Bear in mind that "Wired" is not known for its contributors' understanding of science:).
Ain't that the truth!
It sounds like a second-hand description of "quantum dot" technology. This is where you create a potential well in a conducting material and confine an electron within the well. Because the well is small, you get only certain energy levels permitted for the electron, just as in an atom. By changing the properties of the well, you change the properties of this "fake atom".
Just out of curiousity, do you any more info on this, or on applications for it? I buy that you can do this, but it seems hard to control this sort of potential except using nuclei?
And the funny thing is that the worse article has attracted already about six times as much posters... seems the newspapers are right in dumbing down stories to the least common denominator.
I think it might have something to do with the fact that it landed on everyone's front page, eh?
Apart from that, it is an interesting result, but only three sigma from the standard model, which is not really too much if you want to announce something groundbreaking. Sometimes even four sigma results turn out to be just experimental outliers.
Yeah, I'd have to agree with that. Three standard deviations is worth noticing, but it's not worth getting all crazed out. After a few more runs, we'll see what's up.
I can't believe I haven't seen this posted yet. Apparently experiments in particle physics aren't holding to theory
I think that this is maybe not so surprising. Theories in particle physics are very unlike a lot of other theories. There's not much evidence sitting around for some of these things, and as new evidence comes in, the theories change.
This is true for any scientific endeavor, but the changes are much more rapid in things like high-energy physics.
In short, I'm just saying that it shouldn't be taken as a "radical breakthrough" just because someone had the muon equation wrong, because it was going to happen at some point.
I have to agree on the smugness issue. I haven't read this latest, but I've always thought his attitude was quite a bit too smug. A good example of this is the Dilbert newsletter, which essentially turns into a list of things other people do he thinks is stupid, calling people "InDUHviduals", etc.
I mean, all things being equal, who does he think he is? He's a comic strip writer, for Christ's sake. Sure, I read Dilbert, and it's funny, and it's good to dog on management. But it's a big leap from satiring one specific situation in industry to thinking you can rail on the rest of humanity, and (oh my god) proposing alternate theories of gravity.
All this stuff about matter blinking in and out... fine, this is cute and all, but it can hardly be characterized as even above-average thinking. Ever heard of Occam's Razor? I can propose all kinds of cute expanations for things which are predictably equivalent to the current theory. How is this any different from anti-scientific spirituralism in the first place?
And I'm not being facetious. I think when most people hear about a "National ID", there's a an automatic reaction against it. But why?
We're all happy with having a SSN, a driver's license, and a passport. I can't leave the country without my passport, and I can't do anything of consequence without a SSN and/or a driver's license.
Just take the driver's license itself. I can't even imagine trying to do things without a DL. Forget cashing a check, how about opening a checking account in the first place? Certainly I would need st least a SSN for that. I can't work without a SSN (at least "over the table").
Why are we happy to let each individual state do something that we fear the national government doing? Think about this: which do you trust less, your particular state, or the feds? I've definitely lived in states where it would go both ways, myself.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the only positive evidence they present in this article that people are dumping broadband is Katy Ling. I feel sorry for Katy and all, but she hardly constitutes a trend. (?)
I mean, they also said a few things along the lines of "experts who have just as little evidence as us predict a downturn, etc.,etc.". Whatever.
Maybe I was being dense, I think I see now what you mean about Niven.
It's funny how SF works. There are things which seemed absolutely futuristic in 1950 which we would consider trivial now, and, on the other hand, there are things that probably every SF author thought would happen, but we have yet to go there.
Noone really could have predicted computers, and they've affected our world so much, it makes much of SF kind of silly in some ways. But we haven't progressed in other areas. For example, our energy technologies haven't really been revolutionized; the same ideas are sitting around, and we're not really implementing them. It seems like most SF of the 50s counts on cheap, clean energy in the future, but we haven't made much of a move towards that.
On a slightly different note, I think Alternate History, a genre which is similar to SF, somehow works much better. It seems like the political stuff is much more predictable than the scientific. If you read older AH, it's not so crazy in the way old SF is.
Don't get me wrong, though... some old Heinlein or Asimov stuff is sweet, even if the tech is off.
