All these news articles about a laser could blind a pilot and knock down a plane just incited some bored and stupid people to try to do this. Its like all those kids imitiating MTV Jackass.
I was at a MIT class reunion last year and was amazing at how many of my acquaintences were in software engineering, yet did not major in computer science. I ran into a geologist, linguist, philosopher, biologist all doing S.E.
I dont know if there is any moral to this observation. Perhaps it is spend some time learning broad interests. Making money will come later.
As far as coursework- the trendy course I took in MITs business school became outdated in about three years. However, I still use the stuff from more basic C.S. courses which had little immediate practical value.
Science is *one* way of knowing things about the world: making models for repeatable observations. Because it has been so powerful in explaining many things and developing technology to make our lives comfortable, uninformed people ascribe more capability to the scientific method that it really has. The role of philosophy is to define the boundaries of science as a method of knowing things; then add to it with other methods of knowing things, i.e. speculation, intuition, faith, albeit.
Though the article is cautiously optimistic, it did mention some serious problems. First is that fuel cells currently cost about 100 times than a gasoline engine for the sme power. Second, the storage energy density of gasoline is 4-10 times better than hydrogen.
So MicroSoft will be abandoning their hopelessly inscure Windows operating system for Linux?
They could layer their GUIs and Office Apps on Linux much as Apple transferred to UNIX. (MS already has Office running under Linux, but refuses to market it.)
The simple secret is that they value education and intellectual endeavors while US culture belittles it. So their kids will strive for higher education. These two countries start from incredible handicaps of poverty and bad political systems, despite some glorious periods of history. However they are improving, will catch up and exceed the lazy and bloated USA.
Most bloggers cant write and lead incredibly boring lives. However, a few good blogs have been around since the beginning of Web. Then they were called other names such as frelance journalism or web diaries. I read a few of those every week.
The Venus Magellan radar mapper was designed nominally for one complete mapping cycle, but survived fve before NASA cut funds.
Galileo went nearly triple its two year lifetime. Both were almost out of orientation propellant and some instruments had failed.
Saturn Cassini is designed for four years and 86 moon flybys, but could go ten years or more.
It costs a good amount of money for ground crews to operate the probes and space network capacity.
Eventually you want the people to move on to the next probe, which is about every 2 or 4 years for Mars.
I think the motor died on one of the 12 wheels, so Spirit has been driving backwards for several months. Brakes are bad on two other wheels.
I hear the rovers may be able to traverse flat ground with only three functional wheels apiece. And they could still return some results immobile.
I think students show be able to cut and paste paragraph-size quotes as long as they indent them and give the URLs. Then put them into coherent order, add commentary and summaries. Most non-fiction writing is basically re-organizing existing information. Many blogs do this. (Many blogs also plagarize.) Perhaps calling writing class "blogging class" will trick students into writing more and better.
Several groups have been studying hanging kilometer long wires from satellites to generate energy for the satellite or space habitation. These operate on the same principle: exploit the electric field gradients in the earth's magnetosphere.
Several orbital experiments have been tried. I recall one time mechanical problems prevented full unwinding of the cable. Another time the cable shorted and burnt apart from a power surge. I suspects these bugs will be eventually fixed by the engineers.
Is anti-elitism elitist?
on
Defining Google
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
One of the more interesting comments in the 60-Minutes piece was about the peer pressure not show off one's new found stock option wealth. At many other Silicon Valley companies the nearly rich would quickly buy expensive cars and houses. Most of the people interviewed bragged how modestly they lived and how flashy people would not last at google.
"Filthy rich people can afford to be socialists."
companies that prize PhDs
on
Defining Google
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I picked up one some years back, mainly because I was too lazy to switch out of the academic rut for quite a long time.
I constantly read debates whether companies should hire PhDs because (1) they are too stuck up to perform more routine tasks, (2) ask for too much money, etc.
However I notice the real money engines- MicroSoft in the 1980s/1990s and Google in the 2000s- did seem to accumulate alot of them. There didnt seem to be the usual prejudiuce for or against a PhD. If your degree work or business experience demonstrated great intelligence and creativity- they want ed you, whether you were "over" or "under" educated.
Sub-orbital reaches speeds of Mach-5, well within
the capabilities of current aviation.
Oribtal re-entry reaches Mach-20, requiring heat shielding which adds weight and expense.
Which shrinking electronics every device is going to do all it can. You'll just have several form factors to choose from:
"pocket size" for voice communication, text messaging, web search, music, small photos, music;
"head phone" size;
"clip board" size;
"desk top" size;
"wall size" for high quality entertainment.
MIT's Project Oxygen is experimenting with ubiqitous computing with three of these form factors- handheld, desk and wall. Everything communicates through wifi.
The high tech industry announced another "super highway" between India and Silicon Valley.
It was too incovenient to rely on H1-B visas and off-shoring to do the job officials say.
This super highway will consist of direct high-speed airline service and dedicated InterNet-2 links.
The US Army uses the Phraselator handheld computer for field soldiers to communicate to Iraqi citizens. It voice-recognizes a stock phrase in the input language (English) and then speaks it in the target language (Arabic). No messy phrasebooks or keypads.
You can get these for other language pairs and activity domains.
Slashdot Mirror
All these news articles about a laser could blind a pilot and knock down a plane just incited some bored and stupid people to try to do this. Its like all those kids imitiating MTV Jackass.
A couple of these recent incidents the pilots complained of being temprarily blinded. Doesnt sound so innocent to me.
