But regarding writing interpreters in C or Java for Scheme src file, wouldn't that be easier done in something like Perl?
I was thinking along the same lines too, but isn't there a proof of concept of this, because I remember reading about it somewhere? I do know that MIT has a LISP interpreter in Perl, though.
I guess there is a Scheme interpreter in Java (Jscheme) with an existing code base that could be used. Any idea if there's one in Perl/Python?
You're right. In a puritan sense, strictly only machine-human conversations constitute this element.
But that's open to debate, since Turing also mentions about systematic storage and processing of information based on pre-determined or arrivable patterns, for similar functions.
Since this competition does use Game Theory elements to do something along those lines, it would be correct from that perspective to call this a Turing Test.
They are having an AI tournament, and their supported language list includes C, C++, Java, Perl, Mathematica, and something called the Gambit Command Language.
They're having an AI tournament on something that's more related to Game Theory and which is why GCL has been mentioned.
GCL is a HLL that's used for testing game theory related approaches. It supports a lot of important factors in game theory related operations, like vectorization and form representaion switching.
GCL may not be very well known outside the AI/GT areas, since its used more in a purely CS research oriented environment. I think it started out as a series of C++ libraries for GT related stuff.
I think you're incorrect, the game *has* been defined, albeit with a a set of parameters which *you* will have to optimize
This is more of a resource management problem of optimizing your dataset while making sure that the opponent's is at a pessimum the other. This is infact used in manufacturing and related areas too.
Rather, I guess you mean that the *means* of doing so have not been defined.
... An emulator is computer program that takes as input a stage game file, and gives as output a dataset file.... The input file is in the file game.nfg, and the output file should be written in the file dataset.txt, both of which should reside in the same directory as the executable program. Note that the file game.nfg will be written into each emulator's directory by the tournament program prior to running your emulator....
This is exactly the way ACM ICPC contests are conducted, except that if the systems crash for any reason, you're not given extra time to make up for it:-(
And sadly, from the site:
Languages supported:
The computer program that you submit (for either an emulator or a detector) must be written in a combination of one or more of the following languages:
C or C++ java Perl Mathematica Gambit GCL
I would have expected them to atleast add shell-scripting to this - very useful under such conditions to do some Q&D work, or would be taken for granted that since the shell can be a part of the OS, you are free to use it?
Also, would have been nice if they'd added Python to the list, and more importantly Forth (yes, despite what you've heard, Forth is indeed useful, just look at Arthur T Murray's Mind Project).
Responding in the general to your science fiction argument -> "I guess so." You've got valid points, but you're comparing a short story to novels.
I would not say that, a lot of good short stories have been instrumental in becoming novels in the days to come. Take Asimov, Clarke, David Zindell... their futre works were based on the short stories that they started their careers with.
I dunno, I find myself enjoying many different kinds of things, and I'm sure that if Cory was going to expand his short story into a novel, he'd concentrate much more on the characters than the description.
I think I come across as someonewho is not too fond of Cory:-) That is not the case, he is a wonderful writer, but just that I diagree with his style of writing.
If Cory can pull it off, more power to him! What more can I say?
That's exactly what I'm saying. That's always the way it's been, which is why the modern case is a departure from the norm.
A little too early to say, isn't it?
Besides, I do agree with your factoid of certain words getting adopted. I have in fact written a paper on this particular phenomenon - consider medireview and anyways. Both these are such examples, too.
I'm guessing the Linguists you work with don't agree...
Okay before I go ahead, I'll admit to one thing - I have been brought up in a very Indo-British style background, hence my opinions could be a reflection of that.
I've grown to appreciate literature which a significant segment of the Slashdot would perhaps consider, well, unconventional, and perhaps even archaic.
I thought it was a very entertaining, enjoyable, and thought-provoking read, in the grande style of good science fiction.
But that is not everything! You are forgetting one thing - a merely descriptive work, with certain figments of the contemporary Hacker Culture thrown in does not constitute good science fiction.
I can still read HG Wells or Jules Verne and be awed. If you look at true classics, they would not be descriptive, indeed, they would consist little of that, and a lot to do with how people react to technology. How the various societies and cultures would perchance evolve.
