...most of the R&D spending from the corporate world seems to be calculated to generate news stories, and most of it seems to be vaporware. PLus, corporate R&D is ephemeral--as soon as enough research is done so as to generate the desired publicity/news stories, which causes the stock to go up, or the IPO to become viable, the R&D funding is pulled. As the corporate types care about is getting that money up front for themselves. SO what happens is the promising research is never completed... At least in military R&D, enough research is done so that fundamental breakthroughs are accomplished. yes, it's true that the weapons systems may not work as promised, but, the important thing is that the fundamental research is done, and we get the benefit of it.
SO that is why I hope the military spending is angled more toward biological weaponry and bio-defenses--the resulting R&D could trigger breakthroughs in biology, which could help all of us live longer. Corporate funding has been aimed to this area as well, but it goes for the low-lying fruit; plus, it never goes far enough to generate breakthroughs; only goes far enough to generate executive bonuses...
Back to the good old days of the cold war, I say.
That will also mean the draft, and more jobs and more money for us old guys....
Cryonicists/transhumanists had this idea also
on
The Free State Project
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Cryonicists/transhumanists, who generally want to be able to cryopreserve themselves as soon as possible upon death/terminal illness, have long considered doing this. Problem is that there is only a couple thousand of them.
However, the basic idea is quite viable for those who generally feel constrained by the rules of society. This idea would not work with people such as scumbags/crooks who live outside society's rules, but for libertarian geeks and cryonicists, this might work.
I myself have recommended on the cryonet mailing list that cryonicists do this at the county level, and all move to Loving County, Texas, which has a population of about 100 or so. THey could effectively control the county. How much good that would do, I don't know.
Now, for more power, e.g., a state to "take over", there is Oregon, of course, which appears to be the most libertarian, progressive state available. For example, they have legal structure in place already to allow euthanasia for teh terminally ill, which could be a tremendous boon for cryonicists (or for anyone who does not want to die a lingering painful death when terminally ill). Also, there are the marijuana initiatives which recur periodically in Oregon.
In fact, Oregon is set up for "Power to the People", as opposed to states like Texas, which are set up for Power to the Rich/Corps., etc.
Autism genes that enhance programming abilities may lead to less children for the autistic programmer (AP), but if the AP is programming in the area of, say, development of life-extending technology (e.g., beating old age, cancer etc.) then the AP genes may lead to greater disperal of human genes later down the road.
>> Am I a rapist, that you must know where I am at all times? >>
yes, if an eyewitness saw you near the scene of a rape, you would be questioned.
>> Am I a burglar, that I must explain my reasons for being in a particular place at a particular time? >>>
yes, if an eyewitness saw you near the scene of a burglary, you would have to explain your reasons for being at that particular place at that particular time.
>> Am I a murderer, that I may not move about freely of my own accord? >>
yes, if an eyewitness saw you murder someone, expect some rather severe curtailments of your liberty.
And if the "eyewitness" is one that watches 24-7, unfailingly, always wakeful, always truthful? That is the camera....it never sleeps, or gets tired or hungry...it just keeps coming and coming, and it will never stop (given an ocassional replacement). It is the =Terminator= of witnesses...and I want it on my side.
In fact, not too far from the Washington DC area, the body of a 9 yo girl was found after she was abducted from her home where her parents were murdered. The scavengers didn't leave much, just some ribs and a hank of hair attached to what was left of her skull. But it was enough to identify her....
A cheap webcam mounted on a light pole in her neighborhood could have brought the murderer to justice. But some people would rather indulge in 1984 fantasies....
You with the laser in your hand--why do you need to hide from the camera? Are you are a thief, looking to steal my stero? Are you a burglar, wanting to fence my computer for your party tomorrow night? Are you a rapist, wanting to abuse my 9 year old daughter and mentally scar her for life? Will you take her life after you are done with her, thus ensuring that she, like the camera, cannot bear witness to your evildoing?
Are you teh Washington DC sniper, hiding from the camera while you take innocent lives? No doubt he is reading this news story with glee and will be headed to Sharper Image with money in hand, asking for a handheld laser tomorrow before he makes his deadly rounds.
Why do you electronically scurry with your laser in hand?
....and not represent only rich people and corporations, that is what we want. Right? How about this--suppose a bunch of citizens marched on Washington and hung a bunch of politicians from lamp posts? Well, that would make this a lawless country, then, wouldn't it?
....at least some claims of evey patent are initially rejected. Then after some arguing, either modifications are made, or the rejected claims are cancelled by the applicant.
