Back when I started on at the current job, I had the company buy a copy of the UNIX CD Bookshelf... not because I needed it, but hey, they were willing, and I get a free book.
Overall, I find the HTML format to be wonderfully indexed and cross-referenced, and, as mentioned, the search engine is a flaming pile of crap. It's accurate, but obscures the sought-after data by not jumping directly to the location in a page. The O'Reilly Bookshelves are useful -- a bunch of good books for about $70, on CD, cross-platform... but there are limitations. I'd honestly rather have the books...
Re:What anthropologists say when they don't know
on
Pillars Underwater
·
· Score: 5
"Religious significance" may be what "television anthropologists" cite, but speaking as an Anthropologist of sorts, I'd have to say that it's not always the best explanation for things.
My sister-in-law studied anthro and archeology for about eight years, and she had an interesting story to tell along these lines a few weeks ago -- one of those things that she picked up in college... some of the students at her University had chosen to move into a primitive pseudo-Celtic settlement, in an attempt to study the effect of so-called primitive living on health.
When the research crew came in several months later to quietly observe the "Celts," they discovered a phenomena that had been found in excavations of true Celt villages -- shallow indentations in the floor just inside and to the sides of the doorways. This had always been attributed to unknown religious tradition -- the old standby of previously unexplained phenomena. When they asked one of the "Celts" what the significance was, assuming they were offering pits, or some such, the response rather shocked the researchers:
The "Celt" said, "Oh, that's nothing... every time it rains, the chickens come into the [hut], walk a little way out of the doorway, and flap their wings against the ground for a bit to knock the water off."
Beside, Zeitgeist means spirit of the age, not what they said.
Well, technically, the "general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era" is the "spirit of the age." The only difference is that of terminology and the prevalence of people using terms such as "zeitgeist" to lay claim to membership in some elitist intelligencia, beyond academia into the professional world.
I don't think the name of a piece of software necessarily has to describe it's function. As a piece of software becomes more popular, if it has an original name, that name will become synonymous with the software's function. Take the Gimp as an example;
Umm, the GNU Image Manipulation Program? The name does describe the function. A better example, perhaps, would be something like Slashdot itself. Slashdot is essentially a product (in a loose sense of the term) and the "product" name gives no sense of the utility of said product.
Can you even guess at how many outdated, dilapidated, and otherwise useless systems are kept in place just to be able to do DOD contracting? Hell, defence contracting is the only reason Ada exist today.
While I agree with the sentiment about Ada, I feel it necessary to interject that many European coders are Ada programmers. Ada is also used in the development of non-DoD vital systems.
The problem, at its root, is that in the eye of the general public the Internet is the Web. The part of the web known to the tech-literate does not exist to the general populace... how are they to know that download link number 14 actually points to FTP? The Internet isn't the world wide web. The Web is like a multimedia phone book for the internet, though... you can find just about anything.
There's no real way to track all of the clicks... and even if there were, it's immaterial. I spent 30 minutes reclicking buttons last night on my PC in the home office, trying to get the correct download of some code for which I'd been searching.
And fsck the RIAA and Napster. I used to download my MP3s off of private ftp servers. I still do. No change. No problem.
Stupid admin errors happen both on NT and UNIX - they're not a feature of the OS.
Damn right they're not. The phrases "End-User Error" and "PEBKAC:Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair" both exist for a reason. Computers, properly built, are infallible -- they do exactly what they're told (forgetting manufacturing defects and hardware faults). We the people, the coders, the software developers, are the ones who introduce failings into the machines. OTOH, a computer without software is just a boat anchor.
I don't know about the Alexander Technique, but I know that full-body, life-changing solutions are the only real solutions for some of us. Take my case, as an example: I suffer from a bone disease called Fibrous Displasia. Considering that it has taken root in the ball of my right femor, just outside the hip socket, this causes me some amount of difficulty, walking, and has for at least a decade. Now, eight years ago, I had experimental surgery which seemd to patch the problem with the displasia, but then this past summer I was diagnosed with arthritis in the hip socket. It seems that many years of walking with a slight limp and slightly favoring my right leg in all exercises has worn away the cartilege in the hip socket.
For me, it's too late to start walking correctly and fix the problem -- all I can do is start walking correctly and perhaps hold the degradation of my cartilege off for a while yet.
Guess what, though? The side effect of having walked with a limp for a decade is that the musculature of my back has hypertrophied in odd manners, and now, sitting still, or sitting incorrectly for long periods (as when coding, or gaming) leads to a sharp pain in my lower left back. the solution? A strict exercise regimine. The problem? I have to be very, very careful as to what exercises I choose, so as not to aggravate my arthritis.
