Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Titanium, Art, Israel
You want fries with that software? If the recent report of Microsoft porting apps to *nix, intrigued you, see Paul Thurrott's piece in Windows 2000 Magazine (yes, there is such a thing). Thurrott says, in part: "I can't tell you that the port is going to produce actual products. But I can tell you that Microsoft is looking into it. No, I don't think it's smart. No, it's not what I'd do. But yes, I believe it's true. So why would Microsoft try to port its desktop applications to a platform that has absolutely no desktop market share? I've no idea." Too bad for Microsoft Linux has "absolutely no desktop market share."
Silly! The sky isn't falling! It's just sinking a little each day ... Johann writes "Here is a follow up story to last week's NY Times article which was debated here on Slashdot. The article states that 'Open water at the top of the world isn't evidence that the North Pole is melting, as an article this month in The New York Times suggested.' There are numerous quotes in the article that do suggest that global warming is fact, not fiction."
To which the dapper and elegant Party Remover adds: "The Associated Press reports that a recent New York Times story about liquid water at the North Pole was rather overstating the seriousness of the situation. It seems that the Arctic Ocean is typically 10% ice-free during the summer." And the wording of the correction is amusing, for those of us easily amused.
Getcher doo-dads! Red-hot, computer-generated doo-dads! Get 'em while they're hot, ladies and gents ... ussphoenix writes: "Regarding the /. story about Computer Makes Robot Offspring, here is an article in the journal Nature describing the system. There are also mpegs of the virtual machines and the corresponding real machines moving!"
Next week we explain the buggy-whip makers' case, too. breillysf writes: "Eric Sinrod has condensed the complicated legal issues surrounding 2600's hyperlinking ruling. You can read the article here: Upside Counsel DeCSS article. The article is concise and not filled with legal jargon. A good contribution for those with little time to understand the fundamentals of the case."
And on the DeCSS note, Jim Tyre writes "Tom Vogt, a defendant in the California DeCSS lawsuit brought by DVD CCA, has started DeArt, the DeCSS Art Contest, to further explore the expressive aspects of DeCSS. Original creations only, obviously must be related to DeCSS. The contest runs through Dec. 31, and there will be prizes. Tom and Jon Johansen are the current judges, Emmanuel Goldstein has been asked to be an additional judge. Time for Slashdotters to express their creativity in a new way." I think the most strategic contest area would be performance art. Since it must be digitized, a video recorder would be necessary, I guess. Anyone here watched Roger and Me?[grin]
And if you're feeling less artistic, don't worry: Carpman writes, "I have set up a project to create a letter to congress about the DMCA and its effects. I'm running this like an open source project, you submit, it gets reviewed, and added. Also, you can submit stand alone letters to send allong with the big letter. The page is here." Of course, note the verb sense of "carp" and this makes perfect sense ...
Oh, no, you must have misunderstood. What we meant was something totally different. thebaron writes "Here is a interesting back-pedaling by Sony in this article. One should think before opening mouth and inserting [one's] own foot, even if you're a company exec." Or perhaps especially then. As roblimo pointed out recently, big companies have trouble tying their collective shoelaces sometimes, never mind effecting their own conspiracies.
Hit that high hat, swing that hook! PenguinRadio writes: "The Washington Post notes in Tuesday's paper that Motorola has begun the necessary reporting to certain government agencies so that they can burn up the $4 billion in Iridium satellites. Interesting in this announcements is the fact that their engineers feels certain pieces of the birds may actually reach the Earth and not burn up completely. Most notably a 2 foot by 3 foot titanium fuel tank may make it through the atmosphere. Wanna bet we see it on e-bay if it does fall to earth?"
I like this little ditty in regards to the 2600 ruling:
The judge made the following analogy: "It is analogous to the publication of a bank vault combination in a national newspaper. Even if no one uses the combination to open the vault, its mere publication has the effect of defeating the bank's security system, forcing the bank to reprogram the lock."
Actually. I thought it was more like - hey, we made a car...but you have to use our gas to drive the sum'bitch!
