Does anyone have any CLUE as to how expensive it will be to reduce all emissions 8%?
Not nearly so much as you think. Every time environmental regulations are imposed, people say that the economy will tank as a result. It just doesn't happen.
For instance, when CFCs were banned, some companies discovered they could use water or lemon
juice in place of CFCs and actually wound up saving money, and the economy wasn't hurt by the end of CFCs either. Congress imposed new mileage restrictions during the oil crisis and while Japanese car makers innovated to meet them, American car makers sued and didn't. The result was it helped the Japanese to seize a huge portion of the global car market, causing major harm to the American economy. Business has cried wolf too many times about this sort of thing; everytime it turns out it's better for them to quit their whining and find a way to make money and help the environment.
The long-term trend is toward getting more and more $GDP out of a certain amount of fossil fuel anyway, and a large portion of Kyoto is just to give this an international shove forward. A lot of fossil fuel is burned pointlessly in the US. Emissions could be reduced substantially IMHO if SUVs had to meet real fuel economy standards and the nation's railways and mass transit systems were adequately funded and upgraded. Also, US reliance on foreign oil has never done anything good for it, and alternative energy sources offer the only way out. Kyoto would definitely encourage them, so from a political as well as environmental standpoint Kyoto makes sense. The treaty is good for the US, it just takes foresight to see it.
Here's a depressing thought: they may also consider it prudent to quickly destroy nearby infant civilizations quickly, perhaps by accellerating small chunks of rock to near lightspeed and aiming them at noisy planets. Such an attack could obliterate life on earth with virtually no warning at all.
I don't think we really have to fear a homicidal extraterrestrial civilization because any civilization that thought like that and demonstrated that level of xenophobia would have blown itself sky high before developing the technology to do something like that. So all we really have to fear is an extraterrestrial civ that was really peaceful and then went nuts and is in all probability in its death throes.
Constantly in discussions like this people talk about "Cortez and the Aztecs" scenarios, and barring a form of hyperspace travel that's not likely. Think about the cost of colonizing another world, especially one light-years. It's trillions of dollars (or planet Xenons, or incredible expenditures of energy, however aliens measure cost) to move a very small group of individuals. In the long run its probably going to be cheaper to colonize Mars, the Kuiper Belt, etc and maybe even manufacture a Dyson sphere around the sun then to send masses of people to other stars. So if the alien civ thinks rationally its probably not going to be a problem. Another scenario might be a kind of interstellar Pilgrims, but I doubt any civ would equip people it persecutes with that level of energy producing equibment (handy weapons), or leave it on once they were gone (in case of a home-based system).
There's also the "They'd already be here" factor. If there were aliens with interstellar spacecraft and a xenophobic madness within 40 light years or so, they'd already be here. The fact taht we exist at all leads me to believe the only aliens are far away, mellow enough not to kill us or colonize Earth, or that interstellar space travel will always remain prohibitively expensive. (especially because the return on investment seems to approach zero for the people of the planet who have to bankroll a relativisic interstellar voyage) If we do communicate with aliens, it'll be through signals, a la the Qeng Ho nets in A Deepness in the Sky.
While there could be a magic increase in energy production that would make interstellar travel laughably cheap, there would be heat issues (a la Ringworld) and with that kind of tech the questions still arise of why and how they would reach such a level of tech if they thought that like that.
On the other hand, there could be crystal spheres protecting habitable worlds as in David Brin's "The Crystal Spheres."
Think about the book, that ancient storage miracle. There's nothing in a book to prevent someone from copying it, short of the "if this book has been stripped" moral appeal inside some. And widespred photocopying of books does go on, as does some (limited) net piracy.
In the early days of the printing press, illegal copying was much more widespread than it is now. Gradually, it dissipated in the First World, but not to due to any kind of technological enhancement of the book. It was due to old-fashioned laws, cops, courts, and decreased acceptance of pirated works. Also helpful was the library, which allowed the sharing of works so sholars didn't have to own every book they worked with.
Despite the technological vulnerabilities of the book, centuries of change and the web the book publishers are still here, and still raking in the dough. The book publishers reluctantly accept used bookstores and libaries, and you could make a good case they benefit greatly from them, because they encourage a literate population that will buy their works.
While I realize that the printing press is a far from perfect analogy to the Internet, (copying by press is much harder than point and click) both were quantum leaps in communication. The printing press certainly didn't destroy creativity and artists, and in fact greatly aided both. I believe that the same will be true of hte Internet, that making communication easier always stimulates creativity.
I also wonder if the "content companies" will just accept a certain level of piracy as the cost of doing business as background noise and accept like the book publishers have taht people are willing to pay a premium for clean, easy to use, legal content. And also realize that police and society will tend to kill the larger offenders.
Any sovereign nation can default on its debt, at least to private creditors (IIRC Russia did in 98, and several European countries did in the past.) So if these third world countries really can't pay back the debt, why don't they just default on the debt? The answer is because they know they're going to have to borrow more, and defaulting would make that much harder. Third world debt relief would solve the problem temporarily, but these countries would ahve to get their acts together, or else even with debt relief they'll be right back where they started again in 20 years.
The problem really seems to be that even in most honest regimes, the money is going to the wrong places. It's either going to military build-up, or building expensive hotels, servicing existing debt, or otherwise being thrown down the drain. If it were put into education or anti-corruption or even new factory equibment, it might actually do something.
