I can see where you're coming from, however, I have to very strongly disagree. Before I explain why, for all it's worth I'll let you know I have studied electrical engineering, civil engineering and computer science, but neither is currently my field of work (conveniently, this means I am sufficiently qualified to speak, yet I don't really have a reason to be biased).
I think this argument has become ridiculous, and I'm not referring simply to the parent post. First of all, most of the comments I've seen describe engineering as something that inherently involves a great responsibility. Engineers don't only build bridges or airplanes. One simple example: engineers design autonomous or remote controlled unmanned underwater exploration equipment. Yeah, they cost a lot, but if they sink they're not likely to kill anyone.
One of your arguments is that in engineering (I'll assume you mean "as opposed to software engineering"), "if you screw up, people die". Consider the electronics on board airplanes or space shuttles, and even the electronics that are used to control the brakes on a car. Someone previously commented that his car computer failed and that he was lucky the hardware was made by engineers because otherwise he'd be dead... Because seriously, I've never heard of a fan belt breaking, or the hardware of a car being poorly designed... wtf? (remember the Ford Pinto? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Pinto#Safety_problems) What would happen if there were some serious flaw in the electronics of a car type that resulted in hundreds of serious accidents and a class-action lawsuit? I can assure you that the software engineers that designed the software would be just as liable as the hardware engineers would if the engines had been randomly blowing up.
Do you realize that a multitude of things these days are controlled by software (including nuclear power plants) and do you realize the huge consequences the failures of some of these systems could have? Maybe not all software is rigorously tested, but then again, it depends on the application. I run Office at work and Excel crashes pretty frequently. If a person were to die every time Excel crashed, I can assure you it wouldn't be released until it was failsafe. The same goes with a lot of engineering equipment. That's a financial question of cost/benefit.
Now to say that Computer Science isn't a science is another ridiculous statement, and you haven't studied it. And the application of the knowledge acquired from Computer Science is used to make faster and more reliable software, the same way that the application of physics and chemistry is used to make faster and more reliable cars. If you still doubt me, take a class on algorithms.
I hate it when people are narrow-minded and only consider one example. If you consider that airplanes are engineering and video games are programming, you'll conclude that programming is not engineering.
The application of physics, math and chemistry is engineering. The application of computer science is software engineering.
These people are currently being prosecuted under Swedish law, or depending on how far it goes, maybe European law. If they were subject to U.S. law, they would probably have been indicted a few years ago. This debate has been going on for a long time. The essence of it is that in Sweden it is NOT illegal to link to copyrighted material, as long as it never passes "through your hands" (or servers).
This recent development appears to be that they're accusing them of making profits off copyrighted material. Under Swedish law, they still can't prosecute them for simply linking so they have to come up with something!
Last time I checked, engineers were building bridges. Terrorists were blowing them up.
Seriously though, I can't say any of the engineers I knew in college would fit the description (disclaimer: I am biased as I was one of them). It is true that many had the feeling their field was a superior field of study, but:
a. I could say that about friends in many other fields
b. This claim was somewhat "accepted" as engineering was also considered among the more difficult majors at my school In any case, the engineers I knew were far too pragmatic and rationalist to believe in doctrine. I'm quite sure there were quite a few atheists among them too.
Then again, if you're going to be building bombs and blowing things up, having an engineer around is probably a good idea.
I agree with the above comment. Survival of the fittest is still applicable, but it has a different meaning in the context of our more technologically advanced world. The question nevertheless remains whether we have "evolved" or simply diversified, and perhaps comes down to our definition of evolution.
Keeping in mind Sartin's comment, being able to walk no longer provides (as much of) a benefit to survival and reproduction, but does not being able to walk make you *better* suited to survive and reproduce in your environment? Probably not. As such, I don't really think it can be called an "evolution".
With science and technology, many mutations, which otherwise would provide us with an advantage (or disadvantage, in the case of not being able to walk) no longer have the same consequences. They're only evolutionary if you abstract them from our current high-tech environment.
So, my question again, have we really evolved that much or have we simply diversified?