FluX
After 16 years, MTV has finally completed its deevolution into the shiny things network
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
It seems that right about the time I was getting around to being born, ... they were saying that industrial soceity was bringing about global COOLING!!! We were dooming ourselves to a new ice age! And now they've done a 180 and are doomsaying about global warming???
Well, come on guys... which is it?
You can't have it both ways.
Oh come off it! 30-odd years ago (I'm guessing at your age) the scientists based on the research of the day were theorizing one thing and now, after 30 years of futher research and observation, they are concluding something different. This is not suprising nor can it in any way be called hypocritical. Do you expect scientists to make one theory and stick to it for over a generation, no matter what further evidence may suggest?
You also presuppose that "they" are a monolithic block of researchers and that they speak with a unified voice. Further more, you presuppose that the exact same people from 30 years ago are the ones saying something different now when in actual fact the ones from 30 years ago are probably mostly all dead now or retired and the ones speaking today about global warming are an entirely new generation.
How your comment got moderated as "Insightful" is beyond me, when it mostly shows your profound ignorance of the scientific method and is an extreme over-simplification of the nature of the scientific community based on a hearsay anecdote of a doddering old man who obviously passed on his lack of intelligence to his progeny.
Try this on: "At one time scientists were saying that the world was flat. Now they've done a 180 and are claiming that the world is round! Well come on guys... which is it? You can't have it both ways."
Sounds rather moronic doesn't it?
Trickster Coyote
Life is an illusion.
Ideology is for ideots.
... all these "environmentalists" were, even then, claiming that all the pollutantants that we're spewing into the atmosphere was going to drastically affect the global climate. Tricky bit was, the doomsayers were NOT talking about global warming... they were saying that industrial soceity was bringing about global COOLING!!!
Well, come on guys... which is it?
You can't have it both ways.
If environmentalists were predicting a climate change 50 years ago that's actually pretty insightful. That the direction of the change was wrong is hardly surprising, given the massive complexity to predicting weather. We can't even reliably predict the weather for the next day! What would have been clear 50 years ago was that we were pumping massive amounts of waste into the atmosphere (and rivers etc.), so much that we were changing its composition. It's good to know that some people back then had the foresight to realise that this may have effects on the climate.
As for all the comments that doubt that global warming is going on, you only have to do a simple web search to find some statistics on how the mean temperature has risen over the past 100 years.
Here's a few links I just found:
This graph of the mean world temperature over the last 150 years
From this report
Global Temperatures
A paper from the Proceedings of National Academy of Science
And there is heaps and heaps more evidence if you care to look.
The fact that the world leaders had a conference in Kyoto to discuss global warming means that the evidence is clear enough to worry them. It should probably worry everyone else too.
You can't have it both ways.
YOU CAN HAVE IT BOTH WAYS.
From http://www.canoe.ca/TimeCanada0009/0 4_time8.html
What is really at risk in the Arctic is part of the thermostat of Earth itself. The difference in temperature between the tropics and the poles drives the global climate system. The excess heat that collects in the tropics is dissipated at the poles, about half of it through what has been nicknamed the ocean conveyor, a vast deep-water current equivalent in flow to 100 Amazon Rivers. Much of the rest of the heat is conveyed as the energy in storms that move north from the tropics. If the poles continue to warm disproportionately faster than the tropics, the vigor of this planetary circulatory system may diminish, altering prevailing winds, ocean currents and rainfall patterns. Already, severe and unpredictable storms in the northern hemisphere may be a sign that the global system is changing. Canadians like to think they will be winners in a global-warming era. Warmer weather, the theory goes, will make it possible to grow more food for export. That could happen, but there are no guarantees. Grain production in the breadbaskets of Canada and the U.S. could be in jeopardy if rainfall becomes less steady and predictable. Moreover, greater climate change could be ahead. Growing numbers of scientists fear that the warming trend will so disrupt ocean circulation patterns that the Gulf Stream, the current that warms large parts of the northern hemisphere, could shut down. If that happens, global warming would, ironically, produce global cooling--and bring on a deep freeze.
Nosce te Ipsum
First let me criticize a few suggestions I've seen over the past few days:
(1) Launching a DDOS attack against movie companies' websites: Bad idea. This will only reinforce their accusations that we are all criminals, and turn the general public against us. The decision is frustrating, but we don't need to give them justification for what they've done.
