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Steve Chen Making China's Supercomputer Grid

nanotrends writes "Steve Chen was the principal designer of the Cray X-MP supercomputer. He recently created multi-teraflop blade based supercomputers for a Chinese company. He is now creating a supercomputer grid across China and he is working on a bio-supercomputer extension to human brains called THIRD-BRAIN. The THIRD-BRAIN project has significant 3 year and 5 year targets."

79 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. FTFS: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny
    he is working on a bio-supercomputer extension to human brains called THIRD-BRAIN.
    For some people this could be considered their first brain!
  2. Use of GPUs or PS3 chips? by Salvance · · Score: 1

    I wonder if anyone has tried adding a bunch of high performance GPU chips into the mix (e.g. NVidia or ATI's can run at close to 1 TFlop), or hook together a bunch of PS3 Cell chips? I realize these are more specialized, but they are SO fast that augmenting classic commodity chips with these specialized chips seems like it could greatly boost performance.

    --
    Crack - Free with every butt and set of boobs
    1. Re:Use of GPUs or PS3 chips? by Renfield+Spiffioso · · Score: 1

      Yes, that's in progress.

    2. Re:Use of GPUs or PS3 chips? by AtomicSushi · · Score: 1

      I think its safe to say nearly every major semiconductor company is toying with the idea of massive parallelism via small processors for a variety of tasks.

    3. Re:Use of GPUs or PS3 chips? by rbanffy · · Score: 1

      IIRC, IBM is going to deliver a system that's based on POWER and Cell chips for this exact reason - no commodity chip currently beats the Cell in floating-point brute force and POWER is quite good on everything else (including floating-point).

      We will see some very interesting machines in the next few years.

  3. grid of China by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    >He is now creating a supercomputer grid across China

    Can you see it from space?

    1. Re:grid of China by sisinka · · Score: 1

      not that you could see it, but to me it seems like China wants to build its own internet, which would solve their "problems" with free speech world and The Great Firewall of China.
      In Chen's words: When I have an Integral Grid, I can run Video-on-Demand and IPTV applications on one side of the Grid, and healthcare, education or financial services on the other side. After midnight, the whole Grid can be running Weather Forecasting.

      --
      My parser is a grammar nazi.
  4. Brains, zombies by HiggsBison · · Score: 1

    Brains. Right. Just what some bot-master will want to send his zombies after.

    --
    My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
  5. Strange... by Yvanhoe · · Score: 1

    Why is nobody commenting about this THIRD BRAIN thing ? This is the first time I hear about it, and the first time I hear about a serious government funded initiative for a brain-machine interface...

    --
    The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
  6. I certainly hope this plan is actually reasonable. by neoshroom · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It isn't. From the article, the guy right now has nothing and plans to implement what the entire AI field has been trying to do for years and years. He doesn't mention any new or innovative techinques he is applying to the problem -- only a boatload of unfounded confidence.

    --
    Big apple, new Yorik, undig it, something's unrotting in Edenmark.
  7. Re:The YouTube guy? by jcarkeys · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Different guys.

  8. Difficult to take 3rd brain seriously by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    It seems as though the team is working primarily on the number crunching power at the moment - which is all good and well. But when queried about the AI aspect, he says that they will just have to research it, even after the interviewer points out many other people have been working on this. I think he greatly underestimates the problem! Saying that all other AI researchers have not had an integral approach is a bit lacking as an answer to me.

    1. Re:Difficult to take 3rd brain seriously by KillerCow · · Score: 2, Insightful
      He is now creating a supercomputer grid across China and he is working on a bio-supercomputer extension to human brains called THIRD-BRAIN.


      But when queried about the AI aspect, he says that they will just have to research it, even after the interviewer points out many other people have been working on this. I think he greatly underestimates the problem! Saying that all other AI researchers have not had an integral approach is a bit lacking as an answer to me.


      It's pure hubris. Even if he does make some AI breakthrough (unlikely), he may find that his shiny new grid is not suited to its implementation. It may not clique well. He has a system (a grid) and is trying to apply it to a known problem (AI). It's a lofty and noble goal, but it isn't the best way to solve a problem. Usually, it's a good idea to have your algorithms and systems though out (or at least an idea of what they are) before starting implementation.

