My personal experience with mainframes literally goes back to 1981. I have been working at the same company since then.
I worked on an NCR Criterion which had the unique ability of being able to load a boot floppy and come up as an NCR or an IBM machine. We had two of them, one was the online system (connected to cash registers that served as terminals, and thermal printers) and one that ran batch with 4 data entry terminals. Data transfer between the two systems literally consisted of lifting removable hard disks and remounting them. They each had something like 1-4 MHz and an amazing 1024K, 315 or so of which was used for the OS and not available for jobs.
Operators literally had control of the machine, and regularly had to do hexdumps on screen to help programmers troubleshoot.
For all of that we were able to run daily batch, payroll for 1500 people, and also run materials management AND service bureau-type work for a supply company.
It was a cowboy environment with all sorts of oddball characters and shenanigans I do not care to put on the web. A perfect opportunity for a rebellious type like me to slide in and escape minimum wage.
We moved to a Burroughs machine, which had a stunning, amazing 6 MB (whoa!). It was also a multiprogramming OS (MCP) with a console that was an operator's dream.
I have worked with AS/400s, 390s, RISC, NTs, various Unixen, etc., and nothing, nothing, NOTHING compares to the power, flexibility, this tech ownz joo of the Burroughs MCP ODT. Plain english syntax that generates utility jobs out of thin air, CANDE as the purest most righteous development environment, constantly refreshing screens that were configurable and gave you useable info- magnificent!!!!!
Burroughs created virtual memory and did multiprogramming years before IBM knew how to spell it.
There were problems with Burroughs, of course. They never got the I/O optimized like IBM did, they hired the most pitiful salesmen, they didn't get the machines into the universities, and of course they merged with Sperry, creating Unisys and trashing the last major architecture to threaten IBM dominance. Once again, the superior technical company does not win.
During this period PCs moved into the neighborhood. Originally we checked into B20s, but that was a dead end and we were off and running into the PC world. As a result my job duties turned into part classic mainframe operator and part Help Desk. So I ended up troubleshooting everything on earth, from mainframes to minis to user issues.
We then moved to IBM due to a vendor choice, then we merged with a similar company in our region that also had an IBM mainframe (but home-grown apps). I knew I was taking a step back technically, as IBM takes backwards compatibility to the extreme.
In many respects IBM mainframes are like sharks, they have ancient elements built into them (I like pointing out that the 80-line limit is because those batch and data elements are literally Hollerith cards to the system), but since they do the job and more importantly do not change unless there is a culture of software stability that simply does not exist in other systems. Also, the Beowulf clusters that everyone loves are a long-time feature set of IBM mainframes (parallel sysplex, WLM, etc.).
During that time I moved out of the computer room and into the sysprog seat. I do not earn fantastic bucks and I have probably 3-4 years to go before I am a star, but I can look forward to at least a good 10 years of stability before other factors may knock my mainframe path out from under me. I'm 41, so this demographic favors me mightily.
I sometimes wondered if I missed something by not being a webbie, but it looks like the world is coming to my door. My dinosaur may have to play with penguins to grow, but that's fine by me.
Yes it is more likely that a container nuke or truck bomb will be the likely vector of attack. Nonetheless plenty of other nations are gaining the capability to build cruise missiles, and would be more then happy to build their guidance by using Galileo. We also have allies that can be attacked by such weapons, and have an interest in being able to protect them.
Who would have these cruise missiles and use them? Well for starters China if they attack Taiwan and we help defend it. They may not attack us directly but they would attack Guam and possibly the Panama Canal.
I am afraid I cannot agree with your thesis re: First World nations- WWII was within a generation of WWI and the horrors of the Great War did not serve as a deterrent.
I agree that Europe would do well to have it's own system for the reasons you mention, but they BETTER be able to degrade it at will, otherwise attackers will be able to build Galileo-driven targetting systems and cruise missiles will be able to hit European targets using their own satellites.
As far as anyone else using them against us is concerned, we'll just jam the Galileo frequencies in our AO. Americans would be advised not to buy Galileo handsets because we may have to set up jammers for all non-GPS constellations.
World War II Online has built-in text for a variety of channels based on squad, mission, objective, channel, individual player-to-player, etc. But many players do opt for the voice comms as the reaction time is crucial, especially for stopping truckloads of infantry or coordinating air groups or AA.
Two interesting side effects happen in this game that don't happen in most MMORPGs or FPSs, due to the large organization/military nature of the game. The first unique thing is that conferences, classes, training exercises are held on voice comm systems. The second is that the battle voice comms get picked up as part of 'movies' players make from action in the game, and thus becomes a sort of art form.
