I'm all for reviewing the "kiddie" movies. I went and saw MIB 2 and the Powerpuff Girls movie on the same night, and PPG blew the MIB movie out of the water. Furthermore, a majority of the audience for PPG was in their twenties or older. "Cartoon" ne "kids only".
While that's in principle true, the idea that market pressure actually drives the course of innovation is less and less relevant to the world of technology these days. One of the interesting things about the economic theory behind free market capatalism is that it actually assumes a perfectly informed buyer, one that will make decisions that are in their own best interest. While that's never been the case with any product, it's so far off base with tech products that it's hilarious. While your average/. reader will probably care a great deal about this, the average American PC buyer just wants to get the next $500 Dell so they can download pr0n and play video games. If we rely on market pressure to defeat things that the buyer doesn't know about or understand, we're putting our faith in the wrong place.
Sure, you can get a stripped down piece of crap that's not upgradeable and uses inferior crap in terms of memory and mobo. Those off-the-shelf boxes are the REAL waste of money, IMHO.
Not quite...natural processes SHOULDN'T be patented, but I'd bet my ass that with the current environment they certainly can be. If you can patent business processes, why not a lab procedure that produces something useful? I'm not saying it's right (I vehemently believe that it's not), just that it's probably legal.
Just think...if PCR had been patented when it was discovered, the current bioinformatics revolution would have been stillborn. Millions of people that have been saved by medicines and treatments discovered using PCR would be dead right now. Makes me ill.
Better performing if you don't mind stopping to recharge every 100 miles. The appeal of hybrids is that you never plug them in, as the IC engine recharges the electric doohickeys or whatever. I'm all for true electric cars, but the infrastructure to make them useful to most people simply doesn't exist. Maybe someday, but not yet.
Fie. Organ shmorgan, I'm getting a theremin for my birthday! Now that's the REAL sound of sci-fi. And you wanna know what's super geeky? My wife is building it for me! There's just something soooo sexy about a woman with a soldering iron...
Just a little nitpicking on the categorization here. The stars of Spider-Man have already signed up to do another, making it a series also. I like it well enough that I don't mind at all.
Yeah, that was my reaction...this has been "news" on Card's site for literally years now. Funny enough, it seems that most of his biggest fans are bitterly opposed to it, including myself. There's just no way that the depth of that book can be made into a movie, and I honestly think that they shouldn't even try. Especially with that little Annakin kid who can't act his way out of a paper bag who, last I heard, was Card's pick for Ender. Seriously, if it comes out, I don't think there's any way I won't go see it....but I also don't think there's any way it will live up to the completely justified expectations people have of it.
Even Card himself doesn't seem to understand this, though, as he's talked a lot about toning down the violence in the movies, thinking that people won't accept that kind of harsh behavior between children. He may be right, but it's that very brutality that gave Ender's Game its power. The worst part is that Ender's Game has the inherent ability to be turned into the absolute worst kind of drivel by an incompetent screentwriter or director. Think about it...kids, aliens...when was the last GOOD movie you saw that combined the two? Unless I'm overlooking one, the last I recall was E.T.
I'm actually coming at it from exactly the opposite direction. I started as a "maybe I'll take biology" student, and really fell in love with evolutionary biology and theoretical biology in general. The deeper in I get, the more I realize I need CS skills and math. That's pretty much in line with my own preferences, though, as I've been a computer nerd since way back.
Molecular phylogenetics is in general the use of molecular data to try to reconstruct the evolutionary history of a species or group of species. It can be used for reconstructing the tree of life and parts thereof, or to find the source of an epidemic, or to study how genes disperse within and between groups (which is called phylogeography). A lot of pharmaceutical companies are using it now in a predictive sense in order to try to figure out what ways they can attack a virus that it's unlikely to evolve defenses against. So in answer to your question, it's both and more. My own personal interest is in speciation, but the lab I work in right now is all about the actual theory and algorithmic methods by which phylogeny is done. We do a lot of simulation experiments to try to find out what the best algorithms are in different situations, and our PI has written the world's most widely used phylogenetic software (PAUP). I'm just the lowly peon undergrad, though. Still, I got to build this:
http://www.geocities.com/dan_and_teresa/index.ht ml
I'd say the most important thing is to find a good program with well-respected people and try to learn from them. I know that's so painfully obvious that it's hardly worth saying, but it's also extremely important. My own interests are in phylogenetics and how it applies to population-level biology, so all of my advice will be pretty heavily skewed in that direction. However, phylogenetics is becoming very popular with big pharma right now, and as such there's a lot of money to be had by those who are good with computers and have a nice solid grounding in the field. I'd say my first four pick in the field would be:
-Joe Felsenstein, University of Washington -Wayne and Dave Maddison, University of Arizona -Dave Swofford, Florida State -Pete Waddell, University of South Carolina
As far as skills you would need, you probably have all of the computer skills required. You'll probably need some C++, Perl, and Python, and you'll definitely have to be familiar with Macs. Unix is also extremely important, but that's not going to be a problem for you. Biological and mathematical skills I would reccommend:
Organic Chem Biochem Molecular biology A quantitative evolution course Population genetics (being used more and more in models of sequence evolution) Systematics/Phylogenetics Genetics D iscrete math (which you might already have) A lot of stats
That being said, I haven't even taken all of those yet.:)
It truly is a great field. The problems are computationally very intense, and there's a lot of money out there to work on them, which means that you will almost certainly get a chance to work with some really heavy machines. You will probably also find the people a lot easier to deal with than you think; most scientists open up very very quickly if you show a genuine interest in their field.