      Fortunately for him though, he has a nice preexisting model that he can copy the structure of. Our brains are distributed, and are cliqued (from my understanding). So building a grid and trying to apply it to AI is not a terrible idea.

      At least the Chinese will have a nice super-grid to do weapons research on in the mean time.
  9. frikken friends by imkow · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Put yourself together. Chinese people are not eating you, not without you cooked in our way.(see Chinese Food).

    Seriously a diesel submaine can do nothing to endanger a carrier fleet, if not making itself a firework. and remember, american's claws has alreay been on our door in Taiwan Strait, in East sea, in Japan, in South Korea and everywhere asian. Back few years ago, it's an american spy plane which literally hit down a Chinese fight jet just few koilmeters away from China's coast. it's you, americans always want to war with someone, not Chinese.

    Talking about human life, yes, human resource is inexpensive here in contrast to other part of the planet. it's just because of the number we got,it's not about the value we hold towards the human life. honestly if any possible, i hope we can move .5 billion of our folks to your neighborhood, to make the human resource, the human right, and the population, of both countries, even. this could be an idea to ease your nerve.

    --
    China, in fact, is very fragile.
    1. Re:frikken friends by b4stard · · Score: 1

      what?

    2. Re:frikken friends by Pengo · · Score: 2, Informative

      "Back few years ago, it's an american spy plane which literally hit down a Chinese fight jet just few koilmeters away from China's coast."

      You really believe that a prop-based spy plan intentionally HIT a fighter-jet out of the sky?? Give me a break. Your pilot got reckless in trying to coarse them away from your air-space. I'm not saying that spy plane should of been there to begin with, but I find it mildly amusing, and more than disturbing, that you buy into your ministry of informations claims that the evil Americans knocked their fighter jet out of the sky.

      Out of respect to the dead, I won't rant on how terrible of a pilot of the Chinese fighter pilot must of been if that truly was the case.

    3. Re:frikken friends by Fear+the+Clam · · Score: 2
      Talking about human life, yes, human resource is inexpensive here in contrast to other part of the planet. it's just because of the number we got,it's not about the value we hold towards the human life.


      If large numbers are such a problem maybe the Chinese government should just split the country into four. Perhaps then human life in each of those new nations would be considered as "valuable" as it is in the United States. Well, okay, that was a poor example. How about splitting China into 40 countries, each of which values its citizens as much as Canada does?
  10. One brain in your head, one in your pants by macadamia_harold · · Score: 2, Insightful

    and he is working on a bio-supercomputer extension to human brains called THIRD-BRAIN. The THIRD-BRAIN project has significant 3 year and 5 year targets.

    Why call it Third Brain? I'm not terribly familiar with Anatomy, but I thought humans only had one brain. (Well, unless you're a guy. Then you've got an extra one in your pants that does most of the thinking)

    1. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by Jorrit · · Score: 1

      We actually have two brains. One called 'small brain' (at least in Dutch it is called like that. I hope it translates to english directly) which is responsible for basic primitive operations like breathing and such and then the main part which is responsible for cognitive operations.

      Greetings,

      --
      Project Manager of Crystal Space (http://www.crystalspace3d.org). Support CS at http://tinyurl.com/cb3x4
    2. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by TubeSteak · · Score: 1
      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
    3. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by I+Like+Pudding · · Score: 1
      We actually have two brains. One called 'small brain' (at least in Dutch it is called like that. I hope it translates to english directly)

      I believe the English translation would be "penis"
    4. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by Ididerus · · Score: 1

      I think thats called medulla oblongata, no?

      --
      I'm fighting The War on Drugs!
    5. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by Gwwfps · · Score: 1

      In Chinese, the cerebrum can be literally translated as the "greater brain", while the cerebellum is called the "lesser brain". That's probably where the name came from.

    6. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by msobkow · · Score: 1

      I believe they are talking about a philosophical model, treating a national compute infrastructure as a synthetic memory extension, not a wetwired biological interface. It's a colourful metaphore, not a literal description.

