Tell that to someone whose life is treated like it's worth nothing and see what sort of response you get. This is the sort of stuff that wars are started over. How can we truly call ourselves 'civilized beings' if we don't value lives? Functionally speaking it's no different than racism: if someone can marginalize, devalue, or even as far as demonize any one demographic, then someone can marginalize, devalue, and demonize anyone. Someone saying "You're OLD and USELESS so we don't care what happens to you" is just as bad as saying "You're a N*GGER so we don't care about you," or "You're a FAGGOT so we don't care what happens to you," or "You're a MUSLIM so we don't care what happens to you," and so on, and so on, and so on. Where does it end?
At this point in time, until proven otherwise, I wouldn't put it past this Administration to harass protestors, peaceful or otherwise, just because they exist.
In the long-term view of things, that's what I worry the most about, on behalf of humanity in general. In some places in the world (not going to name any names) human life is already seems to be considered virtually worthless. I see a possible future where an aging population is just 'thrown away' like so much garbage, nobody caring whether or not they starve to death or die of disease, because while young, able-bodied people will be a dime-a-dozen because of automation, elderly people, who are not capable of doing much work, will be considered to be a liability to be liquidated. Do you really think anyone wants to live in a world like that? Sadly in some ways we're already there, the elderly are not honored or taken care of, they're dumped into 'homes' that treat them worse than animals, keeping them alive, but quiet, so they continue to get paid for their 'services' to them. Really, seriously, honestly, some of you seem to think that there's going to be some sort of utopia created by all this automation and robotics and fake 'AI', but the reality is already all around us, and it's just going to get worse when people are made more and more obsolete by a corporate world that has no reason to care about people, only profits, and many governments that are not much better, more interested in their GDP than the welfare of old people. When the entire world is run by money, who is going to advocate for these people? Don't act like you don't care, either, because no one is exempt from aging, and saying you'll just kill yourself when you get too old is a lie.
Exactly right. The executable files would still be running. Also I don't trust Miscreant-o-soft at all, I just assume that it's going to run anyway and continue to spy on anything said within range of a microphone. Since I'm never going to use it I'd just as soon it not use any system resources at all, therefore I prefer to prevent it from running. I haven't really seen anything broken, at least not that I care about. I can do everything I need to do and that's all I care about.
Oh, come on, 'force fields' are so Last Thursday. How about a stasis field? Time stops within the field while it's turned on. Rescuers remove you, stasis field and all, from the wreckage, get you to safety, then turn the field off. Theoretically you could survive a supernova exploding without so much as a scratch. Also works well for misbehaving children; don't have time to deal with them? Stick 'em in a stasis box until you do! Same thing works for unruly pets, unexpected guests, and inlaws, especially mother-in-laws.
It's weird to see the cultural difference between comments here and on Ars Technica. Ars seems to have a better educated and less politicised readership.
I hadn't heard of that place, I think I'll start spending time over there; sounds like fewer trolls and idiots and more actual information and intelligent discussion. Thanks!
Sure, because scientists can only answer a question once, are not allowed to revise it, otherwise they have no credibility, right? They have to be omniscient, like a god, and always know the Truth the first time, otherwise they know nothing, right?
Wrong. You talk like you don't undestand how the scientific method works. If their theories never changed over time, that's when I'd start worrying that they were wrong. So far the trend has been the same, even if the magnitude of the projected effects has changed, and it's not like there's just one or two climatologists saying what they've been saying, there are many, and while they don't agree on all the details, the trend in what they're saying is in the same direction.
So please, let's gamble with the future. What do we have to lose, eh?
Well of course anyone with money and power to protect are going to do that, they only care about what happens while they're alive, not what happens hundreds of years from now, they figure that's someone else's problem, why should they care? Then there's the religious types who are absolutely certain that the World Is Coming To An End Real Soon Now anyway, so again, why should they care? It's all part of 'gods plan' or somesuch nonsense, this Earth and this Existence is all supposed to be temporary so far as they're concerned. What's left are the rank-and-file citizens of countries all over the world, who have neither the time nor the education to understand what's going on; they're all too busy just trying to live their lives and have no time to worry about things that will happen hundreds of years from now, not with bills to pay, kids to raise, etc. So it's a hard sell to them.
If for some reason you're forced to use it, you should be able to go into This PC/Manage/Services, then Stop and Disable the Automatic Updates service. Of course that's just a stop-gap, you still don't get to pick and choose which updates you get if you turn it back on.