(2) Burning DVD's in mass quantities. Are you going to loot video stores to get them? (see above) Otherwise, the movie industry already has your money, and that's the bottom line. I really don't think anyone would care aside from the protesters themselves, and maybe some neighbors who get annoyed by the smell of burning plastic.
There are other forms of entertainment than movies. Gaming, for example.
I'm discussing mainly (but not exclusively--see the end of my post) roleplaying games.
Gaming is cheaper. A typical rulebook for an RPG is $20-$30, cheaper than movie tickets for for the 4-6 people in a typical gaming group. Extra sourcebooks for a gaming system are usually only $10-15.
Gaming is more interesting. Even if you only have one rulebook, you can have a nearly endless variety of scenarios. Your best-case scenario with movies is renting, where you might be able to get 20 movies or so. This leads right into my third point...
Gaming is easier to schedule. Regardless of how much or how little time you have available, a movie (with few exceptions) takes roughly two hours to watch. The length of an RPG session can be controlled by adjusting the complexity of the storyline. I've seen games as short as 2 hours or as long as several days.
With less time available, you might want to consider a card game or board game (maybe monopoly, but I was thinking along the lines of Settlers of Catan)
Not to ramble on too much, I thought I'd post links to a few of my favorite gaming companies:
Steve Jackson Games
White Wolf Game Studio
Cheapass Games (Typically only $5 a game, I recommend Give me the Brain for a fun, short card game.
it's very cool to see the evolved automata work in real life. yeah, it might have been just a cute hack of hooking up a GA system to an automated manufacturing tool, but damn it looks cool!
:) it may tell us something (ie. simple associations, etc.), but it's not nearly enough from an engineering point of view
it's curious, though, that as a branch of AI research, GA has pretty much plateaued. it's been becoming apparent that there are serious limitations to the GA model of design - first and foremost, just like in connectionist systems, the GA system tells the designer nothing* about the workings of the system - a scientist looking at a GA system has no better of a chance to figure out what it's doing than when looking at a biological creature.
and secondly, GAs and connectionist systems alike are very good - in fact, entirely too good - at adapting themselves to the detils of their environment. this means they will use the strangest characteristics of the environment (or training data in case of NNs) if they're only beneficial - and not necessarily the characteristics we'd like them to use.
there's actually an amusing second-hand (third-hand?) story of the incredible adaptivity of NNs. a research lab somewhere develops what appears to be a pretty good NN-based tank detection system for aerial surveillance photographs. they train it on a corpus of photos of tanks going through some natural terrains, and it performs admirably - the program detects tanks not only in the photos similar to the training set, but also in very different ones. in other words, it's quite robust.
so they show it to the people upstairs, and they're reasonably impressed, too. so the machine is given a completely novel set of images to see how it would do - but this time, it utterly fails! everyone's baffled - what's going on, why does it fail now when it used to work so well?
only after a while someone took a good look at the two series of images, and realized - the program really learned to detect tree shadows! because the original series pictures had tanks driving through greenery, the NN detected it was more reliable to rely on that than on anything else... **
and the moral of the story is - these systems are very efficient in adapting to the given task, in whatever way is most optimal. but we as designers don't know what they're 'really' doing - we (connectionist ai people, biologists, dynamic systems people, etc.) lack the proper analytical tools to describe such complex systems. will GAs ever be used to evolve anything larger than toy insect-like agents? probably no, not until better analytical techniques are developed - that is, if ever.
r
*) all right, so i exaggerated.
**) does anyone have a reference for this story? i think i saw it in something written by dreyfus, but i can't for the life of me remember...
My other car is a cons.
While it is heartwarming to see that you've been keeping up on your South Park episodes ("Look! The volcano erupted! Duck and cover!"), one can hardly imagine a single paragraph more chock full of right-wing hysteria and "enemy complex" than the one above.
- If you're suggesting that the government, or anybody for that matter, believes that "ducking and covering" under desks is an appropriate way to defend against an atomic blast, you are a cretin of unimaginable proportions.