      Another way of viewing the Third Brain project might be the application of biological healing and load balancing aspects to a compute fabric. Muscles strengthen with use, the grid increases the measured capacity with need. Stop using them, and the proteins get reabsorbed and reallocated, causing the muscles to weaken and shrink.

      IBM has been doing similar work for their mainframes, Sun has their system monitoring and dynamic configuration hooks, so does HP, and I would guess, Microsoft. This is just building out another layer of management infrastructure, treating distributed clusters and nodes as a national or international compute fabric. I would presume that the major vendors use their own technologies to manage their international operations, providing a real-life proof-of-concept deployment to show customers their implementations work.

      China treating it as a national rather than corporate focus is just one of those little mindset/cultural differences.

      Computing described as biology, nothing more.

      Primeur: I can understand that technically: if you have a capability machine you can run capacity jobs, too. But it is more expensive than using a capacity machine. Is that true with your machine, too?

      Steve Chen:Not necessarily. That is why we have a single cost-effective but very balanced architecture that can suit intensive I/O, or intensive data, or intensive computation: we can decompose the system anyway we want. So when we detect, for instance, that we need to do more capacity or we need more capability from the continuous self-learning intelligent analysis, we just bring those pieces together when we need them. When your application is running on the system we are learning. It is just like a Brain. But we need a lot of middleware to do that, linked to built-in hardware monitoring.

      Primeur: Is the machine that you have out already doing that?

      Steve Chen:To some extent it does, but not to the higher levels. In the lower level it does so statically, not yet dynamically. So, if you say, "Today I want to partition the machine in three different ways with so many processors, so many disks, etc.", we can do it. Yet, to reach the higher levels, we need more intelligence to be integrated into the system. We need machine learning, human-machine interaction, artificial intelligence, intelligent search and pattern recognition.

      Primeur: Who is working on these new parts? Is that done in a company, or in a project?

      Steve Chen:In a company based in the USA and China, called HCOM, which has established the"THIRD-BRAIN Research Institute"where the core development is done. It is a long term and international effort to design a new generation of Supercomputers beyond Petaflop/s. The overall sponsoring company is calledAHA!Ventures based in the USA. They are the one providing the funding as well as collaborating on the development and deployment of large-scaleIntegral Gridprojects worldwide.

      --
      I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
    7. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by WilliamSChips · · Score: 1

      He's talking about either that or the cerebellum.

      --
      Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
    8. Re:One brain in your head, one in your pants by adamgolding · · Score: 1

      Well, there's forebrain, midbrain, and hindbrain, but then it should be FOURTH-BRAIN. Maybe he's thinking of Left-brain, right-brain ?

  11. Re:ethics by imsabbel · · Score: 1

    You mean the same Dalai Lama who used to have a middle-age style feudalism on the back of the peasents back when Tibet was still a sovereign nation?

    Well, turnabout hurts, but nobody cries when the US sucks the brains out of international academics, even though they armed slimebags like hussein, and destabilized whole continents (how many dictators own their job the cia?).

    That nothwithstanding, the guy really is a blowbag, and his claims are void of any kind of reason, or techological background.

    --
    HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
  12. Haha. Not funny. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    s/China/US/
    s/communist/capitalist/
    s/Tibet/Iraq/

    You cannot even talk about their dumb leaders after electing Bush.

    Maybe someone comes up with moral enough to make speeches. This is not America, though.

    1. Re:Haha. Not funny. by WilliamSChips · · Score: 1

      You, of course, assume that your parent voted Bush. I'm neither the pot nor kettle--both Chinaco and Bushco suck. I'm the fracking lightbulb!

      --
      Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
    2. Re:Haha. Not funny. by WilliamSChips · · Score: 1

      You missed my point. My point is that the person talking about how "An American has no right to criticize China" is working under a false assumption--that said American likes what America is doing.
      And yes, 51% is still not a mandate.

      --
      Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
  13. Strange... by Shaltenn · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Strange... Call me crazy, but this reeks of Cyber-brains from Ghost in the Shell. XP

    --
    If you were offended by anything I said... No, I'm not sorry. Please lighten up.
  14. Re:ethics by the_humeister · · Score: 1
    How the hell did this get moderated up?

