Most drivers can't handle those situations either - witness the large number of accidents that happen every day. The driverless cars just have to be better, and have superior liability coverage, than human drivers.
I know that, and you know that... but the juries won't know that, and the ambulance-chasers that will be slavering for an excuse to pocket some of Google's billions aren't likely to bring it up...:^P
However, how would it react to sudden situations at high speed? According to the article and everything I know so far... not well.
In principle, at least, an automated system could react better than a human to sudden emergency situations... because a computer can process more input and faster decisions than a human can, and also (just as importantly) a computer never gets bored, sleepy, or distracted.
Dunno if Google's system reaches that potential or not, but if not it's just a matter of improving the technology until it can.
We'd be at least at Alpha Centauri, possibly further out by now.
I like spending big money on space exploration as much as the next guy, but Alpha Centauri is 4.3 light-years away. If a mission to Alpha Centauri was launched in 1958 (the year NASA was created), it would have had to travel at an average speed of.078c in order to arrive this year.
It's hard to imagine that we could have come up with technology capable of that, even if we spent our entire GDP on developing space technology.
Mars, OTOH, or other locations in our own solar system, sure.
The whole point is having two homes in case of an extinction level event happening (asteroid, nuclear war, plague, etc.).
The value of a "second home" isn't much if the second home can't sustain human life indefinitely. Why spend trillions of dollars just so that a few dozen humans can be miserable on some godforsaken rock for a few years until they die from lack of biosphere?
Even if the Earth was hit by an asteroid, a nuclear war, and a plague simultaneously, there would still be more chance for human survival on Earth than anywhere else.
Whoever ends up running the place, they are going to need to sell oil.
Sure, but what if instead of "someone ending up running the place", we have an extended conflict that sees the middle east going for months or years without an obvious victor, and any oil tankers passing through the area are subject to attack by one side and/or the other? I think that would be the more likely nightmare scenario for an oil-addicted nation.
If you win the lottery, you get to include 25 newly created bitcoins addressed to your own account, plus any transaction fees. At the moment this is worth $3500 or so per block.
Hmm, for $3500 per block, I wonder if anyone has set up a "miner parasite" malware -- it would infect as many legitimate BitCoin-mining machines as possible, then do nothing until a mining machine discovered a winning hash. At that point it would intercept the miner's announcement of the winning hash code at the network level, so that instead of the announcement going out to the BitCoin network, it would go out to the malware creator's machine instead. The malware creator would then cash in on the new blocks at his leisure.
Easy profit, right? Much simpler than buying and setting your own mining hardware or running a massive botnet...:)
It might be using 100% CPU, but on a desktop machine, the user would probably never even know its there.
Is there a way to keep your program's CPU usage from showing up in Task Manager (etc)? If so, then the only other thing you'd need is a way to keep the computer's fans at their nominal levels so that the extra noise wouldn't tip the user off, and you're golden (at least until the computer catches fire).
but that if you're doing a long trip you have to do an hour-long charge every three hours or so.
Ah, I see your point.
Of course, if you're on a 7+ hour drive you're very likely to drive out of range of the current supercharger network anyway. So until batteries get better and/or supercharger stations spread across the country, the Tesla (or any electric car) is probably not the best vehicle for really long road trips.
Of course, anyone who can afford a Tesla can also afford to occasionally rent a gasoline-powered car instead -- or to buy plane tickets.
Hell, even the 45-60 minutes of the Tesla's superchargers are, IMO, way too long for how often you have to do it.
How often do you have to use them? I'm guessing not very often, unless you have a ridiculously long daily commute (in which case a gasoline car will be faster, but then you end up paying a huge monthly gas bill instead; either way it sucks).
It could be that this one time use battery is to quell the complaints of people who say "But what if I want to road trip 500 miles into the middle of no-where!
Well, maybe, but now you're just substituting one kind of range anxiety for another. Now instead of worrying about getting stranded, people will be worried about having to replace an expensive aluminum-battery.