It's crap, it takes over your computer, it spys on you, it has adware embedded in it, it 'phones home' constantly with details about everything you're doing, and Miscreant-o-soft can remotely take control of your computer and do whatever they feel like to it and you have NO say in the matter unless you never connect it to the Internet. Get some version of Linux instead, I recommend Linux Mint.
You can't uninstall Cortana though, it's embedded into the entire OS, and you can't just 'turn it off', either. The closest I've been able to come is a very brute force/nuclear option, which was to deny Windows the ability to execute anything in the subdirectory where the Cortana core files are, so there ends up being a bunch of errors in the System log because it can't start Cortana up, but it does keep it from running it. This also breaks a couple other things at the same time, but I can't say I've really been affected by that.
You should also go through all the Task Scheduler entries, too, if you're worried about the 'phone home' problem, much of it is triggered through Task Scheduler entries, which you can go through and delete.
What I'd want to see is what sort of passenger safety systems are designed into it. Ejection seat, or ballistic parachute for the whole aircraft, maybe? How do you ensure that the passenger can survive a catastropic failure of the aircraft, or be able to exit the aircraft safely in case of an imminent collision (with another aircraft or with a stationary object)? If it were up to me to certify an aircraft that is purpose-built to not have a human pilot, that would be a critical requirement.
..no, you're missing the point entirely. I'm drawing a parallel between two groups for their reasons for preferring what many considering 'obsolete' technology. Also I disagree that a guitar amp is a musical instrument, unless you think 60Hz hum is 'music' -- because without the actual instrument plugged into it, that's all it does. it's a 'sound reinforcement device', really, and while the preamp settings do set the tone, it doesn't make the music all by itself, it reproduces it. You could play an acoustic guitar and not need an amp at all.
Could you please do the world a favor, and spread the word, far and wide, what 'AI' really is, and get your colleagues to do the same? The world-at-large seems to think that what they see in movies and TV that is referred to as 'artificial intelligence' is the reality and not a fantasy.
Get your vinyl records, get a decent turntable, get a decent ADC/DAC (24 bit would be good) for your computer, record the one-time virgin playback of the new vinyl, encode it into FLAC (or just leave it uncompressed), play the digital recording of the vinyl in your car ad infinitum. All the qualities of vinyl without any of the drawbacks.
Do you realize that compression/expansion is applied very often to various channels of the mix (usually vocals) even at live performances? Even if they don't have a compressor/expander in their stack, they've got someone riding the mixer during the entire set to keep things sounding good out in the house.
I think what you really want is a digital recording of a virgin copy of the pressed vinyl, so you get all the personality, flaws, and other characteristics of the actual vinyl record, for the full experience.
See, I think you're thinking like an engineer instead of a musician; I have a foot in both worlds so I think I get it.
Guitar players prefer tube amps, despite them being more expensive, more fragile, tubes wearing out, and so on. Why? "It's got a warmer tone" and similar reasons. Amp manufacturers have gone to great lengths to digitally emulate the characteristics of tube amps because of this, finally resorting to DSP's, which are about as far removed from a vacuum tube as you can get. Sure, vinyl records are clumsy, fragile, they wear out, and they don't have the range of fidelity that an uncompressed digital audio file has, and as you say, each one is slightly differently flawed because it's a purely mechanical medium. But I think people want it for the flaws and the limitations, for similar reasons that guitarists want tube amps: a different tone, a 'warmth' that you can't get as easily from digital formats.
Of course what they ought to be doing is the way we used to preserve our vinyl records, except updated to the current era: Play your vinyl LPs once, recorded into an uncompressed or lossless format, and play the digital file when you want to listen to it. You'd get all the imperfections and personality of the vinyl record, without risking damage to the vinyl or slowly wearing it out. Of course I'm sure the music industry would have epileptic fits if they found out people were doing this regularly..
It doesn't 'tell you you are drunk', it merely detects the presence of alcohol on your breath. You'd need an actual breathalyzer to determine if you're above the legal limit or not.
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Tell that to someone whose life is treated like it's worth nothing and see what sort of response you get. This is the sort of stuff that wars are started over. How can we truly call ourselves 'civilized beings' if we don't value lives? Functionally speaking it's no different than racism: if someone can marginalize, devalue, or even as far as demonize any one demographic, then someone can marginalize, devalue, and demonize anyone. Someone saying "You're OLD and USELESS so we don't care what happens to you" is just as bad as saying "You're a N*GGER so we don't care about you," or "You're a FAGGOT so we don't care what happens to you," or "You're a MUSLIM so we don't care what happens to you," and so on, and so on, and so on. Where does it end?
