Bacteria are constantly self-replicating and evolving, and we're not running around screaming at the possibility _they're_ going to take over.
They already have. There are many, many more bacteria than people, and a fair number of them have decided to rid the world of us. How many people die each year because of bacteria? How many more will?
No, but the two don't go hand in hand. Moreover, self-awareness is potential for awareness of others (ie empathy). This is not to say the two always go hand in hand, just that they can.
Self-awareness isn't dispositive of fascism.
It wouldn't...but it isn't true. Intelligence does not measure synaptic activity at all; it measures problem-solving ability (and things like that). In order to solve problems, you must be ready to try new things. In order to do that, you must have some form of creativity.
And, finally, note that many dictators are crazy. So to say that the normal course of intelligence is to produce fascists might be a bit of a stretch.
There are already robots more intelligent than many household pets.
Not really...they just are good at the traits of animal behavior we normally associate with intelligence. But in terms of processing power, or usually even learning, we are far behind.
But, to the point: the difficulty with robots will be that once we have intelligent robots, we could (probably) make anything on a continuum between them and toasters. The first deserve rights, the last don't, and we will have to try to draw lines...
Actually, the same applies to some animals, which are advanced enough that they could be explained concepts like liberty (see experiments with dolphins, chimps).
Pretty good parallel, but this is too thick a blanket. There is the general assumption here that robots wouldn't have any feelings. Well, of course right now, they don't.
But wouldn't that change if the robots were intelligent? To be intelligent, they need to be self-aware and creative; I think that compassion might follow from these easily enough.
It's very good that they have a working motor, but how are they planning to steer these sorts of things? You could just make a whole bunch (easy enough) and let them spread, but then they don't need to be self-propelling.
First of all, this sort of thing can and does happen in countries which have that right. Every now and then/. posts a story about something like this happening in Europe, and then all sorts of American patriots start shouting, "see how pathetic such-and-such a system is?" But most similar stories on/. take place in America itself.
Honestly, how do you think it would help if every German household had a few guns in it? Maybe we could have the great cd-rw revolution, where every good German grabs his rifle and shoots people until this awful law are repealed? That's both implausible and medicine-worse-than-cure.
I'm sure there are plenty of whetting stones to grind your axe on. Keep it off things where it doesn't belong.
Re:Crippled for a reason
on
Golden Rice
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· Score: 1
What about spontaneous mutations? You thought about that? The plant doesn't want the new gene...
I think we should listen to the talking plant, it sounds pretty smart. I mean, when was the last time you could say which of your genes were good and which were bad?
Seriously, we have a very good idea of how cells produce things. We've had bacteria making extra compounds for a long time, they help produce antibiotics. The concern is how people and ecosystems will respond...
It's a little unnerving that most of the concern is from people who don't understand the issues. It means any real problems there might be are hidden under a thick layer of phobias. And lives are on the line.
Re:GM food is not a good idea yet
on
Golden Rice
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· Score: 1
In general, high survival rates come with low birth rates. But of course this is because they generally come with a high standard of living. And there is this unfortunate lag between when death rates drop and when birth rates do...
Almost all of the interest is that life might possibly have originated someplace other than Earth. The fact that some bacteria made it up into orbit (where they *guaranteed* would evolve, if they reproduced at all - what do you think bacteria do with their time?) isn't nearly so interesting...although still pretty cool...
This is part of a sort of backlash against intellectualism. Another good example is alternative medicine in places where conventional medicine works just fine. I'm not entirely sure why this is (and in fact it might be a selection effect), but I can see how the trends in degrees might be a reflection of this as well.
Hey, a full circle! That can be my accomplishment for today.
Just for something to do, why not type something like "two" into a search engine? Trials like that should give you a rough idea of how much of the internet is what.
A lot of people have been commenting about the fourth dimension being time. I think it is worth clearing this up.
First, dimensions don't have a specific ordering. Time is, according to relativity, one dimension, and space gives us three more. You are welcome to mix them up, that's the Lorentz transform (stationary -> moving frame).
Time is a little different from space, though. Spacetime is hyperbolic, not Euclidean, since time has a different metric sig (or if you prefer, is represented by imaginary rather than real coordinates). Also, if we believe in causality it is one way.
When people say n-D, they are usually referring to a Euclidean space, so spacetime doesn't work. Of course you are welcome to pick any n dimensions you want. In the maze the dimensions are quantized, so the four dimensions are easy to choose - the coordinates of the board and on the board!