True...and I think some of them just want to still have "biologist" in their title, to tell the truth. Biologists get chicks more often than CS guys do, being rugged and sunburned and all.
Eeeeeexxxxactly the problem I've run into. We had a two hour lecture from a visualization expert on how to refine an extremely diffcult problem into a graph that totally removed any sort of biologically reasonable ordering of the data. Essentially it seemed to boil down to "well, if you cease looking for the solution, you can make this really cool graph that finds spurious connections between extremely distant data points". He meant well, but sheeesh.
I'm a bio student at a university that's just starting to push bioinformatics pretty strongly, and we have some really good and pretty well-known people here. Oddly enough, not a one of them calls themselves a "bioinformatician", preferring the more vague "computational biologist". Just odd, that's all.
I actually ditched work for an entirely different reason on Thursday (car repairs), and decided to kill the six or so hours I had to wait at the mall. As luck would have it, I wandered past the theater and noticed that Episode II was playing. I didn't think it came out til Friday, so I was surprised. I siezed the opportunity presented by the surprisingly short line and went to see it. It was better than expected, but not perfect by any means.
You get no argument from me. I say we replace the whole legislative branch with a random number generator; that way it can only screw up HALF the time.
Slashdot Mirror
That would be Matador. It's the closest I know of. Then again, Ninja Tune and Luaka Bop ain't bad either.
The list in question was pretty much a Folk monoculture until the link was posted on /. Lots of different styles there at the bottom of the list.
Yeah, but that will carry a lot less weight without John Entwhistle.
What's truly amazing is that the fish had money and a local newspaper when caught. A disturbingly intelligent creature.
I'm all for reviewing the "kiddie" movies. I went and saw MIB 2 and the Powerpuff Girls movie on the same night, and PPG blew the MIB movie out of the water. Furthermore, a majority of the audience for PPG was in their twenties or older. "Cartoon" ne "kids only".
While that's in principle true, the idea that market pressure actually drives the course of innovation is less and less relevant to the world of technology these days. One of the interesting things about the economic theory behind free market capatalism is that it actually assumes a perfectly informed buyer, one that will make decisions that are in their own best interest. While that's never been the case with any product, it's so far off base with tech products that it's hilarious. While your average /. reader will probably care a great deal about this, the average American PC buyer just wants to get the next $500 Dell so they can download pr0n and play video games. If we rely on market pressure to defeat things that the buyer doesn't know about or understand, we're putting our faith in the wrong place.
Sure, you can get a stripped down piece of crap that's not upgradeable and uses inferior crap in terms of memory and mobo. Those off-the-shelf boxes are the REAL waste of money, IMHO.
Not quite...natural processes SHOULDN'T be patented, but I'd bet my ass that with the current environment they certainly can be. If you can patent business processes, why not a lab procedure that produces something useful? I'm not saying it's right (I vehemently believe that it's not), just that it's probably legal.
Just think...if PCR had been patented when it was discovered, the current bioinformatics revolution would have been stillborn. Millions of people that have been saved by medicines and treatments discovered using PCR would be dead right now. Makes me ill.
"naturally occuring things can't be patented ... Patenting genes is flawed logic"
Well, you'd think so. Your elected leaders see it differently, though. Genes are entirely patentable, and they're doing it at a lightning pace.
Better performing if you don't mind stopping to recharge every 100 miles. The appeal of hybrids is that you never plug them in, as the IC engine recharges the electric doohickeys or whatever. I'm all for true electric cars, but the infrastructure to make them useful to most people simply doesn't exist. Maybe someday, but not yet.
Fie. Organ shmorgan, I'm getting a theremin for my birthday! Now that's the REAL sound of sci-fi. And you wanna know what's super geeky? My wife is building it for me! There's just something soooo sexy about a woman with a soldering iron...
...and then they show it to a focus group, and on the basis of that change the ending so that it's happy, and add a monkey or talking teddy bear.
Yeah, but if you read his page you'll see that the way he wants it isn't the way he wrote it. It will be changed, and not for the best IMHO.
Just a little nitpicking on the categorization here. The stars of Spider-Man have already signed up to do another, making it a series also. I like it well enough that I don't mind at all.
