Re:SOCIAL THREEFOLDING
on
Fair IP Laws?
·
· Score: 2
we see a great debate arising about 'intellectual property'. People are concerned that producers of digital content (writings, music, video, data) are adequately compensated for their efforts. In order to do this, an analogue was made -- we will sell you a number (any digital file is just a big number consisting of 1's and 0's) - and to protect the 'uniqueness' of that number, we will treat that number as if it weren't really a number, but an actual physical tangible good.
But there's one problem with this. If i have an apple and give you an apple, i no longer have an apple. But if i have an idea and give you an idea, then we both have the idea. These inherent properties of matter and bits is ignored for the sake of the analogy, and here lies the fundamental problem at the heart of the intellectual property debate. And it will never be solved until an understanding of social threefolding can be brought to bear on it...
And this is the law of the wild,
As old and as true as the sky.
And the wolf who keeps it will prosper,
But the wolf who breaks it will die!
Like the wind that circles the tree trunk,
this law runneth forward and back.
The strength of the pack is the wolf,
and the strength of the wolf is the pack.
(Rudyard Kipling)
--| THE FUNDAMENTAL SOCIAL LAW |----
Briefly as the subject must be dealt with, there will always be some people whose feeling will lead them to recognize the truth of what it is impossible to discuss in all its fullness here. There is a fundamental social law which spiritual science teaches, and which is as follows:
'The well-being of a community of people working together
will be the greater, the less the individual claims for himself
the proceeds of his work, i.e. the more of these proceeds he
makes over to his fellow-workers, the more his own needs are
satisfied, not out of his own work but out of the work done by
others'.
Every arrangement in a community that is contrary to this law will inevitably engender somewhere after a while distress and want. It is a fundamental law, which holds good for all social life with the same absoluteness and necessity as any law of nature within a particular field of natural causation. It must not be supposed, however, that it is sufficient to acknowledge this law as one for general moral conduct, or to try to interpret it into the sentiment that everyone should work in the service of his fellow men. No, this law only lives in reality as it should when a community of people succeeds in creating arrangements such that no one can ever claim the fruits of his own labour for himself, but that these go wholely to the benefit of the community. And he must himself be supported in return by the labours of his fellow men. The important point is, therefore, that working for one's fellow men and obtaining so much income must be kept apart, as two separate things.
Self-styled 'practical people' will of course have nothing but a smile for such 'outrageous idealism'. And yet this law is more practical than any that was ever devised or enacted by the 'practicians'. Anyone who really examines practical life will find that every community that exists or has ever existed anywhere has two sorts of arrangements, of which the one is in accordance with this law and the other contrary to it. It is bound to be so everywhere, whether men will it or not. Every community would indeed fall to pieces at once, if the work of the individual did not pass over into the totality. But human egoism has from of old run counter to this law, and sought to extract as much as possible for the individual out of his own work. And what has come about from of old in this way due to egoism has alone brought want, poverty and distress in its wake. This simply means that the part of human arrangements brought about by 'practicians' who calculated on the basis of either their own egotism or that of others must always prove impractical.
Now naturally it is not simply a matter of recognizing a law of this kind, but the real practical part begins with the question: How is one to translate this law into actual fact? Obviously this law says nothing less than this: man's welfare is the greater, in proportion as egoism is less. So for its translation into reality one must have people who can find their way out of egoism. In practice, however, this is quite impossible if the individual's share of weal and woe is measured according to his labour. He who labours for himself *must* gradually fall a victim to egoism. Only one who labours solely for the rest can gradually grow to be a worker without egoism.
But there is one thing needed to begin with. If any man works for another, he must find in this other man the reason for his work; and if anyone is to work for the community, he must perceive and feel the value, the nature and importance, of this community. He can only do this when the community is something quite different from a more or less indefinite summation of individual men. It must be informed by an actual spirit, in which each single one has his part. It must be such that each one says: 'It is as it should be, and I *will* that it be so'. The community must have a spiritual mission, and each individual must have the will to contribute towards the fulfilling of this mission. All the vague abstract ideals of which people usually talk cannot present such a mission. If there be nothing but these, then one individual here or one group there will be working without any clear overview of what use there is in their work, except it being to the advantage of their families, or of those particular interests to which they happen to be attached. In every single member, down to the most solitary, this spirit of the community must be alive...
No one need try to discover a solution of the social question that shall hold good for all time, but simply to find the right form for his social thoughts and actions in the light of the immediate need of the time in which he lives. Indeed there is today no theoretical scheme which could be devised or carried into effect by any one person which in itself could solve the social question. For this he would need to possess the power to force a number of people into the conditions which he had created. But in the present day any such compulsion is out of the question. The possibility must be found of each person doing of his own free will that which he is called upon to do according to his strength and abilities. For this reason there can be no possible question of ever trying to work on people theoretically, by merely indoctrinating them with a view as to how economic conditions might best be arranged. A bald economic theory can never act as a force to counteract the powers of egoism. for a while such an economic theory may sweep the masses along with a kind of impetus that *appears* to resemble idealism; but in the long run it helps nobody. Anyone who implants such a theory into a mass of people without giving them some real spiritual substance along with it is sinning against the real meaning of human evolution. The only thing which can help is a spiritual world-conception which of itself, through what it has to offer, can live in the thoughts, in the feelings, in the will -- in short, in a man's whole soul...
The recognition of these principles means, it is true, the loss of many an illusion for various people whose ambition it is to be popular benefactors. It makes working for the welfare of society a really difficult matter-one of which the results, too, may in certain circumstances comprise only quite tiny part-results. Most of what is given out today by whole parties as panaceas for social life loses its value, and is seen to be a mere bubble and hollow phrase, lacking in due knowledge of human life. No parliament, no democracy, no popular agitation can have any meaning for a person who looks at all deeper, if they violate the law stated above; whereas everything of this kind may work for good if it works on the lines of this law. It is a mischievous delusion to believe that particular persons sent up to some parliament as delegates from the people can do anything for the good of mankind, unless their activity is in conformity with the fundamental social law.
Wherever this law finds outer expression, wherever anyone is at work on its lines-so far as is possible in that position in which he is placed within the community-good results will be attained, though it be but in the single case and in never so small a measure. And it is only a number of individual results attained in this way that will together combine to the healthy collective progress of society.
The healthy social life is found
When in the mirror of each human soul
The whole community is shaped,
And when in the community
Lives the strength of each human soul.
==| Capital and Credit in Threefolding |===
Where 'supply and demand' are the determining factors, there the egoistic type of value is the only one that can come into reckoning. The 'market' relationship must be superseded by associations regulating the exchange and production of goods by an intelligent observation of human needs. Such associations can replace mere supply and demand by contracts and negotiations between groups of producers and consumers, and between different groups of producers...
Work done in confidence of the return achievements of others constitutes the giving of *credit* in social life. As there was once a transition from barter to the money system, so there has recently been a progressive transformation to a basis of credit. Life makes it necessary today for one man to work with means entrusted to him by another, or by a community, having confidence in his power to achieve a result. But under the capitalistic method the credit system involves a complete loss of the real and satisfying human relationship of a man to the conditions of his life and work. Credit is given when there is prospect of an increase of capital that seems to justify it; and work is always done subject to the view that the confidence or credit received will have to appear justified in the capitalistic sense. And what is the result? Human beings are subjected to the power of dealings in capital which take place in a sphere of finance remote from life. And the moment they become fully conscious of this fact, they feel it to be unworthy of their humanity...
A healthy system of giving credit presupposes a social structure which enables economic values to be estimated by their relation to the satisfaction of men's bodily and spiritual needs. Men's economic dealings will take their form from this. Production will be considered from the point of view of needs, no longer by an abstract scale of capital and wages.
Economic life in a threefold society is built up by the cooperation of *associations* arising out of the needs of producers and the interests of consumers. In their mutual dealings, impulses from the spiritual sphere and sphere of rights will play a decisive part. These associations will not be bound to a purely capitalistic standpoint, for one association will be in direct mutual dealings with another, and thus the one-sided interests of one branch of production will be regulated and balanced by those of the other. The responsibility for the giving and taking of credit will thus devolve to the associations. This will not impair the scope and activity of individuals with special faculties; on the contrary, only this method will give individual faculties full scope: the individual is responsible to his association for achieving the best possible results. The association is responsible to other associations for using these individual achievements to good purpose. The individual's desire for gain will no longer be imposing production on the life of the community; production will be regulated by the needs of the community...