I think it's pretty common that science fiction gets outdated by the march of science fact. Very few scientific theories are so solid that they don't change much from decade to decade, and those aren't the ones that SF authors tend to speculate about. SF authors tend to talk about theories which are at the cutting edge, or even speculative, e.g. time travel, black holes, FTL travel. There's nothing exciting about classical mechanics in a SF story. (Although CM is exciting in other ways, baby) In general, I think just about everything in SF will be invalidated at some point, because it's about stuff so speculative. Remember Asimov's ships traveling through hyperspace in the Foundation, and the pilot was using a sliderule?
More in response to your comment, though, how exactly does this new sunspot stuff invalidate Niven's story there? Perhaps I'm being dense, but I'm not sure what connection you're making.
I agree with most everything you wrote except this:
"Personally, I'm all for the government stepping in and taking over airline security; I think that would be a good idea. "
What evidence do you have that supports this statement?
Nitpick: Do I need to show you evidence that I think it would be a good idea?
I worded it most carefully, because I don't have much evidence either way. I do have a feeling that law-enforcement types (and especially federeally-trained law-enforcement types) could do a better job than the clowns they have there now. But it's more of a feeling than anything, which is why I worded it the way I did.
Interesting that you would use this example, since the very outcome of what you suggest was one of the largest documented instances of genocide. Colonization sounds so much better in the 4th grade history books, than say mass murder, rape, theft, broken treaties and enslavement.
Ok, so that was the canonical knee-jerk response to my example... I knew it would come from somewhere. Now, if you think it through instead of reacting, you'll realize that your response proves the point.
The opening up of the Americas to European exploitation, of course, led to all kinds of atrocities. This is simply because at the time, Europeans considered their fellow humans a resource that could be acceptably exploited. But the argument is that the shifting of this to private hands meant that all of the New World resources could be exploited more efficiently. Sadly, some of these resources were human beings. But the argument still stands, that the privatization led to a better deal for the consumer (that consumer being the European).
As I said before, giving the consumer what they want is not always a good thing. I gave different examples of this above, and the European colonization is another good example. But the argument still stands: privatization gives the consumer a good deal. The only question to ask is whether or not it is right that they get it.
Privitazation does not equal progress. We already see what happens when we have privatized airline security. Privatization is certainly useful for some things, like sanitation and road building. Privatizing NASA is pure corporate welfare giveaways.
I agree that privatization does not equal progress, in the same sense that giving people what they want is not always the best thing. SUVs are probably a good example of that. Personally, I'm all for the government stepping in and taking over airline security; I think that would be a good idea. But I'm sure you would agree that if this were to happen, this would definitely drive up the cost of airline tickets (by some estimates, actually quite a bit). In this case, I think it is obvious the high costs are worth it, but you will agree that the costs will be higher?
In general, of course you can't make any statements about "good" and "bad" without looking at a particular situation, and weighing all of the factors.
You should perhaps start looking at a wider range of economics textbooks.
Let me see if I get this right. You're asserting that there are Economics texts which agree with your earlier statement (paraphrased) "The consumer always gets the worst deal in the private sector"? I would love to see a reference on that one.
(Regarding supply and demand...)
In simplistic models yes, but they fail to take into account many of the realities of real world economics - the lack of perfect information for instance. They also don't take into account human capital either, although neo-liberals are quite happy about leaving such concerns out of their propaganda
I will certainly grant you that Supply and Demand is not perfect; it describes an equilibrium situation, and if the conditions change rapidly enough, or if, as you said, there isn't a perfect flow of information, it will not work as well. But it is definitely true (and is true on principle and has been determined empirically) that in a static situation, the consumer gets the best deal in a free market.
Ok, so your argument then is that if the market flucuates rapdily, then SD does not accurately predict prices. Are you then really going to assert that the government would be better equipped to deal with pricing in a rapidly fluctuating market? This seems even more preposterous. We all know the speed at which the government can react, and it's actually much slower than the market. I would argue that the only time the government has a fighting chance against the free market is in the static situation. This is why feudalism worked well for a while; during the Dark Ages, technological growth was slow enough that tight government control could react to it. It would be inconceivable now.
Also, I don't know what your definition of neo-liberal is above. You are saying that neo-liberalism is pro-free-market? I would think you would style that neo-conservatism if anything. (?)
