"While youtube is nice for idling away some downtime, it's not the internet-dominating force this article makes out"
Completely not true. Hundreds of universities host content. Youtubes api's, transcribing, and other tools make building video sites around youtube streams easy. It is very expensive to host videos in house, Youtube makes it free, easy, and meets ADA needs.
Schools alone would be in serious upheaval if Youtube went down. And I'm sure that is just one slice of the pie.
The only way to prevent the abuse, short of taxing gross, would be to regulate at a very minute level, what can be spent on infrastructure, upgrades, etc.. that effectively makes many corporations profit zero each year.
Make 200 million in profit but invest it back into the business and it no longer is considered profit, but yet another cost of the business.
Even if that 'investment' is a big corporate jet for the execs.
I can't see any way to curtail that abuse except by taxing the gross and not the net. Can you?
Try a half million accounts. Now deal with a stream of name changes. People get married and want their email changed.
People's accounts get guessed and spam flows out of them, major ISP blocks the school.
Even with clustered servers, there may be single points of failure further along the line (one time power went out, and our central upc failed to connect).
Most email software begins to become stressed in terms of access time once you reach a certain amount of accounts. You often need to modify default install scenarios to less commonly known setups to support greater than average number of user accounts. This requires either very experienced email admins or pricey support contracts with the software makers.
Integration with other systems, mobile devices, etc... is constantly being asked for, and constantly changing. Keeping the UI modern, mobile device support up to date, spam filtration accurate, is much easier for a company that specializes in it.
Just a few things that come to mind off the top of my head.
I'm a system analyst for a major community college network. Most of what you say is not true. Many of the privacy concerns have been ironed out with other schools, and if they aren't already reflected in Google's policies, schools can choose to negotiate additional things with Google (access to the bulk data, audits of account access, etc..). And being a leader like this, if it ever did get out that Google was reading sensitive research data (or anything for that matter), it would destroy their reputation. You'd have schools jumping ship left and right.
I'm not sure how large your school is, but we now have 600,000 accounts and rising. Keeping up with spam, people trying to hack accounts to send spam from us, backup and storage space and duration, etc etc, while still manageable, isn't simple. And lets face it, it is hard to give students cutting edge functionality when it isn't your primary business like it is for Google.
If we add up support contracts on storage arrays, the software and servers (mostly sun, sun java messaging), few staff for it, backup storage and media, etc.. it isn't a small amount.
And moving to an external email system like Google does not in any way prevent the more paranoid from either setting up their own email server, or encrypting their email, or any number of other options. If a school decides to send class information, instructor correspondences, billing information, or other official business, it in no way forces someone to only use that one account for all aspects of their life, it would just be official school emails.
About the only concern that schools have that have researched this, is down time. But looking at things objectively, Google's down time is pretty small, certainly not much more than our own internal down time. We also have other messaging systems (chat, forums, etc..) so its not like the world would grind to a halt:)
Well, it isn't just the interstate commerce section that gives Congress fairly broad powers. There is also the (16th?) amendment that says that Congress can tax things and use the money "to pay the debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States".
There are many different views of what 'general welfare' means. I don't have the time to look up court cases on it, but there have been several.
I don't know, I can still watch older star wars movies and enjoy them more than the newer ones. The older movies had less special effects and more character development. That works universally better than pure CGI.
Of course 12 year olds today are impressed with the pod racing. Its fun to watch. But I bet those 12 year olds are not going to be moved by the movies enough to watch them again at age 40.
The popular news media is not an outlet for dissemination of "science." This is appropriate...its audience has little interest in the tight details that are the realm of science.
The audience might not care to hear the details, but I think the audience would care to know the general truth about an issue.
Instead, the news media is a platform for dissemination of information and entertainment that, in so doing, provides sufficient gratification to its audience that they choose to come back for more. I would guess, for example, that though you make many remarks about Fox News, you probably watch very little of it. (And it's not clear to me that you distinguish the news part of Fox's programming from the opinion/commentary parts.)
I try to watch Fox every so often just to see whats being said. And if you take an honest look at Fox, the "news programming" side of their organization is very much intertwined in the opinion/commentary side. I've seen the news programming side say "some folks are saying X", when those folks who said it are the opinion shows that just aired!
So we should understand that putting a scientist in front of a camera and having him opine does not constitute the dissemination of scientific information; it constitutes the dissemination of a scientist's opinions. Effectively, the real science exists only in the form of the publications that constitute peer-reviewed research. Even the authors' remarks about their own papers stand outside the very critical borders of the peer-reviewed piece (that is presumed to have been produced through rigorous application of the scientific method).
No one would argue that the news is an appropriate place to disseminate scienctific detail. However, the news should certainly research enough to be able to paint a proper picture of the science it reports on. At least let the audience get a sense of what most scientists believe, instead of only airing the minority dissenter. It paints a picture that there is some 50/50 debate about whether climate change is even occuring! That is bad reporting.