All kinds of dealings are possible between the new associations and old forms of business--there is no question of the old having to be destroyed and replaced by the new. The new simply takes its place and will have to justify itself and prove its inherent power, while the old will dwindle away... The essential thing is that the threefold idea will stimulate a real social intelligence in the men and women of the community. The individual will in a very definite sense be contributing to the achievements of the whole community... The individual faculties of men, working in harmony with the human relationships founded in the sphere of rights, and with the production, circulation and consumption that are regulated by the economic associations, will result in the greatest possible efficiency. Increase of capital, and a proper adjustment of work and return for work, will appear as a final consequence...
many proponents of Human-Computer Interaction take the view that 'machines will become more intelligent', and this stems from a view that regards the human brain as a computer.
my question is -- what do you have to say in relation to Searle's Chinese Room and the Turing Test? Do you have any insight beyond where Searle and Eccles have already gone? on the opinion that the 'Brain is a Computer'?
>> Synopsis of Some Existing Research on the Problem:
according to Nobel Prize Neurophysiologist JOHN ECCLES in his book 'Understanding the Human Brain' - the brain is not to be understood as a computer; rather it works more like a TRANSCIEVER for Conscious Experience.
this is confirmed by a second Scientist, JOHN SEARLE, who refuted the 'Turing Test' in two articles: 'IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER?', and 'MINDS BRAINS AND PROGRAMMES' * thoroughly, disputes the view that the Human Brain is an instantiation of a digital computer programme.
Materialism can never offer a satisfactory explanation of the world. For every attempt at an explanation must begin with the formation of thoughts about the phenomena of the world.
Materialism thus begins with the thought of matter or material processes. But, in doing so, it is already confronted by two different sets of facts: the material world, and the thoughts about it.
The materialist seeks to make these latter intelligible by regarding them as purely material processes. He believes that thinking takes place in the brain, much in the same way that digestion takes place in the animal organs.
Just as he attributes mechanical and organic effects to matter, so he credits matter in certain circumstances with the capacity to think.
He overlooks that, in doing so, he is merely shifting the problem from one place to another. He ascribes the power of thinking to matter instead of to himself.
And thus he is back again at his starting point. How does matter come to think about its own nature? Why is it not simply satisfied with itself and content just to exist?
The materialist has turned his attention away from the definite subject, his own I, and has arrived at an image of something quite vague and indefinite. Here the old riddle meets him again.
The materialistic conception cannot solve the problem; it can only shift it from one place to another.
the first company to dedicate resources to porting their high-end SGI IRIX 3D software to linux was from: Side Effects. HOUDINI's the software they used to do gandalf's fireworks, the river stallions, and the effects in 'what dreams may come' and 'the matrix' -- on LINUX!
'Perfection is achieved not when there is nothing more to add,
but rather when there is nothing more to take away.'
(Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
You can increase the apparent simplicity and focus of an OS simply by consolidating five menubars into one.
--| INTERFACE DESIGN > A SINGLE MENUBAR |-----
>> WHAT? Give me the summary.
A SINGLE MENUBAR AT THE TOP OF THE SCREEN that changes according to the current context (window) instead of a menubar for every window.
Setting this as a User Default will improve Linux's ease-of-use. Placing a single Menubar along the top of the screen:
1 - Makes it faster and easier to hit.
(no mouse overshoot to slow things down)
2 - Eliminates clutter in the interface.
3 - Reduces ambiguity (and hence - user error).
--| DISCUSSION |---
>> LINUX MENUS WORK GREAT NOW. >> WHY SHOULD WE DO SO MUCH WORK TO CHANGE THE ACCEPTED DEFAULT?
In programming, if you compute a static variable within a loop - it is highly innefficient - it slows down the loop. You optimize code by pulling all the computes you can out of the loop and processing externally.
Interface design is the same. If a user has to click: A, B, C three hundred times a day - it would make him 3 times as efficient to collapse those three steps into a macro and execute with one keystroke. Making things less steps for users optimizes the UI just like computing static variables outside the loop optimizes code.
Since Menus are one of the most frequently used items in an operating system, optimizing something small in this frequent behaviour equates to a Big savings for the user over time. Therefore getting the menus right is one of the most crucial and fundamental UI decisions that must be made by those implementing the OS.
Linux currently imitates Windows' menubar implementation of putting a menubar in every window. UI studies show this is not the optimal way of implementing menus in an operating system. Linux can beat Windows in menubar GUI by providing the option of a single context-sensitive menubar. There are several good reasons for doing this:
1 - TARGETING CONSTRAINT
How easy it is to hit a target - virtual size.
2 - CONSISTENT PLACEMENT
How easy it is to remember "where" a target is.
3 - SIMPLICITY KEEPING FOCUS
Elimination of extraneous controls that are not
relevant to the current task at hand.
jonathan ive - swoopy curves Are Not design
on
Black Is The New Beige
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
---| swoopy curves Are Not design |---
Certainly, the PC industry has never revered design, preferring blocky beige boxes or, more recently, coloured go-faster curves devoid of real function. He's scornful of those who use 'swoopy shapes to look good, stuff that is so aggressively designed, just to catch the eye. I think that's arrogance, it's not done for the benefit of the user.'
By contrast, he says, "you won't be able to find a single thing on an Apple that hasn't had thought put into it"...
With the first iMac the goal wasn't to look different, but to build the best integrated consumer computer we could. If as a consequence the shape is different, then that's how it is. The thing is, it's very easy to be different, but very difficult to be better. That's what we have tried to do with the new iMac."
Fortune Magazine: What has always distinguished the products of the companies you've led is the design aesthetic. Is your obsession with design an inborn instinct or what?
Steve Jobs: We don't have good language to talk about this kind of thing. In most people's vocabularies, design means veneer. It's interior decorating. It's the fabric of the curtains and the sofa. But to me, nothing could be further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a man-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers of the product or service. The iMac is not just the colour or translucence or the shape of the shell. The essence of the iMac is to be the finest possible consumer computer in which each element plays together.
On our latest iMac, I was adamant that we get rid of the fan, because it is much more pleasant to work on a computer that doesn't drone all the time. That was not just "Steve's decision" to pull out the fan; it required an enormous engineering effort to figure out how to manage power better and do a better job of thermal conduction through the machine. That is the furthest thing from veneer. It was at the core of the product the day we started.
This is what customers pay us for--to sweat all these details so it's easy and pleasant for them to use our computers. We're supposed to be really good at this. That doesn't mean we don't listen to customers, but it's hard for them to tell you what they want when they've never seen anything remotely like it.
| Brooks, on the other hand, is sure that these machines are on the | right track. In a sense, he makes it easier for his robots to catch up | with humans by lowering the bar. On the back of the book, Brooks | ladles out the schmaltz and proclaims, "We are machines, as are our | spouses, our children and our dogs... I believe myself and my children | all to be mere machines." That is, we're all just a slightly more | involved collection of simple neurons that don't do much more than the | balance mechanism of Genghis. You may think that you're deeply in love | with the City of Florence, the ideal of democratic discourse, that | raven-haired beauty three rows up, puppy dogs, or rainy nights cuddled | under warm blankets, but according to the Brooks paradigm, you're just | a bunch of AFSMs passing numbers back and forth.
in combating the concept of free will. The germs of all the relevant arguments are to be found as early as Spinoza. All that he brought forward in clear and simple language against the idea of freedom has since been repeated times without number, but as a rule enveloped in the most hair-splitting theoretical doctrines, so that it is difficult to recognize the straightforward train of thought which is all that matters. Spinoza writes in a letter of October or November, 1674:
I call a thing free which exists and acts from the pure necessity
of its nature, and I call that unfree, of which the being and
action are precisely and fixedly determined by something else.
Thus, for example, God, though necessary, is free because he
exists only through the necessity of his own nature. Similarly,
God cognizes himself and all else freely, because it follows
solely from the necessity of his nature that he cognizes all. You
see, therefore, that for me freedom consists not in free decision,
but in free necessity.
But let us come down to created things which are all
determined by external causes to exist and to act in a fixed and
definite manner. To perceive this more clearly, let us imagine
a perfectly simple case. A stone, for example, receives from an
external cause acting upon it a certan quantity of motion, by
reason of which it necessarily continues to move, after the
impact of the external cause has ceased. The continued motion
of the stone is due to compulsion, not to the necessity of its
own nature, because it requires to be defined by the thrust of
an external cause. What is true here for the stone is true also
for every other particular thing, however complicated and
many-sided it may be, namely, that everything is necessarily
determined by external causes to exist and to act in a fixed and
definite manner.
Now, please, suppose that this stone during its motion thinks and
knows that it is striving to the best of its ability to continue in
motion. This stone, which is conscious only of its striving and is
by no neans indifferent, will believe that it is absolutely free, and
that it continues in motion for no other reason than its own will to
continue. But this is just the human freedom that everybody claims
to possess and which consists in nothing but this, that men are
conscious of their desires, but ignorant of the causes by which they
are determined. Thus the child believes that he desires milk of
his own free will, the angry boy regards his desire for vengeance
as free, and the coward his desire for flight. Again, the drunken
man believes that he says of his own free will what, sober
again, he would fain have left unsaid, and as this prejudice is
innate in all men, it is difficult to free oneself from it. For,
although experience teaches us often enough that man least of
all can temper his desires, and that, moved by conflicting passions,
he sees the better and pursues the worse, yet he considers
himself free because there are some things which he desires
less strongly, and some desires which he can easily inhibit
through the recollection of something else which it is often
possible to recall.
