Feeling uneasy watching someone smash a baby for no reason only proves that most humans a not psychotic murderers. I don't know what the author thinks of humans but this is certainly below my expectations.
Corporations only care about projects that have a good chance of profits in 5-10 years, which is why private spacecraft are only in LEO. Space exploration is something that might be very important 100 years later, but today it's mostly an expensive scientific project. Which is why corporations aren't interested in it, and why it has to be pioneered by governments. What this statement really means is that NASA has no intentions in a manned Mars mission.
On the other hand you get to program a friggin spacecraft that collects space junk. For many people the coolness factor might be more than enough of a compensation.
I guess the idea behind magsails is that a magnetic field, unlike a sail, doesn't have to be carried and then painfully deployed, thus the only thing limiting its size is the power available. But in case of an asteroid, there are no such concerns, because there are plans of "painting" the asteroid with reflective dust, using the rock itself as a sail.
Lisp is, in fact, the perfect example of why academia can screw up language design. It needed garbage collection, an interpreter, higher-order functions and tons of other techniques that weren't available at the time. And even after the first interpreter was coded, it was far too slow for any practical application. It wasn't until the eighties that these technologies have developed to a level to allow for optimal interpreters. Which is why the claim that academia always try to design for efficiency is wrong, with their supercomputers and funds for dedicated Lisp machines they didn't need efficiency.
There are also languages today designed by academics, and a rise of programmers in language design is simply caused by the fact that nowadays everyone has a PC, and thus everyone has the means to design a language.
You complain about lack of innovation yet discard syntax changes as "ugly" and don't care about semantic changes as they all "compile to the same machine code". The fact that you are not interested in new things doesn't mean they don't exist.
Does your language compile to the target? Does your language run and compile from your development host?
When do you live? These problems are nonexistent. Real languages are all crossplatform (maybe except C#).
To an extent, OOP is just a formalisation of things that function programmers have been doing for decades into a space-saving syntax.
OOP is much more than that. True, can implement encapsulation in many languages like Javascript does, but that doesn't make it an OO language. The real power of OOP comes from inheritance and polymorphism, and the OO way of coding that focuses on the data rather than the algorithm.
Similarly for other "paradigms" of programming.
You have already mentioned logical(Prolog), but maybe you haven't heard of functional(Haskell), message-passing(Smalltalk) or stack-based(Forth) languages.
Basically, if you wanted, you could rewrite a C pre-processor to compile any of those languages directly to C syntax, and vice-versa. There's nothing "new", just some "shiny" things.
As C is Turing-complete, you can rewrite any language compiler in it, and true enough many new languages have compilers that produce intermediate C code. On the other hand, you can't rewrite an interpreted language in C.
Things haven't moved on since C, really. Sure, we've prettied up the syntax, clarified some edge-cases, added some libraries, etc. but it's all just spit-and-polish on a language made in the 60's. The fact we use those slightly-cleaner versions for the vast majority of software today (including the compilers of most of those other languages) means that there really wasn't any huge paradigm shift, or change in the way we work, or need to move on.
While it's true that most languages are still imperative, what we need is not a new low-level paradigm. Most low-level problems are already solved, the real advances are in higher-level concepts. Memory management, concurrency, modularity, persistance and portability are the things where the new languages are strong at.
The only thing I think might change the way we work in quantum computing. That's going to need a serious rethink and redesign in order for people to "program" them effectively. But, you know what? I have a suspicion that the first practical languages for that will be "C with knobs on".
Quantum computing will enable mass paralellisation and nonlinear programming. Many new languages are good at those, but C is not even close. I seriously doubt that there will be a C-like language for quantum computing.
But sadly that is only a partial solution. There are also jerks on the bus who dare to talk to each other. Sadly, in this case phone jamming doesn't work, you have to gag them individually. But that still isn't enough, most buses/subways have engines that are even louder than talking people. I still haven't figured out a way to stop those engines, but I'm working on it...
The problem is that these alternative therapies are being practiced and taught without first being subjected to scientific evaluation -- it is anyone's guess as to whether or not these treatments are actually effective.
although they are incompatible with western science which is why many are sceptical about them. But western medicine isn't that scientific either, it's still mostly an empirical field. The majority of modern medication was first found in plants by trial and error, not derived from predictions of a rational model.
These scientists are objecting to the teaching of treatments that have no evidence to support their use
A thousand years of folk knowledge is plenty of statistical evidence.
How do you suppose to disperse people without pissing them off? Every tool can be used for good and bad. Not all demonstrators are peaceful, and crowd control is necessary during riots, to prevent an aggressive minority from vandalising the city. Letting a mob do whatever they want leads exactly to that might-makes-right anarchistic scenario you seem to be against.
Exactly. The problem is not that there aren't good textbooks, but the teachers who only buy the newest shiniest crap. But when a teacher is incompetent then the book is the least of the problems.
Slashdot Mirror
Many of the Japanese nuclear plants are old unsecure BWRs, they should start working on safer ones so they can shut them down in 10 years.
The difference between them is that Japan doesn't have fossil fuels either.
Feeling uneasy watching someone smash a baby for no reason only proves that most humans a not psychotic murderers. I don't know what the author thinks of humans but this is certainly below my expectations.
Corporations only care about projects that have a good chance of profits in 5-10 years, which is why private spacecraft are only in LEO. Space exploration is something that might be very important 100 years later, but today it's mostly an expensive scientific project. Which is why corporations aren't interested in it, and why it has to be pioneered by governments. What this statement really means is that NASA has no intentions in a manned Mars mission.