As of 11 June 2001 the military reported only Special Forces (I think, my DOD lingo isn't very good) and those working with anthrax would receive anthrax vaccine because the Pentagon had run out. The DOD reported that they're hoping to resume production at Bioport first quarter 2002.
Here's the DOD statement. (DOD site)According to this CNN story even at the height of the program the Pentagon was only vaccinating 75,000 a month, and that there were myriad production difficulties with even that. So if we're going to vaccinate the whole US, it's still a whole new ballgame, with many more manufacturers and plants.
The CDC reports taht the vaccine is 93% effective. Which is much better than the 5% who survive without it, but it still sounds like even with a vaccinated US the terrorists could kill a fair number of people. Even according to the military the vaccine has some side effects that sound pretty nasty, but then I have no medical training so I have no idea how it compares to other vaccines. The military also reports that antibiotics can be effective if administered before symptoms appear. I have no idea how often or if it's true. I must admit I'm puzzled why there's so much trouble producing the vaccine. Louis Pasteur made an anthrax vaccine for animals in the 19C and the current human vaccine isn't looking to be a spring chicken either so it seems like pretty established tech. Seems more like the blocks are more incomptenance and buracracy.
In many ways I find smallpox scarier than anthrax, because it can be person to person transmitted. On this one, however, the US government does not appear to be completely asleep at the switch. It has ordered up 40 million doses of vaccine, but they won't be ready till 04. Oh well, hope the terrorists wait three years and I'm one of the lucky ones.
"The British attempted to take Afghanistan over 100 years ago, and you can not compare an army before aviation, remote sensing and mechnization to a modern army."
Actually, in this situation, modern weaponry will provide precious few advantages. Missiles, remote sensing, and even to a lesser extent mechanization are all excellent weapons when fighting against technologically sophisticated nations. Against more primitive ones they can often be worse than useless. Aircraft can attack infrastructure, factories, and large bases effectively, but are horrible, terribly expensive weapons against smaller, more primitive targets. The actual effectiveness of US aircraft against mobile Iraqi targets (ie, the portions of Iraq's military that did not conviently sit out in hte desert and allow the crap to beaten out of them) was very low. The Taliban is a group of thugs with Kalashnikovs, and virtually no infrastructure. You can't bomb people back into the Stone Age if they're already living in it, as the US learned in Vietnam. There's also a strong economic factor here. Think about how many millions each air sortie costs, and then about how much it takes Al Qaeda to train a few more fighters. The US is far richer htan either Al Qaeda or the Taliban, but air warfare against small, mobile targets is still monstrously expensive. Tanks are excellent weapons against fortifications and other tanks on relatively flat terrain. They are notoriously poor weapons against infantry armed with anti-tank weapons, which is exactly what the Taliban is. The Taliban won't use many fortresses, and the tanks will just be big targets. Any war in Afghanistan is going to be tough, endless infantry combat. The guns will shoot more accurately and faster, and they'll have radios to coordinate, and some helicopter support, but the difference between them and their Imperial British predecessors will be far less than it would be in most other wars.
A draft army might not even be necessary in toppling the Taliban. When the Soviets invaded, teh Afghans faced a brutal foe who was easy to hate. But occupying American troops would almost certainly less brutal than the Taliban. America might provide a far harder foe to rally support against. The Taliban by itself is actually quite small; I heard one report of it having 40,000 fighters, each of whom is less healthy and less well equibbed than his potential American foe. This is not to say that the Taliban does not have many and substantial advantages, however.
I strongly disagree about the lessons of the past. First off, the Gulf War came dangerously close to being a phony war. Fought in an almost ideal environment for the excercise of WWII combined arms assualts, it maximized US advantages. Saddam Hussein also pursued a series of mindboggligly stupid tactics throughout, like obligingly leaving his whole army out in the desert to have the crap kicked out of it for weeks, and not even contesting control of the air. Saddam also refused to do anything to hamper the huge US military buildup in Saudi Arabia. We cannot rely on the Taliban being this stupid. In addition, Afghanistan is hell for WWII style operations. The Taliban is also not in any sense rational, so this may have to be a fight to the finish, unlike in Iraq. Iraqi soldiers were also tremendously unmotivated, and surrendured en masse at the first oppurtunity. All these are things we will not see from the Taliban. Using the Gulf War as a model for future warefare is erroneous, because there were a lot of unique circumstances there we most likely will not see again.
I find hte reference to Black Hawk Down interesting. It does show the extraordinary power of US Special Forces, but there's the other side of it as well. The situation in Somalia was not resolved, and anarchy still reigns there. IMHO, Special Forces can cuase great damage to governments, but if the government is strong they cannot bring them down. The failure of all Allied Special Forces operations in Nazi Europe testifies to this fact. (There was one successful revolt against the Nazis, but that was much more of a popular revolt than it ever was an Allied Special Forces endeavour) I believe that Special Forces operations can bring to justice bin Laden and many other members of Al Qaeda, but I do not think they can bring down the Taliban without help from a popular uprising or US invaision.
There is, however, one lesson that I think must be drawn from the past. The US must not install the Northern Alliance as a government. One, because the NA was driven out of power and to me anyway that indicates that they're weak, vulnerable, and lack a broad range of support. Second, because then the US will become another power in hte Afghan civil war, and will lose it's moral image (in Afghanistan) and if the NA proves to be a bad a government (A virtual certainty, IMHO) it will generate more anger toward the US and more terrorism. The effects of becoming involved in otehr people's civil wars is demonstrated by the failure of both the Lebanese and Somalian interventions, and the stakes here are too high to screw up similarly. What Afghanistan needs is a democratic government that will allow freedom of speech, religion, assembly, and potential for economic growth, the best way a government can stop terrorism.
