You say this like you think they don't have our research on the matter.
Are you kidding? I note that you didn't suggest israel doesn't have a bomb... did they carry out some nuke tests? No, they didn't.
So why can the israelis do it without a test but the japenese and koreans can't? Answer, they all can do it.
The japanese might have the bomb broken into pieces that could be slapped into a functional weapon in moments... or they might just have the missiles ready to go.
No one lives in the shadow of China with that much technical knowledge without having a few side projects.
They have nuclear power plants... and all the industry to make nuclear bombs and missiles.
It is quite likely they have a few that they don't talk about just as Israel has a few they don't talk about. And while we're at it, South Korea probably has a couple as well.
The forces of our coalition are the superior military force. Do not doubt it.
An enemy might sucker punch us or be so pitiful that we don't feel it sporting to slaughter them to a man... but we are stronger. And we shall remain stronger for generations to come. Too many generations came before that planned for wars and conquests for the fruits of that effort to be be gone so quickly.
The chinese are getting a lot better at making things. You have to remember the Japanese were once known for making crap as well. For decades everyone would turn their nose up at Japanese made crap. But the Japanese got better at it. Quality went way up until it exceeded the quality coming out of a lot of our own factories.
The chinese are on the same track. I wouldn't rely on them being substandard forever.
Long term, if US industry is to survive, it must automate. Massively. It has to render the pay discrepency irrelevant through massive automation.
I know that's not what labor wants to hear... but we can't save their world. Its as dead as the days of the small family farm. Just as you're not going to get the big agro farms replaced with a hundred thousand tiny farms selling goods at 4 times the current prices... we're not going back to the 1940-50's era manufacturing models. That's done.
And the sooner this is accepted the sooner we can adapt to the future which will require either we pay our own people a LOT less or we automate the hell out of our enterprises so that the total labor cost per unit is so low due to lower staffing requirements that we can afford to pay our people well... and in fact won't mind doing so.
Sadly, the chinese are making more headway with automation then we are because of entrenched labor interests in the US which is obviously moronic since we had all the advantages there. But we've pissed them away trying to preserve something that was dead a generation ago.
These are zombie industries... they're already dead... They're only animated by government subsidies and ignorance. Let them die so that something vital can live.
there are a zillion other video services begging to be considered that really are just as good technically... they obviously lack the huge library of cat videos that youtube has amassed. However, a specialty music site might be a better fit for the independent artists.
"Practical security" assumes you know the capabilities and knowledge of your enemy.
If you're wrong then "practical security" is insecure.
The point is that we can make things that cannot be broken. Cannot. Impossible. No amount of computer resources or human genius can breach perfect security.
And we can do it. It requires that we do things differently and it requires that the very term "practical security" be treated as a big red flag that there is a problem. "practical" means you know there's a vulnerability but you don't take its exploitation as being likely. Why take those risks when we can just make the security perfect.
I'm not suggesting we observe the most paranoid security in all situations. But we should keep in mind that that is the gold standard and that everything else is a compromise. That way when system's planners know that a given system CANNOT fall to the enemy they know they have to use the gold standard security. Nothing else suits.
That security must have encryption that cannot be broken and a software/hardware system that is too simple and inflexible to hack.
An example might be our energy grid. You can't let hackers from wherever get into the grid and start causing brownouts.... or throttling a hydro electric dam up and down which might cause damage.
We have remote facilities all over the world that we must access and may of those systems should not be vulnerable to breach. When I say "should not" I mean literally impossible. We can do it.
Refusing to do so when its right there in front us is inviting Murphy to bend you over and have his way with you.
And the customer has a right to receive what they believe they paid for in the first place.
Look... change the product all you like... just make it clear you did that and don't pull the all too common move of maintaining the same model number as the unmodified version by then putting "v2" in the small print. I've seen a lot of this and its slimy. If you want to sell a stripped down version of the previous product, that is fine...change the model number enough that its clear its not the same thing. Too often they don't change the product name. The full model number includes the version but that's not part of the advertising or marketing and its often not disclosed when you buy it. I can't tell you how many times I bought something crossing my fingers that I got one version or another because there was literally no way to know.
Its fraud. Include the version in the model name at all times so when people give reviews you'll know specifically which version they like... and when you go to buy and don't see that version you know to be careful.
False advertising etc... Doubtless they've found some legal loophole to let them get away with it but it shouldn't be tolerated.
