For that matter, why don't we develop Antartica as well? At least it has an atmosphere, and in parts, some wildlife.
Yeah, those are good reasons not to.
But given that one of the major potential resources of the Antarctic is oil, and given that the major consumer of oil and the home base of many oil companies is a country with little respect for treaties and a generally self-serving interpretation of "the interest of all mankind", it might be only a matter of time.
I don't think research into wireheading was Thomas Jefferson had in mind with the "pursuit of happiness" thing.
There's nothing inherently unethical about the research. But not considering possible downsides definitely is unethical. Not to mention dumb. No shortage of that kind of dumb, these days, when any mention of possible downsides is written off by corporate spokesdroids, etc, as if it's all from irrational anti-science people.
The degrees of a reviewer don't prove but do imply a certain level of intellectual ability. Combined with the admission that the reviewer that the book will "take a while to digest", this doesn't not prove but does imply that it's a challenging book.
Wolfram is looking at a piece of the puzzle, IMHO.
Have you read the book? Or just reviews of the book?
(No offense meant, but there are a lot of people who seem to think that one can somehow form a meaningful opinion of something just by exposure to other folks opinions of it.)
"... one in math and two from MIT" is -- obviously, I think -- not a complete description/list of his degrees. He's just making the point that the degrees that he has probably aren't shallow, and by implication neither is the book.
Re:"For the benefit of humanity"
on
China Plans Moonbase
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· Score: 1, Flamebait
If the US were any kind of honest democracy, voter turnout might be different.
Re:"For the benefit of humanity"
on
China Plans Moonbase
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· Score: 2, Redundant
They should switch to democracy instead!
Maybe they're hoping that someone else will try it first.
Through the history of technology, most innovations have followed this path. A government spends the massive capitol to prove a concept, and then industry and the public take over.
Huh? Which government proved the concept of the solar sail?
No sane businessman in the 1400's would have tried to sail across the Atlantic, even with known benefits, but a government could afford to try, just to see.
Except that businessmen were trying to find a shortcut to Asia, and Columbus was financed by Queen Isabella personally, though I'll admit that distinguishing between her and the gov't of Spain at the time is tricky. But it was definitely an investment by the queen, who expected to be paid back and then some, ASAP. Contrary to what your history teacher may have told you, it was not just a "voyage of discovery".
What's NASA et al have "proved" is that space is for big gov'ts. Perhaps someday, someone will disprove that.
"Would you rather buy a product made from corn from the Midwest or petroleum from the Middle East?"
Yeah, somehow that sounds a lot better than: "Would you rather the corporate farms finished their conquest of the Midwest or shall we fight more wars in the Middle East for the oil corporations?"
It's the CIA telling us about it. It is your duty as a Real and Patriotic American to take these threats seriously and to be afraid of the Enemies of Freedom at all times.
Look out!! Behind you!! Oh, never mind, I must've scared him away.
US definition of evil:
anything that impedes freedom. pretty straight foreward.
Hoo boy. Even if that was the actual US definition of "evil" and not the PR version, that's not straightforward. Not at all.
That's probably a fairly common impression in the US, though... and arguably part of why the US is not a good judge of what's "evil" and what ain't.
In fact, even thinking that it's about "good" vs "evil" is such a huge oversimplification that it's worthless... except for manipulating public opinion, for which it's evidently incredibly effective.
make your nano-bots... make them do useful things... take a million dollars from al queada and develop evil nano-bots... go to federal prison... USA will stop the bots and blow up your country... that is how it works. if you use new technology for evil, you will get knocked the fuck out.
Um, right. And the US gets to decide what is "evil" and what is not?
Thanks but no thanks. Contrary to the current general delusional state, evidence strongly suggests that the US isn't a very good judge of what is evil and what isn't.
Since the Govt. is footing the bill for the majority of this research (over 90% at this point) isnt it fair they decide how its disclosed?
