people don't want to change because they like it the way things are, or are afraid it might get worse. and how do you think it got to be what it is? through change! that said, there's always a few of us who WANT things to change as much as possible (the only way to keep my mind from collapsing out of boredom maybe) and are always trying new things. once these things are "good enough" then everybody else uses it. heck look at the internet....
How can we have the power to increase someone's intelligence and not do it?!?!?! that would not make sense. with the current state of the worlds and the species, we need all the smart people we can get!. how to predict the weather, how to extend life, how does the world work, how to have good solid economy not based on someone else's poverty, all these and other questions require a level of intelligence we just don't have...
after all, i truly believe that the smarter you are the better a person you are. and don't give me the "hitler was smart" crap. As long as intelligence is coupled with good control of your impulses, you're fine. after all probably all ugly things made by smart people weren't intelligent things to do....
in the end it would be like owning a gun. it gives regular people a huge advantage, but it's not forbidden (not that i like guns though).
man, if we can improve our species, let's. sure some ugly scenes will show up in the middle, but in the end it'll work out fine.
Before the ineviatble discussion about the ethics and morale of this research field and its attached dream breaks out (and I already saw some postings along this line), let me jump ahead of the nay-sayers and state this:
do you know what's the purpose of life?
for those of us who distrust formal religion (anyone who's not totally blind about it does at least a bit) and dedicates at least some time to reading about scientific knowledge, the answer is a resounding NO.
which brings me to my point... what tells you that the purpose of life for any living race isn't to survive at any cost? to ensure that humans never dissapear? reagrdless of the means... believe me people I don't just say this, after all i AM a vegetarian and care a lot about the preservation of animals and that sort of things. It's just that we just don't know.
you look at any living thing and they're all designed to survive. even death could be considered a mean for a species to survive (otherwise there wouldn't be evolution right?). we're all hardcoded with that instict that makes us follow the pattern that will make the species survive.
so what if there isn't much evolution can teach us at this point, and the only mean for us to evolve to survival is through our own means?. there's already plenty of us (some say more than the planet can hold with current resources), we live like five times longer than our ancestors, only the animal species we choose survive (except for like bugs and rats), there's no real threat from the animal world that will make us extinct (please leave ebola out of this). we're the only species capable of elaborate thought, the kind that takes the evolution process on its own hands, and on and on.
bottom line, ethics is a word we invented. the only suggestions as to what's right and what's wrong come from religious books that made most family values that eventually became government laws. add all that up and you have people's common sense (which isn't so common and sometimes doesn't really make a lot of sense). leave the scientists be. let them work on new things even if they're risky at first as long as they're aimed at the overall betterment and survival of the species. if we stop programs that can save millions of lives because it will kill a hundred in the process (wasn't that the enola gay's payload?) we might be leaving our survival to an evolution process that's just too slow to keep up with our biggest threat, ourselves. the part of humanity that is not willing to sacrifice itself for the betterment of all.
and BTW, those hundren people that may die? i'm sure there'd be plenty of volunteers out there that are willing to take the risk
ok, enough ranting, and please don't just flame me, use intelligent arguments against my not so inteligent ones. saludos.
what do they mean they can't send email without the government knowing?!?! haven't they heard about hotmail/yahoomail/[place-your-web-based-email-syst em-here]?
heck, if all else fails setup an ftp server so that people can upload text files that are sent through an offshore smtp server or something.
and what does the fact that china.com is a portal have anything to do with which sites you visit? didn't get that one...
Oh C'mon people, give him credit, he did a nice job so stop understating the hack. sure it was easy, but that IS the beauty of it. just because it doesn't take a rocket scientist to do it, doesn't mean the you rocket scientists out there should say it's a piece of crap!
after all, it's the creativity and inventive that counts.