In the New World Order ordinary citizens will not be allowed to have the capability to build rockets unless they are part of the state-approved aeronautics industry. The Homeland Security issues alone will cause most personal heavy rocket experimentation to cease.
There are the liability issues as well if any chemical company ever sells stocks innocently to any terrorists. In a risk-adverse environment, most companies will not take that risk.
Besides, you've seen those Carmack games. They are violent! He creates violence in our children! We must protect our children!!!
Outsourcing white collar jobs and reducing the salary of the rest will result in lower house values as fewer are able to afford servicing their mortgage and are less motivated to live in a given area. This means that both capital formation in banks previously reaping the profits from those loans and governmental tax structures predicated on a given level of cash flow will collapse.
In other words, expect California all across the US.
Genetic mastery is the ultimate point of all this, but remember agriculture (or more properly speaking veterinarian sciences of which TAMU is a foremost practitioner) is a business. Therefore what I see this technology being used for most is cloning top breeder bulls and the like. Losing a top breeder is a big loss for a cattleman, so bringing one back is money well spent.
They won't be bringing back fluffy, they will bring back Brahma Bigstud.
In related news, the entire European culture for the past 1000 years sued Disney due to it's embrace and extend propiatization of classic public domain fairy tales.
Your comments re: teamwork and community are right on.
WWIIOL is built with the ultimate monsters one can face- other organized humans out to get you. Balrogs have nothing on the Wehrmacht.
The WWII Online forums are very very active, keep people very involved becoming friends with each other, and are instrumental in helping the designers determine what changes they will make.
The EQ article made me sad that so many people are giving so much money to such an unresponsive company.
The squads also promote the teamwork/ buddy aspect of play.
Hmmm, time-consuming, buggy, sucks down money, built to keep you enthralled, no joy yet you have to do reptitive tasks endlessly- wow, is this an EverQuest or a Microsoft article?
Oh great we won't even need the apocalyptic mark of the beast to be tracked, they'll just need our fingerprints.
Doctors and Garage Mechanics
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Complications
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· Score: 3, Insightful
You need to think of doctors as garage mechanics that specialize in specific areas of the car (hi, I'm a fuel-injectionologist but this surgery will require a sparkplugologist).
He/she does not have a complete manual of the 'car'. Constant updates to the 'manual' are occurring but they are often contradictory and not settled upon as fact. Also, due to the heavy specialization diagnosis can often be off because the mechanic/doctor has never seen the problem before and will try to fit the condition into the wrong pigeonhole.
Under these conditions, are you going to accept the word of the first doctor you see? You shouldn't. Depending on the seriousness of the condition, getting second and third opinions are lifesavers.
The fix is going to have to be a revolution in diagnostics, where vast comparative databases are at the doctor's fingertips, and the whole weight of medical wisdom is brought to bear on each person's case.
We will need doctor success rates for the purpose of identifying doctor mistakes quickly for correction not punishment, means to make sure people are not turned away because they will likely lower the doctor's 'batting average', truly incompetent dangerous doctors are weeded out less expensively, and an understanding by the general populace of the risky nature of any medical care.
I absolutely never said China did not have the right to make CPUs for military purposes, only that this was an aspect of the Dragon CPU that had not been brought out. I don't take it personally, somehow the Euroweenie decided I couldn't handle the PRC with a targetting chip capability. Frankly I consider it inevitable and they are very late in getting into this business.
I imagine China does not like our capabilities one bit, except for the part where we make sure they aren't messed with by Russia or Japan. Oh yeah, that part, where we are a stabilizing influence and prevent wars.
And why is everyone competing in trade and not some imperial, mercantilist, colonialist manner like nearly every other era in history? Because USN carriers say so.
Now as far as our Coward's comment and my reply is concerned, he needed correction about China being a sweet little nation just minding it's own business. The slow motion sterilization genocide in Tibet betrays their style- slow, sure, patient, deadly. Sad to say, my country has not gotten riled up over that, favoring other issues over what is right.
Re: the EU, everything I have ever read about the Union suggests bureacracy and not legislative debate (except for the trade protectionist/ internal trade aspects). Please enlighten me if I have missed something.
I most certainly can and will disrespect decisions that I think puts us all in danger or are morally corrupt.
I see you live in New Zealand. Your island nation has the freedom to have a small force and dispense with burdensome defense outlays because the USN and Australian air force is in the neighborhood. Would the PRC attack your nation if we weren't there? I don't know, probably not until it suited them, but I do know they won't for now because of your protectors (whether you want to acknowledge them or not).
No the world is NOT black and white, but the fact is Taiwan is building air force bases in mountains due to PRC missile threats (while it tries to influence it's way out of an attack), many Chinese citizens outside of HK and Guangdong province would LOVE to play capitalist running dog but can't (and would do better then the Russians), and Japan does have to constantly consider the PRC's reactions (including potential nuclear responses).