    China also supports widespread censorship of the internet and press. Freedom of speech does not exist in China. Steven Chen is promoting and supporting a China where freedom of speech
    doesn't exist and an e-mail can get you 10 years.


    Guess who also supports them? Cisco, Yahoo, Microsoft, Google, IBM, etc...

    There is also evidence the Chinese reverse engineered a Cray. Chen is no different from Chinese technicians trying to steal chip designs and fly back to China after working at an American company and the blueprints.


    It's also quoted in the article that the guy desigend some of Cray's supercomputers. So who's stealing from who?
  15. Test run takes 7.5 million years... by Woogiemonger · · Score: 2, Funny

    Result = 42

    1. Re:Test run takes 7.5 million years... by daverabbitz · · Score: 1

      Uhm, what.

      I'm pretty sure this was a reference to The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.

      --
      What could be better than a jet powered motorcycle? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8l6GTHLSWE
  16. Third Brain?!?! by itz2000 · · Score: 2, Funny

    "He is now creating a supercomputer grid across China and he is working on a bio-supercomputer extension to human brains called THIRD-BRAIN"

    Why did you jump from 1st brain to 3rd brain? WHERE IS THE 2nd BRAIN?

    someone stole the 2nd brain! call 9-1-1!

  17. He's building it by c0nst · · Score: 3, Funny

    .. so that he can run Vista

  18. Re:frikken traitors by Antiocheian · · Score: 2, Interesting

    How come that China is a threat to anyone in this planet?

    Have the nuked anyone?

    Have they attacked defenseless poor countries?

    Have they messed up other countries causing civil wars?

  19. Logical Falacies 101 by LindseyJ · · Score: 1

    The colour of that kettle has nothing to do with the pot.

    Keep thinking that every other country can do whatever they want because you think the US is evil, though. I'm sure someday you'll see how much of a complete tool you are. Too bad it will probably take a nuke and several tens of thousands of innocent lives first.

    1. Re:Logical Falacies 101 by KDR_11k · · Score: 1

      But it does debunk the argument that it's bad to work for such a kettle. Or at least worse than working for the pot.

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
  20. scoop by thirdbase · · Score: 1

    I've got the first shot of THIRDBRAIN http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Ageofsteel.jpg

    1. Re:scoop by WilliamSChips · · Score: 1

      That's the Cybercontroller, which was in England and not China(although there were Cybermen in China, as they were in all seven continents)

      --
      Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
    2. Re:scoop by thirdbase · · Score: 1

      It's been fun, slashdot. Bye.

  21. The usual BS.... by gweihir · · Score: 1

    A supercomputer is not better, because it is distributed. In fact distributed computing power is useless except for some very specific problems. All this "gird" nonsense does not solve a real problem, but serves to keep initiatives alive that were dead a decade ago when they were started.

    An this nonsense about extending the human brain? Have we not heard enough of this in the last 30 years or so? Having ''significant goals'' will not prevent this from being another case of lying to the public....

    --
    Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
    1. Re:The usual BS.... by RAMMS+EIN · · Score: 1

      ``In fact distributed computing power is useless except for some very specific problems. All this "gird" nonsense does not solve a real problem, but serves to keep initiatives alive that were dead a decade ago when they were started.''

      Seems to me that botnets, spamming, and DDoS attacks are alive and kicking.

      --
      Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
  22. Re:ethics by ATMD · · Score: 2, Funny

    Dammit, as soon as I run out of mod points.

    MOD PARENT UP; INFORMATIVE/INTERESTING.

    I personally had no idea that a lot of the stuff mentioned there was still going on inside China. I mean, torture, concentration camps? WTF?

    --
    Nobody else has this sig.
  23. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting
    ...unlike the Chinese Communist five-year planning, which just got millions killed for nothing.


    As opposed to American Democratic four year non-plans which achieve nothing of historical note and abdicate national planning to corporations motivated only by profit for the shareholders?

    Personally, I'd rather die for my country working on a plan of significance even if it fails, rather than live my life in the meaningless no mans land of corporate quarterly statistics.

    Capitalist Democracy fosters national inaction, for if an elected body achieves something significant it only represents a risk to re-election and corporate support. The less a democratic government achieves, the more successful it is.

