yes: 1 full second), at about a 90% detection rate and a couple of false detections per image. For more complex object classes that are not so nicely symmetric (think cars, houses, landscapes, etc.), the performance is dramatically worse.

You can look at the BitTorrent link. And ONLY if that doesn't work, use this. As for reasoning: this is still in it's infancy, but I'm not working in that field, so I cannot comment on that well. Any takers? ;)

Parent: +6 Insightful

I'm a researcher in AI, and I can do nothing but backup the parent's claim (sad as it is). When we use AI, we would expect a robot to be able to perceive its surroundings (analyzing sensory inputs), make decisions (reasoning) and act (generating actuator outputs).

I can only comment on the first, since I'm a Ph.D. student in Computer Vision. And the general picture is, to be quite honest, depressing. Forget all you've seen in e.g. Terminator (e.g. the robot analyzing its visual input, and all the nice text in the image): it ain't gonna happen for a long time! Although space missions are (presumably) less complex in terms of sensory inputs, the state of affairs in dealing with normal natural images gives a nice idea of what's currently (im)possible:

I'll provide an example here. I'm doing Computer Vision (face-detections), and the current state of affairs is about this: When finding faces in 800x600 images, this can be done in about 1 second (yes: 1 full second), at about a 90% detection rate and a couple of false detections per image. For more complex object classes that are not so nicely symmetric (think cars, houses, landscapes, etc.), the performance is dramatically worse.

You can look at the BitTorrent link. And ONLY if that doesn't work, use this. As for reasoning: this is still in it's infancy, but I'm not working in that field, so I cannot comment on that well. Any takers? ;)

Ok, there goes:

Face Detection .torrent.

Ok, PLEASE leave your client open: I don't want my connection killed! ;)

This robotic duck dates back to the 1700s.

...can be found on Pieter Spronck's aptly named ridiculous patents page. "Scoring based upon goals achieved and subjective elements" - very nice.

dear jaruz, michael,

we didn't make a public announcement, so we didn't put it up on the MERIT website so that it could be confirmed. as questions have been raised regarding the authenticity of the announcement and MERIT's commitment to free software, please note that the following letter will be posted to the FLOSS home page as soon as possible - by monday, at any rate - so that it can be "verified". i have added the last paragraph to respond to /. (incorrect) comments regarding the support of MERIT for free software.

given some comments that MERIT "supports the patent lobby" i would also like to clarify that several of the economists listed in the EPIP conference programme were signatories and/or authors of the Economists' Letter against Software Patents sent to the European Parliament.

Moreover, Luc Soete, Director of MERIT, and I both spoke at the Sep 17th conference in the European Parliament against software patents.

best wishes,
Rishab Ghosh
Project leader FLOSS/FLOSSPOLS
MERIT

----
As director of MERIT at the University of Maastricht, I would like to inform you
that we are no longer organising the conference on the topic of Open Standards
and Libre Software in Government at UNESCO Paris, November 24-26, 2003. Until
now, MERIT was responsible for the logistics and through the FLOSSPOLS project,
EC funding for the conference. This is now wholly withdrawn.

We have taken this decision in consultation with the European Commission, whose
support for this conference was earlier being provided through the proposed
FLOSSPOLS project at MERIT.

We sincerely regret the inconvenience this may cause you. For more information
please contact us by e-mail at nov2003@infonomics.nl

For MERIT Prof. Dr. Luc Soete
Director, MERIT
Universiteit Maastricht
PO Box 616, 6200MD
Maastricht, the Netherlands
Tel: +31 43 388 3875
----
MERIT remains fully committed to its research activities in the area of Free/Libre/Open Source
Software through the EC-funded FLOSS project, and the area of FLOSS and government through
the follow-up project FLOSSPOLS. The 2-year
FLOSSPOLS project, which includes research, studies, surveys and public events related to
government and free/libre/open source software will commence later this year.
More information on the project(s) can be found on the FLOSS home page, flossproject.org

MERIT now organizes a conference for the patent lobby (patent lawyer interest groups)!!

[ EPIP 2 ] Copyright and database protection, patents and research tools, and other challenges to the intellectual property system

Maastricht, November 24-25

On November 24 and 25 of this year a conference will be held at MERIT in Maastricht on the topic "Copyright and database protection, patents andresearch tools, and other challenges to the intellectual property system". This is the second meeting of the EPIP (European Policy for Intellectual Property) network, funded by the European Commission and lead by Dominique Foray and Jacques Mairesse. The partners of EPIP are IMRI from Universite Paris-Dauphine in France, MERIT from University Maastricht in the Netherlands, INNO-tec from the Munich School of Management in Germany, Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies in Italy, Roskilde University in Denmark, and the Santiago de Compostella University in Spain. For more information of the network, please visit the website at:
http://www.dauphine.fr/imri/EPIP/welcome.html .

