The fact that 3rd party developer revenues on the Android store are significantly less than on Apple's store, leading to less developer interest, less choice and competition, and more ads and undesirable misfeatures (like customer data gathering) despite having a more open market, is a perverse but real outcome and directly attributable to the business model.
Funny, developers earn more per app on BB AppWorld than they do on Apple's store or the Android market, yet attracts fewer developers. Source
According to you, developers should be flocking to BB.
Sorry, have you used an iPhone? It's hell on earth. Well, to be fair, just about every touch-screen-only phone is a nightmare.
I honestly don't know why the things are so popular. Trying to do simple things like re-position the cursor or click a small link is needlessly challenging. My blackberry torch, in contrast, handles these and a multitude of other problems simply and intuitively via the optical trackpad.
Why so few android phones have an optical trackpad is beyond me. I don't know that I could use my phone in any serious capacity without one.
Every time I spot a fat "person" eating a doughnut, all I see is another addict sticking a needle into their veins.
Lets place heavy taxes on food and ban indoor eating!
This. I can't stand the stink fatties give off. (They really do smell like shit -- and their stench sticks to everything.)
Their smelly re-heated lunches and "snacks" polluting the air in the office make it nearly impossible for non-fatties to breath. Add to that the copious amounts of perfume they habitually add to cover up their already overwhelming B.O. and you'd be lucky to get through the day without throwing-up.
Yeah, I can hear you disgusting fatties now "I have a slow metabolism" Bullshit -- funny how you don't find "big boned" fat-monsters with a "slow metabolism" in Ethiopia, isn't it?
Here's a tip: put down the fork, wash the grease from your over-sized fingers, and get some exercise. Once you've lost the tonnage, you'll find that shit won't get stuck everywhere and you won't need to lift up the fat-rolls (not that you ever bother) to wash the filth underneath.
When they make magnaram for Solaris/SPARC, let me know, until then, kindly keep your platform-dependent solutions to yourself.
Hey, it's really a really useful post for those of us running Windows 3.1 -- just because it doesn't help you doesn't mean that it's not a helpful solution!
You're thinking of Tipler's argument? I'll refer you to pages 82-87 of Shadows.
Anyhow, I think your misapplying the Bekenstein bound which is 1) contentious and 2) depends on one specific space-time geometry (which has yet to be established).
Accepting the Bekenstein bound, for the sake of argument, all it says regarding computation is what we already knew -- that a true Turing machine (one with the requisite infinite resources) can't be built.
Needless to say, it's a very weak argument in support of computationalism (which is almost dead, save Rapaport.)
Now, I know you're a fan of Bringsjord, so I'll direct you to a fun little paper he wrote titled "Computationalism is Dead; Now What?"
The only thing one needs to read about Penrose's theory on non-computable mind is the _formal_ refutation of it
Formal! HAHAHA! It's nothing of the sort!
Did you even read it? It only addresses Penrose's Godelian argument, which I'll admit wasn't terribly strong. Still, to call this a "formal refutation" with emphasis on 'formal' is ridiculous!
Dig up a copy of Selmer Bringsjord's later paper "The Modalized Godelian Argument Against Computationalism" (Oh, Bringsjord is the first author of the paper that you say is the "formal refutation", in case you didn't know.)
Please, you think that Mohrhoff's ranting "refuted Stapp so well that Stapp must still be changing the bandages on his ass from the whip marks"?
Ridiculous. Did you even read the article you linked to, or did you just look for a paper critical of Stapp?
Besides, Mohrho agrees with Stapp's assertion that “the choice of which question will be put to nature, is not controlled by any rules that are known or understood within contempory physics.” Which is very likely the reason that you want to reject Stapp!
Consciousness is weird. Quantum theory is weird. Therefore quantum theory must explain consciousness.
Best Penrose argument summary ever.
Neat, two people who either didn't read, or didn't understand, Penrose.
The little mutual admiration society you have going is cute. If you can find enough consensus for your uninformed opinion, you needn't bother reading at all -- just enjoy the security that comes from sharing an opinion with a large group.
I think free will is more like - "being able to do anything within the framework of the laws of Nature."
Free will is in the choosing, not in the doing. To will is to commit to a course of action. For your will to be free, means that you had the capacity for choice. That is, you could have chosen differently.
To take the physical side of things out (for clarity), let's look at belief. Belief, as you already know, is not subject to the will. To believe is an act, not a choice. You can choose to believe X, but the force of will alone will not guarantee that you will then believe in X.
the first part of his book contained a proof that the human brain could do something a turing machine cannot
.Haha. I doubt that. If you're talking about the "chinese room argument" -- no, that doesn't prove anything like that.