I have a question in response to this (it's not rhetorical, I actually would like an answer):
From what I learned in school, evolution was mostly driven by the idea of survival of the fittest - i.e. the body doesn't mutate in order to "adapt" to a certain external stimulus, rather random mutations happen, and the ones that make an individual more likely to survive are the ones... well, more likely to survive (or more likely to give a reproductive advantage).
Nowadays, science and technology have brought us an edge which we wouldn't have as naked human beings. And people with disabilities or serious genetic diseases -who 100 years ago would not reach the age of 2- can now survive long enough to even reproduce. Survival of the fittest no longer seems to be as applicable here.
I can understand that we now have greater genetic diversity from this, and that certain genetic mutations (as mentioned in a comment above) may be beneficial in the long term but not the short term, but how exactly are we evolving given that no specific mutated allele has greater chances of reproduction than your common allele?
Are we really still "evolving" or are we just seeing much greater diversity? I wonder if our evolution is now more in our science and technology than in our physical bodies...
Wow, crazy that I'm going back to this discussion, but I've been laughing so hard at everything you've said, I love it.
I have a number of comments:
I. I'm not sure how good you are at martial arts, but I've practiced different martial arts for a number of years (around 7 or 8). In every one of them, I've been taught to look at a person's torso, in order to see two things:
1. motion at the periphery, both legs and arms. If you look at his face or into his eyes, you will likely not see his legs. If you look at his legs you won't see his arms. When he does strike, you see the motion, which leads your brain to interpret the actual body part. You don't have any close detail of that arm, the way you would when looking at it, but you've probably seen it before so you can guess what it looks like. I'm not saying your parry is guesswork, I'm just saying that you don't need to see a scar on his arm to know what his arm looks like and where it is. Your brain actually does extrapolate to make it look like the arm.
2. feints: yeah, since you're so good at martial arts, you will know that you can usually tell a feint by a guy's posture, just looking at his torso. That's because a hit won't have any power unless the guy shifts his weight and uses his whole body.
II. Did you try that link that was posted in a previous comment? Find your blind spot flash game
You'll be surprised that were there was a black spot, it is now "filled in" by the red background... Still don't believe it?
III. I'm sure you've counted all those times that guy turned around to look at you because you were staring really hard at him. Have you counted all the times when the guy didn't turn around to look at you? The idea that our selective memory tends to believe in supernatural things like that is quite documented. For instance, I often think "this is going to happen in about 2 minutes". It happens about 1 time out 10, but when it does, my reaction is "wow, I predicted it once again! Just like last time!" And I always remember the times it works, not the times it doesn't work. Same way, sometimes I can "feel" there's something wrong. Sometimes I'm right, and I could explain that I picked up on subconscious clues. But then again, sometimes I'm just wrong.
I'm sure it makes you feel special to believe these things. And yeah, we all are special in our own ways. But you probably haven't understood how complex the brain actually is, and how much work it's doing that you're not seeing (or in this case, that you think you're really seeing).
Why not simply install Windows XP on the macbook? They're Intel macs, you can run Windows XP natively on a macbook, it shouldn't be a big problem.
This being said, I think a lot of people have trouble switching from Windows to OS X, simply because they're two different systems. It's natural to dislike what you're not used to and, which you don't feel confident using. However, maybe instead of having to learn it to like, it's the other way around, you have to make her like it for her to learn it. By showing her all the cool features of apps like iPhoto (make photo albums or calendars and have them published!), iCal, iSync to sync your address book with your phone over bluetooth, Dashboard, etc. you can probably convince her that it's worth learning. Yes, all in all OS X and XP are quite different, but in terms of usability OS X is very user-friendly and it won't take that long for her to learn it.
I see numbers of 9,350 cells per cubed millimeter which is 93,500 per cube centimeter.
Going from millimeter to centimeter in 1d is a factor of 10. Going from cubed millimeter to cubed centimeter (3 dimensions) is a factor of 1,000.
So you'd have 9,350,000 cells per cubed centimeter if your numbers are correct.
Risk is often well described by the notion of "expected cost", which is simply the [probability of the event happening] x [cost of that event]. E.g. if you have a 10% probability of losing $100, or a 1% probability of losing $1000, the expected cost is approximately the same.