When you look for a solution to one pain, be careful, and look to your whole body. You don't want to end up in my situation, where a solution for one part is a hindrance to another. I'm currently undergoing a exercise routine that will eventually either annihilate my bad hip, or repair a lot of the damage that has been done to the rest of my body. It's a crap shoot, and the Powers That Be use loaded dice.
(B) Why does Slashdot need to post "responsible news for nerds" or present anything in a "grown-up manner?" If I want dry, humourless news, I read the newspaper. If I want dry, humourless, tech news, I read the tech news at the New York Times. If I want to read about new root exploits, reviews of books that only geeks would read, and other dork-related drivel, I go to/., and well I should. You don't pay for it, so don't bitch about content. Just don't read the stories that are "inane."
As for accuracy, hype, and misinformation? This is the `net, pal. Read at your own risk.
They grumble, and adapt. I'm forced to use Lotus Notes for internal mail -- and internal databases -- and it's heinous, but the job is good, otherwise. We don't like Notes, and we bitch about it incessantly, but it hasn't gotten us qmail with IMAP ability yet, and it's not going to earn us that, either. Infrastructure operates under Newton's Law of Inertia, and the body is at rest.
How about an alternate approaches to patents? Since DNA and arguably all other "inventions" existed in nature and were discovered rather than invented, why don't we instead treat them as a public asset and auction them off to the highest bidder?
There is another approach: that these "inventions" and discoveries did not exist before mankind named them. Without an internal symbol for a Thing, it has no recognition, and no identity -- we cannot recognise it.
Take for example the laws of aerodynamics, and such scientific principles as Bernoulli's. Just because Bernoulli's principle held before it was named, classified, and expanded, it did not exist... the conditions which predicate the principle had not been observed.
DNA did not exist before it was discovered. Bacteria did not exist until it was discovered.
So some would say.
Re:There is use for a table in zero-gravity ?
on
Home Improvement
·
· Score: 1
Habit.
Okay, not habit, but inertia. They set it on the table. They're careful not to breathe at it. It stays where it was put, mostly because Newton's laws of inertia hold for the frame of reference.
Velcro would help, too, but I'm guessing they don't have a lot of that to spare.
In your ideal world, it may be the case that you can get away with a paper-free workplace. However, if I handed a disk to the guy who signs my paychecks instead of a printed report, he'd hand me a pink slip instead of a pay check.
Not to mention the fact that algorithm design and complexity analysis are direct applications of high-level mathematical logic to the Science of Computing. Every computer scientist should have a firm mathematical background, if for no other reason than the basis of the field upon the shoulders of centuries of academic mathematics.
Note that I see a strong separation between the titles of Computer Scientist, Computer Engineer, and Software Engineer. Many software engineers can get by with a minimal knowledge of mathematics. Fewer computer engineers can do so. And fewer still computer scientists can do so... computer science is the theoretical application of mathematics to the problems of computing, not the design of some new killer app. That's software engineering.
But, then, I'm biased. I have bachelor's degrees in both maths and computer science, concentrating on the theory of computation and number theory. It should be no surprise that I push a mathematical outlook on my colleagues.
There is no way to short-circut the "years of hard work" involved in understanding higher-level mathematics. I know it's the holy grail of CS geeks everywhere to streamline the hard work of understanding proofs, but mathematical decompilation is not the answer.
I disagree, strongly. Mathematical proof comes down to three things: knowing definitions, the ability to think laterally, and a compositional style which is both terse and precise. This was driven into my skull by constant repetition by my advisor at University, while I was working on my maths degree. Learn the definitions. Memorise them! That's ninety percent of the work. The remaining ten percent can be split evenly by the acquisition of precise compositional style and by the ability to recognise the application of definitions -- this being the lateral thinking I mentioned above.
Claiming that writing and understanding mathematical proofs is hard is absurd. It's fantastically easy to write and understand proofs. The difficulty lies in making the lateral cognitive leap from some postulate to a theory dealing with the postulate. The style required to write proofs can be taught quickly, likely in a matter of hours. Learning the definitions can take a lifetime -- if this MetaMath project provides a bottom-up breakdown of mathematical axioms, theories, laws, and maxims, then it serves as a valuable aid. I know that such a tome, electronic or not, would be irreplaceable in my collection... not to mention replacing a shelf full of bright yellow maths texts.