China has at it's political core a repressive set of smart goons- our best response is to continue to contain any enthusiasm for 'adventures' and engage them so the underlying culture will get away from this command economy and get more representative government.
I live in Texas, thoroughly despise the Bush clan (all four nasty generations of them although Barbara and Laura are good 'Mafia wives'), and do not trust them at all. So don't make assumptions about what I believe or don't believe without asking.
Of course we will reap the consequences of an aggressive military policy.
The EU nations and others are simply not willing to keep up with the US or have complementary capabilities. Now they do not have options to affect outcomes except by economic warfare or diplomacy- they do not bring any usable force to the table when needed.
One does not have to draw the sword if one has it, but it is important to have a sword if needed. Europe is fast losing their sword and thus their position at the bargaining table
Hmmm, China needs carrier-whacking missiles and sub-hunting torpedoes more then ICBM computers, so they need something smart enough to find and hit CVNs and SSNs in an unfriendly environment.
The moon mission is not a good example, you had a bunch of geniuses who could do the rough calcuations with slide rules focussed on one flight. Russia and America had to be able to launch 1000s of missiles under chaotic war conditions with an airman being your launch control officer (rocket soldiers, not rocket scientists).
Military ICBMs will have every potential target pre-calculated for every launch point- it then is simply a matter of loading the desired target program into the right missile.
You are largely correct right now, but with the advent of serious ABM capability a new generation of ballistic warheads are going to have to maneuver to get through- that will require more CPU juice then just the starfix/bus release stuff.
I wanted to make a quick post last night, but yes you are exactly right. Our economics of programming favor brute force CPU to make up for non-optimized code generated from development tools. Hand-coding from someone with brains can give you plenty of power, maybe more with 250 MHz then your typical 2 GHz machine.
It still amazes little post-1980 born people that I was running payroll for 3000 people on a 4 MHz 256K partition in 1982. It ran in 6 hours, but it ran.
PRC is very much a top-down militarily driven system (although less so then Russia), perhaps you haven't been reading up on what's happening with Tibet, and ask Taiwan about whacking and the Japanese about the power equation given China's nuclear capabilities.
I assume this was a typical Euroweenie comment pointed at the impending Iraq invasion.
I'm glad I live in a country that still has the will to defend it's interests. I'm not completely convinced our interests are served by invading Iraq, but at least we have the option as opposed to socialist contemplate-your-naval check-your-sovereignty-in-to-EU-bureaucrats Europe.
Kids, microprocessors are not just happy little toys we like to geek with, they are military weapons.
No I don't mean hacking, I mean weapon guidance.
The first SAM interception of an enemy warplane from a USN ship was done with a 64K 1 MhZ fire control director. Ever since, more powerful computer power drives all of our 'smart' weapons. China knows this and is probably not interested in having a CPU ban cripple their firepower.
Building a native capability means that China can make militarized versions without worrying about whether we 'messed up' a production run or can exploit a flaw we built in.
I have the greatest of respect for the French and Russian military aerospace engineers. They have created truly revolutionary planes that have forced American designers to work far harder to counter them then is realized by the general public. But notice what I actually said- yes they CAN do it, but they CANNOT FOR A LONG TIME TO COME.
Building something like the F-22 takes years of lead time in terms of designing, testing, redesigning, and building (the assembly line as much as the plane for such a specialized item). Even if the will, the money, the workforce and the engineering capability existed in Russia or France (I would argue one or more is lacking in each of those countries) it would be a decade before they could possibly catch up.
Look at the deployment dates of the F-15 versus the SU-27 to see what I mean.
As to your second point, yes Russia did spend itself into the dirt. Given their top-down Communist government, though, I fail to see that the USSR would have done better trying it's hand at consumer goods.
America is not spending itself into the dirt with our military, spending as a percentage of the budget has been dropping (25% during Kennedy years for instance, 8-9% now).
We do have a tremendous debt that has piled up (in large measure during the Reagan years as we spent on both military and social spending and later as Clinton discovered you can artifically pump the economy). In my opinion this debt threatens our national security. The current expansion in defense spending does add to this burden, but just as much as our welfare society (corporate or otherwise).
In between bemoaning the cost of defense, consider the kind of world without a USN or USAF where every tin plate authoritarian government could stop commerce with just a few planes or subs.
With our military we encourage a free trade world which forestalls the kind of mercantilist/colonial governments that started world wars. Pretty good investment I'd say, but you still can't turn an F-22 into a Walkman.
We'll have to come up with the Next Coolest Thing. As long as there is a reward system and infrastructure to support it (part of Stein's point), I'm not worried.