The bias of the media is more insidious than you suggest. While bias is obviously reflected in the opinions of the people speaking to the cameras, it is less obviously reflected by the choices of which people to put in front of the cameras, end EVEN MORE INSIDIOUSLY, in the choices of which stories to cover. Science news is in very small part a production of scientists, and in large part, a production of news editorial boards and science reporters (neither of whom is likely to be a scientist).
Agreed. And it is getting worse. The news show '60 minutes' marked the downfall of unbiased reporting. It was the first time that the major networks realized that news was not a public service anymore, but rather, a money maker.
It is within this comfortable relationship between media outlet and audience that you want to see more what? Ahhh...yes...you want to see more bias toward what you believe. Oh. Wait. No. You want to see more bias toward "what science believes." No. Wait. You want more bias toward the "scientific consensus."
Bias towards the scientific consensus? Are you kidding me? The public deserves to know what level of evidence supports certain ideas. They don't have to know the details, but they should walk away from a news show with a sense of what is most likely the correct answer concerning an issue. That isn't bias, that is responsible reporting. Fox has clearly not provided a clear picture to its viewers concering the levels of evidence on either side of this completely fabricated debate.
Whatever it is that you want the media to put out, it isn't science. It's opinion. It's your opinion. And it's the opinion of many others. And you're just trying to help the "good guys" win.
You probably don't fly in airplanes do you? After all, it
Well, there are increasing accurate brain scans that can estimate the total calculations per second happening in the brain, as well as total neurons, total connection between neurons, etc..
So some of these "AI will be here in 20 years" are people saying that computer trends tell us that the computational equivalent of the human mind will be available in 20 years, at a cheap enough cost, that many researchers can have access to them.
There is lots of talk about after the hardware is sufficient, what comes next? Some people favor trying a complete simulation of the brain, as a biological thing, inside a computer. Others favor various programming approaches like neural networks / machine learning approaches. They assume that with enough calculations per second, storage, and input/output, that it will "just happen".
From the 4-5 pop.sci. books on AI that I've read, I think I'm favoring the complete brain simulation as the most likely to succeed. MRI, FMRI, and all sorts of newer more precise brain scanning techniques are being used, mapping and modeling the brain down to more and more precise tiny levels. I think once the scanning power is down near the molecular level, we'll be able to capture enough details about how the brain works when various input hits it, to model the brain in a virtual biological body inside a computer.
The drawback to the complete simulation based on scanned models, is that it is going to require a lot more computer power. So while 10-20 years will be the point at which we have the computational equivalent in terms of raw calculations per second of a human brain, it will probably be 20-40 before we have a couple orders of magnitude above a brains power, which will be required for a complete simulation.
Now before you say "Hey, he got that from Caprica", I can assure you I was thinking about this when Ray K. wrote the age of spiritual machines long ago!:)
Odd timing, I just bought a couple more books on AI this week.
Bottom line, AI will happen. Speculation on when isn't why I wanted to post though.
As I was reading one of the AI books, I got to thinking about my own job as a system analyst/programmer/integrator, etc.. When we start a new project, say, making software A feed software B user accounts, a whole host of factors must be discussed, as many of you all know. It takes me a while to map out requirements, design a overview of how the processing will work, and then get into mapping out the general logic of a program, and all of this happens based on communication with system owners, system users, other programmers, etc...
As I thought about AI, what popped into my mind, was that I probably wouldn't be coding once functional AI was developed. Rather, programmers and system analysts would most likely act as managers of the AI. I might have a team of 10 AI minds that I control. I'd need to talk with them, tell them about the new system, tell them what we want done, etc... and then they'd bang out a program or 10 variations in seconds, and we'd need to work together to test. I might not have been precise enough telling the AI's what we wanted, so I'd have to redefine my request, or say "oops, I didn't remember that such and such can happen once per year, we have to account for that now".
I'm not sure I'd enjoy managing 10 computers, each with personalities. Just imagine trying to find out if one was wasting cycles wget'ing slashdot all day:)
At least, thats how I envision the earlier phases of functional AI. It will most likely rather quickly spiral up in power as AI builds new AI.
I don't think you understood my point, or I did not convey it correctly.
To date, every questioner I have seen (who's voice is public enough to be heard), in the public eye (Fox News, major web presence, etc..), has been nearly a fanatical denier of climate change. It is like their mind is made up, and they are grasping to find one little flaw to explode with.
I have absolutely zero issues with people having full access to the code and complete transparency for even the unqualified to examine the data.
The problem is that in this politically charged environment, even if 10 people question data set X, and 9 find it is completely fine, Fox News or something similar is going to grab the 1 unqualified person who doesn't like data set X and let them talk for weeks.
Now, that is generally OK to let that one person talk, assuming they are somewhat respected in their field.
But if that 1 person who disagrees with data set X is refuted, Fox (just an example, happens all over) never retracts the damage that was done. And they certainly don't have on the other 9 questioners who can point out why the data set X is just fine.
