To be really picky for the math lovers, I actually don't think pi or the Mandelbrot plots are as complex (in the true meaning of complex) as some people think. They might appear complex because they unpack into a very large system with a lot of points. But a good test of complexity is to apply data compression. When you compress a string of data to it smallest size, you can more clearly see true complexity (measured in size). Compressing a set doesn't change its complexity otherwise it would be 'lossy'. If we train a system to apply various formulas to a very long string of numbers and one of the formulas produces the same result, then the formula is interchangeable with the long string. Of course you need time to parse and enough memory to keep notes but eventually you find that the true complexity of pi is the smallest script that can produce it.
The alternative is to accept an incongruity: we say that both sides of the equation are equal while also saying that one side is more complex.
You were saying that you found proof that a simple system can produce a complex system. This means less complexity is producing more complexity without any donations of complexity from outside systems. Not only does the Mandelbrot not help you, I don't see any other example that does.
You mentioned a "window" that allows a fraction of the whole to be viewed. I think you were possibly referring to imaginary perspective and not mathematics. In math, you either work with all the data or a fraction of it. If you work with fractions of it and unless you fudge the numbers, you cannot produce the same exact result as a formula that works with the whole.
Therefore, we reach another incongruity. Either your window is equal in complexity to the system it is viewing and your claim that a simple system produced a complex system still wants for proof or you are saying the window only represents a fraction of the entire system and therefore the window is not equal to the whole complex system. For one system that is not equal to another system to somehow then become equal to that system, it must gain the information it is missing either from the other system or from somewhere else. Either way, the simple system must borrow from other systems and therefore can't be said to solely, "produce" the complex system. Next, we have a shell game or a simple admission of spontaneous creation of information.
However, if the complexity producing a mandlebrot graph is not taken into account when it referenced, then the reference is lossy. Therefore, the complexity of all the simple rules is equal to the complexity of their product.
Otherwise, you have proof of spontaneous generation of complexity!
This is like saying the symbol for pi is simple even though the number that results is complex. When you use the symbol in a formula and treat it as only simple in complexity, you loose most of its real complexity.
I have searched and haven't found anyone making a HDMI interface for analyzing the raw data stream. Is cracking the crypto for a show you just want to record for your own use illegal? I have an older tivo, looked into building a media PC but nobody makes a 1080P HDMI interface card so I can record shows to my hard drive. there is a 1080i solution that gets around the hdmi interface by using the analog component video ports but that is not what I am looking for.
Just because information is transistioning from paper to electronic form doesn't mean the original mission of the library is no longer needed.
If we find that people seem to be getting dumber, libraries are partially to blaim since they haven't stuck to their original mission.
Libraries are meant to lift up the community. To push knowledge into the dark corners that exist everywhere, not just in the minds of the poor. Funded by tax revenue, they increase the buying power of the average citizen and lower the cost to access knowledge. They increase demand for that knowledge by stocking it in warehouses. They make that knowledge easier to access by organizing it and providing assistance in finding it.
Some libraries have lost their way because they thought it was all about the paper. Some have simply become centers for the poor while the rest of the community is increasingly satisfied by the deluge of cheap, easy but often lower quality information found online. Notice how most of the information in wikipedia is pop culture? Where is the depth? The trend is towards the dumbing down of the citizenry.
Libraries have a mandate by the tax payers to continue to be booster for knowledge. Don't think installing a bunch of internet workstations is the going to be enough. They need to come to us, here on the internet. They need to put up websites where knowledge that normally costs extra, requires physically driving to a certain place or otherwise is difficult enough to access that more and more people simply ignore it, is made easily accessible. There is a lot of information on the internet but it lacks depth in key areas. Libraries have that information and can put it on the internet using public funds. The net result is that the average citizen is once again encouraged to delve deeper into the depths of knowledge and not be satisified by the common knowledge available on the street.
