"No. the probability of a precise sequence is not in question. It is exactly 2^-(10^7). For every exact sequence. That's as true for "HTHHTHTTTH..." as it is for "HHHHHHHHH....""
Incorrect.
The probabilities are dramatically different.
The probability of HHHTTT is the same as HTHTHT, the probability is NOT the same as HHHHHH.
" In the case of life, the question reduces to "How many organizations of matter yield an 'organism' capable of replicating and evolving?" "
Actually there are several far more comlicated questions involved. The answer tends to come out as "very to impossibly small given current knowledge" though.
"How many times did you throw the coins before getting that sequence?"
This is a variant with the monkies with typewriters. It is alo complete nonsense once you realize what that power symbol means.
The number of *atoms in the universe* is 10^80. Even if all of those were interacting every day and could create the right combination, it still wouldn't raise the probability to where it is reasonable.
"you must have been out of the loop for at least 60 years"
Not especially. I have read that site in detail, it does not account for a damned thing I said.
This is what is called a "knee jerk reaction". Quick! He is talking about Macroevoution! Throw This-Website-Which-Doesn't-Relate at him!
Yes, it talks about evidence for macroevolution, however, it doesn't cover my main points and does incorperate several logical flaws (these things look alike, therefore they are alike--we have no genetic evidence to that point, &c)
"frankly I think Dawkins has become an unmitigated jackass in recent years, and I'm not a creationist"
Agreed and true of me as well.
Dawkin's recent popular examples and computer models have been so flawed in their basic assumptions that I just have to shake my head. Yet he, and many others, seem to treat even a basic critique of such models as "Creationist Propaganda".
The probability of a precise sequence may be in question, but the probability of a given number of heads in that sequence is not. Coin tosses can be modeled as a binomial distribution where we check the number of heads and term those "successes" versus the number of tails and term those "failures".
So when we talk about that many heads in a row, we are not talking about the given sequence but the number of heads in a set of size n.
" Every attempt I've seen to calculate the probability of evolution falls into that same basic error."
Look up Robert Shapiro's work regarding abiogenesis.
Regardless of that, however, the odds *are* stacked against abiogenesis occuring and against the formation and distribution of novel genes in a population. *Severely*.
"For example, it is possible to use an evolutionary simulation to solve an equation, even when there is only one possible solution--and it is far more efficient than trying to guess the answer randomly."
Except if my fitness function changes then nothing interesting is going to happen. In evolution, the fitness function is constantly changing. Another poster has covered this, however, so I'll let it lie.
Actually work with GA before you try to use it in an example.
"The theory is not did evolution happen. We already know evolution did and does happen, there is a mountain of factual data underscoring that point."
Clarification:
There is a great deal of evidence pointing to allele frequency shifts and how Microevolution does happen.
Macroevolution, however, I would love to see the evidence for. There is no phenomena which we are aware of that can account for the handwavium that is often used to explain evolutionary theory: "this and this look similar, therefore they likely have a common cause", "of course they had a photoreceptor, things could obviously sense light because they needed it in the past".
Neither of these is a falsifiable statement.
There is an order of magnitude shift between the beneficial point mutations we see in bacteria and the evolution of complex novel genes. The first has been demonstrated, the later has yet to be shown (if you can provide peer-reviewed journal citations, I will be happy to look them up).
Evolution--using our current theories of how it happens--is far, far from a fact.
Okay, so SACD players won't read non-watermarked discs such as CD-Rs. This sounds okay on the outset, but think about it for a moment.
(fictional scenario) I have my own startup band, we burn and distribute our own CDs. Suddenly, I *must* go through the RIAA if I want to distribute my music.
Yes, so long as the means of communicating the checksum are secure (i.e., not prone to a man-in-the-middle attack).