The reason why Asimov's Foundation series strikes a chord with most people is not because he was able to portray futuristic technology. The reason was because his descriptions were based on realistic societies. For example, the Solarians reflect the Ancient Japanese culture, the fear against Robots is something that reflected the world in general at that time - fear of technology.
Let us look at Frank Herbert. How often does he talk technology? Almost nowhere, he discusses PEOPLE and cultures, in a setting that could almost be here on Earth. His references are based on real cultures, and that is all he talks about. Let alone Dune, even the lesser known works of Herbert like The Jesus Incident follow this pattern.
I urge you to read Arthur C Clarke's The Star, if you have not already done so. He hardly talks technology. He talks how PEOPLE REACT to science. To technology. And why!
Technology Augments! Please remember that it is not the end, it is just a means.
This is true for all the great writers - they realise that technology sounds all nice and good, but for someone who is familiar with it, there will not be much fascination. A poster above suggested Vonnegut - that is so very true. It does not set your thought processes into motion in the same way an analytical description of the future would.
Writing is leading language in this case, unlike others, because within this particular group of people, writing has become the dominant communication medium. Otherwise, it would follow the same slang-path that you are probably more familiar with, like "cool", "sweet", "rock", etc, which progresses from within spoken circles to the dictionary in an orderly fashion.
That is incorrect. Complex written linguistic expressions seldom make it to the spoken language, although the other way might be true. A significant percentage of Celtic lanaguges, as well as those from South America have had significantly varied writings, which have been preserved for the sake of posterity, but otherwise are confined to just that.
Historically, linguistic evolution from a niche group to the many is unlikely, especially given the fact that it demands addition of expressions and language external to the group. Else, we would all be learning English with Umlauts and perhaps a dozen other addendums.
Let us leave that alone for a while. Coming to Blogs and Wikis. Yes, I fully agree with Sirinek. Why should I go on to coin another word, when weblog is so very descriptive and serves the purpose? The trouble is, opinions would swing either way, and this is more of one's choice rather than that of language.
And oh, being an NLP & Data-mining researcher, I would pay a penny to shoot dead every damn guy who would use such fancy words and trouble us:-)
What made William Gibson special was that his use of language was creative, not hackneyed. Jack out is such an expression - it fits the context perfectly. Cyberspace? Wintermute? Given the storyline, it blended in very well, and more than anything it was a change. His world was reminiscent of those by Philip K Dick, and used technology to AUGMENT! More than that, you would notice that he had again talked of PEOPLE reacting to technology, and more than that, how TECHNOLOGY(!) reacted to people.
For that matter, take Eric S Nylund's Signal to Noise. So wonderfully written, lots of technology, but again it is HOW people react, how things happen and WHY! That is essential.
Where has the style of writing that used to induce thinking gone? I do not want technology, I can read scientific literature if I were on the lookout for that. I do not need a rundown on the contemporary culture that I'm a part of. I need inspiration, I need to think!
To Think. I wonder where that generation of writers have gone.
Re:Most science fiction
on
Cross-Site-TRACE
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I had commented on exactly this in the previous mention of the 0wnz0red series here.
Offlate, good science fiction has become so very rare, more of Sci-fi and SF stuff (as some poster corrected me).
I shall refrain from ranting, but if 0wnz0red is the best of modern science fiction that we can get today, its sad. Incidentally, I remember that Doctorow had mentioned it as just fiction, not science-fiction.
This reminds me, for all those posters above who talked about CEOs taking a cut and how it is not a big thing, I would like to see the day when Carly would take one.
Now *that* is a slefish CEO. I'm sure if she's given a severance package, the whole company would benefit. Too bad, HP isn't what it was built on. What more, even the families of the founders aren't on the board.
Sad, that this should happen. Hats off to all those good CEOs out there, who still have in them the spirit that their companies were built on.
Interesting article, but this is something that has been happening and will continue to.
Technology being put to use to seek out enemies of the state for the world governments is nothing new.
Atleast it is a good thing that companies are making good money in the process. Your privacy? That was lost long ago.
