The problem with with asking if an animal is "sentient" is that any test rigorous enough to rule out some species will, if applied fairly, also rule out 90% of humans, and I do not just mean the young and the enfeebled. Ultimately, however, we do not need to know sentience or consciousness (be careful), what we need first is "is this entity entitled to protection under the law?
Particle physics has a dogma (e.g, nothing with rest-mass NE 0 can travel at or above the speed of light) that makes a claim of faster-thjan-light neutrinos a claim that requires extraordinary proof, so any claim to have discovered faster-than-light neutrinos results in immediate scrutiny. Biomedicine and social science have much looser dogma, dogma that is often very much polluted by people whose world views are often much more driven by wishful thinking (unicorns for EVERYONE!), than by tested science. So I agree with the posters who claim that the problem is not throughout science, being more a problem at the left end of the scientific spectrum (a spectrum described XKCD).
Not at all surprising, given that all of my fungi-infested girl-friends tended to eat or otherwise use active bacteria-infused yogurt to treat their yeast infections (yeast being fungi).
What is it that we think makes Scientology so egregious when compared with other tax-exemptions? It seems to me that if this gets pushed hard enough we will conclude that "tax-exempt status" for religious groups leads to a violation of the amendment, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". Only by NOT granting tax exempt status do we get government out of the business of deciding what is a valid religion and what is not. Look how well it worked to let government define marriage. Be careful what you wish for.
We need to remember that most of us would not know how to create a financial derivative wrapping up bad mortgages into a pretty package and then selling them to banks who then get the government to cover the losses at the high end leaving the luzr$ holding underwater assets that they have to just give up. $12T worth of equity vanishing in the process. Yet these are the guys who pay us the best. The "techs" who lurk at the fringe, and who do not really know a packet from a pickle should be treated like physician's assistants or paralegals. Useful to do the routine stuff, but needing tech supervision or nudging aside when the going gets tough. They might be the hardware guys opening the hood and putting in the parts, while we wait at the keyboard to make it work. In a repair shop, it makes sense to form these sorts of teams, but for on-site delivery it is usually a one-man team, and in that case, we need to be careful to send in the paratechs only when called for, sending in the true techs when necessary. In the end, it is about education. Educate the users about why they sometimes only need the power user, sometimes the paratech and sometimes the tech. Educate the support spectrum to have proper (if limited) respect for each other and keeping each level engaged.
Sheesh, you'd think we thought being techie qualified us to do brain surgery, for crying out loud.
The sound I use to indicate that the system is shutting down (the "that's it man, game over (NSFW)") sound bite from Aliens. Icons could be the same way, I would think, sort of like themes. But ultimately icons are shortcuts to replace long words like "Save" or "Stop". And look how far the Egyptians of 4,000 years ago got with their icon-based language. And cross cultural issues abound. The red "X" used in 1990's German software caught me off guard, compared to common English usage to indicate "Delete".
In the final analysis, icons are like standards... everyone has their own, sometimes just for marketing.
I was putting pressure on my Representative (R) though I had no influence with my two Senators since they are both from the (D) party. I pushed for the "the Internet is a utility" based on first principles in the Republican party, which does not always lead to wanting private ownership of public goods.
A friend told me that in China the elevator door etiquette was for in-bounds to stand in the door and, similar to the German train behavior, block the door. He is big, and would stand in the elevator with his nose almost touching the door waiting for it to open. Startled a few people, for cure.
Social interaction rules are learned behavior, and we are all both teacher and student, if it is done right. Unfortunately, as a child of the 60's, I know that many of my peers refused to be bound by cultural customs, leading to a ruder world, IMNSHO.
A vessel at anchor always has right of way (though I would not try this with a small boat and a big tanker). So I sometimes stop, take out cell phone and pretend to be answering a call. Since I am stopped, I have the right of way under most social rules of traffic in common spaces.
Turing's test was about the ability to imitate human behavior/knowledge. The real question we need to answer I will call the Mycroft test. The purpose of the test is to determine if the program has earned the right to not be turned off, that is, does it have a right to a trial before it is "terminated"? A program that has earned that right has crossed the blurry line between inanimate and "human" in a way that should be important to us. Defining a test that can measure this is at the heart of deciding what makes us us, vs what makes us tick.