Because this view is so clearly and definitely expressed it is easy to detect the fundamental error that it contains. The same necessity by which a stone makes a definite movement as the result of an impact, is said to compel a man to carry out an action when impelled thereto by any reason. It is only because man is conscious of his action that he thinks himself to be its originator. But in doing so he overlooks the fact that he is driven by a cause which he cannot help obeying. The error in this train of thought is soon discovered. Spinoza, and all who think like him, overlook the fact that man not only is conscious of his action, but also may become conscious of the causes which guide him. Nobody will deny that the child is unfree when he desires milk, or the drunken man when he says things which he later regrets. Neither knows anything of the causes, working in the depths of their organisms, which exercise irresistible control over them. But is it justifiable to lump together actions of this kind with those in which a man is conscious not only of his actions but also of the reasons which cause him to act? Are the actions of men really all of one kind? Should the act of a soldier on the field of battle, of the scientific researcher in his laboratory, of the statesman in the most complicated diplomatic negotiations, be placed scientifically on the same level with that of the child when it desires milk: It is no doubt true that it is best to seek the solution of a problem where the conditions are sinmplest. But inability to discrinminate has before now caused endless confusion. There is, after all, a profound difference between knowing why I am acting and not knowing it. At first sight this seems a self-evident truth. And yet the opponents of freedom never ask themselves whether a motive of action which I recognize and see through, is to be regarded as compulsory for me in the same sense as the organic process which causes the child to cry for milk...
Materialism can never offer a satisfactory explanation of the world. For every attempt at an explanation must begin with the formation of thoughts about the phenomena of the world. Materialism thus begins with the thought of matter or material processes. But, in doing so, it is already confronted by two different sets of facts: the material world, and the thoughts about it. The materialist seeks to make these latter intelligible by regarding them as purely material processes. He believes that thinking takes place in the brain, much in the same way that digestion takes place in the animal organs. Just as he attributes mechanical and organic effects to matter, so he credits matter in certain circumstances with the capacity to think. He overlooks that, in doing so, he is merely shifting the problem from one place to another. He ascribes the power of thinking to matter instead of to himself. And thus he is back again at his starting point. How does matter come to think about its own nature? Why is it not simply satisfied with itself and content just to exist? The materialist has turned his attention away from the definite subject, his own I, and has arrived at an image of something quite vague and indefinite. Here the old riddle meets him again. The materialistic conception cannot solve the problem; it can only shift it from one place to another.
| I'd like to see NASA devote its (too scarce) resources to | making plant-based foods taste fantastic in a space | environement. It sure beats the thought of microwaved | synthetic meat.
NASA spent several million dollars and years of research to make a Pen that works in Zero-G...
does this mean they'll finally manage to have TYPE and CREATOR code metadata so you can name a file what you want, and it'll still work if you forget to put.mp3 or.doc on the end?
these words may be more appropos than ever right now...
--| The Distress of Arjuna |---
ARJUNA'S HEART melted with pity, while he uttered this:
Arjuna. Krishna! as I behold, come here to shed Their common blood, yon concourse of our kin, My members fail, my tongue dries in my mouth, A shudder thrills my body, and my hair Bristles with horror; from my weak hand slips Gandiv, the goodly bow; a fever burns My skin to parching; hardly may I stand; The life within me seems to swim and faint; Nothing do I foresee save woe and wail!
It is not good, O Keshav! nought of good Can spring from mutual slaughter! Lo, I hate Triumph and domination, wealth and ease, Thus sadly won! Aho! what victory Can bring delight, Govinda! what rich spoils Could profit; what rule recompense; what span Of life itself seem sweet, bought with such blood?
Seeing that these stand here, ready to die, For whose sake life was fair, and pleasure pleased, And power grew precious:- grandsires, sires, and sons, Brothers, and fathers-in-law, and sons-in-law, Elders and friends! Shall I deal death on these Even though they seek to slay us? Not one blow, O Madhusudan! will I strike to gain The rule of all Three Worlds; then, how much less To seize an earthly kingdom! Killing these Must breed but anguish, Krishna! If they be Guilty, we shall grow guilty by their deaths; Their sins will light on us, if we shall slay Those sons of Dhritirashtra, and our kin;
What peace could come of that, O Madhava? For if indeed, blinded by lust and wrath, These cannot see, or will not see, the sin Of kingly lines o'erthrown and kinsmen slain, How should not we, who see, shun such a crime-- We who perceive the guilt and feel the shame- O thou Delight of Men, Janardana?
By overthrow of houses perisheth Their sweet continuous household piety, And- rites neglected, piety extinct-- Enters impiety upon that home; Its women grow unwomaned, whence there spring Mad passions, and the mingling-up of castes, Sending a Hell-ward road that family, And whoso wrought its doom by wicked wrath.
Nay, and the souls of honoured ancestors Fall from their place of peace, being bereft Of funeral-cakes and the wan death-water. So teach our holy hymns. Thus, if we slay Kinsfolk and friends for love of earthly power, Ahovat! what an evil fault it were! Better I deem it, if my kinsmen strike, To face them weaponless, and bare my breast To shaft and spear, than answer blow with blow.
(The BHAGAVAD-GITA, translated by Sir Edwin Arnold,
Chapter 1 - Of the Distress of Arjuna)
when it comes down to it, HERE's an actual Mac OS9 screenshot to compare to the Xfree anti-aliasing.
notice that OS9 doesn't anti-alias text below (user settable) 12 points (handy, and faster). i've set the browser font to be: Times-12 -> imo, after examining both the X shot and this shot at 400% magnification, it seems to me that the hinting and definition of the MacOS still yields clearer text.
someone might also want to post up a OS-X and XP screenshot of the same web page:
when it comes down to it, HERE's an actual Mac OS9 screenshot to compare to the Xfree anti-aliasing.
notice that OS9 doesn't anti-alias text below (user settable) 12 points (handy, and faster). i've set the browser font to be: Times-12 -> imo, after examining both the X shot and this shot at 400% magnification, it seems to me that the hinting and definition of the MacOS still yields clearer text.
someone might also want to post up a OS-X and XP screenshot of the same web page:
http://salon.com/ent/feature/2002/03/02/shakespear e/index.html
so we can have a REAL comparison of actual screenshots instead of a lot of/. theorizing about about the Nyquist limit.
regards,
johnrpenner.
If not iPod, Try FTP or ZIP
on
iWarez
·
· Score: 2
this isn't an iPod thing. users used to do this by putting a floppy into the machine to rip their warez, then it was ZIP disks, next its the iPod (just so handy...:) -- if you really wanted an app, you could tar it up, and eMail or FTP it to yourself if the staff aren't paying attention...
the gamma of digital projectors (usually gamma 2.2) is still not (although someday it might be) as good as FILM GAMMA (gamma 1.0). stuff captured on film has a smoothness of gamma that is still smoother than anything caputured by a CCD.
the same is also true of 35mm cameras vs digital cameras. even a $20 disposable 35mm camera has a MINIMUM resolution (approximately 2500 x 1200 pixels) that is better than most $400 digital cameras, and even if you match the resolution, you still have a lousy 2.2 gamma for digital images coming off a CCD (as opposed to 1.0 gamma for film). if you happen to *like* poor CCD gamma quality - that's your choice, but why do people always automatically swallow the HYPE that equates digital = better, when its not!?
although the benefits of going digital (convenience of downloading the film instead of shipping physical flim) is great, it doesn't necessarily follow that the picture that you're going to see is actually any BETTER!
"I shall begin at the beginning," said the D.H.C. and the more zealous
students recorded his intention in their notebooks: Begin at the
beginning. "These," he waved his hand, "are the incubators." And opening
an insulated door he showed them racks upon racks of numbered test-tubes.
"The week's supply of ova. Kept," he explained, "at blood heat; whereas
the male gametes," and here he opened another door, "they have to be kept
at thirty-five instead of thirty-seven. Full blood heat sterilizes." Rams
wrapped in theremogene beget no lambs.
Still leaning against the incubators he gave them, while the pencils
scurried illegibly across the pages, a brief description of the modern
fertilizing process; spoke first, of course, of its surgical
introduction-"the operation undergone voluntarily for the good of Society,
not to mention the fact that it carries a bonus amounting to six months'
salary"; continued with some account of the technique for preserving the
excised ovary alive and actively developing; passed on to a consideration
of optimum temperature, salinity, viscosity; referred to the liquor in
which the detached and ripened eggs were kept; and, leading his charges to
the work tables, actually showed them how this liquor was drawn off from
the test-tubes; how it was let out drop by drop onto the specially warmed
slides of the microscopes; how the eggs which it contained were inspected
for abnormalities, counted and transferred to a porous receptacle; how
(and he now took them to watch the operation) this receptacle was immersed
in a warm bouillon containing free-swimming spermatozoa-at a minimum
concentration of one hundred thousand per cubic centimetre, he insisted;
and how, after ten minutes, the container was lifted out of the liquor and
its contents re-examined; how, if any of the eggs remained unfertilized,
it was again immersed, and, if necessary, yet again; how the fertilized
ova went back to the incubators; where the Alphas and Betas remained until
definitely bottled; while the Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons were brought out
again, after only thirty-six hours, to undergo Bokanovsky's Process.
