"The problem with AI in games is two-fold: players want to be challenged, but players want to win. It's a lot easier to write a chess program that will beat the hell out of everyone except a grandmaster than it is to make something that will let weaker players win.
Similarly, it's difficult to make bots in FPS games that aren't completely stupid, but also don't headshot the player 100% of the time. Computer players will not miss unless you make them."
The "never miss" problem can be dealt with by making the bot's senses or motor control 'noisy', such that there's a controllable error term to their sensing or aiming code.
The are other major problems:
if your AI isn't written in symbolic terms (e.g. you're using neural nets), it's very hard to figure out what caused your AI to do "something strange", and very hard to tweak the AI such that it doesn't do that strange thing, but still has the same performance, which brings us to...
it's hard to design an AI such that you can 'turn a knob' and take the AI from weak to average to strong to expert playing levels.
It's hard to test an adaptive system. How do you know it will perform the way you want when used by real players? Indeed, how do you tell what it's future performance will be, period? If it's adaptive, its parameters could wander into a region of parameter space that makes your AI act like a coked-up mongoose, or a recent lobotomy recipient.
These problems can be solved, but the solutions don't tend to be generic in nature, and must be tailored to the specific game.
I'll be sure to put a call in to Amnesty International, and see if they can do something about the bastard putting a gun to your head, and forcing you to read all these blogs you hate so much. It must be terrible not to be able to pick and choose which blogs you look at.
I'll also be sure to also mention the shackles you've been placed in... the ones keeping you from creating worthwhile content yourself, or walking your ass down to a university and taking some writing classes, and then creating some worthwhile content yourself.
Sir TBL produces 'drivel.' We've seen what he produces. What do you produce, and what should we call it? I believe I have some idea...
I'm not surprised that you disparage the idea that "we have to consider the implications it will have on our society, or God bless, humanity". Do you think such questions are unimportant? Do you think the future is pre-destined, or do "we" (you know, you and everyone else who isn't you) create the future? TBL is just asking you to stop, take a breath, and think about something other than you and your immediate gratification.
"Economic profit is not the only motivator for exploration and technological development, nor is it the only justification for a permanent offworld presence."
"I disagree. While I approve of using my tax dollars to fund the exploration of the solar system via probe, I don't approve of the enormous outlay required to do that exploration with human beings."
The "I don't want my tax dollars going towards X" argument is hardly a relevant response. We already know that you are looking for profit.
"There isn't any justification (in my mind) for doing with humans what can be done much, much cheaper with robots; and even if there were some small scientific gain to be had when using humans I don't think it justifies the cost."
As you say... "in your mind." I see a lot of justification in my mind: abundant resources, abundant energy, a manunfacturing environment that doesn't carry concerns over ecological damange or the consumption of non-renewable resources, an impetus for technological advancement, the eventual creation of offworld colonies that give the human race a chance of surviving a plantary calamity, etc.
"The rest of the solar system offers us space, raw materials, and energy in near unlimited quantities."
"That would be an economic incentive for the exploitation of space, would it not?"
Technically, yes... though I separated it in my mind because these efforts will start out being a consumer of money and resources, and you seem to be rejecting the idea because it won't make profits right now.
"Also, the Earth is a source of single point failure... one ecological or climatological collapse or a comet or astroid collision, and the human race could cease to exist, and those little green pictures of dead presidents will be of little use, value, or comfort."
"Your money would be better spent keeping the Earth from getting hit by some nasty comet or asteroid than in trying to move millions off-world."
"My" money, if spent on establishing a fulltime offworld presence, would yield many benefits... including the means to prevent Earth from getting hit by an asteroid.
"And hell, if you think big enough, terraforming is always a possibility."
"Where, exactly? You can't terraform Venus; it's tidelocked. And Mars is too small. If you want to terraform Mars you're going to have to rebuild all the atmosphere it's lost to space, probably by throwing thousands of comets at it from the Oort Cloud - and that means you'd have to remove all the current colonists for the few centuries it'd take to complete the task. While it might someday become practical, it would be more efficient to colonize Mars without terraforming it."
Fair points... there's always the possiblity of orbital habitats, either constructed like O'Neill stations, or within or on asteroids. Here is a link to many more ideas, and a discussion of the issues surrounding human presence in space.
"When I look to the future, I want "Star Trek"
"When I look to the future I want "Battlestar Galactica". Hot cylon babes like Boomer, hoowah!"
No, seriously... I want to roll around in a pile of naked, oiled Boomers as much as the next geek, but how do you seriously see the future? Do you see a future that is basically the same as today, with a fairly tiny proportion of the world's population controlling and consuming most of the resources, with population stresses causing environmental degradation, and where a few people get Ipod Mk. Vs while most of the rest wonder about the next meal or the next military attack?
I want better for the human race, and I think a vigorous expansion into space is one way of helping that happen.
"Why do you say that "no significant portion of the population will ever move off-world"?
"Because there are no other habitable worlds in the Solar System. It will always be incredibly expensive to house and sustain human life off-planet compared to housing and sustaining human life on Earth. It makes no economic sense whatsoever to make an investment of this nature; the only people you'll ever want to move off-planet are the absolute minimum required to exploit the resources in specific places (e.g., the asteroid belt)."