The right way to say it would be "diagonal punto" or "diagonalpunto". although most spanish speaking people would probably say "slashpunto" since "slash" is rarely translated (at least where I live, Panama)
$150 for the system is just about right. here's the math: 1 GHZ CPU, $700 64MB RAM, +$200 4GB HDD, +$150 ================= SUB-TOTAL $1050 Windows -$900 ----------------- TOTAL $150 See, it works. Windows is a liability.
Contrary to popular belief, a law passed in the US does NOT affect legistlation worldwide. If you read the clonaid website, they state that they're going to some country where it isn't illegal to clone humans, basically, anywhere else but the US and some notable exceptions. Think about how delighted the government of, say, Dominican Republic would be to know that a group of scientists will invest US$5M for research in their country...
what will really happen...
on
RNA Computer
·
· Score: 1
Sure, give the system to microsoft. Before you know it they will translate windows2000. The only problem is the resulting RNA/DNA system will be the size of John Candy after dinner.
Haven't you guys ever been involved in a research program? well then you know how it works. You're not sure what will come of it, but you know the potential for discovering or inventing the next world-changing new thang is biting your behind. So you set your mind to it, then you come across this HUGE roadblock: how do i convince the board to fund it??? then you start working on this ridiculous attempt at making it look profitable (and you know that's the only way to sell it to them dumbasses) and start coming up with these far fetched best case scenarios just to get people interested until they're convinced they want it. at that point you better hurry, cause you know you have NO arguments for the short term profit seekers to sustain your resarch and at the next budget discussion they'll look at you first for cuts. Sounds a lot like NASA / ISS / Congress doesn't it? Bottom line is, we don't know what good will come out of the ISS, we just konw a lot will, so please stop asking what for and start asking what next!
on What about the money:
Guys, for the world's only superpower, your NASA has been VERY dumb. can't blame them though, they're just a bunch of darn good scientists lacking just a liiiitle bit of comercial sense... You can't operate a multibillion dollar operation like NASA subject to budget ups and downs like that!!! my point is, if you really look at it, NASA has been the US's cash cow, you just don't realize it!... Most of the great things that came out of the US (except for Denise Richards, and even she has irish parents) are related one way or another to NASA's research. WTF aren't they making money out of it!!!! my guess is that NASA can become self sustained if it would profit from its own inventions/discoveries. And don't give me that that would hurt the economy, your companies are taking the result of these findings, slightly changing it and then patenting it anyways. Would they have started 30 years ago they would probably have a ring around the earth and A.C.Clarke's space elevator by now!
on why internatinoal
First of all now one could have predicted that Russia would be on such chaos when the USSR broke up, at that time everything looked like a Cisco TV comercial. Besides, they do know a lot from their MIR space program and anyone trying to undermine that is just wrong. Also, if the project is truly international (now that can come to question) then it's a whole lot harder to get it sliced and diced by congress, they were just being smart with your money.... wether it's the right way to do it or not, i think it was the ONLY way to do it, or do you think congress would have wrote the $50Billin check for the new Freedom all over again?!?!?! c'mon..
on the US module threat
Man, that threat is not aimed at Russia, it's not even a threat, that's just a stunt to keep taxpayers happy! don't you see it, the module is in the ISS schedule. the module was planned. the module is built (with some very few modifications planned) and the money to launch it is in the piggy bank. they just moved the launch date back 6 months after it was late 2 years. DUH! I bet the russian's already know about the announcement. all that does is say, well we're not REALLY wasting your money on overhead and personnel due to being late because of russia's problems, we're just moving money around.. BS.
on Mir vs ISS
If Britain came up with a plan to build a new and improved space shuttle, based on international participation with the US involvement, but Britain would be the leader and would call the shots, and there was a very small price of entrance: that the US would stop all resources going to the current space shuttle program so that it can dedicate itself to the new British project. what would you do???????? kudos to Goldin and the others for pulling off that huge diplomatic effort and getting as much as they have so far. The Mir works as much as the shuttles do, with some majer setbacks just like the Shuttle have had (Challenger, wiring problems), they're both pretty much old and in serious overtime and they only have money for one similar program at a time (just like NASA). you're both damn proud of your stuff too. You should be sending thank you notes. If you ask me, the US should have built it and sent it with russian's consulting and then sell it or rent it to them, but they had no way of knowing back then anyways.
