You may have thought you were making a joke, but that's the #1 reason that we do not have replicators yet. Sure, we *could* have the technology by now. There can't ever be any money in it. Make a device that can scan an object, and make a molecular clone of it? What would it's first task be? Make another one.
Anything, absolutely anything, you can get your hands on, you could reproduce at any other station. All you would need is raw material, which would simply be something with atoms. (i.e., dirt into another tangible object)
As long as we live in a capitalist world (ya, even the communists are capitalists these days), and money changes hands for goods, we will never have such a device.
Pizzas are the fun example. Imagine if you could reproduce a CPU, DVD (molecularity, rather than data image), Rolex, Maserati, SR-71 Blackbird, or... well, you get the idea. Not only would capitalism fall, but any individual net worth would be insignificant, as we could all have anything we wanted, any time we wanted. Beyond that, reproducing organic objects would be trivial. Need a heart transplant? No problem, we'll reproduce yours from the last scan where it was healthy.
Excuse me, I feel like seeing how high *MY* SR-71 goes. I just replicated it, and made a few mods.:) The last few failed, so I just recycled them in the raw materials pit.
I wasn't aware that Freud wore a slip. That really clarifies a lot of other questions I had about him. God, I'm glad other bits never made it into the mainstream. Just imagine the Freudian corset, stockings, etc. I guess he took his Oedipus Complex a step beyond, eh?
That's one mighty nice Freudian Chastity Belt(tm) you have there.
The score of 100 was to be the statistical median. The score value remains until the test is renormalized to resume "100" as the median score.
If everyone with a score below 100 were elimianted, the person with a score of 101 would continue to have a score of 101, until such point when the test were renormalized, and only then would they realize they have a score of say 80.
If there was such a cleansing, it would seem to be advantageous to not renormalize the scores, otherwise you would end up in an endless loop until your sample set were reduced to 1. It's very lonely being at the top, but I guess someone could be a bit egomanical at that point. Just because you're smart doesn't mean that you aren't crazy.:)
1.) EASILY SKEWED (as in "4/5 dentists chew trident", oh "sure, sure", especially when they're on the corporate payroll (or paid off to say so by said corporation so their "evidence & observation looks good")
and
2.) IS THE SAMPLE SET LARGE & COMPREHENSIVE ENOUGH? (most?? Most are not, period)...
You know, that particular citation has made me wonder in the past, but not enough to actually research it. So, I went off looking for more information and found it.
The statistic was generated from a July 1976 survey.
The sample group for this statistic was 1,200 dentists. These dentists were hand picked by the research company, probably with good reason.
They were asked, what advice would they give gum-chewing patients
1) sugared gum
2) sugarless gum
3) no gum at all.
Sugarless gum got 85% of the vote. Not terribly surprising. I'd be fairly confident that their time had been paid for, or at very least they were told "This survey is being done for Trident Sugarless Gum." That is only speculation, so hush up.
17/20 doesn't really sound very good. It just doesn't stick in your head. 4/5 is close enough, even though it reduces your answer to 80% (ahhh, a lie). Since these are marketing folks, I'm sure they pushed all kinds of values past focus groups, until "4 in 5" was accepted as most favorable.
As the link cites, they're fairly confident that the "sugared gum" answer got at least one response. There's always someone that'll take the obvious wrong answer. If you don't believe that, look at any Slashdot poll.:)
What they don't say is how many of the 1,200 samples were dropped. I'm sure there were non-responses, and they could have easily added any number of unfavorable answers in as non-responses. Of course, they couldn't have 100% in their favor, so they had to keep some.
The problem with thinning the herd is, despite that it was your idea, and it seemed like a good one, it can likely be expanded to include yourself.
Kind of like the argument of "kill all stupid people". Ok evaluate it based on IQ, and assume that it is your decision that it happens. Take the bottom 10%, and you're clearing out the "unwanted" "stupid" people. That may eliminate everyone with an IQ under 90. The "smart" people may see that there are still "dumb" people, and again want to eliminate the bottom 10% of the population, which may raise the minimum IQ to 100. As subsequent rounds happen, where those who believe they are superior decide that the lessers should die, you will find that there is a subset of the original group who is smarter than you, and you'll find that your head is on the chopping block.