Of course, we could try something like really implementing some serious social welfare programs to help raise some of these poorer kids out of the squalid neighborhoods that we always identify with the drug problem. Hell, we could siphon the money off of the rich white families in upper class suburbs whos kids are into the exact same stuff. Perhaps elimating the rediculously privilaged and the rediculously underprivilaed would contribute to removing this problem. But then, there's no defence contracts or military bases in that plan to make the politicians popular, rich, and powerfull.
This is half the problem, honestly -- the stereotype used as sarcasm at the beginning of this paragraph shows the true nature of the "War on Drugs." There is no war against Drugs. There is, however, a War on Class. A very large percentage of my current social group uses or abuses some form of drug... and all of us are middle-class white Americans. Sure, some live in the ghetto... college kids live where rent is cheap. Others, like myself, live in the higher-rent suburbs, because we have good, solid, and most importantly well-paying tech jobs. None of us waited until we were established in these settings to start using... the easiest place in this town to get drugs, by the way, is one of the local private universities, where - not surprisingly - the majority of students come from middle or upper class backgrounds.
So what am I ranting about? These aren't the people who get arrested. The people who are arrested en masse are the dealers and users of the slums, those who exist as a portion of the lower class, or even the Underclass -- those who exist off the public dole or completely off the public record. To see this, as well, look at the average jail terms and demographics for two drugs in particular: cocaine, and crack. Cocaine is more pure, more expensive, and generally a drug-of-choice to the upper classes... it's generally too expensive for members of the underclass. However, crack, a cocaine derivative, is dirt cheap -- which makes it attractive as a commodity to sell in the low-income areas of our cities. The last time I checked, the ratio between average jail terms for possession of crack and possession of cocaine was close to 5:1.
Maybe it's left-wing radical propaganda... but maybe it's worth investigation, too. Please don't just believe me. Do the research on your own. My facts might not be exacting... I've not watched this for a while now.
In 1908, an asteroid exploded in Siberia, flattening trees over 400 square miles.
Unless I miss my guess, the explosion referenced here was the incident of 30 June 1908, when something exploded 8 km above the river Stony Tunguska in Siberia. Unfortunately, the jury is still out on the actual cause of that blast. It could have been a comet, asteroid, or meteorite... but the off-beat theories may equally be valid -- that it was a rift in space-time, that a massive explosion in nearby dimensions tripped into this one, etc.
Just because they're wacky doesn't mean they're wrong.
Along the same lines, GM recently issued a recall on something like 6000 of their 2002 model-year SUVs. I foresee that the 2007 model-year vehicles/software/everything will be shipped in 2005.
I can see only limited necessity for such access. Okay, yes, it would mean you could take your laptop to the park so that while you're out exercising and enjoying some sunshine, you can keep up your constant reloading of slashdot. While on the train to work, you can check your email because something mission-critical might come across the wire in those 30 minutes, and that the principals wouldn't call you on your cell phone. Houses wouldn't need to have another signal running along the phone or cable to provide internet service.
I just don't get it. Maybe I'm burnt out, because I just don't see the need to have internet access everywhere I go. I don't have a PC with me everywhere I go, and I don't want one. Hells, I'm starting to need a knapsack to cart around the gadgetry I already carry: my knives, leatherman, leatherman adaptor, cell phone, PDA, pager, etc. When I'm not at home, or at work, I'm not concerned with what the latest news might be. It can wait until I go home. I'm not worried about whether Jim Otheruser got my email.
I'm not saying it's useless... wireless connectivity could provide great onboard mapping for vehicles, could aid in CBTC, and help other mobility-required systems stay hot. I just don't see much need for it as a utility for personal consumption and use.
Unfortunately, however, I feel there is a predisposition in the medical research industry to focus on those diseases which the aging, affluent baby boomers will contract; baldness, impotence, type II diabetes, heart problems, osteoporosis, etc.
There's another disease that this will aid that is an issue for people of all ages and of all classes... arthritis. Why does this impact me? Because I'm 22 years old and my doctors want to give me a hip replacement well before I'm 30. Arthritis is no respector of class, age, income, or generation... nearly all people develop it as they age, and many develop it as children.
Also, though not so much treatable, the diseases you list, IIRC, are generally preventable. Simply designing scientific cures for these diseases is not enough: half the problem of "less developed" countries is that there is no health infrastructure, and the masses have no access to the treatments. Much as hunger, disease in the third world is a side-effect of politics. If we want to combat illness in the third world, we must combat the methods by which the medicines are disseminated to the people.
