So, drones are at least carrying missiles. As for walking drones...walking robots are already in existence (see Honda's famous example). Refining them to be human equivalent, to the point where they can be operated by remote control, seems difficult but far from impossible - i.e., it's just going to take a few years to develop.
Drone warfare is likely coming. It's not completely here by any means, agreed, but it is in the near future.
Now all we have to do is mandate that the social security number be printed in cleartext on these licenses, along with a copy of one's signature of high enough quality that even a (good) photocopy could be be mistaken for the real thing.
"If you lose it, or allow it to be destroyed, you will be subject to immediate de-resolution. That will be all." - SARK
Encrypt the binaries, strong enough to prevent reverse-engineering of the type that could allow cheating (which is probably just about all r-e) for the expected initial life of the game (a few years, beyond which either the community will have adopted it or all but a few hobbyists will move on to something else). Anyone with a server and good bandwidth can, technically, run a server...though perhaps don't make the install too easy, requiring a bit more than a script kiddie's familiarity with the system. Have the binaries contact all other known servers upon startup and register themselves; this info gets included into the server binaries, and as patches to the game. (At worst, version 1.0 with all servers that no longer work can just go get a patch to the new server list.) Any given area is only on one server, which handles all interactions in that area (and has a max limit; portals between servers' worlds can be opened by mutual consent of the server operators, but these will automatically close if a server reaches its population limit). Item attributes may be hackable by server operators, but each item is tagged with where it was created and maybe with where it was modded; other servers can degrade items obtained from a hacked world, so that Swordz Of L33tn355 don't give you an advantage, or maybe even turn out to be cursed, when one takes them away from Bobz FF Warez.
I can see it technically working. But the big experiment would be social. Hmm, now where can one find a system of technical networks that are, by design, run by mutual agreements and technical solutions, with distributed processing integrated into the protocols themselves, rather than relying on any central service?
The first human trials of such detectors will begin in 2002. Dr. Charles Garcia of the University of Texas Medical School in Houston will be the surgeon in charge.
If she's that serious, then why doesn't she contact Dr. Garcia and try to convince him to let her be in the trials?
He isn't doing the discrediting in that case. He isn't even responsible for it. Other people discredit based on association with Warwick, perhaps, but that's their decision, not his.
Besides, even if they did launch their nukes at each other...at worst, India and Pakistan become glass crater fields, and we have more radiation in the atmosphere. A tragedy, certainly, but most of humanity survives. This is different than, say, all the NATO and Warsaw Pact countries firing enough weapons at each other to bring nuclear winter.
Ah, but the atmosphere can quickly radiate much of that energy back into space, without the cover of kicked-up dust that an asteroid impact would cause. If there is any damage, it would be greatly reduced.
I absolutely hate this constant discrimination against dead survivors.
Perhaps it was more intended against undead survivors? As in, no points if you're a vampire or something that doesn't notice asteroids to the head anyway.
And, of course, you have to live long enough to claim the chalupa...
We haven't bothered covering the recurring news of declining real-world violence (while video games just get more gruesome and explicit), mostly because it's the same story over and over.
But I, for one, applaud you for at least mentioning it where it is relevant.
People are not attacking him because he has exhibited aggressive behavior, but because he makes wild and unsubstantiated self-serving claims thus discrediting everyone else in his field of study.
Name one instance where he has discredited anyone else in his field of study. He may be pushing for the state of the art to be more advanced than it is, but he doesn't say that it is more advanced. Frankly, without the PR that he brings the field (even if the PR goes to him as a representative), funding for real cybernetics research would likely dry up. It's like with NASA: they have to do some things that capture the public imagination, or they couldn't get funding to do real space science. (Not that they've been all that responsible with the money they do get, but that's another thread.)
For example, what is so innovative about implanting a device in his arm that people have been implanting in dogs for quite a while?
Ever heard of the difference between animal trials and human trials for drugs? Dog biology and human biology aren't 100% identical. Yes, this was a small step, but it's a step that needed to be done.
This is a Microsoft sales exec we're talking about here. It is quite believable that such a person would write a letter like this.