With a 10% probability of losing $100, you might be losing more often, but your expected cost will be the same.
The probability of a regular flu outbreak may be high (happens every year), "many" people die every year.
Conversely, the probability of a widespread avian flu pandemic may be extremely low, but the loss in the event of such a pandemic would be (from what I understand) huge.
I haven't looked at statistics or forecasts in the event of an avian flu pandemic, but my guess is the "expected cost" is significant, even after factoring the probability.
So yeah, more people may be dying from regular flu, that doesn't necessarily imply that it's a greater risk.
You see, those countries' peoples will have a chance to fight because they know what it is. Depends on how bad they're willing to shed blood. THat's why their "leaders" rule with an iron hand. They're AFRAID OF THE PEOPLE.
You do realize that when those countries DO get up and fight, if successful they'll - at best - end up with a system similar to ours. You're never easily going to get rid of corruption, as it's in the nature of some people.
So yes, we have corruption too. Lots of it. But as opposed to certain countries, you CAN actually do some business here without a bribe.
Can't speak for the exact amount, but I heard $10,000 a few times.
This article may help: http://thedartmouth.com/2007/03/29/news/riaa/
"In the past, before the RIAA implemented its pre-litigation settlement policy, settlements generally ranged from $5,000 to $10,000, Donin said."
also...
"But if one takes the case to court, according to the Dartmouth Copyright Policy and Guidelines, the RIAA can sue for $150,000 for each instance of willful infringement.
"Each time you upload or download a copyrighted work from someone, that could be a separate case of willful infringement," Donin said. "They could sue for $150,000 per song.""
A dozen or so students at my college were contacted by the RIAA, including a couple people I know personally. From what I understand, most of them settled for a sum of $10,000. That's a lot of money for a college student.
I don't disagree with the extensive research you've done, but you've missed the point.
(actually you did contradict yourself, when stating that
the demand for off-board video cards has [...]decreased and then saying
Even thou [...] the market share of offboard cards has decreased, the absolute number of cards sold has increased - market share has decreased, but demand hasn't if more cards are sold)
The point is that in general gadgets get better, but year-over-year prices for a "standard" gadget don't change considerably (keep in mind inflation before you start quoting prices from the 80s!).
A standard laptop is probably around $1,200, and that's about what it was 4 years ago. But my laptop today runs circles around my laptop 4 years ago.
This is generally valid once a gadget has been "commoditized", not when it's a brand new really expensive technology.
The reaction he had was because hard drives have dropped from $80 to $50. If hard drives were just getting better capacity as part of the general improvement of technology, you'd still expect them to stay approximately the same price. The fact that the price dropped by a huge percentage like that indicates something else is happening in the market, hence it's "surprising".
Take a minute and ask yourself why they bothered to write an article about it...
Hmm, that's actually what he said. He stated that an average video card costs about the same now as it did in 2000, even if you get more bang for your buck now.
His point is that it's surprising to him that a hard drive in a laptop costs considerably less today than last year. He would expect it to have much greater capacity, but cost around the same price as last year.
While I'm not positive this is the case, I'd bet it's more profitable to sell you a replacement cord that costs 10 cents to produce and sells for a couple of bucks than it is to sell you a $10 iron. That entirely depends on your margin for the iron. Keep in mind that if you're selling a replacement cord that cost you 10 cents to produce for $2, you're making $1.90 (profit margin is 95%). Even with a profit margin as low as 30%, you'd be making more selling an iron for $10 ($3). Seems the $3 is more profitable.
Yeah, but my guess is it's a lot cheaper for someone who isn't particularly rich to buy a used gasoline- or diesel-engine car than a new electric car.
Then take a look at how many electric pickup trucks and utilitarian vehicles are on the market.;)
A lot of people need their cars for more than just going to work.
When storing electricity becomes easier, and electric cars become cheaper, electric cars will most likely take over. But I don't see that happening for another 10 years. So for now, I think it's important to work on getting hybrid adoption higher while waiting for more useful and affordable electric cars.
On another note, did you guys hear that Formula 1 is going "green"? Formula SAE, the undergrad engineering competition has featured a hybrid class for a couple years now.