Because the social impact of technology is often more important than the introduction of the new technology itself. For instance, it might be phenomenally exciting to the scientific and technological communities that new algorithms for compression are written, and that new, stronger crypto is possible, but to the "unwashed masses," what it all comes down to is that they can download larger amounts of crap in shorter times, and their credit cards aren't getting ripped off so frequently. Notice, some time, the prevalence of slashdot sigs that state some variant on the following: "Too often scientists are concerned with the fact that they can, rather than the question of whethey they should."
Slashdot Mirror
My father sagely pointed out that the only reason to worry would have been if the -whatever- landed in Selinsgrove. Portent of doom, anyone?
The CD bookshelves are HTML-based, unless things have changed sizeably since the UNIX bookshelf was released.
Back when I started on at the current job, I had the company buy a copy of the UNIX CD Bookshelf... not because I needed it, but hey, they were willing, and I get a free book.
Overall, I find the HTML format to be wonderfully indexed and cross-referenced, and, as mentioned, the search engine is a flaming pile of crap. It's accurate, but obscures the sought-after data by not jumping directly to the location in a page. The O'Reilly Bookshelves are useful -- a bunch of good books for about $70, on CD, cross-platform... but there are limitations. I'd honestly rather have the books...
My sister-in-law studied anthro and archeology for about eight years, and she had an interesting story to tell along these lines a few weeks ago -- one of those things that she picked up in college... some of the students at her University had chosen to move into a primitive pseudo-Celtic settlement, in an attempt to study the effect of so-called primitive living on health.
When the research crew came in several months later to quietly observe the "Celts," they discovered a phenomena that had been found in excavations of true Celt villages -- shallow indentations in the floor just inside and to the sides of the doorways. This had always been attributed to unknown religious tradition -- the old standby of previously unexplained phenomena. When they asked one of the "Celts" what the significance was, assuming they were offering pits, or some such, the response rather shocked the researchers:
The "Celt" said, "Oh, that's nothing... every time it rains, the chickens come into the [hut], walk a little way out of the doorway, and flap their wings against the ground for a bit to knock the water off."
Well, technically, the "general intellectual, moral, and cultural climate of an era" is the "spirit of the age." The only difference is that of terminology and the prevalence of people using terms such as "zeitgeist" to lay claim to membership in some elitist intelligencia, beyond academia into the professional world.
It's all about semantics, Mr. Jones.
Umm, the GNU Image Manipulation Program? The name does describe the function. A better example, perhaps, would be something like Slashdot itself. Slashdot is essentially a product (in a loose sense of the term) and the "product" name gives no sense of the utility of said product.
While I agree with the sentiment about Ada, I feel it necessary to interject that many European coders are Ada programmers. Ada is also used in the development of non-DoD vital systems.
I still don't like the language.
Model: So, what are you into?
Patrick: Murders and Executions, mostly.
XBOX Technologies, from what I can gather, was the name of a firm involved in Mergers and Acquisitions. Kudos to those who place the quote, btw.
The problem, at its root, is that in the eye of the general public the Internet is the Web. The part of the web known to the tech-literate does not exist to the general populace... how are they to know that download link number 14 actually points to FTP? The Internet isn't the world wide web. The Web is like a multimedia phone book for the internet, though... you can find just about anything.
There's no real way to track all of the clicks... and even if there were, it's immaterial. I spent 30 minutes reclicking buttons last night on my PC in the home office, trying to get the correct download of some code for which I'd been searching.
And fsck the RIAA and Napster. I used to download my MP3s off of private ftp servers. I still do. No change. No problem.
Damn right they're not. The phrases "End-User Error" and "PEBKAC:Problem Exists Between Keyboard And Chair" both exist for a reason. Computers, properly built, are infallible -- they do exactly what they're told (forgetting manufacturing defects and hardware faults). We the people, the coders, the software developers, are the ones who introduce failings into the machines. OTOH, a computer without software is just a boat anchor.
I don't know about the Alexander Technique, but I know that full-body, life-changing solutions are the only real solutions for some of us. Take my case, as an example: I suffer from a bone disease called Fibrous Displasia. Considering that it has taken root in the ball of my right femor, just outside the hip socket, this causes me some amount of difficulty, walking, and has for at least a decade. Now, eight years ago, I had experimental surgery which seemd to patch the problem with the displasia, but then this past summer I was diagnosed with arthritis in the hip socket. It seems that many years of walking with a slight limp and slightly favoring my right leg in all exercises has worn away the cartilege in the hip socket.