No exactly sure why this was marked informative....
""It's time that we the People stop bowing to judges as if they were the ultimate authorities. They are not. The LAW is the ultimate authority""
The entire purpose of a judge is to interpret the law. Law, when applied to real world cases, is not black and white. It requires understanding preceding cases, the original intent of the law, perhaps being aware of other laws that influence that law, etc...
If you think it is so cut and dry that people should stop bowing to judges because the law is so very very clear, then please explain this sentence:
"Every person may speak, write, and publish sentiments on all subjects but shall be responsible for the abuse of that liberty"
Define abuse? In what way can speech be abused? We have libel and slander laws already, so what other ways can speech be abused? Is yelling fire in a crowded theatre abuse? Judges said yes a long time ago.
Is having sex with your partner on a playground full of children as a protest against X abuse? Most judges and communities would say yes.
Every single word in a law, and every single word in the constitution must be applied to a real world case, and a JUDGEMENT must be made whether the real world case meets the definitions of those words or not.
"'m a bit frustrated by the apparent contradiction. For the first time perhaps in history in the USA, you have armchair folks trying to do technical audits of scientific tools, research, and publications -- for free."
One of the problems I see, is that there hasn't been one single valid argument from the "deniers" or whatever you want to call the armchair folks. Every time the media and blog world latches on to some "gotcha" concerning climate change, it is shouted around the world 10 times, aired on Fox News for weeks, and the damage has been done: namely, public perception of climate change has been altered permanently. And yet, when I follow up on whatever the "gotcha" was, it is explained by numerous other blogs, sometimes the scientist himself, and eventually....usually:) ends up on the Jon Stewart show, making fun of the armchair deniers.
When attorneys go about jury selection, if those jurors have been exposed to aspects of the case, whether true or false aspects, the juror is dropped. I feel like climate change is on trial, and every time the attorneys start jury selection, the town they are in has a big media storm about the "client" "climate change", and all the jurors are tainted from exposure, so they have to move the trial to a new city.
There is a reason that science has peer review, and multiple people/teams constantly checking each others work. It is because 'armchair analysis' isn't skilled enough (or knowledgeable about the data set) to do it. And when you combine 'not skilled enough to do it' with some of the armchairs that have clear political motives, you end up with media storms based on bad information, yet directly influencing policy decision because of public perception.
It is really sad actually. I would normally favor more transparency, more eyes watching. But when it is obvious that we can't trust the media to double check sources, and check the credentials of their guests, or to take into account what the consensus is versus what one non-peer reviewed person is saying..... transparency in that case hurts the public more than it helps.
I think it would be amusing for a news show to actually have their guests debate, but the guest ratio would need to reflect the actual support for each side. You'd have Fox News with their 1 denier (who is most likely trained in something completely different than climate, like econ ) debating 5000 climate scientists.
"A nation is a territory or country as political entity or a grouping of people who share real or imagined common history, culture, language or ethnic origin, often possessing or seeking its own government" --wiki article
I would care to bet that those immigrants who still strongly feel affiliated with their former country are also still strongly entrenched in their original cultural identify (religion, food, language, friends, most likely unchanged from former country). It isn't that way 100% of the time, but I'd bet it is 75%+.
Nationhood and culture are independent by definition, but in practice, often very intertwined.
I've read several books where 'kill switches' are discussed. It has been around in the nano-technology literature for a while now. However, it is not enough to just have the kill switch. You also need laws/treaties describing what is appropriate or not before the technology spreads, you need a replicating "police force" that can kill the other replicating organism if they don't behave, and you need monitors in place, some sort of artificially created "immune system" that can detect replication if it occurs out of our sight.
So I wouldn't say they are 'doing the right thing' if the only safe guard is a kill switch
""Wild camping" is not permitted, it's considered a form of squatting"
Can you pay for a permit to hike and camp in unmarked areas? Technically when hiking into remote wilderness in the US, you need to fill out a small form and sometimes a payment and drop it in a locked box that is usually located near the beginning of trail heads or in camping areas.
Those things certainly would help with transparency. Your assumption is that transparency will equal a more informed voter.
I would disagree with that assumption. As an example, full versions (works in progress) of the health care bill(s) are posted all over the internet. Yet the notions of 'death panels' was pretty much stated as fact on Fox News for weeks. Many relatives I know believed it. Yet it was 100% untrue.
The problem is not transparency. The information is there if the average citizen wants it. The problem is that the average citizen is either not going to take the time to review it, or is incapable of understanding it.
That means that a voter will still be getting their information from our current media machine, which is highly biased in favor of corporations (their main source of revenue), and under no obligation to tell the truth.
Many of the talking points that the news runs with, are generated by politicians, who are largely beholden to large corporations (who they get their donations from in various ways).
The truth is out there, right now, for anyone to see. It is the spin that matters, especially when dealing with our populace, who are by far, very low information voters.