This boost of knowledge in a community can occur by:
1. Provide access to paid information services on the internet (newspapers, etc) for no extra charge
2. Scan and digitize information on a ongoing basis and make it available online. negotiate copyright access for the community
3. Organize information so that it is easier to find. this means developing websites that are easy to use and provide quick access to democratizing knowledge
And I am sure there is more, have to go before I can finish writing this...
I simply said taking risks involves faith. I said this because sometimes people shun faith like it is a bad thing. I agree that the faith in question can be more or less reasonable depending on your standard. But faith, in itself is neither good nor bad. It's what you believe in that makes it good or bad and that qualification depends on your perspective.
I like your explanation of a type of faith which most people would agree is good. A faith that given your understanding of a clearly posted standard and your striving to adhere to that standard, that your work would then receive a good review.
The use of the word "faith" for some people is like a "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" type issue. Faith in some particular things (like God) has been judged bad by some people. But rather than saying your beliefs are wrong, they seek to say all kinds of faith are also bad. Maybe this is going to require another changing of the meaning of a word. But then what word will we use to describe the situation you provided (work getting a good review) above? Faith is trusting in the proof that does not yet exist. How reasonable that faith is could be scored on the ratio of unproven to proven facts within a particular belief system.
And understand that some questions are so big that the best we have done so far is to postulate concepts that are mostly unproven. I can see how this would make them controversial.
Would you say that the quality of a particular faith is based on how reasonable it is? Reasonable in this case being that which is proven by observation. Specifically, scientific observation. A hypothesis, for example, typically consists of some already proven things and some not yet proven things. It is preferred to have hypotheses that are mostly proven with a small unproven part that involves an easy experiment. That is preferred, but not always what we get for now.
I agree that a person could choose to only embrace faith that is based on 99.9% proven fact. Thereby seeking the smallest amount of faith possible without denying that some faith is a fact of life.
My original statement stands. In order to risk, we have to have some sort of faith. The argument obviously is therefore about the quality of that faith.
From the article above, "By 31 percent to 18 percent, more liberals than conservatives report seeing a specter." So even the demographic that is often included in the "reason" catagory have something they believe in.
Faith is a good thing. Otherwise no one would take risks.
Does this indicate a loss of information or merely a preference for a particular part of the set? If information is being lost, wouldn't that indicate that mutation has occured (a processed also observed with viruses)?
Is there any place I can donate to her legal expenses? I have already googled for such a site, no luck. A lot of people will benefit from this decision, at least we could contribute a small amount.
Trademarks are a way to get around good limitations in patents (like the pesky fact that patents expire).
All a monopoly has to do is claim that their technical design is so recognized by consumers that they claim a trademark on it. Then it doesn't matter if the patent expired. Sure, the USPTO claims to not allow trademarks on patentable ideas, but it happens. The USPTO is just too overworked. Companies know this and force trademarks through anyways. Then one day you find out that a particular idea or standard is completely inaccessible to you forever.
Trademarks don't expire nor can they be revoked after they pass the 5yr no-contest period. They are much stronger than a patent and a common form of abuse now with big companies.
Did you know for example that the cylinder shape is irrevocably trademarked for certain products?
And this is just one of many examples. This and other reasons is why people are calling for IP reform.
peter
Re:Beyond publicity, is there a point?
on
Blu-ray Laser Gadget
·
· Score: 2, Informative
- The big diff between the $1k and $2k blue laser is the frequency. 473nm vs 405nm. It is not unusual to see a 5x price difference between 100nm of emission. Same thing with LEDs.
- Basically, there is quite a bit you can do with 405nm that you can't do or do as well with say 650nm (red). Briefly: fluoroscopy, higher speed optical comms, nano-scale work, gas spectroscopy, holographic storage, etc. As we get into the higher frequencies even more applications such as portable weapons, etc.
- The average home has 1/2 dozen or more laser diodes. Most are in the cheaper/lower frequencies. As the cost comes done on the higher frequencies, this will open up the floodgates. If you recall, when laser were first invented they were called a, "good idea with no practical use". Sound like some of the posts to this thread?