What the applicant would do to avoid complete rejection (and avoid paying your added rejection fee) is just to modify the claims so as to avoid all prior art...
The problem with your scheme is that it chills potential innovation, which is what the original patent idea was all about--grant a monopoly for a few years in return for disclosure of good stuff, heretofore unknown.
What the/. crowd objects to is that some patents make claims on prior art and thereby stifle use of those techniques by the little guy, which is what all./ers are, or aspire to be.
THe reason that the USPTO does not search google is b/c most of the USPTO examiners who work on s/w patents are EE's, who may not know enuf background on s/w stuff to be effective at searching google for some patent on web design....so what the uspto needs is more comp sci oriented examiners, but the uspto hiring process is slanted towards engineers....
Yes, a lawyer has more knowledge of these issues (which really derive from the case law, esp. recent case law), but one lawyer can keep abreast of these issues and inform multiple agents of changes in case law, etc.
I can see that lawyers keep their livings close to the chest....they guard it jealously. I fully expect to see, what with the recent IP phenonenon, lawyers try to keep agents from practicing before the USPTO....
...I recently switched over to Linux (Mandrake 7.1) on both my PC's from Windows. I switched because I am planning on doing some programming projects on those PC's, and my research indicates that the Linux api's are much better documented that the Windows api's. It is just easier to programmatically control Linux than Windows.
However, the KDE gui and the apps that come with Mandrake are not as workable as in Windows, and they take a lot memory, too.
You've got a long ways to go, Linux--at least on the desktop.
In order to defeat any claims of prior art, the patent inventor may complete an affidavit swearing that he conceived of the invention before any referenced prior art (say, something you guys may dig up from 1996), and show some evidence of diligent reduction to practice since that conception, say, some papers with notes on them that has the dates from 1996 onward.
....daeth occurs when the doctor signs the death certificate. That does not mean that the person has passed some physical (or metaphysical signpost). There are many people walking around today that were at some point, "dead", i.e., had no vital signs.
If you have a heart attack and your heart stops in the middle of Borneo with no one else around, you are dead. If you have a heart attack while undergoing minor surgery in a hospital, you very well may not be dead.
If you die of old age and are cremated, you are dead, because the information in your brain has been randomized beyond recovery.
If you die of old age, and are frozen, you may not be dead. If you make to the future 1000 years from now, you probably will not be dead, because the information that is in your brain and that constitutes "you" has not been randomized, so therefore, it may be recovered.
>> I think the greatest obstacle is the damage done by freezing. I don't care what their advocates say. If you destroy ever single cell in your body (when the water expands and solidifies, cracking all your cells), there is a MASSIVE amount of repair to do. "We can rebuild him", indeed, Mr. Austin. Can you think of the technology required to create nanodevices which have the *specialied* ability to repair the unique characteristics of every different type of body cell?
>>
Why would you think it impossible? It definitely is impossible today. And probably will be impossible 20 years from now. And probably impossible 100 years from now. But what about 500 years? What about 1000 years? 2000 years? Liquid nitrogen essentially stops rot for at least 10000 years, and that limit is only die to radiation, which can be worked around....
>>
And then there is the problem that actually killed you that you need to have repaired. And that not all freezing techniques are not done in whatever "special way" which will be discovered later for something like this to even be attempted.
>>>
Freezing does not randomize information, like cremation does. Therefore at some point in time, if not N days from now, then N+K days, the information retrieval apparatus needed to retrieve the needed information from the frozen brain may well be invented, and in fact, as each day passes, that becomes more likely.
>>>
Further, all the electro-chemical reactions have stopped 100%. Has anyone revived a brain that was 100% "brain dead" as seen on a EEG? Nope.
>>>
Wrong. Happens EVERY day on surgical operating tables all over the world. Those people who undergo certain types of operations are DEAD, without vital signs for hours, and their blood is pumped through a brain. They are flatlined, no heartbeat, etc. But they are now walking around all over the planet.
>>>
And you'd hope that society will continue to evolve technically and medically. And that their deep freeze. And the company doesn't go out of business. And that the legal system doesn't reclassify them as medical parts which can be used for other purposes since they are dead (cyborg, transplants, research, whatever). And that people decide that those 90's and 00's guys were really cool enough to bring back en mass. (Yeah, right.)
>>>
Why do we revive old people who go into cardiac arrest, even if they know nobody and are a burden on society?
>>>>
And even then, you're buying a number of years in a world that you are completely inept to understand and for all practical purposes will be worthless after the novelty wears off in a year (assuming they are able to revive you in a way that doesn't leave you brain damaged or in a poor quality of life).