Economic profit is not the only motivator for exploration and technological development, nor is it the only justification for a permanent offworld presence.
The rest of the solar system offers us space, raw materials, and energy in near unlimited quantities. These resources can, given the necessary development of offworld infrastructure, be made use of without damaging the ecosystems on Earth, or consuming its non-renewable resources. Also, the Earth is a source of single point failure... one ecological or climatological collapse or a comet or astroid collision, and the human race could cease to exist, and those little green pictures of dead presidents will be of little use, value, or comfort.
And hell, if you think big enough, terraforming is always a possibility.
When I look to the future, I want "Star Trek", and not "Soylent Green", "THX-1138", or "Robocop".
What kind of future do you want?
Re:Space travel - no kidding
on
10 Technologies MIA
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
"What the alarmists fail to acknowledge is that they don't get to decide at what point the Earth is "overpopulated". I don't think the Earth is overpopulated at the moment, nor will it be if we reach eight billion. My opinion is just as valid (or invalid) as any alarmist figure."
If by "valid" you mean "I can make whatever mouth noises I want", then you're right. However, if by "valid" you mean "accurately reflects reality", then no, your opinion isn't necessarily as valid... its validity will depend on its accuracy, not on the identity of the speaker.
The "future technology will arise to fix future problems" may end up being true, but it sounds an awful lot like "I don't need to worry about the rent, because there's a big lottery jackpot, and I'm sure to win between now and the end of the month!"
It isn't alarmist to say that we're consuming non-renewable resources, and damaging ecosystems...
"...settled for the emotionally-comforting fallback position that "I don't understand how it could be possible, so God must've done it."
"Wrong! You're so incredibly wrong, and your mis-characterization is a BIG part of the controversey."
I'd say this was a fairly accurate characterization of many in the "Intelligent Design" community, as well as the Creationist community. It's called "Argument from Personal Incredulity", and is rampant. Believe me, I'd love to see Creationist or ID arguments that weren't silly misunderstandings of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, absurd probability "calculations", or naive appeals to complexity theory (which are all AfPI in scientist's clothing).
"Read his position as: "We don't understand these processes very well at all, and it's entirely possible God might have done it."
If we had evidence of Deities (you do realize that there are hundreds, if not thousands of versions of "God" that have been and are being worshipped, right?), evidence they existed and information indicative of their origins, composition, and/or motivation, it would be quite reasonable to say, "That Deity over there appears to have the means and motive to have created life on this planet, so perhaps they did."
"You've given up your scepticism..."
I haven't... that's why I don't let you use the word "God" without definition or substantiation.
"... and really don't deserve to call yourself an advocate of science at all. Your intellectual position is steeped in ideology."
So, where are your falsifiable hypotheses concerning the existence and characteristics of whichever Deity it is you have in mind when you use the word "God" ?
"OMG! I haven't seen a better example of liberal claptrap than this in a looong time. ROFL."
Why did you waste this opportunity? You gave one line of response, of which the chief components wre "OMG!" and "ROFL"
You called the parent post "liberal claptrap"? Why? What was wrong with it? What evidence or reasoning can you offer to substantiate your dismissal of it?
American culture has long has a nasty streak of anti-intellectualism. Our public schools are just the thing... if you're trying to educate a bunch of farmer's kids so that they can work in a factory - show up on time, do what they're told, ask the minimum of questions, and not complain or make much noise. The cost of higher education is going through the roof... and people have less money to spend than they did before. Grad students scrabble for funding, put themselves into heavy debt, or forgo higher education altogether. That lack of money also prevents a significant portion of our students switching from public to private school... assuming they can meet the private school's entrance requirements.
As others have observed, government-funded schools educated the generations that gave us the technology we use today, and made us the (at least for the moment) the technological leader of the world. Other nations use a system of public school and government-run schools, and are moving forward.
Why aren't we? A lot of things... classes are too large, teacher training too limited, teacher wages too low, parents too uninvolved in their student's education, students with home lives that get in the way of their education, the list goes on.
We need small classes, well-trained and motivated teachers, motivated parents, and the teaching materials and equipment needed to keep up with a 21-st century world. How are we going to get these things? I wish I knew...
"Please address the other points I made. I addressed each of yours to the full and I find it very disappointing that you would insult my time and effort by not addressing them."
I think you have me confused with a different poster. I just happened to come across your post, noted those two particular items in your response to someone else, and commented.
"Abiogenesis is a ridiculous notion..."
Argument from Personal Incredulity.
"... and never been observed."
No, it hasn't been directly observed. Much that is studied in science is studied indirectly, via it's consequences, rather than directly via direct observation. At this stage, we only have hypotheses of how abiogenesis could have occurred... it's early days yet. In any case, hypotheses of abiogenesis and evolutionary theory are, at best, tangentially related. They really are two different topics.
That said, the probability arguments that have been proposed to counter even the possibility of unguided abiogenesis are tremendously naive with repect to the mechanisms being proposed.
"Not only that, but many have tried duplicating it, purposefully, and failed."
