Anyone remember the Superconducting Supercollider? That project was terribly mismanaged, but at least it was going to bring us cutting edge science. I would be willing to keep funding the bankrupt Station IF I believed something valuable would come out of it. Let's examine the historical evidence:
Scientific discovery -- the manned space program is fairly spotty on this. Peer review of scientific proposals has been criticized at JSC (the 'manned spaceflight center') as being inadequate or absent. Papers published in peer-reviewed journals are relatively few, considering the billions of dollars spent. Is it unfair to expect some results in exchange for the money spent? I think so. Contrast this with other space research such as Hubble or the Very Large Array / Very Long Baseline Interferometer. Those facilities have yielded large numbers of papers. Sure, we can quibble over whether the quantity or the quality of the science is important, but ultimately there has to be some quantity.
Inspiration -- Some argue that you can't put a price tag on inspiration, and that Astronauts and Cosmonauts inspire children "of all ages". Frankly, I just don't see the interest. Maybe if we put J.Lo and Kid Rock up on the Station this would change. We've seen a huge upsurge in interest in careers at FBI & CIA recently -- contrast this with the exodus at NASA.
So, what is the mission of the manned space program? What are we paying for? I'm all in favor of a manned space program -- but not boring holes in the sky.
So what do I propose for the manned space program? Drastically increase research into advanced transportation technologies:
Space tethers -- to provide artificial gravitational acceleration, to offset bone demineralization and muscular atrophy.
Access to space -- the Space Launch Initiative might be OK, but we need to make sure it does not hinder commercial development, as previous initiatives and policies have.
In short, I think that the time has come for NASA to focus on the basic building blocks of space utilization, rather than pursuing missions as the primary focus. The missions will come when the building blocks are ready. I would like NASA to return to its R+D roots a la NACA.
I'm not in favor of making spaceflight any more risky than it needs to be. But the Young task force noted that Station is way overstaffed with ground personnel sitting in front of consoles. The commission proposed that much of the support be shifted from "on duty" to "on call", based on the notion that few Station problems require immediate response. Those which do require immediate response can be dealt with by the Station backup systems & Station crew, and the on-duty skeleton crew, until the real experts can be called in to get the station back to normal. That doesn't impact safety, just productivity of station time.
As to holding NASA to a budget -- well, actually Congress is holding NASA to a greatly inflated budget (relative to original estimates, which themselves grew several times). And the Young Commission report says that NASA's budget estimation has no credibility, such that the Commission could not even evaluate whether current outyear projections could be met based on current knowledge of the program. Unless Congress is going to write a blank check, there has to be some limit. Goldin has not hesitated to kill scientific projects which went over budget -- why should there be a doube standard for Station?
In light of the USA PATRIOT act, this question may now be moot, but there might be further attempts to impose restrictions on privacy in the future.
What strategy do you think will be the most effective in preserving privacy rights in the future? To be more precise, should the proponents of electronic freedom fight as strongly as possible against attempts to restrict those freedoms, or do you think it would be more effective to have some flexibility? I have often wondered whether the gun manufacturers and the NRA (for example) might be more effective in preserving gun rights if they took some effective actions on their own to keep guns away from wackos.
In the case of electronic freedoms, I wonder whether fighting will only result in a complete collapse of our rights. It might be better to fight the worst proposals vigorously, and to assist the Feds (in some appropriate way) to catch the bad guys. This latter approach might erode some privacy, but might preserve the body of rights better in the long run.
Isn't msn.com where all of the on-line Windows documentation and tech support information is? As such, msn.com could be "accused" of being part and parcel to Windows (this would require a prosecution which is unlikely to occur for several reasons). If Microsoft uses msn.com to establish a "tying" with Internet Explorer, then they would be violating the Shermen act, by using their OS monopoly to dominate the browser market.
The Justice Department and the states contend that Microsoft is violating the Sherman Antitrust Act, which was passed by Congress in 1890. The act has two sections. The first section prohibits certain types of agreements that restrict the flow of trade. The second section prohibits the misuse of monopoly power, namely anti-competitive actions that seek to maintain that monopoly power and actions that attempt to use that monopoly power to dominate another market.
I found a more recent summary of the Court of Appeals decision, some of which "reverses" my thinking -- in actuality, the antitrust code does not directly confer a right to compete to the competitors of a monopoly market. But it does guarantee that the consumers have a right not to be harmed by anti-competitive practices by the monopoly holder. This tends to mean the same thing, but not always. Microsoft has apparently argued effectively that since they have not raised prices the way the old monopolists did, that they have not harmed consumers.
The right which is being abrogated is the right of other browser publishers to compete with IE. Since Microsoft has been ruled a monopoly, special rules apply to them which don't apply generally in the marketplace. Monopolies cannot use their monopoly power to exclude competitors. Some of the licensing issues such as excluding Netscape from the Windows desktop might be permitted if MS were not a monopoly, but as a monopoly they cannot use this power.
Constrain the elements, not the requirements
on
Autonomic Computing
·
· Score: 2
Only 14 amino acids form the basis for tens of thousands of proteins and billions of combinations of genes. Those amino acids combine with one another in exactly three ways (covalence, hydrogen bonds, Van Der Waal bonds) to form those proteins. Maybe this is an example of what you mean by "Simplicity engenders complexity."
