I agree with you fully. I should probably clarify that when I said "A appropriate use of a smart car" I meant "a _more_ appropriate use compared to what people are wishing for".
I'd love to know what a smart car will do when it reaches a construction zone where the lane lines are missing, incorrect, or mixed up with the old lane lines. I update my GPS maps before long trips and I still find instances where road maintenance has temporarily diverted the roadway to be inconsistent with the GPS. A smart car that believes it is on the right course because the lane lines look correct and the GPS measurement is consistent may still be wrong.
And neither should any of those things ever be legal. This is yet another risk of have self-driving cars; the false assumption that what you describe are safe uses of such a vehicle. There will ALWAYS be situations where the automation software can't cope with a particular scenario and you have to take the wheel in a split second. Commercial aircraft can already take-off, fly, and land themselves but this does not replace the need for sober alert pilots to take over in the case of an emergency. A appropriate use of a smart car would be more akin to cruise control. You still need to be continuously alert and ready at the wheel, the cruise control just relieves the effort of continually adjusting to maintain your speed.
I think a lot would actually be shaped by peoples behaviors and expectations of the clone. A sort of self fulfilling prophecy. Imagine if from the day you were born you were surrounded by people that considered you to be the reincarnation of a famous guitar player, eventually you might start to believe it yourself. Heck, I'd be willing to bet that if you raised a child surrounded by people who believed he was a deity he might just try playing the part.
It's also like claiming that parents who spend all their money on drugs and get fired from their jobs are harming their kids. I totally agree that society should have no right to demand a certain degree of productivity out of people but productivity is hardly the only thing affected by addictive substances that skew your priorities and ability to think rationally.
Well, from your earlier comment you seem to assume that people generally behave rationally. Based on how paltry government retirement benefits already are, and how many speculate that such benefits will only get worse, even with current expected lifespans it would not be rational to assume that the government will be there to cover retirement benefits.
Forget retirement, think of how many people barely plan for how they are going to cover their expenses for even a month while at the same time making purchases beyond their means. Unless becoming immortal comes with a rationality and willpower upgrade, I highly doubt immortals will plan any better than mortals do now.
Aging and death is a feature, not a bug. For any given species it needs to have a sufficiently long lifespan to produce (and possibly raise) offspring. The young then have to compete with the more mature for resources. In the case of humans, we also compete within our social hierarchies for the influence of our principles and ideas. To continue the cycle of adaptation and renewal as a species it is important to balance birth with aging, and ultimately with death.
If people want to live forever, they at least need to clock-out and watch from the sidelines at some point. Perhaps as heads in jars in some museum similar to Futurama (sans robotic Richard Nixon).
Had a friend who told me a story about a time he was at a restaurant with some guests from somewhere in the UK. The jist of it was that after dinner his guests were looking for some cigarettes which my friend didn't have so they approached some burly looking marines at the bar and asked where they could find a couple of fags. In a flash moment of terror in envisioning where that exchange might lead my friend sprung up and as quickly as he could explained: "cigarettes!, they are looking for cigarettes!"
It isn't the employer I'd be worried about but your customers and colleagues (as applicable). Knowing the right people and having good relationships with them can make all the difference in finding the good positions, if not for your next job then for the one after that. If you bail unexpectedly on your team, or leave one of your customers high and dry without warning it could leave a bad taste not only in their mouths but in anyone they spread the word to. Even if your employer and everyone you worked with was a jerk you are only giving them more ammo to badmouth you to others. Beyond some fleeting satisfaction, burning a bridge will never help you and may end up hurting you in ways you can't easily predict.
Ahh, see NOW you're talking my language! Come to think of it, most of the junk from my failed KSP launches has been raining down all over the Kerbal Space Center.
No, he's describing how to build devices to intentionally destroy public and private property as well as the vision of certain animals. He asserts that one can trust that they are nearly impervious to prosecution due to a presumed lack of necessary evidence to obtain a conviction. He assures us that due to the technique he is proposing that these likely hobbyist quality devices will not inadvertently blind any human beings because his detector will not trigger in such cases.