We can solve this problem simply and easily. A person can donate as much money to any candidate they can vote for, otherwise it is strictly forbidden.
I'd also increase the number of House members to 1000, each state getting at least two, but they only serve six months (by lottery) at a time. And cut their pay in 1/2.
I'd also make sure that EVERYONE over 18 had to write a check out to the IRS, for some amount, say $25 (or so) "person" tax. The reason for this is because people who don't pay ANY taxes (now about 50% of the population) don't care about how government spends other people's money.
That wouldn't do squat. The problem is that it takes an incredible amount of money to win national campaigns, so the only voices that matter to politicians are very wealthy individuals or very big business. And the supreme court ruling allowing corporations (considered a person) to pay for as many advertisements about politicians or issues as they want (money to this court = speech and people have free speech), has effectively drowned out an averages citizen's ability to be heard.
Here is what commoncause.org says is important to reform: 1. Create a modern campaign finance system that enables federal candidates who swear off special interest money to run vigorous campaigns on a blend of small donor and public funds.
2. Ban lobbyists contributions, bundling and fundraising for federal candidates.
3. End internal fundraising quotas on Capitol Hill that essentially require members of Congress to buy their way into key committee posts and foster a corrosive dependence on K Street for cash.
4. Close loopholes that allow candidates to evade contribution limits by soliciting amounts up to 3,000 percent of those limits for “joint fundraising committees” and unlimited amounts for national party conventions.
5. Increase transparency by requiring electronic filing of campaign finance reports for the U.S. Senate (already in place for the House), and full disclosure of bundlers who raise, or help raise, $50,000 or more for congressional and presidential candidates.
6. Replace the moribund Federal Elections Commissions with a new nonpartisan enforcement agency.
I personally think it needs to go further. 1. Declare corporations as property, not persons. Re-enable rights needed for them to function as a secure business by expressly declaring them, not granting them personhood. 2. Expressly deny corporations from spending on any campaign issue or promoting any candidates. If the employees or members of the corporation want to ban together in their off time and combine their (small) individually allowed donations, or fund a commercial, go for it. 3. Limit the amount any citizen can donate to any candidate, and limit the amount any citizen can contribute to ads of a political nature. It must be small enough so that the average american has some weight. 4. Set up term limits for all members of congress. Maybe 12 or 16 years as a senator. I don't know the ideal length, but forever as it is now. 5. Expand libel and slander laws to include political bills/legislation and scientific ideas/theories. For instance, if Fox or MSNBC, or anyone for that matter, says something blatantly untrue, over and over, about a bill or theory, any group, or any person, can sue that organization or person for libel or slander. If a jury of their peers agree that what was said was damaging to society, malicious in intent, and easily proven false, then Fox or MSNBC are found guilty and have to pay damages to whatever group was affected. (I don't know if this is the best way to restore some level of truth in news and our society, but biased crappy reporting, made up scandals, and misinformation is at an all time high and getting progressively worse). 6. Open the doors to 3rd parties. Allow anyone who gains enough signatures to put themselves on the ballot for a race. Want to run for the senate as the flying spaghetti monster candidate?
This is exactly why End of Life Planning is very important. Make sure your doctor, friends, and family, know what you want done if you end up not being able to communicate your wishes after a tragedy.
Because of that, I can see a future where active monitoring/detection of system changes is going to become more important. Maybe even services that either log into your machine and look at file size, diff, etc.. or actually make requests of your website, mimicking every possible thing a user could do, and look for unintended outcomes (file automatically downloading, for instance.)
Saving lives is always a good thing, don't get me wrong. But I often wonder if 10 billion spent on infrastructure like irrigation, factories, schools, etc.. would save more lives in the long run for impoverished countries.
On one hand, if every 3rd person was dropping dead of an easily preventable disease in a country, it certainly wouldn't be a very stable society. Say you built schools, irrigation, factories, and then every other worker involved in them was sick. It just wouldn't work. The farms wouldn't produce, The factories would shut down, people would fear going to school and contracting something, etc.. On the other hand, education and birth control, infrastructure, etc.. will eventually allow a people to pull themselves up. If ever day is a constant struggle for survival, thinking long term (like building a road) is low on their priority list, and it just won't ever get done.
Perhaps there needs to be some regulation in place that dictates that aid must be spent equally between pure life saving and development of the interior? In the last decade, there have been several good books talking about why pure food aid in Africa, for instance, isn't very beneficial. It is only after seeing the results of multiple decades of food aid, that people are beginning to question pure life saving aid.
Morally, it is hard to say "some must die so that less may die next year", but it certainly doesn't seem like situations in impoverished countries are getting any better with the current model of aid.
Slashdot Mirror
"While youtube is nice for idling away some downtime, it's not the internet-dominating force this article makes out"
Completely not true. Hundreds of universities host content. Youtubes api's, transcribing, and other tools make building video sites around youtube streams easy. It is very expensive to host videos in house, Youtube makes it free, easy, and meets ADA needs.
