Well, the point is that our nuclear weapons are pretty "good". We can, quite easily, use them to nuke cities or islands full of civilians if we so desire.
What do you want to do? Nuke them harder?
Tactical weapons research...taking out military targets. That's worth researching. It can make war more humane while making our military force more powerful.
But I don't see any advantages in having nuclear weapons more devasting than what we already have.
Well, maybe for attacking space aliens or something.
Haha. You even got +5, Insightful. Why don't we look at the rest of the sentence?
Brodie figured out that a document is really just a collection of pieces of text, and that it didn't really matter where each piece of text is physically located within the document's file.
I.e., if you're going to have "The dog is red." appears in the document, it doesn't matter if "The" occurs in the file before "red", or vice-versa.
Maybe this seems trivial to you, but I think most of us when designing a document format would try to put "The" before "dog", by instinct. It makes sense.
So what he figured out is not as straightforward as your out-of-context quotation makes it out to be. He was, at least, being a little creative. The article then goes onto explain multiple ways in which this design was useful in Word processing software.
I realize you're just being an asshole and that you probably didn't read the article, but just looked for a way to use it to make fun of Microsoft. "Standard Operating Procedure" at Slashdot, I know.
But, moderators, this guy doesn't deserve Insightful. He should be Flamebait.
Most instructors are going to be clueless or, at least, misinformed about computers anyway. What the students will be learning probably isn't strictly correct and will most likely be introductions to software that will be obsolete in a few years anyway, rather than more generally applicable knowledge.
Typing, on the other hand, is a motor skill that can be objectively graded by the computer itself. The instructors might teach it wrong but, if so, they'll know they're doing a bad job. So, it's a safe subject for teaching by anyone the school can hire to do so.
But I don't think that typing with high speed and accuracy will benefit most students. I get a lot of mileage out of my typing skills...but I work as a programmer.
Most people are going to type while writing letters, reports, etc. Maybe they can only get 10WPM...but I doubt my own score is going to be much higher in practice. I still spend a lot more time on thinking about what I'm going to write, proofreading, etc. than I do actually typing.
SO...yeah...typing, maybe not that useful, but easy to teach and get right. Computer skills, useful, but not likely to be taught correctly.
Do a little of both and cross your fingers. That's my take on it.
So, basically, what you're saying is that TopCoder is all about encouraging programmers to be the sort of self-centered bastard you want to murder when you have to maintain their code.
No, that isn't what I'm saying. I thought I made this clear.
How about an analogy?
NASCAR isn't about teaching drivers to speed 300mph down Main street while taking their kids to school.
They know better. So should TopCoder participants. Do they? Well, if they don't then they aren't likely to have been very good software developers in the first place.
One of the requirements could be to clearly comment the code.
You obviously don't understand these competitions.
The tricky part isn't the programming. These are small programs. It's figuring out WHAT to program that is difficult - the problem solving portion, you know?
The whole idea is to write the code quickly and your score is based on the time it takes to complete it. So, how much time should someone spend on comments?
You'd have to somehow assess the value of someone's comments to offset the cost of the time to write them. This is would, of course, be almost entirely subjective and would add all manner of complications to the contest. Best to keep it simple, in my opinion.
By the way...as it stands, the tests for correctness, etc. are done automatically by basically unit-testing the submitted code. So to even look at the comments would require actually hiring people (and not just any people...programmers!) to sit there and look every submission. Needless to say, that's a LOT more expensive than running a simple shell script;)
As for why they don't support Smalltalk or APL...well, I don't know. It might have to do with the number of users. The languages they DO support are currently the most popular ones.
Their reasons could easily be political or technical as well though.
Okay. So whether or not Lucy is a "missing link" or whatever is a subject of debate among scientists.
Well, whoop-dee-doo. That was true when Lucy was discovered. I'm not ignorant of this fact. Scientists are wrong all the time and sometimes, maybe too often, they'll refuse to admit it (although the scientific community at large does its best to eventually converge on the truth).
Your quotation makes it sound like a huge conspiracy though, as if the discoverers were just making this stuff up and purposefully tricking other people...or that they discovered later that they were wrong about Lucy and tried to hide it.