The Soviet Union was a mess, sure. But look at it today with a far freer market than the US - massive corruption, waste and poverty. My, what a success.
True enough. I am not asserting that a lack of government, e.g. anarchy, is preferable to a government. But the present Soviet Union is perhaps not a good example, because it has serious problems which trancend its economy. But I will agree with you that a rapid switch from a tightly-controlled economy to a completely unregulated free economy is dangerous. But again, this in no way supports your assertion that the free market inherently shafts the consumer.
Good point, though I'm not sure the NSF is very high on the government's list of priorities right now (not that it ever has been, really) - it's all about defense now.
I think I have to disagree with this... The funding for the NSF rose quite a bit during the Clinton administration, and this is a trend which has been carried out so far during the Bush administration. For example, from 99 to 00 the funding grew at about 10%. See here for some numbers.
Some complain because there's been a lopsidedness in NSF grants in recent years, that essentially way too much money has been going towards biology instead of basic math and physics. But the government has been very kind to the research community under Clinton, and, hopefully, this will continue.
I think there's a valid fear of lost research here, but I think the situation would get even better. If the government laid out less money to NASA, then conceivably more money could migrate towards the NSF in the long run. Actually, I think this would lead to an increase in scientific research done in space, since the money could concentrate on the actual research up there, and we'd not have to spend so much getting the dudes in orbit...
The fact that the private sector invariably gives rise to the worst possible situation for the consumer
I can't imagine a statement less true than this. Would you characterize the corporate Internet in that way, i.e. that the American consumer is worse off with respect to the Internet than had it been held in government hands? Was ARPANet somehow better?
You should have read your Economics textbook more closely. A free market always gives a good situation for the consumer, always gives an optimal situation for the consumer. This is simply known as the Law of Supply and Demand. For some empirical evidence instead, contrast the Soviet Union's consumer with the American consumer in the mid-80s. You would rather stand in line for toilet paper?
I'll grant you that the free market does have its drawbacks. I think the biggest one may very well be the exact opposite of what you said, that the consumer does get exactly what he wants. For example, the American consumer wants big-ass gas-guzzling cars, and that is precisely what the American consumer gets, at a cheap price. Of course, this may end up being bad in many ways (environmental damage, for one). But the people are getting exactly what they want for the best possible price.
In summary, I think it may be bad sometimes that the consumer gets what he wants. But your claim that the free market shafts the consumer is, at best, completely ridiculous.
should not be available for the obscene profit gouging that the US supports wholeheartedly.
Why should travel to the Moon and other planets not give some company a profit? If someone doesn't make a profit off of it, they're not going to provide the service. Contrary to what you may believe, people don't provide services out of the goodness of their heart. They want to get paid for their work.
Consider the Internet again. The recent tech boom is of course attributable to the fact that all of these companies saw the Internet as a way to make money, and did so. The fact that there are so many CS-like jobs out there is only because a bunch of companies are making obscene profits.
How did it ever get to the point where one of our greatest and proudest institutions needs to privitize one of their greatest resources in order to keep going? Americans everywhere should be ashamed at this rape of our space program, once the envy of the world.
You talk about this as if it were a horrible thing. What exactly is the problem here? It seems to me that the main reason to have the government involved in the space race in the first place is that it was such a big enterprise that it was completely out of the scope of any type of private investor. Now that the technology has progressed to a certain point, it becomes cheap enough for a corporation to get into the game.
Two analogies: First, the simpler case of space travel, simply putting stuff into orbit. Think about it: as recently as 1957 (?), we were completely and totally amazed that the Russians could put something the size of a soccer ball into orbit for a couple of revolutions. Now, every little broadcasting company can put an intricate satellitein orbit which does any number of things. Unless you're claiming that the fact that we have private satellite communications is bad, this change to privatization of satellites has been very good for everyone.
Another example: transAtlantic boats. Columbus had to go begging to the government of Spain to get funding to send the first couple of boats over here,and they were putting them over here at the rate of about one every 2-3 years... But the mid-16th century, colonization was in private hands (in England and France, at least), and I'm sure you'll agree that transatlantic commerce got "a little better" as a result. Unless, again, you're arguing that Europe should still be sending boats over here at the rate of one every year or so...