For me, it's too late to start walking correctly and fix the problem -- all I can do is start walking correctly and perhaps hold the degradation of my cartilege off for a while yet.
Guess what, though? The side effect of having walked with a limp for a decade is that the musculature of my back has hypertrophied in odd manners, and now, sitting still, or sitting incorrectly for long periods (as when coding, or gaming) leads to a sharp pain in my lower left back. the solution? A strict exercise regimine. The problem? I have to be very, very careful as to what exercises I choose, so as not to aggravate my arthritis.
When you look for a solution to one pain, be careful, and look to your whole body. You don't want to end up in my situation, where a solution for one part is a hindrance to another. I'm currently undergoing a exercise routine that will eventually either annihilate my bad hip, or repair a lot of the damage that has been done to the rest of my body. It's a crap shoot, and the Powers That Be use loaded dice.
(A) The word you're looking for is "inanity."
(B) Why does Slashdot need to post "responsible news for nerds" or present anything in a "grown-up manner?" If I want dry, humourless news, I read the newspaper. If I want dry, humourless, tech news, I read the tech news at the New York Times. If I want to read about new root exploits, reviews of books that only geeks would read, and other dork-related drivel, I go to /., and well I should. You don't pay for it, so don't bitch about content. Just don't read the stories that are "inane."
As for accuracy, hype, and misinformation? This is the `net, pal. Read at your own risk.
They grumble, and adapt. I'm forced to use Lotus Notes for internal mail -- and internal databases -- and it's heinous, but the job is good, otherwise. We don't like Notes, and we bitch about it incessantly, but it hasn't gotten us qmail with IMAP ability yet, and it's not going to earn us that, either. Infrastructure operates under Newton's Law of Inertia, and the body is at rest.
There is another approach: that these "inventions" and discoveries did not exist before mankind named them. Without an internal symbol for a Thing, it has no recognition, and no identity -- we cannot recognise it.
Take for example the laws of aerodynamics, and such scientific principles as Bernoulli's. Just because Bernoulli's principle held before it was named, classified, and expanded, it did not exist... the conditions which predicate the principle had not been observed.
DNA did not exist before it was discovered. Bacteria did not exist until it was discovered.
So some would say.
Habit.
Okay, not habit, but inertia. They set it on the table. They're careful not to breathe at it. It stays where it was put, mostly because Newton's laws of inertia hold for the frame of reference.
Velcro would help, too, but I'm guessing they don't have a lot of that to spare.
Paperless Society Zealot! Woo!
In your ideal world, it may be the case that you can get away with a paper-free workplace. However, if I handed a disk to the guy who signs my paychecks instead of a printed report, he'd hand me a pink slip instead of a pay check.
The world is going paperless. It's not yet there.
Not to mention the fact that algorithm design and complexity analysis are direct applications of high-level mathematical logic to the Science of Computing. Every computer scientist should have a firm mathematical background, if for no other reason than the basis of the field upon the shoulders of centuries of academic mathematics.
Note that I see a strong separation between the titles of Computer Scientist, Computer Engineer, and Software Engineer. Many software engineers can get by with a minimal knowledge of mathematics. Fewer computer engineers can do so. And fewer still computer scientists can do so... computer science is the theoretical application of mathematics to the problems of computing, not the design of some new killer app. That's software engineering.
But, then, I'm biased. I have bachelor's degrees in both maths and computer science, concentrating on the theory of computation and number theory. It should be no surprise that I push a mathematical outlook on my colleagues.
I disagree, strongly. Mathematical proof comes down to three things: knowing definitions, the ability to think laterally, and a compositional style which is both terse and precise. This was driven into my skull by constant repetition by my advisor at University, while I was working on my maths degree. Learn the definitions. Memorise them! That's ninety percent of the work. The remaining ten percent can be split evenly by the acquisition of precise compositional style and by the ability to recognise the application of definitions -- this being the lateral thinking I mentioned above.
Claiming that writing and understanding mathematical proofs is hard is absurd. It's fantastically easy to write and understand proofs. The difficulty lies in making the lateral cognitive leap from some postulate to a theory dealing with the postulate. The style required to write proofs can be taught quickly, likely in a matter of hours. Learning the definitions can take a lifetime -- if this MetaMath project provides a bottom-up breakdown of mathematical axioms, theories, laws, and maxims, then it serves as a valuable aid. I know that such a tome, electronic or not, would be irreplaceable in my collection... not to mention replacing a shelf full of bright yellow maths texts.
