From a personal experience, companies may rate interests and hobbies very
high. I've never had formal training in electronics or coding (well
except bits of op-amps and FORTRAN with physics:-), yet I've been hired
for responsible positions in serious
projects involving both. Real life experiences are usually valued more
than theoretical education. Of course, the best of such experience is
often from a paid work... Nevertheless, if you're interested and talented
in a certain area, why not get the formal qualifications as well?
Somehow it's hard to believe that everyone will be able to enjoy the
2Mbps or so promised by UMTS (ie 3G). Sounds realistic for a theoretical
maximum, but the total bandwidth per cell is bound to be quite limited.
Personally, I'd be happy with a permanent 100Kbps connection of GPRS if it
worked flawlessly. If there's something good about WAP it is that people
learned to appreciate text based interfaces which were the only ones
possible through GSM's measly 9600bps. After all the website bloat (which
most people still surf at 56k) they realized it's actually possible to
exchance textual information without all that graphics.
I just cannot see why all this hype about 3G. How about getting a decent
mobile IP (ie GPRS) working first. Of course that system isn't directly
expandable to megabit speeds, but it would give people a taste of mobile
IP to see if they want more. Sure it's a cool idea to have wireless video
phonecalls, but is it worth paying for? Videophone technology for land
networks has been around for ages but hasn't quite caught people's
interest.
Finally, these 'third generation' buzzword mobile networks do not quite
fit in my idea of a true wireless Internet, in the sense of freedom an
anarchy. For that we'll need WLANs.
Maybe if they used these fully optical
transistors it might be faster. However, I have slight doubts about
the speed of these babies because of a chemical reaction that is central
to their operation. But then again, ordinary silicon transistors are based
on the diffusion of electrons, which is slow as hell compared to something
purely optical, so these might well turn out a lot faster.
In order to visualize the curvature of space, we need to
embed it in a higher-dimensional space. But that's just an artifact of the
visualization process.
Interesting. I don't see any problem with this and I could say I agree.
However, the new theories mentioned in the article are explicitly about real
higher dimensions. They say gravity is much weaker than other fundamental
forces because, in a small scale, gravitational flux is spread out in a
higher number of dimensions. Here is the theory
paper.
In a way you could also argue that the three dimensions
we know are merely a way of organizing our ideas about the surrounding
world. If we never directly observe the
dimension in which the spacetime is curved, it cannot be said to be real,
but nevertheless it is a useful concept. You probably know there are many
similar 'devices' in physics such as the quantum mechanical wavefunction.
In the end reality is only what we perceive and even the three spatial
dimensions are thus not real, for we only see 2-D projections of things.
Now I better stop before going on deeper and referring to the Matrix;-)
Time is often considered a fourth dimension, but what was meant in the
book was spatial. Einstein's General Relativity predicts that space is
curved near massive objects, and it takes a fourth spatial dimension to
curve the three-dimensional fabric of space. In fact the theory involves
time as one of the dimensions so the four-dimensional spacetime is curved
in a fifth dimension. See
my article for
more.
If you find this stuff about higher dimensions interesting, take a
look at
this article.
Merely an introduction, but it goes on further into new theories,
including the idea that gravity might be aware of higher dimensions
(whereas other forces are not).
--
Causality, determinism and free will?
on
The New Flatland
·
· Score: 2
If nothing changes (==moves) in spacetime, doesn't it mean the future has
already been determined? Then there would be no need for causal relations
either.
Disclaimer:/me is studying physics at Cambridge University, UK.
The speed if light is only marginally faster in vacuum. Even then, the
wave speed has no effect on the data rate. (I think it's obvious but
maybe someone else could explain it to you.) Neither would
this improve any slow ping times, the speed of light is not really an
issue there.
What's more important is the problem of dispersion: different wavelenghts
traveling at different speeds. It's present in any material. As a
consequence, the waveforms are smeared out over time, so distances are
limited (but long lines are possible with repeaters). It gets worse
with higher data rates. With vacuum there won't be any of this problem, so
the bandwidth would only be limited by the frequency of the light, some
10^14 Hz.
However, I've got the feeling you still have to worry about dispersion
because glass is involved in the confinement of light.
One final question: what the heck were the moderators smoking this time?
Seems like good shit:-)
per 50 milliseconds, that would be enough for now:-)
Maybe reformulate that old Gates quote into something like 640 kbps? Well,
I guess I have a 4.5 gigabyte connection, just ignore the remark that it's
per one hour.. not that I'm picky about units or anything;-)
"Up until now we have, quite naturally, assumed that both
foot-and-mouth
and mad cow were spread by Microsoft Outlook," said Nick Brown, Britain's
Agriculture Minister.