Sue them. Let the lawyers latch onto their faces and lay lawyer babies in their stomachs that will after a short period burst out of their chests to fill the world with yet more lawyers.
These guys have it coming. You don't cheat your customers.
I don't think bill gates is a bad guy and I don't associate making money with being immoral or evil.
I just find it be intellectually dishonest to live the life he did... and continues to live... and then tell people money isn't important. He could give it all away. He's never given away something he'd miss. You can say he's given away billions but he's got 70 of them.
I give a car away if I had 70 of the damned things.
As to not knowing if the Voynich manuscript is even language. That is the point.
That's how you know the security is solid.
Imagine for example if I write in chinese and you had no reference for chinese. You do not know how to read it and you don't know of any similar languages to aid in your decoding of the chinese.
You can't use a systematic code attack on it because it will never decode into a known language. You can't use the frequency of given characters to reveal words. There are no vowels or consonants.
Without a basis for understanding the language you will NEVER decode such a message. Ever. Not in a billion years with all the computing power of a universe.
You're ignoring my point which is that the cryptography is theoretically breakable. Where as the things I'm talking about are not.
We have nothing more to discuss if you're going to go into tape recorder mode and utterly fail to have an interactive discussion where you actually respond to what other people have said. Your argument fails at this... This is the sort of crap chat bots output when you say something they don't understand. They just keep going off on their own little direction like wind up tin soldiers.
Well very well... no offense... but you need to respond to people's arguments and not just ignore things you don't have an answer for hoping that people will change their argument to something for which you have an answer.
I am talking about perfect security. Your comment about key lengths demonstrates that you really don't understand what I was talking about at all. All the key length does is make decoding complicated. With enough computing power a brute force attack will break through any systematic encryption scheme unless that scheme is more then simply complex but inscrutable.
As to your point about getting things decrypted by torturing the people that encrypted it... well yes, that always works but the point is to make that a literal requirement.
And if those people are out of reach or unknown then the message will remain secure... and here is the point "forever".
Do not skip over that last word please like you did last time. That is my point and ignoring it will only lead you to make more false arguments.
As to modern cryptography being secure... the premise of most cryptography is that you've made something so complex that no one can sort it out. That is your security. It is security through complexity.
And I grant that it's probably secure in most situations. But my primary problem with it is that it's theoretically breakable.
We can make security systems that are theoretically UNbreakable.
As to a series of linguists breaking an unknown language. Wrong. Generally speaking, without a "Rosetta stone" or some very clear frame of reference unknown languages are totally inscrutable.
Linquists, cryptographers, super computers, etc have all taken a crack at this and failed. Its an unknown language... possibly a made one... and no one can read it.
More importantly, no systematic attack can decode an unknown language. Its not just hard... its literally impossible.
That is what I'm looking for here... security that isn't just good... but literally impossible to break. As in you don't need to patch the fucking thing five times a week. You can set it up once then let the collective intelligence agencies and hackers from now until the end of time attack it and sleep easy because you know they're not getting anywhere with it.
That is why I threw out book codes or one time pad codes as an example. They're unbreakable without the pad. As in NEVER.
And yeah, I understand that most of the breaches happen with the software and not the encryption... but that's just because that's the weakest link. You don't waste your time with the tough stuff if you can find something softer.
Added to what I said above, I think systems that are secure must be simple. Very simple. As in no more then a couple pages of code. Why? Because complicated code is code that can't be debugged. Keep it simple and you can make the code perfect. Total confidence that there is zero error. As in 1+1=2 perfect.
Next the security probably has to be very ridged. Not flexible at all. It has to work a specific way and only that way. This again is to protect against a hack. hackers tend to exploit unintended flexibility in programming. Don't build the flexibility in and keep the system simple enough that you know precisely how it will operate in any situation.
So yeah... maybe I wasn't clear before. I am talking about perfect security. The sort of thing you'd trust to keep out the literal devil.
Its not that hypocrisy is bad so much as its frequently contradictory.
Their words do not match their actions and that has to be reconciled if they're giving advice.
For example, if you're a heavy smoker and want to caution against smoking... say "I've been a heavy smoker for most of my life and regret it... don't be like me."...
Well, gates isn't doing that. he's basically saying that people should go out to do something besides make money but that's exactly what he did and most people would be very happy to be in his position.
Seriously... would you rather run an impoverished charity or have 70 billion in the bank?