But hey, others have considered ethnic cleansing of various sorts. Those have generally been frowned upon.
For some reason, I can't argue against the lawyers choice though. There may be a few to salvage, but they will be statistically irrelevant.
You forgot to mention that the 9,999,999 transactions are normal billing transactions, and the one that fails is the batch that actually charges their credit cards.:)
The formatted it perfectly for the Nigerian Money Scam (tm). If they had offered the funds in anything else, it wouldn't have worked the same.
It's kind of funny though, they showed the only guy in the test group who was stupid enough to fall for it.:) I guess he was proud of himself for donating to a cause, but even then, you don't know if those funds are going to the needy, or to the operating expenses of the project. As the lady said "the project has run out of funds, and we were wondering how to get funding again." Funding, while some can go to worthwhile purposes, also goes to salaries, space, phone lines, internet expenses, and other overhead expenses.
I know someone who works for a non-profit charity. Due to either rules they work under, or the famous "we've always done it this way", a lot of funds are wasted in places that aren't necessary.
I think I understand your confusion. But it's not exactly appropriate to call Mjollnir (Thor's Hammer), a "magic stick". That's like calling a lightning bolt sent from high above Mount Olympus by Zeus just a "pretty light".
We already have those. I change channels on TV with them every night. And, be damned if you're going to take my magic stick away from me. Taking it away is like taking food from an angry dog. I don't care if you don't want to watch the Mystery Science Theater marathon, *I* have the magic stick!
It's not that most places have HID cards. Most big places do. Most small businesses don't. I kind of ended my post before I finished saying my thought too. My pack of HID cards were for various buildings, suites, and datacenters. Individually each knew when I came and went, but to them I was a customer. My company didn't know when I went through any of those doors. As far as I know, no one but me ever called to check up on anything. Even then, it was rare.
I used last a lot to make my own timeline on events, but that was just to notate a report on a job. It's better to log in and out properly, so you can see what you did, but your coworkers are getting around that by staying on. Eventually it may catch up with them, if someone finally asks, "Why are you shown as working 24/7/365?"
When I was in charge of the department, I didn't really care how many hours people worked. I cared that the tasks were accomplished in a timely fashion. I told them on day 1, they have to work what the job dictates. If it's 20 hours or 80 hours in a week, you have to do it. I was very fair with them though, and the weeks were usually 20 to 30 hours. Occasionally things got busy, and they were happy to work the longer hours as required. They knew if I said "I need you for this.", it was because I really did, not because of an artificially created deadline to squeeze extra work from them. If it was something that could wait, I'd cut them off at about 8 hours, and say "just finish it tomorrow." But, if it was mission critical, we stayed on it. By "we" is was usually all of us. Since I was in charge, I took a lot of the really important tasks myself, so they weren't overworked, and then they'd volunteer to help. It made for a really good teamwork environment. That's something that is overlooked by most places these days.
Where? I thought that site was deemed unsuitable for human visitation, and finally shut down because their traffic dropped to nil. Oh.. They still have one user. You. Please, please, don't go there any more. It will melt your mind, and you'll start having urges to post nonsense on Slashdot.
If their filters don't see a message as spam, then it is non-spam.
My box currently has 3,000 emails in it. 2,000 are in the "Junk" folder. 1,000 are in the "Inbox." Therefore, I've received 1,000 non-spam emails.
In reality though, not a single one of those emails was any sort of legitimate message.
This is the top of my Hotmail inbox, that no one legitimate writes to. They're all non-spam according to Hotmail.
Unread Jennifer-Johnson Auction-Processor Position. Easy Work & Great Pay?
Unread New Career! Medical Billing Training from your Home.?
Unread TermFinder Prepare for every possibility with term life insurance?
Unread Local Phone Services Need local phone service? Check out these promotions.?
Unread Mr. Shang Young Attachment Confirmation Reference Number:BEG/2551256008/07?
Unread Degrees in Criminal Justice Exciting opportunities abound in law enforcement.?
Unread Veterinary Programs Care for animals. Enroll in local veterinary programs.?
Unread Retrevo Editor CES 2010 preview and predictions?
Unread Aid-for-School. You can afford to go to school?
Unread Boot Camp They will come home a different person?
Unread Sunroom Sunrooms. Create a sunny oasis you can afford.?