They keep pushing these programs because they never heard of black markets, did not get the lesson in "life finding a way" in Jurassic Park, and for some reason while they believe in evolution vs creationism, they do not think the basic law of the genetic algorithm applies to behaviors (memes). The Soviets had almost 70 years to stamp out superstition and religion, but failed, in spite of some pretty horrific "scientifically justified" methods (not counting their flawed biological science models, thinking mostly of their flawed economic models).
While no one has ever suggested that science is subject to voting, it is naive to claim that opinion does not guide publication. If I wanted to argue data that showed the speed of light in vacuum was much different from the current estimate, my evidence has to be much better than if I were simply confirming a widely held number. AND, it is perfectly reasonable for a political body to declare that pi is 3.1416 for all calculations used in contracts and surveying. Not so reasonable is to hold that planning commissions cannot use the best science when planning for long terms (which they do, by their nature). See North Carolina's actions, which blocked use of the science.
But, in my opinion the best hedge we have is banks and insurance companies. As long as they are permitted to do the math, we will be safe (unless they are prevented from using their best estimates by social engineering in the "democratic" body politic). For example, in New Orleans I bet rational assessment of long term risk would hurt the poor the most, making for irrational attempts to legislate away risk by blocking its use in assessing mortgages, etc. Think of the whole real estate bubble and the good intentions but bad ideas that made home ownership a right, not to be denied just because the owner could not afford it.
How about a Google-enhancement to human driven cars that beeps, whistles or otherwise sound signals a human or large animal only when they are near the car or in the path thereof?
The ability to think meta is important. Some once pointed out that the US Constitution is not a suicide pact, even though without meta-thinking it appears to be so. This is a variation on the idea that the only thing we must not tolerate is intolerance. Do not be afraid to embrace this conflict.
Stingrays, also known as "cell site simulators" or "IMSI catchers," are invasive cell phone surveillance devices that mimic cell phone towers and send out signals to trick cell phones in the area into transmitting their locations and identifying information. When used to track a suspect's cell phone, they also gather information about the phones of countless bystanders who happen to be nearby.
So, I think the Stingray is used to track who and where, very similar to having a beat cop standing on the corner who recognizes you and notes that you just walked by. All the discussion here about wiretapping is just FUD.
Amazingly, this is the premise for my next SciFi novella - "StarEaters of Erdition", about a species of non-sentient astrophages. I think I'll use a plucky 70yo trans-species cyborg who's sentient self (hence, "who's") detects their existence and maps their trajectory from peta-peta-bytes of old Hubble data. Throw in a bit of a Cassandra complex (no one believes its (gender neutral pronoun) pronouncements). I think I'll cast Brent Spiner ("Data") as the carbon-based-component of the cyborg and George Takai ("Mr. Sulu") for the voice of the (nominally) silicone-based-component of the cyborg).
The article notes that Wisniewski says this is part of
"a very mature, well-oiled capitalist machine"
which is inaccurate and only feeds the populist anti-capitalist sentiment that is too often conflated with anti free-market rhetoric. It would be far more accurate to call this a "protection racket" akin to the crime bosses in New York who send thugs into shops, said thugs' opening line then being something like "this is a nice little shop you got here, it would be a real shame if something were to happen to it, like maybe a fire".
A poster wondered if anyone else has the Intelligence gathering budget that the US does. I wonder if NSA is the new NASA, in that it provides jobs for geeks the way the space program did. And by geeks I mean those gifted individuals who would be bored trying to help K-Tar-Mart better ship and sell diapers and bottled water. Give them a mission (save the world from terror, get to the moon) and make them feel special. Keep them busy so they don't just hack apart your world.
Denver already has the smog, now it can grow a narcotics trade as well. Then Nebraska will get some surplus drones and start a campaign agaist the drug trade, then...
My hack would be that any non-secure website would have its background image replaced at the browser end by a red warning background with a watermark "WARNING" embedded in it.
Slashdot Mirror
In a world gone mad, where pi is (int) 3 and dividing by 0 has a value, terror stalks the halls.
