Since there's not a lot to this story, I'll go ahead on a tangent and recommend a book called "Song of the Dodo." It's an excellent book about extinction (and evolution, and biological diversity). There's a section in it about the thylacine.
Highly recommended, definitely up there on my list of science books.
Hm. I would expect "gost" to be a soft O, more like "gossed". For an alternative to ghost, the closest you could get is goast maybe? (No, don't point out that gold, gopher, and gory are counter-examples, I can't hear you.)
Heh. When I asked my neighbor to stop running his power saw at 10 at night, his excuse was that my girls occasionally scream a little while they're playing outside during daylight hours. Apparently those are equivalent.
There is definitely relativity to noise. Once I lived half a block from the interstate, just outside of downtown Chicago. Despite the constant hum, I almost never noticed it, other than the very occasional semi hitting the engine brakes hard, and even that was just kind of a pronounced note out of the background mishmash.
Now I live outside a town of 20,000, in a tiny subdivision, and ten times a day I'm thinking to myself, "What are those crazy neighbors up to?" when they do anything at all, because it's generally so quiet *any* noise is disruptive.
Then again, I've got young kids and a territorial dog now, whereas I was a blithely oblivious 20-something back then. Life circumstances may have something to do with my sensitivity to the noise as well.
For me, the following was one of the more interesting pieces:
Senescent cells carry the type of DNA damage that should spur a protective protein, called p53, to put them down. Instead, the researchers found that a different protein, FOXO4, latches onto p53 and prevents it from doing its duty. To counteract this effect, De Keizer and colleagues designed a molecule, known as a peptide, that carries a shortened version of the segment of FOXO4 that attaches to p53.
Does this mean we have an internal cleanup mechanism, but somehow it's gotten subverted over the years? Our ancestors may have had the benefit of p53, until something changed and we started developing FOXO4 when we hadn't before? Or somewhere along the line the amount of FOXO4 in our bodies increased? That seems fascinating to me.
My first reaction was also to think, "That doesn't seem like a very useful mutation/bit of evolution" but of course most of the age-related stuff won't be important until you're beyond the age of reproduction, so it's probably relatively easier for that kind of problem to sneak in than something that affects the young. I also wonder if it's *just* a mutation, or if the FOXO4 is doing something else more useful for us when we're young, that the tradeoff is worth it?
I swear I see this argument every time: "There are extremists shouting DOOM! so that invalidates the scientists presenting measured arguments." It's a poor argument.
That's the problem with all the Neal Stephenson I've read. He goes in-depth into interesting topics, but it's more like sitting in a college classroom than something you could put on screen. I guess you could handwave through it the way a lot of sci-fi movies do and maybe get away with it.
Instead of a reboot, I'd like to see John Steakley's 'Armor', which basically borrows the premise of Starship Troopers the book (a bug war on an alien planet) but is primarily action focused. When I saw the first preview for the ST movie, I actually thought it *was* Armor before they showed the title. Also, it's just a really good book.
PacMan might be a good choice, as it indicates radii and circumferences, and also looks like a pie with a wedge cut out. A pain to draw, though.
As an aside, as a college student, I enjoyed learning new uses for most of the Greek letters, and liked to keep track of which ones didn't have an assigned special meaning yet.
Hadn't heard of Project Euler before, but it seems nifty. I've been meaning to practice in a new language, and was looking for a source of mini-projects to work on. That seems like it may be a good source of ideas.
Glancing through the first page of the archives, all the ones I saw seemed pretty approachable. Just out of curiosity I jumped into the 400's, and I'll admit I couldn't even tell what the question was asking me to do. Presumably if done in order they'd make sense (acquired vocabulary, notation) but there does seem to be a learning curve.
Just curious, is that for electronic or print versions?
That kind of pricing model might make sense for new books or indie authors: cheap for older books, or to entice the curious, and then more expensive for the newer books and/or once readers are hooked.
I wouldn't expect that for something that old, though.
It's growth. It's just worded strangely. Slashdot has a long-established tradition that everything must be expressed in terms of how much smaller it will be. I.e., "robot growth is expected to be an inverse one-fifteenth times smaller shrinkage in quantity in four years".
"X times larger"? What kinda cockamamie phrasing is that?
One of my college physics lab assignments was to use electric and magnetic fields to steer the beam of a cathode ray tube. It was surprisingly fun!
One of my physics classmates set up one of these, hooked it up to a stereo, and let it dance to the music. This was before I'd seen any other audio visualizers, so it seemed pretty neat to me.
Maybe I read it wrong, but I thought Plato wasn't big on democracies, either: they cause pandering to the masses, a focus on the short-term over long term, shallow discourse, and an obsession with fads. Plus it creates the need to search for a value that's missing. (Gee, that guy might be on to something.)
Plato's top choice seemed to be a benevolent dictatorship. Trick is, how do you get yourself a benevolent one, and not one of the malicious ones?
I had the same curiosity regarding gout, which is a buildup of uric acid. The two attacks I had, a year apart, were both during winter months, during periods of relative inactivity. I theorized if I spent more time working up a sweat, that might help flush it out of my system. I didn't go so far as to research it, but some experimental evidence seemed to suggest it helped.
Slashdot Mirror
Since there's not a lot to this story, I'll go ahead on a tangent and recommend a book called "Song of the Dodo." It's an excellent book about extinction (and evolution, and biological diversity). There's a section in it about the thylacine.
Highly recommended, definitely up there on my list of science books.
Hm. I would expect "gost" to be a soft O, more like "gossed". For an alternative to ghost, the closest you could get is goast maybe? (No, don't point out that gold, gopher, and gory are counter-examples, I can't hear you.)