This is half the problem, honestly -- the stereotype used as sarcasm at the beginning of this paragraph shows the true nature of the "War on Drugs." There is no war against Drugs. There is, however, a War on Class. A very large percentage of my current social group uses or abuses some form of drug... and all of us are middle-class white Americans. Sure, some live in the ghetto... college kids live where rent is cheap. Others, like myself, live in the higher-rent suburbs, because we have good, solid, and most importantly well-paying tech jobs. None of us waited until we were established in these settings to start using... the easiest place in this town to get drugs, by the way, is one of the local private universities, where - not surprisingly - the majority of students come from middle or upper class backgrounds.
So what am I ranting about? These aren't the people who get arrested. The people who are arrested en masse are the dealers and users of the slums, those who exist as a portion of the lower class, or even the Underclass -- those who exist off the public dole or completely off the public record. To see this, as well, look at the average jail terms and demographics for two drugs in particular: cocaine, and crack. Cocaine is more pure, more expensive, and generally a drug-of-choice to the upper classes... it's generally too expensive for members of the underclass. However, crack, a cocaine derivative, is dirt cheap -- which makes it attractive as a commodity to sell in the low-income areas of our cities. The last time I checked, the ratio between average jail terms for possession of crack and possession of cocaine was close to 5:1.
Maybe it's left-wing radical propaganda... but maybe it's worth investigation, too. Please don't just believe me. Do the research on your own. My facts might not be exacting... I've not watched this for a while now.
Unless I miss my guess, the explosion referenced here was the incident of 30 June 1908, when something exploded 8 km above the river Stony Tunguska in Siberia. Unfortunately, the jury is still out on the actual cause of that blast. It could have been a comet, asteroid, or meteorite... but the off-beat theories may equally be valid -- that it was a rift in space-time, that a massive explosion in nearby dimensions tripped into this one, etc.
Just because they're wacky doesn't mean they're wrong.
Along the same lines, GM recently issued a recall on something like 6000 of their 2002 model-year SUVs. I foresee that the 2007 model-year vehicles/software/everything will be shipped in 2005.
Just. Plain. Stupid.
People Eating Tasty Animals?
I can see only limited necessity for such access. Okay, yes, it would mean you could take your laptop to the park so that while you're out exercising and enjoying some sunshine, you can keep up your constant reloading of slashdot. While on the train to work, you can check your email because something mission-critical might come across the wire in those 30 minutes, and that the principals wouldn't call you on your cell phone. Houses wouldn't need to have another signal running along the phone or cable to provide internet service.
I just don't get it. Maybe I'm burnt out, because I just don't see the need to have internet access everywhere I go. I don't have a PC with me everywhere I go, and I don't want one. Hells, I'm starting to need a knapsack to cart around the gadgetry I already carry: my knives, leatherman, leatherman adaptor, cell phone, PDA, pager, etc. When I'm not at home, or at work, I'm not concerned with what the latest news might be. It can wait until I go home. I'm not worried about whether Jim Otheruser got my email.
I'm not saying it's useless... wireless connectivity could provide great onboard mapping for vehicles, could aid in CBTC, and help other mobility-required systems stay hot. I just don't see much need for it as a utility for personal consumption and use.
Unfortunately, however, I feel there is a predisposition in the medical research industry to focus on those diseases which the aging, affluent baby boomers will contract; baldness, impotence, type II diabetes, heart problems, osteoporosis, etc.
There's another disease that this will aid that is an issue for people of all ages and of all classes... arthritis. Why does this impact me? Because I'm 22 years old and my doctors want to give me a hip replacement well before I'm 30. Arthritis is no respector of class, age, income, or generation... nearly all people develop it as they age, and many develop it as children.
Also, though not so much treatable, the diseases you list, IIRC, are generally preventable. Simply designing scientific cures for these diseases is not enough: half the problem of "less developed" countries is that there is no health infrastructure, and the masses have no access to the treatments. Much as hunger, disease in the third world is a side-effect of politics. If we want to combat illness in the third world, we must combat the methods by which the medicines are disseminated to the people.
IANAD
Because the social impact of technology is often more important than the introduction of the new technology itself. For instance, it might be phenomenally exciting to the scientific and technological communities that new algorithms for compression are written, and that new, stronger crypto is possible, but to the "unwashed masses," what it all comes down to is that they can download larger amounts of crap in shorter times, and their credit cards aren't getting ripped off so frequently. Notice, some time, the prevalence of slashdot sigs that state some variant on the following:
"Too often scientists are concerned with the fact that they can, rather than the question of whethey they should."