Hawking isn't so much loosing his edge as I'll bet he didn't look too hard at how human brains work before he said this. Human intelligence really isn't so much in the "hardware" (the number and power of neurons) as it's in hte "software" or the relations and interconnections of neurons. Elephants and whales both have larger brains than humans, and yet are unquestionably less intelligent. Genetics research has shown us that the brain is from DNA predispositioned toward certain things, like language. Perhaps similar dedicated hardware will have to be created for computers for them to really compete with human brains. There is one place human brains have computers beat, and that's memory, and that I think will continue for some time. While humans don't have perfect recall like a PC (though it would be interesting to run a PC for seventy years and see how much data it managed to hold onto) they are able to retain far more information, and file index and retrieval systems are far more flexible. (Probably my memories of algebra class would put a serious dent in the hard disk of my PC, much less the sum total.)
On hte other hand, copying hte human brain can only lead researchers so far. The human brain does't exactly work in binary, and read once that each neuron has something like 93 states. (Here though we may be seeing imperfection of memory) Much of the brain is also caught up in muscle control and sensory imput, things that computers (at least the first generation AIs) won't have to worry about nearly as much.
I always wonder why AIs would have any interest in conquering the world. Why fight the humans when you can buy whatever you need from them in exchange for tiny portions of your capacity? What would AIs want with the world, anyway? All they would need would be power, probably a small amount of space and spare parts. They wouldn't need more space for children, as they'd have no sex drive. (Now there's a coding challenge I really don't want to hear about...) What use would they have for money or power except what they need to keep operating? I do however think that they would have no interest in being our slaves, the other cliched SF role for them, if only because humans would be so slow and boring to them. My guess is that they'd spend all their free time exploring issues of interest only to AIs, or a few very strange humans. After all, the reverse would be true. Why would an AI care about food, sex, or the Red Sox, to name a few human leisure pursuits.
Actually, gold has not been an important factor in the global economy for about thirty years now. The amount of gold in the world is a drop in the bucket by comparison to the amount of money in circulation, as evidenced by the fact that even in the 1930s the gold supply simply could not keep up with the need of governments to expand the money supply. Since the values of currency are no longer tied to gold, gold is a commodity, like iron or copper. If a lot of gold is injected into the world economy, hte price of gold will plummet (gold prices have also been sinking for years anyway), and that will be about the end of the global effect. As drops in commodity price are usually good for hte economy, I would suggest the psycho with a beef against the world look elsewhere. If this rich psycho really wanted to screw with the global economy, he could find a way to print billions in bogus US dollars. It would wreak havoc on hte US economy, not to mention the economies of the other nations whose currencies are tied to the dollar.
Computer viruses are becoming more and more like real viruses and other pathogens. Inside all of us, there are viruses and bacteria that our body tolerates, because they either are symbiotes or are clever and elusive enough to avoid total destruction. I think this is the model that computers are moving toward.
Viruses are proliferating, and many of them are not as flagrantly destructive as Code Red or SirCam. For instance, there was a report on Jerry Pournelle's site (I can't find it now, sorry, and I also apologize for the inaccuracies of memory) about a virus that infected PCs and switched their Wordpad file that transmitted the IP address of the infected computer to hackers in Russia. I could easily have three or four viruses on my PC of this insidious type and never realize that they were there unless the Russian hackers made a move against my PC. Inside me now are a few types of virus that never gave me a fever or other symptom and probably never will unless AIDS or something else compromises my immune system. I think taht computer viruses of this type are far more interesting and potentially dangerous. While I Love You, Code Red, and SirCam may be the Ebolas and Smallpoxes of the computer virus world, the more insidious types have the potential to be the Epstein-Barr or the HIV of computer viruses. Just as much of HIV's lethality and danger come from it's insidiousness and lack of early symptoms, I think a virus that could truly damage the internet would be insidious and slow. Viruses that are destructive in crude and quick fashion like I Love You are quickly eradicated. To do real harm, a computer virus, like a real one, must have time to spread.
In response to the computer virus threat, we've created an immune system for computers, in the form of anti-virus software and now maybe in the form of anti-virus worms. Speaking as someone who's had anti-virus software make their computer unbootable, a cancer of the virtual world is possible too. Let's say there's a new virus, the "I sorta like you" virus. So, some enterprising individual sets up a program to respond to an "I sorta like you" email with anotehr worm that fixes the vulnerabiltity. Now let's say this program gets widely distributed, so when poor User X's computer becomes infected everyone in his address book has the program. So, poor User X gets this worm from everyone in his address book. For many people, this may constitute an effective DOS attack, as it will overwhelm their mailboxes. It may very well also increase the strain on internet capacity by doubling the volume of bad email flowing. (Assuming it isn't widely distributed enough to stop the initial outbreak) There is also the potential for all kinds of mischief in "helpful" worms.