Slashdot Mirror
I can see where you're coming from, however, I have to very strongly disagree. Before I explain why, for all it's worth I'll let you know I have studied electrical engineering, civil engineering and computer science, but neither is currently my field of work (conveniently, this means I am sufficiently qualified to speak, yet I don't really have a reason to be biased).
I think this argument has become ridiculous, and I'm not referring simply to the parent post. First of all, most of the comments I've seen describe engineering as something that inherently involves a great responsibility. Engineers don't only build bridges or airplanes. One simple example: engineers design autonomous or remote controlled unmanned underwater exploration equipment. Yeah, they cost a lot, but if they sink they're not likely to kill anyone.
One of your arguments is that in engineering (I'll assume you mean "as opposed to software engineering"), "if you screw up, people die". Consider the electronics on board airplanes or space shuttles, and even the electronics that are used to control the brakes on a car. Someone previously commented that his car computer failed and that he was lucky the hardware was made by engineers because otherwise he'd be dead... Because seriously, I've never heard of a fan belt breaking, or the hardware of a car being poorly designed... wtf? (remember the Ford Pinto? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Pinto#Safety_problems) What would happen if there were some serious flaw in the electronics of a car type that resulted in hundreds of serious accidents and a class-action lawsuit? I can assure you that the software engineers that designed the software would be just as liable as the hardware engineers would if the engines had been randomly blowing up.
Do you realize that a multitude of things these days are controlled by software (including nuclear power plants) and do you realize the huge consequences the failures of some of these systems could have? Maybe not all software is rigorously tested, but then again, it depends on the application. I run Office at work and Excel crashes pretty frequently. If a person were to die every time Excel crashed, I can assure you it wouldn't be released until it was failsafe. The same goes with a lot of engineering equipment. That's a financial question of cost/benefit.
Now to say that Computer Science isn't a science is another ridiculous statement, and you haven't studied it. And the application of the knowledge acquired from Computer Science is used to make faster and more reliable software, the same way that the application of physics and chemistry is used to make faster and more reliable cars. If you still doubt me, take a class on algorithms.
I hate it when people are narrow-minded and only consider one example. If you consider that airplanes are engineering and video games are programming, you'll conclude that programming is not engineering.
The application of physics, math and chemistry is engineering.
The application of computer science is software engineering.
Now that I've said it, it's not going to happen.
These people are currently being prosecuted under Swedish law, or depending on how far it goes, maybe European law. If they were subject to U.S. law, they would probably have been indicted a few years ago. This debate has been going on for a long time. The essence of it is that in Sweden it is NOT illegal to link to copyrighted material, as long as it never passes "through your hands" (or servers).
This recent development appears to be that they're accusing them of making profits off copyrighted material. Under Swedish law, they still can't prosecute them for simply linking so they have to come up with something!
Last time I checked, engineers were building bridges. Terrorists were blowing them up.
Seriously though, I can't say any of the engineers I knew in college would fit the description (disclaimer: I am biased as I was one of them). It is true that many had the feeling their field was a superior field of study, but:
a. I could say that about friends in many other fields
b. This claim was somewhat "accepted" as engineering was also considered among the more difficult majors at my school
In any case, the engineers I knew were far too pragmatic and rationalist to believe in doctrine. I'm quite sure there were quite a few atheists among them too.
Then again, if you're going to be building bombs and blowing things up, having an engineer around is probably a good idea.
Does this mean we could be AI?
A "don't be evil" company you might have heard of happens to significantly subsidize the purchase of a hybrid Toyota Prius.
I agree with the above comment. Survival of the fittest is still applicable, but it has a different meaning in the context of our more technologically advanced world. The question nevertheless remains whether we have "evolved" or simply diversified, and perhaps comes down to our definition of evolution.
Keeping in mind Sartin's comment, being able to walk no longer provides (as much of) a benefit to survival and reproduction, but does not being able to walk make you *better* suited to survive and reproduce in your environment? Probably not. As such, I don't really think it can be called an "evolution".