"Bokanovsky's Process," repeated the Director, and the students underlined
the words in their little notebooks.
One egg, one embryo, one adult-normality. But a bokanovskified egg will
bud, will proliferate, will divide. From eight to ninety-six buds, and
every bud will grow into a perfectly formed embryo, and every embryo into
a full-sized adult. Making ninety-six human beings grow where only one
grew before. Progress.
"Essentially," the D.H.C. concluded, "bokanovskification consists of a
series of arrests of development. We check the normal growth and,
paradoxically enough, the egg responds by budding."
Responds by budding. The pencils were busy.
He pointed. On a very slowly moving band a rack-full of test-tubes was
entering a large metal box, another, rack-full was emerging. Machinery
faintly purred. It took eight minutes for the tubes to go through, he told
them. Eight minutes of hard X-rays being about as much as an egg can
stand. A few died; of the rest, the least susceptible divided into two;
most put out four buds; some eight; all were returned to the incubators,
where the buds began to develop; then, after two days, were suddenly
chilled, chilled and checked. Two, four, eight, the buds in their turn
budded; and having budded were dosed almost to death with alcohol;
consequently burgeoned again and having budded-bud out of bud out of
bud-were thereafter-further arrest being generally fatal-left to develop
in peace. By which time the original egg was in a fair way to becoming
anything from eight to ninety-six embryos- a prodigious improvement, you
will agree, on nature. Identical twins-but not in piddling twos and threes
as in the old viviparous days, when an egg would sometimes accidentally
divide; actually by dozens, by scores at a time.
"Scores," the Director repeated and flung out his arms, as though he were
distributing largesse. "Scores."
But one of the students was fool enough to ask where the advantage lay.
"My good boy!" The Director wheeled sharply round on him. "Can't you see?
Can't you see?" He raised a hand; his expression was solemn. "Bokanovsky's
Process is one of the major instruments of social stability!"
Major instruments of social stability.
Standard men and women; in uniform batches. The whole of a small factory
staffed with the products of a single bokanovskified egg.
"Ninety-six identical twins working ninety-six identical machines!" The
voice was almost tremulous with enthusiasm. "You really know where you
are. For the first time in history." He quoted the planetary motto.
"Community, Identity, Stability." Grand words. "If we could bokanovskify
indefinitely the whole problem would be solved."
Solved by standard Gammas, unvarying Deltas, uniform Epsilons. Millions of
identical twins. The principle of mass production at last applied to
biology.
'The Living Robots have one goal, to obtain enough energy
to survive and breed.'
thus, it is not like evolution at all, but comes with
a built-in BIAS that DEFINES their evolution.
"Think again before postulating the drive to self preservation
as the cardinal drive in an organic being. A living thing desires
above all to vent its strength - life as such is the
will to power - self preservation is only one of the indirect
and most frequent consequences of it". (Freidrich Nietzsche)
Re:Von Neumann Architecture Can't Do It.
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 2
neural nets simulations are just that - simulations. it isnt' likely that they will ever be anything more. in the words of a somewhat renknown cognitive scientist on the matter:
SEARLE - IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER
Summary of the Argument.
This brief argument has a simple logical structure and I will lay it
out:
1.On the standard textbook definition, computation is defined
syntactically in terms of symbol manipulation.
2.But syntax and symbols are not defined in terms of physics. Though
symbol tokens are always physical tokens, "symbol" and "same symbol" are
not defined in terms of physical features. Syntax, in short, is not
intrinsic to physics.
3.This has the consequence that computation is not discovered in the
physics, it is assigned to it. Certain physical phenomena are assigned
or used or programmed or interpreted syntactically. Syntax and symbols
are observer relative.
4.It follows that you could not discover that the brain or anything else
was intrinsically a digital computer, although you could assign a
computational interpretation to it as you could to anything else. The
point is not that the claim "The brain is a digital computer" is false.
Rather it does not get up to the level of falsehood. It does not have a
clear sense. You will have misunderstood my account if you think that I
am arguing that it is simply false that the brain is a digital computer.
The question "Is the brain a digital computer?" is as ill defined as the
questions "Is it an abacus?", "Is it a book?", or "Is it a set of
symbols?", "Is it a set of mathematical formulae?"
5.Some physical systems facilitate the computational use much better
than others. That is why we build, program, and use them. In such cases
we are the homunculus in the system interpreting the physics in both
syntactical and semantic terms.
6.But the causal explanations we then give do not cite causal properties
different from the physics of the implementation and the intentionality
of the homunculus.
7.The standard, though tacit, way out of this is to commit the
homunculus fallacy. The humunculus fallacy is endemic to computational
models of cognition and cannot be removed by the standard recursive
decomposition arguments. They are addressed to a different question.
8.We cannot avoid the foregoing results by supposing that the brain is
doing "information processing". The brain, as far as its intrinsic
operations are concerned, does no information processing. It is a
specific biological organ and its specific neurobiological processes
cause specific forms of intentionality. In the brain, intrinsically,
there are neurobiological processes and sometimes they cause
consciousness. But that is the end of the story.\**
Re:searle - is brain a digital computer
on
Arguing A.I.
·
· Score: 2
SEARLE - IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER?
Summary of the Argument.
This brief argument has a simple logical structure and I will lay it
out:
1.On the standard textbook definition, computation is defined
syntactically in terms of symbol manipulation.
2.But syntax and symbols are not defined in terms of physics. Though
symbol tokens are always physical tokens, "symbol" and "same symbol" are
not defined in terms of physical features. Syntax, in short, is not
intrinsic to physics.
3.This has the consequence that computation is not discovered in the
physics, it is assigned to it. Certain physical phenomena are assigned
or used or programmed or interpreted syntactically. Syntax and symbols
are observer relative.
4.It follows that you could not discover that the brain or anything else
was intrinsically a digital computer, although you could assign a
computational interpretation to it as you could to anything else. The
point is not that the claim "The brain is a digital computer" is false.
Rather it does not get up to the level of falsehood. It does not have a
clear sense. You will have misunderstood my account if you think that I
am arguing that it is simply false that the brain is a digital computer.
The question "Is the brain a digital computer?" is as ill defined as the
questions "Is it an abacus?", "Is it a book?", or "Is it a set of
symbols?", "Is it a set of mathematical formulae?"
5.Some physical systems facilitate the computational use much better
than others. That is why we build, program, and use them. In such cases
we are the homunculus in the system interpreting the physics in both
syntactical and semantic terms.
6.But the causal explanations we then give do not cite causal properties
different from the physics of the implementation and the intentionality
of the homunculus.
7.The standard, though tacit, way out of this is to commit the
homunculus fallacy. The humunculus fallacy is endemic to computational
models of cognition and cannot be removed by the standard recursive
decomposition arguments. They are addressed to a different question.
8.We cannot avoid the foregoing results by supposing that the brain is
doing "information processing". The brain, as far as its intrinsic
operations are concerned, does no information processing. It is a
specific biological organ and its specific neurobiological processes
cause specific forms of intentionality. In the brain, intrinsically,
there are neurobiological processes and sometimes they cause
consciousness. But that is the end of the story.\**
Slashdot Mirror
we see a great debate arising about
'intellectual property'. People are concerned that producers of digital
content (writings, music, video, data) are adequately compensated for
their efforts. In order to do this, an analogue was made -- we will sell
you a number (any digital file is just a big number consisting of 1's and
0's) - and to protect the 'uniqueness' of that number, we will treat that
number as if it weren't really a number, but an actual physical tangible
good.
But there's one problem with this. If i have an apple and give you an
apple, i no longer have an apple. But if i have an idea and give you an
idea, then we both have the idea. These inherent properties of matter and
bits is ignored for the sake of the analogy, and here lies the fundamental
problem at the heart of the intellectual property debate. And it will
never be solved until an understanding of social threefolding can be
brought to bear on it...
Social Threefolding
And this is the law of the wild,
As old and as true as the sky.
And the wolf who keeps it will prosper,
But the wolf who breaks it will die!
Like the wind that circles the tree trunk,
this law runneth forward and back.
The strength of the pack is the wolf,
and the strength of the wolf is the pack.