Actually checksums have been used for years in order to ensure that a program has not been replaced with a malicious bit of code or modified in any way:
For instance, you want to make sure you haven't been hacked and ls hasn't been tampered with to hide the files? Have an checksum for it stored offsite and/or in a secure manner (encrypt it with a symmetric key and pray that key hasn't been compromised as well) and then compare with what pops up when you look at the file.
The idea is that if the file has changed at all, the checksum is going to be different.
Note though that in order for this to work the means by which you receive the checksum *must* be secure. They can be cleartext (such as in this case), but you must be able to confirm the source of the checksum is who you think it is.
Thus, it would be a poor way for the software update mechanism to operate (since the attacker could send a false checksum) but is okay for something like this.
Why do you, whoever you happen to be, stand for this?
The only way this can truly change is through market intervention: legal solutions will be iffy and likely do more harm than good; internal forces certainly won't cut it; and petitioning is useless.
Support Apple, Support Linux, Support OpenBSD, but don't support Microsoft!
In a world where we cannot convince people that MHz don't matter, and people believe that security is a product, attempting to convince them of the security issues with MS will prove fruitless.
MS will just release statistics and compare their OS with the number of security holes found in OS + Applications and people will believe it to show that Linux is less secure. They will turn up their marketing engines and hype that Open Source means Lower Security and people will believe it.
True Story: I was attempting to convince a certified MS XP technician that MS didn't understand security. Keep in mind this is someone deep within the ranks of the Microsoft Heresy (like the Cainite Heresy, but more Hideously Evil(TM)).
I cited Scheiner, cDc, L0pht, and a half-a-dozen others. I talked about how open source was a good thing, the reply I got back can be summarized:
1) Security is a product ("A firewall will make you secure")
2) He thought the only reason you would want to secure your system was to keep people from browsing the pr0n there (and seeing the other files).
3) The threat level is minimal--no one would want to break into *your* system.
4) Believing that security was a real issue was like believing everything anyone told you (down to "three headed big foots in Utah").
Of course this is absolutely absurd, but thats what he believed. While you may not be able to sell the general public on all of that, it gives an impression on how MS treats security and how their marketing department would convince their users to treat it.
Actually the "technie" crowd, while not the least guilty when it comes to trading music, are certainly not the most.
Saying that it is because the techies "trade more music" is really oversimplifying something which is, in truth, much more complex. There are issues such as the number of them who listen to the particular style of music, the percentage of them who purchase music, and so on. This is particularly relevant since "technical savvy fans" probably make up a very small percentage of the potential fan-base.
Seems that this is more scapegoating than anything having to do with music trading.
I haven't read their actual proposal, but my psychic abilities tell me it is going to look something like this:
1) Microsoft is trustworthy (we will treat this as an definition, so it must be true).
2) All things must go through Microsoft and use Microsoft's (closed) protocols (after all, MS is defined as trustworthy, anything that relies on outside sources and don't go through MS must be evil).
3) Pass legislation to make copying illegal (this should stop all illicit copying: it works for the MPAA and the RIAA).
4) All computer systems, if they can't run MS protocols, need to be replaced with computer systems that can. If they are running anything other than Windows XP, this needs to be fixed. (MUST be using MS products, remember?)
I don't know, I think it is kind of nice not having to download a JVM and being able to run [insert Pure Java(TM) application here] without any finangaling and just by inserting the (simple, easy) commands. Call it a service to the customers.
No reason to do this in particular--it doesn't help you find problems and it doesn't help you check for errors later in better highlighted code.
"Design your code before you write it."
Actually, this is the critical part. If someone hands you a marker and leads you to the white board, draw a UML diagram and write pseudocode. Do complexity analysis, proof of correctness, and draw generalizations and associations.
If they demand C++, you don't want to be working for them.
"Write code away from a computer."
1) I'm dysgraphic, I score in the 30th percentile on handwriting tests.
2) This is a pointless exercise and serves no useful purpose.
