Even if someone manages to prove that P=NP, it doesn't mean that a reasonably efficient solution can be found. All it means is that an NP-complete problem can be solved in polynomial time. That polynomial can still be huge, say N^1000. Except for really large N, current exponential-time algorithms could be superior to polynomial-time ones.
So, the short answer is that proving P=NP probably won't ruin your encryption. On the other hand, if someone did prove it, there will probably be a mad scramble to invent some new encryption schemes, just in case.
Kinda off-topic: what's the hardest party that you've played for FF1? I made it through with 4 White Wizards (and beat WarMech too). It's really hard at the beginning, since you can't hit anything, but eventually you get some items and it gets a lot easier.
I've been meaning to try 1 White Wizard, but haven't had the time recently...
Why did the video game suck so much? The control was awkward and it took forever to move around, by which time you were torn to pieces by the monsters. It was so awful that I stopped playing after 5 minutes and never touched it again.
On the other hand, the commercial for it was hilarious. Some guy gets a hedge-trimmer attached to his arm, and then Bruce chases after him yelling "Get back here you freak". It looks like the streaming isn't working right now; if someone else has a copy of the commercial, I'd love to see it again...
Good point. If the gov't stopped XP from shipping, it could set a dangerous precedent. With the SSSCA in place, they could put the kibosh on Linux for failing to "protect digital rights"...
Some friends and I were just talking about this last night - when was the last time that you used RealPlayer?
That thing is annoying as all hell, it takes control of every filetype that it can by default, and it's almost impossible to make go away. And yet, they're still in business (the last time that I checked)...
Almost no time lost. I'm running Win 98, and it crashes MAYBE two or three times per week. And I don't shut it down at night either.
I rarely lose any work, since the crashes usually occur when I'm playing an "obscure game". On the other hand, I never use Office and I'm not running a server, so my experience may be atypical.
The point is that Windows does what I need it to do, and so does Linux when I use it. But if they can both do the same thing (web browsing, for example), I'll pick Windows.
I've spent a grand total of $0 on Linux (if you don't count CD's to burn). However, I'm not very skilled with Linux, so it takes me a long time to get everything installed and configured correctly.
Windows, on the other hand, has a fixed cost, but (for me at least) requires much less time to get to an operational state.
Like everything else in life, there's no easy answer. If you've got plenty of free time, Linux is "cheaper". But if you're like me and a lot of your time is spent on other things (homework, drinking, Counterstrike, etc.), then your time is too valuable to spend figuring out options in a config file.
-Chris
(and yes, I am running Windows and Linux on two separate computers. but I use Windows most of the time.)
Some friends of mine went to E3 and were talking about the wireless controllers. They seemed to think that the wireless models were the default for the Gamecube, although the article implies that they're sold separately.
Personally, I hope they're optional. I sure as hell don't want to swap out a few AA batteries every 8 hours of game play. And besides, do you really need to be able to play from 30 feet away? Hell, you probably can't even make out the screen from that far.
I've got a similar question: are the any IM clients (or GAIM plugins) that will convert equations in messages from text into a graphical representation of the equation? I.e., if I send someone a message containing "Integrate[x^2, {x, a b}]" (using Mathematica notation), is there something that will properly render it on the receiving end?
It doesn't seem like it would be too hard to do using LaTeX or something like Lyx's rendering engine. I was just curious about whether or not it has already been done...
Here, s can be any real or complex number. For example, zeta(2) = Pi^2 / 6, and zeta(.5 + 14.134i) = 0.
The Reimann hypothesis is that all the zeroes of the function lie are of the form.5+b*i. where b is some real number. To date, this hasn't been proven and remains one of the great unsolved problems of math.
From what I've been told, the zeta function also shows up a lot in number theory and quantum mechanics, but I don't really know much about it...
I notice that in the Peacefire comparison, the only number they consider is (# of non-pornographic sites blocked)/(total # of sites blocked), i.e. the number of false positives. Wouldn't it make sense to also consider the percentage of unblocked pornographic sites?
I guess this is just another example of using statistics to prove whatever you want. I'm opposed to filtering as much as Peacefire (well, maybe not quite that much), but they should still try to give unbiased facts.
The weird part is
that if you take an electron and put it in an infinite energy well, the electron is bounded to exist in the well. It gets funky in that there is a small
probability that it will exist outside the well also!
Not true. This is the "infinite square well" setup. If the potential outside the area you're considering is truly infinite (i.e., 0 between points A and B, and infinite everywhere else), the electron is guaranteed to be between points A and B. If the potential is really high, but not infinite, then there is a non-zero probability that the electron will exist outside the well. I believe that the probability goes something like exp[-potential], but it's been a few months since I had any quantum (goddam Ph 2B).
There are some other interesting things that go on with these particular boundary conditions (something with sines and cosines), but I forget. Check out an intro Quantum book for some more info.
"When deep space exploration ramps up, it will be corporations that name everything. The IBM Stellar Sphere. The Philip Morris Galaxy. Planet Starbucks."
(I don't think that's exactly what it was in the movie, but it's what's in the script that I found)
Slashdot Mirror
Even if someone manages to prove that P=NP, it doesn't mean that a reasonably efficient solution can be found. All it means is that an NP-complete problem can be solved in polynomial time. That polynomial can still be huge, say N^1000. Except for really large N, current exponential-time algorithms could be superior to polynomial-time ones.
So, the short answer is that proving P=NP probably won't ruin your encryption. On the other hand, if someone did prove it, there will probably be a mad scramble to invent some new encryption schemes, just in case.