Of course, there are other important chemicals in the body (both organic and inorganic) -- lipids, carbohydrates, salts, etc. But the "simplicity" of the protein "alphabet" is a starting point.
Autonomic responses are based on microbiology
on
Autonomic Computing
·
· Score: 2
Any biochemists out there care to enlighten the rest of us on the viability of the idea?
While the idea has the power of lucidity, it's not clear whether it can be implemented effectively. The development of autonomic responses in complex animals developed over millions of years using sexual reproduction as a means of pruning less viable branches while introducing sufficient variation to ensure species-level survival.
At the organism level, autonomy is accomplished through a combination of neural, hormonal, and physiological responses to external stimuli and internal state changes. How many proteins and hormones, etc are required for this? How many combinations of signals are there? Clearly the number of combinations is large enough to be considered "countless". That an organism as complex as a human being works at all is an impressive feat of biochemical integration and regulation.
"...we don't really need... sentient machines and androids programmed to love and laugh -- to overcome the largest obstacle standing in our way."
That's an assumption which remains to be validated! How does IBM know that it's not the other way around? Perhaps love and laughter (i.e. higher emotions) are a natural and inevitable byproduct of the ultimate expression of the ideas of autonomy. Put another way, it may be possible to provide some sort of low-level homeostasis without emotions, but the maximum expression of those concepts might lead to a deeper philosophical awareness. At that point, look for IBM's business systems to call in sick with "mental health days" once in a while.
Richard Powers' novel Galatea 2.2 was an interesting examination of the relationship between self-awareness, emotion, and intelligence.
Re:Aerobraking vs. Propulsion Braking
on
The Art of Aerobraking
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Things are getting better every day and by the minute...
Bzzzt! Thanks for playing. I wish I had your confidence in NASA's management. Unfortunately, instead of emulating successful missions such as Mars Pathfinder, NASA is planning to spread the model for a failed mission (Mars 98) throughout the agency.
Mars Pathfinder was managed and built in-house by JPL -- this was the lander / rover mission which succeeded wildly (albeit with modest goals) in 1997.
Mars 98 was the combined missions of Mars Climate Orbiter, Mars Polar Lander, and the experimental Deep Space 2 impact samplers. The loss of the two primary spacecraft was attributed to poor coordination between JPL and the contractor who built them (Lockheed Martin Astronautics).
Yet, the "plan" being advanced to contain the massive cost overruns on Space Station, is based on outsourcing as much work as possible. Hmm. I'm not saying that outsourcing is always a bad thing, but NASA had better tell the taxpayers what's going to be different in the new formula.
The article says that geneticists delayed the development of transgenic technology in the 1970's until scientists' fears of germ warfare could be assuaged.
Hmm. Does this mean that "safeguards" were developed (I cannot imagine what safeguards *could* be developed)? Or does it simply mean that scientists became "comfortable" with the idea, after the passage of some time?
Currently, the big biochem companies like ConAgra and Monsanto are experimenting with our ecosystem, releasing Genetically Modified Organisms into the wild. Forget sabotage or terrorism, we may screw things up by "accident". Anyone else worried about that?
Umm. Are you replying to my comments, or what? I made no comparison to WW2 except in the sense of what individuals did and might should do now. I presume from your comments that you think that I would propose to fight these terrorists like we fought the Axis powers in WW2. If so then you would be grossly misinterpreting my comments.
Where did I mention cruise missile pinpricks?
As to blaming this on so-called imperialist U.S. foreign policy, if there is to be a superpower then who would you prefer that it be? China? Russia? How about Afghanistan? Saudi Arabia?
I never said "my country good or bad". That is your completely inaccurate interpretation of what I wrote. Please re-read carefully what I wrote. Did I not mention (for instance) the ineptitude of the FBI? Was my proposal to re-target DEA agents against a more pressing threat, namely terrorists, a blanket endorsement of everything the USGovt does? I hardly think so.
As to the notion of assassinating ObN, yes, this would likely inflame and inspire more attacks. I did not say we should kill him in particular. In fact, had you followed the link which I included to the brief Washington Post transcript (about 1 page), you would note that that point has already been raised and I concur with it. However, while I did say that only killing the terrorists would stop them, I see no practical solutions to terrorism from you, except maybe for the U.S. to retreat completely from the world stage. Personally, I doubt even that would appease these medieval-minded morons.
Did I propose acts of terror? No, merely solving the problem.
Next time, read my comments carefully before replying. I kinda doubt you did this time.
[this is a repost from another thread on the same subject]
I fully expect to be lambasted for this, but even as one who has said "you can have my PGP when you pry it from my cold dead fingers", and as one who understands how quickly the minions of ObL can switch communication methods, I think the "fight the man" attitude is selfish, ignorant, and in the long run, a position which will fail in the marketplace of ideas.
I condemn those who would outlaw strong encryption products. These people (including elected officials) are ignorant and they would throw out the baby with the bath water, as many have pointed out.
