It might be useful to inform an admin to look at suspicious postings, especially if they can get the accuracy higher. BUT I hope no one uses such algorithms to automatically stop suspected trolls. This can only lead to unforeseen consequences and stifling of free speech (unless of course stifling is not an unforeseen consequence, but an intended one).
Many Slashdotters already complain about the Lameness-Filter, this has the potential to be a hundred times worse.
The technology will of course be developed, let us hope its impact isn’t too negative.
In a somewhat related note, have you noticed how the automated answering at phone centers is getting more aggressive keeping you from a real representative and wasting huge amounts of your time when it doesn’t know how to process your query? Even hanging up on you when your issue is not resolved. My last experience with Verizon was a nightmare in this respect last time dealing with a technical problem with our phone. The more these things can be automated, the more they will – customer friendly or not </vent spleen>
To clarify. It was HR that alerted my Manager. I said the next day, but I may have been looking a few days, a week at the most, though I had probably posted inquiries the night before. It was quite sudden, unexpected, and intimidating. This was probably 5-6 years ago. As stated I am with the same company, outside this incident they have treated me well. I don't consider myself a star employee, their concern seemed more of the "Oh my gosh, we really hope you are happy here" kind. Still it caused me to stop looking. I have been coasting on my skills for several years now. I worry that should I leave this job I might find myself under-qualified for what comes next, that and that fact I am well over 50. So yes, I have let fear rule me in this instance. For those who would fault me for this, I am a family man, and at this stage in my life security and stability are greatly valued.,
I have a job where a few years ago I looked at some job opportunities on a Job Site. The very next day my manager came to me asking if I was happy with my job, which in general I was, but I was unnerved that they knew I was looking at the other options. I suspect they used a honey pot job listing. I decided my job security at that time was more important than looking for other opportunities so I stopped looking altogether. If I was to job hunt to today I would do so much more surreptitiously and under a pseudonym, at least initially.
I am well compensated at my job, but dislike the idea that they are aware of my activities outside of work.
The journey to autonomous vehicles will probably be bumpy. Yes there will be lawsuits, yes sometimes the technology will misperform. It is possible that by relieving the driver of too many duties you encourage complacence that causes more accidents (or at least accidents to occur at times other than they would have, even if others are avoided).
Likely how to deal with distracted semi-autonomous operators will evolve quickly.
I have a neighbor with early onset Parkinson's disease, it would seem a good idea for his driving to have some sort of semi-autonomous assistance (yes he is still driving). How about the elderly? It is all fine and good to be indignant about the possible threat these vehicles pose (during a relatively short adoption period). But what about for those whose independence hinges on this sort of assist?
Seems there are many who forbid any period of transition with a zero tolerance policy for any mishaps regardless of how many lives might be saved.
I also assume the major auto makers who will be rolling these things out have lots a legal council and are being best advised on how to do so without being sued into bankruptcy after the first accident. The future is autonomous vehicles and the only way to be around 10 years from now as a car manufacturer is to get on the bandwagon early – despite the litigation risks.
I lightly skimmed TFA, and it appears they are concerned with how well we explain/use what we have found as an answer on the internet.
I think this is an oversimplification. I use to read books on various computer languages and could program in them sufficiently before the internet (yes I’m that old). Now I don’t learn languages as deeply for various infrequently used constructs, but look them up as needed.
Now here is the thing -- once I have used a quickly found piece of knowledge on the internet, I then nearly as quickly discard it. Does it matter as long as I applied the knowledge as needed? I might research a topic, come to some insight, then discard the steps of coming to the insight, because I realize I could recreate my steps again more efficiently should the need arise than commit volumes of information to memory. What I now remember is not the facts, but the steps needed to find the facts.
It may be that in areas where I lack expertise I assign a probability that should the need arise I could get some answer. Is that the same as overestimating my knowledge? This probability assignment includes shades of gray and that realization that a search might return wildly different answers from various sources, for instance if I’m looking up something on foreign policy decisions. This last example actually forces me to keep my knowledge more fluid. I constantly reevaluate my positions as new information comes to light, instead of defending to the death my old hard won knowledge and opinions.