Yeah, that was my reaction...this has been "news" on Card's site for literally years now. Funny enough, it seems that most of his biggest fans are bitterly opposed to it, including myself. There's just no way that the depth of that book can be made into a movie, and I honestly think that they shouldn't even try. Especially with that little Annakin kid who can't act his way out of a paper bag who, last I heard, was Card's pick for Ender. Seriously, if it comes out, I don't think there's any way I won't go see it....but I also don't think there's any way it will live up to the completely justified expectations people have of it.
Even Card himself doesn't seem to understand this, though, as he's talked a lot about toning down the violence in the movies, thinking that people won't accept that kind of harsh behavior between children. He may be right, but it's that very brutality that gave Ender's Game its power. The worst part is that Ender's Game has the inherent ability to be turned into the absolute worst kind of drivel by an incompetent screentwriter or director. Think about it...kids, aliens...when was the last GOOD movie you saw that combined the two? Unless I'm overlooking one, the last I recall was E.T.
Just my two cents, and boy do I hope I'm wrong.
I'm actually coming at it from exactly the opposite direction. I started as a "maybe I'll take biology" student, and really fell in love with evolutionary biology and theoretical biology in general. The deeper in I get, the more I realize I need CS skills and math. That's pretty much in line with my own preferences, though, as I've been a computer nerd since way back.
t ml
Molecular phylogenetics is in general the use of molecular data to try to reconstruct the evolutionary history of a species or group of species. It can be used for reconstructing the tree of life and parts thereof, or to find the source of an epidemic, or to study how genes disperse within and between groups (which is called phylogeography). A lot of pharmaceutical companies are using it now in a predictive sense in order to try to figure out what ways they can attack a virus that it's unlikely to evolve defenses against. So in answer to your question, it's both and more. My own personal interest is in speciation, but the lab I work in right now is all about the actual theory and algorithmic methods by which phylogeny is done. We do a lot of simulation experiments to try to find out what the best algorithms are in different situations, and our PI has written the world's most widely used phylogenetic software (PAUP). I'm just the lowly peon undergrad, though. Still, I got to build this:
http://www.geocities.com/dan_and_teresa/index.h
Which was a lot of fun.
I'd say the most important thing is to find a good program with well-respected people and try to learn from them. I know that's so painfully obvious that it's hardly worth saying, but it's also extremely important. My own interests are in phylogenetics and how it applies to population-level biology, so all of my advice will be pretty heavily skewed in that direction. However, phylogenetics is becoming very popular with big pharma right now, and as such there's a lot of money to be had by those who are good with computers and have a nice solid grounding in the field. I'd say my first four pick in the field would be:
D iscrete math (which you might already have)
:)
-Joe Felsenstein, University of Washington
-Wayne and Dave Maddison, University of Arizona
-Dave Swofford, Florida State
-Pete Waddell, University of South Carolina
As far as skills you would need, you probably have all of the computer skills required. You'll probably need some C++, Perl, and Python, and you'll definitely have to be familiar with Macs. Unix is also extremely important, but that's not going to be a problem for you. Biological and mathematical skills I would reccommend:
Organic Chem
Biochem
Molecular biology
A quantitative evolution course
Population genetics (being used more and more in models of sequence evolution)
Systematics/Phylogenetics
Genetics
A lot of stats
That being said, I haven't even taken all of those yet.
It truly is a great field. The problems are computationally very intense, and there's a lot of money out there to work on them, which means that you will almost certainly get a chance to work with some really heavy machines. You will probably also find the people a lot easier to deal with than you think; most scientists open up very very quickly if you show a genuine interest in their field.
True...and I think some of them just want to still have "biologist" in their title, to tell the truth. Biologists get chicks more often than CS guys do, being rugged and sunburned and all.
(That was a joke)
And why I'm going to be working on our brand new bioinformatics cluster with 128 CPU's this fall. It's a good time to be a techie/bio nerd indeed. ;-)
Eeeeeexxxxactly the problem I've run into. We had a two hour lecture from a visualization expert on how to refine an extremely diffcult problem into a graph that totally removed any sort of biologically reasonable ordering of the data. Essentially it seemed to boil down to "well, if you cease looking for the solution, you can make this really cool graph that finds spurious connections between extremely distant data points". He meant well, but sheeesh.
I'm a bio student at a university that's just starting to push bioinformatics pretty strongly, and we have some really good and pretty well-known people here. Oddly enough, not a one of them calls themselves a "bioinformatician", preferring the more vague "computational biologist". Just odd, that's all.
Well, the last two seats were in the millions, so they're expecting it to go considerably higher.
I actually ditched work for an entirely different reason on Thursday (car repairs), and decided to kill the six or so hours I had to wait at the mall. As luck would have it, I wandered past the theater and noticed that Episode II was playing. I didn't think it came out til Friday, so I was surprised. I siezed the opportunity presented by the surprisingly short line and went to see it. It was better than expected, but not perfect by any means.
You get no argument from me. I say we replace the whole legislative branch with a random number generator; that way it can only screw up HALF the time.
Hell of a lot more died at Chernobyl, though. Intentionally skewed sample.