Infant mortality rates, average lifespan, casualties of disease and injury. I think the argument that information is evil is neglecting a couple of things.
By the way, information is also a great way to help stop tyranny. You mention the printing press engulfed Europe in the thirty years war through protestantism, but what was protestantism a response to? At the time, the catholic church was fairly corrupt, and I think it is ridiculous to claim the best solution would have been to be ignorant of the problems. Someone has already mentioned the nazis as another (good) example.
Information changes what problems you are dealing with. To look only at the new ones, and ignore the old ones, is popular but an unfair treatment.
Personally I would be surprised if you could fine many single-celled organisms that were nearly as complex as the neurons.
Not really on topic, but...
We usually think of them as protoplasmic blobs, but single-celled organisms are exceedingly complex. Remember, they do as much as many multicellular organisms! The outstanding examples are the ciliates, which have such wonderful abilities as coordinating thousands of cilia ('hairs' for swimming), have a distinct mouth and sort-of digestive tract, and are able to find food and mates.
A fair match for any cell in a multicellular organism. Remember, by and large those things don't have to feed themselves or move about!
Any half-decent introduction to Science would have told him that Science is not a search for "the ultimate truth" -- that dodo is in the realm of philosophy.
I think very few people would be interested in theoretical physics, for instance, if they didn't think it helped them understand ultimate truth. What sets science apart is it restricts itself to the observable world, and understands that our knowledge of truth is always subject to revision.
Which is pretty impressive, I might add. The story is interesting, but there's not much to comment on the citius, altius, fortius of stars. Most people have just been making lame jokes, and I think anything else deserves applause.
We are trying to discuss POKEY THE PENGUIN!!! Please do not dilute the conversation with topics so boring and unimportant as the fate of superpowers. It's Nutty industries that gives the ocean its distinctive color and odor.
Since it assumes that the power each individual voter has over the decision is the measure of democracy. In fact, it is a mathematical argument that this is not the case.
Democracy is about the rule of the majority. The argument goes that with an electoral college, there will be a higher chance of deadlock, allowing some particular Joe to push the balance. But giving the decision to Joe in the case that there was a majority vote is not democracy.
Fine mathematics with incorrect premises gets you nowhere.
In that case, though, all someone would need to do is scan and upload copyright materials, and presto! they are free. This could be somewhat difficult to people who rely on copyrights to protect their income-generating works.
If copyrights are no good, they should be gotten rid of; if not, kept. But an impotent half-implemented copyright system merely would inconvenience everyone.
Mathworld is in a different boat, since it was a webpage long before there was a hardcopy.
So while talking about discovering Higgs particle we actually mean discovering Higgs boson field.
Remember, though, that in the mathematics of quantum mechanics particles and fields are the same thing. Photons are quanta of the electromagnetic field, electrons are quanta of the electron field. And Higgs particles are simply quanta of the Higgs field.
At the time, the British had no problem with boarding the vessels of other soverign nations and pulling off whoever they felt like on the grounds that they *might* be deserters.
But that was far more a pretense than a cause. As I said, it was hardly the mideastern states (the ones who actually were involved in shipping) that were pro-war, and the British had actually announced they would drop the boarding policy before the war started. The main reason for the war was manifest destiny.
And as for the British being "stupid enough" to get involved on the continent again...who do you think owned Canada? The British were coming to defend one of their colonies, and were completely succesful. It was the later counter-attack that failed.
And, finally, the Americans didn't accomplish anything with the war of 1812. The ending of the boarding policy had already been offered, and the whole matter had more to do with the rise and fall of Napoleon then it did with the sideshow war in North America.
Calling this war an American defense is ridiculous. I wouldn't even call the war an American victory - Britain, after all, succesfully repelled the American attack, and only failed to reduce the enemy territory.
The war of 1812 is hardly a defense of American freedoms, since they were the aggressors. The pretense was the continental policy, but since the main shipping states were actually against the war, it's clear enough they were looking for territory.
America attacked, and got repelled. Then Britain attacked, but retreated after its navy was defeated. A peace treaty was signed, and then the battle of New Orleans happened.
Remember, though, that this was caused by the Athenian democracy after it had suffered through the Peloponesian war and the Spartan oligarchy. Even during the war, things were well enough that Aristophanes could freely critique the government.