This question shows why we don't want English majors cross-training into programming. :-)
The problem with with asking if an animal is "sentient" is that any test rigorous enough to rule out some species will, if applied fairly, also rule out 90% of humans, and I do not just mean the young and the enfeebled. Ultimately, however, we do not need to know sentience or consciousness (be careful), what we need first is "is this entity entitled to protection under the law?
Particle physics has a dogma (e.g, nothing with rest-mass NE 0 can travel at or above the speed of light) that makes a claim of faster-thjan-light neutrinos a claim that requires extraordinary proof, so any claim to have discovered faster-than-light neutrinos results in immediate scrutiny. Biomedicine and social science have much looser dogma, dogma that is often very much polluted by people whose world views are often much more driven by wishful thinking (unicorns for EVERYONE!), than by tested science. So I agree with the posters who claim that the problem is not throughout science, being more a problem at the left end of the scientific spectrum (a spectrum described XKCD).
Not at all surprising, given that all of my fungi-infested girl-friends tended to eat or otherwise use active bacteria-infused yogurt to treat their yeast infections (yeast being fungi).
What is it that we think makes Scientology so egregious when compared with other tax-exemptions? It seems to me that if this gets pushed hard enough we will conclude that "tax-exempt status" for religious groups leads to a violation of the amendment, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". Only by NOT granting tax exempt status do we get government out of the business of deciding what is a valid religion and what is not. Look how well it worked to let government define marriage. Be careful what you wish for.
We need to remember that most of us would not know how to create a financial derivative wrapping up bad mortgages into a pretty package and then selling them to banks who then get the government to cover the losses at the high end leaving the luzr$ holding underwater assets that they have to just give up. $12T worth of equity vanishing in the process. Yet these are the guys who pay us the best. The "techs" who lurk at the fringe, and who do not really know a packet from a pickle should be treated like physician's assistants or paralegals. Useful to do the routine stuff, but needing tech supervision or nudging aside when the going gets tough. They might be the hardware guys opening the hood and putting in the parts, while we wait at the keyboard to make it work. In a repair shop, it makes sense to form these sorts of teams, but for on-site delivery it is usually a one-man team, and in that case, we need to be careful to send in the paratechs only when called for, sending in the true techs when necessary. In the end, it is about education. Educate the users about why they sometimes only need the power user, sometimes the paratech and sometimes the tech. Educate the support spectrum to have proper (if limited) respect for each other and keeping each level engaged.
Sheesh, you'd think we thought being techie qualified us to do brain surgery, for crying out loud.
The sound I use to indicate that the system is shutting down (the "that's it man, game over (NSFW)") sound bite from Aliens. Icons could be the same way, I would think, sort of like themes. But ultimately icons are shortcuts to replace long words like "Save" or "Stop". And look how far the Egyptians of 4,000 years ago got with their icon-based language. And cross cultural issues abound. The red "X" used in 1990's German software caught me off guard, compared to common English usage to indicate "Delete".
... everyone has their own, sometimes just for marketing.
In the final analysis, icons are like standards
the tail lights of the car in front of you are a pretty integral part of driving
Only if let them get and stay ahead of you ...
I was putting pressure on my Representative (R) though I had no influence with my two Senators since they are both from the (D) party. I pushed for the "the Internet is a utility" based on first principles in the Republican party, which does not always lead to wanting private ownership of public goods.
I thought ad hominum attacks were the preferred tool of the people with no science to use.
A friend told me that in China the elevator door etiquette was for in-bounds to stand in the door and, similar to the German train behavior, block the door. He is big, and would stand in the elevator with his nose almost touching the door waiting for it to open. Startled a few people, for cure. Social interaction rules are learned behavior, and we are all both teacher and student, if it is done right. Unfortunately, as a child of the 60's, I know that many of my peers refused to be bound by cultural customs, leading to a ruder world, IMNSHO.
A vessel at anchor always has right of way (though I would not try this with a small boat and a big tanker). So I sometimes stop, take out cell phone and pretend to be answering a call. Since I am stopped, I have the right of way under most social rules of traffic in common spaces.