We know that Linux is free in terms of acquisition cost. He's deliberately trying to confuse that with the cost of maintaining a server (and good administration always costs some non-zero amount of time, which the OS can affect but not completely eliminate; for a business, a hired admin's time == salary expenses == money). Of course, given all the Windows security holes that need to be learned about and patched (and the patches tested), we know that the cost of proper maintenance of a Windows server is higher than for a Linux server, assuming an admin who is competent in the OS being administered (i.e., don't compare cost to admin a Linux server with Windows-trained admins, to that for a Windows server with Windows-trained admins)...
BTW, note that the "insiders" are actually Microsoft employees, specialized in fabricating and justifying reasons why MS's products beat out Sun or Linux. Personally, while the role itself might have good use in other companies, I find the fact that they use it only for sales jargon, with no intention of using the reasons as indicators of ways that MS's products might actually be improved, to be misguided and shortsighted at best...and perhaps actually "evil".
No prob. 'Tis easy to lose one's way in these ethically murky areas. 'Tis one's duty to shine light on the paths being missed, in the hopes that those who seem lost may find their way...or may, in turn, shine their own light and show how oneself is the lost one.
And here is where capitalism saves. If thermometers really are that cheap compared to fish, who in their right mind (except for the scientists trying to gain a little more knowledge of genetics) would use the fish? Once the experiments are done, and the results duly recorded for posterity, the project is abandoned - or converted to a more useful tack.
How about if we just release one fish, which was going to die anyway? The fish would have an explicit purpose from the moment it is conceived; a destiny, and a promise that its life will not have been in vain.
That's far more than most humans ever get. (Not that I'd want it myself, but a lot of people seem to desire such.)
Actually, there is a relevant legal theory for this kind of insecurity. Take, for example, a swimming pool with no fence around it, in a neighborhood with lots of young kids. The pool tempts some kids to try to swim - but, for those who don't know how to swim, it can drown them. The legalese name is "attractive nuisance", and the owner of the pool can be held criminally negligent for not putting up even minimal security (say, a solid wood fence to obscure the pool from public view, or a chain link fence with a locked gate that at least prevents kids from getting at it without nontrivial effort).
Now imagine if, instead of being posted in the windows, the photos were in a drawer with a big-lettered sign - big enough to be readable from the street, through the open door the sign faces - that says "Nude pix! Do not open!". I suspect the same legal theory could apply, especially if the kid were to sustain any injury as a result. (The way the world is going, forever destroying one's ability to blindly trust big institutions might almost count as "injury". ^_-)
I know this applies in California, USA, at the least; does anyone know if it applies elsewhere?
The disconnect, as I see it, is between what these worms have the perceived potential to do and what they actually do. Which is, actually, the case with much potential terrorist acts.
Two popular (among gov't theorists) scenarios are a terrorist poisoning a reservoir, or piloting a cropduster loaded with biological agents over a city. Yet neither of those seems to have yet happened. Likewise, if nukes are so "easy" to obtain on the black market, why haven't we seen any suicide bombers with them yet?
Now, consider a worm designed to, say, sniff out the settings (including passwords) needed to gain root-level remote access to a large, typically insecure company's network. Perception: the hacker could, say, add himself to the company's payroll, with money going to a Caribbean or Swiss bank account, or just transfer much of the company's liquid assets to same, and that's just the easy stuff (not counting corporate espionage or, for companies with a lot of intellectual property, copying the IP - say, stealing the Windows source code with intent to post to the world). Reality: these programs almost never go beyond mere defacement or disablement of the systems, and spreading themselves; deeper hacking would require personal involvement and actual malice that the script kiddies usually lack (for example: even if one had complete access to Microsoft's networks, it would take ages to gather and document for public release even a mere majority of the Windows source code).
Not that I fully agree either, but one possible defense: just how many man-years has Gates' commitment to insecure OSes and ruthless trouncing of all would-be competitors cost?
Slashdot Mirror
Probably the second. ^_-
http://www.sptimes.com/News/101801/Worldandnation/ Armed_drones_in_comba.shtml
So, drones are at least carrying missiles. As for walking drones...walking robots are already in existence (see Honda's famous example). Refining them to be human equivalent, to the point where they can be operated by remote control, seems difficult but far from impossible - i.e., it's just going to take a few years to develop.