Except Mad Cow isn't spread via a virus, but a prion (kind of protein).
But I guess Outlook isn't too picky about that.
There is already a strong theory, supported by experiments, of quantum teleportation of
individual particles. Their quantum state (except the position) is
preserved exactly: the original state is destroyed, because it has to be
quantum mechanically observed by a part of the system, but it is
reproduced exactly at the other. So you cannot copy particles, in addition
the transmission is limited by the speed of light, which makes this
philosophically sound. In principle this allows teleportation of any
quantum mechanical system such as Capt. Kirk, but so far only elementary
particles have been used. Moreover, it is not exactly clear whether
consciousness obeys QM; wouldn't that suck if your body was
teleported but not your mind. (Very funny Scotty, now beam down my
memories;-)
I'd like to explain a bit about this wonderful idea that objects have
inertia only due to their relative motion. The classical example of Mach's
principle is a merry-go-round; according to the principle of relativity,
you could argue that people in it are stationary and the world revolves
around them (no pun intended, unless Linus is aboard:-).
So how do the
people in it feel the rotation? According to Mach, it is a valid viewpoint
that they are stationary, but the huge masses of the rest of the universe
revolving around them causes a 'magnetic gravitational force'.
The 'magnetic' analogy is useful here: between charged particles there is
an electrostatic force, but when they move _sideways_ with respect to
their line of separation, there is a magnetic force as well. Similarly,
between moving masses there is a 'magnetic gravitational' force
perpendicular to their separation.
Experiments also indicate that microstructured fibres like holey fibres
could be used to guide atoms. A fibre is made with four holes
in a square and a central hole. A wire is inserted in each of
the four outer holes and a current passed through it. This creates a
magnetic field that can guide atoms through the central
channel. Proof of principle experiments have shown that this is possible,
but research here is only just beginning.
Even though this isn't about moving huge amounts of stuff around, moving
individual atoms is 'matter transmission'. This could be interesting if
some of the quantum state of the atom is preserved - maybe use it for
information storage?
To everyone making solemn remarks of taking the old wreck of a station out
of its misery, remember 'mir' means peace. Finally the station has reached
the state worthy of its name.
In my impression 'countable' here means you can order primes
starting from 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc and say that 13 is the 7th prime,
even though there are an infinite number of primes.
--
Slashdot Mirror
"If I have been able to see further, it was only because I was surrounded by dwarves."
--
From a personal experience, companies may rate interests and hobbies very high. I've never had formal training in electronics or coding (well except bits of op-amps and FORTRAN with physics :-), yet I've been hired
for responsible positions in serious
projects involving both. Real life experiences are usually valued more
than theoretical education. Of course, the best of such experience is
often from a paid work... Nevertheless, if you're interested and talented
in a certain area, why not get the formal qualifications as well?
--
Now go and ask yourself that question.
--
that I submitted the story on the optical transistor (a different link) on Friday night. Woo hoo.
--
Agreed! Except I'm using w3m instead. It is basically like lynx but renders tables and frames, and it is a lot lighter.
--
Personally, I'd be happy with a permanent 100Kbps connection of GPRS if it worked flawlessly. If there's something good about WAP it is that people learned to appreciate text based interfaces which were the only ones possible through GSM's measly 9600bps. After all the website bloat (which most people still surf at 56k) they realized it's actually possible to exchance textual information without all that graphics.
I just cannot see why all this hype about 3G. How about getting a decent mobile IP (ie GPRS) working first. Of course that system isn't directly expandable to megabit speeds, but it would give people a taste of mobile IP to see if they want more. Sure it's a cool idea to have wireless video phonecalls, but is it worth paying for? Videophone technology for land networks has been around for ages but hasn't quite caught people's interest.
Finally, these 'third generation' buzzword mobile networks do not quite fit in my idea of a true wireless Internet, in the sense of freedom an anarchy. For that we'll need WLANs.
--
Maybe if they used these fully optical transistors it might be faster. However, I have slight doubts about the speed of these babies because of a chemical reaction that is central to their operation. But then again, ordinary silicon transistors are based on the diffusion of electrons, which is slow as hell compared to something purely optical, so these might well turn out a lot faster.
--
or maybe the server's dedicated fission reactor just melt down..
--
Interesting. I don't see any problem with this and I could say I agree. However, the new theories mentioned in the article are explicitly about real higher dimensions. They say gravity is much weaker than other fundamental forces because, in a small scale, gravitational flux is spread out in a higher number of dimensions. Here is the theory paper.