Schools alone would be in serious upheaval if Youtube went down. And I'm sure that is just one slice of the pie.
The only way to prevent the abuse, short of taxing gross, would be to regulate at a very minute level, what can be spent on infrastructure, upgrades, etc.. that effectively makes many corporations profit zero each year.
Make 200 million in profit but invest it back into the business and it no longer is considered profit, but yet another cost of the business.
Even if that 'investment' is a big corporate jet for the execs.
I can't see any way to curtail that abuse except by taxing the gross and not the net. Can you?
"You obviously know nothing about business."
You obviously do not know how corporations abuse this.
Try a half million accounts.
Now deal with a stream of name changes. People get married and want their email changed.
People's accounts get guessed and spam flows out of them, major ISP blocks the school.
Even with clustered servers, there may be single points of failure further along the line (one time power went out, and our central upc failed to connect).
Most email software begins to become stressed in terms of access time once you reach a certain amount of accounts. You often need to modify default install scenarios to less commonly known setups to support greater than average number of user accounts. This requires either very experienced email admins or pricey support contracts with the software makers.
Integration with other systems, mobile devices, etc... is constantly being asked for, and constantly changing. Keeping the UI modern, mobile device support up to date, spam filtration accurate, is much easier for a company that specializes in it.
Just a few things that come to mind off the top of my head.
I'm a system analyst for a major community college network. Most of what you say is not true. Many of the privacy concerns have been ironed out with other schools, and if they aren't already reflected in Google's policies, schools can choose to negotiate additional things with Google (access to the bulk data, audits of account access, etc..). And being a leader like this, if it ever did get out that Google was reading sensitive research data (or anything for that matter), it would destroy their reputation. You'd have schools jumping ship left and right.
I'm not sure how large your school is, but we now have 600,000 accounts and rising. Keeping up with spam, people trying to hack accounts to send spam from us, backup and storage space and duration, etc etc, while still manageable, isn't simple. And lets face it, it is hard to give students cutting edge functionality when it isn't your primary business like it is for Google.
If we add up support contracts on storage arrays, the software and servers (mostly sun, sun java messaging), few staff for it, backup storage and media, etc.. it isn't a small amount.
And moving to an external email system like Google does not in any way prevent the more paranoid from either setting up their own email server, or encrypting their email, or any number of other options. If a school decides to send class information, instructor correspondences, billing information, or other official business, it in no way forces someone to only use that one account for all aspects of their life, it would just be official school emails.
About the only concern that schools have that have researched this, is down time. But looking at things objectively, Google's down time is pretty small, certainly not much more than our own internal down time. We also have other messaging systems (chat, forums, etc..) so its not like the world would grind to a halt:)
Well, it isn't just the interstate commerce section that gives Congress fairly broad powers. There is also the (16th?) amendment that says that Congress can tax things and use the money "to pay the debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States".
There are many different views of what 'general welfare' means. I don't have the time to look up court cases on it, but there have been several.
True. I should have said 'compared to the new movies, the old movies had less cgi' to be more accurate.
I bet if todays CGI were available back then, Lucas would have used it to the detriment of character interaction.
I don't know, I can still watch older star wars movies and enjoy them more than the newer ones. The older movies had less special effects and more character development. That works universally better than pure CGI.
Of course 12 year olds today are impressed with the pod racing. Its fun to watch. But I bet those 12 year olds are not going to be moved by the movies enough to watch them again at age 40.
The popular news media is not an outlet for dissemination of "science." This is appropriate...its audience has little interest in the tight details that are the realm of science.
The audience might not care to hear the details, but I think the audience would care to know the general truth about an issue.
Instead, the news media is a platform for dissemination of information and entertainment that, in so doing, provides sufficient gratification to its audience that they choose to come back for more. I would guess, for example, that though you make many remarks about Fox News, you probably watch very little of it. (And it's not clear to me that you distinguish the news part of Fox's programming from the opinion/commentary parts.)
I try to watch Fox every so often just to see whats being said. And if you take an honest look at Fox, the "news programming" side of their organization is very much intertwined in the opinion/commentary side. I've seen the news programming side say "some folks are saying X", when those folks who said it are the opinion shows that just aired!
So we should understand that putting a scientist in front of a camera and having him opine does not constitute the dissemination of scientific information; it constitutes the dissemination of a scientist's opinions. Effectively, the real science exists only in the form of the publications that constitute peer-reviewed research. Even the authors' remarks about their own papers stand outside the very critical borders of the peer-reviewed piece (that is presumed to have been produced through rigorous application of the scientific method).
No one would argue that the news is an appropriate place to disseminate scienctific detail. However, the news should certainly research enough to be able to paint a proper picture of the science it reports on. At least let the audience get a sense of what most scientists believe, instead of only airing the minority dissenter. It paints a picture that there is some 50/50 debate about whether climate change is even occuring! That is bad reporting.