    It is a horrifying future for humanity, and now that the meme of capitalism has spread to the formerly communist nations of Eastern Europe and Asia it represents a genuine threat to the future survival of the human race.
  24. New lies for old money by billcopc · · Score: 1

    Back in the day we called it "Y2K consulting", today it's "Supercomputer grid consulting". The main difference is this guy has friends in the business whose products he will be pushing for a nice kickback, in addition to his hourly fee.

    Any twit can write "Qty: 1000" next to a system order when someone else is footing the bill.

    --
    -Billco, Fnarg.com
  25. third-brain? we already have that... by Agram · · Score: 1

    ...and from the looks of it, it appears to make people go insane... http://www.threebrain.com/

  26. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by edward2020 · · Score: 1

    So I guess you would have been a proponent of things like the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Yeah, it was great. I hear there was even cannibalism. Or think of some of Stalin's wonderful 5-year plans. Also, the USA is not a democracy - it is a republic which uses democratic processes (I assume your comment of "four year non-plans" was referring to US presidential terms). I find it humorous that you feel the spread of capitalism to former communist areas is a "threat to the future survival [sic] of the human race." Are you serious? Certainly, capitalism has its flaws and will someday (hopefully) be replaced with a better system. But do you truly believe that communism is the answer? Why don't you look at the record of communism? Do you really believe that Stalin's artificial famines are better than capitalism's corporate farms? Instead of expressing your admittedly warranted anger at the US's policies in an ignorant fashion you should do some research so that you are able to add to the discussion/process in a reasonable and thought-out manner.

    --
    Don't worry about the mule, just load the wagon.
  27. diesel-electrics actually quite capable by yppiz · · Score: 1

    Actually, diesel-electrics are said to be much quieter and harder to detect than nuclear submarines. I remember reading a few years ago that an Australian diesel-electric, in exercises, was took out the carrier in a carrier group.

    Ah, here it is:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collins_class_submari ne

    In a 2003 joint naval exercise, three Collins-class submarines reportedly "sank" two American Los Angeles class attack submarines and a US aircraft carrier, supporting the claims of defect resolution and combat effectiveness

    Here's a description of the US/Australian exercise: http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/09/23/10640 82993693.html

    --Pat

  28. SECOND BRAIN by EraserMouseMan · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm surprised that nobody's asked about why there's no mention of a SECOND BRAIN? Has china already developed that one? Or are they just skipping a brain?

    1. Re:SECOND BRAIN by salimma · · Score: 1

      Presumably the second brain is the electronic computer.

      --
      Michel
      Fedora Project Contribut
    2. Re:SECOND BRAIN by iminplaya · · Score: 1

      It was never released. Was there ever a Windows 2.0?...

      ...

      ...

      D'oh!

      --
      What?
    3. Re:SECOND BRAIN by BiggerIsBetter · · Score: 1

      Or are they just skipping a brain?

      No, they're just saying that it's a male thing.

      --
      Forget thrust, drag, lift and weight. Airplanes fly because of money.
    4. Re:SECOND BRAIN by schwieter · · Score: 1

      In Chinese, one word for computer can be literally translated as "electric brain."

    5. Re:SECOND BRAIN by Stooshie · · Score: 1

      RTFA!

      --
      America, Home of the Brave. ... .and the Squaw.
    6. Re:SECOND BRAIN by salimma · · Score: 1

      Interesting, didn't know that. Thanks!

      --
      Michel
      Fedora Project Contribut
  29. What's that smell? by surfcow · · Score: 1

    > "bio-supercomputer extension to human brains"

    Um... I'm from dairy country, and have learned to identify bullshit quite accurately.

    Especially when a cow-pie crawls up your leg and bites you on the ass.

    Sir, I have been bitten.

  30. Re:I certainly hope this plan is actually reasonab by RAMMS+EIN · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ``only a boatload of unfounded confidence.''

    Well, isn't that what made America so great?

    --
    Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
  31. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by grimwell · · Score: 1
    Unfortunately, this is extremely unlikely, as it requires national(global) planning of extreme significance (which capitalist democracy precludes) on the order of more than five years and is not initially going to be in the least profitable, therefore extremely unlikely to happen under global capitalism.