Cartoon lightening should hit gates in his weedy little head. What a hilarious hypocrite.
Tell you what, Gates... after I hit 70 billion I'll stop making it all about the money too. What a giant joke.
Yes, gates does a lot of very nice charity work around the world... and that's lovely. But he didn't just hop on a couch airplane and then do relief work in africa for years. The man amassed an insane fortune and then casually jet sets around the world making appearences for his charities. Don't get me wrong... he writes checks that clear. But that's his contribution to all these issues... writing checks. And that's very important... but to do that you have to have money. If you don't you can't do that.
So... I'm a little confused about his message. Because if I judged him by his actions... the sensible thing would seem to be... make billions of dollars by any means and then retire to run various charities and tell people what a good person you've always been.
I don't know... this charity kick that some of the super rich go off on seems like more of a donation to the "Everyone love me" fund. I frankly respect the anonymous donations more in most cases simply because you know they actually care more about the cause then they do about what people think of them.
Wrong. What we've been seeing lately is that they'll just tell you they don't have it. They'll confirm they don't have it. Especially if they do actually have it.
They're on record lying to congress already. So they're not going to have any trouble looking you right in the eye and saying "nope"...
Keep in mind, we're talking about investigating an IRS scandal in which the IRS is now claiming the requested emails were lost in a hard drive crash.
They expect us to believe that the emails were only stored on an end user laptop and that there were no back ups and that the server retained no records... of official IRS email.
Do you believe that? No one does. Even the people saying they believe it don't actually believe it... its just part of the political game going on right now.
Apparently the IRS was taken over by some political factions that wanted to limit speech... and when they got caught at it the whole IRS is now trying to cover it up.
None of which is being made easier by the white house which wants everyone to believe their shit doesn't stink... and the "justice" department which so far as I've seen has made a point of not investigating anything.
I could respect the "neither confirm nor deny" line because it wasn't a lie. It was a refusal to answer. But they're not doing that anymore. They're just lying now. And they're not just doing it to casual requests for information. They're lying on court documents, lying in response to FOIA orders, and they're lying directly to congress.
Which means they're lying to everyone we have access to... they could be lying to the president as well for all we know.
if they actually had that information... they can't possibly... and even if they do I'm pretty sure they'll deny it. The feds are in full blown police state at this point as regards due process. But still imagine if they actually had that information. That would be pretty incredible.
Other ideas would be unique protocols... utterly distinct means of communicating information such that any system that doesn't understand the protocol wouldn't even be able to interface with it much less decode it.
Its akin to the Indian code talkers in WW2. You can use an encryption system like Germans or Japanese used... which the British and Americans broke respectively. Or you can use something like an unknown language to render the transmission unbreakable.
The unknown language can of course be something you just invent for the purpose. But the point is that it doesn't explicitly decode into what you'd think it would decode into.
Part of what allows decryption programs to work is that they know roughly what the final message will look like... that is letters, words, sentences, etc. What if it doesn't decode into what they expect? What if it decodes into columns of numbers or mathematical proofs that when run through a separate translation algorithm output the fully decoded message.
The one time pad though strikes me as the ultimate encryption method. And its much easier to use with computers.
Imagine if I gave you a one time pad file that was about 4 gigabytes in size. No problem for a modern computer. And now we can transfer 4 gbs of secure messages back and forth. Obviously not idea for high traffic messages but for limited ultra secure messages... what could be better. It would only be breached if the enemy got access to the machine used to send the messages. And nothing is going to survive that.
We can start moving towards literally unbreakable security. And we really should for all high priority services. Things like book codes or modern versions of the same thing.
Encryption seeds into the terabytes.
Networks that are air-gapped and rely on proprietary network hardware that is simply different from everything else.
We need to push it farther. The NSA demonstrated that this is not paranoia. You make it theoretically possible and they're in.
And now you've forced the trainers to coordinate everything with programmers.
Previously if they wanted to change the senario they just did it... no back and forth with programmers required.
Now on top of everything else I've said the training system is less flexible.
Here is what is going to happen.
They're going to take your toys and play with them for awhile. Then they're going to go back to the old training system because it actually is more useful. Oh they'll play with the toys on and off again... doubtless they'll be used for a specific type of training that doesn't change much. So they'll whip those out and do that... and then right back to the old training method.
Look. I love technology. But the point of technology is to make things easier... to make people more powerful. Technology doesn't always do that. Sometimes it wastes time. Sometimes it places artifical constraints on otherwise more flexible situations.