With science and technology, many mutations, which otherwise would provide us with an advantage (or disadvantage, in the case of not being able to walk) no longer have the same consequences. They're only evolutionary if you abstract them from our current high-tech environment.
So, my question again, have we really evolved that much or have we simply diversified?
I have a question in response to this (it's not rhetorical, I actually would like an answer):
From what I learned in school, evolution was mostly driven by the idea of survival of the fittest - i.e. the body doesn't mutate in order to "adapt" to a certain external stimulus, rather random mutations happen, and the ones that make an individual more likely to survive are the ones... well, more likely to survive (or more likely to give a reproductive advantage).
Nowadays, science and technology have brought us an edge which we wouldn't have as naked human beings. And people with disabilities or serious genetic diseases -who 100 years ago would not reach the age of 2- can now survive long enough to even reproduce. Survival of the fittest no longer seems to be as applicable here.
I can understand that we now have greater genetic diversity from this, and that certain genetic mutations (as mentioned in a comment above) may be beneficial in the long term but not the short term, but how exactly are we evolving given that no specific mutated allele has greater chances of reproduction than your common allele?
Are we really still "evolving" or are we just seeing much greater diversity? I wonder if our evolution is now more in our science and technology than in our physical bodies...
Wow, crazy that I'm going back to this discussion, but I've been laughing so hard at everything you've said, I love it.
I have a number of comments:
I. I'm not sure how good you are at martial arts, but I've practiced different martial arts for a number of years (around 7 or 8). In every one of them, I've been taught to look at a person's torso, in order to see two things:
1. motion at the periphery, both legs and arms. If you look at his face or into his eyes, you will likely not see his legs. If you look at his legs you won't see his arms. When he does strike, you see the motion, which leads your brain to interpret the actual body part. You don't have any close detail of that arm, the way you would when looking at it, but you've probably seen it before so you can guess what it looks like. I'm not saying your parry is guesswork, I'm just saying that you don't need to see a scar on his arm to know what his arm looks like and where it is. Your brain actually does extrapolate to make it look like the arm.
2. feints: yeah, since you're so good at martial arts, you will know that you can usually tell a feint by a guy's posture, just looking at his torso. That's because a hit won't have any power unless the guy shifts his weight and uses his whole body.
II. Did you try that link that was posted in a previous comment? Find your blind spot flash game
You'll be surprised that were there was a black spot, it is now "filled in" by the red background... Still don't believe it?
III. I'm sure you've counted all those times that guy turned around to look at you because you were staring really hard at him. Have you counted all the times when the guy didn't turn around to look at you? The idea that our selective memory tends to believe in supernatural things like that is quite documented. For instance, I often think "this is going to happen in about 2 minutes". It happens about 1 time out 10, but when it does, my reaction is "wow, I predicted it once again! Just like last time!" And I always remember the times it works, not the times it doesn't work. Same way, sometimes I can "feel" there's something wrong. Sometimes I'm right, and I could explain that I picked up on subconscious clues. But then again, sometimes I'm just wrong.
I'm sure it makes you feel special to believe these things. And yeah, we all are special in our own ways. But you probably haven't understood how complex the brain actually is, and how much work it's doing that you're not seeing (or in this case, that you think you're really seeing).
If you know that, why don't you skip the other places and look there first? :P
This thing is awesome: after shaking my phone and causing the vibrator to work for 10 minutes, I know my battery's depleted!
Why not simply install Windows XP on the macbook? They're Intel macs, you can run Windows XP natively on a macbook, it shouldn't be a big problem.
This being said, I think a lot of people have trouble switching from Windows to OS X, simply because they're two different systems. It's natural to dislike what you're not used to and, which you don't feel confident using. However, maybe instead of having to learn it to like, it's the other way around, you have to make her like it for her to learn it. By showing her all the cool features of apps like iPhoto (make photo albums or calendars and have them published!), iCal, iSync to sync your address book with your phone over bluetooth, Dashboard, etc. you can probably convince her that it's worth learning. Yes, all in all OS X and XP are quite different, but in terms of usability OS X is very user-friendly and it won't take that long for her to learn it.
Going from millimeter to centimeter in 1d is a factor of 10. Going from cubed millimeter to cubed centimeter (3 dimensions) is a factor of 1,000.