"A modification of that data might screw up the picture of your cat dangling from the edge of the kitchen table you like so much, but it won't turn the image into a potential virus transmitter"
Obviously you haven't read Snow Crash;-)
The image could be infecting you, of course!
(to those who wonder: in Snow Crash there is a virus which is transmitted to the programmer via a visual image that looks like white noise).
Slashdot Mirror
"No. the probability of a precise sequence is not in question. It is exactly 2^-(10^7). For every exact sequence. That's as true for "HTHHTHTTTH..." as it is for "HHHHHHHHH....""
Incorrect.
The probabilities are dramatically different.
The probability of HHHTTT is the same as HTHTHT, the probability is NOT the same as HHHHHH.
" In the case of life, the question reduces to "How many organizations of matter yield an 'organism' capable of replicating and evolving?" "
Actually there are several far more comlicated questions involved. The answer tends to come out as "very to impossibly small given current knowledge" though.
"How many times did you throw the coins before getting that sequence?"
This is a variant with the monkies with typewriters. It is alo complete nonsense once you realize what that power symbol means.
The number of *atoms in the universe* is 10^80. Even if all of those were interacting every day and could create the right combination, it still wouldn't raise the probability to where it is reasonable.
"you must have been out of the loop for at least 60 years"
Not especially. I have read that site in detail, it does not account for a damned thing I said.
This is what is called a "knee jerk reaction". Quick! He is talking about Macroevoution! Throw This-Website-Which-Doesn't-Relate at him!
Yes, it talks about evidence for macroevolution, however, it doesn't cover my main points and does incorperate several logical flaws (these things look alike, therefore they are alike--we have no genetic evidence to that point, &c)
For instance, it doesn't even mentin hox genes.
"frankly I think Dawkins has become an unmitigated jackass in recent years, and I'm not a creationist"
Agreed and true of me as well.
Dawkin's recent popular examples and computer models have been so flawed in their basic assumptions that I just have to shake my head. Yet he, and many others, seem to treat even a basic critique of such models as "Creationist Propaganda".
"Now, I calculate the probability of that exact sequence, and discover that it is exactly as low as the probability of having them all come up heads."
Proof by mathematical impossibility.
2^(10^7) is an enormous hurdle to overcome.
"Have I proved that the coins are weighted? Or influenced by God?"
Nope. If that sequence comes up though, you can be fairly certain that something other than chance is present.
Otherwise, the probability of us being here is *nil*. It implies we do not understand what is going on.
"No, because every sequence of coins has exactly the same very low probability"
Someone who doesn't understand probability, I see.
*cough* P(X = x; n, p) = (n! / x!(n-x)!) * p^x * (1-p)^(n-x) *cough*.
The probability of a precise sequence may be in question, but the probability of a given number of heads in that sequence is not. Coin tosses can be modeled as a binomial distribution where we check the number of heads and term those "successes" versus the number of tails and term those "failures".
So when we talk about that many heads in a row, we are not talking about the given sequence but the number of heads in a set of size n.
" Every attempt I've seen to calculate the probability of evolution falls into that same basic error."
Look up Robert Shapiro's work regarding abiogenesis.
Regardless of that, however, the odds *are* stacked against abiogenesis occuring and against the formation and distribution of novel genes in a population. *Severely*.
"For example, it is possible to use an evolutionary simulation to solve an equation, even when there is only one possible solution--and it is far more efficient than trying to guess the answer randomly."
Except if my fitness function changes then nothing interesting is going to happen. In evolution, the fitness function is constantly changing. Another poster has covered this, however, so I'll let it lie.
Actually work with GA before you try to use it in an example.
"The theory is not did evolution happen. We already know evolution did and does happen, there is a mountain of factual data underscoring that point."
Clarification:
There is a great deal of evidence pointing to allele frequency shifts and how Microevolution does happen.
Macroevolution, however, I would love to see the evidence for. There is no phenomena which we are aware of that can account for the handwavium that is often used to explain evolutionary theory: "this and this look similar, therefore they likely have a common cause", "of course they had a photoreceptor, things could obviously sense light because they needed it in the past".