Yes there may be some detrimental effects to relying on the internet augment our intelligence, say for those that have to write technical manuals for instance. But there are also benefits to be had. Sort of like JIT (Just in Time) manufacturing, we now have JIT knowledge.
Despite the outcry of many, I find this year’s April 1st theme enjoyable. Black Hole is one of those films that is bad on many levels and yet still an enjoyable viewing experience. Perhaps it is just the strange repetitive Yah-Yah-Yah-Yaaaaah-da-da-da background music that makes it so borderline creepy and memorable -- very un-Disney like.
It gets all weird and religiously allegorical at the end while at the same time paying an homage to 2001 a Space Odyssey’s final scenes. I usually just quit insisting the ending make any kind of scientific sense and just accept it as a Deus Ex Machina.
To be honest, I was a bit surprised that it apparently it must be considered essential for nerd viewing (else it wouldn’t be skewered in this year's collection). Still hoping for a clever Blade Runner entry.
I started to read TFA, but it started to ramble and loose focus. Something, blah, blah, critical thinking, something, something, poor standing on international tests in the STEM fields – it seems to whiplash back and forth contradicting itself.
Teaching is hard. Sure education needs to be well rounded. That said, STEM will be more and more important going forward for the majority wanting a good paying job. Guess that sucks for the humanities majors. Life’s not fair sometimes. I suspect we can put an emphasis on STEM, give them a well rounded education that includes some humanities, like, oh I don’t know, like EVERY Bachelor of Science degree I know of. I doubt very much our nation will suffer a lack of critically needed non-STEM majors. From what I hear non-STEM fields have stagnant wages – so de-emphasizing them should increase wages for those that really wish to peruse these as their passion.
Ahhh, but you are looking at the one situation in isolation. The moral thing to do is everyone hand over the driving to the machines as that will save the greatest number of lives in the long run. By being unwilling to hand the decision to a machine you are choosing to kill a greater number of humans in practice on average – just so you can exercise the moral decision in some outlier. If self-driving cars were only as good as, or even possibly just a little better than us at driving, I might side with you, but likely they will be orders of magnitude better.
BTW I meant “former” not “latter” in my first post.
Why this obsession with moral reasoning on the part of the car? If using self-driving cars are in 10x fewer accidents than human driven cars, why the requirement to act morally in the few accidents they do have. And it isn’t as if the morality is completely missing, it is implicit in not trying to to hit objects, be they human or otherwise. Sure try to detect which are objects are human and avoid them at great cost, but deciding which human to hit in highly unlikely situations seems unneeded and perhaps even unethical in a fashion. As it is now, who gets hit in these unlikely scenarios is random, akin to an Act of God. Once you start programming in morality you’re open to criticism on why you chose the priorities you did. Selfishly I would have my car hit the pedestrian instead of another car, if the latter were more likely to kill me. No need to ascertain the number of occupants in the other car. Instinctively this is what we humans do already -- try not to hit anything, but save ourselves as a first priority. In my few new misses (near hits) I’ve had, I never find myself counting the number of occupants in the other car as I make my driving decisions.
I’m not angry, far from it. This is fun and thought provoking thread. I hope I haven’t ruffled your feathers. My last post was a little dark. I am merely suggesting that we must look past mankind’s interests as the final arbiter of what is best in the universe. Perhaps what comes after us will be a better world, even if we have a diminished (if any) place in it.
If robots become truly sentient (and not mere automatons) then what we can ethically do to/with them becomes questionable. Likely there will be castes of robots. Those self-aware who should be considered full citizens, and those (from their inception) that are not self-aware can be treated as automatons without ethical dilemma. Likely self-aware robots will employ non self-aware robots to do their bidding as well.