I also condemn the comments made by those who say "aw shucks, 5000 deaths isn't so bad... X people die from Y each year." Those who make such comments are both insensitive and ignorant. They are insensitive to the pain felt by tens of thousands directly affected as well as those who, like me, take these attacks very personally in spite of not knowing a soul who perished. If for no other reason, the fact that I lived in Manhattan for 9 years makes my blood boil at comments like these.
Those who dismiss the importance of this event have failed to grasp one essential fact about the various individuals and groups who have allied
themselves against the U.S. That is, they will stop at nothing. If you think 5000 is acceptable, then next time it will be 5000000, if these SOBs get their hands on a nuke. Would that be OK with you? These people will only stop when we kill them. I refer you to the Washington Post, which has plenty of interesting and compelling information and commentary by people who are in a position to know. For starters, I suggest the transcript of a chat with Vernon Loeb: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/liveonline/01/nation/attack_loeb.htm . These comments underscore my personal belief that there is nothing the U.S. can do to appease these terrorists, because what they desire is the extinguishment of the "light on the hill" represented by the U.S.
Another in-depth viewpoint is offered by Robert D. Kaplan, who has spent considerable time visiting the trouble spots of the world, including the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/09/kaplan.h tm
Now, to my main point. There is a wealth of technical and creative talent here at Slashdot. In my naivete, I somehow thought that even the radical
uber-Libertarian chic here would be blunted by the enormity of last week's events. I figured that maybe, just maybe, these events would unleash a fury which would turn towards fighting the bastards who did this, rather than childishly clinging to yesterday's anti-government paranoia. I somehow hoped that people here would be as outraged as I am, and that they would sign up to use their skills (in their own idiom) to find these SOBs and to protect the U.S. from future attacks, just as countless citizens did after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Hah! What an idiot I was to believe that.
Look, I'm not real comfortable with the govt reading my electronic transmissions either. I strongly believe in the 4th amendment. I am well aware that the FBI (aka "Famous But Incompetent") has been a poor custodian of its already considerable powers, and has been quite spotty in its investigatory competence, as the Wen Ho Lee investigation showed.
But, my belief is that if you want to preserve *any* of your rights to electronic privacy, you should moderate your viewpoint. Only children maintain the fantasy that no negotiation and no compromise is necessary. I challenge the/. community to devise an effective response to the events of 11 September. This response should not simply be "no compromise in the defense of our privacy rights" which incidentally did not have any effective means of enforcement until PGP 1.0. Rather, it should include technical assistance to help protect U.S. safety AND ALSO OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS.
Thank you!
P.S. -- I wrote a letter to my Representative proposing that all DEA agents be re-assigned to keep track of those on "watch lists", such as two of the hijackers who somehow eluded the FBI.
I fully expect to be lambasted for this, but even as one who has said "you can have my PGP when you pry it from my cold dead fingers", and as one who understands how quickly the minions of ObL can switch communication methods, I think the "fight the man" attitude is selfish, ignorant, and in the long run, a position which will fail in the marketplace of ideas.
I condemn those who would outlaw strong encryption products. These people (including elected officials) are ignorant and they would throw out the baby with the bath water, as many have pointed out.
I also condemn the comments made by those who say "aw shucks, 5000 deaths isn't so bad... X people die from Y each year." Those who make such comments are both insensitive and ignorant. They are insensitive to the pain felt by tens of thousands directly affected as well as those who, like me, take these attacks very personally in spite of not knowing a soul who perished. If for no other reason, the fact that I lived in Manhattan for 9 years makes my blood boil at comments like these.
Those who dismiss the importance of this event have failed to grasp one essential fact about the various individuals and groups who have allied themselves against the U.S. That is, they will stop at nothing. If you think 5000 is acceptable, then next time it will be 5000000, if these SOBs get their hands on a nuke. Would that be OK with you? These people will only stop when we kill them. I refer you to the Washington Post, which has plenty of interesting and compelling information and commentary by people who are in a position to know. For starters, I suggest the transcript of a chat with Vernon Loeb: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/liveonline/01/nation/attack_loeb.htm . These comments underscore my personal belief that there is nothing the U.S. can do to appease these terrorists, because what they desire is the extinguishment of the "light on the hill" represented by the U.S.
Another in-depth viewpoint is offered by Robert D. Kaplan, who has spent considerable time visiting the trouble spots of the world, including the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/09/kaplan.h tm
Now, to my main point. There is a wealth of technical and creative talent here at Slashdot. In my naivete, I somehow thought that even the radical uber-Libertarian chic here would be blunted by the enormity of last week's events. I figured that maybe, just maybe, these events would unleash a fury which would turn towards fighting the bastards who did this, rather than childishly clinging to yesterday's anti-government paranoia. I somehow hoped that people here would be as outraged as I am, and that they would sign up to use their skills (in their own idiom) to find these SOBs and to protect the U.S. from future attacks, just as countless citizens did after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Hah! What an idiot I was to believe that.
Look, I'm not real comfortable with the govt reading my electronic transmissions either. I strongly believe in the 4th amendment. I am well aware that the FBI (aka "Famous But Incompetent") has been a poor custodian of its already considerable powers, and has been quite spotty in its investigatory competence, as the Wen Ho Lee investigation showed.