You might try reading his book before you comment on its contents. Penrose's approach is very different from Searle's, though they both reach the same conclusion.
On a related note, if you can convincingly tear-down Searle's arguments, you'll find yourself quite a famous philosopher. There is a reason that we're still talking about the CRA 30 years after it was proposed.
As for "free will", my gut attitude is that the only answer is that it's a philosophical matter whose (non-)answer essentially comes down to perspective and viewpoint because the issue is essentially circular. "Free" from what? The way fate put our brains together?
It's not "Free from...", it's "Free to...". Let's break it down.
The "will" part is easy. To will is to commit to a course of action. The ability to carry out your will is irrelevant. Will is in the choosing, not in the doing. (A lot of people seem to confuse "free will" with "freedom to act" and say absurd things like 'my will isn't free because I can't fly'. Putting physical limits aside for clarity, belief is also not subject to the will for the same reason.)
The "free" part is harder. For your will to be free, means that you had the capacity to choose otherwise. This does not just mean that there were other possibilities, but that you had the ability to choose.
If your will is determined, then there is no element of choice; thus no free will. If there is a random element then, similarly, you lack the capability to choose, as choice is different that merely the potential for difference randomness provides. Suffice it to say that randomness doesn't gain you any freedom.
Moving on, I don't see anything "circular". From the GP, I don't see any "god-of-the-gaps"-type argument either.
I'll define consciousness simply as 'subjective experience'. It should be obvious by now that classical physics can not supply an answer to the problem. (To say that consciousness is an emergent phenomenon is not an answer. It's as unsatisfying, and oddly less explanatory, as saying it happens by magic!) The last real hope there was computationalism, and no one save William Rapaport really takes that idea seriously anymore.
There is hope, some think, in the especially weird bits of quantum mechanics where the observer seems to play a leading role. An observer capable of... observation (having subjective experience) seems inescapably necessary. If you believe that consciousness can be explained in physical terms, that seem to be the obvious place to start looking. Now, Penrose isn't saying "here's a gap, that's where it must be", he's saying this is a good place to look if the physics works out a particular way. In "shadows of the mind" he offers his Orch-OR theory, and a number of tests.
Penrose could very easily be wrong, but he's far too accomplished to dismiss out-of-hand -- he isn't positing anything mystical, after all. If we can take anything away from his three books on the subject, it's that if science is to explain consciousness, we need new physics. On that point, it's difficult to disagree.
You say that with a certainty that implies that we 'know' enough to make a definitive statement about the complexity necessary for consciousness to emerge.
We don't.
The definition of conscience is as far as I'm also vague as to whether that is intelligence like a humans,
What?
You seem to think that consciousness and intelligence are the same. They're not.
So dragging your finger from left to right in a drawing program is supposed to do the same things as dragging your finger from left to right in a contact list?
How many times are you going to repeat this? Every time someone says that gestures should be consistent?
Just stop. It's obvious that you haven't put anymore than a seconds thought into this.
Sorry, but context and mode mean that the "same" gestures do different things.
Yeah, everyone else figured this out ages ago. They just don't feel the need to specify 'context' when that is obvious to everyone but you.
What people write: Swiping right means delete in email, but does nothing in calendar.
Which everyone but you interprets as: Swiping right [on a list item] means delete in email, but does nothing [to list items] in calendar.
Why stop there, we should all have SIX monitors, plus a flat screen mounted inside of each toilet stall so that this programmer downtime is not wasted!
Yeah, lazy employees are just sitting there waiting for shit to download.
Slashdot Mirror
it works without limitation on "approved" content.
You don't seem to know what "without limitation" means.
The fact that 3rd party developer revenues on the Android store are significantly less than on Apple's store, leading to less developer interest, less choice and competition, and more ads and undesirable misfeatures (like customer data gathering) despite having a more open market, is a perverse but real outcome and directly attributable to the business model.
Funny, developers earn more per app on BB AppWorld than they do on Apple's store or the Android market, yet attracts fewer developers. Source
According to you, developers should be flocking to BB.
combined with the more useable interface
Sorry, have you used an iPhone? It's hell on earth. Well, to be fair, just about every touch-screen-only phone is a nightmare.
I honestly don't know why the things are so popular. Trying to do simple things like re-position the cursor or click a small link is needlessly challenging. My blackberry torch, in contrast, handles these and a multitude of other problems simply and intuitively via the optical trackpad.