The bias of the media is more insidious than you suggest. While bias is obviously reflected in the opinions of the people speaking to the cameras, it is less obviously reflected by the choices of which people to put in front of the cameras, end EVEN MORE INSIDIOUSLY, in the choices of which stories to cover. Science news is in very small part a production of scientists, and in large part, a production of news editorial boards and science reporters (neither of whom is likely to be a scientist).
Agreed. And it is getting worse. The news show '60 minutes' marked the downfall of unbiased reporting. It was the first time that the major networks realized that news was not a public service anymore, but rather, a money maker.
It is within this comfortable relationship between media outlet and audience that you want to see more what? Ahhh...yes...you want to see more bias toward what you believe. Oh. Wait. No. You want to see more bias toward "what science believes." No. Wait. You want more bias toward the "scientific consensus."
Bias towards the scientific consensus? Are you kidding me? The public deserves to know what level of evidence supports certain ideas. They don't have to know the details, but they should walk away from a news show with a sense of what is most likely the correct answer concerning an issue. That isn't bias, that is responsible reporting. Fox has clearly not provided a clear picture to its viewers concering the levels of evidence on either side of this completely fabricated debate.
Whatever it is that you want the media to put out, it isn't science. It's opinion. It's your opinion. And it's the opinion of many others. And you're just trying to help the "good guys" win.
You probably don't fly in airplanes do you? After all, it
Well, there are increasing accurate brain scans that can estimate the total calculations per second happening in the brain, as well as total neurons, total connection between neurons, etc..
So some of these "AI will be here in 20 years" are people saying that computer trends tell us that the computational equivalent of the human mind will be available in 20 years, at a cheap enough cost, that many researchers can have access to them.
There is lots of talk about after the hardware is sufficient, what comes next? Some people favor trying a complete simulation of the brain, as a biological thing, inside a computer. Others favor various programming approaches like neural networks / machine learning approaches. They assume that with enough calculations per second, storage, and input/output, that it will "just happen".
From the 4-5 pop.sci. books on AI that I've read, I think I'm favoring the complete brain simulation as the most likely to succeed. MRI, FMRI, and all sorts of newer more precise brain scanning techniques are being used, mapping and modeling the brain down to more and more precise tiny levels. I think once the scanning power is down near the molecular level, we'll be able to capture enough details about how the brain works when various input hits it, to model the brain in a virtual biological body inside a computer.
The drawback to the complete simulation based on scanned models, is that it is going to require a lot more computer power. So while 10-20 years will be the point at which we have the computational equivalent in terms of raw calculations per second of a human brain, it will probably be 20-40 before we have a couple orders of magnitude above a brains power, which will be required for a complete simulation.
Now before you say "Hey, he got that from Caprica", I can assure you I was thinking about this when Ray K. wrote the age of spiritual machines long ago! :)
Odd timing, I just bought a couple more books on AI this week.
Bottom line, AI will happen. Speculation on when isn't why I wanted to post though.
As I was reading one of the AI books, I got to thinking about my own job as a system analyst/programmer/integrator, etc.. When we start a new project, say, making software A feed software B user accounts, a whole host of factors must be discussed, as many of you all know. It takes me a while to map out requirements, design a overview of how the processing will work, and then get into mapping out the general logic of a program, and all of this happens based on communication with system owners, system users, other programmers, etc...
As I thought about AI, what popped into my mind, was that I probably wouldn't be coding once functional AI was developed. Rather, programmers and system analysts would most likely act as managers of the AI. I might have a team of 10 AI minds that I control. I'd need to talk with them, tell them about the new system, tell them what we want done, etc... and then they'd bang out a program or 10 variations in seconds, and we'd need to work together to test. I might not have been precise enough telling the AI's what we wanted, so I'd have to redefine my request, or say "oops, I didn't remember that such and such can happen once per year, we have to account for that now".
I'm not sure I'd enjoy managing 10 computers, each with personalities. Just imagine trying to find out if one was wasting cycles wget'ing slashdot all day:)
At least, thats how I envision the earlier phases of functional AI. It will most likely rather quickly spiral up in power as AI builds new AI.
I don't think you understood my point, or I did not convey it correctly.
To date, every questioner I have seen (who's voice is public enough to be heard), in the public eye (Fox News, major web presence, etc..), has been nearly a fanatical denier of climate change. It is like their mind is made up, and they are grasping to find one little flaw to explode with.
I have absolutely zero issues with people having full access to the code and complete transparency for even the unqualified to examine the data.
The problem is that in this politically charged environment, even if 10 people question data set X, and 9 find it is completely fine, Fox News or something similar is going to grab the 1 unqualified person who doesn't like data set X and let them talk for weeks.
Now, that is generally OK to let that one person talk, assuming they are somewhat respected in their field.
But if that 1 person who disagrees with data set X is refuted, Fox (just an example, happens all over) never retracts the damage that was done. And they certainly don't have on the other 9 questioners who can point out why the data set X is just fine.
