I wonder if something like this could be tapped through clothing, by standing next to someone or simply shaking hands with someone. I would be very nervous using this to transmit vital information.
".. you get people jumping up and down when you graft some stem cells into a pig so that its blood is structured like a human's, but there's no such outcry over the fact that great apes effectively have no rights?
Chimps and gorillas have far more in common with humans than half of the potential chimeras mentioned in the article will ever do."
It's about time someone mentioned this! It's funny how the religious right exists on both sides of the equation in this one. If you mess with the sacred human material, you're a sinner. If you regard anything other than a human as being human, you are going against the teachings of the bible and are a sinner.
Is it any wonder the Dark Ages lasted as long as it did?
"Honestly though, I don't care what your moral or ethical beliefs are... this is something that needs watching and a good combination of government and private control. Playing God in a petri dish is one thing, but creating a new species and bringing an unknown consiousnous with who knows what kind of mental trama to bear is just plain wrong. I'm no scientific antagonist, but this is one line that should not be crossed."
What is your position on artificial intelligence research? Suppose in 10 years we are able to simulate the basic elements of the mind to the point it can achieve sentience on its own. Would you have any problems pulling the plug on it once it demonstrates a desire to exist?
While there are some lines we should probably never cross, it seems foolish for one to rely on fiction for making decisions before facts can be obtained. (Of course, this thinking also treads dangerously close to religion.)
As far as I know, Jurassic Park and the rest of the "what if" sci-fi stories have no real basis in reality yet. Until we have proof that there is a danger in researching these kinds of things, why shouldn't we experiment with it and expand our knowledge further?
Anyone working on output intended for other machines should never depend on their working machine as a true representative of the end result.
This is why people who work in the print industry have the pantone color system. A color doesn't need to look the same on the screen as it does when printed. It only needs to share the same numeric color values as its pantone equivalent.
As for output to non-print mediums, it will always be a best guess issue outside of matching RGB values. You cannot count on the end viewer to have a system calibrated identically to your own.
Trust me, we will have to have committed many other atrocities before reaching the point where non-humans get the same rights as any human has now. Such as genetic engineering to the point that we have human/animal hybrids with human intelligence.
Aside from that, a machine cannot have true emotions, intelligence or sentience. They can only be programmed to believe they do.
Of course, when you deal with real emotions, intelligence and sentience, you'd better be prepared for instabilities. There will always be an "off" switch on these kinds of things for that very reason. Why should risk a machine getting bored and going insane from sensory deprivation or jealousy, only to put laws into place to prevent us from acting on it?
And that's only assuming there isn't a hardware malfunction at the root of the problem. Good luck trying to convince a machine that a bad stick of RAM is making it angry.
In any case, I pity the first company that puts a seemingly sentient AI system in charge of its own security. I'm sure the basic human rights for machines ideal wouldn't protect the company that created it from being responsible a wrongful death, as a result of the machine going nuts and killing someone it deemed a threat.
That said, no one in their right mind should ever create a machine with survival insticts or a "will" to live. Machines are tools, and they always will be.
While I myself loved my Sharp Zaurus for the mobile powerhouse it was, I never could get used to its clunky interface. Even swapping out the OEM stuff for OpenZaurus and XFree, I always ended up carrying around a cheap Palm Zire for all of my PIM needs.
A few of us may have a pretty good working knowledge of Linux, but a lot of end users trying to adopt these devices aren't looking for something that will require them to have that knowledge on-hand at all times. Unfortunately, a lot of open source developers lack the skill needed to make their software efficient in the aesthetic sense. The software may work extremely well, but the interface usually leaves much to be desired.
If Palm is indeed planning to adopt Linux into future versions of Palm OS, it could be the one thing needed to finally change this problem for the better. Palm could even offer training courses on how to develop software interfaces to best suit the user's needs. And as cliché as it sounds, take a look at what Mac OS X has done for the BSD community.
I'm not suggesting that linux developers dumb down their software, but, I am suggesting they get more creative with how their software communicates with the user. By adopting Palm OS interface design principles, mobile linux developers could gain much of the discipline needed to give Linux a fighting chance in the mobile arena.
Doesn't it seem odd that a low-end device, using slow, flash-based memory would use firewire instead of USB? For a device like this, firewire would simply be overkill for the job.
If this thing even does exist, I'll put my money on it being USB based.
Seriously, if the moon is such an abundant source of energy, Why not just build an an energy processing plant up there and get some lunar bases running? Then just wrap it in a giant bubble ala Spaceballs and work on developing a sustainable atmosphere,
If we can manage that much, maybe going to mars might seem a lot more realistic to those of us who think it can't be done.