As a long-time wargamer that specializes in resource allocation, I am very concerned about the outrageous cost of the F-22. This is definitely a program that is out of control, and is well on it's way to destroying serious transport and logistics assets as the Air Force mortgages the present for it.
However, two Eurofighters do not equal one F-22 in capability. The Eurofighter is essentially a bigger evolutionary version of the F-15 and SU-27. The F-22 is a revolution.
The F-22 has three crucial technologies that in combination make it revolutionary-
* it is part stealth while retaining full combat maneuverability, so it will not be invivisible but it will be very very difficult to hit (and EW will work better for it),
* it has a totally radical radar that can track general targets while illuminating others for final weapon acquisition and firing with a low probability that the enemy will detect the radar, (this thing is almost like having an Aegis radar in a fighter with low signature),
* and it has supercruise, meaning that it can cruise at normal power above Mach 1, which has incredible advantages in terms of reaction time, distances covered, requiring fewer planes total to do the same job.
Bottom line, the F-22 is an incredibly radical weapons system as revolutionary as the M-1 battle tank was. The Eurofighter is a relatively weak sister, you would be better off getting a cheaper fighter and working on your missiles and AWACS capability.
The only question is, will the F-22 destroy the European military aerospace industry or American expeditionary capabilities first?
Any society will respond to what is valued either through the marketplace or socially. Ours is no exception.
We do not value little smart gadgets like the Japanese do, so we do not make them as well or as consistently. The Japanese do not have per capita square footage like we do, so anything that gives them more capability in a small space is prized. Electronics are also a very profitable item to ship, so it was an excellent arena for the Japanese to specialize in.
Being behind in consumer electronics is not new. Our broadcast standards have been absolutely behind most of the world for decades, for instance. But a clear picture wasn't as important to us and so we have lagged until HDTV.
On the other hand we feel a need to have a strong military. So we put our money into all sorts of hideous toys that are so far ahead of everyone else's that Pax Americana is an absolute fact. No matter how much Japan or France or Russia or China may want to, they simply cannot build an F-22 for a long time to come.
Unfortunately F-22s do not readily translate into consumer products, but items like BOMARC and B-52s translated into the 747, still a world-beater product.
I'm not suggesting that the military-industrial complex is our technical salvation, but since we prioritize and pay for it we get that kind of technical edge. If we want innovation in other sectors of our economy, we will need to prioritize that, either as a government initiative or the natural course of market desire.
And we need to stop whining if we don't absolutely dominate every global industrial endeavor. As long as we can offload the commoditization to Japan or the Little Dragons and keep the innovation in-house, who cares if we all have Playstations instead of Ataris?
One of the biggest problems from my perspective is that the entire purpose of patent law has been undermined by the expansion beyond the original intent of trade secrets and copyrights.
Trade secrets has allowed companies to essentially patent the unpatentable and protect concepts and ideas far past the patent limit.
Copyrights are even worse in that they have allowed companies to publish software and legally protect it without actually publishing the source code.
Consider Microsoft's successful squashing of any 'unauthorized' books regarding API calls. To me Microsoft would be truly covered if all the API calls were actually published and therefore copyrighted, but they are not. So what is covered is not actually known to the public or described in any public way, yet Microsoft can continue to have them and be legally protected by just copyrighting the distribution of the executables.
This is an abomination of the entire point of having a patent or a copyright system- to encourage innovation by giving the user exclusive use and rights legally protected for a time in exchange for having the body of knowledge published publically.
Why bother to patent when trade secrets or copyright can protect you longer with no public release of knowledge or concepts?
We have drastically erred on the side of use and rights without the fair exchange of public knowledge. Until we fix this part our innovative tech base will continue to suffer.
I can agree that there are horrid stupid no-responsiblity lawsuits out there.
My current favorite is the asbestos suits in which the companies have been utterly destroyed, but the true needy victims will likely get no money because the industrial-sized law firms have methodically looted the funds for relatively undeserving clients.
However, lawsuits have been the most effective way to force companies to build safety into their products. If there were full tort reform as Stein and his ilk would like, then killing people with exploding car gas tanks would just be another cost of doing business.
Responsiblity cuts both ways- the populace should take responsibility for their own foolish or immoral actions, but not at the expense of being able to make sure larger organizations are responsible too.
How about this change- lawsuits must pass more stringent tests to not be deemed frivolous, and are limited to realistic damage levels, but company officers who do harm either through negligence or willful contempt of safety are criminally liable.
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My personal experience with mainframes literally goes back to 1981. I have been working at the same company since then.