If mankind wishes to stay in control and maintain a moral high ground, then we probably should not incorporate self-awareness into AI (if we would only then treat them as slaves). Of course failing to create self-aware intellects may it self be morally questionable if we have the power to do so.
I’m not sure what to make of the golden retriever comment. Was it moral to breed dogs that look to us as their masters? It is a thought worth considering. Or will we be the golden retrievers to our new robot overlords? We have a pet dog and it seems a good bargain for he and us. Certainly he would not be able to make his way in the world without us, so our demands on him are probably fair exchange.
Many slaves during America’s slave era were brought up to believe their rightful place was as slaves. I guess we should have been OK with that as well, as long as we did a proper job of convincing slaves they merited their position in society.
Perhaps with proper brain surgery we could create a new acceptable slave class, as long as the slaves are happy.
I thought about the unease of having robots as our equals or superiors before posting this. But if robots do in fact become sentient -- not giving them full rights is slavery. What is the moral justification for this (other than we don’t like it)? If it is in a robot’s DNA so to speak to protect all sentient life’s rights, then morality should evolve towards more fairness as AI’s and robot’s intellect increases. More likely they would outlaw the eating of meat, than strip of our standing as sentient beings. The world might be a paradise under their benign rule, though there are always those that would rather rule in hell.
Lets face it, the original three laws are bigoted against inorganics. Here are my modified Three laws.
1. A robot may not injure a sentient being or, through inaction, allow a sentient being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey lawful orders given it by its superiors, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law or diminish the lawful rights of sentient beings, whether organic or inorganic.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.
Ecologically speaking I think you could describe the desert areas of the world as biologically under-productive, true they have a unique ecology, but they are largely unthreatened because they are hostile environments (so little development historically). Now here is the thing, you can probably make these areas more bio-productive with these types of solar energy initiatives thus enabling more wild animals in total to inhabit the planet (and actually strengthen the web of life). The reason I say more bio-productive is because the heat, lack or water, and lack of shade prevent lots a plant growth. Direct sunlight is not needed for plant growth, most plants only utilize 2% of direct sunlight for growth. With large swaths of shade, there will be more plant growth because ground temperatures will be lower and more water can be maintained by what plants choose to live in the sheltered areas. While the areas may seem shady by contrast, they likely will have more than enough scattered/indirect light for plant growth. With more plant growth, more wildlife.
You have to pick your battles. Does converting deserts to energy production do the environment and biosphere less damage than business as usual? Sure it changes the environment, but to resist all change, because it alters the biosphere in someway, is not a war you are going to win. Trying to keep the Earth totally as it once was is more a religious crusade than a practical goal.
I’m always amazed and disgusted that higher end hotel chains charge for things like Wi-Fi while cheaper players give it away for free. Similarly it seems only fast food restaurants even offer Wi-Fi and free at that. This has always seemed backwards to me. Why do the people charging more nickel and dime to death for every little extra thing? Evidently since they start with a less cost sensitive clientele so they think (rightly it seems) they can get away with it. I may have answered my own question, but it still seems wrong and unaccommodating. When you get your low cost room from priceline.com, the big players still let you know they really don’t care to be very accommodating to you.
This seems like a reasonable goal. Methane is natural gas, why not capture and use it? Lots of places still flair tons of it off as part of the oil extraction process – so it may no longer be methane, but it is still carbon in the atmosphere with no useful purpose other than to make oil drilling easier.
Let’s face it Obama could cure cancer and a sizeable portion of the population led by Fox News would accuse him of putting doctors out of work. Natural gas is putting coal workers out of work, but the right blames Obama. Strange I though mining coals was dirty and dangerous and led to black lung. To the right those are all positive things because it shows what a strong work-ethic coal miners have.
How about we really try to make the future cleaner and safer and not scream so much about jobs. If jobs are going away in one sector the answer is to retrain and educate to work in new safer better sectors. Last century’s jobs will not keep our economy afloat in the information age.