So you'd have 9,350,000 cells per cubed centimeter if your numbers are correct.
They could start with a football player to make the task easier!
Risk is often well described by the notion of "expected cost", which is simply the [probability of the event happening] x [cost of that event]. E.g. if you have a 10% probability of losing $100, or a 1% probability of losing $1000, the expected cost is approximately the same.
With a 10% probability of losing $100, you might be losing more often, but your expected cost will be the same.
The probability of a regular flu outbreak may be high (happens every year), "many" people die every year.
Conversely, the probability of a widespread avian flu pandemic may be extremely low, but the loss in the event of such a pandemic would be (from what I understand) huge.
I haven't looked at statistics or forecasts in the event of an avian flu pandemic, but my guess is the "expected cost" is significant, even after factoring the probability.
So yeah, more people may be dying from regular flu, that doesn't necessarily imply that it's a greater risk.
You do realize that when those countries DO get up and fight, if successful they'll - at best - end up with a system similar to ours. You're never easily going to get rid of corruption, as it's in the nature of some people.
So yes, we have corruption too. Lots of it. But as opposed to certain countries, you CAN actually do some business here without a bribe.
I know it's fairly recent, but just so you know, Gmail supports both IMAP (Idle) and POP3.
Good for you. I'll let her know she didn't settle for $10,000. I'm sure she'll be delighted to hear that.
From what I heard from the person I know, they settled for $10,000. I won't speak for the people I don't know, but otherwise I maintain the statement.
Can't speak for the exact amount, but I heard $10,000 a few times.
This article may help: http://thedartmouth.com/2007/03/29/news/riaa/
"In the past, before the RIAA implemented its pre-litigation settlement policy, settlements generally ranged from $5,000 to $10,000, Donin said."
also...
"But if one takes the case to court, according to the Dartmouth Copyright Policy and Guidelines, the RIAA can sue for $150,000 for each instance of willful infringement.
"Each time you upload or download a copyrighted work from someone, that could be a separate case of willful infringement," Donin said. "They could sue for $150,000 per song.""
A dozen or so students at my college were contacted by the RIAA, including a couple people I know personally. From what I understand, most of them settled for a sum of $10,000. That's a lot of money for a college student.
(actually you did contradict yourself, when stating that the demand for off-board video cards has [...]decreased and then saying Even thou [...] the market share of offboard cards has decreased, the absolute number of cards sold has increased - market share has decreased, but demand hasn't if more cards are sold)
The point is that in general gadgets get better, but year-over-year prices for a "standard" gadget don't change considerably (keep in mind inflation before you start quoting prices from the 80s!).
A standard laptop is probably around $1,200, and that's about what it was 4 years ago. But my laptop today runs circles around my laptop 4 years ago.
This is generally valid once a gadget has been "commoditized", not when it's a brand new really expensive technology.
The reaction he had was because hard drives have dropped from $80 to $50. If hard drives were just getting better capacity as part of the general improvement of technology, you'd still expect them to stay approximately the same price. The fact that the price dropped by a huge percentage like that indicates something else is happening in the market, hence it's "surprising".
Take a minute and ask yourself why they bothered to write an article about it...
Hmm, that's actually what he said. He stated that an average video card costs about the same now as it did in 2000, even if you get more bang for your buck now.
His point is that it's surprising to him that a hard drive in a laptop costs considerably less today than last year. He would expect it to have much greater capacity, but cost around the same price as last year.
Yeah, but my guess is it's a lot cheaper for someone who isn't particularly rich to buy a used gasoline- or diesel-engine car than a new electric car.
;)
A lot of people need their cars for more than just going to work.
Then take a look at how many electric pickup trucks and utilitarian vehicles are on the market.
When storing electricity becomes easier, and electric cars become cheaper, electric cars will most likely take over. But I don't see that happening for another 10 years. So for now, I think it's important to work on getting hybrid adoption higher while waiting for more useful and affordable electric cars.
On another note, did you guys hear that Formula 1 is going "green"? Formula SAE, the undergrad engineering competition has featured a hybrid class for a couple years now.