But, my belief is that if you want to preserve *any* of your rights to electronic privacy, you should moderate your viewpoint. Only children maintain the fantasy that no negotiation and no compromise is necessary. I challenge the/. community to devise an effective response to the events of 11 September. This response should not simply be "no compromise in the defense of our privacy rights" which incidentally did not have any effective means of enforcement until PGP 1.0. Rather, it should include technical assistance to help protect U.S. safety AND ALSO OUR CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS.
The San Francisco Chronicle has an article on this subject today also. Here it is.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/ch ronicle/archive/2001/04/15/BU216416.DTL .
This one is about the challenge which KQED (San Francisco PBS affiliate) is facing with the conversion to digital broadcasts and digital studio equipment. They have raised (through private donations) $48M of the $70M required for the conversion.
The user guides which come with the commercial PGP explain the weaknesses pretty well. Man in the middle attacks or other means of key compromise become harder and harder as the number of key-signatures on a given key goes up. Keeping a copy of the key fingerprint in one's possession would also help.
Phil Zimmerman alluded to the ease of use issues with PGP when he left Network Associates and went to HushMail. Those issues are (IMO) most likely to result in compromise of security, because the users really must understand all of the links in the process to maintain security.
Bottom line is that you usually can achieve practical security (i.e. the resources needed to crack the ciphertext exceed the value of the plaintext to the potential cracker). But absolute security is very difficult to achieve with current technology. No news there.
A question which has particular applicability for/. readers seems to have gone unasked:
What do Do Soto's '5 mysteries' say about intellectual property and ecommerce?
1. The Mystery of Missing Information.Huge numbers of people live and work off the books: they have no clear title to their land and possessions, they pay no taxes, they have no credit. The unbridled sharing of the creative works of artists might fit here...
5. The Mystery of Legal Failure.In the
Roman legal tradition, laws are not created, they are 'discovered'; the best laws are those that
fit existing practice. It should surprise no one that RIAA is trying to kill the notion of unpaid music before it gains the patina of respectability.
Bzzzt. Thanks for playing. You are absolutely correct that we (U.S.) invest too much in SIGINT and imaging, and not enough in HUMINT. Technical intelligence methods are easy to foil (just ask India about their nuclear test site) and easy to fool (just ask Serbia about their tanks in Kosovo).
But, recent terrorist attacks against U.S. targets show a pattern: they are all targets of opportunity, and they were all attacked with very low-tech devices. NMD cannot find a truck bimb, let alone stop it. As opportunists, bin Ladin and his minions will hardly be stopped by NMD. If they were to acquire a nuke, why would they waste their time trying to acquire a missile to deliver it? Just bring it in on a ship. Oops, just let the cat out of the bag. Sorry, New York.
The USAToady article lists 3 examples where these techniques were used. How about if the FBI publishes the actual documents so that their claims can be evaluated? Since they have defuzed the plots in those cases, it would not harm security to expose the evidence to public scrutiny.
Not that I doubt that it's possible for terrorists to exploit these techniques, but so far the feds have not substantiated their claims.
In 1996, Apple touted OpenDoc as the object-oriented component software architecture which would implement much of what Raskin wants to do. There was a Wired interview with Jobs around that time in which St Stephen sang the glories of object technology as The Answer to all our software problems.
Unfortunately, Apple's revolution faltered in the marketplace. It was a great vision, but I think too many application developers had been burned in the past to follow Apple through the fire of yet another architecture change. Once burned, twice shy and all that.
In a smaller way, your answer is also found in the 6th of Henry Spencer's 10 Commandments for C programmers... no doubt this will spawn groans from partisans of other languages.
The Ten Commandments for C Programmers
Henry Spencer
Thou shalt run lint frequently and study its pronouncements with care, for verily its perception and judgement oft exceed thine.
Thou shalt not follow the NULL pointer, for chaos and
madness await thee at its end.
Thou shalt cast all function arguments to the expected
type if they are not of that type already, even when
thou art convinced that this is unnecessary, lest they
take cruel vengeance upon thee when thou least expect
it.
If thy header files fail to declare the return types of
thy library functions, thou shalt declare them thyself
with the most meticulous care, lest grievous harm
befall thy program.
Thou shalt check the array bounds of all strings
(indeed, all arrays), for surely where thou typest
``foo'' someone someday shall type ``supercalifragilisticexpialidocious''.
If a function be advertised to return an error code in
the event of difficulties, thou shalt check for that
code, yea, even though the checks triple the size of
thy code and produce aches in thy typing fingers, for
if thou thinkest ``it cannot happen to me'', the gods
shall surely punish thee for thy arrogance.
Thou shalt study thy libraries and strive not to re-
invent them without cause, that thy code may be short
and readable and thy days pleasant and productive.
Thou shalt make thy program's purpose and structure
clear to thy fellow man by using the One True Brace
Style, even if thou likest it not, for thy creativity
is better used in solving problems than in creating
beautiful new impediments to understanding.