Neither of these is a falsifiable statement.
There is an order of magnitude shift between the beneficial point mutations we see in bacteria and the evolution of complex novel genes. The first has been demonstrated, the later has yet to be shown (if you can provide peer-reviewed journal citations, I will be happy to look them up).
Evolution--using our current theories of how it happens--is far, far from a fact.
Okay, so SACD players won't read non-watermarked discs such as CD-Rs. This sounds okay on the outset, but think about it for a moment.
(fictional scenario)
I have my own startup band, we burn and distribute our own CDs. Suddenly, I *must* go through the RIAA if I want to distribute my music.
This is bad bad news if it is true.
Who thought "Programming Libraries".
::shakes head, sighs:: I am such a geek.
The answer to make sure they weren't spying was to create open-source ones, duuuuuh.
Free? Not really, unless you count "evaluation" as free. Or perhaps I'm looking at the wrong thing, hard to tell.
/. that the person and reviewer both actually *read* the information before commenting on it.
Platform Independent? FireWire is, Apple's SDK is not (last I checked).
FireWire SDK. Yes, defiantly.
Well, I guess it *is* too much to ask on
I guess it would also be too much to ask for a link to the actual press release.
Firewire has taken several industries, such as digital recording and portable hard drives, by storm.
It has proven itself to be very popular in a variety of areas and now they can use "FireWire" as a name.
Just the way it goes.
Yes, so long as the means of communicating the checksum are secure (i.e., not prone to a man-in-the-middle attack).
Actually checksums have been used for years in order to ensure that a program has not been replaced with a malicious bit of code or modified in any way:
For instance, you want to make sure you haven't been hacked and ls hasn't been tampered with to hide the files? Have an checksum for it stored offsite and/or in a secure manner (encrypt it with a symmetric key and pray that key hasn't been compromised as well) and then compare with what pops up when you look at the file.
The idea is that if the file has changed at all, the checksum is going to be different.
Note though that in order for this to work the means by which you receive the checksum *must* be secure. They can be cleartext (such as in this case), but you must be able to confirm the source of the checksum is who you think it is.
Thus, it would be a poor way for the software update mechanism to operate (since the attacker could send a false checksum) but is okay for something like this.
Why do we stand for this?
Why do you, whoever you happen to be, stand for this?
The only way this can truly change is through market intervention: legal solutions will be iffy and likely do more harm than good; internal forces certainly won't cut it; and petitioning is useless.
Support Apple, Support Linux, Support OpenBSD, but don't support Microsoft!
>Perhaps it's too technical
*Exactly*.
In a world where we cannot convince people that MHz don't matter, and people believe that security is a product, attempting to convince them of the security issues with MS will prove fruitless.
MS will just release statistics and compare their OS with the number of security holes found in OS + Applications and people will believe it to show that Linux is less secure. They will turn up their marketing engines and hype that Open Source means Lower Security and people will believe it.
True Story: I was attempting to convince a certified MS XP technician that MS didn't understand security. Keep in mind this is someone deep within the ranks of the Microsoft Heresy (like the Cainite Heresy, but more Hideously Evil(TM)).
I cited Scheiner, cDc, L0pht, and a half-a-dozen others. I talked about how open source was a good thing, the reply I got back can be summarized:
1) Security is a product ("A firewall will make you secure")
2) He thought the only reason you would want to secure your system was to keep people from browsing the pr0n there (and seeing the other files).
3) The threat level is minimal--no one would want to break into *your* system.
4) Believing that security was a real issue was like believing everything anyone told you (down to "three headed big foots in Utah").
Of course this is absolutely absurd, but thats what he believed. While you may not be able to sell the general public on all of that, it gives an impression on how MS treats security and how their marketing department would convince their users to treat it.
Sad, but true.