No exactly sure why this was marked informative....
""It's time that we the People stop bowing to judges as if they were the ultimate authorities. They are not. The LAW is the ultimate authority""
The entire purpose of a judge is to interpret the law. Law, when applied to real world cases, is not black and white. It requires understanding preceding cases, the original intent of the law, perhaps being aware of other laws that influence that law, etc...
If you think it is so cut and dry that people should stop bowing to judges because the law is so very very clear, then please explain this sentence:
"Every person may speak, write, and publish sentiments on all subjects but shall be responsible for the abuse of that liberty"
Define abuse? In what way can speech be abused? We have libel and slander laws already, so what other ways can speech be abused? Is yelling fire in a crowded theatre abuse? Judges said yes a long time ago.
Is having sex with your partner on a playground full of children as a protest against X abuse? Most judges and communities would say yes.
Every single word in a law, and every single word in the constitution must be applied to a real world case, and a JUDGEMENT must be made whether the real world case meets the definitions of those words or not.
"'m a bit frustrated by the apparent contradiction. For the first time perhaps in history in the USA, you have armchair folks trying to do technical audits of scientific tools, research, and publications -- for free."
One of the problems I see, is that there hasn't been one single valid argument from the "deniers" or whatever you want to call the armchair folks. Every time the media and blog world latches on to some "gotcha" concerning climate change, it is shouted around the world 10 times, aired on Fox News for weeks, and the damage has been done: namely, public perception of climate change has been altered permanently. And yet, when I follow up on whatever the "gotcha" was, it is explained by numerous other blogs, sometimes the scientist himself, and eventually....usually:) ends up on the Jon Stewart show, making fun of the armchair deniers.
When attorneys go about jury selection, if those jurors have been exposed to aspects of the case, whether true or false aspects, the juror is dropped. I feel like climate change is on trial, and every time the attorneys start jury selection, the town they are in has a big media storm about the "client" "climate change", and all the jurors are tainted from exposure, so they have to move the trial to a new city.
There is a reason that science has peer review, and multiple people/teams constantly checking each others work. It is because 'armchair analysis' isn't skilled enough (or knowledgeable about the data set) to do it. And when you combine 'not skilled enough to do it' with some of the armchairs that have clear political motives, you end up with media storms based on bad information, yet directly influencing policy decision because of public perception.
It is really sad actually. I would normally favor more transparency, more eyes watching. But when it is obvious that we can't trust the media to double check sources, and check the credentials of their guests, or to take into account what the consensus is versus what one non-peer reviewed person is saying..... transparency in that case hurts the public more than it helps.
I think it would be amusing for a news show to actually have their guests debate, but the guest ratio would need to reflect the actual support for each side. You'd have Fox News with their 1 denier (who is most likely trained in something completely different than climate, like econ ) debating 5000 climate scientists.
"A nation is a territory or country as political entity or a grouping of people who share real or imagined common history, culture, language or ethnic origin, often possessing or seeking its own government" --wiki article
I would care to bet that those immigrants who still strongly feel affiliated with their former country are also still strongly entrenched in their original cultural identify (religion, food, language, friends, most likely unchanged from former country). It isn't that way 100% of the time, but I'd bet it is 75%+.
Nationhood and culture are independent by definition, but in practice, often very intertwined.
I've read several books where 'kill switches' are discussed. It has been around in the nano-technology literature for a while now. However, it is not enough to just have the kill switch. You also need laws/treaties describing what is appropriate or not before the technology spreads, you need a replicating "police force" that can kill the other replicating organism if they don't behave, and you need monitors in place, some sort of artificially created "immune system" that can detect replication if it occurs out of our sight.
So I wouldn't say they are 'doing the right thing' if the only safe guard is a kill switch
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/12/why-does-us-health-care-cost-so-much-part-iv-a-primer-on-medicare/
""Wild camping" is not permitted, it's considered a form of squatting"
Can you pay for a permit to hike and camp in unmarked areas? Technically when hiking into remote wilderness in the US, you need to fill out a small form and sometimes a payment and drop it in a locked box that is usually located near the beginning of trail heads or in camping areas.
Those things certainly would help with transparency. Your assumption is that transparency will equal a more informed voter.
I would disagree with that assumption. As an example, full versions (works in progress) of the health care bill(s) are posted all over the internet. Yet the notions of 'death panels' was pretty much stated as fact on Fox News for weeks. Many relatives I know believed it. Yet it was 100% untrue.
The problem is not transparency. The information is there if the average citizen wants it. The problem is that the average citizen is either not going to take the time to review it, or is incapable of understanding it.
That means that a voter will still be getting their information from our current media machine, which is highly biased in favor of corporations (their main source of revenue), and under no obligation to tell the truth.
Many of the talking points that the news runs with, are generated by politicians, who are largely beholden to large corporations (who they get their donations from in various ways).