In a way you could also argue that the three dimensions we know are merely a way of organizing our ideas about the surrounding world. If we never directly observe the dimension in which the spacetime is curved, it cannot be said to be real, but nevertheless it is a useful concept. You probably know there are many similar 'devices' in physics such as the quantum mechanical wavefunction. In the end reality is only what we perceive and even the three spatial dimensions are thus not real, for we only see 2-D projections of things. Now I better stop before going on deeper and referring to the Matrix ;-)
--
Time is often considered a fourth dimension, but what was meant in the book was spatial. Einstein's General Relativity predicts that space is curved near massive objects, and it takes a fourth spatial dimension to curve the three-dimensional fabric of space. In fact the theory involves time as one of the dimensions so the four-dimensional spacetime is curved in a fifth dimension. See my article for more.
--
If you find this stuff about higher dimensions interesting, take a look at this article. Merely an introduction, but it goes on further into new theories, including the idea that gravity might be aware of higher dimensions (whereas other forces are not).
--
If nothing changes (==moves) in spacetime, doesn't it mean the future has already been determined? Then there would be no need for causal relations either.
--
here at channel.nytimes.com as usual.
--
How about the following for Linux hackers:
or any other *shell for that matter. Which reminds--
The speed if light is only marginally faster in vacuum. Even then, the wave speed has no effect on the data rate. (I think it's obvious but maybe someone else could explain it to you.) Neither would this improve any slow ping times, the speed of light is not really an issue there.
What's more important is the problem of dispersion: different wavelenghts traveling at different speeds. It's present in any material. As a consequence, the waveforms are smeared out over time, so distances are limited (but long lines are possible with repeaters). It gets worse with higher data rates. With vacuum there won't be any of this problem, so the bandwidth would only be limited by the frequency of the light, some 10^14 Hz.
However, I've got the feeling you still have to worry about dispersion because glass is involved in the confinement of light.
One final question: what the heck were the moderators smoking this time? Seems like good shit :-)
--
"The Dot.Station, which is a blue color similar to the one Intel uses in its logo, runs the Linux operating system and uses a Mozilla Web browser."
RTFA ;-)
--
http://channel.nytimes.com/2001/03/25/world/25CLON .html
if you didn't know already ;-)
--
Maybe reformulate that old Gates quote into something like 640 kbps? Well, I guess I have a 4.5 gigabyte connection, just ignore the remark that it's per one hour.. not that I'm picky about units or anything ;-)
--
Except Mad Cow isn't spread via a virus, but a prion (kind of protein). But I guess Outlook isn't too picky about that.
--
There is already a strong theory, supported by experiments, of quantum teleportation of individual particles. Their quantum state (except the position) is preserved exactly: the original state is destroyed, because it has to be quantum mechanically observed by a part of the system, but it is reproduced exactly at the other. So you cannot copy particles, in addition the transmission is limited by the speed of light, which makes this philosophically sound. In principle this allows teleportation of any quantum mechanical system such as Capt. Kirk, but so far only elementary particles have been used. Moreover, it is not exactly clear whether consciousness obeys QM; wouldn't that suck if your body was teleported but not your mind. (Very funny Scotty, now beam down my memories ;-)
--
So how do the people in it feel the rotation? According to Mach, it is a valid viewpoint that they are stationary, but the huge masses of the rest of the universe revolving around them causes a 'magnetic gravitational force'.
The 'magnetic' analogy is useful here: between charged particles there is an electrostatic force, but when they move _sideways_ with respect to their line of separation, there is a magnetic force as well. Similarly, between moving masses there is a 'magnetic gravitational' force perpendicular to their separation.
--
Experiments also indicate that microstructured fibres like holey fibres could be used to guide atoms. A fibre is made with four holes in a square and a central hole. A wire is inserted in each of the four outer holes and a current passed through it. This creates a magnetic field that can guide atoms through the central channel. Proof of principle experiments have shown that this is possible, but research here is only just beginning.
Even though this isn't about moving huge amounts of stuff around, moving individual atoms is 'matter transmission'. This could be interesting if some of the quantum state of the atom is preserved - maybe use it for information storage?
--
To everyone making solemn remarks of taking the old wreck of a station out of its misery, remember 'mir' means peace. Finally the station has reached the state worthy of its name.
--
Just gunzip the hex representation of the Omega number.
--
In my impression 'countable' here means you can order primes starting from 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13 etc and say that 13 is the 7th prime, even though there are an infinite number of primes.
--