Replicators already exist. They are robust, they use materials in the environment, they reproduce. They're called "bacteria" and the reason they can't overtake the planet is that it's a very hostile place.
Organisms have evolved for a very long time, and generally they get more efficient at making more of them. Yet here we are. I, for one, am not worried about grey goo.
Bullshit. I listened to this argument 15 years ago at the start of 15 years of trickle-down failure. It has now been proven and proven and _proven_ that trickle-down doesn't work. when we were "causing rich people to go away due to high taxes" we were in a hell of a lot better shape.
That's right! No one in authority in the US has never, ever manipulated laws because a lobbyist gave them money. Furthermore no one in authority has ever harmed a non-lawbreaker.
Widespread requirements by social media to give one's "real name" are, on the surface, only harmful to those who would prefer to remain anonymous but would rather give up anonymity than the utility of these sites.
One may simply say "if you want to remain anonymous don't give up your information. There's no one forcing you to use these sites" But there's a side-effect of this requirement.
Like it or not "what a lot of people do" always defines what is okay and good and normal. to most people. It makes it much easier to pass laws that forbid anonymity in many areas offline and on. So even though I don't use facebook, google plus, or other such services specifically because I prefer to remain anonymous, this "real name" crap is indirectly harming me.
Experience has taught less intelligent people that going with the default is likely to fare them better than trying to have ideas of their own. That is all.
It's not about oil, it's about energy but let's talk about oil. The US has reserves of oil shale that will last it 50 years from the time the price stays high enough to extract it. How about coal? 300 years. It's messy and it will cause climate destabilization but that will happen long before your imagined energy shortage distopia.* If there's an energy crunch solar in its present form won't do (takes too much energy to make solar panels) but nuclear power will.
For you to make the claim that everything is just going to shit you have to say that:
-It will take over 50 years for alternative energy to be produced.
-In 50 years energy storage won't be up to letting transportation happen using electricity on a broad scale. (i.e. the infrastructure won't exist)
*And in the very long term global warming will allow farming in places that couldn't have it before, like Siberia. Don't pretend it would be a total catastrophe.
you don't get it. AI, nuclear fusion,robust genetic engineering, nanotechnology. These technologies all show tremendous promise and wild optimism in their supporters but the important question is not "when will these applications be widely disseminated?" but "Will these applications be widely disseminated". To answer the latter question in the negative you have to assume that no further progress will be made.
The great thing about science is it builds up. Knowledge on knowledge. However long it was predicted to take the puzzle is finite and is being solved. Soon enough "20 years" will become "10 years" which will become 5, "working on it now" "building it now" and "available to the rich" Whether that's 40 years in the future or 20 doesn't change the almost-fact that it will happen.
Your brain, which runs on a few tens of watts and weighs as much as your laptop, has a 10 gigabyte "hello world". you chose the wrong measure for efficiency.
I'm not sure why someone would interact in this way with any organization: Wikileaks, the Wall Street Journal, or the local newspaper without first masking any information that could identify them unless the publishing organization demands proof of authenticity. In that case, though, Wikileaks alone has proven it will protect its sources.
In the US most middle class private schools' main purpose is to give their kids a hefty dose of Jesus in their lessons. While kids in private schools learn more it's because of parental involvement and despite the broken lesson plans.
So all I have to do is sacrifice hundreds of thousands of dollars and years of my life whilst exposing myself to harassment by my local police department and if I'm lucky and the supreme court decides to hear my case in some jurisdictions I'll get off scott free from the defacto crime of recording an officer in Maryland? Where do I sign up?
The whole purpose and background for each of these wars is to provide politicians with money and power. It's time to recognize this and stop playing the game. Don't rally against the "war on anonymous", rally against would-be tyrants.
is much less of a danger in this case I think. You couldn't convince a dedicated, highly paid engineer to endanger a digital system any more easily than you could convince him to endanger a system based on analog controls. These aren't bored medium waged desk workers, they are among the world's best educated and most aware of the systems they control. I think it wouldn't take a huge amount of effort to train them on how to keep the systems isolated.
Windows XP was a stable, hugely popular operating system that has had over a decade of bug and security patches. Give me XP over the latest xnix flavor any day.
Actually I think you mean to call shenanigans on what you thought was his implication that homosexuality is unnatural. That hetrosexuality is all but an evolutionary necessity is self-evident.
Please tell me the real, fundamental reason (ethics aside) it wouldn't be just as valid a scientific endeavor to forge ahead all at once without trying to understand every step and the implications of every signal. "we don't understand this yet" is not a reason to say we have a long way to go. All it would take is understanding of how to keep these cells alive and connecting, a large number of rat embryos, a clean room, and a scientist who doesn't care about his reputation to make a large working brain-in-a-lab and I think we have all of that.
Slashdot Mirror
Replicators already exist. They are robust, they use materials in the environment, they reproduce. They're called "bacteria" and the reason they can't overtake the planet is that it's a very hostile place. Organisms have evolved for a very long time, and generally they get more efficient at making more of them. Yet here we are. I, for one, am not worried about grey goo.