Whenever technology does that it is the enemy and should either be re purposed or eliminated.
If the most efficient way to do something was to go over and hit it with a rock... I'd suggest you go over and hit it with a rock. Even if the alternative solution is to build a ray gun, bounce a beam off a satilite in space, and then over a period of time melt the target down.
Why do things the hard way? That its "cool" or "technology!" or "science" is not justification for the waste of time and resources.
This VR idea stinks of a waste of money.
Now if you want to know a good application for VR... Tank commanders, sub commanders, ship commanders, and fighter pilots... also drone commanders.
That's something you can use VR for in the military. Full 360 display with integrated sensors. So I can see 3d radar returns... see 3d sonar returns... So I can see where the enemy was last, what their speed and heading was, and the projected course in 3D. etc.
Biofuels if made by the refineries would cost around 5 dollars to 6 dollars a gallon before taxes. After taxes it could be closer to 7 or 8 dollars a gallon if not 10.
Its not competitive unless we do something creative.
Simply getting men with guns to force people to comply or be shot is not especially clever or creative either.
Do you have any original ideas? Ideas you came up with yourself?
Because the men with guns idea has failed and backfired... on top of being immoral and stupid... or possibly because its immoral and stupid. Either way... I'm trying to come up with ideas that don't depend on people being forced to comply at gun point. That means rethinking the industrial process.
As to self generated biofuels undermining the economy, the production of fossil fuels won't stop. We can expect that to continue for a long time to come. But we can start to break the link between that industry and every other. Farmers and other rural dwellers are best positioned to self generate because they have the land, water, and can even use waste biomass to fuel the system.
Furthermore, the decentralized systems that make this stuff will have to be manufactured and maintained. GE for example already has a SynGas generator that they're marketing to large farms. There are smaller companies that are making smaller units for smaller farms.
I've seen SynGas generators for 30 thousand dollars that produce 20kw. Carbon neutral power.
That's cheaper then solar and far more reliable.
People don't like it because it relies on burning things. And they've been mislead to think that burning things is anti environment. When really what is anti environment is burning sequestered hydrocarbons.
Wood is not a sequestered hydrocarbon.
The ideal set up for a system like this is to bundle it with a pellet mill and possibly a hammer mill.
Using the pellet mill and hammer mill... and maybe a wood chipper if needed you can process any kind of plant matter into uniform wood pellets which burn very nicely in the syngas generator.
When generating about 20kw it goes through 75 pounds of fuel in a day. Given that the average household consumes about 5-6kwh per day, you can see that one of these generators could service many homes concurrently.
And how large is this machine? I'm looking at one right now that is about 3' by 3' by 6'. Which is nothing if you consider how many homes it services.
And on top of the power, it generates a storable, portable gas that can be used in modified cars, heats water, and can heat whatever buildings are hooked up to it directly.
And with tweaking, a syngas generator can make crude, gasoline, kerosene, propane, etc. Most of them are set up to produce syngas and nothing else. But you can crack that to produce anything.
Which is where the big oil companies come in because they know more about that then anyone else. We need their help. They can provide technical expertise in return for patients and licensing all of which will sunset in about 14 years after their investment.
This is something we could do that would be applicable all over the world and could make a difference without resorting to force.
We could offer these machines to the world. Offer bio engineered crops for biofuel... genetically engineered algae... We have the technology to do these things. But it requires burying the failed and counterproductive Soylent orthodoxy.
I'd point out the infection seems to have started in San Diego... not Idaho or Seattle or even New York.
If you know anything about San Diego then you know it has a strong influx of people from south of the border and I'd be very interested to know where the infection came from. My guess is that it came from Mexico...
Whatever you think of American immunization rates... Mexico is a totally different kettle of fish. I'm not saying this as an anti mexico thing or an anti immigration thing. I'm just saying if you're trying to trace the vector of infection... I'd look very strongly at mexico here because there could be a lot going on across the border that is not being properly monitored or reported. There could epidemics over there that simply go unnoticed amongst the general dysfunction of that society.
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You say this like you think they don't have our research on the matter.
Are you kidding? I note that you didn't suggest israel doesn't have a bomb... did they carry out some nuke tests? No, they didn't.
So why can the israelis do it without a test but the japenese and koreans can't? Answer, they all can do it.
The japanese might have the bomb broken into pieces that could be slapped into a functional weapon in moments... or they might just have the missiles ready to go.