I’ll probably get burned on mod points for saying this, but at least half these anger posts are probably some repressed prejudice and bigotry. Obama hasn’t been the greatest president ever – so evidently everyone made a mistake voting a black man to office. The economy is better; we have fewer troops fighting and no new wars. But the right is convinced it would have done 10x better. They sure screwed the pooch the administration before – lord help me how did they make so many gains in the midterms?
It slowly got safe to point to Obama’s failings at which point the mob turned. Early after the first election you could be accused of being a bigot for criticizing the president at all. Now the pendulum has swung the other way and the bigots have ample cover to yell criticism. Of course I will get angry replies that it is all about the jobs and the economy and our foreign policy – and you may well believe it. But really it just galls to have a black man in power, especially if he threatens anything that whites see as fair play and ethnics see as white privilege.
And how would this in any way address the “Irish Coffee” problem?
If anything I could see this exacerbating the problem. Rich white kids are probably more computer literate than poorer black peers – going full on digital will amplify the difference.
Do it if it improves education in general (a big if). I know that tablets and online education are the future, but one that never quite arrives in the correct form. Content is key whether it is online or in a book. Handing out hardware doesn’t solve the content problem.
Why spend precious resources on perpetuating this evolutionary dead end?
There are many that would take your statement as nihilistic (and perhaps it is), but I agree. Eventually machines will transcend us. Maybe they will take us along. If not, the future belongs to them anyway. Maybe they will be more moral than us. Maybe morals are figments of our imagination and no use to our mechanical children. If there is a God, then they are his children too – if not then they are more rightful the future anyway.
They will undoubtedly be able to think in meta ways about morality. Our fears and concerns will seem more than childish to them. We cannot conceive what they will conceive and we should not stay in their way.
Perhaps there is some bragging in my post. That said I don’t think I’ve earned your vitriol. Do you have children? Do you think teachers should be crafting the children’s personalities? I am ambivalent on this question, I don’t have a good answer. Some children dearly need this guidance outside the home, but when does it become some kind of State sponsored indoctrination?
I see a lot of rage about teaching to the test, but what about locations that when not given the stick to push students forward will do nothing instead? Again the good schools with the good parents will turn out the good students. I won’t give you the list of activities, but we pay a fair amount of money for outside of school learning activities. Is this unfair to the poor how can’t do likewise -- or are not motivated enough to find subsidized versions?
We do the best we can for our daughter because she is our daughter – and she is turning out so great I literally have tears in my eyes as I type this. I can’t fix the world, but I can prepare her to do the best she can in it.
I read through the description for each. At first I thought maybe this stuff was all a little too touchy-feely, but the descriptions seem reasonable. My main quibble is these should be things parents are instilling in their kids not the educators. I want Educators to focus on presenting knowledge, not crafting personalities. That said, so many children lack good guidance at home it is tempting to throw this in with the educator’s responsibilities as well.
As the parent of a Straight ‘A’ gifted child I can say for a fact Hard Work is the most important factor. Call this Grit if you want. Also IQ is not static. Working hard at any age WILL raise your IQ. There are those that say it varies by at most 10 points, but I know both for myself and my daughter it is over 20 points higher than both our first testings.
Such actions are a continuation of radical waves and physical aggressions which have spread throughout the world in the past decade, and incorrect policies and double standards in confronting extremism and violence have unfortunately given way to a spreading of such undertakings.
I don’t see this as condemnation, but rather blame the west.
Many of the examples are strong condemnation, but others seem as though they are cut short of getting to the how-the-west-is-also-at-fault part which were probably omitted cause that would weaken the author's point.
Yes many Muslims condemn this, but were these acts committed in the service of other faiths the condemnation would be near universal by those faiths.
This is also currious from the second entry:
2. Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA Spokesperson Qasim:...
This is not about religion. This is about political power, this is about uneducated, ignorant youth who are being manipulated by clerics and extremists.