Why not? The Russians sent up that guy (Tito?) and had a massive infusion of capital into their space program. The Russians, of course, need money more than Americans, but everyone can use it.
This is a good move in the right direction. As soon as someone works out a business plan that allows them to make a profit off of flying to the moon, Mars, etc., there will be all kinds of stuff in space. And this will of course drive costs down, just through volume and through increased R&D budgets. if this all goes according to plan, maybe one day there will be a permanent Lunar settlement with regular shuttles. This would be sweet...
I was going to say exactly this, but you said it first. I would also like to add that one advantage of grad school is that you're working on interesting problems, not problems which have some short-term goal. The latter type of problem of course generates more money, but it's just no fun.
I've heard grad students complain about many things (lack of money, too much work, impossiblity of a social life), but I have never heard a grad student (in fields like math, CS, physics, etc.) complain that the problems are too boring, that they're just implementing others' ideas. It forces you to be creative, to either solve problems which have never been solved, or to take solutions which are not understood well, and turn them into something which is conceptually nice.
Also, I would like to add to anyone thinking about entering grad school in a technical field, it is becoming harder for graduate schools to attract qualified candidates (I understand that these reasons are more demographic than economic, i.e. there just aren't so many people in that age group, as opposed to too many people wanting to be in industry). In short, it is reasonable for someone who hasn't focused on a graduate career so far to move toward that track, because the competition is less. -- Incidentally, I could probably dig up some stats on this, if people really wanted them...
If you want the BMW and a loft downtown, finish the degree, get the job, and deal with your angst somehow. If you want to work on original and interesting problems, and hang out with, literally, the smartest group of people in the world^{TM}, go to grad school, get the advanced degree, and create something all your own.
All else failing, pr0n is, in fact, the one constant in this world.
For about 10 years, the president of the state senate was the kid brother of the major local mafia boss. I kid you not...
And I think he's still in public office, being president of the UMass system (the kid brother, that is)... the older one is still on the run from the FBI.
How fast, exactly, do you accelerate at takeoff with this ScramJet thing? I saw it on the news the other night, and it seems to do some serious hauling at first.
How much acceleration does one want to be subjected to?
Ok, let's say that you decide to use this measure of efficiency, for better or for worse. Then it is correct to say that 3 is the integer which maximizes this function, etc. But it is definitely an open question as to why you would want this function as opposed to any other.
But it makes no sense to refer to e being the "most efficient base" because it maximizes some function, when actually using base e will give you all the other problems we've noted.
I'm a bit puzzled by the comment that "e is the most efficient base". While there's no rule against using a non-integer for a base, it has a certain disadvantage, that being that the real numbers you can represent exactly are not integers, but polynomials in e, e.g. any number of the form
n_1 e + n_2 e^2 + n_3 e^3 +...
where the n_i's are integers.
In particular, since e is irrational (NB it's even a bit worse than that), if you were to represent an integer in base e, it would have to be represented in floating-point. So efficient integer arithmetic will only be good for this special class of numbers which are not integers.
On the other hand, I also can't see how having an integer base close to e helps at all either. Doing logarithms in base e is best for certain mathematical reasons, but if you're off, you're off. Perhaps there's a definition of efficiency here that I don't know, but it's the obvious tradeoff: if by efficiency you mean short expressions, then the bigger the base, the better... of course, the bigger the base, the harder it is to implement in hardware. This is why humans use decimal and hexadecimal but computer use binary.
So, in summary, I can't see what e has to do with anything.
Slashdot Mirror
Ain't that the truth!
It sounds like a second-hand description of "quantum dot" technology. This is where you create a potential well in a conducting material and confine an electron within the well. Because the well is small, you get only certain energy levels permitted for the electron, just as in an atom. By changing the properties of the well, you change the properties of this "fake atom".
Just out of curiousity, do you any more info on this, or on applications for it? I buy that you can do this, but it seems hard to control this sort of potential except using nuclei?
I think it might have something to do with the fact that it landed on everyone's front page, eh?
Apart from that, it is an interesting result, but only three sigma from the standard model, which is not really too much if you want to announce something groundbreaking. Sometimes even four sigma results turn out to be just experimental outliers.