No one lives in the shadow of China with that much technical knowledge without having a few side projects.
They have nuclear power plants... and all the industry to make nuclear bombs and missiles.
It is quite likely they have a few that they don't talk about just as Israel has a few they don't talk about. And while we're at it, South Korea probably has a couple as well.
The forces of our coalition are the superior military force. Do not doubt it.
An enemy might sucker punch us or be so pitiful that we don't feel it sporting to slaughter them to a man... but we are stronger. And we shall remain stronger for generations to come. Too many generations came before that planned for wars and conquests for the fruits of that effort to be be gone so quickly.
The chinese are getting a lot better at making things. You have to remember the Japanese were once known for making crap as well. For decades everyone would turn their nose up at Japanese made crap. But the Japanese got better at it. Quality went way up until it exceeded the quality coming out of a lot of our own factories.
The chinese are on the same track. I wouldn't rely on them being substandard forever.
Long term, if US industry is to survive, it must automate. Massively. It has to render the pay discrepency irrelevant through massive automation.
I know that's not what labor wants to hear... but we can't save their world. Its as dead as the days of the small family farm. Just as you're not going to get the big agro farms replaced with a hundred thousand tiny farms selling goods at 4 times the current prices... we're not going back to the 1940-50's era manufacturing models. That's done.
And the sooner this is accepted the sooner we can adapt to the future which will require either we pay our own people a LOT less or we automate the hell out of our enterprises so that the total labor cost per unit is so low due to lower staffing requirements that we can afford to pay our people well... and in fact won't mind doing so.
Sadly, the chinese are making more headway with automation then we are because of entrenched labor interests in the US which is obviously moronic since we had all the advantages there. But we've pissed them away trying to preserve something that was dead a generation ago.
These are zombie industries... they're already dead... They're only animated by government subsidies and ignorance. Let them die so that something vital can live.
there are a zillion other video services begging to be considered that really are just as good technically... they obviously lack the huge library of cat videos that youtube has amassed. However, a specialty music site might be a better fit for the independent artists.
"Practical security" assumes you know the capabilities and knowledge of your enemy.
If you're wrong then "practical security" is insecure.
The point is that we can make things that cannot be broken. Cannot. Impossible. No amount of computer resources or human genius can breach perfect security.
And we can do it. It requires that we do things differently and it requires that the very term "practical security" be treated as a big red flag that there is a problem. "practical" means you know there's a vulnerability but you don't take its exploitation as being likely. Why take those risks when we can just make the security perfect.
I'm not suggesting we observe the most paranoid security in all situations. But we should keep in mind that that is the gold standard and that everything else is a compromise. That way when system's planners know that a given system CANNOT fall to the enemy they know they have to use the gold standard security. Nothing else suits.
That security must have encryption that cannot be broken and a software/hardware system that is too simple and inflexible to hack.
An example might be our energy grid. You can't let hackers from wherever get into the grid and start causing brownouts.... or throttling a hydro electric dam up and down which might cause damage.
We have remote facilities all over the world that we must access and may of those systems should not be vulnerable to breach. When I say "should not" I mean literally impossible. We can do it.
Refusing to do so when its right there in front us is inviting Murphy to bend you over and have his way with you.
They're not doing that though... they're maintaining the impression that its the same product.
Its fine if they make it clear its a distinct product. If they don't then its not.
just out of curiosity, what is your problem with his education push... I am not terribly familiar with it... your opinion would be enlightening.
And the customer has a right to receive what they believe they paid for in the first place.
Look... change the product all you like... just make it clear you did that and don't pull the all too common move of maintaining the same model number as the unmodified version by then putting "v2" in the small print. I've seen a lot of this and its slimy. If you want to sell a stripped down version of the previous product, that is fine...change the model number enough that its clear its not the same thing. Too often they don't change the product name. The full model number includes the version but that's not part of the advertising or marketing and its often not disclosed when you buy it. I can't tell you how many times I bought something crossing my fingers that I got one version or another because there was literally no way to know.
Its fraud. Include the version in the model name at all times so when people give reviews you'll know specifically which version they like... and when you go to buy and don't see that version you know to be careful.
... the refrigerator has to be a bigger draw then the stupid cable box.
False advertising etc... Doubtless they've found some legal loophole to let them get away with it but it shouldn't be tolerated.