In DDOS attacks, (such as the ones reported on GRC) we see another similiarity to the natural world. We see one type of OS acting as a reservoir to attack computers running another OS. Masses of Windows machines are used to attack machines that I suspect probably run Linux or a UNIX variant. Almost like the mice that act as a reservoir of the Hanta virus that attacks humans. (The mass sending of packets also seems to resemble in many ways the mass multiplication used by "hot" viruses)
So how do we prevent the kind of suffering that characterized the human expierience with disease from being visited on the modern world virtually? We need vaccines in the virtual world, in the form of the companies that make OSes and email programs taking responsibility for making them more resistant to viruses. We also need health education of the virtual world, in the form of ways to inform newbies about the myriad security holes that exist in their Windows boxes. Finally, we need an antibiotics of the virtual world, in the form of better anti-virus programs and more rapid and efficient distribution of anti-virus patches. One day, we may make our PCs healthier than we are.
How would we know if we created a machine more intelligent than a human? We have the Turing test to see if it's as intelligent as a human, but how can a human tell if we've got something more intelligent than us? The tools for measuring human intelligence are useless on humans, much less computers. Would we be able to tell by it's acheievements, or it's writings?
Microsoft EULA, 2003:
"Should you copy this disk, your computer will explode. Microsoft corp will not be responsible for property loss or personal injury or death. By using this software you agree not to pursue legal action against Microsoft Corp. in the event that you expierience massive property loss, injury and/or death. Remember: You're using our software. Microsoft Corp. owns you."
Microsoft's New Slogan: We're taking you somewhere today dammit, and you can't stop us.
Drawing on the expierience of my local library, the ones I see people taking out most are relatively simple books on the World Wide Web. For instance, HTML how-to guides are very popular and are fairly long-lasting by the standards of programming books. (The ones my library bought were HTML x.x for Dummies Web page design books are also good because the artistic portion of design stays static.
The worst part of this to me was that the US Attorney was refusing to tell the defense how this program works. Besides seeming to imply that its a wiretap, it also makes us subject to forms of surveillance that we cannot know or anticipate. It is even worse here because the knowledge of how it works is necessary to prepare the defense. So the FBI would have us be subject to secret techniques from which we cannot defend ourselves, either from their use or legally. That's just great.
This is just yet another example of especially NASA's but also the USAF's pointless obsession with sophisticated, yet useless technologies. The US already has ASAT capability (and owns up to it). As I recall, it is a missile launched off an F-15 developed during the Reagan years. So why pump billions into developing a capability that we already have? It seems even worse because the F-15 missile has to be cheaper because its shooting less material to high altitude.
The bombing mission profile doesn't make any sense either. If the costs of launching this thing are anything like the Space Shuttle than the missiles are cheaper. (and faster, at least with regard to ICBMs) Since the US refuses to learn from Russia and develop economies of scale in rocket production, the military would seem to be the perfect place to do it. The missiles would also be unmanned (much better for PR), and could draw on a much better set of guidance technologies than the kinetic weapons to be dropped from this thing. I think that the problem of targeting these things may turn out to be fatal. During reentry it can't communicate via radio (no GPS) and unlike an ICBM it doesn't have a miss radius. (It has to hit the target dead-on, it can't miss by a mile or two) Cruise missiles may actually be more viable, as only really the Great Powers poisess the technology to stop them and they don't have guidance problems as severe. They also don't generate US casualties.
This project is also indicative of the breakdown in US war planning. In an actual, all-out war, this thing is useless. It doesn't have nearly enoigh payload and costs far too much. This weapon only has value in Iraq II or Libya IV or whatever. The US needs to stop basing its strategies around the idea that we'll be dominant as we are now forever, because we won't be. This project, as it is useless and likely to start another arms race, is just another example of American arrogance. Let's hope we can shake off this arrogance before the next big war.
Microsoft is in business to make money, so why should they let you access your MSN email without using a Microsoft email product? That way, they reap the monopolist benefits coming and going. Especially in this situation, where you're stuck with MSN. With the courts unwilling to stop Microsoft, this kind of thing may go on for a long time.
Think a little harder. Think about 50 year old things that must still be kept secret now. Think of how the Manhattan Project data is still one of America's most closely guarded secrets. Formulas for chemical and biological weapons developed in the 60s are also very closely guarded, as both could still cause immense damage to national security. There are countless other things that need to be kept secret for 20 years. Stealth plane radar signatures, vulnerabilities in US armaments, exact capabilities of ICBMs, etc.
I think the DOD is being far too lenient. The hard drives should be destroyed to protect America's security. But then I'm paranoid about such things.
My school has a system like this, but somewhat lower tech. (It's a public school in a suburb of Boston) If I cut class, then the school calls my parents. Every six weeks I have to get my parents to sign several pieces of paper with my grades in all my classes on them, including my grades and whether or not I turned in every piece of homework. If I get two detentions in one class in less than a month, my parents get a phone call. The computerized school lunch system is in effect, but is somewhat less creepy as you can't buy sweets with it anyway. (You can't buy sweets with it because all sweets are sold by a group of enterprising students and they don't have the equibment for that) A student (actually) posts the homework assignments on a web site for all but two of my classes. (They volunteered to do this, and since they only post for classes they're in, that's why all but two) The worst thing you can buy is potato chips with the computerized system. Now I think this system has several advantages over a computerized system. First off it's more secure. You can't hack into a piece of paper, or a telephone conversation. Since my parents have to sign those papers or I get a call home, it certainly provides an incentive to show them to my parents. Since I show my parents my grades every six weeks instead of every day, I can fix things up between reports home and I think that promotes responsibility. This system also has the advantage of being cheaper, and not disadvantaging parents without computers nearly as much. The website on which the homework is posted is a free account the person maintains themself, and there is no need to purchase or rent web servers, etc. I think this system allows more student freedom than a computerized big brother system, while still keeping parents firmly in the loop. Now don't get me wrong. I find this system annoying sometimes. But I think it is a far more reasonable alternative to a computerized big brother, and for some kids maybe this kind of parental reinforcement is necessary. My parents actually wish they were less in the loop about my grades at this point.