>>> I can learn whatever I need, given time, and if I wake up in the future, I will have a lot of time....
Just so everyone will know what we are talking about, I will quote my previous post (now modded to 0 by ??) and your reply:
I wrote:
"You came to America b/c there is work here, and none or very little in your country. You came to the country me and my ancestors built from wilderness, leaving your country. You came here b/c there are benefits to BEING HERE--namely you may sell a product here, namely your labor.
So there are benefits to building a country like America. Namely, there is demand for labor here. Thus, building a country like America gives benefits to those who built it.
But YOU (and YOUR ancestors) did NOT build America. You built India (or whatever).
We Americans and our ancestors built America. But YOU reap the benefits, and you benefit through OUR work. And b/c you coming here increases the supply of labor, we lose, even while you gain.
Therefore you are a thief, and those who facilitated your entry into this country are also thieves. Polls show that Americans want less immigration, not more.
Therefore I call for you to be imprisoned for theft, along with those politicians and organzations (e.g., the ITAA) that aided and abetted you in your crime."
You wrote: "If everyone was held responsible for what their anchestors did.... Segregation and civil liberties... Colonialism and killing of American Indians or Native Americans. Crusades, religious wars etc. etc. and so on, everyone would be charged with something.
If "your" anchestor built America, what about the Indian-Arabic numbers that they use that came from India? What about the other things that came from India's anchestors that "your" anchestor borrowed or as you might say "stole"?
It's a stupid comment cryofan2 made but just in case something actually thinks it's valid in some nonsensical way."
My reply:
First of all, you appear to be laboring under a misconception, as evidenced by your use of the phrase " If everyone was responsible for what their ancestors did..." You are, I think, confusing a pre-programmed media-fed response you already have in your brain, with an entirely different situation as presented by my origianl post. You are off on some "sins of the fathers" slant.
What I am talking about here is "inheritance." We and our ancestors built this land, and the benefits accruing therefrom are ours, and not anyone else's.
Do you have something you inherited from a dead relative? Then by your logic, it is now mine.... Of course, you don't really use logic, do you? You just output preprogrammed responses...
You came to America b/c there is work here, and none or very little in your country. You came to the country me and my ancestors built from wilderness, leaving your country. You came here b/c there are benefits to BEING HERE--namely you may sell a product here, namely your labor.
So there are benefits to building a country like America. Namely, there is demand for labor here. Thus, building a country like America gives benefits to those who built it.
But YOU (and YOUR ancestors) did NOT build America. You built India (or whatever).
We Americans and our ancestors built America. But YOU reap the benefits, and you benefit through OUR work. And b/c you coming here increases the supply of labor, we lose, even while you gain.
Therefore you are a thief, and those who facilitated your entry into this country are also thieves. Polls show that Americans want less immigration, not more.
Therefore I call for you to be imprisoned for theft, along with those politicians and organzations (e.g., the ITAA) that aided and abetted you in your crime.
Slashdot Mirror
The original poster said:
"It is nice to see stuff like this in the mainstream media."
Nice to see acknowledgement that CorpGovMedia is not necessarily on our side.
At least in military R&D, enough research is done so that fundamental breakthroughs are accomplished. yes, it's true that the weapons systems may not work as promised, but, the important thing is that the fundamental research is done, and we get the benefit of it.
SO that is why I hope the military spending is angled more toward biological weaponry and bio-defenses--the resulting R&D could trigger breakthroughs in biology, which could help all of us live longer. Corporate funding has been aimed to this area as well, but it goes for the low-lying fruit; plus, it never goes far enough to generate breakthroughs; only goes far enough to generate executive bonuses...
Back to the good old days of the cold war, I say.
That will also mean the draft, and more jobs and more money for us old guys....
However, the basic idea is quite viable for those who generally feel constrained by the rules of society. This idea would not work with people such as scumbags/crooks who live outside society's rules, but for libertarian geeks and cryonicists, this might work.
I myself have recommended on the cryonet mailing list that cryonicists do this at the county level, and all move to Loving County, Texas, which has a population of about 100 or so. THey could effectively control the county. How much good that would do, I don't know.
Now, for more power, e.g., a state to "take over", there is Oregon, of course, which appears to be the most libertarian, progressive state available. For example, they have legal structure in place already to allow euthanasia for teh terminally ill, which could be a tremendous boon for cryonicists (or for anyone who does not want to die a lingering painful death when terminally ill). Also, there are the marijuana initiatives which recur periodically in Oregon.
In fact, Oregon is set up for "Power to the People", as opposed to states like Texas, which are set up for Power to the Rich/Corps., etc.