The first EPIP meeting took place in Munich on the magnificent premises of the European Patent Office with over hundred participants, lawyers and economists, academics as well as practitioners (from the business world and the patent offices) from Europe and the United States. The papers presented at this conference touched upon many themes and challenges of the intellectual property rights system. The program of the Munich conference is also available on the website.

The next conference, while open to other themes, will essentially focus on research tools and databases. Both research tools and databases are major inputs of science and technology. In the view of fostering their impact on the economy through commercialization, governments have allowed IP to be taken on certain inventions, in the form of patents (on research tools) and sui generic rights (data bases). Whereas the US pioneered the former, Europe is leading the latter. The central issue is to strike the balance right between the conditions needed for commercialization (which often requires some exclusivity) with the conditions associated with scientific progress (open access). Should Europe reform its database directive along the lines of the United States? What should be the legal environment for the commercialization and diffusion of public databases? Should research tools be exempted from patent protection or other intellectual property protection mechanisms for the sake of scientific and technological development?

These are some of the questions that we would like to see discussed at the conference.

We aim at assembling leading scholars and thinkers on the contentious issue of ways and merits of protecting research tools and databases.

Some of the confirmed speakers and participants:

Dominique Foray, Univ. Paris-Dauphine
Jacques Mairesse, CREST/INSEE
Dominique Guellec, OECD
Jean-Michel Dalle, IMRI
Bronwyn Hall, Univ. of California at Berkeley
Paul Uhlir, National Academy of Sciences
Stephen Mark Maurer, Univ. of California at Berkeley
John Walsh, University of Tokyo
Peter Schroeder, Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, Netherlands
Dietmar Harhoff, Munich School of Management
Stephan Wagner, Munich School of Management
Paul David, Stanford University
Anselm Kamperman Sanders, Univ. Maastricht
Robin Cowan, MERIT
Luc Soete, MERIT
Pierre Mohnen, MERIT
Elad Harison, MERIT
Brian Kahin, Univerity of Michigan
Pierre Jean Benghozi, Ecole Polytechnique, Paris
Paul Wouters, The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
Wilfred Dolfsma, Erasmus University
Tettu Luukonen, ETLA, Finland
Rene Vleugels, Univ. Maastricht

More information on the program of the conference and of ways to get to Maastricht will be made available shortly.

Local organisor: Pierre Mohnen
31-43-388 3869
E-mail: p.mohnen@merit.unimaas.nl

Or maybe MERIT has simply discovered a serious discrepancy between their diverse interests, and are now going after the money. Don't forget that the patent-loving side of the EU seriously despises the "open source posse". Also remember that the whole premise of Open Source in Government is a serious nightmare for companies throughout Europe. Barring a good and plausible explanation, I figure they were simply bought out.....

Anyway, the fun part: I told my brother (physics Phd) about this wacko, and we were bien etonne de se trouver ensemble: the same guy gave an incomprehensible talk at his physics institute, and projected the same . If a room full of physics PhDs don't understand what this guy is saying he really is full of shit. ( His homepage is kind of fun -- after a laundry list of publications and presentations, his only real work turns out to be on the art of Leonardo DaVinci)

Well, enough drivel. What scares me is that some of these windbags manage to fake people into believing that they have something interesting to tell. And that the EU is giving out money for this type of bullshit research.

Here's more than you ever want to know about spina bifida / hydrocephalus and how it generally affects those who have it - one of whom talks about it here. One study on IQ follow-up is here but it only says the expected problems result. My wife is a labor / delivery nurse and sees this pretty frequently, it's not pretty and just about always causes neurological damage....

MamedDC runs most smallish roms very well. It's made by the people who ported MAME to Digita-based digital cameras. You can check out the complete compatibility list at this site.

There are 45 NeoGeo games that are considered "somewhat playable" -- that is, with no sound and at 75% speed.

Incidentally, dcemulation.com reports a new NeoGeo emulator in the works. Check out their news page for more info.

That's what I saw here, on every human's face while they waited for their computers to figure out what to do next.

You'd think they'd at least have had a foosball or ping pong table or something. If I ever get into something like that, I'll remember to bring a copy of War and Peace.