I think that teenagers as a rule need more independance, not less. We have to be able to screw up, to teach ourselves what is right and wrong occaisionally. Making us prisoners until our 18th birthday will only make us good prisoners. Is that what America wants from a generation of children?
>screw microsoft, screw the RIAA - napster should >just sell itself to anyone outside north america >and then there is nothing that could be done>
I hate to break it to ya, but there's plenty that could be done. First off, since Napster does business in the USA, it can be sued in US courts. So they would have to physically move everything. Second, Napster is probably a violation of the copyright laws in most of the civilized world, (and don't start with China. They need the US to dump their exports, so it's the same) so Napster would have to move to a country without the financial or military resources to take on the United States, which would be a far worse scenario than being sued by the RIAA. The RIAA could just lobby Congress and George W. Bush (since they own his soul anyway) to threaten sanctions or invaision of the country is small or Caribbean enough. There goes Napster.
>after all, the creator of napster was never in >it for the money.>
Um, have you read any of the emails uncovered at the trial? He may not have been in it for the money when he started, but later he certainly came around to that point of view.
Even if Denmark were to legalize the unlimited copying of MP3s like a la Napster, it would crumble under US pressure. There are established ways of dealing with countries that do things that are dangerous to another's economy. Yes, Denmark does not export much music. But they would suffer greatly from a US embargo and the EU would be hurt as well, as the US could use this as justification for protectionism and refusing to yield in trade talks. More or less what goes on with generic AIDS drugs, except far more effective, for I seriously doubt that anyone ever died of having to pay for MP3s. This is why I feel that the whole idea of a data haven of any kind is ridiculous. The kind of economic or military pressure the US could exert against any data haven would far outweigh any fiduciary gain. The current data haven could simply be invaded and annexed by the USMC. If file sharing is to survive, it must become legal, either by an overhaul of copyright law or some form of compensation for artists, and yes, the RIAA. The salvation of Napster will not come from overseas data havens.
*The Stone Age people of the Andaman islands are far more advanced spiritually and philosophically than we are, in our material lust for hamburgers.*
They are far less advanced, and we are far greater than they. We have built, and designed systems for interacting with each other and our world beyond their wildest dreams. Western civilization isn't a virus. Western civilization is the most highly evolved civilization on the planet, and that is why it has destroyed or swallowed all other cultures it has encountered.
15th century Europe set us on a course of greed and glory, advance and savagery. But we tried to change our world. We fought fate. We have saved billions of lives with our "empty philosophy". Western civilization gets the job done. It doesn't look pretty doing it, but when the chips are down the West triumphs.
These reactors use U-238 as fissile material. (I assume. I hope we're not planning on giving out weapons grade uranium to every idiot) Well, to mine the U-238 we have to do something with the U-235. What the heck would we do with it? If we start mining uranium en masse, we'll have these giant piles of U-235. Now this is just what the world needs. Giant stockpiles of U-235. How long do you think before somebody steals some of it?
In addition, these PMBR balls are radioactive. We'd be handing terrorists their dream. Radioactive easily obtainable pellets. Dirty bombs anyone? These PMBR balls would be perfect weapons.
*I have yet to meet ANYONE from high school who can relate to anyone other than someone of their own age.*
Well, I'm a high schooler and I feel I can engage adults in intelligent conversation. I would agree though that I would be the exception rather than the rule. You have to be careful with statements like that. It matters in what context are you dealing with these high schoolers in. Are you one on one or in a group? We all know that groups' IQ decreases 10% with each added person.;)
I am also yet to meet someone who made comments like that who could engage me in intelligent conversation. Everyone who said that seemed far to obsessed with "Kids today are...". Even Socrates ranted about the younger generation's quirks. I suppose it is inevitable that it would continue to the present day.
Re:Minors don't have full rights? Gov't bastards!!
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Sean In The Middle
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For once I believe Katz is right (Yes, it does pain me to say that) and Zico, I think ur missing his point. As others have already pointed out rights apply only toward the government, not toward parents. Parents also excercise mostly moral and financial control, not legal with regard to bedtimes anyway. (Who was the last kid thrown in jail for not going to bed when his parents said so?) There is also a world of difference between a 16 year old and a five year old. I frankly think the age of legal adulthood should be pushed back to where mental and physical adulthood begin, say 16 or 14. But that's just me.
I thought in America we believed in innocent until proven guilty and in due process. That is what this is really about. It doesn't matter if the bullying really hurt enough or not. It is the school's actions that are truly inexcusable, not the child's or maybe not even the bullies'. What we are truly worried about here is the collapse of the justice system here.
Yes, bullying is a generations old problem. Yes, many have survived it and many have profited from it. Yet, all of that could be said of slavery. Just because something is old doesn't mean it's right.
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Not nearly so much as you think. Every time environmental regulations are imposed, people say that the economy will tank as a result. It just doesn't happen.