That's wrong, low, unscientific...just terrible. If they did, in fact, do this, then everyone knowingly involved should lose their jobs and be barred from the scientific community.
But if they were just wrong and didn't know it...well, that's an occupational hazard. They should admit it (or not, whatever) and move on.
But I don't see any evidence of any such conspiracy in your quotations. Is there any evidence?
Does anyone have any information on Lucy? Is there any reason to believe that it was a hoax?
I wasn't aware of this...and, searching, I did find modern references to Lucy. It doesn't appear that Johannson was part of any huge scandal or anything. The only references I can find to Lucy as some sort of hoax were on religious sites.
Granted, I didn't search for THAT long. But you'd think if it were true it wouldn't take long to find it.
Searching for info on Hanegraff on Google though, the first two links referred to him as "The Bible Answer Man"...the third referred to a criminal lawsuit against him.
Neither of which makes him particularly trustworthy when talking about evolution...
That doesn't mean he's wrong though. If anyone knows of any reputable (and preferably secular) sources of information about this I'd appreciate it you could post links here.
Pornography is indecent. I think any sane person agrees with that. Yup. Of course, your definition of pornography might be different than mine.
It has no role in public or private life. What you mean to say is that you think it shouldn't have a role in public or private life. Pornography is a very sucessful business. I'd say it most certainly plays a role in public and private life. That doesn't mean it is good, of course. Death, poverty, hunger...these things also play a role in public and private life.
It demeans women, turns them into toys. No it doesn't.
It glamorizes sex. Yup.
That's the problem. Why is it a problem to glamorize sex?
I can think of only two bad effects this might have:
a) People might be disappointed because they were expecting something better? I doubt that's your concern.
b) People will seek out sex because it has been made to seem more desirable than it really is.
I can see how you might be worried about B but a better bet than making porn illegal would be to distribute drugs to kill people's sex drive.
It is the sex drive that causes people to seek out pornography, not vice versa.
I guess if you believe that sex is something that should be done outside of marriage, then you probably don't have a problem with pornography. Yup!
If our nation turns into one where the majority don't value the sanctity of life or the sanctity of the institution created by God to bring forth that life, pornography is the least of our worries. Why?
Lewd talk and foul language have no place in public discourse. You can express yourself better if you use clean language. If you're talking to a bunch of Puritans your message will be delivered much more effectively if you avoid using "foul" language. Why? Because they'll stop listening to you if you don't cater to their preferences. It's like that with any group.
My favorite author, Isaac Asimov, agreed with your sentiment. He felt it unnecessary to include a great deal of swearing in his stories. I remember one of his characters would go around screaming "Unprintable!" all the time. It was funny.
But it was INTENDED to be funny.
A lot of TV shows, movies, books, etc...will use foul language simply because having people shout "Fiddlesticks!" or "Golly jeepers!" when they're being shot at would just be comical. That (generally) isn't the intended effect.
They did do (roughly) that in "O Brother Where Art Thou?" And people laughed. Point made, I hope?
The fact is that this these particular stories are generally about "coarse" people and that's the way they speak.
"SHAFT! You're gosh-darn-tootin' right."
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?
There is no need to use sailor talk in front on women or children, or even men for that matter. Hmmm....sure is interesting that you lump women and children in the same group. Unconsciously too, I'll bet.
It is a crime to defecate in public places, so it should be a crime to defecate foul language with your mouth in public places. You do know that "defecate" means exactly the same thing as "shit", right? Except that "shit" will work as a verb OR a noun.
You've decided that saying "shit" will somehow destroy society but that saying "defectate" is okay.
Weird.
That said, if I'm visiting an elementary school I'm not going to go around yelling "Shit!" all the time.
But not because I think it's going to hurt anyone.
I just don't want to cause a scene because people like you get so riled up about it sometimes.
I know this peeves you so-called "liberals" and libertarians out there, but let's face the facts. Why don't we? All you've mentioned so far are your opinions. I'd love to hear some facts.
America was founded on religious principles, that rights come from God, that government is supposed to p
Although explained in the context of consciously made decisions, the poster is not implying that these decisions are actually meticulously calculated.