So much for the conspiracy theories and the political grand schemes. it's usually a whole lot simpler and real than that. now on with the flaming...
Sorry Graymalkin, but if I'm not mistaken, ion propulsion, at least the one we know how to do today, can't be used to boost anything heavier than a thought to a higher orbit when you're still under the influence of earth's gravity. for ion thrusters to work you need a whole lot of momentun in the desired direction and then you engage those thrusters. what they do is they "push" the space ship with the force of a sheet of paper droping on your desk, but at a constant rate for a loooong time. eventually, when you talk abou years of travel, you get a huge gain by reaching very fast speeds at very low acceleration very economically.
Of course! don't you guys get it? the people is right! if we leave Microsoft as it is, it will collapse of its own weight!!! I say don't touch microsoft, let them rot in one piece. After all, they've managed to get in as much trouble without help!
Funny how the researchers comments were all conservative as in "There's a long way to go" or "This is just the first step", yet reporters are already pre-ordering pin sized versions of Enciclopedia Britannica... We're on the very early stages of manipulating atoms, and I don't believe we even know if we can make a stable system, meaning, if I leave that atom there, will it stay there. As the REAL smart people said, "this is just a first step in a different direction". I believe more practical nanotec apps will come in the form of more biological solutions, since those already work in nature and we're just tweaking them, and will most likely apply to medical uses since that's where the money is (anyone with the big pockets would pay $100K+ for a shot that would cure parkinson's, but only a government would pay that kind of money for a micron sized 386DX) Sooooo, back to the DNA/RNA computers I guess.
Slashdot Mirror
People do NOT want to change
people don't want to change because they like it the way things are, or are afraid it might get worse. and how do you think it got to be what it is? through change! that said, there's always a few of us who WANT things to change as much as possible (the only way to keep my mind from collapsing out of boredom maybe) and are always trying new things. once these things are "good enough" then everybody else uses it. heck look at the internet....
How can we have the power to increase someone's intelligence and not do it?!?!?! that would not make sense. with the current state of the worlds and the species, we need all the smart people we can get!. how to predict the weather, how to extend life, how does the world work, how to have good solid economy not based on someone else's poverty, all these and other questions require a level of intelligence we just don't have...
after all, i truly believe that the smarter you are the better a person you are. and don't give me the "hitler was smart" crap. As long as intelligence is coupled with good control of your impulses, you're fine. after all probably all ugly things made by smart people weren't intelligent things to do....
in the end it would be like owning a gun. it gives regular people a huge advantage, but it's not forbidden (not that i like guns though).
man, if we can improve our species, let's. sure some ugly scenes will show up in the middle, but in the end it'll work out fine.
Before the ineviatble discussion about the ethics and morale of this research field and its attached dream breaks out (and I already saw some postings along this line), let me jump ahead of the nay-sayers and state this:
do you know what's the purpose of life?
for those of us who distrust formal religion (anyone who's not totally blind about it does at least a bit) and dedicates at least some time to reading about scientific knowledge, the answer is a resounding NO.
which brings me to my point... what tells you that the purpose of life for any living race isn't to survive at any cost? to ensure that humans never dissapear? reagrdless of the means... believe me people I don't just say this, after all i AM a vegetarian and care a lot about the preservation of animals and that sort of things. It's just that we just don't know.
you look at any living thing and they're all designed to survive. even death could be considered a mean for a species to survive (otherwise there wouldn't be evolution right?). we're all hardcoded with that instict that makes us follow the pattern that will make the species survive.
so what if there isn't much evolution can teach us at this point, and the only mean for us to evolve to survival is through our own means?. there's already plenty of us (some say more than the planet can hold with current resources), we live like five times longer than our ancestors, only the animal species we choose survive (except for like bugs and rats), there's no real threat from the animal world that will make us extinct (please leave ebola out of this). we're the only species capable of elaborate thought, the kind that takes the evolution process on its own hands, and on and on.