The truth is out there, right now, for anyone to see. It is the spin that matters, especially when dealing with our populace, who are by far, very low information voters.
We can solve this problem simply and easily. A person can donate as much money to any candidate they can vote for, otherwise it is strictly forbidden.
I'd also increase the number of House members to 1000, each state getting at least two, but they only serve six months (by lottery) at a time. And cut their pay in 1/2.
I'd also make sure that EVERYONE over 18 had to write a check out to the IRS, for some amount, say $25 (or so) "person" tax. The reason for this is because people who don't pay ANY taxes (now about 50% of the population) don't care about how government spends other people's money.
That wouldn't do squat. The problem is that it takes an incredible amount of money to win national campaigns, so the only voices that matter to politicians are very wealthy individuals or very big business. And the supreme court ruling allowing corporations (considered a person) to pay for as many advertisements about politicians or issues as they want (money to this court = speech and people have free speech), has effectively drowned out an averages citizen's ability to be heard.
Here is what commoncause.org says is important to reform:
1. Create a modern campaign finance system that enables federal candidates who swear off special interest money to run vigorous campaigns on a blend of small donor and public funds.
2. Ban lobbyists contributions, bundling and fundraising for federal candidates.
3. End internal fundraising quotas on Capitol Hill that essentially require members of Congress to buy their way into key committee posts and foster a corrosive dependence on K Street for cash.
4. Close loopholes that allow candidates to evade contribution limits by soliciting amounts up to 3,000 percent of those limits for “joint fundraising committees” and unlimited amounts for national party conventions.
5. Increase transparency by requiring electronic filing of campaign finance reports for the U.S. Senate (already in place for the House), and full disclosure of bundlers who raise, or help raise, $50,000 or more for congressional and presidential candidates.
6. Replace the moribund Federal Elections Commissions with a new nonpartisan enforcement agency.
I personally think it needs to go further.
1. Declare corporations as property, not persons. Re-enable rights needed for them to function as a secure business by expressly declaring them, not granting them personhood.
2. Expressly deny corporations from spending on any campaign issue or promoting any candidates. If the employees or members of the corporation want to ban together in their off time and combine their (small) individually allowed donations, or fund a commercial, go for it.
3. Limit the amount any citizen can donate to any candidate, and limit the amount any citizen can contribute to ads of a political nature. It must be small enough so that the average american has some weight.
4. Set up term limits for all members of congress. Maybe 12 or 16 years as a senator. I don't know the ideal length, but forever as it is now.
5. Expand libel and slander laws to include political bills/legislation and scientific ideas/theories. For instance, if Fox or MSNBC, or anyone for that matter, says something blatantly untrue, over and over, about a bill or theory, any group, or any person, can sue that organization or person for libel or slander. If a jury of their peers agree that what was said was damaging to society, malicious in intent, and easily proven false, then Fox or MSNBC are found guilty and have to pay damages to whatever group was affected. (I don't know if this is the best way to restore some level of truth in news and our society, but biased crappy reporting, made up scandals, and misinformation is at an all time high and getting progressively worse).
6. Open the doors to 3rd parties. Allow anyone who gains enough signatures to put themselves on the ballot for a race. Want to run for the senate as the flying spaghetti monster candidate?
This is exactly why End of Life Planning is very important. Make sure your doctor, friends, and family, know what you want done if you end up not being able to communicate your wishes after a tragedy.
I use no-script in chrome and it didn't stop it. Auto-downloaded some dubious exe.
"We're outgunned and outnumbered."
Because of that, I can see a future where active monitoring/detection of system changes is going to become more important. Maybe even services that either log into your machine and look at file size, diff, etc.. or actually make requests of your website, mimicking every possible thing a user could do, and look for unintended outcomes (file automatically downloading, for instance.)
http://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-759580.html
Saving lives is always a good thing, don't get me wrong. But I often wonder if 10 billion spent on infrastructure like irrigation, factories, schools, etc.. would save more lives in the long run for impoverished countries.
On one hand, if every 3rd person was dropping dead of an easily preventable disease in a country, it certainly wouldn't be a very stable society. Say you built schools, irrigation, factories, and then every other worker involved in them was sick. It just wouldn't work. The farms wouldn't produce, The factories would shut down, people would fear going to school and contracting something, etc..
On the other hand, education and birth control, infrastructure, etc.. will eventually allow a people to pull themselves up. If ever day is a constant struggle for survival, thinking long term (like building a road) is low on their priority list, and it just won't ever get done.
Perhaps there needs to be some regulation in place that dictates that aid must be spent equally between pure life saving and development of the interior? In the last decade, there have been several good books talking about why pure food aid in Africa, for instance, isn't very beneficial. It is only after seeing the results of multiple decades of food aid, that people are beginning to question pure life saving aid.
Morally, it is hard to say "some must die so that less may die next year", but it certainly doesn't seem like situations in impoverished countries are getting any better with the current model of aid.