- The higher the frequency, the more effective the energy against the target. As a result, a 20mw 405nm is more destructive than a 60mw 650nm for example. Incidentally, the reason laser diode power output is rising in disk players is that is allows the disk to be spun faster. This maintains the average energy per data area. Historically, the biggest impediment to faster CDR/RW speeds has been the availability of the high power laser diodes. We are going to continue to see applications held up by the availability of sufficient laser diodes in desired frequencies and power levels until investment dramatically increases.
- One of the difficulties with the higher frequencies is that the same energetic advantages of the wavelength work against the very materials of the diode. Basically the diode attacks itself. This reduces the lifespan of the device for a particular drive level. Early blue laser diodes had a lifespan measured in 100s of hours. The 405nm devices used in the disk players may only be good for 2-5k hours, depending on the drive level. This will improve of course. Eventually the 405nm 20mw devices will cost less than $5 and last 50k hours or more.
- Basically, putting an expensive laser diode in a handheld pointer is mostly for fun at this point. People with money who also know lasers realize that with a 405nm device they are going to see very unusual things. For example, imagine what a 405nm pointer looks like when shone against a 3d object painted with fluorescent material. Some people buy the latest game or sci-fi movie, others buy rare laser pointers. As these devices become more available, creative people will find more uses for them. Like I said earlier, laser diodes are already quite common in the average home or business.
- Our government is going to have a real problem with high power laser diodes in the near future. Without going into details, advanced laser diodes can have significant public threat. Right now the law is fairly lax and not enforced. I am not for more laws but I don't want to have to wear eye protection every time I attend a public event. It will be a sticky issue and I hope that whatever the solution, it provides the most liberty for scientific experimentation.
Remember the scene in Minority Report when Mr. Cruise was using the gesture interface to manipulate some data? That was all good until the next thing he did. He then saved the file to a cute little laser disk, popped out the cartridge and turns around and then loaded it into another machine just a few feet away. I was thinking, "What! No network?!" Then I remembered, this is a movie made by Hollywood. Could it be that Hollywood wants you to think removable media is cool and high tech?
Maybe the reporter hasn't done much research on wifi. There are several municipal networks in north america that are much larger than 6 square km. Maybe they meant the program was larger in some other aspect?
Google brought up a Business Week article with the top 10 city networks. Some are over 100 sq miles in size:
Slashdot Mirror
The alternative is to accept an incongruity: we say that both sides of the equation are equal while also saying that one side is more complex.
You were saying that you found proof that a simple system can produce a complex system. This means less complexity is producing more complexity without any donations of complexity from outside systems. Not only does the Mandelbrot not help you, I don't see any other example that does.
You mentioned a "window" that allows a fraction of the whole to be viewed. I think you were possibly referring to imaginary perspective and not mathematics. In math, you either work with all the data or a fraction of it. If you work with fractions of it and unless you fudge the numbers, you cannot produce the same exact result as a formula that works with the whole.
Therefore, we reach another incongruity. Either your window is equal in complexity to the system it is viewing and your claim that a simple system produced a complex system still wants for proof or you are saying the window only represents a fraction of the entire system and therefore the window is not equal to the whole complex system. For one system that is not equal to another system to somehow then become equal to that system, it must gain the information it is missing either from the other system or from somewhere else. Either way, the simple system must borrow from other systems and therefore can't be said to solely, "produce" the complex system. Next, we have a shell game or a simple admission of spontaneous creation of information.
Otherwise, you have proof of spontaneous generation of complexity!
This is like saying the symbol for pi is simple even though the number that results is complex. When you use the symbol in a formula and treat it as only simple in complexity, you loose most of its real complexity.
Which is more complex? What a system can learn or it's ability to learn?
It may be what we have learned is easier for us to comprehend and therefore appears more impressive.