bottom line, ethics is a word we invented. the only suggestions as to what's right and what's wrong come from religious books that made most family values that eventually became government laws. add all that up and you have people's common sense (which isn't so common and sometimes doesn't really make a lot of sense).
leave the scientists be. let them work on new things even if they're risky at first as long as they're aimed at the overall betterment and survival of the species. if we stop programs that can save millions of lives because it will kill a hundred in the process (wasn't that the enola gay's payload?) we might be leaving our survival to an evolution process that's just too slow to keep up with our biggest threat, ourselves. the part of humanity that is not willing to sacrifice itself for the betterment of all.
and BTW, those hundren people that may die? i'm sure there'd be plenty of volunteers out there that are willing to take the risk
ok, enough ranting, and please don't just flame me, use intelligent arguments against my not so inteligent ones.
saludos.
what do they mean they can't send email without the government knowing?!?! haven't they heard about hotmail/yahoomail/[place-your-web-based-email-syst em-here]?
heck, if all else fails setup an ftp server so that people can upload text files that are sent through an offshore smtp server or something.
and what does the fact that china.com is a portal have anything to do with which sites you visit? didn't get that one...
WOW!!!, I didn't know John Rocker posted on slashdot!
Oh C'mon people, give him credit, he did a nice job so stop understating the hack. sure it was easy, but that IS the beauty of it. just because it doesn't take a rocket scientist to do it, doesn't mean the you rocket scientists out there should say it's a piece of crap!
after all, it's the creativity and inventive that counts.
are you selling your services?
The right way to say it would be "diagonal punto" or "diagonalpunto". although most spanish speaking people would probably say "slashpunto" since "slash" is rarely translated (at least where I live, Panama)
(sorry about the previous posting, just pasted it in there) $150 for the system is just about right. here's the math:
1 GHZ CPU, $700
64MB RAM, +$200
4GB HDD, +$150
=================
SUB-TOTAL $1050
Windows -$900
-----------------
TOTAL $150
See, it works. Windows is a liability.
$150 for the system is just about right. here's the math: 1 GHZ CPU, $700 64MB RAM, +$200 4GB HDD, +$150 ================= SUB-TOTAL $1050 Windows -$900 ----------------- TOTAL $150 See, it works. Windows is a liability.
Contrary to popular belief, a law passed in the US does NOT affect legistlation worldwide. If you read the clonaid website, they state that they're going to some country where it isn't illegal to clone humans, basically, anywhere else but the US and some notable exceptions. Think about how delighted the government of, say, Dominican Republic would be to know that a group of scientists will invest US$5M for research in their country...
Sure, give the system to microsoft. Before you know it they will translate windows2000. The only problem is the resulting RNA/DNA system will be the size of John Candy after dinner.
Finally I can speak my mind over these issues:
on Why the ISS:
Haven't you guys ever been involved in a research program? well then you know how it works. You're not sure what will come of it, but you know the potential for discovering or inventing the next world-changing new thang is biting your behind. So you set your mind to it, then you come across this HUGE roadblock: how do i convince the board to fund it??? then you start working on this ridiculous attempt at making it look profitable (and you know that's the only way to sell it to them dumbasses) and start coming up with these far fetched best case scenarios just to get people interested until they're convinced they want it. at that point you better hurry, cause you know you have NO arguments for the short term profit seekers to sustain your resarch and at the next budget discussion they'll look at you first for cuts. Sounds a lot like NASA / ISS / Congress doesn't it? Bottom line is, we don't know what good will come out of the ISS, we just konw a lot will, so please stop asking what for and start asking what next!