H
Autism genes that enhance programming abilities may lead to less children for the autistic programmer (AP), but if the AP is programming in the area of, say, development of life-extending technology (e.g., beating old age, cancer etc.) then the AP genes may lead to greater disperal of human genes later down the road.
That's what we get for allowing fucking teenagers to moderate and post....
>>
Am I a rapist, that you must know where I am at all times?
>>
yes, if an eyewitness saw you near the scene of a rape, you would be questioned.
>>
Am I a burglar, that I must explain my reasons for being in a particular place at a particular time?
>>>
yes, if an eyewitness saw you near the scene of a burglary, you would have to explain your reasons for being at that particular place at that particular time.
>>
Am I a murderer, that I may not move about freely of my own accord?
>>
yes, if an eyewitness saw you murder someone, expect some rather severe curtailments of your liberty.
And if the "eyewitness" is one that watches 24-7, unfailingly, always wakeful, always truthful? That is the camera....it never sleeps, or gets tired or hungry...it just keeps coming and coming, and it will never stop (given an ocassional replacement). It is the =Terminator= of witnesses...and I want it on my side.
A cheap webcam mounted on a light pole in her neighborhood could have brought the murderer to justice. But some people would rather indulge in 1984 fantasies....
Are you teh Washington DC sniper, hiding from the camera while you take innocent lives? No doubt he is reading this news story with glee and will be headed to Sharper Image with money in hand, asking for a handheld laser tomorrow before he makes his deadly rounds.
Why do you electronically scurry with your laser in hand?
What are you hiding...Rapist? Thief? Murderer?
....and not represent only rich people and corporations, that is what we want. Right? How about this--suppose a bunch of citizens marched on Washington and hung a bunch of politicians from lamp posts? Well, that would make this a lawless country, then, wouldn't it?
...or at least they will be when they are mature.
What the applicant would do to avoid complete rejection (and avoid paying your added rejection fee) is just to modify the claims so as to avoid all prior art...
The problem with your scheme is that it chills potential innovation, which is what the original patent idea was all about--grant a monopoly for a few years in return for disclosure of good stuff, heretofore unknown.
What the
THe reason that the USPTO does not search google is b/c most of the USPTO examiners who work on s/w patents are EE's, who may not know enuf background on s/w stuff to be effective at searching google for some patent on web design....so what the uspto needs is more comp sci oriented examiners, but the uspto hiring process is slanted towards engineers....
I can see that lawyers keep their livings close to the chest....they guard it jealously. I fully expect to see, what with the recent IP phenonenon, lawyers try to keep agents from practicing before the USPTO....
we typically have BS degrees in Eng, CS, Phy, Chem, and Bio.
In fact, you cannot even take the patent bar without a tech degree....
I use Skyway Soap because.....
whatever happened to that contest, anyway?
...I recently switched over to Linux (Mandrake 7.1) on both my PC's from Windows. I switched because I am planning on doing some programming projects on those PC's, and my research indicates that the Linux api's are much better documented that the Windows api's. It is just easier to programmatically control Linux than Windows.
However, the KDE gui and the apps that come with Mandrake are not as workable as in Windows, and they take a lot memory, too.
You've got a long ways to go, Linux--at least on the desktop.
I sure hope software patents are accepted on the same basis as the USA--that is how I make my living!
In order to defeat any claims of prior art, the patent inventor may complete an affidavit swearing that he conceived of the invention before any referenced prior art (say, something you guys may dig up from 1996), and show some evidence of diligent reduction to practice since that conception, say, some papers with notes on them that has the dates from 1996 onward.
no msg
But not in SV; in Houston.
A-1856
If you have a heart attack and your heart stops in the middle of Borneo with no one else around, you are dead. If you have a heart attack while undergoing minor surgery in a hospital, you very well may not be dead.
If you die of old age and are cremated, you are dead, because the information in your brain has been randomized beyond recovery.
If you die of old age, and are frozen, you may not be dead. If you make to the future 1000 years from now, you probably will not be dead, because the information that is in your brain and that constitutes "you" has not been randomized, so therefore, it may be recovered.
People are "killed" and their blood is cleaned by machine. "Flatlining" means no brain output, here.
You wrote:
>>
I think the greatest obstacle is the damage done by freezing. I don't care what their advocates say. If you destroy ever single cell in your body (when the water expands and solidifies, cracking all your cells), there is a MASSIVE amount of repair to do. "We can rebuild him", indeed, Mr. Austin. Can you think of the technology required to create nanodevices which have the *specialied* ability to repair the unique characteristics of every different type of body cell?