And remember that Socrates was an outspoken critic of democracy; two of his close friends ended up being involved in the thirty tyrants. Even though he himself was loyal, it is hard to acquit him of corrupting his peers...
And finally, remember that the jury chose between the sentence of the prosecutor and the defendant. Had Socrates chose exile, he would have received it. Instead he suggested an insulting fine.
Socrates' execution is a tragedy, but it is hard to blame the Athenians for what happened.
The western European countries developed into nation-states towards the end of the Middle ages (with the notable exceptions of Germany and Italy). The concept of nation-state did not extend throughout the rest of the world until the 20th century, but clearly Europe had an impact disproportionate to its size.
Slashdot Mirror
They already have. There are many, many more bacteria than people, and a fair number of them have decided to rid the world of us. How many people die each year because of bacteria? How many more will?
No, but the two don't go hand in hand. Moreover, self-awareness is potential for awareness of others (ie empathy). This is not to say the two always go hand in hand, just that they can.
Self-awareness isn't dispositive of fascism.
It wouldn't...but it isn't true. Intelligence does not measure synaptic activity at all; it measures problem-solving ability (and things like that). In order to solve problems, you must be ready to try new things. In order to do that, you must have some form of creativity.
And, finally, note that many dictators are crazy. So to say that the normal course of intelligence is to produce fascists might be a bit of a stretch.
Usual way - something that sort of involves things like learning, creativity, self-awareness, reasoning, and stuff kind of like that.
Not really...they just are good at the traits of animal behavior we normally associate with intelligence. But in terms of processing power, or usually even learning, we are far behind.
But, to the point: the difficulty with robots will be that once we have intelligent robots, we could (probably) make anything on a continuum between them and toasters. The first deserve rights, the last don't, and we will have to try to draw lines...
Actually, the same applies to some animals, which are advanced enough that they could be explained concepts like liberty (see experiments with dolphins, chimps).
Pretty good parallel, but this is too thick a blanket. There is the general assumption here that robots wouldn't have any feelings. Well, of course right now, they don't.
But wouldn't that change if the robots were intelligent? To be intelligent, they need to be self-aware and creative; I think that compassion might follow from these easily enough.
It's very good that they have a working motor, but how are they planning to steer these sorts of things? You could just make a whole bunch (easy enough) and let them spread, but then they don't need to be self-propelling.
Honestly, how do you think it would help if every German household had a few guns in it? Maybe we could have the great cd-rw revolution, where every good German grabs his rifle and shoots people until this awful law are repealed? That's both implausible and medicine-worse-than-cure.
I'm sure there are plenty of whetting stones to grind your axe on. Keep it off things where it doesn't belong.
I think we should listen to the talking plant, it sounds pretty smart. I mean, when was the last time you could say which of your genes were good and which were bad?
Seriously, we have a very good idea of how cells produce things. We've had bacteria making extra compounds for a long time, they help produce antibiotics. The concern is how people and ecosystems will respond...
It's a little unnerving that most of the concern is from people who don't understand the issues. It means any real problems there might be are hidden under a thick layer of phobias. And lives are on the line.
In general, high survival rates come with low birth rates. But of course this is because they generally come with a high standard of living. And there is this unfortunate lag between when death rates drop and when birth rates do...
Almost all of the interest is that life might possibly have originated someplace other than Earth. The fact that some bacteria made it up into orbit (where they *guaranteed* would evolve, if they reproduced at all - what do you think bacteria do with their time?) isn't nearly so interesting...although still pretty cool...
Hey, a full circle! That can be my accomplishment for today.
Just for something to do, why not type something like "two" into a search engine? Trials like that should give you a rough idea of how much of the internet is what.
First, dimensions don't have a specific ordering. Time is, according to relativity, one dimension, and space gives us three more. You are welcome to mix them up, that's the Lorentz transform (stationary -> moving frame).
Time is a little different from space, though. Spacetime is hyperbolic, not Euclidean, since time has a different metric sig (or if you prefer, is represented by imaginary rather than real coordinates). Also, if we believe in causality it is one way.
When people say n-D, they are usually referring to a Euclidean space, so spacetime doesn't work. Of course you are welcome to pick any n dimensions you want. In the maze the dimensions are quantized, so the four dimensions are easy to choose - the coordinates of the board and on the board!