I have searched and haven't found anyone making a HDMI interface for analyzing the raw data stream. Is cracking the crypto for a show you just want to record for your own use illegal? I have an older tivo, looked into building a media PC but nobody makes a 1080P HDMI interface card so I can record shows to my hard drive. there is a 1080i solution that gets around the hdmi interface by using the analog component video ports but that is not what I am looking for.
If we find that people seem to be getting dumber, libraries are partially to blaim since they haven't stuck to their original mission.
Libraries are meant to lift up the community. To push knowledge into the dark corners that exist everywhere, not just in the minds of the poor. Funded by tax revenue, they increase the buying power of the average citizen and lower the cost to access knowledge. They increase demand for that knowledge by stocking it in warehouses. They make that knowledge easier to access by organizing it and providing assistance in finding it.
Some libraries have lost their way because they thought it was all about the paper. Some have simply become centers for the poor while the rest of the community is increasingly satisfied by the deluge of cheap, easy but often lower quality information found online. Notice how most of the information in wikipedia is pop culture? Where is the depth? The trend is towards the dumbing down of the citizenry.
Libraries have a mandate by the tax payers to continue to be booster for knowledge. Don't think installing a bunch of internet workstations is the going to be enough. They need to come to us, here on the internet. They need to put up websites where knowledge that normally costs extra, requires physically driving to a certain place or otherwise is difficult enough to access that more and more people simply ignore it, is made easily accessible. There is a lot of information on the internet but it lacks depth in key areas. Libraries have that information and can put it on the internet using public funds. The net result is that the average citizen is once again encouraged to delve deeper into the depths of knowledge and not be satisified by the common knowledge available on the street.
This boost of knowledge in a community can occur by:
1. Provide access to paid information services on the internet (newspapers, etc) for no extra charge
2. Scan and digitize information on a ongoing basis and make it available online. negotiate copyright access for the community
3. Organize information so that it is easier to find. this means developing websites that are easy to use and provide quick access to democratizing knowledge
And I am sure there is more, have to go before I can finish writing this...
I like your explanation of a type of faith which most people would agree is good. A faith that given your understanding of a clearly posted standard and your striving to adhere to that standard, that your work would then receive a good review.
The use of the word "faith" for some people is like a "throwing the baby out with the bathwater" type issue. Faith in some particular things (like God) has been judged bad by some people. But rather than saying your beliefs are wrong, they seek to say all kinds of faith are also bad. Maybe this is going to require another changing of the meaning of a word. But then what word will we use to describe the situation you provided (work getting a good review) above? Faith is trusting in the proof that does not yet exist. How reasonable that faith is could be scored on the ratio of unproven to proven facts within a particular belief system.
And understand that some questions are so big that the best we have done so far is to postulate concepts that are mostly unproven. I can see how this would make them controversial.
Would you say that the quality of a particular faith is based on how reasonable it is? Reasonable in this case being that which is proven by observation. Specifically, scientific observation. A hypothesis, for example, typically consists of some already proven things and some not yet proven things. It is preferred to have hypotheses that are mostly proven with a small unproven part that involves an easy experiment. That is preferred, but not always what we get for now.
I agree that a person could choose to only embrace faith that is based on 99.9% proven fact. Thereby seeking the smallest amount of faith possible without denying that some faith is a fact of life.
My original statement stands. In order to risk, we have to have some sort of faith. The argument obviously is therefore about the quality of that faith.
From the article above, "By 31 percent to 18 percent, more liberals than conservatives report seeing a specter." So even the demographic that is often included in the "reason" catagory have something they believe in. Faith is a good thing. Otherwise no one would take risks.
Is this another example of Information Entrophy? Some systems reduce to a more crystaline form as they lose information.
Here's another 100mw from a DVD burner starting a fire (with the help of some gun powder). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RS_nF7t6feE
Does this indicate a loss of information or merely a preference for a particular part of the set? If information is being lost, wouldn't that indicate that mutation has occured (a processed also observed with viruses)?