(Rudyard Kipling)
--| THE FUNDAMENTAL SOCIAL LAW |----
Briefly as the subject must be dealt with, there will always be some people
whose feeling will lead them to recognize the truth of what it is impossible
to discuss in all its fullness here. There is a fundamental social law which
spiritual science teaches, and which is as follows:
'The well-being of a community of people working together
will be the greater, the less the individual claims for himself
the proceeds of his work, i.e. the more of these proceeds he
makes over to his fellow-workers, the more his own needs are
satisfied, not out of his own work but out of the work done by
others'.
Every arrangement in a community that is contrary to this law will
inevitably engender somewhere after a while distress and want. It is a
fundamental law, which holds good for all social life with the same
absoluteness and necessity as any law of nature within a particular field of
natural causation. It must not be supposed, however, that it is sufficient
to acknowledge this law as one for general moral conduct, or to try to
interpret it into the sentiment that everyone should work in the service of
his fellow men. No, this law only lives in reality as it should when a
community of people succeeds in creating arrangements such that no one can
ever claim the fruits of his own labour for himself, but that these go
wholely to the benefit of the community. And he must himself be supported in
return by the labours of his fellow men. The important point is, therefore,
that working for one's fellow men and obtaining so much income must be kept
apart, as two separate things.
Self-styled 'practical people' will of course have nothing but a smile for
such 'outrageous idealism'. And yet this law is more practical than any that
was ever devised or enacted by the 'practicians'. Anyone who really examines
practical life will find that every community that exists or has ever
existed anywhere has two sorts of arrangements, of which the one is in
accordance with this law and the other contrary to it. It is bound to be so
everywhere, whether men will it or not. Every community would indeed fall to
pieces at once, if the work of the individual did not pass over into the
totality. But human egoism has from of old run counter to this law, and
sought to extract as much as possible for the individual out of his own
work. And what has come about from of old in this way due to egoism has
alone brought want, poverty and distress in its wake. This simply means that
the part of human arrangements brought about by 'practicians' who calculated
on the basis of either their own egotism or that of others must always prove
impractical.
Now naturally it is not simply a matter of recognizing a law of this kind,
but the real practical part begins with the question: How is one to
translate this law into actual fact? Obviously this law says nothing less
than this: man's welfare is the greater, in proportion as egoism is less. So
for its translation into reality one must have people who can find their way
out of egoism. In practice, however, this is quite impossible if the
individual's share of weal and woe is measured according to his labour. He
who labours for himself *must* gradually fall a victim to egoism. Only one
who labours solely for the rest can gradually grow to be a worker without
egoism.
But there is one thing needed to begin with. If any man works for another,
he must find in this other man the reason for his work; and if anyone is to
work for the community, he must perceive and feel the value, the nature and
importance, of this community. He can only do this when the community is
something quite different from a more or less indefinite summation of
individual men. It must be informed by an actual spirit, in which each
single one has his part. It must be such that each one says: 'It is as it
should be, and I *will* that it be so'. The community must have a spiritual
mission, and each individual must have the will to contribute towards the
fulfilling of this mission. All the vague abstract ideals of which people
usually talk cannot present such a mission. If there be nothing but these,
then one individual here or one group there will be working without any
clear overview of what use there is in their work, except it being to the
advantage of their families, or of those particular interests to which they
happen to be attached. In every single member, down to the most solitary,
this spirit of the community must be alive...
No one need try to discover a solution of the social question that shall
hold good for all time, but simply to find the right form for his social
thoughts and actions in the light of the immediate need of the time in which
he lives. Indeed there is today no theoretical scheme which could be devised
or carried into effect by any one person which in itself could solve the
social question. For this he would need to possess the power to force a
number of people into the conditions which he had created. But in the
present day any such compulsion is out of the question. The possibility must
be found of each person doing of his own free will that which he is called
upon to do according to his strength and abilities. For this reason there
can be no possible question of ever trying to work on people theoretically,
by merely indoctrinating them with a view as to how economic conditions
might best be arranged. A bald economic theory can never act as a force to
counteract the powers of egoism. for a while such an economic theory may
sweep the masses along with a kind of impetus that *appears* to resemble
idealism; but in the long run it helps nobody. Anyone who implants such a
theory into a mass of people without giving them some real spiritual
substance along with it is sinning against the real meaning of human
evolution. The only thing which can help is a spiritual world-conception
which of itself, through what it has to offer, can live in the thoughts, in
the feelings, in the will -- in short, in a man's whole soul...
The recognition of these principles means, it is true, the loss of many an
illusion for various people whose ambition it is to be popular benefactors.
It makes working for the welfare of society a really difficult matter-one of
which the results, too, may in certain circumstances comprise only quite
tiny part-results. Most of what is given out today by whole parties as
panaceas for social life loses its value, and is seen to be a mere bubble
and hollow phrase, lacking in due knowledge of human life. No parliament, no
democracy, no popular agitation can have any meaning for a person who looks
at all deeper, if they violate the law stated above; whereas everything of
this kind may work for good if it works on the lines of this law. It is a
mischievous delusion to believe that particular persons sent up to some
parliament as delegates from the people can do anything for the good of
mankind, unless their activity is in conformity with the fundamental social
law.
Wherever this law finds outer expression, wherever anyone is at work on its
lines-so far as is possible in that position in which he is placed within
the community-good results will be attained, though it be but in the single
case and in never so small a measure. And it is only a number of individual
results attained in this way that will together combine to the healthy
collective progress of society.
The healthy social life is found
When in the mirror of each human soul
The whole community is shaped,
And when in the community
Lives the strength of each human soul.
==| Capital and Credit in Threefolding |===
Where 'supply and demand' are the determining factors, there the egoistic
type of value is the only one that can come into reckoning. The 'market'
relationship must be superseded by associations regulating the exchange and
production of goods by an intelligent observation of human needs. Such
associations can replace mere supply and demand by contracts and
negotiations between groups of producers and consumers, and between
different groups of producers...
Work done in confidence of the return achievements of others constitutes the
giving of *credit* in social life. As there was once a transition from
barter to the money system, so there has recently been a progressive
transformation to a basis of credit. Life makes it necessary today for one
man to work with means entrusted to him by another, or by a community,
having confidence in his power to achieve a result. But under the
capitalistic method the credit system involves a complete loss of the real
and satisfying human relationship of a man to the conditions of his life and
work. Credit is given when there is prospect of an increase of capital that
seems to justify it; and work is always done subject to the view that the
confidence or credit received will have to appear justified in the
capitalistic sense. And what is the result? Human beings are subjected to
the power of dealings in capital which take place in a sphere of finance
remote from life. And the moment they become fully conscious of this fact,
they feel it to be unworthy of their humanity...
A healthy system of giving credit presupposes a social structure which
enables economic values to be estimated by their relation to the
satisfaction of men's bodily and spiritual needs. Men's economic dealings
will take their form from this. Production will be considered from the point
of view of needs, no longer by an abstract scale of capital and wages.
Economic life in a threefold society is built up by the cooperation of
*associations* arising out of the needs of producers and the interests of
consumers. In their mutual dealings, impulses from the spiritual sphere and
sphere of rights will play a decisive part. These associations will not be
bound to a purely capitalistic standpoint, for one association will be in
direct mutual dealings with another, and thus the one-sided interests of one
branch of production will be regulated and balanced by those of the other.
The responsibility for the giving and taking of credit will thus devolve to
the associations. This will not impair the scope and activity of individuals
with special faculties; on the contrary, only this method will give
individual faculties full scope: the individual is responsible to his
association for achieving the best possible results. The association is
responsible to other associations for using these individual achievements to
good purpose. The individual's desire for gain will no longer be imposing
production on the life of the community; production will be regulated by the
needs of the community...
All kinds of dealings are possible between the new associations and old
forms of business--there is no question of the old having to be destroyed
and replaced by the new. The new simply takes its place and will have to
justify itself and prove its inherent power, while the old will dwindle
away... The essential thing is that the threefold idea will stimulate a real
social intelligence in the men and women of the community. The individual
will in a very definite sense be contributing to the achievements of the
whole community... The individual faculties of men, working in harmony with
the human relationships founded in the sphere of rights, and with the
production, circulation and consumption that are regulated by the economic
associations, will result in the greatest possible efficiency. Increase of
capital, and a proper adjustment of work and return for work, will appear as
a final consequence...
--
(Rudolf Steiner, Architect, Playwright, Philosopher, Human)
Social Threefolding
---
many proponents of Human-Computer Interaction take the view
that 'machines will become more intelligent', and this stems
from a view that regards the human brain as a computer.
my question is -- what do you have to say in relation to Searle's
Chinese Room and the Turing Test? Do you have any insight beyond
where Searle and Eccles have already gone? on the opinion that
the 'Brain is a Computer'?
>> Synopsis of Some Existing Research on the Problem:
according to Nobel Prize Neurophysiologist JOHN ECCLES in his
book 'Understanding the Human Brain' - the brain is not to be
understood as a computer; rather it works more like a TRANSCIEVER
for Conscious Experience.
this is confirmed by a second Scientist, JOHN SEARLE, who refuted
the 'Turing Test' in two articles: 'IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER?',
and 'MINDS BRAINS AND PROGRAMMES' * thoroughly, disputes the
view that the Human Brain is an instantiation of a digital computer
programme.