Not Avatar, the reason he went under sea is to film Titanic 2.
If terrorists would start hacking instead of blowing up civilians, would it really be that bad?
Don't worry, most studios don't spend much on salaries, the big costs are marketing and management.
Yeah it's not the first law it violates but the second.
The European entertainment industry is owned by American companies. Although you are right about Japan, Sony plays a major part in these legislations.
On the other hand you get to program a friggin spacecraft that collects space junk. For many people the coolness factor might be more than enough of a compensation.
I guess the idea behind magsails is that a magnetic field, unlike a sail, doesn't have to be carried and then painfully deployed, thus the only thing limiting its size is the power available. But in case of an asteroid, there are no such concerns, because there are plans of "painting" the asteroid with reflective dust, using the rock itself as a sail.
I think they did it for the lulz.
Lisp is, in fact, the perfect example of why academia can screw up language design. It needed garbage collection, an interpreter, higher-order functions and tons of other techniques that weren't available at the time. And even after the first interpreter was coded, it was far too slow for any practical application. It wasn't until the eighties that these technologies have developed to a level to allow for optimal interpreters. Which is why the claim that academia always try to design for efficiency is wrong, with their supercomputers and funds for dedicated Lisp machines they didn't need efficiency.
There are also languages today designed by academics, and a rise of programmers in language design is simply caused by the fact that nowadays everyone has a PC, and thus everyone has the means to design a language.
You complain about lack of innovation yet discard syntax changes as "ugly" and don't care about semantic changes as they all "compile to the same machine code". The fact that you are not interested in new things doesn't mean they don't exist.
Does your language compile to the target? Does your language run and compile from your development host?
When do you live? These problems are nonexistent. Real languages are all crossplatform (maybe except C#).
To an extent, OOP is just a formalisation of things that function programmers have been doing for decades into a space-saving syntax.
OOP is much more than that. True, can implement encapsulation in many languages like Javascript does, but that doesn't make it an OO language. The real power of OOP comes from inheritance and polymorphism, and the OO way of coding that focuses on the data rather than the algorithm.
Similarly for other "paradigms" of programming.
You have already mentioned logical(Prolog), but maybe you haven't heard of functional(Haskell), message-passing(Smalltalk) or stack-based(Forth) languages.
Basically, if you wanted, you could rewrite a C pre-processor to compile any of those languages directly to C syntax, and vice-versa. There's nothing "new", just some "shiny" things.
As C is Turing-complete, you can rewrite any language compiler in it, and true enough many new languages have compilers that produce intermediate C code. On the other hand, you can't rewrite an interpreted language in C.
Things haven't moved on since C, really. Sure, we've prettied up the syntax, clarified some edge-cases, added some libraries, etc. but it's all just spit-and-polish on a language made in the 60's. The fact we use those slightly-cleaner versions for the vast majority of software today (including the compilers of most of those other languages) means that there really wasn't any huge paradigm shift, or change in the way we work, or need to move on.
While it's true that most languages are still imperative, what we need is not a new low-level paradigm. Most low-level problems are already solved, the real advances are in higher-level concepts. Memory management, concurrency, modularity, persistance and portability are the things where the new languages are strong at.
The only thing I think might change the way we work in quantum computing. That's going to need a serious rethink and redesign in order for people to "program" them effectively. But, you know what? I have a suspicion that the first practical languages for that will be "C with knobs on".
Quantum computing will enable mass paralellisation and nonlinear programming. Many new languages are good at those, but C is not even close. I seriously doubt that there will be a C-like language for quantum computing.
Solar sails use radiation pressure, not solar wind.
But sadly that is only a partial solution. There are also jerks on the bus who dare to talk to each other. Sadly, in this case phone jamming doesn't work, you have to gag them individually. But that still isn't enough, most buses/subways have engines that are even louder than talking people. I still haven't figured out a way to stop those engines, but I'm working on it...
Welcome to the face of globalization, where the rush to the bottom has given us jobs that pay only 1/10 of a McJob.
I'm pretty sure that in Morocco McDonald's doesn't pay 10$/hour. Even here in eastern Europe they only pay about 2$/hour.
The problem is that these alternative therapies are being practiced and taught without first being subjected to scientific evaluation -- it is anyone's guess as to whether or not these treatments are actually effective.
Chinese medicine has detailed models
although they are incompatible with western science which is why many are sceptical about them. But western medicine isn't that scientific either, it's still mostly an empirical field. The majority of modern medication was first found in plants by trial and error, not derived from predictions of a rational model.
These scientists are objecting to the teaching of treatments that have no evidence to support their use
A thousand years of folk knowledge is plenty of statistical evidence.
If they still have at least one hand, just put an off switch on it.
It might come as a surprise but there are also people listening to music that is hundreds of years old.
Of course not, it was only copied and the original version is still there.
So this is how it works in America? In that case, excuse my ignorance.
How do you suppose to disperse people without pissing them off? Every tool can be used for good and bad. Not all demonstrators are peaceful, and crowd control is necessary during riots, to prevent an aggressive minority from vandalising the city. Letting a mob do whatever they want leads exactly to that might-makes-right anarchistic scenario you seem to be against.
But teachers decide which books their students have to use.
Exactly. The problem is not that there aren't good textbooks, but the teachers who only buy the newest shiniest crap. But when a teacher is incompetent then the book is the least of the problems.