Sigh. Take a logic course, and quick!
If attempts at abiogenesis have been performed (and I'd like to see come cites to back up your claim), and have not so far succeeded, this does not imply that abiogenesis didn't or couldn't have happened.
"Because of this, Evolution is a belief system, similar to creationism."
Rubbish. Evolution is a fact, in that lifeforms are populations of species have been observed to evolve, up to and including speciation. Evolution is a theory, in that a theory was constructed to explain the mountains of data we have concerning how life changes in the present, and how life has changed in the past.
In addition, evolutionary theory deals with how life changes over time. Hypotheses of abiogenesis propose mechanisms by which non-reproducing matter led to reproducing matter... life. They are separate areas of investigation. Our ignorance concerning abiogenesis in no way diminishes our understanding of evolution.
"I don't even need Borel's law to state this, I merely need to point to the failure of evolutionists to find one abiogenesis observation. "
Life exists on Earth. The fossil evidence is consistent the position that the life we see today descended from ancestors, and did so in the pattern of a twin, nested hierarchy leading back to a few common ancestors of life. Further back, we find no evidence of life. Is it really so absurd to you to conclude that life arose at some point in the Earth's past, and that populations have been changing their composition ever since?
"Oh, you say, but a comet hit earth!"
Many bodies have hit the earth in the past. Did you have a particular comment in mind?
"Yeah, and God snapped his fingers too."
Please provide evidence supporting the existence of this "God" entity. Also, please specify if you are speaking of "Astarte, Quetzlcoatl, Odin, Zeus, or some other Deity or Deities when you use the word "God."
"Both seem equally ridiculous, and based on what we know in science, both are."
The position living matter arose from non-living matter is consistent with what we know of physics and chemistry, even if the exact mechanisms are currently unknown. The existence of a Deity is unsupported by current data, aside from the trivial "The world looks the way it does because God wanted it that way!"
"To argue that one is "more scientific" is saying that evolution is true because no other paradigm is available."
Again, abiogenesis and evolutionary theory are two different fields of study. There is an abundance of evidence supporting evolutionary theory. There are hypotheses of abiogenesis that have yet to be confirmed. Please try to remember this difference.
"Eh? How do you go from "energy-cause mutations" to this?"
"Men with Down syndrome are essentially sterile and cannot
It looks to me as if what Google is actually doing is letting us add RSS feeds from some sort of "approved list of feeds", rather than letting us add any feed we wish. If so, lame.
You have it backwards... People started out organizing phyla/genera/etc. based on gross physiological similarities, then made changes once they were able to look at the actual genetics.
As for your links, I have a hard time taking a 'blog seriously when they state on their front page, in all caps, "Discusses creation and evolution, mostly from a creation perspective."
The evidence supporting evolutionary theory is vast, and predates the theory. This can't be said clearly enough: The theory of evolution was created to explain the fact that species change as they reproduce in a pattern we call "evolution."
Yes, you can organize cars into a cladogram. And, if you actually observed cars exhibiting mutation, crossover, and differential selection, you'd be justified in organizing along evolutionary lines. We observe a twin nested hierarchy when we look at life. This is an indicator of evolution.
"1. This argument centers on belief in life outside our solar system. Your response has given me no indication you think to contrary of *many* evolutionists. If the majority of evolutionists believe in life outside our solar system, is it really any surprise that Intelligent Design has worked its way into public debate?"
Here is what you originally said:
"Chance over probability. This is probably the weakest argument (because we *could* be the 1 in septendecillion instance), but it is a significant one, because many of the same individuals that believe we evolved from single-cell organisms also believe in extraterrestrial life within our own galaxy. You'd think these individuals would actually be ID proponents."
Your statements appear illogical to me. So far, we have a grand total of one planet with life from which to draw conclusions. Assuming that physics and chemistry work the same on other planets, and assuming that life arose on our planet without the help of some Intelligence, it is reasonable to assume, given the size of the galaxy (let alone the universe) that life arose elsewhere. How you get ID proponents from this line of reasoning escapes me. The probablility arguments used against the likelihood of life arising without an Intelligence are beyond specious. This article, "Lies, Damned Lies, Statistics, and Abiogenesis Calculations," discusses some of the issues involved.
"2. The earth is a closed system. Let me repeat, the earth is a closed system. Our environment allows energy and not mass to pass into the system."
You can repeat it all you like... it's still incorrect. The Earth is closed to neither mass nor energy. Plenty of material appears to have impacted the Earth during the solar system's early history, and, to a lesser degree, continues to do so today.
"Thus, the argument has to be that energy-cause mutations can increase information."
Google "Kolmogorov-Chaitin Complexity" for a discussion of information and information increase. Your seeming complaint against "energy-cause mutations" is best seen in this light.
"In such mutations, the organism cannot reproduce or at least, cannot reproduce with those of the same species."
Eh? How do you go from "energy-cause mutations" to this?
So, tell me: how do you think life came to arise on this planet, and how do your ideas as to how life changes over time differ from those expressed in modern evolutionary theory?
"So, the situation is more complicated than I thought, but my basic point, that the observed genetic clustering of humans is not well-correlated with popular notions of "race", remains solid."