I worked on an NCR Criterion which had the unique ability of being able to load a boot floppy and come up as an NCR or an IBM machine. We had two of them, one was the online system (connected to cash registers that served as terminals, and thermal printers) and one that ran batch with 4 data entry terminals. Data transfer between the two systems literally consisted of lifting removable hard disks and remounting them. They each had something like 1-4 MHz and an amazing 1024K, 315 or so of which was used for the OS and not available for jobs.
Operators literally had control of the machine, and regularly had to do hexdumps on screen to help programmers troubleshoot.
For all of that we were able to run daily batch, payroll for 1500 people, and also run materials management AND service bureau-type work for a supply company.
It was a cowboy environment with all sorts of oddball characters and shenanigans I do not care to put on the web. A perfect opportunity for a rebellious type like me to slide in and escape minimum wage.
We moved to a Burroughs machine, which had a stunning, amazing 6 MB (whoa!). It was also a multiprogramming OS (MCP) with a console that was an operator's dream.
I have worked with AS/400s, 390s, RISC, NTs, various Unixen, etc., and nothing, nothing, NOTHING compares to the power, flexibility, this tech ownz joo of the Burroughs MCP ODT. Plain english syntax that generates utility jobs out of thin air, CANDE as the purest most righteous development environment, constantly refreshing screens that were configurable and gave you useable info- magnificent!!!!!
Burroughs created virtual memory and did multiprogramming years before IBM knew how to spell it.
There were problems with Burroughs, of course. They never got the I/O optimized like IBM did, they hired the most pitiful salesmen, they didn't get the machines into the universities, and of course they merged with Sperry, creating Unisys and trashing the last major architecture to threaten IBM dominance. Once again, the superior technical company does not win.
During this period PCs moved into the neighborhood. Originally we checked into B20s, but that was a dead end and we were off and running into the PC world. As a result my job duties turned into part classic mainframe operator and part Help Desk. So I ended up troubleshooting everything on earth, from mainframes to minis to user issues.
We then moved to IBM due to a vendor choice, then we merged with a similar company in our region that also had an IBM mainframe (but home-grown apps). I knew I was taking a step back technically, as IBM takes backwards compatibility to the extreme.
In many respects IBM mainframes are like sharks, they have ancient elements built into them (I like pointing out that the 80-line limit is because those batch and data elements are literally Hollerith cards to the system), but since they do the job and more importantly do not change unless there is a culture of software stability that simply does not exist in other systems. Also, the Beowulf clusters that everyone loves are a long-time feature set of IBM mainframes (parallel sysplex, WLM, etc.).
During that time I moved out of the computer room and into the sysprog seat. I do not earn fantastic bucks and I have probably 3-4 years to go before I am a star, but I can look forward to at least a good 10 years of stability before other factors may knock my mainframe path out from under me. I'm 41, so this demographic favors me mightily.
I sometimes wondered if I missed something by not being a webbie, but it looks like the world is coming to my door. My dinosaur may have to play with penguins to grow, but that's fine by me.
Yes it is more likely that a container nuke or truck bomb will be the likely vector of attack. Nonetheless plenty of other nations are gaining the capability to build cruise missiles, and would be more then happy to build their guidance by using Galileo. We also have allies that can be attacked by such weapons, and have an interest in being able to protect them.
Who would have these cruise missiles and use them? Well for starters China if they attack Taiwan and we help defend it. They may not attack us directly but they would attack Guam and possibly the Panama Canal.
I am afraid I cannot agree with your thesis re: First World nations- WWII was within a generation of WWI and the horrors of the Great War did not serve as a deterrent.
I agree that Europe would do well to have it's own system for the reasons you mention, but they BETTER be able to degrade it at will, otherwise attackers will be able to build Galileo-driven targetting systems and cruise missiles will be able to hit European targets using their own satellites.
As far as anyone else using them against us is concerned, we'll just jam the Galileo frequencies in our AO. Americans would be advised not to buy Galileo handsets because we may have to set up jammers for all non-GPS constellations.
World War II Online has built-in text for a variety of channels based on squad, mission, objective, channel, individual player-to-player, etc. But many players do opt for the voice comms as the reaction time is crucial, especially for stopping truckloads of infantry or coordinating air groups or AA.
Two interesting side effects happen in this game that don't happen in most MMORPGs or FPSs, due to the large organization/military nature of the game. The first unique thing is that conferences, classes, training exercises are held on voice comm systems. The second is that the battle voice comms get picked up as part of 'movies' players make from action in the game, and thus becomes a sort of art form.
This is the post that hit the nail on the head. Congrats- unfortunately you labor in obscurity, sir.
In the New World Order ordinary citizens will not be allowed to have the capability to build rockets unless they are part of the state-approved aeronautics industry. The Homeland Security issues alone will cause most personal heavy rocket experimentation to cease.