"Sure, it 'automatically' syncs up the iPod, but what happens when you have 6GB of mp3 and a 5GB iPod?? "
Step 1: Click on the iPod button.
Step 2: Select "Manually Manage Songs and Playlists"
Step 3: Manually manage your songs and playlists.
"iTunes is grossly lacking in configuration options, any winamp user using iTunes would be appalled at the lack of functionality."
Either that or thrilled with the ability to find everything at a glance.
"And, yes, I too was once a Apple biggot. Then I mended my ways, got a CS degree, and found Linux."
Odd. I was thinking about converting completely to linux, but I mended by ways, got a CS degree, and found MacOS X.
At least not on /.
/excellent article/" (emphasis added)
"/Popular Science/ is running an
Actually the "technie" crowd, while not the least guilty when it comes to trading music, are certainly not the most.
Saying that it is because the techies "trade more music" is really oversimplifying something which is, in truth, much more complex. There are issues such as the number of them who listen to the particular style of music, the percentage of them who purchase music, and so on. This is particularly relevant since "technical savvy fans" probably make up a very small percentage of the potential fan-base.
Seems that this is more scapegoating than anything having to do with music trading.
I haven't read their actual proposal, but my psychic abilities tell me it is going to look something like this:
1) Microsoft is trustworthy (we will treat this as an definition, so it must be true).
2) All things must go through Microsoft and use Microsoft's (closed) protocols (after all, MS is defined as trustworthy, anything that relies on outside sources and don't go through MS must be evil).
3) Pass legislation to make copying illegal (this should stop all illicit copying: it works for the MPAA and the RIAA).
4) All computer systems, if they can't run MS protocols, need to be replaced with computer systems that can. If they are running anything other than Windows XP, this needs to be fixed. (MUST be using MS products, remember?)
5) MS is trustworthy (see #1 for the proof).
I don't know, I think it is kind of nice not having to download a JVM and being able to run [insert Pure Java(TM) application here] without any finangaling and just by inserting the (simple, easy) commands. Call it a service to the customers.
But then, I'm a Mac user.
Odd, but I believe I specifically said to do this.
/UML/ on a sketchpad or whiteboard and writing C-code on a sketchpad or whiteboard.
When I start to code the first thing I pull out is my sketchpad and out comes pseudocode, UML, and the math involved, among other things.
There is a huge difference, however, between writing
Don't forget Apple's recent campaign:
Switch!
"Stop using IDEs."
No reason to do this in particular--it doesn't help you find problems and it doesn't help you check for errors later in better highlighted code.
"Design your code before you write it."
Actually, this is the critical part. If someone hands you a marker and leads you to the white board, draw a UML diagram and write pseudocode. Do complexity analysis, proof of correctness, and draw generalizations and associations.
If they demand C++, you don't want to be working for them.
"Write code away from a computer."
1) I'm dysgraphic, I score in the 30th percentile on handwriting tests.
2) This is a pointless exercise and serves no useful purpose.
Except if I skip over a line of code in a program I generally catch it before I attempt to compile the code.
On paper if I catch it later its bad (no space for it) and if I don't catch (because I am in a hurry) it then its worse.
"A modification of that data might screw up the picture of your cat dangling from the edge of the kitchen table you like so much, but it won't turn the image into a potential virus transmitter"
;-)
Obviously you haven't read Snow Crash
The image could be infecting you, of course!
(to those who wonder: in Snow Crash there is a virus which is transmitted to the programmer via a visual image that looks like white noise).
It was part of the deal that occurred awhile back where MS agreed to continue producing office and apple dropped some lawsuits.
However, I think that the deal has expired should they care to switch it.
Regardless Netscape/Mozilla can still be included and Netscape 4.7x is still bundled with OS 9.
So the question is who do you trust to use is responsibly and not abuse it?
Under the spreading chestnut tree
I sold you and you sold me
There lie they and here lie we
Under the spreading chestnut tree