Men remain faithful to women because they like (love?) that woman or because they are in some way dependent on them...NOT because they've figured it is the best way to ensure the proliferation of their genes.
That's what our brains buy us.
However, there are things beyond our control. A man might be in love with one woman, with absolutely no intention or desire to ever be unfaithful to her. But if this man sees a beautiful, young, scantily clad woman dancing provocatively on TV, he's very likely going to be affected by that.
It's that impulse that the poster is talking about. All of this talk about calculations...those are possible explanations for why those impulses exist. We KNOW the impulses are there, but we don't know why they evolved. So we speculate. We find out what triggers these natural responses, then try to figure out how this could be an advantage.
Of course, if you think the concept of "human evolution" is a load of crap, this will mean nothing to you. Oh, well;)
But if you're interested, Richard Dawkins talks a lot about this sort of thing in "The Selfish Gene".
I keep getting a call from the NYT(?)...claiming to be asking for a donation to the MacArthur(?) foundation or something of the sort. They help kids with cancer...certainly a worthy cause and if that was really the purpose of the call, I probably would've given them some money.
The thing is, they're really just selling a subscription to the NYT. Something like 5-10% of the subscription goes to the charity. Whoop-dee-doo.
If there was an ounce of sincerity in the offer, they'd give them the lion's share of the money and hope to recoup the loss if renewed my subscription. Sleazy bastards.
Well, there are a number of ways she could (theorhetically) be helping by working as a psychologist, though there is certainly no guarantee.
* If she treats children she might prevent those children from becoming abusive to their own children, ten years down the line. Or she might prevent them from becoming rapists.
* If she works in social services she might identify children who are being abused and put an earlier stop to it.
* Even if she doesn't help prevent it, she might be able to help repair the damage in the aftermath. Just because she's making money from it doesn't mean it isn't still a worthy cause.
That said, I've never been impressed with what I've seen from the field of psychology. I do think that just talking to someone who is genuinely interested in helping you work through your problems is helpful though.
So, regardless of whether or not their science has much merit, I think psychologists are doing good work.
But the whole "how can you study X when Y is occurring argument" is pretty lame. A society like ours which supports deep specializations has to have people specializing in every field. Might as well go with the one you enjoy and/or have talent for...
Of course, you'd have to be a total prick to actually do it. It's not the fault of anyone that works at the store you're at - it's "the suits" handing down corporate policy.
It's likely you'd be asked to leave...or be thrown out by security (or police, if necessary). The chances are very good the people making the decision would never hear about it. You'd have just made a fool of yourself or given the store's employees a lot of unnecessary grief.
We don't even have to build something smart enough to learn.
Uhm...the machine you're talking about knows how to "take over" another machine and the two working together magically have the "abilities" of both?
This most definitely requires learning if it is going to be anything special. Otherwise, how is this program going to discover anything interesting about the computer it has "taken over" and use it for anything other than spreading itself?
Without some very sophisticated AI, you're just talking about internet worms...which we've already got plenty of and they're not very interesting.
Re:What applications are there
on
Mono Beta 2 Released
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Maybe.
But it's even more like Microsoft was being practical.
Erhm...the world-wide flood is the reason the dinosaurs are extinct? You mean the whole Noah's Ark thing? That's what you think happened to the dinosaurs?
Despite the current lack of evidence for a world-wide flood?
Despite the consensus among scientists that there simply weren't any humans around when the dinosaurs died off, when according to the Bible there were humans around during the world-wide flood.
I've heard much better creationist theories. Why would you believe that particular one?
Slashdot Mirror
It behooves us to stay ahead of the curve.
Well, the point is that our nuclear weapons are pretty "good". We can, quite easily, use them to nuke cities or islands full of civilians if we so desire.
What do you want to do? Nuke them harder?
Tactical weapons research...taking out military targets. That's worth researching. It can make war more humane while making our military force more powerful.
But I don't see any advantages in having nuclear weapons more devasting than what we already have.
Well, maybe for attacking space aliens or something.
Haha. You even got +5, Insightful. Why don't we look at the rest of the sentence?