Unread Medical Billing and Coding Opportunities in medical billing?
Unread New Orleans Jazz and jambalaya. New Orleans.?
Unread Truck Dont miss these deals on trucks.?
Unread Match.com Find your match today?
Unread Security Camera Security comes in small packages?
Unread Match.com Find your Match today.?
Unread Engagement Ring Looking to buy an engagement ring??
Unread Solar Panels Let the sun pay your electric bill?
Unread Solar Panels Do not pay another electric bill?
Unread Apartment Search Rental property search?
Unread Bing Bing in the New Year: Search Smarter in 2010?
Unread Rene Garcia New whitepaper by David Norfolk: "The Integration Tar-Pit"?
Unread Search Schools Network Keep your New Year's resolution - finish your degree?
Unread Human Resource Training
Did you happen to have a Hotmail account before Microsoft bought them? If you did, you would have seen the marked increase in spam coming in as soon as they took ownership. It wasn't just a little, it was huge. That was when I gave up my account. Well, I still have it, but it collects spam. There are thousands in that box now, which is hilarious since I never use it. I only log in occasionally to get a laugh of how many spams there are, and to see if anyone accidentally wrote to me there.
tl.dr. Something about a guess of the number of accounts set with spammy autoresponders. He does know that it's hotmail, so most of the autoresponses are going back out to other spammers, right? It sounds like a nice spammy feedback loop.
Step 1) You get a bunch of money together.
Step 2) You go out to Hollywood and do a casting call.
Step 3) You pick the prettiest ones that are willing to have sex on camera.
Step 4) See previous post.
Aw, who cares about the profit step. I just got freaky with a bunch of hot chicks that thought they were in a movie.:)
IMAX still isn't most theaters, unfortunately. At least we've progressed beyond the old 16 fps silent movies.:)
I'll actually be a happy camper when 3d has finally broken into mainstream, and used in almost all theaters. I know once it gets a foothold, the modern 24fps color talkies will just be a memory.
I actually have shot photos professionally on occasion.:) I know exactly what you mean. That's why I absolutely love the DSLR cameras now. There's no waiting to develop the film to figure out if my shots turned out the way I expected. I can shoot, and then check through the screen on the camera, to if the shots came out to be something resembling what I wanted. Not that ever shot comes out perfectly, but they never do. That's why I burn through shots there's no tomorrow. It's never the "Oh that's perfect" picture that was perfect. It's her real smile after the fake posed one and you started to laugh with her.
But, back to TFA. Without dual eyepieces, you have to guess if that 3D shot is really what you wanted. Did it jump out of the screen, or did it just become part of the background? You won't know until it's reviewed later. Maybe it can hook directly to a 3d capable monitor, so it can be viewed live. 2 monitors would be nice for composition of the frame from each view, but it will never compensate for the depth which is what 3d is all about.
Disney World has a 3D movie, Mickey's PhilharMagic, that was really good. It is a completely animated movie though, but the idea still applies. I saw it with my 2 year old daughter. It kind of freaked her out because things were popping out at her. Once I started encouraging her to grab the things out of the air, she really enjoyed it. There's a huge difference for the audience if an object may have come half way towards them, or right up to them. We felt that we could reach out and touch things through the whole movie. They reinforced it with blasts of scented air and sprinkling water, which is a bit beyond anything that'll show up in most theaters anytime soon.
Just think of what will happen when someone gets seasick, and hurls towards the camera! That's real family entertainment. "Play it again, I wanna see grandma puke again! Wow, I can almost taste it!"
I guess Slashdot is now advocating outright plagiarism by giving it the eyeballs instead of what it rips-off? Do I get three guesses who the "anonymous reader" was that submitted the summary text?
You do indeed. Go ahead and post them and then I'll copy what you wrote and post it too - it makes it better, apparently.
You do indeed. Go ahead and post them and then I'll copy what you wrote and post it too - it makes it better, apparently.
At most places, I totally agree. It's the exception places that I really like. They're pretty rare though. Ya, no face time (or seat warming time) makes you invisible. Well, at least until the day comes that they get rid of you, and they realize what you actually did. Frequently, ego's get in the way though, so they won't bring you back on later.