In light of new (to me) information, I'll have to downgrade this from "remains solid" to "subject to controversy." This article would seem to cast doubt on my earlier statements. Still, it's only one unrepeated (so far as I know) study, which means this is by no means a decided question.
Thanks for that reference... it will be interesting to see if this study proves to be repeatable, particularly when performed with a different choice of genetic markers.
Mind you, your comments elsewhere in this discussion, i.e.
Unfortunatly humans have such powerful intellects that they can be brainwashed to think things (ie: multiculturalism) against their inherent knowledge (ie: diversity good, miscegenation bad). They can even be brainwashed to consider it taboo to discuss (usually a crime) or even think (soon to be a crime:) about such realities.
Such radical idealogical beliefs in such an unforgiving reality that is life are blatantly obvious to thinking people as nothing but recipies for suicide for the people or races (ie: white Europeans) practicing them.
and
I meant zoologists are the last stand on race, not anthropologists.
The later is the group required to parrot PC doctrine about races only being skin deep (if they want grant money, etc).
carry with them the impression that the section of your closet holding white garments would include some robes of the non-bath variety... with matching hoods.
Take sickle cell. Doctors were long taught that sickle cell anemia was a genetic disease of Negroes, a marker of their race. Yet sickle cell is found among peoples from central and western Africa, but not southern Africa. It is also carried by Turks, Yemenis, Indians, Greeks, and Sicilians. That's because sickle cell arose several thousand years ago as a mutation in one of the genes that codes for hemoglobin. The mutation soon spread to successive populations along the trade routes where malaria was common. It turns out that inheriting one sickle cell allele confers resistance to malaria and thus provides a selective advantage in malarial regions (inheriting sickle cell alleles from both parents causes sickle-cell disease). In other words, sickle cell, like tandem repeats in the Science study, is a marker not of skin color or race but ancestry, or more precisely, having ancestors from where malaria was common.
So, the situation is more complicated than I thought, but my basic point, that the observed genetic clustering of humans is not well-correlated with popular notions of "race", remains solid.
In other words, if you took genetic samples of a bunch of people, ran clustering software that grouped the genes of those people into groups of genetic similarity, the groupings you'd get wouldn't match up with the groupings you'd get if you were asked to group them according to "race."
What I said: "Race is a social construct genetically speaking, it's meaningless."
What you said: "Race has nothing to do with genetics?"
Not the same thing... if you look at human genetics, and look at clusters of similarities and differences, that clustering does not correlate with what is popularly known as "race."
genetically speaking, it's meaningless. There is no "white race" or "black race" or "asian race", or any of the rest. Humans do appear to have instincts towards forming social hierarchies, and distinguishing between "in my tribe" and "not in my tribe", but the concept of "race" has no real basis in biology or genetics.
Sorry to disappoint you, but your prejudices will need to find some other foundation upon which to rest.
The assumptions I'm making are based solely upon the content of your post, which is reminiscent of the intellectual rigor and sophistication of those I have seen posted to www.FreeRepublic.com... hence my recommendation.
"Dude, this guy wasn't "rooting for the underdog" (Yay, Hindus!! Sis Boom Bah!!),..."
I meant that, in this country, Jews, Wiccans and Muslims are "underdogs" with respect to Christians, in that they are in the numerical minority and in the minority wrt the "mindshare" they have in our culture.
"... he's taking a shot at a *very* large and *very* diverse group of people and comparing them to the Goatse guy!"
Actually, what he seems to have been trying to do (clumsily) is say that he wouldn't expect the intersection of the set of "Born-Again Christians" and "Nerds" to be much bigger than the empty set. He also said "I don't expect true nerds to be religious..."
"Then, when he gets called out on it, he basically sez, "So sorry, I didn't mean just Christians, I mean *all* religious people"
I didn't interpret his posts as saying that.
"(My many 'techno-pagan' friends will be tres amused to learn they can't be nerds cuz they're spiritual, BTW...)."
Your many techno-pagan friends? Where do you live? I've met Wiccans and Pagans, but never, to my knowledge, a techno-pagan.
It has been my experience that "nerds" do tend towards being secular in nature.
"It's incumbent upon the manager to make sure that the employee's day is filled with work, and to fire employees who just can't seem to wrap their brains around the fact that they're being paid to work ALL OF THE TIME, not just some fraction of it."
First, are you seriously suggesting that people work through every lunch hour or break? Second, do you really think people are productive at creative tasks if they don't have any mental "down time" during the day? Third, your way of "thinking" will lead to workers doing the absolute minimum needed, giving you absolutely zero respect, no loyalty to the company, and will absolutely not work a single extra moment, or do anything to improve the company. That is the sort of workplace your attitude would create.
I'll bet you measure productivity by lines coded per hour, too.
No, a manager's job is to tell the employee what is expected of them, give them the materials and tools they need to get the job done, and to stay the hell out of their way unless the employee needs help. A good manager acts as a buffer between their department and the rest of the company, balancing tasks and abilities, and helping their employees to grow and develop.