Bullshit. I listened to this argument 15 years ago at the start of 15 years of trickle-down failure. It has now been proven and proven and _proven_ that trickle-down doesn't work. when we were "causing rich people to go away due to high taxes" we were in a hell of a lot better shape.
I found the new crew uniform!
That's right! No one in authority in the US has never, ever manipulated laws because a lobbyist gave them money. Furthermore no one in authority has ever harmed a non-lawbreaker.
Widespread requirements by social media to give one's "real name" are, on the surface, only harmful to those who would prefer to remain anonymous but would rather give up anonymity than the utility of these sites.
One may simply say "if you want to remain anonymous don't give up your information. There's no one forcing you to use these sites" But there's a side-effect of this requirement.
Like it or not "what a lot of people do" always defines what is okay and good and normal. to most people. It makes it much easier to pass laws that forbid anonymity in many areas offline and on. So even though I don't use facebook, google plus, or other such services specifically because I prefer to remain anonymous, this "real name" crap is indirectly harming me.
It could be worse. It could be like the cocaine other rich people do at private parties for the same reason. (quip about hookers' nethers here)
Experience has taught less intelligent people that going with the default is likely to fare them better than trying to have ideas of their own. That is all.
No, it's the difference between blocking 5 stores and blocking corporate HQ.
I think it's safe to say font choice is the single least important aspect of their proven unprofessionalism.
are in a square foot?
It's not about oil, it's about energy but let's talk about oil. The US has reserves of oil shale that will last it 50 years from the time the price stays high enough to extract it. How about coal? 300 years. It's messy and it will cause climate destabilization but that will happen long before your imagined energy shortage distopia.* If there's an energy crunch solar in its present form won't do (takes too much energy to make solar panels) but nuclear power will.
For you to make the claim that everything is just going to shit you have to say that:
-It will take over 50 years for alternative energy to be produced.
-In 50 years energy storage won't be up to letting transportation happen using electricity on a broad scale. (i.e. the infrastructure won't exist)
*And in the very long term global warming will allow farming in places that couldn't have it before, like Siberia. Don't pretend it would be a total catastrophe.
you don't get it. AI, nuclear fusion,robust genetic engineering, nanotechnology. These technologies all show tremendous promise and wild optimism in their supporters but the important question is not "when will these applications be widely disseminated?" but "Will these applications be widely disseminated". To answer the latter question in the negative you have to assume that no further progress will be made. The great thing about science is it builds up. Knowledge on knowledge. However long it was predicted to take the puzzle is finite and is being solved. Soon enough "20 years" will become "10 years" which will become 5, "working on it now" "building it now" and "available to the rich" Whether that's 40 years in the future or 20 doesn't change the almost-fact that it will happen.
They probably asked the oldest and most experienced workers they had, who being older and more experienced envisioned analog.
Well Google could spend 4 billion dollars developing 5G...
Can anyone tell us the most recent accepted figure for human brain emulation in petaflops and terrabytes of memory?
Your brain, which runs on a few tens of watts and weighs as much as your laptop, has a 10 gigabyte "hello world". you chose the wrong measure for efficiency.
I'm not sure why someone would interact in this way with any organization: Wikileaks, the Wall Street Journal, or the local newspaper without first masking any information that could identify them unless the publishing organization demands proof of authenticity. In that case, though, Wikileaks alone has proven it will protect its sources.
This completely dodges the point I hoped to see addressed: whether copyright law as written stands on constitutionally firm grounds.
In the US most middle class private schools' main purpose is to give their kids a hefty dose of Jesus in their lessons. While kids in private schools learn more it's because of parental involvement and despite the broken lesson plans.
So all I have to do is sacrifice hundreds of thousands of dollars and years of my life whilst exposing myself to harassment by my local police department and if I'm lucky and the supreme court decides to hear my case in some jurisdictions I'll get off scott free from the defacto crime of recording an officer in Maryland? Where do I sign up?
The whole purpose and background for each of these wars is to provide politicians with money and power. It's time to recognize this and stop playing the game. Don't rally against the "war on anonymous", rally against would-be tyrants.
is much less of a danger in this case I think. You couldn't convince a dedicated, highly paid engineer to endanger a digital system any more easily than you could convince him to endanger a system based on analog controls. These aren't bored medium waged desk workers, they are among the world's best educated and most aware of the systems they control. I think it wouldn't take a huge amount of effort to train them on how to keep the systems isolated.
Windows XP was a stable, hugely popular operating system that has had over a decade of bug and security patches. Give me XP over the latest xnix flavor any day.
Actually I think you mean to call shenanigans on what you thought was his implication that homosexuality is unnatural. That hetrosexuality is all but an evolutionary necessity is self-evident.
Please tell me the real, fundamental reason (ethics aside) it wouldn't be just as valid a scientific endeavor to forge ahead all at once without trying to understand every step and the implications of every signal. "we don't understand this yet" is not a reason to say we have a long way to go. All it would take is understanding of how to keep these cells alive and connecting, a large number of rat embryos, a clean room, and a scientist who doesn't care about his reputation to make a large working brain-in-a-lab and I think we have all of that.