Thy external identifiers shall be unique in the first
six characters, though this harsh discipline be irksome
and the years of its necessity stretch before thee
seemingly without end, lest thou tear thy hair out and
go mad on that fateful day when thou desirest to make
thy program run on an old system.
Thou shalt foreswear, renounce, and abjure the vile
heresy which claimeth that ``All the world's a VAX'',
and have no commerce with the benighted heathens who
cling to this barbarous belief, that the days of thy
program may be long even though the days of thy current
machine be short.
OK, if that works for you. Use the right team for the job at hand. It depends on the domain... mass market shrinkwrap software development is different from embedded realtime applications (which is my current job) which is different from operating system development. And so on.
My basic point # [1] is: remain ever critical of management. Usually the best you can hope for is that they get you the resources you need and don't demand too many non-productive metrics. That they remain responsive to and respectful of the primary contributors (yea right).
I don't pretend that SW projects should run open-loop, but they should also not run on the misinformed and out of date dogma of some program manager. A good project manager (that most rare of rarities) can fend off the interventionist idiots with appropriate communications to them. Figure out what they are worried about, and find a way to communicate the progress which is being made on that issue (or tell him what resources are needed to improve progress, or to improve reporting).
Failure is not an option, but neither is unhelpful intervention.
Fire the lickspittle program managers / marketroids who promise the world to the customer without having a clue on what is realistic. Listen to the engineers when they say "we're pushing too hard". Consider the end game -- we can get to a solid final release via lots of buggy "final" releases and chaos or by lots of interim releases which are not advertised as final, and which are easier to kick out the door than "final" releases.
Send the entire team to an in-depth design patterns seminar. Even if you are not using OOD or DP, it will get people thinking about design, design artifacts (diagrams), and collaboration.
Wings give you several valuable attributes over ballistic (Apollo-style) entry:
Lower G-forces during entry (Shuttle is 2-4 G, ballistic is 8-11 depending on the trajectory... Shepherd's suborbital flight peaked out at 11 G. Ouch.).
More downmass payload capability. I suspect it would have been hard to recover LDEF using ballistic entry. Spacelab flights would also have been impossible without significant downmass capability.
Crosstrack trajectory capability. This greatly widens landing options, particularly for abort scenarios.
Precision landing capability. You can marshall your landing recovery assets at specific places instead of all over the Pacific Ocean.
Over at NASAWatch, a new GAO report is posted. The report reiterates some previously known problems in the workforce in the Shuttle program.
Here is an excerpt from the summary:
Several internal NASA studies have
shown that the shuttle program's workforce has been
affected negatively by such downsizing. In particular,
the shuttle program has identified many key areas that
are not sufficiently staffed by qualified workers, and the
remaining workforce shows signs of overwork and
fatigue. Moreover, the program's demographic shape
and skill mix jeopardize the program's ability to "hand
off" leadership roles to the next generation and achieve
a higher flight rate to support assembly of the
International Space Station.
While NASA has begun to address the problem, the summary concludes that "continued NASA management
emphasis on human capital planning will be critical to
continued safe shuttle operations in an environment of
increasing shuttle flights."
So, although the stance of management has changed about tactical decisions, the budget just isn't there to support the workforce needed to support the demands of the Shuttle at the flight rate needed for Station assembly.
Does this issue have its origins in the Shuttle program or in the Station program? Probably a little of both. Station is probably not really paying its way, but Shuttle probably is not demanding the resources needed for high flight rate operations either.
My hope is that the new NASA Administrator (whoever that may be) will examine and address this issue early in his tenure.
I'm not a materials engineer, but I suspect that Ti was not an afterthought or an adornment. The new PowerBook would be a very different machine were it made of different materials. The 15 inch LCD needs a strong material to support it, and if they used plastic or steel then the case would be far thicker. The market wants a thin and light laptop. You can get there with Ti, not with plastic.
Also, why is it wasteful to make the case out of Ti? Metal is far easier to recycle than plastic. (It may require more energy to produce however.)
IMHO -- the real Apple story of 2001 will be OS X. As several stories on/. have noted, OS X has been / can be ported to other hardware. While I doubt that Apple will ever go to purely commodity hardware, they may throw in the towel on PowerPC eventually if the vendors cannot provide price/performance parity with x86. Look for a fork in the road in Apple's future: to continue or abandon PPC. OS X will give Apple the ability to exploit that decision when the time comes.
If they eventually do abandon PPC then they might build their own systems based on x86 or SPARC CPUs, but add some whiz-bang interfaces which commodity vendors might not provide. Consider Apple's leadership on USB & Firewire as such an idea.
For now, I'm impressed with the Ti-PowerBook. Maybe they can get a product placement in the next 007 movie (world's first bulletproof laptop). My only complaint is that the profile is rectangular, instead of an airfoil shape!
Slashdot Mirror
So, what is the mission of the manned space program? What are we paying for? I'm all in favor of a manned space program -- but not boring holes in the sky.
So what do I propose for the manned space program? Drastically increase research into advanced transportation technologies:
In short, I think that the time has come for NASA to focus on the basic building blocks of space utilization, rather than pursuing missions as the primary focus. The missions will come when the building blocks are ready. I would like NASA to return to its R+D roots a la NACA.