on What about the money:
Guys, for the world's only superpower, your NASA has been VERY dumb. can't blame them though, they're just a bunch of darn good scientists lacking just a liiiitle bit of comercial sense... You can't operate a multibillion dollar operation like NASA subject to budget ups and downs like that!!! my point is, if you really look at it, NASA has been the US's cash cow, you just don't realize it!... Most of the great things that came out of the US (except for Denise Richards, and even she has irish parents) are related one way or another to NASA's research. WTF aren't they making money out of it!!!! my guess is that NASA can become self sustained if it would profit from its own inventions/discoveries. And don't give me that that would hurt the economy, your companies are taking the result of these findings, slightly changing it and then patenting it anyways. Would they have started 30 years ago they would probably have a ring around the earth and A.C.Clarke's space elevator by now!
on why internatinoal
First of all now one could have predicted that Russia would be on such chaos when the USSR broke up, at that time everything looked like a Cisco TV comercial. Besides, they do know a lot from their MIR space program and anyone trying to undermine that is just wrong. Also, if the project is truly international (now that can come to question) then it's a whole lot harder to get it sliced and diced by congress, they were just being smart with your money.... wether it's the right way to do it or not, i think it was the ONLY way to do it, or do you think congress would have wrote the $50Billin check for the new Freedom all over again?!?!?! c'mon..
on the US module threat
Man, that threat is not aimed at Russia, it's not even a threat, that's just a stunt to keep taxpayers happy! don't you see it, the module is in the ISS schedule. the module was planned. the module is built (with some very few modifications planned) and the money to launch it is in the piggy bank. they just moved the launch date back 6 months after it was late 2 years. DUH! I bet the russian's already know about the announcement. all that does is say, well we're not REALLY wasting your money on overhead and personnel due to being late because of russia's problems, we're just moving money around.. BS.
on Mir vs ISS
If Britain came up with a plan to build a new and improved space shuttle, based on international participation with the US involvement, but Britain would be the leader and would call the shots, and there was a very small price of entrance: that the US would stop all resources going to the current space shuttle program so that it can dedicate itself to the new British project. what would you do???????? kudos to Goldin and the others for pulling off that huge diplomatic effort and getting as much as they have so far. The Mir works as much as the shuttles do, with some majer setbacks just like the Shuttle have had (Challenger, wiring problems), they're both pretty much old and in serious overtime and they only have money for one similar program at a time (just like NASA). you're both damn proud of your stuff too. You should be sending thank you notes. If you ask me, the US should have built it and sent it with russian's consulting and then sell it or rent it to them, but they had no way of knowing back then anyways.
So much for the conspiracy theories and the political grand schemes. it's usually a whole lot simpler and real than that.
now on with the flaming...
Sorry Graymalkin, but if I'm not mistaken, ion propulsion, at least the one we know how to do today, can't be used to boost anything heavier than a thought to a higher orbit when you're still under the influence of earth's gravity.
for ion thrusters to work you need a whole lot of momentun in the desired direction and then you engage those thrusters. what they do is they "push" the space ship with the force of a sheet of paper droping on your desk, but at a constant rate for a loooong time. eventually, when you talk abou years of travel, you get a huge gain by reaching very fast speeds at very low acceleration very economically.
Of course! don't you guys get it? the people is right! if we leave Microsoft as it is, it will collapse of its own weight!!! I say don't touch microsoft, let them rot in one piece. After all, they've managed to get in as much trouble without help!
Funny how the researchers comments were all conservative as in "There's a long way to go" or "This is just the first step", yet reporters are already pre-ordering pin sized versions of Enciclopedia Britannica... We're on the very early stages of manipulating atoms, and I don't believe we even know if we can make a stable system, meaning, if I leave that atom there, will it stay there. As the REAL smart people said, "this is just a first step in a different direction". I believe more practical nanotec apps will come in the form of more biological solutions, since those already work in nature and we're just tweaking them, and will most likely apply to medical uses since that's where the money is (anyone with the big pockets would pay $100K+ for a shot that would cure parkinson's, but only a government would pay that kind of money for a micron sized 386DX) Sooooo, back to the DNA/RNA computers I guess.