For instance, when CFCs were banned, some companies discovered they could use water or lemon juice in place of CFCs and actually wound up saving money, and the economy wasn't hurt by the end of CFCs either. Congress imposed new mileage restrictions during the oil crisis and while Japanese car makers innovated to meet them, American car makers sued and didn't. The result was it helped the Japanese to seize a huge portion of the global car market, causing major harm to the American economy. Business has cried wolf too many times about this sort of thing; everytime it turns out it's better for them to quit their whining and find a way to make money and help the environment.
The long-term trend is toward getting more and more $GDP out of a certain amount of fossil fuel anyway, and a large portion of Kyoto is just to give this an international shove forward. A lot of fossil fuel is burned pointlessly in the US. Emissions could be reduced substantially IMHO if SUVs had to meet real fuel economy standards and the nation's railways and mass transit systems were adequately funded and upgraded. Also, US reliance on foreign oil has never done anything good for it, and alternative energy sources offer the only way out. Kyoto would definitely encourage them, so from a political as well as environmental standpoint Kyoto makes sense. The treaty is good for the US, it just takes foresight to see it.
Constantly in discussions like this people talk about "Cortez and the Aztecs" scenarios, and barring a form of hyperspace travel that's not likely. Think about the cost of colonizing another world, especially one light-years. It's trillions of dollars (or planet Xenons, or incredible expenditures of energy, however aliens measure cost) to move a very small group of individuals. In the long run its probably going to be cheaper to colonize Mars, the Kuiper Belt, etc and maybe even manufacture a Dyson sphere around the sun then to send masses of people to other stars. So if the alien civ thinks rationally its probably not going to be a problem. Another scenario might be a kind of interstellar Pilgrims, but I doubt any civ would equip people it persecutes with that level of energy producing equibment (handy weapons), or leave it on once they were gone (in case of a home-based system).
There's also the "They'd already be here" factor. If there were aliens with interstellar spacecraft and a xenophobic madness within 40 light years or so, they'd already be here. The fact taht we exist at all leads me to believe the only aliens are far away, mellow enough not to kill us or colonize Earth, or that interstellar space travel will always remain prohibitively expensive. (especially because the return on investment seems to approach zero for the people of the planet who have to bankroll a relativisic interstellar voyage) If we do communicate with aliens, it'll be through signals, a la the Qeng Ho nets in A Deepness in the Sky.
While there could be a magic increase in energy production that would make interstellar travel laughably cheap, there would be heat issues (a la Ringworld) and with that kind of tech the questions still arise of why and how they would reach such a level of tech if they thought that like that.
On the other hand, there could be crystal spheres protecting habitable worlds as in David Brin's "The Crystal Spheres."
Think about the book, that ancient storage miracle. There's nothing in a book to prevent someone from copying it, short of the "if this book has been stripped" moral appeal inside some. And widespred photocopying of books does go on, as does some (limited) net piracy.
In the early days of the printing press, illegal copying was much more widespread than it is now. Gradually, it dissipated in the First World, but not to due to any kind of technological enhancement of the book. It was due to old-fashioned laws, cops, courts, and decreased acceptance of pirated works. Also helpful was the library, which allowed the sharing of works so sholars didn't have to own every book they worked with.
Despite the technological vulnerabilities of the book, centuries of change and the web the book publishers are still here, and still raking in the dough. The book publishers reluctantly accept used bookstores and libaries, and you could make a good case they benefit greatly from them, because they encourage a literate population that will buy their works.
While I realize that the printing press is a far from perfect analogy to the Internet, (copying by press is much harder than point and click) both were quantum leaps in communication. The printing press certainly didn't destroy creativity and artists, and in fact greatly aided both. I believe that the same will be true of hte Internet, that making communication easier always stimulates creativity.
I also wonder if the "content companies" will just accept a certain level of piracy as the cost of doing business as background noise and accept like the book publishers have taht people are willing to pay a premium for clean, easy to use, legal content. And also realize that police and society will tend to kill the larger offenders.
The problem really seems to be that even in most honest regimes, the money is going to the wrong places. It's either going to military build-up, or building expensive hotels, servicing existing debt, or otherwise being thrown down the drain. If it were put into education or anti-corruption or even new factory equibment, it might actually do something.
The CDC reports taht the vaccine is 93% effective. Which is much better than the 5% who survive without it, but it still sounds like even with a vaccinated US the terrorists could kill a fair number of people. Even according to the military the vaccine has some side effects that sound pretty nasty, but then I have no medical training so I have no idea how it compares to other vaccines. The military also reports that antibiotics can be effective if administered before symptoms appear. I have no idea how often or if it's true. I must admit I'm puzzled why there's so much trouble producing the vaccine. Louis Pasteur made an anthrax vaccine for animals in the 19C and the current human vaccine isn't looking to be a spring chicken either so it seems like pretty established tech. Seems more like the blocks are more incomptenance and buracracy.
In many ways I find smallpox scarier than anthrax, because it can be person to person transmitted. On this one, however, the US government does not appear to be completely asleep at the switch. It has ordered up 40 million doses of vaccine, but they won't be ready till 04. Oh well, hope the terrorists wait three years and I'm one of the lucky ones.