At this point in time, until proven otherwise, I wouldn't put it past this Administration to harass protestors, peaceful or otherwise, just because they exist.
You might like my own comment: https://tech.slashdot.org/comm...
In the long-term view of things, that's what I worry the most about, on behalf of humanity in general. In some places in the world (not going to name any names) human life is already seems to be considered virtually worthless. I see a possible future where an aging population is just 'thrown away' like so much garbage, nobody caring whether or not they starve to death or die of disease, because while young, able-bodied people will be a dime-a-dozen because of automation, elderly people, who are not capable of doing much work, will be considered to be a liability to be liquidated. Do you really think anyone wants to live in a world like that? Sadly in some ways we're already there, the elderly are not honored or taken care of, they're dumped into 'homes' that treat them worse than animals, keeping them alive, but quiet, so they continue to get paid for their 'services' to them. Really, seriously, honestly, some of you seem to think that there's going to be some sort of utopia created by all this automation and robotics and fake 'AI', but the reality is already all around us, and it's just going to get worse when people are made more and more obsolete by a corporate world that has no reason to care about people, only profits, and many governments that are not much better, more interested in their GDP than the welfare of old people. When the entire world is run by money, who is going to advocate for these people? Don't act like you don't care, either, because no one is exempt from aging, and saying you'll just kill yourself when you get too old is a lie.
Exactly right. The executable files would still be running. Also I don't trust Miscreant-o-soft at all, I just assume that it's going to run anyway and continue to spy on anything said within range of a microphone. Since I'm never going to use it I'd just as soon it not use any system resources at all, therefore I prefer to prevent it from running. I haven't really seen anything broken, at least not that I care about. I can do everything I need to do and that's all I care about.
Oh, come on, 'force fields' are so Last Thursday. How about a stasis field? Time stops within the field while it's turned on. Rescuers remove you, stasis field and all, from the wreckage, get you to safety, then turn the field off. Theoretically you could survive a supernova exploding without so much as a scratch. Also works well for misbehaving children; don't have time to deal with them? Stick 'em in a stasis box until you do! Same thing works for unruly pets, unexpected guests, and inlaws, especially mother-in-laws.
president Cheeto
Hey now, call him by his proper name! It's 'President Pussy-Grabber'. Do that again and I'll report you to the Seekrit Cervize!
It's weird to see the cultural difference between comments here and on Ars Technica. Ars seems to have a better educated and less politicised readership.
I hadn't heard of that place, I think I'll start spending time over there; sounds like fewer trolls and idiots and more actual information and intelligent discussion. Thanks!
Sure, because scientists can only answer a question once, are not allowed to revise it, otherwise they have no credibility, right? They have to be omniscient, like a god, and always know the Truth the first time, otherwise they know nothing, right?
Wrong. You talk like you don't undestand how the scientific method works. If their theories never changed over time, that's when I'd start worrying that they were wrong. So far the trend has been the same, even if the magnitude of the projected effects has changed, and it's not like there's just one or two climatologists saying what they've been saying, there are many, and while they don't agree on all the details, the trend in what they're saying is in the same direction.
So please, let's gamble with the future. What do we have to lose, eh?
Well of course anyone with money and power to protect are going to do that, they only care about what happens while they're alive, not what happens hundreds of years from now, they figure that's someone else's problem, why should they care? Then there's the religious types who are absolutely certain that the World Is Coming To An End Real Soon Now anyway, so again, why should they care? It's all part of 'gods plan' or somesuch nonsense, this Earth and this Existence is all supposed to be temporary so far as they're concerned. What's left are the rank-and-file citizens of countries all over the world, who have neither the time nor the education to understand what's going on; they're all too busy just trying to live their lives and have no time to worry about things that will happen hundreds of years from now, not with bills to pay, kids to raise, etc. So it's a hard sell to them.
If for some reason you're forced to use it, you should be able to go into This PC/Manage/Services, then Stop and Disable the Automatic Updates service. Of course that's just a stop-gap, you still don't get to pick and choose which updates you get if you turn it back on.