It was only a matter of time before this happened. Atleast be glad that we've not yet reached the stage where they'd bother having your entire genome sequence to create solutions and replacements for you:-)
Perhaps the author of the article has just read Cryptonomicon or something.
Get over it, companies will track you, governments will monitor it. And there will be people who will beat both, and people who will be susceptible to both. Unfortunate, but hey, paranoia does not help either.
Doesn't anyone EVER read the linked stories, or what? Duh!
From the Pioneer Press site:
But they both got married during the episode's long genesis and now intend to concentrate on raising their children (Josh has three kids; Jimm has a baby on the way).
Highly unlikely for that to happen, especially given the huge tariffs that exist today.
It had to come down one way or the other, and it so happened that Reliance is smart enough to capitalise on that. You have to be in India to know the amount of excitement this has generated.
But that is not what I meant, I was referring to have basic access to these resources per se. A former CS professor of mine was in the CDAC and CSIR earlier on, and was into building these things in the 80s.
It was indeed a pretty bad time that they had, any request for information/technology would me met with a stern, that's not allowed answer, and they were forced to do things from scratch.
What I meant was that given the situation, it is indeed a good job.
Besides, India is very poor on the manufacturing sector, unlikely that we could ever match upto the mfg. technology of a lot of countries, particularly the US.
Do remember the economic limitations in a developing democracy:-)
It's amazing what pressure can do for you. Until a few years, we were denied technology for building supercomputers by the west. This forced CDAC to work on such technology from scratch.
Likewise for most of India's rocket programme (albeit with the occasional help from Russia) and other technology. When pushed to the limits, you outperform yourself.
Every country has a black mark. How do you justify American action in Iraq? Perhaps they have a point, perhaps they do not.
How about Pakistan, which sponsors terrorist activities, is ruled by a military dictator and whose intelligence agency ISI is *confirmed* to have ties with the underworld in India?
India has a rocket scientist for a president, a *democratically elected* president, while being surrounded by a Military Dictatorship (ruling a fundamentalist country) on one side and a Communist Dictatorship on the other.
India is a developing nation, and has it's own set of problems in healthcare and basic utilities, I do agree. But technology IS the ONLY way out of this mess. Only when you educate people about the ill effects of bad environments, AIDS and the like will there be progress. People NEED to know.
Yes, we have sectarian violence. Try having a billion people of disparate cultural differences, with hundreds of languages, who have been exploited by colonialism for 400 years. You will then know.
Keeping them in the dark only worsens the situation. People *need* to be taught that this would not help in the long run. People need to be taught tolerance.
Technology has done a wealth of good for us, with revolutions in the agro sector, IT industry and now communication industry.
More the money the industries make, more the revenue the govt. earns, and the society as a whole benefits. And you have a booming economy, with a growing middle class which is tech savvy.
Please tell me what is wrong with this. I fail to see how something as beneficial as technology is going to do ill to a society.
Unforunately, people like "metlin" forget that their country needs to be brought up from 3rd world status and that will not happen by giving people cell-phones.
Incorrect reference, third world refers to Non-Aligned Nations, and has nothing to do with economic development. Developing nations would be an appropriate usage. Technology is not the end, it is the means to solving world's problems. If you think otherwise, you're a fool.
Most of the achievements in the Western world have come from hardwork and a sincere desire to change. Technological advances were created with the evolution of society not by handing them technology.
Huh? What the hell did you just blabber? Oh so wait, we want to have technology so that we can sit and play Quake all day? Or wait, technology happens on its own without us having to work or just loitering around or what?
What an absurd statement. Technology arms people. Technology gives people the power to do things that they thought impossible, and improves their standard of living. It does not happen overnite, and it does not happen to everybody. But it does happen, it is a process and it will take time.
But that does not mean that its all useless. This is one of the MOST STUPID comments I've EVER read on/.
You are wrong, and have no idea how wrong you are.
This has absolutely nothing to do with helping the poor, or trying to get a phone to a beggar in India. It has everything to do with the fact that Reliance is providing the right service at the right time.
Reliance is not just a J Random company in India. Reasons why this will be a killer service in India.
They have done their groundwork beautifully well. They have been laying fiber optic all over the country, for quite a while, and have enormous clout. As an example, where other providers have so far been unsuccessful in getting govt. clearance for certain services in India, it looks like Reliance will not be having that problem.