Well, there's also the whole issue of how to keep these sites secured from potential attacks against them. As it is, we can't effectively protect the few nuclear plants we currently have in operation.
Actually, I've read the name of the system was not that clear cut. Supposedly, the official meaning of the "DS" part is something along the lines of "Development System", paying heed to the fact that the system was designed in a way to encourage innovative game design in a time where innovation in the industry has become stagnant.
Until Comcast ruined TechTV with their annoyingly mindless G4 drivel. The quality of the programming on G4TechTV is hopelessly pathetic. Many of the great shows they did have on there have been dumped for reruns of Arena, Filter and PLayers.
Also, the majority of people who made the original TechTV worth watching have already jumped ship.
Who knows... maybe if were lucky, the Discovery channel will create it's own version of what TechTV once was... but for now, the outlook is pretty grim.
If it were, i'd consider it, simply because Apple has always ensured us a smooth transition path every time the hardware has changed. I'd imagine the first gen machines would use a hybrid x86-PPC setup for about a year, then go specifically x86... giving us all the time we need to move.
However, if we're just talking about a port of OS X to run on your $299 walmart-purchased celeron machine, then no. What would be the point in throwing away money on a product that would have practically no native apps at launch and highly questionable stability from system to system.
The Mac OS works because Apple can coordinate the hardware and software to work well with one another. If you remove this aspect, you reduce it to nothing more than being just another crash-prone PC, lik every other Microsoft-based doorstop.
It comes down to the fact that Apple did break the agreement. They may have done it purposefully once they knew they weren't getting the Beatles' tracks on the iTMS - to see what they could get Apple Corps to do
This goes back way farther than that. The Apple IIgs and the Mac itself came under fire from Apple Corps simply by having sound systems advanced enough to play music with. It just escalated from there as more technologies, like QuickTime, were piled on.
Steve has already told us no PDAs are being made. The market for tablets is anything but profitable. How about a more realistic rumor, like a powerbook with a touch sensitive display or somrthing?
Wake me up when we have an official word from Apple...
Actually, the major problem was that the clone makers (particularly PowerComputing) were starting to produce better hardware at lower prices than Apple could offer. Everyone jumped ship from Apple to PowerComputing due to the lower prices and higher-quality hardware.
To this day, I still regard the Power Tower Pro as the best Mac ever produced.
I could be way off on this, but I read somewhere else that the tune for "This Land is Made for You and Me" actually existed in the public domain long before Woody Guthrie recorded it.
The music that accompanies it may have been based on an old gospel song called "When The World's on Fire" which dates back as far as the 1930's.
A group called "The Carter Family" did a cover of it, as did many others. Could it be the tune was in the back of Woody's mind when he wrote the lyrics "This Land"? If I remember correctly, this is how our national anthem had started out, as well.
Anyway, if what I read was correct on this, couldn't JibJab simply claim they were using "When The World's on Fire" as a starting point, and that the "this land" lines are merely coincidental?
Ok, I'm confused here... who is their target market supposed to be? I don't personally know anyone who would justify spending $2,000-$3,000 on a pc based game console that will be rendered obsolete well before the sub-$200 consoles will.
Granted, they added features like Tivo style functions and the ability to surf the web and what not, but look at the history of such all-in-one devices in the past. When was the last time you bought a combo vcr/dvd player or a TV with dvd/vcr built into it?
No sane person would buy into such gimmicks. if one part breaks, the entire unit will likely has to be replaced. At $2,000-$3,000 a pop to keep $500+ worth of hardware in one neat box, I just don't see what incentive they are offering to make it worth the extra $1,500-$2,500 in the price. (I do know I'm not that concerned about hiding a couple wires.)
If they want to pitch this item as a game console, fine... then price it competatively with rest of the console gaming systems. If they don't want to lose the profits, then promote it as a niche market item, instead of confusing the consumers.
While I don't want to discredit the "Discover" technology, I do predict this system will ultimately fail. No one is going to buy something that cost more than your average PC, just to play the latest games at NTSC resolutions.
Wow, even as a Mac user, I find this thread annoying simply for the impending flame war that will inevitably erupt. Don't we have anything more worthwhile we could be discussing than just another lame Mac vs. PC debate?
It does if anything anything causes a sudden change in direction, like turbulence. Speeds like this may be safe for space travel, where friction and other interferences are kept at a minimum, but in an atmosphere like we have here on earth, it would be incredibly rsky to use on a casual basis like we do with airplanes today.
A safer solution is to simply send a craft as close to earth orbit as possible, then descend toward your destnation. Granted, it wouldn't be nearly as fast, but would likely be faster than currently used flight technology.