* MINDS BRAINS AND PROGRAMMES (THE CHINESE ROOM):
http://www.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/bbs/Archive/bbs.sea
IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER?
http://cogprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Papers/P
there you have direct testimony from the Scientific Establishment
that directly contradicts the view that 'The Human Brain is a Computer'.
Materialism can never offer a satisfactory explanation of the world.
2 . tml
For every attempt at an explanation must begin with the formation
of thoughts about the phenomena of the world.
Materialism thus begins with the thought of matter or material processes.
But, in doing so, it is already confronted by two different sets of facts:
the material world, and the thoughts about it.
The materialist seeks to make these latter intelligible by regarding
them as purely material processes. He believes that thinking takes place
in the brain, much in the same way that digestion takes place in the animal
organs.
Just as he attributes mechanical and organic effects to matter, so he
credits matter in certain circumstances with the capacity to think.
He overlooks that, in doing so, he is merely shifting the problem from
one place to another. He ascribes the power of thinking to matter
instead of to himself.
And thus he is back again at his starting point. How does matter come
to think about its own nature? Why is it not simply satisfied with
itself and content just to exist?
The materialist has turned his attention away from the definite subject,
his own I, and has arrived at an image of something quite vague and
indefinite. Here the old riddle meets him again.
The materialistic conception cannot solve the problem;
it can only shift it from one place to another.
(Rudolf Steiner, The Philosophy of Freedom, Chapter 2)
http://www.elib.com/Steiner/Books/GA004/TPOF/pofc
that is the most succinct piece of clear thought
on open source and government i've ever read.
way to go!
the first company to dedicate resources to porting their high-end SGI IRIX 3D software to linux was from: Side Effects. HOUDINI's the software they used to do gandalf's fireworks, the river stallions, and the effects in 'what dreams may come' and 'the matrix' -- on LINUX!
john.
'Perfection is achieved not when there is nothing more to add,
but rather when there is nothing more to take away.'
(Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
You can increase the apparent simplicity and focus of an OS
simply by consolidating five menubars into one.
--| INTERFACE DESIGN > A SINGLE MENUBAR |-----
>> WHAT? Give me the summary.
A SINGLE MENUBAR AT THE TOP OF THE SCREEN that changes according to
the current context (window) instead of a menubar for every window.
Setting this as a User Default will improve Linux's ease-of-use.
Placing a single Menubar along the top of the screen:
1 - Makes it faster and easier to hit.
(no mouse overshoot to slow things down)
2 - Eliminates clutter in the interface.
3 - Reduces ambiguity (and hence - user error).
--| DISCUSSION |---
>> LINUX MENUS WORK GREAT NOW.
>> WHY SHOULD WE DO SO MUCH WORK TO CHANGE THE ACCEPTED DEFAULT?
In programming, if you compute a static variable within a loop - it is
highly innefficient - it slows down the loop. You optimize code by pulling
all the computes you can out of the loop and processing externally.
Interface design is the same. If a user has to click: A, B, C three hundred
times a day - it would make him 3 times as efficient to collapse those three
steps into a macro and execute with one keystroke. Making things less steps
for users optimizes the UI just like computing static variables outside the
loop optimizes code.
Since Menus are one of the most frequently used items in an operating system,
optimizing something small in this frequent behaviour equates to a Big savings
for the user over time. Therefore getting the menus right is one of the most
crucial and fundamental UI decisions that must be made by those implementing
the OS.
Linux currently imitates Windows' menubar implementation of putting a menubar
in every window. UI studies show this is not the optimal way of implementing
menus in an operating system. Linux can beat Windows in menubar GUI by providing
the option of a single context-sensitive menubar. There are several good reasons
for doing this:
1 - TARGETING CONSTRAINT
How easy it is to hit a target - virtual size.
2 - CONSISTENT PLACEMENT
How easy it is to remember "where" a target is.
3 - SIMPLICITY KEEPING FOCUS
Elimination of extraneous controls that are not
relevant to the current task at hand.
>> See the rest of this posting - Why Single Menubar
best regads,
john.
---| swoopy curves Are Not design |---
Certainly, the PC industry has never revered design, preferring blocky
beige boxes or, more recently, coloured go-faster curves devoid of real
function. He's scornful of those who use 'swoopy shapes to look good,
stuff that is so aggressively designed, just to catch the eye. I think
that's arrogance, it's not done for the benefit of the user.'
By contrast, he says, "you won't be able to find a single thing on an
Apple that hasn't had thought put into it"...
With the first iMac the goal wasn't to look different, but to build the
best integrated consumer computer we could. If as a consequence the shape
is different, then that's how it is. The thing is, it's very easy to be
different, but very difficult to be better. That's what we have tried to
do with the new iMac."
(THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME, Interview with Jonathan Ive,
Charles Arthur talks to the designer of the iMac, January 14 2002)
--
regards,
john penner
--- Steve Jobs on Design ---
Fortune Magazine: What has always distinguished the products of the
companies you've led is the design aesthetic. Is your obsession with design
an inborn instinct or what?
Steve Jobs: We don't have good language to talk about this kind of thing.
In most people's vocabularies, design means veneer. It's interior decorating.
It's the fabric of the curtains and the sofa. But to me, nothing could be
further from the meaning of design. Design is the fundamental soul of a
man-made creation that ends up expressing itself in successive outer layers
of the product or service. The iMac is not just the colour or translucence or
the shape of the shell. The essence of the iMac is to be the finest possible
consumer computer in which each element plays together.
On our latest iMac, I was adamant that we get rid of the fan, because it is
much more pleasant to work on a computer that doesn't drone all the time.
That was not just "Steve's decision" to pull out the fan; it required an
enormous engineering effort to figure out how to manage power better and do
a better job of thermal conduction through the machine. That is the furthest
thing from veneer. It was at the core of the product the day we started.
This is what customers pay us for--to sweat all these details so it's easy
and pleasant for them to use our computers. We're supposed to be really good
at this. That doesn't mean we don't listen to customers, but it's hard for
them to tell you what they want when they've never seen anything remotely
like it.
fortune - january 24, 2000
regards,
john penner
| Brooks, on the other hand, is sure that these machines are on the
| right track. In a sense, he makes it easier for his robots to catch up
| with humans by lowering the bar. On the back of the book, Brooks
| ladles out the schmaltz and proclaims, "We are machines, as are our
| spouses, our children and our dogs... I believe myself and my children
| all to be mere machines." That is, we're all just a slightly more
| involved collection of simple neurons that don't do much more than the
| balance mechanism of Genghis. You may think that you're deeply in love
| with the City of Florence, the ideal of democratic discourse, that
| raven-haired beauty three rows up, puppy dogs, or rainy nights cuddled
| under warm blankets, but according to the Brooks paradigm, you're just
| a bunch of AFSMs passing numbers back and forth.
in combating the concept of free will. The germs of all the relevant
arguments are to be found as early as Spinoza. All that he brought forward
in clear and simple language against the idea of freedom has since been
repeated times without number, but as a rule enveloped in the most
hair-splitting theoretical doctrines, so that it is difficult to recognize
the straightforward train of thought which is all that matters. Spinoza
writes in a letter of October or November, 1674:
I call a thing free which exists and acts from the pure necessity
of its nature, and I call that unfree, of which the being and
action are precisely and fixedly determined by something else.
Thus, for example, God, though necessary, is free because he
exists only through the necessity of his own nature. Similarly,
God cognizes himself and all else freely, because it follows
solely from the necessity of his nature that he cognizes all. You
see, therefore, that for me freedom consists not in free decision,
but in free necessity.
But let us come down to created things which are all
determined by external causes to exist and to act in a fixed and
definite manner. To perceive this more clearly, let us imagine
a perfectly simple case. A stone, for example, receives from an
external cause acting upon it a certan quantity of motion, by
reason of which it necessarily continues to move, after the
impact of the external cause has ceased. The continued motion
of the stone is due to compulsion, not to the necessity of its
own nature, because it requires to be defined by the thrust of
an external cause. What is true here for the stone is true also
for every other particular thing, however complicated and
many-sided it may be, namely, that everything is necessarily
determined by external causes to exist and to act in a fixed and
definite manner.
Now, please, suppose that this stone during its motion thinks and
knows that it is striving to the best of its ability to continue in
motion. This stone, which is conscious only of its striving and is
by no neans indifferent, will believe that it is absolutely free, and
that it continues in motion for no other reason than its own will to
continue. But this is just the human freedom that everybody claims
to possess and which consists in nothing but this, that men are
conscious of their desires, but ignorant of the causes by which they
are determined. Thus the child believes that he desires milk of
his own free will, the angry boy regards his desire for vengeance
as free, and the coward his desire for flight. Again, the drunken
man believes that he says of his own free will what, sober
again, he would fain have left unsaid, and as this prejudice is
innate in all men, it is difficult to free oneself from it. For,
although experience teaches us often enough that man least of
all can temper his desires, and that, moved by conflicting passions,
he sees the better and pursues the worse, yet he considers
himself free because there are some things which he desires
less strongly, and some desires which he can easily inhibit
through the recollection of something else which it is often
possible to recall.