I see a lot of issues with biofuels, but I'm less concerned with this issue. If some biofuel crop presents a more economical use of a farmers land than his other options then it also makes it slightly more attractive for that farmer to cultivate the land rather than sell it to some developer. Should food become more scarce then the balance may tip to that same farmer choosing to grow a food crop on that same plot of land. Once you turn the land into the suburbs, chances are you won't be seeing it grow crops ever again. The bigger concern I have is that no matter what you are growing, it requires irrigation, nutrients, and possibly other things like pesticides / herbicides. This issue is compounded if the demand for these biofuel crops encourages the leveling of more forested areas to create more farmland.
I'm not sure, though it doesn't seem strange to me. A magnet doesn't have to have its poles 180 degrees away from each other (think a horseshoe magnet).
I had to cheat and look it up but there is actually a part where you can hire a native as a guide to cross the Snake River in exchange for clothing. The only thing in that game I think you could even kill was animals for food.
So I haven't missed the boat after all! In fact, since mining coins using these currency systems starts fast and then slow over time I should create a few hundred genesis blocks myself and be the first miner in each new currency! I'll call them 001coin, 002coin, 003coin, and so on! And the benefit isn't just for me! Imagine how many virtual coins people will have the opportunity to own with so many new currencies to mine for! Sure, some of them may die off leaving people with worthless digital artifacts, but with so many currencies out there I'm sure it'll be a net gain in the end!
I just like the fact that when several hundred dollars of fraudulent purchases were made against my card that I was notified and ultimately re-imbursed for the total amount. Who do I talk to if I need to be reimbursed for a fraudulent transaction or loss of my Bitcoin wallet? What is the customer service contact number?
Bitcoin is the digital equivalent of burying a chest of gold coins in your backyard. Perhaps you are perfect and nobody will ever find it and you'll never lose or forget where you hid it, but I'm certainly not and anyone else in that group should be very cautious of placing any significant sum of funds into Bitcoin. And sure, "Bitcoin is just another market force" just as Linden dollars are, though I wouldn't say the average person has a reason to care for either.
Doctor: "Clear!" ... ... ...
Nurse: "Doctor, are you going to administer the shock?"
Doctor: "Hang on, the defibrillator is still booting... Ok." -BZZT!- "Has the EKG finished installing that JVM update yet?"
Nurse: "98%, 99%, 100%!... Oh, it's installing now... want to grab a coffee?"
Have a friend who installed motion triggered lighting in his bathroom. Seemed like an ok idea (apart from the public-restroom vibe) till I took a shower at his place and the lights went off lol. But yea, it's really just as simple as turning off lights when you aren't in the room, no gizmos needed.
Besides wasting energy casting light where it is not needed there are many real and well studied effects on the health of both humans and animals attributed to light pollution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pollution.
I don't see the conflict. Understanding how natural selection works is completely separate from having a desire to prevent a species from going extinct. Would it be strange for a person familiar with the natural process of erosion to then take artificial measures to prevent their home from being carried away in a mudslide?
What I'm saying is that as soon as you envelope the wearer with a water-tight suit the sweating has no net cooling effect. Sweating works because you shed the excess heat in the moisture leaving your body. If you try to keep the water you have to find another way to cool it. You could use a different process to cool the lining of the suit enough to cause water to condense on it but if you could do that it would be more efficient to directly press the cool suit against the wearers skin.
With an external power source, sure you could be as cool as you like. You'd want to carry the solar panels like an umbrella though rather than wear them on the surface of the suit. A 20% efficient solar panel would convert 20% of the Sun's energy to usable electricity while the other 80% would just be heating you up. Carrying the solar panels will also require more physical exertion which generates heat.
And I always have to imagine how the subsequent news story of his failed space mission would have 'helped' in the greater cause in stamping out genetic screening and discrimination in the GATTACA world.
GATTACA teaches us:
"Reach for the stars ignoring the potential risks imposed on others."
"Bet everything on a risky proposition. You'll probably lose, but imagine if you win!"
"Don't save anything for the return trip. Figure it out when it becomes a problem."
Slashdot Mirror
I agree with you fully. I should probably clarify that when I said "A appropriate use of a smart car" I meant "a _more_ appropriate use compared to what people are wishing for".