Reliance is using existing technology customised for India, at the Indian Inst. of Technology Madras. Details here.
You have NO idea the way the demand for bandwidth for both voice and data is growing in India. Want figures? Find them here.
Do you know the proposed cost of deployment of RIL's telecom plan? You pay Rs.3000 initially ($60) and Rs.600 monthly ($12) you get the instrument and the service, but will have to service for a period of 3 years, as part of the Rs.600 will go towards your instrument. Just look at their pricing schemes.
In fact, pricing is one of the reasons why Reliance will succeed. Reason? They chose NOT to use GSM as the initial cost is high, but wanted to help atleast the middle class.
If you still are not convinced, goto Chaoszone, run by cygnusx. He has been keeping track of this for a long time, and has very interesting links on the current scenario and WHY this WILL work.
You are forgetting one very basic point. Yes, India has poverty to handle, but you do not solve it by denying all other technology, atleast that's what your attitude sounds like. There is a significant chunk of the middle class for whom the rates that reliance offers is EASILY affordable, and that comes to a significant portion of the population of a billion.
Read this interview with Mukesh Ambani. Forget quality, they'll see gold through quantity. And that is exactly what Reliance is banking on.
And as a geek, I sure as hell hope they do, am looking forward to getting one of their J2ME enabled thingys;-)
Actually, several practical methods of terraforming Mars have been proposed.
So far, 2 of them seem very pragmatic, one is the melting of the polar ice caps and creating a greenhouse effect of sorts, so that the planet is warmed. The melting can be done, if we really had the initiative to set up a series of high energy solar driven equipment to do the same.
The other is a little more trickier, and involves the introduction of certain genetically modified algae into Mars, which might help increase the percentage of oxygen and other gases there.
The trouble with these kinds of terraforming methodologies is that you will end up introducing foreign elements, I mean biological elements, which you may not want to.
In fact, I think Wolf Vishniac (am not too sure about the name) had ideas about introducing complex organic chemicals into the Martian soil to aid in terraforming at a very basic level. If my memory serves me right, he was also mentioned in Carl Sagan's Cosmos as the designer of soil based bio-detection equipment, for space missions.
Well, that's true for most pure science research disciplines. Being a CS researcher, I have to justify my work as being relevant to the industry to get grants etc. Creative control? That's something that the people at the top decide for you.
I guess this is true for a lot of people in Math, Physics and other areas too.
Contrary to what people think, there is little money in pure theoretical CS (in my case, AI) research. The only way to get recognized is to show commercial relevance.
The funny thing is that, publications carry you only so far, unlike some areas like Physics where good publications will keep you alive. I guess the same would be true for Biology too, since like CS it is also more of an application level science. Unfortunate, but inevitable.
I'm surprised that I did not even read a single mention of David Zindell. He is the author of Shanidar and Neverness (both of which were relatively well acclaimed), as well as a series called "A Requiem for Homo Sapiens".
He's one of my most favourite writers, and his world is just as colorful and varied, as Frank Herbert's, Asimov's or even Tolkiens (especially the names remind of Tolkien - Danlo wi Soli Ringess, Tamara Ten Ashtoreth etc:).
Well, yes, you would probably see some similarities in his world's with some of Frank Herbert's creations, including say, Jesus Incident, etc - He talks of the possibility of us interfacing our brains with computers, using voidships and massive bodies as infinite data extractors where we could redesign ourselves till we are nothing but a moon sized brain, and growing, where information is all that matters.
Amazing philosophy, great science fiction, well written and it has a touch of William Gibson's or Philip K Dick's world's. And what more, he's got a sarcastic sense of humour like Neal Stephenson in some parts:-D
I'd suggest any fan of science fiction to read him.
Slashdot Mirror
And they missed ML too.
But regarding writing interpreters in C or Java for Scheme src file, wouldn't that be easier done in something like Perl?
I was thinking along the same lines too, but isn't there a proof of concept of this, because I remember reading about it somewhere? I do know that MIT has a LISP interpreter in Perl, though.