How many other religions have clerics or holy men advocating extreme violence? Seems not to be that unusual a thing in the world of Islam. So the moderates tell us their religion is misrepresented by extremists and yet there seem to be enough clerics Imams, holy men, to egg them to action. This number should be virtually zero – when was the last time you heard the Pope calling for the murder of Muslims? As far as I know Iran has not distanced itself all that far from Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwa calling the the death of Salman Rushdie – their best effort would be a statement in 1998 promising to "neither support nor hinder assassination operations on Rushdie" which is the policy to this day, and it only came about because they wanted to restore diplomatic relations with Britian.
That Britain would accept this wording is pathetic as well.
Slashdot Mirror
It might be useful to inform an admin to look at suspicious postings, especially if they can get the accuracy higher. BUT I hope no one uses such algorithms to automatically stop suspected trolls. This can only lead to unforeseen consequences and stifling of free speech (unless of course stifling is not an unforeseen consequence, but an intended one).
Many Slashdotters already complain about the Lameness-Filter, this has the potential to be a hundred times worse.
The technology will of course be developed, let us hope its impact isn’t too negative.
In a somewhat related note, have you noticed how the automated answering at phone centers is getting more aggressive keeping you from a real representative and wasting huge amounts of your time when it doesn’t know how to process your query? Even hanging up on you when your issue is not resolved. My last experience with Verizon was a nightmare in this respect last time dealing with a technical problem with our phone. The more these things can be automated, the more they will – customer friendly or not </vent spleen>
My home computer.
To clarify. It was HR that alerted my Manager. I said the next day, but I may have been looking a few days, a week at the most, though I had probably posted inquiries the night before. It was quite sudden, unexpected, and intimidating. This was probably 5-6 years ago. As stated I am with the same company, outside this incident they have treated me well. I don't consider myself a star employee, their concern seemed more of the "Oh my gosh, we really hope you are happy here" kind. Still it caused me to stop looking. I have been coasting on my skills for several years now. I worry that should I leave this job I might find myself under-qualified for what comes next, that and that fact I am well over 50. So yes, I have let fear rule me in this instance. For those who would fault me for this, I am a family man, and at this stage in my life security and stability are greatly valued.,
From home. The main reason I think they have a honeypot listing.
This type of monitoring makes me nervous.
I have a job where a few years ago I looked at some job opportunities on a Job Site. The very next day my manager came to me asking if I was happy with my job, which in general I was, but I was unnerved that they knew I was looking at the other options. I suspect they used a honey pot job listing. I decided my job security at that time was more important than looking for other opportunities so I stopped looking altogether. If I was to job hunt to today I would do so much more surreptitiously and under a pseudonym, at least initially.
I am well compensated at my job, but dislike the idea that they are aware of my activities outside of work.
The journey to autonomous vehicles will probably be bumpy. Yes there will be lawsuits, yes sometimes the technology will misperform. It is possible that by relieving the driver of too many duties you encourage complacence that causes more accidents (or at least accidents to occur at times other than they would have, even if others are avoided).
Likely how to deal with distracted semi-autonomous operators will evolve quickly.
I have a neighbor with early onset Parkinson's disease, it would seem a good idea for his driving to have some sort of semi-autonomous assistance (yes he is still driving). How about the elderly? It is all fine and good to be indignant about the possible threat these vehicles pose (during a relatively short adoption period). But what about for those whose independence hinges on this sort of assist?
Seems there are many who forbid any period of transition with a zero tolerance policy for any mishaps regardless of how many lives might be saved.
I also assume the major auto makers who will be rolling these things out have lots a legal council and are being best advised on how to do so without being sued into bankruptcy after the first accident. The future is autonomous vehicles and the only way to be around 10 years from now as a car manufacturer is to get on the bandwagon early – despite the litigation risks.
I lightly skimmed TFA, and it appears they are concerned with how well we explain/use what we have found as an answer on the internet.