Commercial human use? Probably not.
on
X43-A on to Mach 10
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Every time I hear about these scram jet things, I keep picturing the Ghost fighter/Guld Bowman fight from Macross Plus, where Guld's body ends up crushed like a tin can just before his suicide collision with the Ghost fighter.
While it may be possible to control the rate of acceleration to human-tolerable limits, I can't see this being open to anyone who isn't trained and endurance tested prior to flight. How would you explain a flight where half the passengers end up having strokes or heart attacks from the stresses such a beast would generate during an instance of turbulence?
Wow, so there really are others out there who use their connections to crush egos? Glad to see I'm not alone on doing this.
Why is it these kinds of asshats always announce their backup plan to the "enemy" before following through on it? Can we really be blamed for throwing a monkey wrench into the works every time someone does this?
Nintendo has already told us their direction was changing numerous times in the past. They are trying to get out of developing more lengthy titles that take over 40 hours to play in favor of games you can pick up and learn in 5 minutes. This guy isn't as nuts as he might sound. The industry is suffering due to a serious lack of innovation as well as the general human rush to perform more tasks faster in a shorter amount of time. In a sense, we don't have the time to play games like we used too.
This is why we're seeing the industry making such a strong push into the portable markets. I also believe game consoles as we know them will not be produced anymore once the next generation of them have been distributed to the masses. There is only so much smooth framerates and more complex reflection maps can add to gaming.
This is nice and all, but is it really necessary now that curved surfaces can be accurately represented by splines? While it may require more data per point in the model, the total number of points in a spline-based model is already far lower than the number of verticies needed to create the same model using polygons.
I can't imagine why else anyone would need a high-density of verticies unless they were trying to represent a curved surface.
Has anyone here tried creating a 3D model of themselves with realistic texture maps? I started on such a project a few weeks ago and finally got some renderings made... and for the most part, I agree with the creepiness factor this article mentions. It just feels... "wrong" somehow.
I don't think it's quite so bad when you don't personally know the character, but you really notice it on faces/bodies you're used to seeing on a regular basis in real life.
Seriously though, I do recommend those of you with any 3D artistic talent take a moment to try modelling one's own body or head... it's a totally surreal experience playing around with what is esscentially an electronic version of your own corpse.
Slashdot Mirror
I wonder if something like this could be tapped through clothing, by standing next to someone or simply shaking hands with someone. I would be very nervous using this to transmit vital information.
".. you get people jumping up and down when you graft some stem cells into a pig so that its blood is structured like a human's, but there's no such outcry over the fact that great apes effectively have no rights?
Chimps and gorillas have far more in common with humans than half of the potential chimeras mentioned in the article will ever do."
It's about time someone mentioned this! It's funny how the religious right exists on both sides of the equation in this one. If you mess with the sacred human material, you're a sinner. If you regard anything other than a human as being human, you are going against the teachings of the bible and are a sinner.
Is it any wonder the Dark Ages lasted as long as it did?
"Honestly though, I don't care what your moral or ethical beliefs are... this is something that needs watching and a good combination of government and private control. Playing God in a petri dish is one thing, but creating a new species and bringing an unknown consiousnous with who knows what kind of mental trama to bear is just plain wrong. I'm no scientific antagonist, but this is one line that should not be crossed."
What is your position on artificial intelligence research? Suppose in 10 years we are able to simulate the basic elements of the mind to the point it can achieve sentience on its own. Would you have any problems pulling the plug on it once it demonstrates a desire to exist?
While there are some lines we should probably never cross, it seems foolish for one to rely on fiction for making decisions before facts can be obtained. (Of course, this thinking also treads dangerously close to religion.)
As far as I know, Jurassic Park and the rest of the "what if" sci-fi stories have no real basis in reality yet. Until we have proof that there is a danger in researching these kinds of things, why shouldn't we experiment with it and expand our knowledge further?
Anyone working on output intended for other machines should never depend on their working machine as a true representative of the end result.
This is why people who work in the print industry have the pantone color system. A color doesn't need to look the same on the screen as it does when printed. It only needs to share the same numeric color values as its pantone equivalent.
As for output to non-print mediums, it will always be a best guess issue outside of matching RGB values. You cannot count on the end viewer to have a system calibrated identically to your own.
Trust me, we will have to have committed many other atrocities before reaching the point where non-humans get the same rights as any human has now. Such as genetic engineering to the point that we have human/animal hybrids with human intelligence.
Aside from that, a machine cannot have true emotions, intelligence or sentience. They can only be programmed to believe they do.