"Also think about the notion that if the guy's website was called "jewnerd" or "wiccannerd" or "muslimnerd" and you had made the same crack you would have been modded so low so fast it would make your head spin."
If the dominant (in terms of percentage of the population) religion were Judaism, Wicca, or Islam, and they had a vocal, politically active minority looking to establish the equivalent of a theocracy (note the "and" in this sentence), people would play the "Free Pass from Karma Loss" card on those, too. It's an American tradition to root for the underdog, and Christianity certainly isn't that, protestations to the contrary notwithstanding. Remember: persecution is not another word for "not getting everything we want right now."
All that said, prejudice isn't cool regardless of whom it's directed against.
"Implementing a less generic version on the CPU is likely to result in it being faster than the GPU sort."
How do you make a meaningful statement concerning the speed of a "less generic" algorithm running on a general-purpose CPU vs. a "generic" algorithm running on a piece of special-purpose hardware (GPU)?
Methinks your statement carries with it a load of unstated assumptions... care to spell them out for us?
Slashdot Mirror
Similarly, it's difficult to make bots in FPS games that aren't completely stupid, but also don't headshot the player 100% of the time. Computer players will not miss unless you make them."
The "never miss" problem can be dealt with by making the bot's senses or motor control 'noisy', such that there's a controllable error term to their sensing or aiming code.
The are other major problems:
These problems can be solved, but the solutions don't tend to be generic in nature, and must be tailored to the specific game.
"I believe in Intelligent Design. It was all done by Benevolent Space Aliens. How else can you explain Tom Cruise?"
Benevolent?!?!?!?
I'll be sure to put a call in to Amnesty International, and see if they can do something about the bastard putting a gun to your head, and forcing you to read all these blogs you hate so much. It must be terrible not to be able to pick and choose which blogs you look at.
I'll also be sure to also mention the shackles you've been placed in... the ones keeping you from creating worthwhile content yourself, or walking your ass down to a university and taking some writing classes, and then creating some worthwhile content yourself.
Sir TBL produces 'drivel.' We've seen what he produces. What do you produce, and what should we call it? I believe I have some idea...
I'm not surprised that you disparage the idea that "we have to consider the implications it will have on our society, or God bless, humanity". Do you think such questions are unimportant? Do you think the future is pre-destined, or do "we" (you know, you and everyone else who isn't you) create the future? TBL is just asking you to stop, take a breath, and think about something other than you and your immediate gratification.
"Economic profit is not the only motivator for exploration and technological development, nor is it the only justification for a permanent offworld presence."
"I disagree. While I approve of using my tax dollars to fund the exploration of the solar system via probe, I don't approve of the enormous outlay required to do that exploration with human beings."
The "I don't want my tax dollars going towards X" argument is hardly a relevant response. We already know that you are looking for profit.
"There isn't any justification (in my mind) for doing with humans what can be done much, much cheaper with robots; and even if there were some small scientific gain to be had when using humans I don't think it justifies the cost."
As you say... "in your mind." I see a lot of justification in my mind: abundant resources, abundant energy, a manunfacturing environment that doesn't carry concerns over ecological damange or the consumption of non-renewable resources, an impetus for technological advancement, the eventual creation of offworld colonies that give the human race a chance of surviving a plantary calamity, etc.
"The rest of the solar system offers us space, raw materials, and energy in near unlimited quantities."
"That would be an economic incentive for the exploitation of space, would it not?"
Technically, yes... though I separated it in my mind because these efforts will start out being a consumer of money and resources, and you seem to be rejecting the idea because it won't make profits right now.
"Also, the Earth is a source of single point failure... one ecological or climatological collapse or a comet or astroid collision, and the human race could cease to exist, and those little green pictures of dead presidents will be of little use, value, or comfort."
"Your money would be better spent keeping the Earth from getting hit by some nasty comet or asteroid than in trying to move millions off-world."
"My" money, if spent on establishing a fulltime offworld presence, would yield many benefits... including the means to prevent Earth from getting hit by an asteroid.
"And hell, if you think big enough, terraforming is always a possibility."
"Where, exactly? You can't terraform Venus; it's tidelocked. And Mars is too small. If you want to terraform Mars you're going to have to rebuild all the atmosphere it's lost to space, probably by throwing thousands of comets at it from the Oort Cloud - and that means you'd have to remove all the current colonists for the few centuries it'd take to complete the task. While it might someday become practical, it would be more efficient to colonize Mars without terraforming it."
Fair points... there's always the possiblity of orbital habitats, either constructed like O'Neill stations, or within or on asteroids. Here is a link to many more ideas, and a discussion of the issues surrounding human presence in space.
"When I look to the future, I want "Star Trek"
"When I look to the future I want "Battlestar Galactica". Hot cylon babes like Boomer, hoowah!"
No, seriously... I want to roll around in a pile of naked, oiled Boomers as much as the next geek, but how do you seriously see the future? Do you see a future that is basically the same as today, with a fairly tiny proportion of the world's population controlling and consuming most of the resources, with population stresses causing environmental degradation, and where a few people get Ipod Mk. Vs while most of the rest wonder about the next meal or the next military attack?
I want better for the human race, and I think a vigorous expansion into space is one way of helping that happen.