As to holding NASA to a budget -- well, actually Congress is holding NASA to a greatly inflated budget (relative to original estimates, which themselves grew several times). And the Young Commission report says that NASA's budget estimation has no credibility, such that the Commission could not even evaluate whether current outyear projections could be met based on current knowledge of the program. Unless Congress is going to write a blank check, there has to be some limit. Goldin has not hesitated to kill scientific projects which went over budget -- why should there be a doube standard for Station?
What strategy do you think will be the most effective in preserving privacy rights in the future? To be more precise, should the proponents of electronic freedom fight as strongly as possible against attempts to restrict those freedoms, or do you think it would be more effective to have some flexibility? I have often wondered whether the gun manufacturers and the NRA (for example) might be more effective in preserving gun rights if they took some effective actions on their own to keep guns away from wackos.
In the case of electronic freedoms, I wonder whether fighting will only result in a complete collapse of our rights. It might be better to fight the worst proposals vigorously, and to assist the Feds (in some appropriate way) to catch the bad guys. This latter approach might erode some privacy, but might preserve the body of rights better in the long run.
Here's a basic overview from 1998.
A quote from the article:
The Justice Department and the states contend that Microsoft is violating the Sherman Antitrust Act, which was passed by Congress in 1890. The act has two sections. The first section prohibits certain types of agreements that restrict the flow of trade. The second section prohibits the misuse of monopoly power, namely anti-competitive actions that seek to maintain that monopoly power and actions that attempt to use that monopoly power to dominate another market.
I found a more recent summary of the Court of Appeals decision, some of which "reverses" my thinking -- in actuality, the antitrust code does not directly confer a right to compete to the competitors of a monopoly market. But it does guarantee that the consumers have a right not to be harmed by anti-competitive practices by the monopoly holder. This tends to mean the same thing, but not always. Microsoft has apparently argued effectively that since they have not raised prices the way the old monopolists did, that they have not harmed consumers.
The right which is being abrogated is the right of other browser publishers to compete with IE. Since Microsoft has been ruled a monopoly, special rules apply to them which don't apply generally in the marketplace. Monopolies cannot use their monopoly power to exclude competitors. Some of the licensing issues such as excluding Netscape from the Windows desktop might be permitted if MS were not a monopoly, but as a monopoly they cannot use this power.
Only 14 amino acids form the basis for tens of thousands of proteins and billions of combinations of genes. Those amino acids combine with one another in exactly three ways (covalence, hydrogen bonds, Van Der Waal bonds) to form those proteins. Maybe this is an example of what you mean by "Simplicity engenders complexity."
Of course, there are other important chemicals in the body (both organic and inorganic) -- lipids, carbohydrates, salts, etc. But the "simplicity" of the protein "alphabet" is a starting point.
While the idea has the power of lucidity, it's not clear whether it can be implemented effectively. The development of autonomic responses in complex animals developed over millions of years using sexual reproduction as a means of pruning less viable branches while introducing sufficient variation to ensure species-level survival.
At the organism level, autonomy is accomplished through a combination of neural, hormonal, and physiological responses to external stimuli and internal state changes. How many proteins and hormones, etc are required for this? How many combinations of signals are there? Clearly the number of combinations is large enough to be considered "countless". That an organism as complex as a human being works at all is an impressive feat of biochemical integration and regulation.
"...we don't really need... sentient machines and androids programmed to love and laugh -- to overcome the largest obstacle standing in our way."
That's an assumption which remains to be validated! How does IBM know that it's not the other way around? Perhaps love and laughter (i.e. higher emotions) are a natural and inevitable byproduct of the ultimate expression of the ideas of autonomy. Put another way, it may be possible to provide some sort of low-level homeostasis without emotions, but the maximum expression of those concepts might lead to a deeper philosophical awareness. At that point, look for IBM's business systems to call in sick with "mental health days" once in a while.
Richard Powers' novel Galatea 2.2 was an interesting examination of the relationship between self-awareness, emotion, and intelligence.
Bzzzt! Thanks for playing. I wish I had your confidence in NASA's management. Unfortunately, instead of emulating successful missions such as Mars Pathfinder, NASA is planning to spread the model for a failed mission (Mars 98) throughout the agency.
Mars Pathfinder was managed and built in-house by JPL -- this was the lander / rover mission which succeeded wildly (albeit with modest goals) in 1997.
Mars 98 was the combined missions of Mars Climate Orbiter, Mars Polar Lander, and the experimental Deep Space 2 impact samplers. The loss of the two primary spacecraft was attributed to poor coordination between JPL and the contractor who built them (Lockheed Martin Astronautics).
Yet, the "plan" being advanced to contain the massive cost overruns on Space Station, is based on outsourcing as much work as possible. Hmm. I'm not saying that outsourcing is always a bad thing, but NASA had better tell the taxpayers what's going to be different in the new formula.
Here's NASA's "Commercialization" plan:
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=3730
Hmm. Does this mean that "safeguards" were developed (I cannot imagine what safeguards *could* be developed)? Or does it simply mean that scientists became "comfortable" with the idea, after the passage of some time?