I guess there is a Scheme interpreter in Java (Jscheme) with an existing code base that could be used. Any idea if there's one in Perl/Python?
You're right. In a puritan sense, strictly only machine-human conversations constitute this element.
But that's open to debate, since Turing also mentions about systematic storage and processing of information based on pre-determined or arrivable patterns, for similar functions.
Since this competition does use Game Theory elements to do something along those lines, it would be correct from that perspective to call this a Turing Test.
They are having an AI tournament, and their supported language list includes C, C++, Java, Perl, Mathematica, and something called the Gambit Command Language.
They're having an AI tournament on something that's more related to Game Theory and which is why GCL has been mentioned.
GCL is a HLL that's used for testing game theory related approaches. It supports a lot of important factors in game theory related operations, like vectorization and form representaion switching.
Read this Caltech site for more on GCL.
GCL may not be very well known outside the AI/GT areas, since its used more in a purely CS research oriented environment. I think it started out as a series of C++ libraries for GT related stuff.
I think you're incorrect, the game *has* been defined, albeit with a a set of parameters which *you* will have to optimize
This is more of a resource management problem of optimizing your dataset while making sure that the opponent's is at a pessimum the other. This is infact used in manufacturing and related areas too.
Rather, I guess you mean that the *means* of doing so have not been defined.
From the site:
... ... ...
:-(
An emulator is computer program that takes as input a stage game file, and gives as output a dataset file.
The input file is in the file game.nfg, and the output file should be written in the file dataset.txt, both of which should reside in the same directory as the executable program. Note that the file game.nfg will be written into each emulator's directory by the tournament program prior to running your emulator.
This is exactly the way ACM ICPC contests are conducted, except that if the systems crash for any reason, you're not given extra time to make up for it
And sadly, from the site:
Languages supported:
The computer program that you submit (for either an emulator or a detector) must be written in a combination of one or more of the following languages:
C or C++
java
Perl
Mathematica
Gambit GCL
I would have expected them to atleast add shell-scripting to this - very useful under such conditions to do some Q&D work, or would be taken for granted that since the shell can be a part of the OS, you are free to use it?
Also, would have been nice if they'd added Python to the list, and more importantly Forth (yes, despite what you've heard, Forth is indeed useful, just look at Arthur T Murray's Mind Project).
And don't you forget catalogs.google.com - although it is in the Beta stages, amazing stuff.
More than that, this does away with the need of intermediate hardware for long distances.
A big boon for use in desolate and (naturally)unfriendly environs.
Very cool indeed. That is infact something that would be immensely useful in places like this for these people.
That's so bloody unfair :-(
*sigh*
Responding in the general to your science fiction argument -> "I guess so." You've got valid points, but you're comparing a short story to novels.
I would not say that, a lot of good short stories have been instrumental in becoming novels in the days to come. Take Asimov, Clarke, David Zindell... their futre works were based on the short stories that they started their careers with.
I dunno, I find myself enjoying many different kinds of things, and I'm sure that if Cory was going to expand his short story into a novel, he'd concentrate much more on the characters than the description.
I think I come across as someonewho is not too fond of Cory
If Cory can pull it off, more power to him! What more can I say?
That's exactly what I'm saying. That's always the way it's been, which is why the modern case is a departure from the norm.
A little too early to say, isn't it?
Besides, I do agree with your factoid of certain words getting adopted. I have in fact written a paper on this particular phenomenon - consider medireview and anyways. Both these are such examples, too.
I'm guessing the Linguists you work with don't agree...
Well, I'd not blame them!
Okay before I go ahead, I'll admit to one thing - I have been brought up in a very Indo-British style background, hence my opinions could be a reflection of that.
:-)
I've grown to appreciate literature which a significant segment of the Slashdot would perhaps consider, well, unconventional, and perhaps even archaic.
I thought it was a very entertaining, enjoyable, and thought-provoking read, in the grande style of good science fiction.
But that is not everything! You are forgetting one thing - a merely descriptive work, with certain figments of the contemporary Hacker Culture thrown in does not constitute good science fiction.
I can still read HG Wells or Jules Verne and be awed. If you look at true classics, they would not be descriptive, indeed, they would consist little of that, and a lot to do with how people react to technology. How the various societies and cultures would perchance evolve.