Slashdot Mirror
You may have thought you were making a joke, but that's the #1 reason that we do not have replicators yet. Sure, we *could* have the technology by now. There can't ever be any money in it. Make a device that can scan an object, and make a molecular clone of it? What would it's first task be? Make another one.
Anything, absolutely anything, you can get your hands on, you could reproduce at any other station. All you would need is raw material, which would simply be something with atoms. (i.e., dirt into another tangible object)
As long as we live in a capitalist world (ya, even the communists are capitalists these days), and money changes hands for goods, we will never have such a device.
Pizzas are the fun example. Imagine if you could reproduce a CPU, DVD (molecularity, rather than data image), Rolex, Maserati, SR-71 Blackbird, or ... well, you get the idea. Not only would capitalism fall, but any individual net worth would be insignificant, as we could all have anything we wanted, any time we wanted. Beyond that, reproducing organic objects would be trivial. Need a heart transplant? No problem, we'll reproduce yours from the last scan where it was healthy.
Excuse me, I feel like seeing how high *MY* SR-71 goes. I just replicated it, and made a few mods. :) The last few failed, so I just recycled them in the raw materials pit.
I wasn't aware that Freud wore a slip. That really clarifies a lot of other questions I had about him. God, I'm glad other bits never made it into the mainstream. Just imagine the Freudian corset, stockings, etc. I guess he took his Oedipus Complex a step beyond, eh?
That's one mighty nice Freudian Chastity Belt(tm) you have there.
I'm going to have nightmares for weeks. ick.
Well....
The score of 100 was to be the statistical median. The score value remains until the test is renormalized to resume "100" as the median score.
If everyone with a score below 100 were elimianted, the person with a score of 101 would continue to have a score of 101, until such point when the test were renormalized, and only then would they realize they have a score of say 80.
If there was such a cleansing, it would seem to be advantageous to not renormalize the scores, otherwise you would end up in an endless loop until your sample set were reduced to 1. It's very lonely being at the top, but I guess someone could be a bit egomanical at that point. Just because you're smart doesn't mean that you aren't crazy. :)
You know, that particular citation has made me wonder in the past, but not enough to actually research it. So, I went off looking for more information and found it.
The statistic was generated from a July 1976 survey.
The sample group for this statistic was 1,200 dentists. These dentists were hand picked by the research company, probably with good reason.
They were asked, what advice would they give gum-chewing patients
1) sugared gum
2) sugarless gum
3) no gum at all.
Sugarless gum got 85% of the vote. Not terribly surprising. I'd be fairly confident that their time had been paid for, or at very least they were told "This survey is being done for Trident Sugarless Gum." That is only speculation, so hush up.
17/20 doesn't really sound very good. It just doesn't stick in your head. 4/5 is close enough, even though it reduces your answer to 80% (ahhh, a lie). Since these are marketing folks, I'm sure they pushed all kinds of values past focus groups, until "4 in 5" was accepted as most favorable.
As the link cites, they're fairly confident that the "sugared gum" answer got at least one response. There's always someone that'll take the obvious wrong answer. If you don't believe that, look at any Slashdot poll. :)
What they don't say is how many of the 1,200 samples were dropped. I'm sure there were non-responses, and they could have easily added any number of unfavorable answers in as non-responses. Of course, they couldn't have 100% in their favor, so they had to keep some.
The problem with thinning the herd is, despite that it was your idea, and it seemed like a good one, it can likely be expanded to include yourself.
Kind of like the argument of "kill all stupid people". Ok evaluate it based on IQ, and assume that it is your decision that it happens. Take the bottom 10%, and you're clearing out the "unwanted" "stupid" people. That may eliminate everyone with an IQ under 90. The "smart" people may see that there are still "dumb" people, and again want to eliminate the bottom 10% of the population, which may raise the minimum IQ to 100. As subsequent rounds happen, where those who believe they are superior decide that the lessers should die, you will find that there is a subset of the original group who is smarter than you, and you'll find that your head is on the chopping block.
But hey, others have considered ethnic cleansing of various sorts. Those have generally been frowned upon.
For some reason, I can't argue against the lawyers choice though. There may be a few to salvage, but they will be statistically irrelevant.
You forgot to mention that the 9,999,999 transactions are normal billing transactions, and the one that fails is the batch that actually charges their credit cards. :)
I'm a firm believer in statistics, as long as I made them up to prove my point, which works 95% of the time. :)
The formatted it perfectly for the Nigerian Money Scam (tm). If they had offered the funds in anything else, it wouldn't have worked the same.