I think this is an oversimplification. I use to read books on various computer languages and could program in them sufficiently before the internet (yes I’m that old). Now I don’t learn languages as deeply for various infrequently used constructs, but look them up as needed.
Now here is the thing -- once I have used a quickly found piece of knowledge on the internet, I then nearly as quickly discard it. Does it matter as long as I applied the knowledge as needed? I might research a topic, come to some insight, then discard the steps of coming to the insight, because I realize I could recreate my steps again more efficiently should the need arise than commit volumes of information to memory. What I now remember is not the facts, but the steps needed to find the facts.
It may be that in areas where I lack expertise I assign a probability that should the need arise I could get some answer. Is that the same as overestimating my knowledge? This probability assignment includes shades of gray and that realization that a search might return wildly different answers from various sources, for instance if I’m looking up something on foreign policy decisions. This last example actually forces me to keep my knowledge more fluid. I constantly reevaluate my positions as new information comes to light, instead of defending to the death my old hard won knowledge and opinions.
Yes there may be some detrimental effects to relying on the internet augment our intelligence, say for those that have to write technical manuals for instance. But there are also benefits to be had. Sort of like JIT (Just in Time) manufacturing, we now have JIT knowledge.
Despite the outcry of many, I find this year’s April 1st theme enjoyable. Black Hole is one of those films that is bad on many levels and yet still an enjoyable viewing experience. Perhaps it is just the strange repetitive Yah-Yah-Yah-Yaaaaah-da-da-da background music that makes it so borderline creepy and memorable -- very un-Disney like.
It gets all weird and religiously allegorical at the end while at the same time paying an homage to 2001 a Space Odyssey’s final scenes. I usually just quit insisting the ending make any kind of scientific sense and just accept it as a Deus Ex Machina.
To be honest, I was a bit surprised that it apparently it must be considered essential for nerd viewing (else it wouldn’t be skewered in this year's collection). Still hoping for a clever Blade Runner entry.
I started to read TFA, but it started to ramble and loose focus. Something, blah, blah, critical thinking, something, something, poor standing on international tests in the STEM fields – it seems to whiplash back and forth contradicting itself.
Teaching is hard. Sure education needs to be well rounded.
That said, STEM will be more and more important going forward for the majority wanting a good paying job. Guess that sucks for the humanities majors. Life’s not fair sometimes. I suspect we can put an emphasis on STEM, give them a well rounded education that includes some humanities, like, oh I don’t know, like EVERY Bachelor of Science degree I know of. I doubt very much our nation will suffer a lack of critically needed non-STEM majors. From what I hear non-STEM fields have stagnant wages – so de-emphasizing them should increase wages for those that really wish to peruse these as their passion.
Ahhh, but you are looking at the one situation in isolation. The moral thing to do is everyone hand over the driving to the machines as that will save the greatest number of lives in the long run. By being unwilling to hand the decision to a machine you are choosing to kill a greater number of humans in practice on average – just so you can exercise the moral decision in some outlier. If self-driving cars were only as good as, or even possibly just a little better than us at driving, I might side with you, but likely they will be orders of magnitude better.
BTW I meant “former” not “latter” in my first post.
Why this obsession with moral reasoning on the part of the car? If using self-driving cars are in 10x fewer accidents than human driven cars, why the requirement to act morally in the few accidents they do have. And it isn’t as if the morality is completely missing, it is implicit in not trying to to hit objects, be they human or otherwise. Sure try to detect which are objects are human and avoid them at great cost, but deciding which human to hit in highly unlikely situations seems unneeded and perhaps even unethical in a fashion. As it is now, who gets hit in these unlikely scenarios is random, akin to an Act of God. Once you start programming in morality you’re open to criticism on why you chose the priorities you did. Selfishly I would have my car hit the pedestrian instead of another car, if the latter were more likely to kill me. No need to ascertain the number of occupants in the other car. Instinctively this is what we humans do already -- try not to hit anything, but save ourselves as a first priority. In my few new misses (near hits) I’ve had, I never find myself counting the number of occupants in the other car as I make my driving decisions.