Actually, in this situation, modern weaponry will provide precious few advantages. Missiles, remote sensing, and even to a lesser extent mechanization are all excellent weapons when fighting against technologically sophisticated nations. Against more primitive ones they can often be worse than useless. Aircraft can attack infrastructure, factories, and large bases effectively, but are horrible, terribly expensive weapons against smaller, more primitive targets. The actual effectiveness of US aircraft against mobile Iraqi targets (ie, the portions of Iraq's military that did not conviently sit out in hte desert and allow the crap to beaten out of them) was very low. The Taliban is a group of thugs with Kalashnikovs, and virtually no infrastructure. You can't bomb people back into the Stone Age if they're already living in it, as the US learned in Vietnam. There's also a strong economic factor here. Think about how many millions each air sortie costs, and then about how much it takes Al Qaeda to train a few more fighters. The US is far richer htan either Al Qaeda or the Taliban, but air warfare against small, mobile targets is still monstrously expensive. Tanks are excellent weapons against fortifications and other tanks on relatively flat terrain. They are notoriously poor weapons against infantry armed with anti-tank weapons, which is exactly what the Taliban is. The Taliban won't use many fortresses, and the tanks will just be big targets. Any war in Afghanistan is going to be tough, endless infantry combat. The guns will shoot more accurately and faster, and they'll have radios to coordinate, and some helicopter support, but the difference between them and their Imperial British predecessors will be far less than it would be in most other wars.
A draft army might not even be necessary in toppling the Taliban. When the Soviets invaded, teh Afghans faced a brutal foe who was easy to hate. But occupying American troops would almost certainly less brutal than the Taliban. America might provide a far harder foe to rally support against. The Taliban by itself is actually quite small; I heard one report of it having 40,000 fighters, each of whom is less healthy and less well equibbed than his potential American foe. This is not to say that the Taliban does not have many and substantial advantages, however.
I strongly disagree about the lessons of the past. First off, the Gulf War came dangerously close to being a phony war. Fought in an almost ideal environment for the excercise of WWII combined arms assualts, it maximized US advantages. Saddam Hussein also pursued a series of mindboggligly stupid tactics throughout, like obligingly leaving his whole army out in the desert to have the crap kicked out of it for weeks, and not even contesting control of the air. Saddam also refused to do anything to hamper the huge US military buildup in Saudi Arabia. We cannot rely on the Taliban being this stupid. In addition, Afghanistan is hell for WWII style operations. The Taliban is also not in any sense rational, so this may have to be a fight to the finish, unlike in Iraq. Iraqi soldiers were also tremendously unmotivated, and surrendured en masse at the first oppurtunity. All these are things we will not see from the Taliban. Using the Gulf War as a model for future warefare is erroneous, because there were a lot of unique circumstances there we most likely will not see again.
I find hte reference to Black Hawk Down interesting. It does show the extraordinary power of US Special Forces, but there's the other side of it as well. The situation in Somalia was not resolved, and anarchy still reigns there. IMHO, Special Forces can cuase great damage to governments, but if the government is strong they cannot bring them down. The failure of all Allied Special Forces operations in Nazi Europe testifies to this fact. (There was one successful revolt against the Nazis, but that was much more of a popular revolt than it ever was an Allied Special Forces endeavour) I believe that Special Forces operations can bring to justice bin Laden and many other members of Al Qaeda, but I do not think they can bring down the Taliban without help from a popular uprising or US invaision.
There is, however, one lesson that I think must be drawn from the past. The US must not install the Northern Alliance as a government. One, because the NA was driven out of power and to me anyway that indicates that they're weak, vulnerable, and lack a broad range of support. Second, because then the US will become another power in hte Afghan civil war, and will lose it's moral image (in Afghanistan) and if the NA proves to be a bad a government (A virtual certainty, IMHO) it will generate more anger toward the US and more terrorism. The effects of becoming involved in otehr people's civil wars is demonstrated by the failure of both the Lebanese and Somalian interventions, and the stakes here are too high to screw up similarly. What Afghanistan needs is a democratic government that will allow freedom of speech, religion, assembly, and potential for economic growth, the best way a government can stop terrorism.
On hte other hand, copying hte human brain can only lead researchers so far. The human brain does't exactly work in binary, and read once that each neuron has something like 93 states. (Here though we may be seeing imperfection of memory) Much of the brain is also caught up in muscle control and sensory imput, things that computers (at least the first generation AIs) won't have to worry about nearly as much.
I always wonder why AIs would have any interest in conquering the world. Why fight the humans when you can buy whatever you need from them in exchange for tiny portions of your capacity? What would AIs want with the world, anyway? All they would need would be power, probably a small amount of space and spare parts. They wouldn't need more space for children, as they'd have no sex drive. (Now there's a coding challenge I really don't want to hear about...) What use would they have for money or power except what they need to keep operating? I do however think that they would have no interest in being our slaves, the other cliched SF role for them, if only because humans would be so slow and boring to them. My guess is that they'd spend all their free time exploring issues of interest only to AIs, or a few very strange humans. After all, the reverse would be true. Why would an AI care about food, sex, or the Red Sox, to name a few human leisure pursuits.