It's kind of funny though, they showed the only guy in the test group who was stupid enough to fall for it. :) I guess he was proud of himself for donating to a cause, but even then, you don't know if those funds are going to the needy, or to the operating expenses of the project. As the lady said "the project has run out of funds, and we were wondering how to get funding again." Funding, while some can go to worthwhile purposes, also goes to salaries, space, phone lines, internet expenses, and other overhead expenses.
I know someone who works for a non-profit charity. Due to either rules they work under, or the famous "we've always done it this way", a lot of funds are wasted in places that aren't necessary.
[sound of crickets]
Did someone say something?
I think I understand your confusion. But it's not exactly appropriate to call Mjollnir (Thor's Hammer), a "magic stick". That's like calling a lightning bolt sent from high above Mount Olympus by Zeus just a "pretty light".
Magic stick works the electronics.
Mjollnir bangs your wife. :)
No, no, that's the power of invincibility. But can I get that without the tea or lime. I don't need any of that girlie crap thinning out my liquor.
We already have those. I change channels on TV with them every night. And, be damned if you're going to take my magic stick away from me. Taking it away is like taking food from an angry dog. I don't care if you don't want to watch the Mystery Science Theater marathon, *I* have the magic stick!
It's not that most places have HID cards. Most big places do. Most small businesses don't. I kind of ended my post before I finished saying my thought too. My pack of HID cards were for various buildings, suites, and datacenters. Individually each knew when I came and went, but to them I was a customer. My company didn't know when I went through any of those doors. As far as I know, no one but me ever called to check up on anything. Even then, it was rare.
I used last a lot to make my own timeline on events, but that was just to notate a report on a job.
It's better to log in and out properly, so you can see what you did, but your coworkers are getting around that by staying on. Eventually it may catch up with them, if someone finally asks, "Why are you shown as working 24/7/365?"
When I was in charge of the department, I didn't really care how many hours people worked. I cared that the tasks were accomplished in a timely fashion. I told them on day 1, they have to work what the job dictates. If it's 20 hours or 80 hours in a week, you have to do it. I was very fair with them though, and the weeks were usually 20 to 30 hours. Occasionally things got busy, and they were happy to work the longer hours as required. They knew if I said "I need you for this.", it was because I really did, not because of an artificially created deadline to squeeze extra work from them. If it was something that could wait, I'd cut them off at about 8 hours, and say "just finish it tomorrow." But, if it was mission critical, we stayed on it. By "we" is was usually all of us. Since I was in charge, I took a lot of the really important tasks myself, so they weren't overworked, and then they'd volunteer to help. It made for a really good teamwork environment. That's something that is overlooked by most places these days.
Where? I thought that site was deemed unsuitable for human visitation, and finally shut down because their traffic dropped to nil. Oh.. They still have one user. You. Please, please, don't go there any more. It will melt your mind, and you'll start having urges to post nonsense on Slashdot.
No, that's very easy to believe.
If their filters don't see a message as spam, then it is non-spam.
My box currently has 3,000 emails in it. 2,000 are in the "Junk" folder. 1,000 are in the "Inbox." Therefore, I've received 1,000 non-spam emails.
In reality though, not a single one of those emails was any sort of legitimate message.
This is the top of my Hotmail inbox, that no one legitimate writes to. They're all non-spam according to Hotmail.
Unread Jennifer-Johnson Auction-Processor Position. Easy Work & Great Pay?
Unread New Career! Medical Billing Training from your Home.?
Unread TermFinder Prepare for every possibility with term life insurance?
Unread Local Phone Services Need local phone service? Check out these promotions.?
Unread Mr. Shang Young Attachment Confirmation Reference Number:BEG/2551256008/07?
Unread Degrees in Criminal Justice Exciting opportunities abound in law enforcement.?
Unread Veterinary Programs Care for animals. Enroll in local veterinary programs.?
Unread Retrevo Editor CES 2010 preview and predictions?
Unread Aid-for-School. You can afford to go to school?
Unread Boot Camp They will come home a different person?
Unread Sunroom Sunrooms. Create a sunny oasis you can afford.?