Of course, when you deal with real emotions, intelligence and sentience, you'd better be prepared for instabilities. There will always be an "off" switch on these kinds of things for that very reason. Why should risk a machine getting bored and going insane from sensory deprivation or jealousy, only to put laws into place to prevent us from acting on it?
And that's only assuming there isn't a hardware malfunction at the root of the problem. Good luck trying to convince a machine that a bad stick of RAM is making it angry.
In any case, I pity the first company that puts a seemingly sentient AI system in charge of its own security. I'm sure the basic human rights for machines ideal wouldn't protect the company that created it from being responsible a wrongful death, as a result of the machine going nuts and killing someone it deemed a threat.
That said, no one in their right mind should ever create a machine with survival insticts or a "will" to live. Machines are tools, and they always will be.
While I myself loved my Sharp Zaurus for the mobile powerhouse it was, I never could get used to its clunky interface. Even swapping out the OEM stuff for OpenZaurus and XFree, I always ended up carrying around a cheap Palm Zire for all of my PIM needs.
A few of us may have a pretty good working knowledge of Linux, but a lot of end users trying to adopt these devices aren't looking for something that will require them to have that knowledge on-hand at all times. Unfortunately, a lot of open source developers lack the skill needed to make their software efficient in the aesthetic sense. The software may work extremely well, but the interface usually leaves much to be desired.
If Palm is indeed planning to adopt Linux into future versions of Palm OS, it could be the one thing needed to finally change this problem for the better. Palm could even offer training courses on how to develop software interfaces to best suit the user's needs. And as cliché as it sounds, take a look at what Mac OS X has done for the BSD community.
I'm not suggesting that linux developers dumb down their software, but, I am suggesting they get more creative with how their software communicates with the user. By adopting Palm OS interface design principles, mobile linux developers could gain much of the discipline needed to give Linux a fighting chance in the mobile arena.
Doesn't it seem odd that a low-end device, using slow, flash-based memory would use firewire instead of USB? For a device like this, firewire would simply be overkill for the job.
If this thing even does exist, I'll put my money on it being USB based.
Seriously, if the moon is such an abundant source of energy, Why not just build an an energy processing plant up there and get some lunar bases running? Then just wrap it in a giant bubble ala Spaceballs and work on developing a sustainable atmosphere,
If we can manage that much, maybe going to mars might seem a lot more realistic to those of us who think it can't be done.
Well, there's also the whole issue of how to keep these sites secured from potential attacks against them. As it is, we can't effectively protect the few nuclear plants we currently have in operation.
Actually, I've read the name of the system was not that clear cut. Supposedly, the official meaning of the "DS" part is something along the lines of "Development System", paying heed to the fact that the system was designed in a way to encourage innovative game design in a time where innovation in the industry has become stagnant.
Until Comcast ruined TechTV with their annoyingly mindless G4 drivel. The quality of the programming on G4TechTV is hopelessly pathetic. Many of the great shows they did have on there have been dumped for reruns of Arena, Filter and PLayers.
Also, the majority of people who made the original TechTV worth watching have already jumped ship.
Who knows... maybe if were lucky, the Discovery channel will create it's own version of what TechTV once was... but for now, the outlook is pretty grim.
If it were, i'd consider it, simply because Apple has always ensured us a smooth transition path every time the hardware has changed. I'd imagine the first gen machines would use a hybrid x86-PPC setup for about a year, then go specifically x86... giving us all the time we need to move.
However, if we're just talking about a port of OS X to run on your $299 walmart-purchased celeron machine, then no. What would be the point in throwing away money on a product that would have practically no native apps at launch and highly questionable stability from system to system.
The Mac OS works because Apple can coordinate the hardware and software to work well with one another. If you remove this aspect, you reduce it to nothing more than being just another crash-prone PC, lik every other Microsoft-based doorstop.
It'd be interesting to see what the console hacking community could come up with to address this.
It comes down to the fact that Apple did break the agreement. They may have done it purposefully once they knew they weren't getting the Beatles' tracks on the iTMS - to see what they could get Apple Corps to do
This goes back way farther than that. The Apple IIgs and the Mac itself came under fire from Apple Corps simply by having sound systems advanced enough to play music with. It just escalated from there as more technologies, like QuickTime, were piled on.
Steve has already told us no PDAs are being made. The market for tablets is anything but profitable. How about a more realistic rumor, like a powerbook with a touch sensitive display or somrthing?
Wake me up when we have an official word from Apple...
Actually, the major problem was that the clone makers (particularly PowerComputing) were starting to produce better hardware at lower prices than Apple could offer. Everyone jumped ship from Apple to PowerComputing due to the lower prices and higher-quality hardware.