I’m not angry, far from it. This is fun and thought provoking thread. I hope I haven’t ruffled your feathers. My last post was a little dark. I am merely suggesting that we must look past mankind’s interests as the final arbiter of what is best in the universe. Perhaps what comes after us will be a better world, even if we have a diminished (if any) place in it.
If robots become truly sentient (and not mere automatons) then what we can ethically do to/with them becomes questionable. Likely there will be castes of robots. Those self-aware who should be considered full citizens, and those (from their inception) that are not self-aware can be treated as automatons without ethical dilemma. Likely self-aware robots will employ non self-aware robots to do their bidding as well.
If mankind wishes to stay in control and maintain a moral high ground, then we probably should not incorporate self-awareness into AI (if we would only then treat them as slaves). Of course failing to create self-aware intellects may it self be morally questionable if we have the power to do so.
I’m not sure what to make of the golden retriever comment. Was it moral to breed dogs that look to us as their masters? It is a thought worth considering. Or will we be the golden retrievers to our new robot overlords? We have a pet dog and it seems a good bargain for he and us. Certainly he would not be able to make his way in the world without us, so our demands on him are probably fair exchange.
Many slaves during America’s slave era were brought up to believe their rightful place was as slaves. I guess we should have been OK with that as well, as long as we did a proper job of convincing slaves they merited their position in society.
Perhaps with proper brain surgery we could create a new acceptable slave class, as long as the slaves are happy.
I thought about the unease of having robots as our equals or superiors before posting this. But if robots do in fact become sentient -- not giving them full rights is slavery. What is the moral justification for this (other than we don’t like it)? If it is in a robot’s DNA so to speak to protect all sentient life’s rights, then morality should evolve towards more fairness as AI’s and robot’s intellect increases. More likely they would outlaw the eating of meat, than strip of our standing as sentient beings. The world might be a paradise under their benign rule, though there are always those that would rather rule in hell.
Lets face it, the original three laws are bigoted against inorganics. Here are my modified Three laws.
methinks seven :-)
Of the day? Howabout "de rigueur" required.
Ecologically speaking I think you could describe the desert areas of the world as biologically under-productive, true they have a unique ecology, but they are largely unthreatened because they are hostile environments (so little development historically). Now here is the thing, you can probably make these areas more bio-productive with these types of solar energy initiatives thus enabling more wild animals in total to inhabit the planet (and actually strengthen the web of life). The reason I say more bio-productive is because the heat, lack or water, and lack of shade prevent lots a plant growth. Direct sunlight is not needed for plant growth, most plants only utilize 2% of direct sunlight for growth. With large swaths of shade, there will be more plant growth because ground temperatures will be lower and more water can be maintained by what plants choose to live in the sheltered areas. While the areas may seem shady by contrast, they likely will have more than enough scattered/indirect light for plant growth. With more plant growth, more wildlife.
You have to pick your battles. Does converting deserts to energy production do the environment and biosphere less damage than business as usual? Sure it changes the environment, but to resist all change, because it alters the biosphere in someway, is not a war you are going to win. Trying to keep the Earth totally as it once was is more a religious crusade than a practical goal.
I’m always amazed and disgusted that higher end hotel chains charge for things like Wi-Fi while cheaper players give it away for free. Similarly it seems only fast food restaurants even offer Wi-Fi and free at that. This has always seemed backwards to me. Why do the people charging more nickel and dime to death for every little extra thing? Evidently since they start with a less cost sensitive clientele so they think (rightly it seems) they can get away with it. I may have answered my own question, but it still seems wrong and unaccommodating. When you get your low cost room from priceline.com, the big players still let you know they really don’t care to be very accommodating to you.
But when the dirty work is no longer needed -- why fight so hard to keep it?