"Why do you say that "no significant portion of the population will ever move off-world"?
"Because there are no other habitable worlds in the Solar System. It will always be incredibly expensive to house and sustain human life off-planet compared to housing and sustaining human life on Earth. It makes no economic sense whatsoever to make an investment of this nature; the only people you'll ever want to move off-planet are the absolute minimum required to exploit the resources in specific places (e.g., the asteroid belt)."
Economic profit is not the only motivator for exploration and technological development, nor is it the only justification for a permanent offworld presence.
The rest of the solar system offers us space, raw materials, and energy in near unlimited quantities. These resources can, given the necessary development of offworld infrastructure, be made use of without damaging the ecosystems on Earth, or consuming its non-renewable resources. Also, the Earth is a source of single point failure... one ecological or climatological collapse or a comet or astroid collision, and the human race could cease to exist, and those little green pictures of dead presidents will be of little use, value, or comfort.
And hell, if you think big enough, terraforming is always a possibility.
When I look to the future, I want "Star Trek", and not "Soylent Green", "THX-1138", or "Robocop".
What kind of future do you want?
"What the alarmists fail to acknowledge is that they don't get to decide at what point the Earth is "overpopulated". I don't think the Earth is overpopulated at the moment, nor will it be if we reach eight billion. My opinion is just as valid (or invalid) as any alarmist figure."
If by "valid" you mean "I can make whatever mouth noises I want", then you're right. However, if by "valid" you mean "accurately reflects reality", then no, your opinion isn't necessarily as valid... its validity will depend on its accuracy, not on the identity of the speaker.
The "future technology will arise to fix future problems" may end up being true, but it sounds an awful lot like "I don't need to worry about the rent, because there's a big lottery jackpot, and I'm sure to win between now and the end of the month!"
It isn't alarmist to say that we're consuming non-renewable resources, and damaging ecosystems...
A monopoly can use it's monopoly position to erect barriers to market entry. It's a free market in theory, but, in practice, it certainly isn't.
"...settled for the emotionally-comforting fallback position that "I don't understand how it could be possible, so God must've done it."
"Wrong! You're so incredibly wrong, and your mis-characterization is a BIG part of the controversey."
I'd say this was a fairly accurate characterization of many in the "Intelligent Design" community, as well as the Creationist community. It's called "Argument from Personal Incredulity", and is rampant. Believe me, I'd love to see Creationist or ID arguments that weren't silly misunderstandings of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, absurd probability "calculations", or naive appeals to complexity theory (which are all AfPI in scientist's clothing).
"Read his position as: "We don't understand these processes very well at all, and it's entirely possible God might have done it."
If we had evidence of Deities (you do realize that there are hundreds, if not thousands of versions of "God" that have been and are being worshipped, right?), evidence they existed and information indicative of their origins, composition, and/or motivation, it would be quite reasonable to say, "That Deity over there appears to have the means and motive to have created life on this planet, so perhaps they did."
"You've given up your scepticism..."
I haven't... that's why I don't let you use the word "God" without definition or substantiation.
"... and really don't deserve to call yourself an advocate of science at all. Your intellectual position is steeped in ideology."
So, where are your falsifiable hypotheses concerning the existence and characteristics of whichever Deity it is you have in mind when you use the word "God" ?
"OMG! I haven't seen a better example of liberal claptrap than this in a looong time. ROFL."
Why did you waste this opportunity? You gave one line of response, of which the chief components wre "OMG!" and "ROFL"
You called the parent post "liberal claptrap"? Why? What was wrong with it? What evidence or reasoning can you offer to substantiate your dismissal of it?
American culture has long has a nasty streak of anti-intellectualism. Our public schools are just the thing... if you're trying to educate a bunch of farmer's kids so that they can work in a factory - show up on time, do what they're told, ask the minimum of questions, and not complain or make much noise. The cost of higher education is going through the roof... and people have less money to spend than they did before. Grad students scrabble for funding, put themselves into heavy debt, or forgo higher education altogether. That lack of money also prevents a significant portion of our students switching from public to private school... assuming they can meet the private school's entrance requirements.
As others have observed, government-funded schools educated the generations that gave us the technology we use today, and made us the (at least for the moment) the technological leader of the world. Other nations use a system of public school and government-run schools, and are moving forward.
Why aren't we? A lot of things... classes are too large, teacher training too limited, teacher wages too low, parents too uninvolved in their student's education, students with home lives that get in the way of their education, the list goes on.
We need small classes, well-trained and motivated teachers, motivated parents, and the teaching materials and equipment needed to keep up with a 21-st century world. How are we going to get these things? I wish I knew...
"Please address the other points I made. I addressed each of yours to the full and I find it very disappointing that you would insult my time and effort by not addressing them."
I think you have me confused with a different poster. I just happened to come across your post, noted those two particular items in your response to someone else, and commented.
"Abiogenesis is a ridiculous notion..."
Argument from Personal Incredulity.
"... and never been observed."
No, it hasn't been directly observed. Much that is studied in science is studied indirectly, via it's consequences, rather than directly via direct observation. At this stage, we only have hypotheses of how abiogenesis could have occurred... it's early days yet. In any case, hypotheses of abiogenesis and evolutionary theory are, at best, tangentially related. They really are two different topics.