I was at a MIT class reunion last year and was amazing at how many of my acquaintences were in software engineering, yet did not major in computer science. I ran into a geologist, linguist, philosopher, biologist all doing S.E.
I dont know if there is any moral to this observation. Perhaps it is spend some time learning broad interests. Making money will come later.
As far as coursework- the trendy course I took in MITs business school became outdated in about three years. However, I still use the stuff from more basic C.S. courses which had little immediate practical value.
I see this all over Colorado already. But I haven't "peeked under the covers" to see how they were doing it.
Science is *one* way of knowing things about the world: making models for repeatable observations. Because it has been so powerful in explaining many things and developing technology to make our lives comfortable, uninformed people ascribe more capability to the scientific method that it really has. The role of philosophy is to define the boundaries of science as a method of knowing things; then add to it with other methods of knowing things, i.e. speculation, intuition, faith, albeit.
Though the article is cautiously optimistic, it did mention some serious problems. First is that fuel cells currently cost about 100 times than a gasoline engine for the sme power. Second, the storage energy density of gasoline is 4-10 times better than hydrogen.
So MicroSoft will be abandoning their hopelessly inscure Windows operating system for Linux?
They could layer their GUIs and Office Apps on Linux much as Apple transferred to UNIX. (MS already has Office running under Linux, but refuses to market it.)
The simple secret is that they value education and intellectual endeavors while US culture belittles it. So their kids will strive for higher education. These two countries start from incredible handicaps of poverty and bad political systems, despite some glorious periods of history. However they are improving, will catch up and exceed the lazy and bloated USA.
Most bloggers cant write and lead incredibly boring lives. However, a few good blogs have been around since the beginning of Web. Then they were called other names such as frelance journalism or web diaries. I read a few of those every week.
The Venus Magellan radar mapper was designed nominally for one complete mapping cycle, but survived fve before NASA cut funds. Galileo went nearly triple its two year lifetime. Both were almost out of orientation propellant and some instruments had failed. Saturn Cassini is designed for four years and 86 moon flybys, but could go ten years or more. It costs a good amount of money for ground crews to operate the probes and space network capacity. Eventually you want the people to move on to the next probe, which is about every 2 or 4 years for Mars.
I think the motor died on one of the 12 wheels, so Spirit has been driving backwards for several months. Brakes are bad on two other wheels. I hear the rovers may be able to traverse flat ground with only three functional wheels apiece. And they could still return some results immobile.
It was proposed for thr 1976 Vikings.
There was a mike on the failed 1999 mission.
I think students show be able to cut and paste paragraph-size quotes as long as they indent them and give the URLs. Then put them into coherent order, add commentary and summaries. Most non-fiction writing is basically re-organizing existing information. Many blogs do this. (Many blogs also plagarize.) Perhaps calling writing class "blogging class" will trick students into writing more and better.
Several groups have been studying hanging kilometer long wires from satellites to generate energy for the satellite or space habitation. These operate on the same principle: exploit the electric field gradients in the earth's magnetosphere.
Several orbital experiments have been tried. I recall one time mechanical problems prevented full unwinding of the cable. Another time the cable shorted and burnt apart from a power surge. I suspects these bugs will be eventually fixed by the engineers.
One of the more interesting comments in the 60-Minutes piece was about the peer pressure not show off one's new found stock option wealth. At many other Silicon Valley companies the nearly rich would quickly buy expensive cars and houses. Most of the people interviewed bragged how modestly they lived and how flashy people would not last at google.
"Filthy rich people can afford to be socialists."
I picked up one some years back, mainly because I was too lazy to switch out of the academic rut for quite a long time.
I constantly read debates whether companies should hire PhDs because (1) they are too stuck up to perform more routine tasks, (2) ask for too much money, etc. However I notice the real money engines- MicroSoft in the 1980s/1990s and Google in the 2000s- did seem to accumulate alot of them. There didnt seem to be the usual prejudiuce for or against a PhD. If your degree work or business experience demonstrated great intelligence and creativity- they want ed you, whether you were "over" or "under" educated.
Sub-orbital reaches speeds of Mach-5, well within the capabilities of current aviation. Oribtal re-entry reaches Mach-20, requiring heat shielding which adds weight and expense.
Which shrinking electronics every device is going to do all it can. You'll just have several form factors to choose from:
"pocket size" for voice communication, text messaging, web search, music, small photos, music;
"head phone" size;
"clip board" size;
"desk top" size;
"wall size" for high quality entertainment.
MIT's Project Oxygen is experimenting with ubiqitous computing with three of these form factors- handheld, desk and wall. Everything communicates through wifi.
Think of all the inaccurance in the term papers students cut-and-paste from wikipedia!
At $10,000+ to deliver a pound of payload, that is some expensive minibar.
I just turn all my senses off for 6 hour rest or 15 minute nap ... and ... the overload disappears!
He wrote one interesting book on hacking culture, then had free reign to blather on slashdot for a couple of years. Most of it was not good.
NASA is re-naming the science module the American Space Station High Observation Laboratory Environment after its management team.
The high tech industry announced another "super highway" between India and Silicon Valley. It was too incovenient to rely on H1-B visas and off-shoring to do the job officials say. This super highway will consist of direct high-speed airline service and dedicated InterNet-2 links.
The US Army uses the Phraselator handheld computer for field soldiers to communicate to Iraqi citizens. It voice-recognizes a stock phrase in the input language (English) and then speaks it in the target language (Arabic). No messy phrasebooks or keypads.
You can get these for other language pairs and activity domains.