Does Google Glass deserve extra scrutiny before it hits the market?"
No, it deserves scrutiny after it hits the market. Passing judgement before the product is even finalized is just an exercise in fearmongering (how can you judge something when you don't yet know what it does?) and smacks of prior restraint.
I wonder if an arrangement with the neighbours would help: "I put my Time Capsule in your loft, and you put yours in my loft".
Sure, that could work. Of course take this idea to its logical extreme and you have BuddyBackup (not meant as an endorsement, just as an example; I'm sure there are other similar services out there that are just as good)
Try getting even 6 years out of current hard drives. Now everything has this planned obsolescence by manufacturers, since they want to sell you again soon as possible...
The other way to look at it is that you are no longer forced to pay extra for overengineered parts that provide longevity that you aren't likely ever to use anyway.
Time machine requires about zero maintenance and will help me recover quickly if my main hard drive dies. Of course, if a fire or theft results in the simultaneous loss of the backup drive as well, I'm out of luck. So for data that's worth spending a little extra time securing, checking it in to an SVN server works for me.
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Most drivers can't handle those situations either - witness the large number of accidents that happen every day. The driverless cars just have to be better, and have superior liability coverage, than human drivers.
I know that, and you know that... but the juries won't know that, and the ambulance-chasers that will be slavering for an excuse to pocket some of Google's billions aren't likely to bring it up... :^P
However, how would it react to sudden situations at high speed? According to the article and everything I know so far... not well.
In principle, at least, an automated system could react better than a human to sudden emergency situations... because a computer can process more input and faster decisions than a human can, and also (just as importantly) a computer never gets bored, sleepy, or distracted.
Dunno if Google's system reaches that potential or not, but if not it's just a matter of improving the technology until it can.
Birds have enough problems without being always shot at on sight because they might be spies.
We'd be at least at Alpha Centauri, possibly further out by now.
I like spending big money on space exploration as much as the next guy, but Alpha Centauri is 4.3 light-years away. If a mission to Alpha Centauri was launched in 1958 (the year NASA was created), it would have had to travel at an average speed of .078c in order to arrive this year.
It's hard to imagine that we could have come up with technology capable of that, even if we spent our entire GDP on developing space technology.
Mars, OTOH, or other locations in our own solar system, sure.
The whole point is having two homes in case of an extinction level event happening (asteroid, nuclear war, plague, etc.).
The value of a "second home" isn't much if the second home can't sustain human life indefinitely. Why spend trillions of dollars just so that a few dozen humans can be miserable on some godforsaken rock for a few years until they die from lack of biosphere?
Even if the Earth was hit by an asteroid, a nuclear war, and a plague simultaneously, there would still be more chance for human survival on Earth than anywhere else.
Whoever ends up running the place, they are going to need to sell oil.
Sure, but what if instead of "someone ending up running the place", we have an extended conflict that sees the middle east going for months or years without an obvious victor, and any oil tankers passing through the area are subject to attack by one side and/or the other? I think that would be the more likely nightmare scenario for an oil-addicted nation.
If you win the lottery, you get to include 25 newly created bitcoins addressed to your own account, plus any transaction fees. At the moment this is worth $3500 or so per block.
Hmm, for $3500 per block, I wonder if anyone has set up a "miner parasite" malware -- it would infect as many legitimate BitCoin-mining machines as possible, then do nothing until a mining machine discovered a winning hash. At that point it would intercept the miner's announcement of the winning hash code at the network level, so that instead of the announcement going out to the BitCoin network, it would go out to the malware creator's machine instead. The malware creator would then cash in on the new blocks at his leisure.
Easy profit, right? Much simpler than buying and setting your own mining hardware or running a massive botnet... :)
It might be using 100% CPU, but on a desktop machine, the user would probably never even know its there.