    Maybe ten years ago it required a national plan, today individuals & companies are making their way into space and space travel. Maybe you missed the story that the $20 million tickets to space are SOLD OUT until 2009 I think that demostrated market demand is what Virgin & that other guy are hoping to sell their space traveling ticket to.

    As people aquire more wealth and free time, they will be able to fund more exotic items like space travel.

    Yes, I agree capitalism has flaws... what system doesn't? Corruption is a difficult thing to counter, even in a system with checks&balances.

    Intelligence, genius and foresight are not a boon to a person, but are a terrible curse. The feeling of helplessness and sorrow is overwhelming and crippling.


    Ignorance is bliss.. or "I want to die peacefully in my sleep like my grandpa... not kicking & screaming like the passengers in his car."
    --
    If the govt becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law, it invites man to become his own law, it invites anarchy
  32. Third Brain... by FlyingSquidStudios · · Score: 1

    Sounds great! Who's going to be the first sucker- er- I mean brave volunteer to beta test it?

  33. "our technology"? by totalctrl · · Score: 1

    he designed the Cray XMP in US, now the one he worked on in China is a new design.

    i think what you meant should be "his technology"...

  34. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by An+Onerous+Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Might I add that this abdication has turned out to be wildly successful?
    Not universally. In health care, our mostly private system is the most expensive in the world, yet we have about the same life expectancy as Cuba (with a higher infant mortality rate). In agriculture, we overproduce and overconsume things that are frankly not good for us. Our food is overprocessed, our diets too high in lard and sugar, and we eat far more than is healthy (in no small part thanks to the unceasing, mind-warping advertisements plastered on every visible surface in our country).

    This is in no small part due to government agricultural subsidies, but the fact that these subsidies continue despite the fact that they actively undermine our health has to say something about the power our government grants business.

    Meanwhile, the wages of the poorest 40% of Americans have hardly budged since the 1970s, while the richest 1% of Americans now own about half the wealth in this country. Is that the sort of economy anyone would plan, or anyone would ask for? Besides the aforementioned 1%, I mean.

    In a way, we have the worst sort of mix of private and public: a government which allows business to write its rules. Capitalism is no more a panacea than communism. Global capitalism isn't all prosperity and health and flat-screen TVs; it also brings wage arbitrage, huge wealth inequalities, unsustainable overconsumption, sweatshop labor, and a host of other problems. In your rush to defend the good aspects of the free market, you shouldn't ignore its pitfalls and limitations.
    --

    You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!

  35. Missing brains? by Kadin2048 · · Score: 1
    According to TFA

    1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerebellum
    2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cerebrum
    3. Third Brain
    4. ???
    5. Profit!
    --
    "Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
  36. Re:frikken traitors by Ardavan1367 · · Score: 2, Funny

    wtf? for the last time, America = Liberalism. drop your guns or die! why cant anyone understand that?! If all the armies in the world would accept this do you think there would be any more war? no because the age of cannibalism is OVEEEEEEEEEEEEEEER

  37. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by iminplaya · · Score: 2, Funny

    Intelligence, genius and foresight are not a boon to a person, but are a terrible curse.

    Consider yourself lucky to never have been afflicted with such a horrible condition :)

    --
    What?
  38. Re:frikken traitors by iminplaya · · Score: 1

    (sorry, but it is true, I call it like I see it)

    Maybe a trip to the optometrist is in order?

    --
    What?
  39. Re:THIRD brain? by WilliamSChips · · Score: 1

    The Cerebellum and the Cerebrum are the first two--in Latin(and in translation to most other languages), the words mean "big brain" and "small brain", although with a slight loss of accuracy.

