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User: minstrelmike

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  1. limited information on Incorporating Human Behavior Into Wall Street Mathematical Models · · Score: 0

    The problem with the Adam Smith view of the market is they assume everyone is 1) rational and 2) completely informed. When you add in incomplete information, i.e. the person is rational about what he knows but he can only see 3 or 4 levels of transactions, then you get the 1/f power curve which demonstrates continual fluctuations at all scales, including huge economic bubbles and depressions. a lot like real life,

  2. firewalls are the cost of M$ on The Real-World State of Windows Use · · Score: 0

    The heavy duty firewalls most business keep around their private networks are due to the lazy use of ActiveX controls on the desktop. Lazy in-house developers are the ones who create not only lock-in for the business, they _force_ the company to keep the pcs on the never-ending patch cycle so they can surf the web AND keep the firewalls in place so no strangers can come in and take advantage of the wide-open ActiveX controls on the employee's PCs.

    All decisions cost money.

  3. Motivation is key for learning on Why Motivation Is Key For Artificial Intelligence · · Score: 0

    The _only_ way something learns is via motivation; otherwise learning does not take place.

    The AI researchers who are trying to teach a machine to know everything will continue to fail.
    The ones who are setting up neural nets to learn how to be intelligent will succeed and the only way to get learning to occur is to 'motivate' the system with rewards of some sort.

  4. What about texting? on The Case For Mandatory Touch-Typing In High School · · Score: 0

    Teaching kids to type sounds like a good idea but is actually a complete waste of time. Most of the high school kids I know with cell phones can already touch-text amazingly fast. And they learned that on their own.

    I can't figure out how a class would 'help' them learn that stuff faster. Giving students cell phones with unlimited texting would probably be cheaper and faster than buying keyboards and training material and having an adult stand over them saying: "Type: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog."

  5. who gets to vote on Lawsuit Claims WGA Is Spyware · · Score: 0

    I like the idea of punishing the corporation, but I certainly don't want them to vote.

  6. Placebo healing is REAL on Placebos Are Getting More Effective · · Score: 0

    As usual, many of the commenters assume the placebo effect is some sort of false healing. It isn't. It is real healing (which is probably the basis of Christian Science, meditiation and many of the so-called 'quack' cures).
    .
    In the Wired article, one group of irritable bowel syndrome patients were parsed into 3 categories. Group one had their names silently put on a list for treatment. Group two was given information about their problem but with the emphasis on how to alleviate the 'suffering' they could expect in the future. Group three was told they were too late for the study and too late for any drugs but the interviewer spent an hour listening to the patient and talking hopefully about how they will get better.
    .
    The patients in group 3 got better--actually physically better--which is the definition of the effect of placebos.
    .
    Drug companies have supposedly brain-washed us that drugs will improve our lives; but advertising isn't that effective. We all want something that will make our lives better, especially when we are in pain. We are considered gullible when it doesn't work and insightful when it does work, but for some reason we distrust things that work when they shouldn't.

  7. It always starts someplace on Police Swarm Bungie Office Over Halo Replica Rifle · · Score: 0

    First they start with toy guns then work their way up to real guns. This can lead to terrible tragedies.
    .
    It's just like how America started out this century with a starter president and then moved up to one who can speak in complete sentences and then folks started going absolutely crazy when he said he wanted to talk to our children.

  8. Religiousology Ridiculumus on Church of Scientology Proposes Net Censorship In Australia · · Score: 0

    It seems to me that free speech is the ability to practice what you believe. Of course, if you believe you have the one true belief and all others are wrong, then you are free to say so.
    .
    However, when you shut others down from saying that their belief is right, then speech is no longer free.
    .
    And if my belief is that Scientology not only is wrong, but is a scam and a degradation of actual science and of true religion (every other faith will give me their doctrine instead of charge me for it), then how am I to express MY belief? Every belief that isn't identical to someone else's belief is antithetical to it in some way, shape, or form.
    .
    Removing anonymity from comments would probably improve the level of discussion but the Church of Scientology is not interested in discussion--witness their desire for lawsuits and laws. In addition, what is good for the goose is good for the gander. How about _none_ of the Scientologists get to post anonymously either? Or publish books and pamphlets without the author's name, address and phone number on it? Fair's fair and free speech must be free.

  9. AT&T is laughing on Thieves Clear Out NJ Apple Store In 31 Seconds · · Score: 0

    If the thieves took 14 iPhones, then that means AT&T will get 14 new accounts.
    AT&T is probably laughing all the way to the bank.
    As usual.