That said, the probability arguments that have been proposed to counter even the possibility of unguided abiogenesis are tremendously naive with repect to the mechanisms being proposed.
"Not only that, but many have tried duplicating it, purposefully, and failed."
Sigh. Take a logic course, and quick!
If attempts at abiogenesis have been performed (and I'd like to see come cites to back up your claim), and have not so far succeeded, this does not imply that abiogenesis didn't or couldn't have happened.
"Because of this, Evolution is a belief system, similar to creationism."
Rubbish. Evolution is a fact, in that lifeforms are populations of species have been observed to evolve, up to and including speciation. Evolution is a theory, in that a theory was constructed to explain the mountains of data we have concerning how life changes in the present, and how life has changed in the past.
In addition, evolutionary theory deals with how life changes over time. Hypotheses of abiogenesis propose mechanisms by which non-reproducing matter led to reproducing matter... life. They are separate areas of investigation. Our ignorance concerning abiogenesis in no way diminishes our understanding of evolution.
"I don't even need Borel's law to state this, I merely need to point to the failure of evolutionists to find one abiogenesis observation. "
Life exists on Earth. The fossil evidence is consistent the position that the life we see today descended from ancestors, and did so in the pattern of a twin, nested hierarchy leading back to a few common ancestors of life. Further back, we find no evidence of life. Is it really so absurd to you to conclude that life arose at some point in the Earth's past, and that populations have been changing their composition ever since?
"Oh, you say, but a comet hit earth!"
Many bodies have hit the earth in the past. Did you have a particular comment in mind?
"Yeah, and God snapped his fingers too."
Please provide evidence supporting the existence of this "God" entity. Also, please specify if you are speaking of "Astarte, Quetzlcoatl, Odin, Zeus, or some other Deity or Deities when you use the word "God."
"Both seem equally ridiculous, and based on what we know in science, both are."
The position living matter arose from non-living matter is consistent with what we know of physics and chemistry, even if the exact mechanisms are currently unknown. The existence of a Deity is unsupported by current data, aside from the trivial "The world looks the way it does because God wanted it that way!"
"To argue that one is "more scientific" is saying that evolution is true because no other paradigm is available."
Again, abiogenesis and evolutionary theory are two different fields of study. There is an abundance of evidence supporting evolutionary theory. There are hypotheses of abiogenesis that have yet to be confirmed. Please try to remember this difference.
"Eh? How do you go from "energy-cause mutations" to this?"
"Men with Down syndrome are essentially sterile and cannot
I've tried it... doesn't work.
It looks to me as if what Google is actually doing is letting us add RSS feeds from some sort of "approved list of feeds", rather than letting us add any feed we wish. If so, lame.
It looks as if Google will let you add an RSS feed, but only if that feed is from a short list of feeds they've made available.
Is everyone else seeing this? Am I just making a mistake of some sort? I'd like to add my del.icio.us inbox RSS feeds.
You have it backwards... People started out organizing phyla/genera/etc. based on gross physiological similarities, then made changes once they were able to look at the actual genetics.
As for your links, I have a hard time taking a 'blog seriously when they state on their front page, in all caps, "Discusses creation and evolution, mostly from a creation perspective."
The evidence supporting evolutionary theory is vast, and predates the theory. This can't be said clearly enough: The theory of evolution was created to explain the fact that species change as they reproduce in a pattern we call "evolution."
Yes, you can organize cars into a cladogram. And, if you actually observed cars exhibiting mutation, crossover, and differential selection, you'd be justified in organizing along evolutionary lines. We observe a twin nested hierarchy when we look at life. This is an indicator of evolution.
"1. This argument centers on belief in life outside our solar system. Your response has given me no indication you think to contrary of *many* evolutionists. If the majority of evolutionists believe in life outside our solar system, is it really any surprise that Intelligent Design has worked its way into public debate?"
Here is what you originally said:
"Chance over probability. This is probably the weakest argument (because we *could* be the 1 in septendecillion instance), but it is a significant one, because many of the same individuals that believe we evolved from single-cell organisms also believe in extraterrestrial life within our own galaxy. You'd think these individuals would actually be ID proponents."
Your statements appear illogical to me. So far, we have a grand total of one planet with life from which to draw conclusions. Assuming that physics and chemistry work the same on other planets, and assuming that life arose on our planet without the help of some Intelligence, it is reasonable to assume, given the size of the galaxy (let alone the universe) that life arose elsewhere. How you get ID proponents from this line of reasoning escapes me. The probablility arguments used against the likelihood of life arising without an Intelligence are beyond specious. This article, "Lies, Damned Lies, Statistics, and Abiogenesis Calculations," discusses some of the issues involved.
"2. The earth is a closed system. Let me repeat, the earth is a closed system. Our environment allows energy and not mass to pass into the system."
You can repeat it all you like... it's still incorrect. The Earth is closed to neither mass nor energy. Plenty of material appears to have impacted the Earth during the solar system's early history, and, to a lesser degree, continues to do so today.