Currently, the big biochem companies like ConAgra and Monsanto are experimenting with our ecosystem, releasing Genetically Modified Organisms into the wild. Forget sabotage or terrorism, we may screw things up by "accident". Anyone else worried about that?
Where did I mention cruise missile pinpricks?
As to blaming this on so-called imperialist U.S. foreign policy, if there is to be a superpower then who would you prefer that it be? China? Russia? How about Afghanistan? Saudi Arabia?
I never said "my country good or bad". That is your completely inaccurate interpretation of what I wrote. Please re-read carefully what I wrote. Did I not mention (for instance) the ineptitude of the FBI? Was my proposal to re-target DEA agents against a more pressing threat, namely terrorists, a blanket endorsement of everything the USGovt does? I hardly think so.
As to the notion of assassinating ObN, yes, this would likely inflame and inspire more attacks. I did not say we should kill him in particular. In fact, had you followed the link which I included to the brief Washington Post transcript (about 1 page), you would note that that point has already been raised and I concur with it. However, while I did say that only killing the terrorists would stop them, I see no practical solutions to terrorism from you, except maybe for the U.S. to retreat completely from the world stage. Personally, I doubt even that would appease these medieval-minded morons.
Did I propose acts of terror? No, merely solving the problem.
Next time, read my comments carefully before replying. I kinda doubt you did this time.
I fully expect to be lambasted for this, but even as one who has said "you can have my PGP when you pry it from my cold dead fingers", and as one who understands how quickly the minions of ObL can switch communication methods, I think the "fight the man" attitude is selfish, ignorant, and in the long run, a position which will fail in the marketplace of ideas.
I condemn those who would outlaw strong encryption products. These people (including elected officials) are ignorant and they would throw out the baby with the bath water, as many have pointed out.
I also condemn the comments made by those who say "aw shucks, 5000 deaths isn't so bad... X people die from Y each year." Those who make such comments are both insensitive and ignorant. They are insensitive to the pain felt by tens of thousands directly affected as well as those who, like me, take these attacks very personally in spite of not knowing a soul who perished. If for no other reason, the fact that I lived in Manhattan for 9 years makes my blood boil at comments like these.
Those who dismiss the importance of this event have failed to grasp one essential fact about the various individuals and groups who have allied
themselves against the U.S. That is, they will stop at nothing. If you think 5000 is acceptable, then next time it will be 5000000, if these SOBs get their hands on a nuke. Would that be OK with you? These people will only stop when we kill them. I refer you to the Washington Post, which has plenty of interesting and compelling information and commentary by people who are in a position to know. For starters, I suggest the transcript of a chat with Vernon Loeb: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/liveonline/0
Another in-depth viewpoint is offered by Robert D. Kaplan, who has spent considerable time visiting the trouble spots of the world, including the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/09/kaplan.
Now, to my main point. There is a wealth of technical and creative talent here at Slashdot. In my naivete, I somehow thought that even the radical
uber-Libertarian chic here would be blunted by the enormity of last week's events. I figured that maybe, just maybe, these events would unleash a fury which would turn towards fighting the bastards who did this, rather than childishly clinging to yesterday's anti-government paranoia. I somehow hoped that people here would be as outraged as I am, and that they would sign up to use their skills (in their own idiom) to find these SOBs and to protect the U.S. from future attacks, just as countless citizens did after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Hah! What an idiot I was to believe that.
Look, I'm not real comfortable with the govt reading my electronic transmissions either. I strongly believe in the 4th amendment. I am well aware that the FBI (aka "Famous But Incompetent") has been a poor custodian of its already considerable powers, and has been quite spotty in its investigatory competence, as the Wen Ho Lee investigation showed.
But, my belief is that if you want to preserve *any* of your rights to electronic privacy, you should moderate your viewpoint. Only children maintain the fantasy that no negotiation and no compromise is necessary. I challenge the
Thank you!
P.S. -- I wrote a letter to my Representative proposing that all DEA agents be re-assigned to keep track of those on "watch lists", such as two of the hijackers who somehow eluded the FBI.
I condemn those who would outlaw strong encryption products. These people (including elected officials) are ignorant and they would throw out the baby with the bath water, as many have pointed out.
I also condemn the comments made by those who say "aw shucks, 5000 deaths isn't so bad... X people die from Y each year." Those who make such comments are both insensitive and ignorant. They are insensitive to the pain felt by tens of thousands directly affected as well as those who, like me, take these attacks very personally in spite of not knowing a soul who perished. If for no other reason, the fact that I lived in Manhattan for 9 years makes my blood boil at comments like these.
Those who dismiss the importance of this event have failed to grasp one essential fact about the various individuals and groups who have allied themselves against the U.S. That is, they will stop at nothing. If you think 5000 is acceptable, then next time it will be 5000000, if these SOBs get their hands on a nuke. Would that be OK with you? These people will only stop when we kill them. I refer you to the Washington Post, which has plenty of interesting and compelling information and commentary by people who are in a position to know. For starters, I suggest the transcript of a chat with Vernon Loeb: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/liveonline/0
Another in-depth viewpoint is offered by Robert D. Kaplan, who has spent considerable time visiting the trouble spots of the world, including the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2000/09/kaplan.