There are the liability issues as well if any chemical company ever sells stocks innocently to any terrorists. In a risk-adverse environment, most companies will not take that risk.
Besides, you've seen those Carmack games. They are violent! He creates violence in our children! We must protect our children!!!
Outsourcing white collar jobs and reducing the salary of the rest will result in lower house values as fewer are able to afford servicing their mortgage and are less motivated to live in a given area. This means that both capital formation in banks previously reaping the profits from those loans and governmental tax structures predicated on a given level of cash flow will collapse.
In other words, expect California all across the US.
The only way out is to outtech everyone else.
Genetic mastery is the ultimate point of all this, but remember agriculture (or more properly speaking veterinarian sciences of which TAMU is a foremost practitioner) is a business. Therefore what I see this technology being used for most is cloning top breeder bulls and the like. Losing a top breeder is a big loss for a cattleman, so bringing one back is money well spent.
They won't be bringing back fluffy, they will bring back Brahma Bigstud.
Here is a link to Costikyan's work. Most of you won't recognize the wargaming titles, but this man is one of the greats.
Bow you PC worms.
In related news, the entire European culture for the past 1000 years sued Disney due to it's embrace and extend propiatization of classic public domain fairy tales.
SMU is 50% rude elitist jackasses, 10% wannabe rude elitist jackasses, and the rest are trying to get a good theater or business degree.
Your comments re: teamwork and community are right on.
WWIIOL is built with the ultimate monsters one can face- other organized humans out to get you. Balrogs have nothing on the Wehrmacht.
The WWII Online forums are very very active, keep people very involved becoming friends with each other, and are instrumental in helping the designers determine what changes they will make.
The EQ article made me sad that so many people are giving so much money to such an unresponsive company.
The squads also promote the teamwork/ buddy aspect of play.
Hmmm, time-consuming, buggy, sucks down money, built to keep you enthralled, no joy yet you have to do reptitive tasks endlessly- wow, is this an EverQuest or a Microsoft article?
Sorry, just had to do it.
Oh great we won't even need the apocalyptic mark of the beast to be tracked, they'll just need our fingerprints.
You need to think of doctors as garage mechanics that specialize in specific areas of the car (hi, I'm a fuel-injectionologist but this surgery will require a sparkplugologist).
He/she does not have a complete manual of the 'car'. Constant updates to the 'manual' are occurring but they are often contradictory and not settled upon as fact. Also, due to the heavy specialization diagnosis can often be off because the mechanic/doctor has never seen the problem before and will try to fit the condition into the wrong pigeonhole.
Under these conditions, are you going to accept the word of the first doctor you see? You shouldn't. Depending on the seriousness of the condition, getting second and third opinions are lifesavers.
The fix is going to have to be a revolution in diagnostics, where vast comparative databases are at the doctor's fingertips, and the whole weight of medical wisdom is brought to bear on each person's case.
We will need doctor success rates for the purpose of identifying doctor mistakes quickly for correction not punishment, means to make sure people are not turned away because they will likely lower the doctor's 'batting average', truly incompetent dangerous doctors are weeded out less expensively, and an understanding by the general populace of the risky nature of any medical care.
I absolutely never said China did not have the right to make CPUs for military purposes, only that this was an aspect of the Dragon CPU that had not been brought out. I don't take it personally, somehow the Euroweenie decided I couldn't handle the PRC with a targetting chip capability. Frankly I consider it inevitable and they are very late in getting into this business.
I imagine China does not like our capabilities one bit, except for the part where we make sure they aren't messed with by Russia or Japan. Oh yeah, that part, where we are a stabilizing influence and prevent wars.
And why is everyone competing in trade and not some imperial, mercantilist, colonialist manner like nearly every other era in history? Because USN carriers say so.
Now as far as our Coward's comment and my reply is concerned, he needed correction about China being a sweet little nation just minding it's own business. The slow motion sterilization genocide in Tibet betrays their style- slow, sure, patient, deadly. Sad to say, my country has not gotten riled up over that, favoring other issues over what is right.
Re: the EU, everything I have ever read about the Union suggests bureacracy and not legislative debate (except for the trade protectionist/ internal trade aspects). Please enlighten me if I have missed something.
I most certainly can and will disrespect decisions that I think puts us all in danger or are morally corrupt.
I see you live in New Zealand. Your island nation has the freedom to have a small force and dispense with burdensome defense outlays because the USN and Australian air force is in the neighborhood. Would the PRC attack your nation if we weren't there? I don't know, probably not until it suited them, but I do know they won't for now because of your protectors (whether you want to acknowledge them or not).