"The Govt" is not footing the bill. The govt does not have any money. What it has is significant control over what is done with tax revenue, and it is at least supposedly accountable to the people whose money it controls and it is at least supposedly committed to implement the will of the people whose money it's spending.
Now granted, reality has diverged a long way from the ideal, at least in the US, but that's no reason to think that the decisions should be wholly theirs. Though no doubt many of them would be happy for us to believe that.
My question is: Can an independent body be more trustworthy than the government?
Yes.
Can it be less trustworthy?
Yes.
Details matter. Which government? Which independent body? What's the structure of each? Who gets to decide who's involved in either? What are the safeguards? How well are the safeguards guarded?
Can't be too far off - just look at the laptop market - 5 years back you were considered cool if you had one at all - now every bastard has at least 2!
Oh, so that's why I don't have a laptop -- my parents were married!
Yes. Well, I dunno how many bits are involved, but they certainly have color. On the other hand, for an illustrated version of a novel -- like this one -- maybe I'd prefer the dead-tree version anyway. On the gripping hand, many textbooks and references are in color, and it'd be great to be able to have those in an ebook.
Sanders basically admitted this on the stand. He didn't even bother reading up on the federal settlement nor the states' penalties. He just repeated the official MS line. Pathetic.
Well, yes, but not the way you think. Oil is easier to control from a few central points (governments and corporations) than solar or wind, etc. So there's more economic incentive to stay with oil as long as possible.
Makes me wonder - if such "ant colony" sentience could exist, might this not be one heck of a complex (and as a result possibly more intelligent) example of one?
Then again, it/they still don't seem to be making any overtures toward chatting with the primates, heh...
Sounds like proof of intelligence to me. [grin] Maybe they figure we act so much like their dumb, non-cooperative cousins that we couldn't possibly be worth chatting with.
Re:If you cant disprove the science attack the sou
on
Rare Earth
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· Score: 2
You got to love the postscript.
Huh. The postscript must have been entirely changed before I read it, as the version that I read makes no smears nor does any name-calling.
Unlike your post.
Re:Too restrictive definition?
on
Rare Earth
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· Score: 2
Isn't Drake's equation falling victim to the classic human flaw of being too, well human-centric?
If I remember correctly, Drake and Sagan were both quite aware of this. I think it was part of their relatively conservative (at the time) approach to the question. To wit: if life-as-we-know-it is the only kind of life, there could still be lots of life.
should have made a few 'back of the enveloppe' calculations BEFORE sitting a few thousand yards away from a nuclear blast. And then WALKING around the blast area.
Um. Before the blast, there was nothing to do the back of the envelope calculations about. They'd already done whatever calculations they could've done based on the theories they had. Doing more calculations without any real data would definitely not have been a sign of high intelligence.
The clever thing was not really the caculations, it was the improvised data-gathering.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, those are good reasons not to.
But given that one of the major potential resources of the Antarctic is oil, and given that the major consumer of oil and the home base of many oil companies is a country with little respect for treaties and a generally self-serving interpretation of "the interest of all mankind", it might be only a matter of time.
There's nothing inherently unethical about the research. But not considering possible downsides definitely is unethical. Not to mention dumb. No shortage of that kind of dumb, these days, when any mention of possible downsides is written off by corporate spokesdroids, etc, as if it's all from irrational anti-science people.
I see spelling has changed, too. The future just ain't what it used to be.
[nod] Not that they're the first generation to have that delusion.
You are the source of your confusion. The review is not a mathematical context, nor are our posts about it a mathematical context.
The degrees of a reviewer don't prove but do imply a certain level of intellectual ability. Combined with the admission that the reviewer that the book will "take a while to digest", this doesn't not prove but does imply that it's a challenging book.
Have you read the book? Or just reviews of the book?
(No offense meant, but there are a lot of people who seem to think that one can somehow form a meaningful opinion of something just by exposure to other folks opinions of it.)