>>
Why would you think it impossible? It definitely is impossible today. And probably will be impossible 20 years from now. And probably impossible 100 years from now. But what about 500 years? What about 1000 years? 2000 years? Liquid nitrogen essentially stops rot for at least 10000 years, and that limit is only die to radiation, which can be worked around....
>>
And then there is the problem that actually killed you that you need to have repaired. And that not all freezing techniques are not done in whatever "special way" which will be discovered later for something like this to even be attempted.
>>>
Freezing does not randomize information, like cremation does. Therefore at some point in time, if not N days from now, then N+K days, the information retrieval apparatus needed to retrieve the needed information from the frozen brain may well be invented, and in fact, as each day passes, that becomes more likely.
>>>
Further, all the electro-chemical reactions have stopped 100%. Has anyone revived a brain that was 100% "brain dead" as seen on a EEG? Nope.
>>>
Wrong. Happens EVERY day on surgical operating tables all over the world. Those people who undergo certain types of operations are DEAD, without vital signs for hours, and their blood is pumped through a brain. They are flatlined, no heartbeat, etc. But they are now walking around all over the planet.
>>>
And you'd hope that society will continue to evolve technically and medically. And that their deep freeze. And the company doesn't go out of business. And that the legal system doesn't reclassify them as medical parts which can be used for other purposes since they are dead (cyborg, transplants, research, whatever). And that people decide that those 90's and 00's guys were really cool enough to bring back en mass. (Yeah, right.)
>>>
Why do we revive old people who go into cardiac arrest, even if they know nobody and are a burden on society?
>>>>
And even then, you're buying a number of years in a world that you are completely inept to understand and for all practical purposes will be worthless after the novelty wears off in a year (assuming they are able to revive you in a way that doesn't leave you brain damaged or in a poor quality of life).
>>>
I can learn whatever I need, given time, and if I wake up in the future, I will have a lot of time....
>>
And then you're going to die anyways.
>>>
Sez you....
How was my analogy flawed?
Sounds like you are just going by what is traditionally flawed. Maybe I should not be asking such logic-oriented questions....
I wrote:
"You came to America b/c there is work here, and none or very little in your country. You came to the country me and my ancestors built from wilderness, leaving your country. You came here b/c there are benefits to BEING HERE--namely you may sell a product here, namely your labor.
So there are benefits to building a country like America. Namely, there is demand for labor here. Thus, building a country like America gives benefits to those who built it.
But YOU (and YOUR ancestors) did NOT build America. You built India (or whatever).
We Americans and our ancestors built America. But YOU reap the benefits, and you benefit through OUR work. And b/c you coming here increases the supply of labor, we lose, even while you gain.
Therefore you are a thief, and those who facilitated your entry into this country are also thieves. Polls show that Americans want less immigration, not more.
Therefore I call for you to be imprisoned for theft, along with those politicians and organzations (e.g., the ITAA) that aided and abetted you in your crime."
You wrote:
"If everyone was held responsible for what their anchestors did
Segregation and civil liberties
Colonialism and killing of American Indians or Native Americans.
Crusades, religious wars etc. etc. and so on, everyone would be charged with something.
If "your" anchestor built America, what about the Indian-Arabic numbers that they use that came from India? What about the other things that came from India's anchestors that "your" anchestor borrowed or as you might say "stole"?
It's a stupid comment cryofan2 made but just in case something actually thinks it's valid in some nonsensical way."
My reply:
First of all, you appear to be laboring under a misconception, as evidenced by your use of the phrase " If everyone was responsible for what their ancestors did..."
You are, I think, confusing a pre-programmed media-fed response you already have in your brain, with an entirely different situation as presented by my origianl post. You are off on some "sins of the fathers" slant.
What I am talking about here is "inheritance." We and our ancestors built this land, and the benefits accruing therefrom are ours, and not anyone else's.
Do you have something you inherited from a dead relative? Then by your logic, it is now mine....
Of course, you don't really use logic, do you? You just output preprogrammed responses...
So there are benefits to building a country like America. Namely, there is demand for labor here. Thus, building a country like America gives benefits to those who built it.
But YOU (and YOUR ancestors) did NOT build America. You built India (or whatever).
We Americans and our ancestors built America. But YOU reap the benefits, and you benefit through OUR work. And b/c you coming here increases the supply of labor, we lose, even while you gain.
Therefore you are a thief, and those who facilitated your entry into this country are also thieves. Polls show that Americans want less immigration, not more.
Therefore I call for you to be imprisoned for theft, along with those politicians and organzations (e.g., the ITAA) that aided and abetted you in your crime.