The reason why Asimov's Foundation series strikes a chord with most people is not because he was able to portray futuristic technology. The reason was because his descriptions were based on realistic societies. For example, the Solarians reflect the Ancient Japanese culture, the fear against Robots is something that reflected the world in general at that time - fear of technology.
Let us look at Frank Herbert. How often does he talk technology? Almost nowhere, he discusses PEOPLE and cultures, in a setting that could almost be here on Earth. His references are based on real cultures, and that is all he talks about. Let alone Dune, even the lesser known works of Herbert like The Jesus Incident follow this pattern.
I urge you to read Arthur C Clarke's The Star, if you have not already done so. He hardly talks technology. He talks how PEOPLE REACT to science. To technology. And why!
Technology Augments! Please remember that it is not the end, it is just a means.
This is true for all the great writers - they realise that technology sounds all nice and good, but for someone who is familiar with it, there will not be much fascination. A poster above suggested Vonnegut - that is so very true. It does not set your thought processes into motion in the same way an analytical description of the future would.
Writing is leading language in this case, unlike others, because within this particular group of people, writing has become the dominant communication medium. Otherwise, it would follow the same slang-path that you are probably more familiar with, like "cool", "sweet", "rock", etc, which progresses from within spoken circles to the dictionary in an orderly fashion.
That is incorrect. Complex written linguistic expressions seldom make it to the spoken language, although the other way might be true. A significant percentage of Celtic lanaguges, as well as those from South America have had significantly varied writings, which have been preserved for the sake of posterity, but otherwise are confined to just that.
Historically, linguistic evolution from a niche group to the many is unlikely, especially given the fact that it demands addition of expressions and language external to the group. Else, we would all be learning English with Umlauts and perhaps a dozen other addendums.
Let us leave that alone for a while. Coming to Blogs and Wikis. Yes, I fully agree with Sirinek. Why should I go on to coin another word, when weblog is so very descriptive and serves the purpose? The trouble is, opinions would swing either way, and this is more of one's choice rather than that of language.
And oh, being an NLP & Data-mining researcher, I would pay a penny to shoot dead every damn guy who would use such fancy words and trouble us
What made William Gibson special was that his use of language was creative, not hackneyed. Jack out is such an expression - it fits the context perfectly. Cyberspace? Wintermute? Given the storyline, it blended in very well, and more than anything it was a change. His world was reminiscent of those by Philip K Dick, and used technology to AUGMENT! More than that, you would notice that he had again talked of PEOPLE reacting to technology, and more than that, how TECHNOLOGY(!) reacted to people.
For that matter, take Eric S Nylund's Signal to Noise. So wonderfully written, lots of technology, but again it is HOW people react, how things happen and WHY! That is essential.
Where has the style of writing that used to induce thinking gone? I do not want technology, I can read scientific literature if I were on the lookout for that. I do not need a rundown on the contemporary culture that I'm a part of. I need inspiration, I need to think!
To Think. I wonder where that generation of writers have gone.
I had commented on exactly this in the previous mention of the 0wnz0red series here.
Offlate, good science fiction has become so very rare, more of Sci-fi and SF stuff (as some poster corrected me).
I shall refrain from ranting, but if 0wnz0red is the best of modern science fiction that we can get today, its sad. Incidentally, I remember that Doctorow had mentioned it as just fiction, not science-fiction.
*sigh* Hope springs eternal.
This reminds me, for all those posters above who talked about CEOs taking a cut and how it is not a big thing, I would like to see the day when Carly would take one.
Now *that* is a slefish CEO. I'm sure if she's given a severance package, the whole company would benefit. Too bad, HP isn't what it was built on. What more, even the families of the founders aren't on the board.
Sad, that this should happen. Hats off to all those good CEOs out there, who still have in them the spirit that their companies were built on.
Interesting article, but this is something that has been happening and will continue to.
:-)
Technology being put to use to seek out enemies of the state for the world governments is nothing new.
Atleast it is a good thing that companies are making good money in the process. Your privacy? That was lost long ago.