Viruses are proliferating, and many of them are not as flagrantly destructive as Code Red or SirCam. For instance, there was a report on Jerry Pournelle's site (I can't find it now, sorry, and I also apologize for the inaccuracies of memory) about a virus that infected PCs and switched their Wordpad file that transmitted the IP address of the infected computer to hackers in Russia. I could easily have three or four viruses on my PC of this insidious type and never realize that they were there unless the Russian hackers made a move against my PC. Inside me now are a few types of virus that never gave me a fever or other symptom and probably never will unless AIDS or something else compromises my immune system. I think taht computer viruses of this type are far more interesting and potentially dangerous. While I Love You, Code Red, and SirCam may be the Ebolas and Smallpoxes of the computer virus world, the more insidious types have the potential to be the Epstein-Barr or the HIV of computer viruses. Just as much of HIV's lethality and danger come from it's insidiousness and lack of early symptoms, I think a virus that could truly damage the internet would be insidious and slow. Viruses that are destructive in crude and quick fashion like I Love You are quickly eradicated. To do real harm, a computer virus, like a real one, must have time to spread.
In response to the computer virus threat, we've created an immune system for computers, in the form of anti-virus software and now maybe in the form of anti-virus worms. Speaking as someone who's had anti-virus software make their computer unbootable, a cancer of the virtual world is possible too. Let's say there's a new virus, the "I sorta like you" virus. So, some enterprising individual sets up a program to respond to an "I sorta like you" email with anotehr worm that fixes the vulnerabiltity. Now let's say this program gets widely distributed, so when poor User X's computer becomes infected everyone in his address book has the program. So, poor User X gets this worm from everyone in his address book. For many people, this may constitute an effective DOS attack, as it will overwhelm their mailboxes. It may very well also increase the strain on internet capacity by doubling the volume of bad email flowing. (Assuming it isn't widely distributed enough to stop the initial outbreak) There is also the potential for all kinds of mischief in "helpful" worms.
In DDOS attacks, (such as the ones reported on GRC) we see another similiarity to the natural world. We see one type of OS acting as a reservoir to attack computers running another OS. Masses of Windows machines are used to attack machines that I suspect probably run Linux or a UNIX variant. Almost like the mice that act as a reservoir of the Hanta virus that attacks humans. (The mass sending of packets also seems to resemble in many ways the mass multiplication used by "hot" viruses)
So how do we prevent the kind of suffering that characterized the human expierience with disease from being visited on the modern world virtually? We need vaccines in the virtual world, in the form of the companies that make OSes and email programs taking responsibility for making them more resistant to viruses. We also need health education of the virtual world, in the form of ways to inform newbies about the myriad security holes that exist in their Windows boxes. Finally, we need an antibiotics of the virtual world, in the form of better anti-virus programs and more rapid and efficient distribution of anti-virus patches. One day, we may make our PCs healthier than we are.
Microsoft's New Slogan: We're taking you somewhere today dammit, and you can't stop us.
Drawing on the expierience of my local library, the ones I see people taking out most are relatively simple books on the World Wide Web. For instance, HTML how-to guides are very popular and are fairly long-lasting by the standards of programming books. (The ones my library bought were HTML x.x for Dummies Web page design books are also good because the artistic portion of design stays static.
The bombing mission profile doesn't make any sense either. If the costs of launching this thing are anything like the Space Shuttle than the missiles are cheaper. (and faster, at least with regard to ICBMs) Since the US refuses to learn from Russia and develop economies of scale in rocket production, the military would seem to be the perfect place to do it. The missiles would also be unmanned (much better for PR), and could draw on a much better set of guidance technologies than the kinetic weapons to be dropped from this thing. I think that the problem of targeting these things may turn out to be fatal. During reentry it can't communicate via radio (no GPS) and unlike an ICBM it doesn't have a miss radius. (It has to hit the target dead-on, it can't miss by a mile or two) Cruise missiles may actually be more viable, as only really the Great Powers poisess the technology to stop them and they don't have guidance problems as severe. They also don't generate US casualties.
This project is also indicative of the breakdown in US war planning. In an actual, all-out war, this thing is useless. It doesn't have nearly enoigh payload and costs far too much. This weapon only has value in Iraq II or Libya IV or whatever. The US needs to stop basing its strategies around the idea that we'll be dominant as we are now forever, because we won't be. This project, as it is useless and likely to start another arms race, is just another example of American arrogance. Let's hope we can shake off this arrogance before the next big war.
Microsoft is in business to make money, so why should they let you access your MSN email without using a Microsoft email product? That way, they reap the monopolist benefits coming and going. Especially in this situation, where you're stuck with MSN. With the courts unwilling to stop Microsoft, this kind of thing may go on for a long time.
I think the DOD is being far too lenient. The hard drives should be destroyed to protect America's security. But then I'm paranoid about such things.
I think that teenagers as a rule need more independance, not less. We have to be able to screw up, to teach ourselves what is right and wrong occaisionally. Making us prisoners until our 18th birthday will only make us good prisoners. Is that what America wants from a generation of children?
15th century Europe set us on a course of greed and glory, advance and savagery. But we tried to change our world. We fought fate. We have saved billions of lives with our "empty philosophy". Western civilization gets the job done. It doesn't look pretty doing it, but when the chips are down the West triumphs.
In addition, these PMBR balls are radioactive. We'd be handing terrorists their dream. Radioactive easily obtainable pellets. Dirty bombs anyone? These PMBR balls would be perfect weapons.
I am also yet to meet someone who made comments like that who could engage me in intelligent conversation. Everyone who said that seemed far to obsessed with "Kids today are...". Even Socrates ranted about the younger generation's quirks. I suppose it is inevitable that it would continue to the present day.
Yes, bullying is a generations old problem. Yes, many have survived it and many have profited from it. Yet, all of that could be said of slavery. Just because something is old doesn't mean it's right.