- If you're suggesting that Al Gore (and Al Gore alone) personally approved Motorola's technology transfer to China, you are a laughable buffoon. You people get a little behind in the polls, and you'll say anything. (Interesting how if the economy is good, you people say we have to give Ronald Reagan the credit personally, but if it goes bad, we have to blame Clinton or Gore personally.)
- China does not have the military strength to successfully invade Taiwan, a tiny island a stone's throw off of its own shores, and yet you claim that it is somehow a threat to the United States. Sheer, unadulterated poppycock. What is it about the right wing that requires them to always have "an enemy?" Since the Soviet Union collapsed, they can no longer direct their hatred there (well, at least not all of it.) Who is our enemy now? By golly, it must be the Chinese! I've never understood why the right wing (and particularly the religious right) are so terrified of the idea of a peaceful, united world. Perhaps it's part of the damnable "New World Order" that Pat Robertson preaches about so vociferously?
- Communism is on its way out in China. Over the course of the past few years, the regime has moved to privatize several of its key state-owned industries. With the advent of the Internet and access to it spreading in China, it is ridiculous to suggest that these trends will reverse themselves. With each passing year, China inches away from being a brutal Communist regime. Within 20 years, "Communist China" wil be as much a part of history as the Berlin Wall.
Finally, I personally am glad that China is experimenting with a space program. Space exploration is a necessity, and if a bit of friendly competition can get NASA and the ESA off of their asses and step up their investments in this important field of study, then so much is the better. Admiral Ackbar, you of all people (Mon Calamari?) should appreciate the importance of space exploration.In the meantime, think for yourself. You are allowed to disagree with the Rush Limbaughs and Michael Reagans and Jerry Falwells of the world. Ask yourself what Communist China has to gain from provoking an arms race with the United States. Take a look at the trends and ask yourself -- honestly -- if you believe that the current regime is going to be in place forever. I personally feel that if the Chinese regime attempted another Tianamen Square today, there would be a bloody revolt that they would be powerless to stop.
Your mileage may vary, of course.
--
--
The New World Order is upon us, and it's about damned time.
Okay...we have all the geeks going to Radio Shack to pick up their free CueCats (http://www.cuecat.com).
So, while they are there, get a tube of heat sink compound and send it to the north pole. Motorola then brings down Iridium carefully to the arctic ice cap, and we use the metal to make the worlds largest heat sink. Put the compound on the glaciers (make sure to fill the cracks for better transfer!).
If we all do this and it works, then we can all buy the Intel P4's without worry of more global warming.
Besides, I read someplace a while ago (wish I could find the reference) that we are actually in a warm period in the middle of an ice age!
OTOH, listen to the voice of the scientific majority. In it you will hear a relatively conservative, guarded discussion of global warming. Yes, there will be a vocal minority of scientists who put forth outlandish hypotheses, but the consensus of the others will return the debate to more solid ground.
There will be a report on global warming issued this year by an international multidisciple group of scientists. These reports come out every five years. Unless the politicians intervene, this report will state that human activity is having a discernable affect on global temperature increase. This plot shows measured and computed global temperature for the past 1000 yrs. I find it scary.
Global warming alarmists ought to be especially careful to save the screaming for the real thing. They'll be taken a lot more seriously that way. The siren that goes off every day at noon gets ignored; the one that only sounds when bombs are falling is paid attention to by everybody.
And the brethren went away edified.
With respect to the defendants' constitutional argument, the judge stated that while the Constitution "is a framework for building a just and democratic society -- it is not a suicide pact."
Oh, dear. Nothing closer to taking one's own life than allowing people to communicate with each other and advance the art of computer science. However did our founding fathers make do in the years before the ratification of the constitution, when just anyone on the block could copy his dvds?
I'd say a two foot by three foot fuel tank has a good chance of hitting the ground. I've seen (and touched) a two foot titanium ball from a delta second stage. You can see pictures of things that have survived on my company's website.
Disclamer: I do not speak for The Aerospace Corporation in any capacity.
-- Any statement of the form "X is the one, true Y" is FALSE.
I am far more concerned that "environmentalists" will push us into doing something that really does counter environmental changes, and those changes turn out to be natural and necessary.
My mom is not a Karma whore!