Brodie figured out that a document is really just a collection of pieces of text, and that it didn't really matter where each piece of text is physically located within the document's file.
I.e., if you're going to have "The dog is red." appears in the document, it doesn't matter if "The" occurs in the file before "red", or vice-versa.
Maybe this seems trivial to you, but I think most of us when designing a document format would try to put "The" before "dog", by instinct. It makes sense.
So what he figured out is not as straightforward as your out-of-context quotation makes it out to be. He was, at least, being a little creative. The article then goes onto explain multiple ways in which this design was useful in Word processing software.
I realize you're just being an asshole and that you probably didn't read the article, but just looked for a way to use it to make fun of Microsoft. "Standard Operating Procedure" at Slashdot, I know.
But, moderators, this guy doesn't deserve Insightful. He should be Flamebait.
But on the other hand, people watch baseball.
I agree.
Most instructors are going to be clueless or, at least, misinformed about computers anyway. What the students will be learning probably isn't strictly correct and will most likely be introductions to software that will be obsolete in a few years anyway, rather than more generally applicable knowledge.
Typing, on the other hand, is a motor skill that can be objectively graded by the computer itself. The instructors might teach it wrong but, if so, they'll know they're doing a bad job. So, it's a safe subject for teaching by anyone the school can hire to do so.
But I don't think that typing with high speed and accuracy will benefit most students. I get a lot of mileage out of my typing skills...but I work as a programmer.
Most people are going to type while writing letters, reports, etc. Maybe they can only get 10WPM...but I doubt my own score is going to be much higher in practice. I still spend a lot more time on thinking about what I'm going to write, proofreading, etc. than I do actually typing.
SO...yeah...typing, maybe not that useful, but easy to teach and get right. Computer skills, useful, but not likely to be taught correctly.
Do a little of both and cross your fingers. That's my take on it.
So, basically, what you're saying is that TopCoder is all about encouraging programmers to be the sort of self-centered bastard you want to murder when you have to maintain their code.
No, that isn't what I'm saying. I thought I made this clear.
How about an analogy?
NASCAR isn't about teaching drivers to speed 300mph down Main street while taking their kids to school.
They know better. So should TopCoder participants. Do they? Well, if they don't then they aren't likely to have been very good software developers in the first place.
One of the requirements could be to clearly comment the code.
;)
You obviously don't understand these competitions.
The tricky part isn't the programming. These are small programs. It's figuring out WHAT to program that is difficult - the problem solving portion, you know?
The whole idea is to write the code quickly and your score is based on the time it takes to complete it. So, how much time should someone spend on comments?
You'd have to somehow assess the value of someone's comments to offset the cost of the time to write them. This is would, of course, be almost entirely subjective and would add all manner of complications to the contest. Best to keep it simple, in my opinion.
By the way...as it stands, the tests for correctness, etc. are done automatically by basically unit-testing the submitted code. So to even look at the comments would require actually hiring people (and not just any people...programmers!) to sit there and look every submission. Needless to say, that's a LOT more expensive than running a simple shell script
As for why they don't support Smalltalk or APL...well, I don't know. It might have to do with the number of users. The languages they DO support are currently the most popular ones.
Their reasons could easily be political or technical as well though.
Okay. So whether or not Lucy is a "missing link" or whatever is a subject of debate among scientists.
Well, whoop-dee-doo. That was true when Lucy was discovered. I'm not ignorant of this fact. Scientists are wrong all the time and sometimes, maybe too often, they'll refuse to admit it (although the scientific community at large does its best to eventually converge on the truth).
Your quotation makes it sound like a huge conspiracy though, as if the discoverers were just making this stuff up and purposefully tricking other people...or that they discovered later that they were wrong about Lucy and tried to hide it.
That's wrong, low, unscientific...just terrible. If they did, in fact, do this, then everyone knowingly involved should lose their jobs and be barred from the scientific community.
But if they were just wrong and didn't know it...well, that's an occupational hazard. They should admit it (or not, whatever) and move on.
But I don't see any evidence of any such conspiracy in your quotations. Is there any evidence?