Why so few android phones have an optical trackpad is beyond me. I don't know that I could use my phone in any serious capacity without one.
More people die from obesity than smoking.
Every time I spot a fat "person" eating a doughnut, all I see is another addict sticking a needle into their veins.
Lets place heavy taxes on food and ban indoor eating!
This. I can't stand the stink fatties give off. (They really do smell like shit -- and their stench sticks to everything.)
Their smelly re-heated lunches and "snacks" polluting the air in the office make it nearly impossible for non-fatties to breath. Add to that the copious amounts of perfume they habitually add to cover up their already overwhelming B.O. and you'd be lucky to get through the day without throwing-up.
Yeah, I can hear you disgusting fatties now "I have a slow metabolism" Bullshit -- funny how you don't find "big boned" fat-monsters with a "slow metabolism" in Ethiopia, isn't it?
Here's a tip: put down the fork, wash the grease from your over-sized fingers, and get some exercise. Once you've lost the tonnage, you'll find that shit won't get stuck everywhere and you won't need to lift up the fat-rolls (not that you ever bother) to wash the filth underneath.
When they make magnaram for Solaris/SPARC, let me know, until then, kindly keep your platform-dependent solutions to yourself.
Hey, it's really a really useful post for those of us running Windows 3.1 -- just because it doesn't help you doesn't mean that it's not a helpful solution!
There was something sweet, simple, endearing and DAMN FAST about the 3.1 shell that I haven't found anywhere since. It flew even on 200MHz machines.
I sure hope it was fast on a 200mhz machine! I could run Doom in a window on my 66mhz IBM Aptiva with 8mb of RAM.
With today's hardware, computers should be unimaginably fast. There is really no excuse for the slow bloated crap we have today.
My Quantum hard drive ran just fine, but my cat died...
Assuming we're still talking about the Kindle
So they can make it so I can take out the battery and the page I'm reading won't disappear?
Yes
I suspect the screens take some power to keep on
No
You're thinking of Tipler's argument? I'll refer you to pages 82-87 of Shadows.
Anyhow, I think your misapplying the Bekenstein bound which is 1) contentious and 2) depends on one specific space-time geometry (which has yet to be established).
Accepting the Bekenstein bound, for the sake of argument, all it says regarding computation is what we already knew -- that a true Turing machine (one with the requisite infinite resources) can't be built.
Needless to say, it's a very weak argument in support of computationalism (which is almost dead, save Rapaport.)
Now, I know you're a fan of Bringsjord, so I'll direct you to a fun little paper he wrote titled "Computationalism is Dead; Now What?"
You know, you'd think that you'd have bothered to actually read the paper you've been posting over and over again.
As I've told you once already, Mohrhoff doesn't disagree with either Penrose or Stapp on the point you personally object to.
The only thing one needs to read about Penrose's theory on non-computable mind is the _formal_ refutation of it
Formal! HAHAHA! It's nothing of the sort!
Did you even read it? It only addresses Penrose's Godelian argument, which I'll admit wasn't terribly strong. Still, to call this a "formal refutation" with emphasis on 'formal' is ridiculous!
Dig up a copy of Selmer Bringsjord's later paper "The Modalized Godelian Argument Against Computationalism" (Oh, Bringsjord is the first author of the paper that you say is the "formal refutation", in case you didn't know.)
Please, you think that Mohrhoff's ranting "refuted Stapp so well that Stapp must still be changing the bandages on his ass from the whip marks"?
Ridiculous. Did you even read the article you linked to, or did you just look for a paper critical of Stapp?
Besides, Mohrho agrees with Stapp's assertion that “the choice of which question will be put to nature, is not controlled by any rules that are known or understood within contempory physics.” Which is very likely the reason that you want to reject Stapp!
Consciousness is weird. Quantum theory is weird. Therefore quantum theory must explain consciousness.
Best Penrose argument summary ever.
Neat, two people who either didn't read, or didn't understand, Penrose.
The little mutual admiration society you have going is cute. If you can find enough consensus for your uninformed opinion, you needn't bother reading at all -- just enjoy the security that comes from sharing an opinion with a large group.
An observer in quantum mechanics is essentially everything that interacts with a particle. So if two particles collide, one of them is an observer.
No.
I think free will is more like - "being able to do anything within the framework of the laws of Nature."
Free will is in the choosing, not in the doing. To will is to commit to a course of action. For your will to be free, means that you had the capacity for choice. That is, you could have chosen differently.