Drone warfare is likely coming. It's not completely here by any means, agreed, but it is in the near future.
BTW, I know the quote was actually "If you lose your disk...", but the ID cards in question aren't currently disk-shaped.
Actually, that wasn't a sig. It just looked like one. ^_^
Now all we have to do is mandate that the social security number be printed in cleartext on these licenses, along with a copy of one's signature of high enough quality that even a (good) photocopy could be be mistaken for the real thing.
"If you lose it, or allow it to be destroyed, you will be subject to immediate de-resolution. That will be all." - SARK
Hmm. Perhaps this could be done...
Encrypt the binaries, strong enough to prevent reverse-engineering of the type that could allow cheating (which is probably just about all r-e) for the expected initial life of the game (a few years, beyond which either the community will have adopted it or all but a few hobbyists will move on to something else). Anyone with a server and good bandwidth can, technically, run a server...though perhaps don't make the install too easy, requiring a bit more than a script kiddie's familiarity with the system. Have the binaries contact all other known servers upon startup and register themselves; this info gets included into the server binaries, and as patches to the game. (At worst, version 1.0 with all servers that no longer work can just go get a patch to the new server list.) Any given area is only on one server, which handles all interactions in that area (and has a max limit; portals between servers' worlds can be opened by mutual consent of the server operators, but these will automatically close if a server reaches its population limit). Item attributes may be hackable by server operators, but each item is tagged with where it was created and maybe with where it was modded; other servers can degrade items obtained from a hacked world, so that Swordz Of L33tn355 don't give you an advantage, or maybe even turn out to be cursed, when one takes them away from Bobz FF Warez.
I can see it technically working. But the big experiment would be social. Hmm, now where can one find a system of technical networks that are, by design, run by mutual agreements and technical solutions, with distributed processing integrated into the protocols themselves, rather than relying on any central service?
(Hint: we're using it.)
I know people who could make those devices. At least, I'm sure they've got a mirror of the instructions.
From the article:
The first human trials of such detectors will begin in 2002. Dr. Charles Garcia of the University of Texas Medical School in Houston will be the surgeon in charge.
If she's that serious, then why doesn't she contact Dr. Garcia and try to convince him to let her be in the trials?
What's a vacuum got that's so special anyway?
Nothing. Specifically, more nothing than anywhere else.
Why, yes, there is. (Inserted just to create a circular reference: follow the link, then follow the link back. ^_-)
G+B=Cyan, not Yellow.
He isn't doing the discrediting in that case. He isn't even responsible for it. Other people discredit based on association with Warwick, perhaps, but that's their decision, not his.
Besides, even if they did launch their nukes at each other...at worst, India and Pakistan become glass crater fields, and we have more radiation in the atmosphere. A tragedy, certainly, but most of humanity survives. This is different than, say, all the NATO and Warsaw Pact countries firing enough weapons at each other to bring nuclear winter.
Ah, but the atmosphere can quickly radiate much of that energy back into space, without the cover of kicked-up dust that an asteroid impact would cause. If there is any damage, it would be greatly reduced.
> free chalupas to any living survivors.
I absolutely hate this constant discrimination against dead survivors.
Perhaps it was more intended against undead survivors? As in, no points if you're a vampire or something that doesn't notice asteroids to the head anyway.
And, of course, you have to live long enough to claim the chalupa...
We haven't bothered covering the recurring news of declining real-world violence (while video games just get more gruesome and explicit), mostly because it's the same story over and over.
But I, for one, applaud you for at least mentioning it where it is relevant.
People are not attacking him because he has exhibited aggressive behavior, but because he makes wild and unsubstantiated self-serving claims thus discrediting everyone else in his field of study.
Name one instance where he has discredited anyone else in his field of study. He may be pushing for the state of the art to be more advanced than it is, but he doesn't say that it is more advanced. Frankly, without the PR that he brings the field (even if the PR goes to him as a representative), funding for real cybernetics research would likely dry up. It's like with NASA: they have to do some things that capture the public imagination, or they couldn't get funding to do real space science. (Not that they've been all that responsible with the money they do get, but that's another thread.)
For example, what is so innovative about implanting a device in his arm that people have been implanting in dogs for quite a while?