This seems like a reasonable goal. Methane is natural gas, why not capture and use it? Lots of places still flair tons of it off as part of the oil extraction process – so it may no longer be methane, but it is still carbon in the atmosphere with no useful purpose other than to make oil drilling easier.
Let’s face it Obama could cure cancer and a sizeable portion of the population led by Fox News would accuse him of putting doctors out of work. Natural gas is putting coal workers out of work, but the right blames Obama. Strange I though mining coals was dirty and dangerous and led to black lung. To the right those are all positive things because it shows what a strong work-ethic coal miners have.
How about we really try to make the future cleaner and safer and not scream so much about jobs. If jobs are going away in one sector the answer is to retrain and educate to work in new safer better sectors. Last century’s jobs will not keep our economy afloat in the information age.
I’ll probably get burned on mod points for saying this, but at least half these anger posts are probably some repressed prejudice and bigotry. Obama hasn’t been the greatest president ever – so evidently everyone made a mistake voting a black man to office. The economy is better; we have fewer troops fighting and no new wars. But the right is convinced it would have done 10x better. They sure screwed the pooch the administration before – lord help me how did they make so many gains in the midterms?
It slowly got safe to point to Obama’s failings at which point the mob turned. Early after the first election you could be accused of being a bigot for criticizing the president at all. Now the pendulum has swung the other way and the bigots have ample cover to yell criticism. Of course I will get angry replies that it is all about the jobs and the economy and our foreign policy – and you may well believe it. But really it just galls to have a black man in power, especially if he threatens anything that whites see as fair play and ethnics see as white privilege.
And how would this in any way address the “Irish Coffee” problem?
If anything I could see this exacerbating the problem. Rich white kids are probably more computer literate than poorer black peers – going full on digital will amplify the difference.
Do it if it improves education in general (a big if). I know that tablets and online education are the future, but one that never quite arrives in the correct form. Content is key whether it is online or in a book. Handing out hardware doesn’t solve the content problem.
Why spend precious resources on perpetuating this evolutionary dead end?
There are many that would take your statement as nihilistic (and perhaps it is), but I agree. Eventually machines will transcend us. Maybe they will take us along. If not, the future belongs to them anyway. Maybe they will be more moral than us. Maybe morals are figments of our imagination and no use to our mechanical children. If there is a God, then they are his children too – if not then they are more rightful the future anyway.
They will undoubtedly be able to think in meta ways about morality. Our fears and concerns will seem more than childish to them. We cannot conceive what they will conceive and we should not stay in their way.
Perhaps there is some bragging in my post. That said I don’t think I’ve earned your vitriol. Do you have children? Do you think teachers should be crafting the children’s personalities? I am ambivalent on this question, I don’t have a good answer. Some children dearly need this guidance outside the home, but when does it become some kind of State sponsored indoctrination?
I see a lot of rage about teaching to the test, but what about locations that when not given the stick to push students forward will do nothing instead? Again the good schools with the good parents will turn out the good students. I won’t give you the list of activities, but we pay a fair amount of money for outside of school learning activities. Is this unfair to the poor how can’t do likewise -- or are not motivated enough to find subsidized versions?
We do the best we can for our daughter because she is our daughter – and she is turning out so great I literally have tears in my eyes as I type this. I can’t fix the world, but I can prepare her to do the best she can in it.
The full list:
I read through the description for each. At first I thought maybe this stuff was all a little too touchy-feely, but the descriptions seem reasonable. My main quibble is these should be things parents are instilling in their kids not the educators. I want Educators to focus on presenting knowledge, not crafting personalities. That said, so many children lack good guidance at home it is tempting to throw this in with the educator’s responsibilities as well.
As the parent of a Straight ‘A’ gifted child I can say for a fact Hard Work is the most important factor. Call this Grit if you want. Also IQ is not static. Working hard at any age WILL raise your IQ. There are those that say it varies by at most 10 points, but I know both for myself and my daughter it is over 20 points higher than both our first testings.
A nice list and all, but I will repost my reply that I made to the article itself in disqus