Unread Medical Billing and Coding Opportunities in medical billing?
Unread New Orleans Jazz and jambalaya. New Orleans.?
Unread Truck Dont miss these deals on trucks.?
Unread Match.com Find your match today?
Unread Security Camera Security comes in small packages?
Unread Match.com Find your Match today.?
Unread Engagement Ring Looking to buy an engagement ring??
Unread Solar Panels Let the sun pay your electric bill?
Unread Solar Panels Do not pay another electric bill?
Unread Apartment Search Rental property search?
Unread Bing Bing in the New Year: Search Smarter in 2010?
Unread Rene Garcia New whitepaper by David Norfolk: "The Integration Tar-Pit"?
Unread Search Schools Network Keep your New Year's resolution - finish your degree?
Unread Human Resource Training
Did you happen to have a Hotmail account before Microsoft bought them? If you did, you would have seen the marked increase in spam coming in as soon as they took ownership. It wasn't just a little, it was huge. That was when I gave up my account. Well, I still have it, but it collects spam. There are thousands in that box now, which is hilarious since I never use it. I only log in occasionally to get a laugh of how many spams there are, and to see if anyone accidentally wrote to me there.
tl.dr. Something about a guess of the number of accounts set with spammy autoresponders. He does know that it's hotmail, so most of the autoresponses are going back out to other spammers, right? It sounds like a nice spammy feedback loop.
Step 1) You get a bunch of money together.
Step 2) You go out to Hollywood and do a casting call.
Step 3) You pick the prettiest ones that are willing to have sex on camera.
Step 4) See previous post.
Aw, who cares about the profit step. I just got freaky with a bunch of hot chicks that thought they were in a movie. :)
IMAX still isn't most theaters, unfortunately. At least we've progressed beyond the old 16 fps silent movies. :)
I'll actually be a happy camper when 3d has finally broken into mainstream, and used in almost all theaters. I know once it gets a foothold, the modern 24fps color talkies will just be a memory.
I actually have shot photos professionally on occasion. :) I know exactly what you mean. That's why I absolutely love the DSLR cameras now. There's no waiting to develop the film to figure out if my shots turned out the way I expected. I can shoot, and then check through the screen on the camera, to if the shots came out to be something resembling what I wanted. Not that ever shot comes out perfectly, but they never do. That's why I burn through shots there's no tomorrow. It's never the "Oh that's perfect" picture that was perfect. It's her real smile after the fake posed one and you started to laugh with her.
But, back to TFA. Without dual eyepieces, you have to guess if that 3D shot is really what you wanted. Did it jump out of the screen, or did it just become part of the background? You won't know until it's reviewed later. Maybe it can hook directly to a 3d capable monitor, so it can be viewed live. 2 monitors would be nice for composition of the frame from each view, but it will never compensate for the depth which is what 3d is all about.
Disney World has a 3D movie, Mickey's PhilharMagic, that was really good. It is a completely animated movie though, but the idea still applies. I saw it with my 2 year old daughter. It kind of freaked her out because things were popping out at her. Once I started encouraging her to grab the things out of the air, she really enjoyed it. There's a huge difference for the audience if an object may have come half way towards them, or right up to them. We felt that we could reach out and touch things through the whole movie. They reinforced it with blasts of scented air and sprinkling water, which is a bit beyond anything that'll show up in most theaters anytime soon.
Just think of what will happen when someone gets seasick, and hurls towards the camera! That's real family entertainment. "Play it again, I wanna see grandma puke again! Wow, I can almost taste it!"
{{shivers}}
I'd go original Star Trek style, and it would just be hot chicks in body paint, wearing not much of anything.
And then it goes into someone elses comment above "wheres the 3d porn?" :)
Funny thing about that camera. There's only one eyepiece. I guess you're not expected to see the scene as it's recorded. That's a shame.
You do indeed. Go ahead and post them and then I'll copy what you wrote and post it too - it makes it better, apparently.
It's a hard life as a gigolo, but the pay is good, and frequently the beds are comfortable. :)
At most places, I totally agree. It's the exception places that I really like. They're pretty rare though. Ya, no face time (or seat warming time) makes you invisible. Well, at least until the day comes that they get rid of you, and they realize what you actually did. Frequently, ego's get in the way though, so they won't bring you back on later.