"... one in math and two from MIT" is -- obviously, I think -- not a complete description/list of his degrees. He's just making the point that the degrees that he has probably aren't shallow, and by implication neither is the book.
If the US were any kind of honest democracy, voter turnout might be different.
Maybe they're hoping that someone else will try it first.
Huh? Which government proved the concept of the solar sail?
No sane businessman in the 1400's would have tried to sail across the Atlantic, even with known benefits, but a government could afford to try, just to see.
Except that businessmen were trying to find a shortcut to Asia, and Columbus was financed by Queen Isabella personally, though I'll admit that distinguishing between her and the gov't of Spain at the time is tricky. But it was definitely an investment by the queen, who expected to be paid back and then some, ASAP. Contrary to what your history teacher may have told you, it was not just a "voyage of discovery".
What's NASA et al have "proved" is that space is for big gov'ts. Perhaps someday, someone will disprove that.
Yeah, somehow that sounds a lot better than: "Would you rather the corporate farms finished their conquest of the Midwest or shall we fight more wars in the Middle East for the oil corporations?"
(Not that it's really an either/or, of course.)
Look out!! Behind you!! Oh, never mind, I must've scared him away.
anything that impedes freedom. pretty straight foreward.
Hoo boy. Even if that was the actual US definition of "evil" and not the PR version, that's not straightforward. Not at all.
That's probably a fairly common impression in the US, though ... and arguably part of why the US is not a good judge of what's "evil" and what ain't.
In fact, even thinking that it's about "good" vs "evil" is such a huge oversimplification that it's worthless ... except for manipulating public opinion, for which it's evidently incredibly effective.
Um, right. And the US gets to decide what is "evil" and what is not?
Thanks but no thanks. Contrary to the current general delusional state, evidence strongly suggests that the US isn't a very good judge of what is evil and what isn't.
"The Govt" is not footing the bill. The govt does not have any money. What it has is significant control over what is done with tax revenue, and it is at least supposedly accountable to the people whose money it controls and it is at least supposedly committed to implement the will of the people whose money it's spending.
Now granted, reality has diverged a long way from the ideal, at least in the US, but that's no reason to think that the decisions should be wholly theirs. Though no doubt many of them would be happy for us to believe that.
Yes.
Can it be less trustworthy?
Yes.
Details matter. Which government? Which independent body? What's the structure of each? Who gets to decide who's involved in either? What are the safeguards? How well are the safeguards guarded?
"Quis cusotdiet ipsos custodes?"
Oh, so that's why I don't have a laptop -- my parents were married!
Yes. Well, I dunno how many bits are involved, but they certainly have color. On the other hand, for an illustrated version of a novel -- like this one -- maybe I'd prefer the dead-tree version anyway. On the gripping hand, many textbooks and references are in color, and it'd be great to be able to have those in an ebook.
Sanders basically admitted this on the stand. He didn't even bother reading up on the federal settlement nor the states' penalties. He just repeated the official MS line. Pathetic.
Well, yes, but not the way you think. Oil is easier to control from a few central points (governments and corporations) than solar or wind, etc. So there's more economic incentive to stay with oil as long as possible.
Then again, it/they still don't seem to be making any overtures toward chatting with the primates, heh...
Sounds like proof of intelligence to me. [grin] Maybe they figure we act so much like their dumb, non-cooperative cousins that we couldn't possibly be worth chatting with.
Huh. The postscript must have been entirely changed before I read it, as the version that I read makes no smears nor does any name-calling.
Unlike your post.
If I remember correctly, Drake and Sagan were both quite aware of this. I think it was part of their relatively conservative (at the time) approach to the question. To wit: if life-as-we-know-it is the only kind of life, there could still be lots of life.
Um. Before the blast, there was nothing to do the back of the envelope calculations about. They'd already done whatever calculations they could've done based on the theories they had. Doing more calculations without any real data would definitely not have been a sign of high intelligence.
The clever thing was not really the caculations, it was the improvised data-gathering.