Now, to my main point. There is a wealth of technical and creative talent here at Slashdot. In my naivete, I somehow thought that even the radical uber-Libertarian chic here would be blunted by the enormity of last week's events. I figured that maybe, just maybe, these events would unleash a fury which would turn towards fighting the bastards who did this, rather than childishly clinging to yesterday's anti-government paranoia. I somehow hoped that people here would be as outraged as I am, and that they would sign up to use their skills (in their own idiom) to find these SOBs and to protect the U.S. from future attacks, just as countless citizens did after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Hah! What an idiot I was to believe that.
Look, I'm not real comfortable with the govt reading my electronic transmissions either. I strongly believe in the 4th amendment. I am well aware that the FBI (aka "Famous But Incompetent") has been a poor custodian of its already considerable powers, and has been quite spotty in its investigatory competence, as the Wen Ho Lee investigation showed.
But, my belief is that if you want to preserve *any* of your rights to electronic privacy, you should moderate your viewpoint. Only children maintain the fantasy that no negotiation and no compromise is necessary. I challenge the
Thank you!
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c
This one is about the challenge which KQED (San Francisco PBS affiliate) is facing with the conversion to digital broadcasts and digital studio equipment. They have raised (through private donations) $48M of the $70M required for the conversion.
Phil Zimmerman alluded to the ease of use issues with PGP when he left Network Associates and went to HushMail. Those issues are (IMO) most likely to result in compromise of security, because the users really must understand all of the links in the process to maintain security.
Bottom line is that you usually can achieve practical security (i.e. the resources needed to crack the ciphertext exceed the value of the plaintext to the potential cracker). But absolute security is very difficult to achieve with current technology. No news there.
What do Do Soto's '5 mysteries' say about intellectual property and ecommerce?
1. The Mystery of Missing Information. Huge numbers of people live and work off the books: they have no clear title to their land and possessions, they pay no taxes, they have no credit. The unbridled sharing of the creative works of artists might fit here...
5. The Mystery of Legal Failure. In the Roman legal tradition, laws are not created, they are 'discovered'; the best laws are those that fit existing practice. It should surprise no one that RIAA is trying to kill the notion of unpaid music before it gains the patina of respectability.
But, recent terrorist attacks against U.S. targets show a pattern: they are all targets of opportunity, and they were all attacked with very low-tech devices. NMD cannot find a truck bimb, let alone stop it. As opportunists, bin Ladin and his minions will hardly be stopped by NMD. If they were to acquire a nuke, why would they waste their time trying to acquire a missile to deliver it? Just bring it in on a ship. Oops, just let the cat out of the bag. Sorry, New York.
Not that I doubt that it's possible for terrorists to exploit these techniques, but so far the feds have not substantiated their claims.
Unfortunately, Apple's revolution faltered in the marketplace. It was a great vision, but I think too many application developers had been burned in the past to follow Apple through the fire of yet another architecture change. Once burned, twice shy and all that.
In a smaller way, your answer is also found in the 6th of Henry Spencer's 10 Commandments for C programmers... no doubt this will spawn groans from partisans of other languages.
The Ten Commandments for C Programmers
Henry Spencer
My basic point # [1] is: remain ever critical of management. Usually the best you can hope for is that they get you the resources you need and don't demand too many non-productive metrics. That they remain responsive to and respectful of the primary contributors (yea right).
I don't pretend that SW projects should run open-loop, but they should also not run on the misinformed and out of date dogma of some program manager. A good project manager (that most rare of rarities) can fend off the interventionist idiots with appropriate communications to them. Figure out what they are worried about, and find a way to communicate the progress which is being made on that issue (or tell him what resources are needed to improve progress, or to improve reporting).
Failure is not an option, but neither is unhelpful intervention.
Here is an excerpt from the summary:
While NASA has begun to address the problem, the summary concludes that "continued NASA management emphasis on human capital planning will be critical to continued safe shuttle operations in an environment of increasing shuttle flights."So, although the stance of management has changed about tactical decisions, the budget just isn't there to support the workforce needed to support the demands of the Shuttle at the flight rate needed for Station assembly.
Does this issue have its origins in the Shuttle program or in the Station program? Probably a little of both. Station is probably not really paying its way, but Shuttle probably is not demanding the resources needed for high flight rate operations either.
My hope is that the new NASA Administrator (whoever that may be) will examine and address this issue early in his tenure.
Also, why is it wasteful to make the case out of Ti? Metal is far easier to recycle than plastic. (It may require more energy to produce however.)
Here is a perspective by Jobs on energy efficiency: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive//4.02/jobs.html ?pg=8&topic=. Kinda long-winded, but it gives a perspective on St Steven's thinking.
If they eventually do abandon PPC then they might build their own systems based on x86 or SPARC CPUs, but add some whiz-bang interfaces which commodity vendors might not provide. Consider Apple's leadership on USB & Firewire as such an idea.
For now, I'm impressed with the Ti-PowerBook. Maybe they can get a product placement in the next 007 movie (world's first bulletproof laptop). My only complaint is that the profile is rectangular, instead of an airfoil shape!