  10. Remembering violence is important on Running Over Virtual Pedestrians Helps In-Game Ad Recall · · Score: 0

    If you think about our biological behavior or suspect evolution had something to do with how we got here, then the ability to remember _everything_ about a violent act is probably a survival trait. At first creation, beings would avoid anything that had cars or pedestrians or billboards, but species with so-called higher consciousnesses could distinguish (possibly) between which items are associated with the violence and which are simply co-located in time and space with the violence.
    .
    But you still have to remember everything first in order to make the distinction.

  11. speedy trial on Judge Won't Lower $5M Bail For Jailed SF IT Admin · · Score: 0

    Where is his right to a speedy trial? It's been 14 months. Childs is just building up more credit for the inevitable lawsuit.
    The prosecutors are simply digging themselves a bigger hole. I suspect the whole game now is to get him to 'confess' to the single charge on the table and then sentence him to time served.

    If he does, then he can't sue.
    Childs is the one who is holding out and he will have to wait until the D.A.'s office either drops the final charge or actually takes him to court.
    And loses.

  12. Good idea on Utah Law Punishes Texters As Much As Drunks In Driving Fatalities · · Score: 0

    Treating texters like drunks is a good idea.

    M.A.D.D. and groups like that promote the idea of drunks _causing_ accidents, but that is not the truth. A legally drunk person has a 2-5% more likelihood of _having_ an accident (probably due to inattentiveness). Insurance companies know this.

    People who read Reader's Digest and the M.A.D.D. literature will not be able to reconcile the fact that driving while legally drunk is exactly as dangerous as driving while texting.

  13. Opposite world on Depression May Provide Cognitive Advantages · · Score: 0

    I was always under the impression that thought and depression worked opposite that; they've got cause-effect wrong.
    Seems to me folks start off not thinking and many maintain that throughout life.
    Some however, do begin thinking about the world and people and the way things are right now and the way things could or 'should' be and then they get depressed.

    Depression doesn't cause clear thought; clear thought causes depression.

  14. Re:No... on Global Warming To Be Put On Trial? · · Score: 0

    I think a trial is a good idea.
    But before it goes on trial, they will have to reach an understanding of the difference between scientific proof and legal proof.

    Legal proofs rest on vacuous ideas such as honesty and intent and other pointless, unmeasurable philosophic garbage.

    Scientific proof rests on being able to interpret data. Since interpretation is involved, scholars, voters and other believers in belief think that interpreting a fact wrongly is the same as deciding the fact is wrong.

    The proof that the earth is warming is contained in the ever-increasing temperature of the ocean.
    Whether that is completely due to Mankind probably cannot be determined, not at least until after everything is already over.

  15. Pollution and disease on a single planet on Developing World's Parasites, Diseases Enter US · · Score: 1

    We think we can throw things _away_ or bury them where they will never ever bother us again, but that isn't true. It is a single planet. I call it Aquarium Earth. Anything that happens on one side of the planet will happen on the other. We're all in the mess together.

  16. Sounds workable on US Tests System To Evade Foreign Web Censorship · · Score: 1

    Five years ago when my daughter was in 7th grade, the school system (USA) blocked all access to gmail accounts, wanting to force the students to use the official school email package. It took less than a week for the knowledge to get around school that you could go to yahoo, search for google, and then open your gmail up inside a yahoo child window.

  17. Re:obvious answers on Parents Baffled By Science Questions · · Score: 1

    What State is Britain in again?

  18. Don't hire the math-challenged on Student Sues University Because She's Unemployable · · Score: 1

    She's surprised that the companies prefer 4.0 gpa students to 2.6 gpa ones. Well, that's because they are at least 1.3 times as smart, regardless of how well they attended all classes. Attendance, when you don't get paid for it, doesn't count. Results (such as a GPA) are what counts. But this argument only makes cents for people who can count.

  19. Blame correctly on The Music Industry's Crisis Writ Large · · Score: 1

    The music industry should blame Steve Jobs. Regardless of what folks think of the ethics or lack thereof of the music industry and the avid listeners they call pirates, the decline of the CD is due directly to on-line streaming pioneered by Apple. And while there appears to be less music being sold by volume, I suspect that is an artifact of how sales are counted. Usually half the cuts on a CD are not worth listening to so if I have perfect choice of songs instead of 15-song albums, the loss of music sales ought to 50% instead of 15%. They are selling a lot more _music_, probably from a lot more different artists, but aren't able to sell packaged CDs so much because you're probably still wasting half your money.