Because this view is so clearly and definitely expressed it is easy to
detect the fundamental error that it contains. The same necessity by which
a stone makes a definite movement as the result of an impact, is said to
compel a man to carry out an action when impelled thereto by any reason.
It is only because man is conscious of his action that he thinks himself
to be its originator. But in doing so he overlooks the fact that he is
driven by a cause which he cannot help obeying. The error in this train of
thought is soon discovered. Spinoza, and all who think like him, overlook
the fact that man not only is conscious of his action, but also may become
conscious of the causes which guide him. Nobody will deny that the child
is unfree when he desires milk, or the drunken man when he says things
which he later regrets. Neither knows anything of the causes, working in
the depths of their organisms, which exercise irresistible control over
them. But is it justifiable to lump together actions of this kind with
those in which a man is conscious not only of his actions but also of the
reasons which cause him to act? Are the actions of men really all of one
kind? Should the act of a soldier on the field of battle, of the
scientific researcher in his laboratory, of the statesman in the most
complicated diplomatic negotiations, be placed scientifically on the same
level with that of the child when it desires milk: It is no doubt true
that it is best to seek the solution of a problem where the conditions are
sinmplest. But inability to discrinminate has before now caused endless
confusion. There is, after all, a profound difference between knowing why
I am acting and not knowing it. At first sight this seems a self-evident
truth. And yet the opponents of freedom never ask themselves whether a
motive of action which I recognize and see through, is to be regarded as
compulsory for me in the same sense as the organic process which causes
the child to cry for milk...
(Rudolf Steiner, The Philosophy of Freedom, Chapter 1, 1895)
Materialism can never offer a satisfactory explanation of the world. For
every attempt at an explanation must begin with the formation of thoughts
about the phenomena of the world. Materialism thus begins with the thought
of matter or material processes. But, in doing so, it is already
confronted by two different sets of facts: the material world, and the
thoughts about it. The materialist seeks to make these latter intelligible
by regarding them as purely material processes. He believes that thinking
takes place in the brain, much in the same way that digestion takes place
in the animal organs. Just as he attributes mechanical and organic effects
to matter, so he credits matter in certain circumstances with the capacity
to think. He overlooks that, in doing so, he is merely shifting the
problem from one place to another. He ascribes the power of thinking to
matter instead of to himself. And thus he is back again at his starting
point. How does matter come to think about its own nature? Why is it not
simply satisfied with itself and content just to exist? The materialist
has turned his attention away from the definite subject, his own I, and
has arrived at an image of something quite vague and indefinite. Here the
old riddle meets him again. The materialistic conception cannot solve the
problem; it can only shift it from one place to another.
(Ibid, Chapter 2)
anyone try 'Remote Desktop' for OS-X ?
storm's nest.
| I'd like to see NASA devote its (too scarce) resources to
:-\
| making plant-based foods taste fantastic in a space
| environement. It sure beats the thought of microwaved
| synthetic meat.
NASA spent several million dollars and years of research
to make a Pen that works in Zero-G...
the russians just used a pencil...
typical.
storm's nest
does this mean they'll finally manage to have TYPE and CREATOR code metadata so you can name a file what you want, and it'll still work if you forget to put
these words may be more appropos than ever right now...
--| The Distress of Arjuna |---
ARJUNA'S HEART melted with pity,
while he uttered this:
Arjuna.
Krishna! as I behold, come here to shed Their common blood,
yon concourse of our kin, My members fail, my tongue dries in my mouth,
A shudder thrills my body, and my hair Bristles with horror;
from my weak hand slips Gandiv, the goodly bow; a fever burns
My skin to parching; hardly may I stand; The life within me seems
to swim and faint; Nothing do I foresee save woe and wail!
It is not good, O Keshav! nought of good Can spring from mutual slaughter!
Lo, I hate Triumph and domination, wealth and ease, Thus sadly won!
Aho! what victory Can bring delight, Govinda! what rich spoils Could profit;
what rule recompense; what span Of life itself seem sweet, bought
with such blood?
Seeing that these stand here, ready to die, For whose sake life was fair,
and pleasure pleased, And power grew precious:- grandsires, sires, and sons,
Brothers, and fathers-in-law, and sons-in-law, Elders and friends!
Shall I deal death on these Even though they seek to slay us?
Not one blow, O Madhusudan! will I strike to gain The rule of
all Three Worlds; then, how much less To seize an earthly kingdom!
Killing these Must breed but anguish, Krishna! If they be Guilty,
we shall grow guilty by their deaths; Their sins will light on us,
if we shall slay Those sons of Dhritirashtra, and our kin;
What peace could come of that, O Madhava? For if indeed,
blinded by lust and wrath, These cannot see, or will not see,
the sin Of kingly lines o'erthrown and kinsmen slain,
How should not we, who see, shun such a crime-- We who perceive
the guilt and feel the shame- O thou Delight of Men, Janardana?
By overthrow of houses perisheth Their sweet continuous household piety,
And- rites neglected, piety extinct-- Enters impiety upon that home;
Its women grow unwomaned, whence there spring Mad passions,
and the mingling-up of castes, Sending a Hell-ward road that family,
And whoso wrought its doom by wicked wrath.
Nay, and the souls of honoured ancestors Fall from their place of peace,
being bereft Of funeral-cakes and the wan death-water.
So teach our holy hymns. Thus, if we slay Kinsfolk and friends for
love of earthly power, Ahovat! what an evil fault it were!
Better I deem it, if my kinsmen strike, To face them weaponless,
and bare my breast To shaft and spear, than answer blow with blow.
(The BHAGAVAD-GITA, translated by Sir Edwin Arnold,
Chapter 1 - Of the Distress of Arjuna)
Storm's Nest
--
when it comes down to it, HERE's an actual Mac OS9 screenshot to compare to the Xfree anti-aliasing.
notice that OS9 doesn't anti-alias text below (user settable) 12 points (handy, and faster). i've set the browser font to be: Times-12 -> imo, after examining both the X shot and this shot at 400% magnification, it seems to me that the hinting and definition of the MacOS still yields clearer text.
someone might also want to post up a OS-X and XP screenshot of the same web page:
http://salon.com/ent/feature/2002/03/02/shakespea
so we can have a REAL comparison of actual screenshots instead of a lot of
regards,
johnrpenner.
when it comes down to it, HERE's an actual Mac OS9 screenshot to compare to the Xfree anti-aliasing. notice that OS9 doesn't anti-alias text below (user settable) 12 points (handy, and faster). i've set the browser font to be: Times-12 -> imo, after examining both the X shot and this shot at 400% magnification, it seems to me that the hinting and definition of the MacOS still yields clearer text. someone might also want to post up a OS-X and XP screenshot of the same web page: http://salon.com/ent/feature/2002/03/02/shakespear e/index.html
so we can have a REAL comparison of actual screenshots instead of a lot of /. theorizing about about the Nyquist limit.
regards,
johnrpenner.
this isn't an iPod thing. users used to do this by putting a floppy into the machine to rip their warez, then it was ZIP disks, next its the iPod (just so handy...
Single Menubar - Reasons
A SINGLE MENUBAR AT THE TOP OF THE SCREEN that changes according to
the current context (window) instead of a menubar for every window.
Setting this as a User Default will improve Linux's ease-of-use.
Placing a single Menubar along the top of the screen:
1 - Makes it faster and easier to hit.
(no mouse overshoot to slow things down)
2 - Eliminates clutter in the interface.
3 - Reduces ambiguity (and hence - user error).
regards,
john.
if we're going to standardize, it would be a good idea to eliminate uncessary ambiguity in the interface by standardizing on a Single Menubar.
reasons: http://home.earthlink.net/~johnrpenner/Articles/S
the gamma of digital projectors (usually gamma 2.2) is still not (although someday it might be) as good as FILM GAMMA (gamma 1.0). stuff captured on film has a smoothness of gamma that is still smoother than anything caputured by a CCD.
the same is also true of 35mm cameras vs digital cameras. even a $20 disposable 35mm camera has a MINIMUM resolution (approximately 2500 x 1200 pixels) that is better than most $400 digital cameras, and even if you match the resolution, you still have a lousy 2.2 gamma for digital images coming off a CCD (as opposed to 1.0 gamma for film). if you happen to *like* poor CCD gamma quality - that's your choice, but why do people always automatically swallow the HYPE that equates digital = better, when its not!?
although the benefits of going digital (convenience of downloading the film instead of shipping physical flim) is great, it doesn't necessarily follow that the picture that you're going to see is actually any BETTER!