Sue them. Let the lawyers latch onto their faces and lay lawyer babies in their stomachs that will after a short period burst out of their chests to fill the world with yet more lawyers.
These guys have it coming. You don't cheat your customers.
I don't think bill gates is a bad guy and I don't associate making money with being immoral or evil.
I just find it be intellectually dishonest to live the life he did... and continues to live... and then tell people money isn't important. He could give it all away. He's never given away something he'd miss. You can say he's given away billions but he's got 70 of them.
I give a car away if I had 70 of the damned things.
If you don't mind me asking, what is your experience in this matter? You claim to have special knowledge. Where and when did it come from?
As to not knowing if the Voynich manuscript is even language. That is the point.
That's how you know the security is solid.
Imagine for example if I write in chinese and you had no reference for chinese. You do not know how to read it and you don't know of any similar languages to aid in your decoding of the chinese.
You can't use a systematic code attack on it because it will never decode into a known language. You can't use the frequency of given characters to reveal words. There are no vowels or consonants.
Without a basis for understanding the language you will NEVER decode such a message. Ever. Not in a billion years with all the computing power of a universe.
You're ignoring my point which is that the cryptography is theoretically breakable. Where as the things I'm talking about are not.
We have nothing more to discuss if you're going to go into tape recorder mode and utterly fail to have an interactive discussion where you actually respond to what other people have said. Your argument fails at this... This is the sort of crap chat bots output when you say something they don't understand. They just keep going off on their own little direction like wind up tin soldiers.
Well very well... no offense... but you need to respond to people's arguments and not just ignore things you don't have an answer for hoping that people will change their argument to something for which you have an answer.
I am talking about perfect security. Your comment about key lengths demonstrates that you really don't understand what I was talking about at all. All the key length does is make decoding complicated. With enough computing power a brute force attack will break through any systematic encryption scheme unless that scheme is more then simply complex but inscrutable.
As to your point about getting things decrypted by torturing the people that encrypted it... well yes, that always works but the point is to make that a literal requirement.
And if those people are out of reach or unknown then the message will remain secure... and here is the point "forever".
Do not skip over that last word please like you did last time. That is my point and ignoring it will only lead you to make more false arguments.
He seems to live pretty well for a guy ashamed of his money.
As to modern cryptography being secure... the premise of most cryptography is that you've made something so complex that no one can sort it out. That is your security. It is security through complexity.
And I grant that it's probably secure in most situations. But my primary problem with it is that it's theoretically breakable.
We can make security systems that are theoretically UNbreakable.
As to a series of linguists breaking an unknown language. Wrong. Generally speaking, without a "Rosetta stone" or some very clear frame of reference unknown languages are totally inscrutable.
Here's an example for you:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V...
Linquists, cryptographers, super computers, etc have all taken a crack at this and failed. Its an unknown language... possibly a made one... and no one can read it.
More importantly, no systematic attack can decode an unknown language. Its not just hard... its literally impossible.
That is what I'm looking for here... security that isn't just good... but literally impossible to break. As in you don't need to patch the fucking thing five times a week. You can set it up once then let the collective intelligence agencies and hackers from now until the end of time attack it and sleep easy because you know they're not getting anywhere with it.
That is why I threw out book codes or one time pad codes as an example. They're unbreakable without the pad. As in NEVER.
And yeah, I understand that most of the breaches happen with the software and not the encryption... but that's just because that's the weakest link. You don't waste your time with the tough stuff if you can find something softer.
Added to what I said above, I think systems that are secure must be simple. Very simple. As in no more then a couple pages of code. Why? Because complicated code is code that can't be debugged. Keep it simple and you can make the code perfect. Total confidence that there is zero error. As in 1+1=2 perfect.
Next the security probably has to be very ridged. Not flexible at all. It has to work a specific way and only that way. This again is to protect against a hack. hackers tend to exploit unintended flexibility in programming. Don't build the flexibility in and keep the system simple enough that you know precisely how it will operate in any situation.
So yeah... maybe I wasn't clear before. I am talking about perfect security. The sort of thing you'd trust to keep out the literal devil.
Its not that hypocrisy is bad so much as its frequently contradictory.
Their words do not match their actions and that has to be reconciled if they're giving advice.
For example, if you're a heavy smoker and want to caution against smoking... say "I've been a heavy smoker for most of my life and regret it... don't be like me."...
Well, gates isn't doing that. he's basically saying that people should go out to do something besides make money but that's exactly what he did and most people would be very happy to be in his position.