    --
    Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
  40. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by scum-e-bag · · Score: 1
    Intelligence, genius and foresight are not a boon to a person, but are a terrible curse. The feeling of helplessness and sorrow is overwhelming and crippling.

    depression... when it happens to me, i call it depression.... unfortunately, i have found nothing which can fix it.
    --
    Does it go on forever?
  41. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by edward2020 · · Score: 1

    The 'sic' was in response to your use of 'future survival.' It is obvious that any survival is necessarily in the future - thus you repeat yourself when you use it. I also believe that I was quite clear in saying that I hope capitalism is one day replaced with something better. I also "attacked" communism because you say that it is superior to capitalism - this is foolish and you seem unable to address any of the specific points I made about failures in communism. Also - I find your attribution of a certain 'attitude' to myself to be funnier even than your assertion that communism is better than capitalism. Once again I must suggest that you do your research so that you are able to add constructively to the process and not resort to ad hominem attacks about my "attitude." What exactly do you think should replace capitalism? P.S. - I did not misuse 'sic' - from dictionary.com - denote that a word, phrase, passage, etc., that may appear strange or incorrect has been written intentionally or has been quoted verbatim.

    --
    Don't worry about the mule, just load the wagon.
  42. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by homer_s · · Score: 1

    huge wealth inequalities
    I've never understood this point.
    There are huge inequalities in the world in intelligence, in musical ability, athletic ability, application, perseverance, etc.
    Why would anyone expect that moneymaking ability should be different from all the other abilities? I mean do you complain that musical ability in the world is unfairly distributed?

  43. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by khallow · · Score: 1

    In other words, the key problems are in areas where we don't have free markets, but substantial government interference which in turn results in a lot of rent-seeking and other behavior that concentrates wealth and even harms the health of US citizens.

    PS, why do people keep refering to Cuba like the comparison were valid? Cuba (and other dictatorships like it) is know to distort statistics like this. And the statistics aren't the same. For example, stillbirths aren't routinely counted as infant deaths, and there are a number of premature babies with serious health problems born in the US that would be counted as stillbirths in Cuba.
  44. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by khallow · · Score: 1

    You missed the point - capitalism is the threat to the future of humanity. It is what virtually guarantees that global warming will exterminate us. If not that, then some other environmental disaster which will result from the unbelievably naive idea that the market can grow indefinitely on a finite resource base. As long as we do not have successful interstellar colonization, capitalism is irresponsible and a recipe for disaster. By definition capitalism is incapable of achieving successful interstellar colonization.

    You are batting around a strawman. Capitalism is merely an efficient way to move around "scarce" (ie, finite) resources. Externalities like carbon dioxide emissions are easy to factor in. Just make the cost of emitting a unit of CO2 (through taxes or a carbon market) equivalent to the actual cost it imposes. Growth is merely an outlook or expectation of the future. I think it is justified because of the massive amount of infrastructure both physical and social, and elevating billions of people out of poverty. Ie, the economy of the world is growing and has been doing so for centuries in terms of resources, infrastructure, technology, and population. If at some point, growth stops, then capitalism is an great way to adjust expectations to a zero growth world.

    End to poverty? Clearly you do not understand how capitalism works. Capitalism requires poverty to work.

    No, it merely requires that the parties have material needs and have something to trade in exchange. Having an extreme need is counterproductive since that often forces the party to resort to tactics like theft or extortion that undermine capitalism and can destroy infrastructure.

    Capitalism as a solution to global warming? Laughable. Show me the profit in that.

    There will be considerable profit in replacement and sequestration technologies once fossil fuel burning becomes expensive either due to global warming costs or "peak oil" scenarios.

    And end to wars like those of the 20th century? Just wait, you have not seen anything yet. Capitalism is the perfect machine for war.

    Yes, it is for producing war material. But wars are also vastly unprofitable for capitalist societies as a whole. It breaks expensive things including people who will require expensive care. And the risks involved are extraordinary. My take is that we won't see serious wars between two capitalist societies unless one or both are extremely unhealthy and on the verge of breaking down.

    The problem with the abdication of plans for humanity to corporations governed by the principles of capitalism, is that they are not responsible and accountable to the people, they can hide behind puppet governments giving the people the illusion of control over their nation and the future of humanity. Sorry, but the "invisible hand" is not adequate for this juncture in history, we need planning with intelligence behind it, not the haphazard and irresponsible philosophy of the market.