It's crap, it takes over your computer, it spys on you, it has adware embedded in it, it 'phones home' constantly with details about everything you're doing, and Miscreant-o-soft can remotely take control of your computer and do whatever they feel like to it and you have NO say in the matter unless you never connect it to the Internet. Get some version of Linux instead, I recommend Linux Mint.
You can't uninstall Cortana though, it's embedded into the entire OS, and you can't just 'turn it off', either. The closest I've been able to come is a very brute force/nuclear option, which was to deny Windows the ability to execute anything in the subdirectory where the Cortana core files are, so there ends up being a bunch of errors in the System log because it can't start Cortana up, but it does keep it from running it. This also breaks a couple other things at the same time, but I can't say I've really been affected by that.
You should also go through all the Task Scheduler entries, too, if you're worried about the 'phone home' problem, much of it is triggered through Task Scheduler entries, which you can go through and delete.
They forced us onto Windows 10 at work, I installed Classic Explorer and that gets rid of their retarded implementation of a start menu.
What I'd want to see is what sort of passenger safety systems are designed into it. Ejection seat, or ballistic parachute for the whole aircraft, maybe? How do you ensure that the passenger can survive a catastropic failure of the aircraft, or be able to exit the aircraft safely in case of an imminent collision (with another aircraft or with a stationary object)? If it were up to me to certify an aircraft that is purpose-built to not have a human pilot, that would be a critical requirement.
..no, you're missing the point entirely. I'm drawing a parallel between two groups for their reasons for preferring what many considering 'obsolete' technology. Also I disagree that a guitar amp is a musical instrument, unless you think 60Hz hum is 'music' -- because without the actual instrument plugged into it, that's all it does. it's a 'sound reinforcement device', really, and while the preamp settings do set the tone, it doesn't make the music all by itself, it reproduces it. You could play an acoustic guitar and not need an amp at all.
Could you please do the world a favor, and spread the word, far and wide, what 'AI' really is, and get your colleagues to do the same? The world-at-large seems to think that what they see in movies and TV that is referred to as 'artificial intelligence' is the reality and not a fantasy.
All mouth
Oh, you mean like this?
If you thought Creationists had fits over the idea we're descended from primates, just imagine how much of a conniption fit they'll have over this.
Get your vinyl records, get a decent turntable, get a decent ADC/DAC (24 bit would be good) for your computer, record the one-time virgin playback of the new vinyl, encode it into FLAC (or just leave it uncompressed), play the digital recording of the vinyl in your car ad infinitum. All the qualities of vinyl without any of the drawbacks.
Do you realize that compression/expansion is applied very often to various channels of the mix (usually vocals) even at live performances? Even if they don't have a compressor/expander in their stack, they've got someone riding the mixer during the entire set to keep things sounding good out in the house.
I think what you really want is a digital recording of a virgin copy of the pressed vinyl, so you get all the personality, flaws, and other characteristics of the actual vinyl record, for the full experience.
See, I think you're thinking like an engineer instead of a musician; I have a foot in both worlds so I think I get it.
Guitar players prefer tube amps, despite them being more expensive, more fragile, tubes wearing out, and so on. Why? "It's got a warmer tone" and similar reasons. Amp manufacturers have gone to great lengths to digitally emulate the characteristics of tube amps because of this, finally resorting to DSP's, which are about as far removed from a vacuum tube as you can get. Sure, vinyl records are clumsy, fragile, they wear out, and they don't have the range of fidelity that an uncompressed digital audio file has, and as you say, each one is slightly differently flawed because it's a purely mechanical medium. But I think people want it for the flaws and the limitations, for similar reasons that guitarists want tube amps: a different tone, a 'warmth' that you can't get as easily from digital formats.
Of course what they ought to be doing is the way we used to preserve our vinyl records, except updated to the current era: Play your vinyl LPs once, recorded into an uncompressed or lossless format, and play the digital file when you want to listen to it. You'd get all the imperfections and personality of the vinyl record, without risking damage to the vinyl or slowly wearing it out. Of course I'm sure the music industry would have epileptic fits if they found out people were doing this regularly..
This story was also posted on The Consumerist: Tostitos ‘Party Safe’ Bags Will Detect If You’ve Been Drinking; Help You Call Uber
It doesn't 'tell you you are drunk', it merely detects the presence of alcohol on your breath. You'd need an actual breathalyzer to determine if you're above the legal limit or not.
I did, jackass, and the physics is over my head, so we're discussing it here. If you have nothing of value to add to the conversation then shove off.