Seriously... would you rather run an impoverished charity or have 70 billion in the bank?
I'm highly dubious that they would touch it. But you could be right... I just wouldn't think they'd touch it... a little too close to home.
Cartoon lightening should hit gates in his weedy little head. What a hilarious hypocrite.
Tell you what, Gates... after I hit 70 billion I'll stop making it all about the money too. What a giant joke.
Yes, gates does a lot of very nice charity work around the world... and that's lovely. But he didn't just hop on a couch airplane and then do relief work in africa for years. The man amassed an insane fortune and then casually jet sets around the world making appearences for his charities. Don't get me wrong... he writes checks that clear. But that's his contribution to all these issues... writing checks. And that's very important... but to do that you have to have money. If you don't you can't do that.
So... I'm a little confused about his message. Because if I judged him by his actions... the sensible thing would seem to be... make billions of dollars by any means and then retire to run various charities and tell people what a good person you've always been.
I don't know... this charity kick that some of the super rich go off on seems like more of a donation to the "Everyone love me" fund. I frankly respect the anonymous donations more in most cases simply because you know they actually care more about the cause then they do about what people think of them.
Wrong. What we've been seeing lately is that they'll just tell you they don't have it. They'll confirm they don't have it. Especially if they do actually have it.
They're on record lying to congress already. So they're not going to have any trouble looking you right in the eye and saying "nope"...
Keep in mind, we're talking about investigating an IRS scandal in which the IRS is now claiming the requested emails were lost in a hard drive crash.
They expect us to believe that the emails were only stored on an end user laptop and that there were no back ups and that the server retained no records... of official IRS email.
Do you believe that? No one does. Even the people saying they believe it don't actually believe it... its just part of the political game going on right now.
Apparently the IRS was taken over by some political factions that wanted to limit speech... and when they got caught at it the whole IRS is now trying to cover it up.
None of which is being made easier by the white house which wants everyone to believe their shit doesn't stink... and the "justice" department which so far as I've seen has made a point of not investigating anything.
I could respect the "neither confirm nor deny" line because it wasn't a lie. It was a refusal to answer. But they're not doing that anymore. They're just lying now. And they're not just doing it to casual requests for information. They're lying on court documents, lying in response to FOIA orders, and they're lying directly to congress.
Which means they're lying to everyone we have access to... they could be lying to the president as well for all we know.
if they actually had that information... they can't possibly... and even if they do I'm pretty sure they'll deny it. The feds are in full blown police state at this point as regards due process. But still imagine if they actually had that information. That would be pretty incredible.
Other ideas would be unique protocols... utterly distinct means of communicating information such that any system that doesn't understand the protocol wouldn't even be able to interface with it much less decode it.
Its akin to the Indian code talkers in WW2. You can use an encryption system like Germans or Japanese used... which the British and Americans broke respectively. Or you can use something like an unknown language to render the transmission unbreakable.
The unknown language can of course be something you just invent for the purpose. But the point is that it doesn't explicitly decode into what you'd think it would decode into.
Part of what allows decryption programs to work is that they know roughly what the final message will look like... that is letters, words, sentences, etc. What if it doesn't decode into what they expect? What if it decodes into columns of numbers or mathematical proofs that when run through a separate translation algorithm output the fully decoded message.
The one time pad though strikes me as the ultimate encryption method. And its much easier to use with computers.
Imagine if I gave you a one time pad file that was about 4 gigabytes in size. No problem for a modern computer. And now we can transfer 4 gbs of secure messages back and forth. Obviously not idea for high traffic messages but for limited ultra secure messages... what could be better. It would only be breached if the enemy got access to the machine used to send the messages. And nothing is going to survive that.
We can start moving towards literally unbreakable security. And we really should for all high priority services. Things like book codes or modern versions of the same thing.
Encryption seeds into the terabytes.
Networks that are air-gapped and rely on proprietary network hardware that is simply different from everything else.
We need to push it farther. The NSA demonstrated that this is not paranoia. You make it theoretically possible and they're in.
Except they won't do it continuously.
And now you've forced the trainers to coordinate everything with programmers.
Previously if they wanted to change the senario they just did it... no back and forth with programmers required.
Now on top of everything else I've said the training system is less flexible.
Here is what is going to happen.