    Puppet governments? So you're really saying is that as usual the problem is in badly managed government not in some concept of capitalism? And why should "the people" automatically have a say in what a business does? Most of the time, it's simply not relevant to society what a business does as long as they conform to the laws of the land. For a government, virtually everyone pays for and receives some sort of benefit from government. So it matters what that government does and they should have a say in its operation. But a business often has a very narrow scope. Eg, it sells flavored carbonated water. So it's affairs really matter only to the customers, employees, owners, and anyone else who happens to have some sort of dealing with that business. Capitalism provides a great means by which to mediate between the interests of those parties without involving society or government in it.

    I have thought this through completely over decades, capitalism is fatally flawed and extremely dangerous to the

  45. Re:Third Brain?!?! Found the second one! by iaculus · · Score: 1

    > WHERE IS THE 2nd BRAIN?

    In your gut.

    The enteric nervous system is a bunch of neurons in the lining of your digestive system that are complex enough to be called a brain in their own right.

    http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1175/is _3_32/ai_54504396
    http://www.aikidoaus.com.au/dojo/docs/2nd_braina.h tm

  46. Keep Buying Shit at Walmart by pebear · · Score: 1

    The Chinese get their money to invest in this stuff because we keep purchasing cheap shit at Walmart. I'm not picking on Walmart per se it's just that we are addicted to buying cheaply made gizmatrons made in China a cut rate prices and we gota have them. We are boosting the Chi Coms by doing this and 1. I read the other day that some clown had sold the Chi Coms the plans to the steal bomber and now this, what a great deal, they got our telemetry and guidance systems thanks to Former Pres. Clinton and now the bomber shit and with this third brain crap the'll use it to bury us

    --
    Paul E. Bahre
  47. Movie Reference by The_mad_linguist · · Score: 1

    Wasn't the "Third Brain" a Macguffin in the Spykids franchise?

  48. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by An+Onerous+Coward · · Score: 1

    That's a completely different issue. Eugenics aside, we have no control over the distribution of the talents you listed. But as a society, we have a lot of control over how wealth is distributed.

    If you're trying to say that some of these attributes just naturally lead to making more money, then I'd agree. I'm fine with the fact that one person can earn more than another. What I have a problem with is income that is not earned: income generated entirely by ownership of some business, property, etc. I'm an unrepentant communist, in the sense that I believe that the wealth generated by a business should go to the people doing the work, and that mere ownership confers little value.

    --

    You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!

  49. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by An+Onerous+Coward · · Score: 1

    Here's a challenge: Name me the country that has fewer controls on its health care system, yet delivers better health outcomes. I can name plenty of countries where people live longer, and plenty where less is spent per capita. But in all those cases, the government is more in control of how health care is distributed, not less.

    Come to think of it, name the free market paradise where the food industry is both lightly regulated and primarily devoted to delivering the sort of food that will keep people healthy, instead of clogging arteries and turning its citizens into porkers.

    I have little hope that this free market utopianism, if implemented, could do anything beyond lining the pockets of the rich. Meanwhile, every country I perceive as having a better quality of life has a more stringent approach to regulating business than the U.S.

    While it's not easy to compare infant mortality rates between the two countries, it's safe to say that Cuba has an impressive health care system. Cubans live about as long as we do, even though we spend more per person on health care than Cubans spend on everything put together.

    Further, unless Cuba is flat-out lying about their infant mortality numbers (not just adding them up differently), they're doing stunningly well with regard to infant mortality. The U.S.--which has far greater resources to tackle the problem--is a pathetic underachiever by comparison.

    Some of America's poor performance may be attributable to different ways of collecting statistics, and to more active intervention in the cases of very high-risk births. But you're ignoring the role played by inadequate prenatal care, poor nutrition, poverty, and inadequate access to health care. It's hard to respect such a Panglossian attitude when there are plenty of better outcomes staring us in the face. Cuba, for its many faults, shows what can come of a government that is devoted to ensuring that everyone has access to basic medical care. The United States, for all its wonders, delivers terrible health outcomes at exorbitant rates, because it marries an obsession with technological gadgetry and a complete lack of interest in making sure that everyone has the basics.

    --

    You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!

  50. Re:A Great Leap Forward in computing? by khallow · · Score: 1

    Canada. Gets the best of both worlds. Access to cheap government subsidized health care, and just south is the US.