-Chris
Kinda off-topic: what's the hardest party that you've played for FF1? I made it through with 4 White Wizards (and beat WarMech too). It's really hard at the beginning, since you can't hit anything, but eventually you get some items and it gets a lot easier.
I've been meaning to try 1 White Wizard, but haven't had the time recently...
-Chris
Taco, do you frequently rip open things that you find cute? Remind me never to let you near my dog.
-Chris
Why did the video game suck so much? The control was awkward and it took forever to move around, by which time you were torn to pieces by the monsters. It was so awful that I stopped playing after 5 minutes and never touched it again.
On the other hand, the commercial for it was hilarious. Some guy gets a hedge-trimmer attached to his arm, and then Bruce chases after him yelling "Get back here you freak". It looks like the streaming isn't working right now; if someone else has a copy of the commercial, I'd love to see it again...
-Chris
I agree completely. In a CNN interview (here), Powell said that his "defined mission" is "to make sure that nothing like this happens again."
If that's a defined mission, I'm afraid to ask what a "poorly-defined" mission is like...
-Chris
Good point. If the gov't stopped XP from shipping, it could set a dangerous precedent. With the SSSCA in place, they could put the kibosh on Linux for failing to "protect digital rights"...
-Chris
Maybe you should take the Pringles out of your ears. Just a suggestion...
-Chris
Some friends and I were just talking about this last night - when was the last time that you used RealPlayer?
That thing is annoying as all hell, it takes control of every filetype that it can by default, and it's almost impossible to make go away. And yet, they're still in business (the last time that I checked)...
-Chris
Almost no time lost. I'm running Win 98, and it crashes MAYBE two or three times per week. And I don't shut it down at night either.
I rarely lose any work, since the crashes usually occur when I'm playing an "obscure game". On the other hand, I never use Office and I'm not running a server, so my experience may be atypical.
The point is that Windows does what I need it to do, and so does Linux when I use it. But if they can both do the same thing (web browsing, for example), I'll pick Windows.
-Chris
I've spent a grand total of $0 on Linux (if you don't count CD's to burn). However, I'm not very skilled with Linux, so it takes me a long time to get everything installed and configured correctly.
Windows, on the other hand, has a fixed cost, but (for me at least) requires much less time to get to an operational state.
Like everything else in life, there's no easy answer. If you've got plenty of free time, Linux is "cheaper". But if you're like me and a lot of your time is spent on other things (homework, drinking, Counterstrike, etc.), then your time is too valuable to spend figuring out options in a config file.
-Chris
(and yes, I am running Windows and Linux on two separate computers. but I use Windows most of the time.)
You mean like this?
http://www.theonion.com/onion3123/hawkingexo.html
-Chris
Some friends of mine went to E3 and were talking about the wireless controllers. They seemed to think that the wireless models were the default for the Gamecube, although the article implies that they're sold separately.
Personally, I hope they're optional. I sure as hell don't want to swap out a few AA batteries every 8 hours of game play. And besides, do you really need to be able to play from 30 feet away? Hell, you probably can't even make out the screen from that far.
I've got a similar question: are the any IM clients (or GAIM plugins) that will convert equations in messages from text into a graphical representation of the equation? I.e., if I send someone a message containing "Integrate[x^2, {x, a b}]" (using Mathematica notation), is there something that will properly render it on the receiving end?
It doesn't seem like it would be too hard to do using LaTeX or something like Lyx's rendering engine. I was just curious about whether or not it has already been done...
-Chris
Does anyone know where I can buy a phonebooth, preferably used? It doesn't need to be operational...
-Chris
-Chris
"All your zero are belong to 1/2 + b*i"
-Chris
Here, s can be any real or complex number. For example, zeta(2) = Pi^2 / 6, and zeta(.5 + 14.134i) = 0.
The Reimann hypothesis is that all the zeroes of the function lie are of the form .5+b*i. where b is some real number. To date, this hasn't been proven and remains one of the great unsolved problems of math.
From what I've been told, the zeta function also shows up a lot in number theory and quantum mechanics, but I don't really know much about it...
-Chris
(I'm an applied mathematician, dammit.)
Here's the corresponding Caltech link:
http://www.caltech.edu/events/mitcit/citmit.html
-Chris
Here's some info on the CAVE project at Brown (I believe where it started):_ Journal/vol23/23GSJ28e.html
http://www.cs. bro wn.edu/research/graphics/research/cave/home.html
http://www.brown.edu/Administration/George_Street
-Chris
... that, and we've got guns :)
-Chris
I notice that in the Peacefire comparison, the only number they consider is (# of non-pornographic sites blocked)/(total # of sites blocked), i.e. the number of false positives. Wouldn't it make sense to also consider the percentage of unblocked pornographic sites?
I guess this is just another example of using statistics to prove whatever you want. I'm opposed to filtering as much as Peacefire (well, maybe not quite that much), but they should still try to give unbiased facts.
-Chris
What you're saying is: Carnivore costs millions (billions?) of tax dollars, and is easily circumventable. How is that good for anything?
-Chris
elion@caltech.edu
Not true. This is the "infinite square well" setup. If the potential outside the area you're considering is truly infinite (i.e., 0 between points A and B, and infinite everywhere else), the electron is guaranteed to be between points A and B. If the potential is really high, but not infinite, then there is a non-zero probability that the electron will exist outside the well. I believe that the probability goes something like exp[-potential], but it's been a few months since I had any quantum (goddam Ph 2B).
There are some other interesting things that go on with these particular boundary conditions (something with sines and cosines), but I forget. Check out an intro Quantum book for some more info.
-Chris
http://www.theonion.com/onion 3627/infograph_3627.html
-Chris
(I don't think that's exactly what it was in the movie, but it's what's in the script that I found)
-ElJefe