No the world is NOT black and white, but the fact is Taiwan is building air force bases in mountains due to PRC missile threats (while it tries to influence it's way out of an attack), many Chinese citizens outside of HK and Guangdong province would LOVE to play capitalist running dog but can't (and would do better then the Russians), and Japan does have to constantly consider the PRC's reactions (including potential nuclear responses).
China has at it's political core a repressive set of smart goons- our best response is to continue to contain any enthusiasm for 'adventures' and engage them so the underlying culture will get away from this command economy and get more representative government.
I live in Texas, thoroughly despise the Bush clan (all four nasty generations of them although Barbara and Laura are good 'Mafia wives'), and do not trust them at all. So don't make assumptions about what I believe or don't believe without asking.
Of course we will reap the consequences of an aggressive military policy.
The EU nations and others are simply not willing to keep up with the US or have complementary capabilities. Now they do not have options to affect outcomes except by economic warfare or diplomacy- they do not bring any usable force to the table when needed.
One does not have to draw the sword if one has it, but it is important to have a sword if needed. Europe is fast losing their sword and thus their position at the bargaining table
Hmmm, China needs carrier-whacking missiles and sub-hunting torpedoes more then ICBM computers, so they need something smart enough to find and hit CVNs and SSNs in an unfriendly environment.
The moon mission is not a good example, you had a bunch of geniuses who could do the rough calcuations with slide rules focussed on one flight. Russia and America had to be able to launch 1000s of missiles under chaotic war conditions with an airman being your launch control officer (rocket soldiers, not rocket scientists).
Military ICBMs will have every potential target pre-calculated for every launch point- it then is simply a matter of loading the desired target program into the right missile.
You are largely correct right now, but with the advent of serious ABM capability a new generation of ballistic warheads are going to have to maneuver to get through- that will require more CPU juice then just the starfix/bus release stuff.
I wanted to make a quick post last night, but yes you are exactly right. Our economics of programming favor brute force CPU to make up for non-optimized code generated from development tools. Hand-coding from someone with brains can give you plenty of power, maybe more with 250 MHz then your typical 2 GHz machine.
It still amazes little post-1980 born people that I was running payroll for 3000 people on a 4 MHz 256K partition in 1982. It ran in 6 hours, but it ran.
PRC is very much a top-down militarily driven system (although less so then Russia), perhaps you haven't been reading up on what's happening with Tibet, and ask Taiwan about whacking and the Japanese about the power equation given China's nuclear capabilities.
I assume this was a typical Euroweenie comment pointed at the impending Iraq invasion.
I'm glad I live in a country that still has the will to defend it's interests. I'm not completely convinced our interests are served by invading Iraq, but at least we have the option as opposed to socialist contemplate-your-naval check-your-sovereignty-in-to-EU-bureaucrats Europe.
Kids, microprocessors are not just happy little toys we like to geek with, they are military weapons.
No I don't mean hacking, I mean weapon guidance.
The first SAM interception of an enemy warplane from a USN ship was done with a 64K 1 MhZ fire control director. Ever since, more powerful computer power drives all of our 'smart' weapons. China knows this and is probably not interested in having a CPU ban cripple their firepower.
Building a native capability means that China can make militarized versions without worrying about whether we 'messed up' a production run or can exploit a flaw we built in.
I have the greatest of respect for the French and Russian military aerospace engineers. They have created truly revolutionary planes that have forced American designers to work far harder to counter them then is realized by the general public. But notice what I actually said- yes they CAN do it, but they CANNOT FOR A LONG TIME TO COME.
Building something like the F-22 takes years of lead time in terms of designing, testing, redesigning, and building (the assembly line as much as the plane for such a specialized item). Even if the will, the money, the workforce and the engineering capability existed in Russia or France (I would argue one or more is lacking in each of those countries) it would be a decade before they could possibly catch up.
Look at the deployment dates of the F-15 versus the SU-27 to see what I mean.
As to your second point, yes Russia did spend itself into the dirt. Given their top-down Communist government, though, I fail to see that the USSR would have done better trying it's hand at consumer goods.
America is not spending itself into the dirt with our military, spending as a percentage of the budget has been dropping (25% during Kennedy years for instance, 8-9% now).
We do have a tremendous debt that has piled up (in large measure during the Reagan years as we spent on both military and social spending and later as Clinton discovered you can artifically pump the economy). In my opinion this debt threatens our national security. The current expansion in defense spending does add to this burden, but just as much as our welfare society (corporate or otherwise).
In between bemoaning the cost of defense, consider the kind of world without a USN or USAF where every tin plate authoritarian government could stop commerce with just a few planes or subs.