Is there a way to keep your program's CPU usage from showing up in Task Manager (etc)? If so, then the only other thing you'd need is a way to keep the computer's fans at their nominal levels so that the extra noise wouldn't tip the user off, and you're golden (at least until the computer catches fire).
When can we start suing them for being a monopoly?
It's the USA, you can pretty much sue anyone for any reason at any time.
That said, there isn't anything illegal or actionable about being a monopoly. It's only when you abuse your monopoly that you get in trouble.
but that if you're doing a long trip you have to do an hour-long charge every three hours or so.
Ah, I see your point.
Of course, if you're on a 7+ hour drive you're very likely to drive out of range of the current supercharger network anyway. So until batteries get better and/or supercharger stations spread across the country, the Tesla (or any electric car) is probably not the best vehicle for really long road trips.
Of course, anyone who can afford a Tesla can also afford to occasionally rent a gasoline-powered car instead -- or to buy plane tickets.
Electric cars sound great as long as you do not live in a flat. How do you connect to the power grid if you have to park out on the street?
1) Find nearest street lamp
2) Patch outlet into the side
3) Free power forever!
Hell, even the 45-60 minutes of the Tesla's superchargers are, IMO, way too long for how often you have to do it.
How often do you have to use them? I'm guessing not very often, unless you have a ridiculously long daily commute (in which case a gasoline car will be faster, but then you end up paying a huge monthly gas bill instead; either way it sucks).
It is always a good thing to have some earth between your solar panels and the sun when it is night time.
No, it's a terrible thing -- it greatly reduces the efficiency of the solar panels.
However, if we were to position a large mirror in geosynchronous orbit, I think we could largely avoid the problem.
That tiny island is probably* more solvent than the United States.
* note that "probably" in the above sentence means "I have no idea what I'm talking about"
Get a bigger water tank, and automatic refill system. Or maybe I'm thinking too simple now?
You're not thinking simple enough. Hint: The driver is sucking down a 64 ounce Big Gulp every two hours...
It could be that this one time use battery is to quell the complaints of people who say "But what if I want to road trip 500 miles into the middle of no-where!
Well, maybe, but now you're just substituting one kind of range anxiety for another. Now instead of worrying about getting stranded, people will be worried about having to replace an expensive aluminum-battery.
... and bad things happened.
Come to think of it, that's the plot of every Stephen King story.
Does Google Glass deserve extra scrutiny before it hits the market?"
No, it deserves scrutiny after it hits the market. Passing judgement before the product is even finalized is just an exercise in fearmongering (how can you judge something when you don't yet know what it does?) and smacks of prior restraint.
I wonder if an arrangement with the neighbours would help: "I put my Time Capsule in your loft, and you put yours in my loft".
Sure, that could work. Of course take this idea to its logical extreme and you have BuddyBackup (not meant as an endorsement, just as an example; I'm sure there are other similar services out there that are just as good)
Try getting even 6 years out of current hard drives. Now everything has this planned obsolescence by manufacturers, since they want to sell you again soon as possible...
The other way to look at it is that you are no longer forced to pay extra for overengineered parts that provide longevity that you aren't likely ever to use anyway.
Time machine requires about zero maintenance and will help me recover quickly if my main hard drive dies. Of course, if a fire or theft results in the simultaneous loss of the backup drive as well, I'm out of luck. So for data that's worth spending a little extra time securing, checking it in to an SVN server works for me.
We all know inflation on the dollar is crazy and trending toward never getting better
Do we all know that? According to a this, USD inflation is at 2%. Is that a crazy amount of inflation? It doesn't seem so to me.
Magicking $1 trillion out of thin air would make the US government very happy.
The US government already has ways to do that, that do not require server farms. They can just print the bills if they want to.
AFAIK the only things successfully extracted from seawater on an industrial scale are sea salt and water.
... and fish ;)
No moon (it would fly away)
Just out of curiosity, why would the absence of a sun cause the moon to fly away from the Earth?