They're going to take your toys and play with them for awhile. Then they're going to go back to the old training system because it actually is more useful. Oh they'll play with the toys on and off again... doubtless they'll be used for a specific type of training that doesn't change much. So they'll whip those out and do that... and then right back to the old training method.
Look. I love technology. But the point of technology is to make things easier... to make people more powerful. Technology doesn't always do that. Sometimes it wastes time. Sometimes it places artifical constraints on otherwise more flexible situations.
Whenever technology does that it is the enemy and should either be re purposed or eliminated.
If the most efficient way to do something was to go over and hit it with a rock... I'd suggest you go over and hit it with a rock. Even if the alternative solution is to build a ray gun, bounce a beam off a satilite in space, and then over a period of time melt the target down.
Why do things the hard way? That its "cool" or "technology!" or "science" is not justification for the waste of time and resources.
This VR idea stinks of a waste of money.
Now if you want to know a good application for VR... Tank commanders, sub commanders, ship commanders, and fighter pilots... also drone commanders.
That's something you can use VR for in the military. Full 360 display with integrated sensors. So I can see 3d radar returns... see 3d sonar returns... So I can see where the enemy was last, what their speed and heading was, and the projected course in 3D. etc.
That's something useful.
But this?... trash.
Biofuels if made by the refineries would cost around 5 dollars to 6 dollars a gallon before taxes. After taxes it could be closer to 7 or 8 dollars a gallon if not 10.
Its not competitive unless we do something creative.
Simply getting men with guns to force people to comply or be shot is not especially clever or creative either.
Do you have any original ideas? Ideas you came up with yourself?
Because the men with guns idea has failed and backfired... on top of being immoral and stupid... or possibly because its immoral and stupid. Either way... I'm trying to come up with ideas that don't depend on people being forced to comply at gun point. That means rethinking the industrial process.
As to self generated biofuels undermining the economy, the production of fossil fuels won't stop. We can expect that to continue for a long time to come. But we can start to break the link between that industry and every other. Farmers and other rural dwellers are best positioned to self generate because they have the land, water, and can even use waste biomass to fuel the system.
Furthermore, the decentralized systems that make this stuff will have to be manufactured and maintained. GE for example already has a SynGas generator that they're marketing to large farms. There are smaller companies that are making smaller units for smaller farms.
I've seen SynGas generators for 30 thousand dollars that produce 20kw. Carbon neutral power.
That's cheaper then solar and far more reliable.
People don't like it because it relies on burning things. And they've been mislead to think that burning things is anti environment. When really what is anti environment is burning sequestered hydrocarbons.
Wood is not a sequestered hydrocarbon.
The ideal set up for a system like this is to bundle it with a pellet mill and possibly a hammer mill.
Using the pellet mill and hammer mill... and maybe a wood chipper if needed you can process any kind of plant matter into uniform wood pellets which burn very nicely in the syngas generator.
When generating about 20kw it goes through 75 pounds of fuel in a day. Given that the average household consumes about 5-6kwh per day, you can see that one of these generators could service many homes concurrently.
And how large is this machine? I'm looking at one right now that is about 3' by 3' by 6'. Which is nothing if you consider how many homes it services.
And on top of the power, it generates a storable, portable gas that can be used in modified cars, heats water, and can heat whatever buildings are hooked up to it directly.
And with tweaking, a syngas generator can make crude, gasoline, kerosene, propane, etc. Most of them are set up to produce syngas and nothing else. But you can crack that to produce anything.
Which is where the big oil companies come in because they know more about that then anyone else. We need their help. They can provide technical expertise in return for patients and licensing all of which will sunset in about 14 years after their investment.
This is something we could do that would be applicable all over the world and could make a difference without resorting to force.
We could offer these machines to the world. Offer bio engineered crops for biofuel... genetically engineered algae... We have the technology to do these things. But it requires burying the failed and counterproductive Soylent orthodoxy.
I'd point out the infection seems to have started in San Diego... not Idaho or Seattle or even New York.
If you know anything about San Diego then you know it has a strong influx of people from south of the border and I'd be very interested to know where the infection came from. My guess is that it came from Mexico...
Whatever you think of American immunization rates... Mexico is a totally different kettle of fish. I'm not saying this as an anti mexico thing or an anti immigration thing. I'm just saying if you're trying to trace the vector of infection... I'd look very strongly at mexico here because there could be a lot going on across the border that is not being properly monitored or reported. There could epidemics over there that simply go unnoticed amongst the general dysfunction of that society.