Does anyone have any information on Lucy? Is there any reason to believe that it was a hoax?
I wasn't aware of this...and, searching, I did find modern references to Lucy. It doesn't appear that Johannson was part of any huge scandal or anything. The only references I can find to Lucy as some sort of hoax were on religious sites.
Granted, I didn't search for THAT long. But you'd think if it were true it wouldn't take long to find it.
Searching for info on Hanegraff on Google though, the first two links referred to him as "The Bible Answer Man"...the third referred to a criminal lawsuit against him.
Neither of which makes him particularly trustworthy when talking about evolution...
That doesn't mean he's wrong though. If anyone knows of any reputable (and preferably secular) sources of information about this I'd appreciate it you could post links here.
Agreed...The End of Eternity was awesome.
However, I don't think it is the perfect example of his non-robot work.
The perfect example, in my opinion, is The Senousous Dirty Old Man.
Well, that's all fine and dandy, I suppose...but how am I going to dodge the draft for THAT war?
Sneak into Mexico?
Other people have already said it at length, but it can be put succinctly.
When it comes to science, we'd rather have false negatives than false positives.
Pornography is indecent. I think any sane person agrees with that.
Yup. Of course, your definition of pornography might be different than mine.
It has no role in public or private life.
What you mean to say is that you think it shouldn't have a role in public or private life. Pornography is a very sucessful business. I'd say it most certainly plays a role in public and private life. That doesn't mean it is good, of course. Death, poverty, hunger...these things also play a role in public and private life.
It demeans women, turns them into toys.
No it doesn't.
It glamorizes sex.
Yup.
That's the problem.
Why is it a problem to glamorize sex?
I can think of only two bad effects this might have:
a) People might be disappointed because they were expecting something better? I doubt that's your concern.
b) People will seek out sex because it has been made to seem more desirable than it really is.
I can see how you might be worried about B but a better bet than making porn illegal would be to distribute drugs to kill people's sex drive.
It is the sex drive that causes people to seek out pornography, not vice versa.
I guess if you believe that sex is something that should be done outside of marriage, then you probably don't have a problem with pornography.
Yup!
If our nation turns into one where the majority don't value the sanctity of life or the sanctity of the institution created by God to bring forth that life, pornography is the least of our worries.
Why?
Lewd talk and foul language have no place in public discourse. You can express yourself better if you use clean language.
If you're talking to a bunch of Puritans your message will be delivered much more effectively if you avoid using "foul" language. Why? Because they'll stop listening to you if you don't cater to their preferences. It's like that with any group.
My favorite author, Isaac Asimov, agreed with your sentiment. He felt it unnecessary to include a great deal of swearing in his stories. I remember one of his characters would go around screaming "Unprintable!" all the time. It was funny.
But it was INTENDED to be funny.
A lot of TV shows, movies, books, etc...will use foul language simply because having people shout "Fiddlesticks!" or "Golly jeepers!" when they're being shot at would just be comical. That (generally) isn't the intended effect.
They did do (roughly) that in "O Brother Where Art Thou?" And people laughed. Point made, I hope?
The fact is that this these particular stories are generally about "coarse" people and that's the way they speak.
"SHAFT! You're gosh-darn-tootin' right."
Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?
There is no need to use sailor talk in front on women or children, or even men for that matter.
Hmmm....sure is interesting that you lump women and children in the same group. Unconsciously too, I'll bet.
It is a crime to defecate in public places, so it should be a crime to defecate foul language with your mouth in public places.
You do know that "defecate" means exactly the same thing as "shit", right? Except that "shit" will work as a verb OR a noun.
You've decided that saying "shit" will somehow destroy society but that saying "defectate" is okay.
Weird.
That said, if I'm visiting an elementary school I'm not going to go around yelling "Shit!" all the time.
But not because I think it's going to hurt anyone.
I just don't want to cause a scene because people like you get so riled up about it sometimes.
I know this peeves you so-called "liberals" and libertarians out there, but let's face the facts.
Why don't we? All you've mentioned so far are your opinions. I'd love to hear some facts.