I'd love to know what a smart car will do when it reaches a construction zone where the lane lines are missing, incorrect, or mixed up with the old lane lines. I update my GPS maps before long trips and I still find instances where road maintenance has temporarily diverted the roadway to be inconsistent with the GPS. A smart car that believes it is on the right course because the lane lines look correct and the GPS measurement is consistent may still be wrong.
And neither should any of those things ever be legal. This is yet another risk of have self-driving cars; the false assumption that what you describe are safe uses of such a vehicle. There will ALWAYS be situations where the automation software can't cope with a particular scenario and you have to take the wheel in a split second. Commercial aircraft can already take-off, fly, and land themselves but this does not replace the need for sober alert pilots to take over in the case of an emergency. A appropriate use of a smart car would be more akin to cruise control. You still need to be continuously alert and ready at the wheel, the cruise control just relieves the effort of continually adjusting to maintain your speed.
I think a lot would actually be shaped by peoples behaviors and expectations of the clone. A sort of self fulfilling prophecy. Imagine if from the day you were born you were surrounded by people that considered you to be the reincarnation of a famous guitar player, eventually you might start to believe it yourself. Heck, I'd be willing to bet that if you raised a child surrounded by people who believed he was a deity he might just try playing the part.
No need to imagine it, just youtube it! ;)
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=underwater+bicycle
It's also like claiming that parents who spend all their money on drugs and get fired from their jobs are harming their kids. I totally agree that society should have no right to demand a certain degree of productivity out of people but productivity is hardly the only thing affected by addictive substances that skew your priorities and ability to think rationally.
Well, from your earlier comment you seem to assume that people generally behave rationally. Based on how paltry government retirement benefits already are, and how many speculate that such benefits will only get worse, even with current expected lifespans it would not be rational to assume that the government will be there to cover retirement benefits.
Forget retirement, think of how many people barely plan for how they are going to cover their expenses for even a month while at the same time making purchases beyond their means. Unless becoming immortal comes with a rationality and willpower upgrade, I highly doubt immortals will plan any better than mortals do now.
Aging and death is a feature, not a bug. For any given species it needs to have a sufficiently long lifespan to produce (and possibly raise) offspring. The young then have to compete with the more mature for resources. In the case of humans, we also compete within our social hierarchies for the influence of our principles and ideas. To continue the cycle of adaptation and renewal as a species it is important to balance birth with aging, and ultimately with death.
If people want to live forever, they at least need to clock-out and watch from the sidelines at some point. Perhaps as heads in jars in some museum similar to Futurama (sans robotic Richard Nixon).
Had a friend who told me a story about a time he was at a restaurant with some guests from somewhere in the UK. The jist of it was that after dinner his guests were looking for some cigarettes which my friend didn't have so they approached some burly looking marines at the bar and asked where they could find a couple of fags. In a flash moment of terror in envisioning where that exchange might lead my friend sprung up and as quickly as he could explained: "cigarettes!, they are looking for cigarettes!"
It isn't the employer I'd be worried about but your customers and colleagues (as applicable). Knowing the right people and having good relationships with them can make all the difference in finding the good positions, if not for your next job then for the one after that. If you bail unexpectedly on your team, or leave one of your customers high and dry without warning it could leave a bad taste not only in their mouths but in anyone they spread the word to. Even if your employer and everyone you worked with was a jerk you are only giving them more ammo to badmouth you to others. Beyond some fleeting satisfaction, burning a bridge will never help you and may end up hurting you in ways you can't easily predict.
Ahh, see NOW you're talking my language! Come to think of it, most of the junk from my failed KSP launches has been raining down all over the Kerbal Space Center.
No, he's describing how to build devices to intentionally destroy public and private property as well as the vision of certain animals. He asserts that one can trust that they are nearly impervious to prosecution due to a presumed lack of necessary evidence to obtain a conviction. He assures us that due to the technique he is proposing that these likely hobbyist quality devices will not inadvertently blind any human beings because his detector will not trigger in such cases.
So it'd be like BOOM! But not like KA-FOOOM!
So what you're saying is it would be like a Fus without the Ro Dah?