It was only a matter of time before this happened. Atleast be glad that we've not yet reached the stage where they'd bother having your entire genome sequence to create solutions and replacements for you
Perhaps the author of the article has just read Cryptonomicon or something.
Get over it, companies will track you, governments will monitor it. And there will be people who will beat both, and people who will be susceptible to both. Unfortunate, but hey, paranoia does not help either.
And oh, first post?
Doesn't anyone EVER read the linked stories, or what? Duh!
:-P
From the Pioneer Press site:
But they both got married during the episode's long genesis and now intend to concentrate on raising their children (Josh has three kids; Jimm has a baby on the way).
Looks like they pretty much did
Show me :-P
Feat?!?
At least I hope it's not a waste of capitals...
Highly unlikely for that to happen, especially given the huge tariffs that exist today.
It had to come down one way or the other, and it so happened that Reliance is smart enough to capitalise on that. You have to be in India to know the amount of excitement this has generated.
IMHO, this is a definite seller.
Yepp, I know. And they use an IBM chip too.
:-)
But that is not what I meant, I was referring to have basic access to these resources per se. A former CS professor of mine was in the CDAC and CSIR earlier on, and was into building these things in the 80s.
It was indeed a pretty bad time that they had, any request for information/technology would me met with a stern, that's not allowed answer, and they were forced to do things from scratch.
What I meant was that given the situation, it is indeed a good job.
Besides, India is very poor on the manufacturing sector, unlikely that we could ever match upto the mfg. technology of a lot of countries, particularly the US.
Do remember the economic limitations in a developing democracy
It's amazing what pressure can do for you. Until a few years, we were denied technology for building supercomputers by the west. This forced CDAC to work on such technology from scratch.
Likewise for most of India's rocket programme (albeit with the occasional help from Russia) and other technology. When pushed to the limits, you outperform yourself.
Every country has a black mark. How do you justify American action in Iraq? Perhaps they have a point, perhaps they do not.
How about Pakistan, which sponsors terrorist activities, is ruled by a military dictator and whose intelligence agency ISI is *confirmed* to have ties with the underworld in India?
India has a rocket scientist for a president, a *democratically elected* president, while being surrounded by a Military Dictatorship (ruling a fundamentalist country) on one side and a Communist Dictatorship on the other.
India is a developing nation, and has it's own set of problems in healthcare and basic utilities, I do agree. But technology IS the ONLY way out of this mess. Only when you educate people about the ill effects of bad environments, AIDS and the like will there be progress. People NEED to know.
Yes, we have sectarian violence. Try having a billion people of disparate cultural differences, with hundreds of languages, who have been exploited by colonialism for 400 years. You will then know.
Keeping them in the dark only worsens the situation. People *need* to be taught that this would not help in the long run. People need to be taught tolerance.
Technology has done a wealth of good for us, with revolutions in the agro sector, IT industry and now communication industry.
More the money the industries make, more the revenue the govt. earns, and the society as a whole benefits. And you have a booming economy, with a growing middle class which is tech savvy.
Please tell me what is wrong with this. I fail to see how something as beneficial as technology is going to do ill to a society.
Unforunately, people like "metlin" forget that their country needs to be brought up from 3rd world status and that will not happen by giving people cell-phones.
Incorrect reference, third world refers to Non-Aligned Nations, and has nothing to do with economic development. Developing nations would be an appropriate usage. Technology is not the end, it is the means to solving world's problems. If you think otherwise, you're a fool.
Most of the achievements in the Western world have come from hardwork and a sincere desire to change. Technological advances were created with the evolution of society not by handing them technology.
Huh? What the hell did you just blabber? Oh so wait, we want to have technology so that we can sit and play Quake all day? Or wait, technology happens on its own without us having to work or just loitering around or what?
What an absurd statement. Technology arms people. Technology gives people the power to do things that they thought impossible, and improves their standard of living. It does not happen overnite, and it does not happen to everybody. But it does happen, it is a process and it will take time.
But that does not mean that its all useless. This is one of the MOST STUPID comments I've EVER read on
Duh.
With that kind of clout, they don't need to. :-)
This has absolutely nothing to do with helping the poor, or trying to get a phone to a beggar in India. It has everything to do with the fact that Reliance is providing the right service at the right time.