Is there any place I can donate to her legal expenses? I have already googled for such a site, no luck. A lot of people will benefit from this decision, at least we could contribute a small amount.
All a monopoly has to do is claim that their technical design is so recognized by consumers that they claim a trademark on it. Then it doesn't matter if the patent expired. Sure, the USPTO claims to not allow trademarks on patentable ideas, but it happens. The USPTO is just too overworked. Companies know this and force trademarks through anyways. Then one day you find out that a particular idea or standard is completely inaccessible to you forever.
Trademarks don't expire nor can they be revoked after they pass the 5yr no-contest period. They are much stronger than a patent and a common form of abuse now with big companies.
Did you know for example that the cylinder shape is irrevocably trademarked for certain products?
This probably sounds incredible to most people. Search the http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/gate.exe?f=searchss&sta te=qdqb5u.1.1 for trademark #75501874 (I have not found a way to link directly to a record in their database).
And this is just one of many examples. This and other reasons is why people are calling for IP reform.
peter
- The big diff between the $1k and $2k blue laser is the frequency. 473nm vs 405nm. It is not unusual to see a 5x price difference between 100nm of emission. Same thing with LEDs.
- Basically, there is quite a bit you can do with 405nm that you can't do or do as well with say 650nm (red). Briefly: fluoroscopy, higher speed optical comms, nano-scale work, gas spectroscopy, holographic storage, etc. As we get into the higher frequencies even more applications such as portable weapons, etc.
- The average home has 1/2 dozen or more laser diodes. Most are in the cheaper/lower frequencies. As the cost comes done on the higher frequencies, this will open up the floodgates. If you recall, when laser were first invented they were called a, "good idea with no practical use". Sound like some of the posts to this thread?
- The higher the frequency, the more effective the energy against the target. As a result, a 20mw 405nm is more destructive than a 60mw 650nm for example. Incidentally, the reason laser diode power output is rising in disk players is that is allows the disk to be spun faster. This maintains the average energy per data area. Historically, the biggest impediment to faster CDR/RW speeds has been the availability of the high power laser diodes. We are going to continue to see applications held up by the availability of sufficient laser diodes in desired frequencies and power levels until investment dramatically increases.
- One of the difficulties with the higher frequencies is that the same energetic advantages of the wavelength work against the very materials of the diode. Basically the diode attacks itself. This reduces the lifespan of the device for a particular drive level. Early blue laser diodes had a lifespan measured in 100s of hours. The 405nm devices used in the disk players may only be good for 2-5k hours, depending on the drive level. This will improve of course. Eventually the 405nm 20mw devices will cost less than $5 and last 50k hours or more.
- Basically, putting an expensive laser diode in a handheld pointer is mostly for fun at this point. People with money who also know lasers realize that with a 405nm device they are going to see very unusual things. For example, imagine what a 405nm pointer looks like when shone against a 3d object painted with fluorescent material. Some people buy the latest game or sci-fi movie, others buy rare laser pointers. As these devices become more available, creative people will find more uses for them. Like I said earlier, laser diodes are already quite common in the average home or business.
- Our government is going to have a real problem with high power laser diodes in the near future. Without going into details, advanced laser diodes can have significant public threat. Right now the law is fairly lax and not enforced. I am not for more laws but I don't want to have to wear eye protection every time I attend a public event. It will be a sticky issue and I hope that whatever the solution, it provides the most liberty for scientific experimentation.
Remember the scene in Minority Report when Mr. Cruise was using the gesture interface to manipulate some data? That was all good until the next thing he did. He then saved the file to a cute little laser disk, popped out the cartridge and turns around and then loaded it into another machine just a few feet away. I was thinking, "What! No network?!" Then I remembered, this is a movie made by Hollywood. Could it be that Hollywood wants you to think removable media is cool and high tech?
Google brought up a Business Week article with the top 10 city networks. Some are over 100 sq miles in size:
http://images.businessweek.com/ss/06/08/muni_wifi/ index_01.htm