To this day, I still regard the Power Tower Pro as the best Mac ever produced.
I could be way off on this, but I read somewhere else that the tune for "This Land is Made for You and Me" actually existed in the public domain long before Woody Guthrie recorded it.
The music that accompanies it may have been based on an old gospel song called "When The World's on Fire" which dates back as far as the 1930's.
A group called "The Carter Family" did a cover of it, as did many others. Could it be the tune was in the back of Woody's mind when he wrote the lyrics "This Land"? If I remember correctly, this is how our national anthem had started out, as well.
Anyway, if what I read was correct on this, couldn't JibJab simply claim they were using "When The World's on Fire" as a starting point, and that the "this land" lines are merely coincidental?
Ok, I'm confused here... who is their target market supposed to be? I don't personally know anyone who would justify spending $2,000-$3,000 on a pc based game console that will be rendered obsolete well before the sub-$200 consoles will.
Granted, they added features like Tivo style functions and the ability to surf the web and what not, but look at the history of such all-in-one devices in the past. When was the last time you bought a combo vcr/dvd player or a TV with dvd/vcr built into it?
No sane person would buy into such gimmicks. if one part breaks, the entire unit will likely has to be replaced. At $2,000-$3,000 a pop to keep $500+ worth of hardware in one neat box, I just don't see what incentive they are offering to make it worth the extra $1,500-$2,500 in the price. (I do know I'm not that concerned about hiding a couple wires.)
If they want to pitch this item as a game console, fine... then price it competatively with rest of the console gaming systems. If they don't want to lose the profits, then promote it as a niche market item, instead of confusing the consumers.
While I don't want to discredit the "Discover" technology, I do predict this system will ultimately fail. No one is going to buy something that cost more than your average PC, just to play the latest games at NTSC resolutions.
Wow, even as a Mac user, I find this thread annoying simply for the impending flame war that will inevitably erupt. Don't we have anything more worthwhile we could be discussing than just another lame Mac vs. PC debate?
It does if anything anything causes a sudden change in direction, like turbulence. Speeds like this may be safe for space travel, where friction and other interferences are kept at a minimum, but in an atmosphere like we have here on earth, it would be incredibly rsky to use on a casual basis like we do with airplanes today.
A safer solution is to simply send a craft as close to earth orbit as possible, then descend toward your destnation. Granted, it wouldn't be nearly as fast, but would likely be faster than currently used flight technology.
Every time I hear about these scram jet things, I keep picturing the Ghost fighter/Guld Bowman fight from Macross Plus, where Guld's body ends up crushed like a tin can just before his suicide collision with the Ghost fighter.
While it may be possible to control the rate of acceleration to human-tolerable limits, I can't see this being open to anyone who isn't trained and endurance tested prior to flight. How would you explain a flight where half the passengers end up having strokes or heart attacks from the stresses such a beast would generate during an instance of turbulence?
Wow, so there really are others out there who use their connections to crush egos? Glad to see I'm not alone on doing this.
;-)
Why is it these kinds of asshats always announce their backup plan to the "enemy" before following through on it? Can we really be blamed for throwing a monkey wrench into the works every time someone does this?
Gotta love psychological warfare.
Nintendo has already told us their direction was changing numerous times in the past. They are trying to get out of developing more lengthy titles that take over 40 hours to play in favor of games you can pick up and learn in 5 minutes. This guy isn't as nuts as he might sound. The industry is suffering due to a serious lack of innovation as well as the general human rush to perform more tasks faster in a shorter amount of time. In a sense, we don't have the time to play games like we used too.
This is why we're seeing the industry making such a strong push into the portable markets. I also believe game consoles as we know them will not be produced anymore once the next generation of them have been distributed to the masses. There is only so much smooth framerates and more complex reflection maps can add to gaming.
This is nice and all, but is it really necessary now that curved surfaces can be accurately represented by splines? While it may require more data per point in the model, the total number of points in a spline-based model is already far lower than the number of verticies needed to create the same model using polygons.
I can't imagine why else anyone would need a high-density of verticies unless they were trying to represent a curved surface.
Has anyone here tried creating a 3D model of themselves with realistic texture maps? I started on such a project a few weeks ago and finally got some renderings made... and for the most part, I agree with the creepiness factor this article mentions. It just feels... "wrong" somehow.
I don't think it's quite so bad when you don't personally know the character, but you really notice it on faces/bodies you're used to seeing on a regular basis in real life.
Seriously though, I do recommend those of you with any 3D artistic talent take a moment to try modelling one's own body or head... it's a totally surreal experience playing around with what is esscentially an electronic version of your own corpse.