You know what? I just checked my map, and Chicago isn't even *in* England. What do they know about English? This is an outrage!
"Everyone needs to be sure to tighten THEY safety belt before approaching the cliff." ... aah, doesn't that feel better?
And yes, I noticed the same thing. Example could at least use the same word form as the headline.
Portmanteau. It was a very nuanced announcement.
Heh. When I asked my neighbor to stop running his power saw at 10 at night, his excuse was that my girls occasionally scream a little while they're playing outside during daylight hours. Apparently those are equivalent.
There is definitely relativity to noise. Once I lived half a block from the interstate, just outside of downtown Chicago. Despite the constant hum, I almost never noticed it, other than the very occasional semi hitting the engine brakes hard, and even that was just kind of a pronounced note out of the background mishmash.
Now I live outside a town of 20,000, in a tiny subdivision, and ten times a day I'm thinking to myself, "What are those crazy neighbors up to?" when they do anything at all, because it's generally so quiet *any* noise is disruptive.
Then again, I've got young kids and a territorial dog now, whereas I was a blithely oblivious 20-something back then. Life circumstances may have something to do with my sensitivity to the noise as well.
For me, the following was one of the more interesting pieces:
Senescent cells carry the type of DNA damage that should spur a protective protein, called p53, to put them down. Instead, the researchers found that a different protein, FOXO4, latches onto p53 and prevents it from doing its duty. To counteract this effect, De Keizer and colleagues designed a molecule, known as a peptide, that carries a shortened version of the segment of FOXO4 that attaches to p53.
Does this mean we have an internal cleanup mechanism, but somehow it's gotten subverted over the years? Our ancestors may have had the benefit of p53, until something changed and we started developing FOXO4 when we hadn't before? Or somewhere along the line the amount of FOXO4 in our bodies increased? That seems fascinating to me.
My first reaction was also to think, "That doesn't seem like a very useful mutation/bit of evolution" but of course most of the age-related stuff won't be important until you're beyond the age of reproduction, so it's probably relatively easier for that kind of problem to sneak in than something that affects the young. I also wonder if it's *just* a mutation, or if the FOXO4 is doing something else more useful for us when we're young, that the tradeoff is worth it?
Yeah. I'd think a fraction of that would be enough to disappear someplace cheap and quiet, and enjoy what life has to offer.
I swear I see this argument every time: "There are extremists shouting DOOM! so that invalidates the scientists presenting measured arguments." It's a poor argument.
You add some angular momentum. That's the way 9 out of 10 physicists prefer to get their spin.
Isaac Asimov, for improperly formulating the three laws of robotics. If he'd gotten them right, none of this would be necessary.
That's the problem with all the Neal Stephenson I've read. He goes in-depth into interesting topics, but it's more like sitting in a college classroom than something you could put on screen. I guess you could handwave through it the way a lot of sci-fi movies do and maybe get away with it.
Instead of a reboot, I'd like to see John Steakley's 'Armor', which basically borrows the premise of Starship Troopers the book (a bug war on an alien planet) but is primarily action focused. When I saw the first preview for the ST movie, I actually thought it *was* Armor before they showed the title. Also, it's just a really good book.
There's a Greek myth of a king asking a wise god, "What is the greatest gift man could receive?"
Answer: "To never have been born."
PacMan might be a good choice, as it indicates radii and circumferences, and also looks like a pie with a wedge cut out. A pain to draw, though.
As an aside, as a college student, I enjoyed learning new uses for most of the Greek letters, and liked to keep track of which ones didn't have an assigned special meaning yet.
They ain't so pretty in base 7, is all I'm sayin'.
Hadn't heard of Project Euler before, but it seems nifty. I've been meaning to practice in a new language, and was looking for a source of mini-projects to work on. That seems like it may be a good source of ideas.
Glancing through the first page of the archives, all the ones I saw seemed pretty approachable. Just out of curiosity I jumped into the 400's, and I'll admit I couldn't even tell what the question was asking me to do. Presumably if done in order they'd make sense (acquired vocabulary, notation) but there does seem to be a learning curve.
... Reading a boot ...
Wait, they're Canadian? And what should they be reading about?
Just curious, is that for electronic or print versions?
That kind of pricing model might make sense for new books or indie authors: cheap for older books, or to entice the curious, and then more expensive for the newer books and/or once readers are hooked.
I wouldn't expect that for something that old, though.
It's growth. It's just worded strangely. Slashdot has a long-established tradition that everything must be expressed in terms of how much smaller it will be. I.e., "robot growth is expected to be an inverse one-fifteenth times smaller shrinkage in quantity in four years".
"X times larger"? What kinda cockamamie phrasing is that?
Hah-ha! Wait, you wouldn't download a car, would you?
One of my college physics lab assignments was to use electric and magnetic fields to steer the beam of a cathode ray tube. It was surprisingly fun!
One of my physics classmates set up one of these, hooked it up to a stereo, and let it dance to the music. This was before I'd seen any other audio visualizers, so it seemed pretty neat to me.
Maybe I read it wrong, but I thought Plato wasn't big on democracies, either: they cause pandering to the masses, a focus on the short-term over long term, shallow discourse, and an obsession with fads. Plus it creates the need to search for a value that's missing. (Gee, that guy might be on to something.)
Plato's top choice seemed to be a benevolent dictatorship. Trick is, how do you get yourself a benevolent one, and not one of the malicious ones?
I had the same curiosity regarding gout, which is a buildup of uric acid. The two attacks I had, a year apart, were both during winter months, during periods of relative inactivity. I theorized if I spent more time working up a sweat, that might help flush it out of my system. I didn't go so far as to research it, but some experimental evidence seemed to suggest it helped.