To take the physical side of things out (for clarity), let's look at belief. Belief, as you already know, is not subject to the will. To believe is an act, not a choice. You can choose to believe X, but the force of will alone will not guarantee that you will then believe in X.
the first part of his book contained a proof that the human brain could do something a turing machine cannot
.Haha. I doubt that. If you're talking about the "chinese room argument" -- no, that doesn't prove anything like that.
You might try reading his book before you comment on its contents. Penrose's approach is very different from Searle's, though they both reach the same conclusion.
On a related note, if you can convincingly tear-down Searle's arguments, you'll find yourself quite a famous philosopher. There is a reason that we're still talking about the CRA 30 years after it was proposed.
There is an irony in your post being modded "+4 insightful".
As for "free will", my gut attitude is that the only answer is that it's a philosophical matter whose (non-)answer essentially comes down to perspective and viewpoint because the issue is essentially circular. "Free" from what? The way fate put our brains together?
It's not "Free from ...", it's "Free to ...". Let's break it down.
The "will" part is easy. To will is to commit to a course of action. The ability to carry out your will is irrelevant. Will is in the choosing, not in the doing. (A lot of people seem to confuse "free will" with "freedom to act" and say absurd things like 'my will isn't free because I can't fly'. Putting physical limits aside for clarity, belief is also not subject to the will for the same reason.)
The "free" part is harder. For your will to be free, means that you had the capacity to choose otherwise. This does not just mean that there were other possibilities, but that you had the ability to choose.
If your will is determined, then there is no element of choice; thus no free will. If there is a random element then, similarly, you lack the capability to choose, as choice is different that merely the potential for difference randomness provides. Suffice it to say that randomness doesn't gain you any freedom.
Moving on, I don't see anything "circular". From the GP, I don't see any "god-of-the-gaps"-type argument either.
I'll define consciousness simply as 'subjective experience'. It should be obvious by now that classical physics can not supply an answer to the problem. (To say that consciousness is an emergent phenomenon is not an answer. It's as unsatisfying, and oddly less explanatory, as saying it happens by magic!) The last real hope there was computationalism, and no one save William Rapaport really takes that idea seriously anymore.
There is hope, some think, in the especially weird bits of quantum mechanics where the observer seems to play a leading role. An observer capable of ... observation (having subjective experience) seems inescapably necessary. If you believe that consciousness can be explained in physical terms, that seem to be the obvious place to start looking. Now, Penrose isn't saying "here's a gap, that's where it must be", he's saying this is a good place to look if the physics works out a particular way. In "shadows of the mind" he offers his Orch-OR theory, and a number of tests.
Penrose could very easily be wrong, but he's far too accomplished to dismiss out-of-hand -- he isn't positing anything mystical, after all. If we can take anything away from his three books on the subject, it's that if science is to explain consciousness, we need new physics. On that point, it's difficult to disagree.
Brrr. A guy could catch his death of incompetent philosophy here.
FTFY
It is too simple to have had a consciousness.
You say that with a certainty that implies that we 'know' enough to make a definitive statement about the complexity necessary for consciousness to emerge.
We don't.
The definition of conscience is as far as I'm also vague as to whether that is intelligence like a humans,
What?
You seem to think that consciousness and intelligence are the same. They're not.
That's like saying vintage '94 web design was a step back from menu and keystroke driven application design.
To be fair, it was.
So dragging your finger from left to right in a drawing program is supposed to do the same things as dragging your finger from left to right in a contact list?
How many times are you going to repeat this? Every time someone says that gestures should be consistent?
Just stop. It's obvious that you haven't put anymore than a seconds thought into this.
Sorry, but context and mode mean that the "same" gestures do different things.
Yeah, everyone else figured this out ages ago. They just don't feel the need to specify 'context' when that is obvious to everyone but you.
What people write: Swiping right means delete in email, but does nothing in calendar.
Which everyone but you interprets as: Swiping right [on a list item] means delete in email, but does nothing [to list items] in calendar.
Now go and sin no more.
The best argument for a second monitor is that developers aren't constantly productive
Seems like the best argument against a second monitor to me.
Why stop there, we should all have SIX monitors, plus a flat screen mounted inside of each toilet stall so that this programmer downtime is not wasted!
Yeah, lazy employees are just sitting there waiting for shit to download.
If my second monitor means I get an extra minute of work done per day, the monitor has more than paid for itself and the extra electricity it uses.
Just imagine the savings if they blocked slashdot...