America was founded on religious principles, that rights come from God, that government is supposed to p
Roll-your-own security algorithms are a very bad idea, as most of us know. Get a professional to do it.
We're not talking about the IT department at the local grocery store here. We're talking about India.
INDIA.
Something tells me they're not going to have a problem finding a competent mathematician or computer scientist to help them out.
To an individual developer $995 might be a lot of money, but for a software company that's not really all that much.
Although explained in the context of consciously made decisions, the poster is not implying that these decisions are actually meticulously calculated.
;)
Men remain faithful to women because they like (love?) that woman or because they are in some way dependent on them...NOT because they've figured it is the best way to ensure the proliferation of their genes.
That's what our brains buy us.
However, there are things beyond our control. A man might be in love with one woman, with absolutely no intention or desire to ever be unfaithful to her. But if this man sees a beautiful, young, scantily clad woman dancing provocatively on TV, he's very likely going to be affected by that.
It's that impulse that the poster is talking about. All of this talk about calculations...those are possible explanations for why those impulses exist. We KNOW the impulses are there, but we don't know why they evolved. So we speculate. We find out what triggers these natural responses, then try to figure out how this could be an advantage.
Of course, if you think the concept of "human evolution" is a load of crap, this will mean nothing to you. Oh, well
But if you're interested, Richard Dawkins talks a lot about this sort of thing in "The Selfish Gene".
No kidding. Regulation would be nice.
I keep getting a call from the NYT(?)...claiming to be asking for a donation to the MacArthur(?) foundation or something of the sort. They help kids with cancer...certainly a worthy cause and if that was really the purpose of the call, I probably would've given them some money.
The thing is, they're really just selling a subscription to the NYT. Something like 5-10% of the subscription goes to the charity. Whoop-dee-doo.
If there was an ounce of sincerity in the offer, they'd give them the lion's share of the money and hope to recoup the loss if renewed my subscription. Sleazy bastards.
Hell, in zero G...I could "hold the whole goddamn shuttle up".
The trick, of course, is figuring out which direction is up.
Well, there are a number of ways she could (theorhetically) be helping by working as a psychologist, though there is certainly no guarantee.
* If she treats children she might prevent those children from becoming abusive to their own children, ten years down the line. Or she might prevent them from becoming rapists.
* If she works in social services she might identify children who are being abused and put an earlier stop to it.
* Even if she doesn't help prevent it, she might be able to help repair the damage in the aftermath. Just because she's making money from it doesn't mean it isn't still a worthy cause.
That said, I've never been impressed with what I've seen from the field of psychology. I do think that just talking to someone who is genuinely interested in helping you work through your problems is helpful though.
So, regardless of whether or not their science has much merit, I think psychologists are doing good work.
But the whole "how can you study X when Y is occurring argument" is pretty lame. A society like ours which supports deep specializations has to have people specializing in every field. Might as well go with the one you enjoy and/or have talent for...
Brilliant!
Well, almost.
Of course, you'd have to be a total prick to actually do it. It's not the fault of anyone that works at the store you're at - it's "the suits" handing down corporate policy.
It's likely you'd be asked to leave...or be thrown out by security (or police, if necessary). The chances are very good the people making the decision would never hear about it. You'd have just made a fool of yourself or given the store's employees a lot of unnecessary grief.
We don't even have to build something smart enough to learn.
Uhm...the machine you're talking about knows how to "take over" another machine and the two working together magically have the "abilities" of both?
This most definitely requires learning if it is going to be anything special. Otherwise, how is this program going to discover anything interesting about the computer it has "taken over" and use it for anything other than spreading itself?
Without some very sophisticated AI, you're just talking about internet worms...which we've already got plenty of and they're not very interesting.
Maybe.
But it's even more like Microsoft was being practical.
Erhm...the world-wide flood is the reason the dinosaurs are extinct? You mean the whole Noah's Ark thing? That's what you think happened to the dinosaurs?
Despite the current lack of evidence for a world-wide flood?
Despite the consensus among scientists that there simply weren't any humans around when the dinosaurs died off, when according to the Bible there were humans around during the world-wide flood.
I've heard much better creationist theories. Why would you believe that particular one?