By the way, information is also a great way to help stop tyranny. You mention the printing press engulfed Europe in the thirty years war through protestantism, but what was protestantism a response to? At the time, the catholic church was fairly corrupt, and I think it is ridiculous to claim the best solution would have been to be ignorant of the problems. Someone has already mentioned the nazis as another (good) example.
Information changes what problems you are dealing with. To look only at the new ones, and ignore the old ones, is popular but an unfair treatment.
Not really on topic, but...
We usually think of them as protoplasmic blobs, but single-celled organisms are exceedingly complex. Remember, they do as much as many multicellular organisms! The outstanding examples are the ciliates, which have such wonderful abilities as coordinating thousands of cilia ('hairs' for swimming), have a distinct mouth and sort-of digestive tract, and are able to find food and mates.
A fair match for any cell in a multicellular organism. Remember, by and large those things don't have to feed themselves or move about!
I think very few people would be interested in theoretical physics, for instance, if they didn't think it helped them understand ultimate truth. What sets science apart is it restricts itself to the observable world, and understands that our knowledge of truth is always subject to revision.
Which is pretty impressive, I might add. The story is interesting, but there's not much to comment on the citius, altius, fortius of stars. Most people have just been making lame jokes, and I think anything else deserves applause.
We are trying to discuss POKEY THE PENGUIN!!! Please do not dilute the conversation with topics so boring and unimportant as the fate of superpowers. It's Nutty industries that gives the ocean its distinctive color and odor.
Democracy is about the rule of the majority. The argument goes that with an electoral college, there will be a higher chance of deadlock, allowing some particular Joe to push the balance. But giving the decision to Joe in the case that there was a majority vote is not democracy.
Fine mathematics with incorrect premises gets you nowhere.
If copyrights are no good, they should be gotten rid of; if not, kept. But an impotent half-implemented copyright system merely would inconvenience everyone.
Mathworld is in a different boat, since it was a webpage long before there was a hardcopy.
So while talking about discovering Higgs particle we actually mean discovering Higgs boson field.
Remember, though, that in the mathematics of quantum mechanics particles and fields are the same thing. Photons are quanta of the electromagnetic field, electrons are quanta of the electron field. And Higgs particles are simply quanta of the Higgs field.
At the time, the British had no problem with boarding the vessels of other soverign nations and pulling off whoever they felt like on the grounds that they *might* be deserters.
But that was far more a pretense than a cause. As I said, it was hardly the mideastern states (the ones who actually were involved in shipping) that were pro-war, and the British had actually announced they would drop the boarding policy before the war started. The main reason for the war was manifest destiny.
And as for the British being "stupid enough" to get involved on the continent again...who do you think owned Canada? The British were coming to defend one of their colonies, and were completely succesful. It was the later counter-attack that failed.
And, finally, the Americans didn't accomplish anything with the war of 1812. The ending of the boarding policy had already been offered, and the whole matter had more to do with the rise and fall of Napoleon then it did with the sideshow war in North America.
Calling this war an American defense is ridiculous. I wouldn't even call the war an American victory - Britain, after all, succesfully repelled the American attack, and only failed to reduce the enemy territory.
The war of 1812 is hardly a defense of American freedoms, since they were the aggressors. The pretense was the continental policy, but since the main shipping states were actually against the war, it's clear enough they were looking for territory.
America attacked, and got repelled. Then Britain attacked, but retreated after its navy was defeated. A peace treaty was signed, and then the battle of New Orleans happened.
Great defense!
Remember, though, that this was caused by the Athenian democracy after it had suffered through the Peloponesian war and the Spartan oligarchy. Even during the war, things were well enough that Aristophanes could freely critique the government.
And remember that Socrates was an outspoken critic of democracy; two of his close friends ended up being involved in the thirty tyrants. Even though he himself was loyal, it is hard to acquit him of corrupting his peers...
And finally, remember that the jury chose between the sentence of the prosecutor and the defendant. Had Socrates chose exile, he would have received it. Instead he suggested an insulting fine.
Socrates' execution is a tragedy, but it is hard to blame the Athenians for what happened.
The western European countries developed into nation-states towards the end of the Middle ages (with the notable exceptions of Germany and Italy). The concept of nation-state did not extend throughout the rest of the world until the 20th century, but clearly Europe had an impact disproportionate to its size.