Ever heard of the difference between animal trials and human trials for drugs? Dog biology and human biology aren't 100% identical. Yes, this was a small step, but it's a step that needed to be done.
This is a Microsoft sales exec we're talking about here. It is quite believable that such a person would write a letter like this.
We know that Linux is free in terms of acquisition cost. He's deliberately trying to confuse that with the cost of maintaining a server (and good administration always costs some non-zero amount of time, which the OS can affect but not completely eliminate; for a business, a hired admin's time == salary expenses == money). Of course, given all the Windows security holes that need to be learned about and patched (and the patches tested), we know that the cost of proper maintenance of a Windows server is higher than for a Linux server, assuming an admin who is competent in the OS being administered (i.e., don't compare cost to admin a Linux server with Windows-trained admins, to that for a Windows server with Windows-trained admins)...
BTW, note that the "insiders" are actually Microsoft employees, specialized in fabricating and justifying reasons why MS's products beat out Sun or Linux. Personally, while the role itself might have good use in other companies, I find the fact that they use it only for sales jargon, with no intention of using the reasons as indicators of ways that MS's products might actually be improved, to be misguided and shortsighted at best...and perhaps actually "evil".
I didn't say I agreed. Just trying to point out what the sig's author might have been thinking.
No prob. 'Tis easy to lose one's way in these ethically murky areas. 'Tis one's duty to shine light on the paths being missed, in the hopes that those who seem lost may find their way...or may, in turn, shine their own light and show how oneself is the lost one.
And here is where capitalism saves. If thermometers really are that cheap compared to fish, who in their right mind (except for the scientists trying to gain a little more knowledge of genetics) would use the fish? Once the experiments are done, and the results duly recorded for posterity, the project is abandoned - or converted to a more useful tack.
No?
How about if we just release one fish, which was going to die anyway? The fish would have an explicit purpose from the moment it is conceived; a destiny, and a promise that its life will not have been in vain.
That's far more than most humans ever get. (Not that I'd want it myself, but a lot of people seem to desire such.)
Actually, there is a relevant legal theory for this kind of insecurity. Take, for example, a swimming pool with no fence around it, in a neighborhood with lots of young kids. The pool tempts some kids to try to swim - but, for those who don't know how to swim, it can drown them. The legalese name is "attractive nuisance", and the owner of the pool can be held criminally negligent for not putting up even minimal security (say, a solid wood fence to obscure the pool from public view, or a chain link fence with a locked gate that at least prevents kids from getting at it without nontrivial effort).
Now imagine if, instead of being posted in the windows, the photos were in a drawer with a big-lettered sign - big enough to be readable from the street, through the open door the sign faces - that says "Nude pix! Do not open!". I suspect the same legal theory could apply, especially if the kid were to sustain any injury as a result. (The way the world is going, forever destroying one's ability to blindly trust big institutions might almost count as "injury". ^_-)
I know this applies in California, USA, at the least; does anyone know if it applies elsewhere?
The disconnect, as I see it, is between what these worms have the perceived potential to do and what they actually do. Which is, actually, the case with much potential terrorist acts.
Two popular (among gov't theorists) scenarios are a terrorist poisoning a reservoir, or piloting a cropduster loaded with biological agents over a city. Yet neither of those seems to have yet happened. Likewise, if nukes are so "easy" to obtain on the black market, why haven't we seen any suicide bombers with them yet?
Now, consider a worm designed to, say, sniff out the settings (including passwords) needed to gain root-level remote access to a large, typically insecure company's network. Perception: the hacker could, say, add himself to the company's payroll, with money going to a Caribbean or Swiss bank account, or just transfer much of the company's liquid assets to same, and that's just the easy stuff (not counting corporate espionage or, for companies with a lot of intellectual property, copying the IP - say, stealing the Windows source code with intent to post to the world). Reality: these programs almost never go beyond mere defacement or disablement of the systems, and spreading themselves; deeper hacking would require personal involvement and actual malice that the script kiddies usually lack (for example: even if one had complete access to Microsoft's networks, it would take ages to gather and document for public release even a mere majority of the Windows source code).
Not that I fully agree either, but one possible defense: just how many man-years has Gates' commitment to insecure OSes and ruthless trouncing of all would-be competitors cost?