"Thus, the argument has to be that energy-cause mutations can increase information."
Google "Kolmogorov-Chaitin Complexity" for a discussion of information and information increase. Your seeming complaint against "energy-cause mutations" is best seen in this light.
"In such mutations, the organism cannot reproduce or at least, cannot reproduce with those of the same species."
Eh? How do you go from "energy-cause mutations" to this?
So, tell me: how do you think life came to arise on this planet, and how do your ideas as to how life changes over time differ from those expressed in modern evolutionary theory?
In light of new (to me) information, I'll have to downgrade this from "remains solid" to "subject to controversy." This article would seem to cast doubt on my earlier statements. Still, it's only one unrepeated (so far as I know) study, which means this is by no means a decided question.
This Wikipedia article gives more details.
Mind you, your comments elsewhere in this discussion, i.e.
and
carry with them the impression that the section of your closet holding white garments would include some robes of the non-bath variety... with matching hoods.
This is from the second article:
So, the situation is more complicated than I thought, but my basic point, that the observed genetic clustering of humans is not well-correlated with popular notions of "race", remains solid.
In other words, if you took genetic samples of a bunch of people, ran clustering software that grouped the genes of those people into groups of genetic similarity, the groupings you'd get wouldn't match up with the groupings you'd get if you were asked to group them according to "race."
What I said: "Race is a social construct genetically speaking, it's meaningless."
What you said: "Race has nothing to do with genetics?"
Not the same thing... if you look at human genetics, and look at clusters of similarities and differences, that clustering does not correlate with what is popularly known as "race."
genetically speaking, it's meaningless. There is no "white race" or "black race" or "asian race", or any of the rest. Humans do appear to have instincts towards forming social hierarchies, and distinguishing between "in my tribe" and "not in my tribe", but the concept of "race" has no real basis in biology or genetics.
Sorry to disappoint you, but your prejudices will need to find some other foundation upon which to rest.
The assumptions I'm making are based solely upon the content of your post, which is reminiscent of the intellectual rigor and sophistication of those I have seen posted to www.FreeRepublic.com... hence my recommendation.
Bored and trolling, are we?
I'm sure you'll find what you're looking for at www.FreeRepublic.com... perhaps you should be posting there instead?
I meant that, in this country, Jews, Wiccans and Muslims are "underdogs" with respect to Christians, in that they are in the numerical minority and in the minority wrt the "mindshare" they have in our culture.
"... he's taking a shot at a *very* large and *very* diverse group of people and comparing them to the Goatse guy!"
Actually, what he seems to have been trying to do (clumsily) is say that he wouldn't expect the intersection of the set of "Born-Again Christians" and "Nerds" to be much bigger than the empty set. He also said "I don't expect true nerds to be religious..."
"Then, when he gets called out on it, he basically sez, "So sorry, I didn't mean just Christians, I mean *all* religious people"
I didn't interpret his posts as saying that.
"(My many 'techno-pagan' friends will be tres amused to learn they can't be nerds cuz they're spiritual, BTW...)."
Your many techno-pagan friends? Where do you live? I've met Wiccans and Pagans, but never, to my knowledge, a techno-pagan.
It has been my experience that "nerds" do tend towards being secular in nature.
"It's incumbent upon the manager to make sure that the employee's day is filled with work, and to fire employees who just can't seem to wrap their brains around the fact that they're being paid to work ALL OF THE TIME, not just some fraction of it."
First, are you seriously suggesting that people work through every lunch hour or break? Second, do you really think people are productive at creative tasks if they don't have any mental "down time" during the day? Third, your way of "thinking" will lead to workers doing the absolute minimum needed, giving you absolutely zero respect, no loyalty to the company, and will absolutely not work a single extra moment, or do anything to improve the company. That is the sort of workplace your attitude would create.
I'll bet you measure productivity by lines coded per hour, too.
No, a manager's job is to tell the employee what is expected of them, give them the materials and tools they need to get the job done, and to stay the hell out of their way unless the employee needs help. A good manager acts as a buffer between their department and the rest of the company, balancing tasks and abilities, and helping their employees to grow and develop.
That's what a good manager does...
"Also think about the notion that if the guy's website was called "jewnerd" or "wiccannerd" or "muslimnerd" and you had made the same crack you would have been modded so low so fast it would make your head spin."
If the dominant (in terms of percentage of the population) religion were Judaism, Wicca, or Islam, and they had a vocal, politically active minority looking to establish the equivalent of a theocracy (note the "and" in this sentence), people would play the "Free Pass from Karma Loss" card on those, too. It's an American tradition to root for the underdog, and Christianity certainly isn't that, protestations to the contrary notwithstanding. Remember: persecution is not another word for "not getting everything we want right now."
All that said, prejudice isn't cool regardless of whom it's directed against.
"Implementing a less generic version on the CPU is likely to result in it being faster than the GPU sort."
How do you make a meaningful statement concerning the speed of a "less generic" algorithm running on a general-purpose CPU vs. a "generic" algorithm running on a piece of special-purpose hardware (GPU)?
Methinks your statement carries with it a load of unstated assumptions... care to spell them out for us?