I see a lot of issues with biofuels, but I'm less concerned with this issue. If some biofuel crop presents a more economical use of a farmers land than his other options then it also makes it slightly more attractive for that farmer to cultivate the land rather than sell it to some developer. Should food become more scarce then the balance may tip to that same farmer choosing to grow a food crop on that same plot of land. Once you turn the land into the suburbs, chances are you won't be seeing it grow crops ever again. The bigger concern I have is that no matter what you are growing, it requires irrigation, nutrients, and possibly other things like pesticides / herbicides. This issue is compounded if the demand for these biofuel crops encourages the leveling of more forested areas to create more farmland.
Great, so now DOGS are posting on Slashdot!
I'm not sure, though it doesn't seem strange to me. A magnet doesn't have to have its poles 180 degrees away from each other (think a horseshoe magnet).
Such an awkward sentence, almost like a coded message or perhaps even a kill-phrase to someth
I had to cheat and look it up but there is actually a part where you can hire a native as a guide to cross the Snake River in exchange for clothing. The only thing in that game I think you could even kill was animals for food.
So I haven't missed the boat after all! In fact, since mining coins using these currency systems starts fast and then slow over time I should create a few hundred genesis blocks myself and be the first miner in each new currency! I'll call them 001coin, 002coin, 003coin, and so on! And the benefit isn't just for me! Imagine how many virtual coins people will have the opportunity to own with so many new currencies to mine for! Sure, some of them may die off leaving people with worthless digital artifacts, but with so many currencies out there I'm sure it'll be a net gain in the end!
I just like the fact that when several hundred dollars of fraudulent purchases were made against my card that I was notified and ultimately re-imbursed for the total amount. Who do I talk to if I need to be reimbursed for a fraudulent transaction or loss of my Bitcoin wallet? What is the customer service contact number?
Bitcoin is the digital equivalent of burying a chest of gold coins in your backyard. Perhaps you are perfect and nobody will ever find it and you'll never lose or forget where you hid it, but I'm certainly not and anyone else in that group should be very cautious of placing any significant sum of funds into Bitcoin. And sure, "Bitcoin is just another market force" just as Linden dollars are, though I wouldn't say the average person has a reason to care for either.
Doctor: "Clear!"
...
...
... ... Oh, it's installing now... want to grab a coffee?"
Nurse: "Doctor, are you going to administer the shock?"
Doctor: "Hang on, the defibrillator is still booting... Ok." -BZZT!- "Has the EKG finished installing that JVM update yet?"
Nurse: "98%, 99%, 100%!
Have a friend who installed motion triggered lighting in his bathroom. Seemed like an ok idea (apart from the public-restroom vibe) till I took a shower at his place and the lights went off lol. But yea, it's really just as simple as turning off lights when you aren't in the room, no gizmos needed.
Besides wasting energy casting light where it is not needed there are many real and well studied effects on the health of both humans and animals attributed to light pollution http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_pollution.
I don't see the conflict. Understanding how natural selection works is completely separate from having a desire to prevent a species from going extinct. Would it be strange for a person familiar with the natural process of erosion to then take artificial measures to prevent their home from being carried away in a mudslide?
What I'm saying is that as soon as you envelope the wearer with a water-tight suit the sweating has no net cooling effect. Sweating works because you shed the excess heat in the moisture leaving your body. If you try to keep the water you have to find another way to cool it. You could use a different process to cool the lining of the suit enough to cause water to condense on it but if you could do that it would be more efficient to directly press the cool suit against the wearers skin.
With an external power source, sure you could be as cool as you like. You'd want to carry the solar panels like an umbrella though rather than wear them on the surface of the suit. A 20% efficient solar panel would convert 20% of the Sun's energy to usable electricity while the other 80% would just be heating you up. Carrying the solar panels will also require more physical exertion which generates heat.
This topic has been analyzed by others as well http://web.archive.org/web/20080319013644/http://www.dailycamera.com/news/2008/mar/14/exploring-duniverse-of-frank-herbert/. Basically, a stillsuit as described in Dune won't work, and sure you could engineer something that would be more practical.
And I always have to imagine how the subsequent news story of his failed space mission would have 'helped' in the greater cause in stamping out genetic screening and discrimination in the GATTACA world.
GATTACA teaches us:
"Reach for the stars ignoring the potential risks imposed on others."
"Bet everything on a risky proposition. You'll probably lose, but imagine if you win!"
"Don't save anything for the return trip. Figure it out when it becomes a problem."