With our military we encourage a free trade world which forestalls the kind of mercantilist/colonial governments that started world wars. Pretty good investment I'd say, but you still can't turn an F-22 into a Walkman.
We'll have to come up with the Next Coolest Thing. As long as there is a reward system and infrastructure to support it (part of Stein's point), I'm not worried.
As a long-time wargamer that specializes in resource allocation, I am very concerned about the outrageous cost of the F-22. This is definitely a program that is out of control, and is well on it's way to destroying serious transport and logistics assets as the Air Force mortgages the present for it.
However, two Eurofighters do not equal one F-22 in capability. The Eurofighter is essentially a bigger evolutionary version of the F-15 and SU-27. The F-22 is a revolution.
The F-22 has three crucial technologies that in combination make it revolutionary-
* it is part stealth while retaining full combat maneuverability, so it will not be invivisible but it will be very very difficult to hit (and EW will work better for it),
* it has a totally radical radar that can track general targets while illuminating others for final weapon acquisition and firing with a low probability that the enemy will detect the radar, (this thing is almost like having an Aegis radar in a fighter with low signature),
* and it has supercruise, meaning that it can cruise at normal power above Mach 1, which has incredible advantages in terms of reaction time, distances covered, requiring fewer planes total to do the same job.
Bottom line, the F-22 is an incredibly radical weapons system as revolutionary as the M-1 battle tank was. The Eurofighter is a relatively weak sister, you would be better off getting a cheaper fighter and working on your missiles and AWACS capability.
The only question is, will the F-22 destroy the European military aerospace industry or American expeditionary capabilities first?
Any society will respond to what is valued either through the marketplace or socially. Ours is no exception.
We do not value little smart gadgets like the Japanese do, so we do not make them as well or as consistently. The Japanese do not have per capita square footage like we do, so anything that gives them more capability in a small space is prized. Electronics are also a very profitable item to ship, so it was an excellent arena for the Japanese to specialize in.
Being behind in consumer electronics is not new. Our broadcast standards have been absolutely behind most of the world for decades, for instance. But a clear picture wasn't as important to us and so we have lagged until HDTV.
On the other hand we feel a need to have a strong military. So we put our money into all sorts of hideous toys that are so far ahead of everyone else's that Pax Americana is an absolute fact. No matter how much Japan or France or Russia or China may want to, they simply cannot build an F-22 for a long time to come.
Unfortunately F-22s do not readily translate into consumer products, but items like BOMARC and B-52s translated into the 747, still a world-beater product.
I'm not suggesting that the military-industrial complex is our technical salvation, but since we prioritize and pay for it we get that kind of technical edge. If we want innovation in other sectors of our economy, we will need to prioritize that, either as a government initiative or the natural course of market desire.
And we need to stop whining if we don't absolutely dominate every global industrial endeavor. As long as we can offload the commoditization to Japan or the Little Dragons and keep the innovation in-house, who cares if we all have Playstations instead of Ataris?
One of the biggest problems from my perspective is that the entire purpose of patent law has been undermined by the expansion beyond the original intent of trade secrets and copyrights.
Trade secrets has allowed companies to essentially patent the unpatentable and protect concepts and ideas far past the patent limit.
Copyrights are even worse in that they have allowed companies to publish software and legally protect it without actually publishing the source code.
Consider Microsoft's successful squashing of any 'unauthorized' books regarding API calls. To me Microsoft would be truly covered if all the API calls were actually published and therefore copyrighted, but they are not. So what is covered is not actually known to the public or described in any public way, yet Microsoft can continue to have them and be legally protected by just copyrighting the distribution of the executables.
This is an abomination of the entire point of having a patent or a copyright system- to encourage innovation by giving the user exclusive use and rights legally protected for a time in exchange for having the body of knowledge published publically.
Why bother to patent when trade secrets or copyright can protect you longer with no public release of knowledge or concepts?
We have drastically erred on the side of use and rights without the fair exchange of public knowledge. Until we fix this part our innovative tech base will continue to suffer.
I can agree that there are horrid stupid no-responsiblity lawsuits out there.
My current favorite is the asbestos suits in which the companies have been utterly destroyed, but the true needy victims will likely get no money because the industrial-sized law firms have methodically looted the funds for relatively undeserving clients.
However, lawsuits have been the most effective way to force companies to build safety into their products. If there were full tort reform as Stein and his ilk would like, then killing people with exploding car gas tanks would just be another cost of doing business.
Responsiblity cuts both ways- the populace should take responsibility for their own foolish or immoral actions, but not at the expense of being able to make sure larger organizations are responsible too.
How about this change- lawsuits must pass more stringent tests to not be deemed frivolous, and are limited to realistic damage levels, but company officers who do harm either through negligence or willful contempt of safety are criminally liable.