"I shall begin at the beginning," said the D.H.C. and the more zealous
students recorded his intention in their notebooks: Begin at the
beginning. "These," he waved his hand, "are the incubators." And opening
an insulated door he showed them racks upon racks of numbered test-tubes.
"The week's supply of ova. Kept," he explained, "at blood heat; whereas
the male gametes," and here he opened another door, "they have to be kept
at thirty-five instead of thirty-seven. Full blood heat sterilizes." Rams
wrapped in theremogene beget no lambs.
Still leaning against the incubators he gave them, while the pencils
scurried illegibly across the pages, a brief description of the modern
fertilizing process; spoke first, of course, of its surgical
introduction-"the operation undergone voluntarily for the good of Society,
not to mention the fact that it carries a bonus amounting to six months'
salary"; continued with some account of the technique for preserving the
excised ovary alive and actively developing; passed on to a consideration
of optimum temperature, salinity, viscosity; referred to the liquor in
which the detached and ripened eggs were kept; and, leading his charges to
the work tables, actually showed them how this liquor was drawn off from
the test-tubes; how it was let out drop by drop onto the specially warmed
slides of the microscopes; how the eggs which it contained were inspected
for abnormalities, counted and transferred to a porous receptacle; how
(and he now took them to watch the operation) this receptacle was immersed
in a warm bouillon containing free-swimming spermatozoa-at a minimum
concentration of one hundred thousand per cubic centimetre, he insisted;
and how, after ten minutes, the container was lifted out of the liquor and
its contents re-examined; how, if any of the eggs remained unfertilized,
it was again immersed, and, if necessary, yet again; how the fertilized
ova went back to the incubators; where the Alphas and Betas remained until
definitely bottled; while the Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons were brought out
again, after only thirty-six hours, to undergo Bokanovsky's Process.
"Bokanovsky's Process," repeated the Director, and the students underlined
the words in their little notebooks.
One egg, one embryo, one adult-normality. But a bokanovskified egg will
bud, will proliferate, will divide. From eight to ninety-six buds, and
every bud will grow into a perfectly formed embryo, and every embryo into
a full-sized adult. Making ninety-six human beings grow where only one
grew before. Progress.
"Essentially," the D.H.C. concluded, "bokanovskification consists of a
series of arrests of development. We check the normal growth and,
paradoxically enough, the egg responds by budding."
Responds by budding. The pencils were busy.
He pointed. On a very slowly moving band a rack-full of test-tubes was
entering a large metal box, another, rack-full was emerging. Machinery
faintly purred. It took eight minutes for the tubes to go through, he told
them. Eight minutes of hard X-rays being about as much as an egg can
stand. A few died; of the rest, the least susceptible divided into two;
most put out four buds; some eight; all were returned to the incubators,
where the buds began to develop; then, after two days, were suddenly
chilled, chilled and checked. Two, four, eight, the buds in their turn
budded; and having budded were dosed almost to death with alcohol;
consequently burgeoned again and having budded-bud out of bud out of
bud-were thereafter-further arrest being generally fatal-left to develop
in peace. By which time the original egg was in a fair way to becoming
anything from eight to ninety-six embryos- a prodigious improvement, you
will agree, on nature. Identical twins-but not in piddling twos and threes
as in the old viviparous days, when an egg would sometimes accidentally
divide; actually by dozens, by scores at a time.
"Scores," the Director repeated and flung out his arms, as though he were
distributing largesse. "Scores."
But one of the students was fool enough to ask where the advantage lay.
"My good boy!" The Director wheeled sharply round on him. "Can't you see?
Can't you see?" He raised a hand; his expression was solemn. "Bokanovsky's
Process is one of the major instruments of social stability!"
Major instruments of social stability.
Standard men and women; in uniform batches. The whole of a small factory
staffed with the products of a single bokanovskified egg.
"Ninety-six identical twins working ninety-six identical machines!" The
voice was almost tremulous with enthusiasm. "You really know where you
are. For the first time in history." He quoted the planetary motto.
"Community, Identity, Stability." Grand words. "If we could bokanovskify
indefinitely the whole problem would be solved."
Solved by standard Gammas, unvarying Deltas, uniform Epsilons. Millions of
identical twins. The principle of mass production at last applied to
biology.
sounds like the clones in huxley's 'brave new world'.
the RESULT depends on the goals you DEFINE:
'The Living Robots have one goal, to obtain enough energy
to survive and breed.'
thus, it is not like evolution at all, but comes with
a built-in BIAS that DEFINES their evolution.
"Think again before postulating the drive to self preservation
as the cardinal drive in an organic being. A living thing desires
above all to vent its strength - life as such is the
will to power - self preservation is only one of the indirect
and most frequent consequences of it". (Freidrich Nietzsche)
neural nets simulations are just that - simulations. it isnt' likely that they will ever be anything more. in the words of a somewhat renknown cognitive scientist on the matter: SEARLE - IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER Summary of the Argument. This brief argument has a simple logical structure and I will lay it out: 1.On the standard textbook definition, computation is defined syntactically in terms of symbol manipulation. 2.But syntax and symbols are not defined in terms of physics. Though symbol tokens are always physical tokens, "symbol" and "same symbol" are not defined in terms of physical features. Syntax, in short, is not intrinsic to physics. 3.This has the consequence that computation is not discovered in the physics, it is assigned to it. Certain physical phenomena are assigned or used or programmed or interpreted syntactically. Syntax and symbols are observer relative. 4.It follows that you could not discover that the brain or anything else was intrinsically a digital computer, although you could assign a computational interpretation to it as you could to anything else. The point is not that the claim "The brain is a digital computer" is false. Rather it does not get up to the level of falsehood. It does not have a clear sense. You will have misunderstood my account if you think that I am arguing that it is simply false that the brain is a digital computer. The question "Is the brain a digital computer?" is as ill defined as the questions "Is it an abacus?", "Is it a book?", or "Is it a set of symbols?", "Is it a set of mathematical formulae?" 5.Some physical systems facilitate the computational use much better than others. That is why we build, program, and use them. In such cases we are the homunculus in the system interpreting the physics in both syntactical and semantic terms. 6.But the causal explanations we then give do not cite causal properties different from the physics of the implementation and the intentionality of the homunculus. 7.The standard, though tacit, way out of this is to commit the homunculus fallacy. The humunculus fallacy is endemic to computational models of cognition and cannot be removed by the standard recursive decomposition arguments. They are addressed to a different question. 8.We cannot avoid the foregoing results by supposing that the brain is doing "information processing". The brain, as far as its intrinsic operations are concerned, does no information processing. It is a specific biological organ and its specific neurobiological processes cause specific forms of intentionality. In the brain, intrinsically, there are neurobiological processes and sometimes they cause consciousness. But that is the end of the story.\**
here's the summary from the link.
SEARLE - IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER
SEARLE - IS THE BRAIN A DIGITAL COMPUTER?
Summary of the Argument.
This brief argument has a simple logical structure and I will lay it
out:
1.On the standard textbook definition, computation is defined
syntactically in terms of symbol manipulation.
2.But syntax and symbols are not defined in terms of physics. Though
symbol tokens are always physical tokens, "symbol" and "same symbol" are
not defined in terms of physical features. Syntax, in short, is not
intrinsic to physics.
3.This has the consequence that computation is not discovered in the
physics, it is assigned to it. Certain physical phenomena are assigned
or used or programmed or interpreted syntactically. Syntax and symbols
are observer relative.
4.It follows that you could not discover that the brain or anything else
was intrinsically a digital computer, although you could assign a
computational interpretation to it as you could to anything else. The
point is not that the claim "The brain is a digital computer" is false.
Rather it does not get up to the level of falsehood. It does not have a
clear sense. You will have misunderstood my account if you think that I
am arguing that it is simply false that the brain is a digital computer.
The question "Is the brain a digital computer?" is as ill defined as the
questions "Is it an abacus?", "Is it a book?", or "Is it a set of
symbols?", "Is it a set of mathematical formulae?"
5.Some physical systems facilitate the computational use much better
than others. That is why we build, program, and use them. In such cases
we are the homunculus in the system interpreting the physics in both
syntactical and semantic terms.
6.But the causal explanations we then give do not cite causal properties
different from the physics of the implementation and the intentionality
of the homunculus.
7.The standard, though tacit, way out of this is to commit the
homunculus fallacy. The humunculus fallacy is endemic to computational
models of cognition and cannot be removed by the standard recursive
decomposition arguments. They are addressed to a different question.
8.We cannot avoid the foregoing results by supposing that the brain is
doing "information processing". The brain, as far as its intrinsic
operations are concerned, does no information processing. It is a
specific biological organ and its specific neurobiological processes
cause specific forms of intentionality. In the brain, intrinsically,
there are neurobiological processes and sometimes they cause
consciousness. But that is the end of the story.\**