Turing's test was about the ability to imitate human behavior/knowledge. The real question we need to answer I will call the Mycroft test. The purpose of the test is to determine if the program has earned the right to not be turned off, that is, does it have a right to a trial before it is "terminated"? A program that has earned that right has crossed the blurry line between inanimate and "human" in a way that should be important to us. Defining a test that can measure this is at the heart of deciding what makes us us, vs what makes us tick.
They keep pushing these programs because they never heard of black markets, did not get the lesson in "life finding a way" in Jurassic Park, and for some reason while they believe in evolution vs creationism, they do not think the basic law of the genetic algorithm applies to behaviors (memes). The Soviets had almost 70 years to stamp out superstition and religion, but failed, in spite of some pretty horrific "scientifically justified" methods (not counting their flawed biological science models, thinking mostly of their flawed economic models).
While no one has ever suggested that science is subject to voting, it is naive to claim that opinion does not guide publication. If I wanted to argue data that showed the speed of light in vacuum was much different from the current estimate, my evidence has to be much better than if I were simply confirming a widely held number. AND, it is perfectly reasonable for a political body to declare that pi is 3.1416 for all calculations used in contracts and surveying. Not so reasonable is to hold that planning commissions cannot use the best science when planning for long terms (which they do, by their nature). See North Carolina's actions, which blocked use of the science.
But, in my opinion the best hedge we have is banks and insurance companies. As long as they are permitted to do the math, we will be safe (unless they are prevented from using their best estimates by social engineering in the "democratic" body politic). For example, in New Orleans I bet rational assessment of long term risk would hurt the poor the most, making for irrational attempts to legislate away risk by blocking its use in assessing mortgages, etc. Think of the whole real estate bubble and the good intentions but bad ideas that made home ownership a right, not to be denied just because the owner could not afford it.
How about a Google-enhancement to human driven cars that beeps, whistles or otherwise sound signals a human or large animal only when they are near the car or in the path thereof?
The ability to think meta is important. Some once pointed out that the US Constitution is not a suicide pact, even though without meta-thinking it appears to be so. This is a variation on the idea that the only thing we must not tolerate is intolerance. Do not be afraid to embrace this conflict.
Stingrays, also known as "cell site simulators" or "IMSI catchers," are invasive cell phone surveillance devices that mimic cell phone towers and send out signals to trick cell phones in the area into transmitting their locations and identifying information. When used to track a suspect's cell phone, they also gather information about the phones of countless bystanders who happen to be nearby.
So, I think the Stingray is used to track who and where, very similar to having a beat cop standing on the corner who recognizes you and notes that you just walked by. All the discussion here about wiretapping is just FUD.
Outlaw bats and only criminals will have bats!
What? Not the wooden kind but rather the furry kind?
Nevermind.
Amazingly, this is the premise for my next SciFi novella - "StarEaters of Erdition", about a species of non-sentient astrophages. I think I'll use a plucky 70yo trans-species cyborg who's sentient self (hence, "who's") detects their existence and maps their trajectory from peta-peta-bytes of old Hubble data. Throw in a bit of a Cassandra complex (no one believes its (gender neutral pronoun) pronouncements). I think I'll cast Brent Spiner ("Data") as the carbon-based-component of the cyborg and George Takai ("Mr. Sulu") for the voice of the (nominally) silicone-based-component of the cyborg).
"a very mature, well-oiled capitalist machine"
which is inaccurate and only feeds the populist anti-capitalist sentiment that is too often conflated with anti free-market rhetoric. It would be far more accurate to call this a "protection racket" akin to the crime bosses in New York who send thugs into shops, said thugs' opening line then being something like "this is a nice little shop you got here, it would be a real shame if something were to happen to it, like maybe a fire".
A poster wondered if anyone else has the Intelligence gathering budget that the US does. I wonder if NSA is the new NASA, in that it provides jobs for geeks the way the space program did. And by geeks I mean those gifted individuals who would be bored trying to help K-Tar-Mart better ship and sell diapers and bottled water. Give them a mission (save the world from terror, get to the moon) and make them feel special. Keep them busy so they don't just hack apart your world.
Denver already has the smog, now it can grow a narcotics trade as well. Then Nebraska will get some surplus drones and start a campaign agaist the drug trade, then ...
My hack would be that any non-secure website would have its background image replaced at the browser end by a red warning background with a watermark "WARNING" embedded in it.