Reliance is not just a J Random company in India. Reasons why this will be a killer service in India.
They have done their groundwork beautifully well. They have been laying fiber optic all over the country, for quite a while, and have enormous clout. As an example, where other providers have so far been unsuccessful in getting govt. clearance for certain services in India, it looks like Reliance will not be having that problem.
Reliance is using existing technology customised for India, at the Indian Inst. of Technology Madras. Details here.
You have NO idea the way the demand for bandwidth for both voice and data is growing in India. Want figures? Find them here.
Do you know the proposed cost of deployment of RIL's telecom plan? You pay Rs.3000 initially ($60) and Rs.600 monthly ($12) you get the instrument and the service, but will have to service for a period of 3 years, as part of the Rs.600 will go towards your instrument. Just look at their pricing schemes.
In fact, pricing is one of the reasons why Reliance will succeed. Reason? They chose NOT to use GSM as the initial cost is high, but wanted to help atleast the middle class.
;-)
If you still are not convinced, goto Chaoszone, run by cygnusx. He has been keeping track of this for a long time, and has very interesting links on the current scenario and WHY this WILL work.
You are forgetting one very basic point. Yes, India has poverty to handle, but you do not solve it by denying all other technology, atleast that's what your attitude sounds like. There is a significant chunk of the middle class for whom the rates that reliance offers is EASILY affordable, and that comes to a significant portion of the population of a billion.
Read this interview with Mukesh Ambani. Forget quality, they'll see gold through quantity. And that is exactly what Reliance is banking on.
And as a geek, I sure as hell hope they do, am looking forward to getting one of their J2ME enabled thingys
Actually, several practical methods of terraforming Mars have been proposed.
So far, 2 of them seem very pragmatic, one is the melting of the polar ice caps and creating a greenhouse effect of sorts, so that the planet is warmed. The melting can be done, if we really had the initiative to set up a series of high energy solar driven equipment to do the same.
The other is a little more trickier, and involves the introduction of certain genetically modified algae into Mars, which might help increase the percentage of oxygen and other gases there.
The trouble with these kinds of terraforming methodologies is that you will end up introducing foreign elements, I mean biological elements, which you may not want to.
In fact, I think Wolf Vishniac (am not too sure about the name) had ideas about introducing complex organic chemicals into the Martian soil to aid in terraforming at a very basic level. If my memory serves me right, he was also mentioned in Carl Sagan's Cosmos as the designer of soil based bio-detection equipment, for space missions.
Well, that's true for most pure science research disciplines. Being a CS researcher, I have to justify my work as being relevant to the industry to get grants etc. Creative control? That's something that the people at the top decide for you.
I guess this is true for a lot of people in Math, Physics and other areas too.
Contrary to what people think, there is little money in pure theoretical CS (in my case, AI) research. The only way to get recognized is to show commercial relevance.
The funny thing is that, publications carry you only so far, unlike some areas like Physics where good publications will keep you alive. I guess the same would be true for Biology too, since like CS it is also more of an application level science. Unfortunate, but inevitable.
I'm surprised that I did not even read a single mention of David Zindell. He is the author of Shanidar and Neverness (both of which were relatively well acclaimed), as well as a series called "A Requiem for Homo Sapiens".
:).
:-D
He's one of my most favourite writers, and his world is just as colorful and varied, as Frank Herbert's, Asimov's or even Tolkiens (especially the names remind of Tolkien - Danlo wi Soli Ringess, Tamara Ten Ashtoreth etc
Well, yes, you would probably see some similarities in his world's with some of Frank Herbert's creations, including say, Jesus Incident, etc - He talks of the possibility of us interfacing our brains with computers, using voidships and massive bodies as infinite data extractors where we could redesign ourselves till we are nothing but a moon sized brain, and growing, where information is all that matters.
Amazing philosophy, great science fiction, well written and it has a touch of William Gibson's or Philip K Dick's world's. And what more, he's got a sarcastic sense of humour like Neal Stephenson in some parts
I'd suggest any fan of science fiction to read him.
As a poster pointed out up there, it is referred to as (more correctly) the X Windowing System.