Yeah, I'd have to agree with that. Three standard deviations is worth noticing, but it's not worth getting all crazed out. After a few more runs, we'll see what's up.
I think that this is maybe not so surprising. Theories in particle physics are very unlike a lot of other theories. There's not much evidence sitting around for some of these things, and as new evidence comes in, the theories change.
This is true for any scientific endeavor, but the changes are much more rapid in things like high-energy physics.
In short, I'm just saying that it shouldn't be taken as a "radical breakthrough" just because someone had the muon equation wrong, because it was going to happen at some point.
I mean, all things being equal, who does he think he is? He's a comic strip writer, for Christ's sake. Sure, I read Dilbert, and it's funny, and it's good to dog on management. But it's a big leap from satiring one specific situation in industry to thinking you can rail on the rest of humanity, and (oh my god) proposing alternate theories of gravity.
All this stuff about matter blinking in and out... fine, this is cute and all, but it can hardly be characterized as even above-average thinking. Ever heard of Occam's Razor? I can propose all kinds of cute expanations for things which are predictably equivalent to the current theory. How is this any different from anti-scientific spirituralism in the first place?
We're all happy with having a SSN, a driver's license, and a passport. I can't leave the country without my passport, and I can't do anything of consequence without a SSN and/or a driver's license.
Just take the driver's license itself. I can't even imagine trying to do things without a DL. Forget cashing a check, how about opening a checking account in the first place? Certainly I would need st least a SSN for that. I can't work without a SSN (at least "over the table").
Why are we happy to let each individual state do something that we fear the national government doing? Think about this: which do you trust less, your particular state, or the feds? I've definitely lived in states where it would go both ways, myself.
I mean, they also said a few things along the lines of "experts who have just as little evidence as us predict a downturn, etc.,etc.". Whatever.
Maybe I was being dense, I think I see now what you mean about Niven.
It's funny how SF works. There are things which seemed absolutely futuristic in 1950 which we would consider trivial now, and, on the other hand, there are things that probably every SF author thought would happen, but we have yet to go there.
Noone really could have predicted computers, and they've affected our world so much, it makes much of SF kind of silly in some ways. But we haven't progressed in other areas. For example, our energy technologies haven't really been revolutionized; the same ideas are sitting around, and we're not really implementing them. It seems like most SF of the 50s counts on cheap, clean energy in the future, but we haven't made much of a move towards that.
On a slightly different note, I think Alternate History, a genre which is similar to SF, somehow works much better. It seems like the political stuff is much more predictable than the scientific. If you read older AH, it's not so crazy in the way old SF is.
Don't get me wrong, though... some old Heinlein or Asimov stuff is sweet, even if the tech is off.
Honestly, though, I'm willing to say that that's gotta be a coincidence
I think it's pretty common that science fiction gets outdated by the march of science fact. Very few scientific theories are so solid that they don't change much from decade to decade, and those aren't the ones that SF authors tend to speculate about. SF authors tend to talk about theories which are at the cutting edge, or even speculative, e.g. time travel, black holes, FTL travel. There's nothing exciting about classical mechanics in a SF story. (Although CM is exciting in other ways, baby) In general, I think just about everything in SF will be invalidated at some point, because it's about stuff so speculative. Remember Asimov's ships traveling through hyperspace in the Foundation, and the pilot was using a sliderule?
More in response to your comment, though, how exactly does this new sunspot stuff invalidate Niven's story there? Perhaps I'm being dense, but I'm not sure what connection you're making.
Nitpick: Do I need to show you evidence that I think it would be a good idea?
I worded it most carefully, because I don't have much evidence either way. I do have a feeling that law-enforcement types (and especially federeally-trained law-enforcement types) could do a better job than the clowns they have there now. But it's more of a feeling than anything, which is why I worded it the way I did.
Ok, so that was the canonical knee-jerk response to my example... I knew it would come from somewhere. Now, if you think it through instead of reacting, you'll realize that your response proves the point.
The opening up of the Americas to European exploitation, of course, led to all kinds of atrocities. This is simply because at the time, Europeans considered their fellow humans a resource that could be acceptably exploited. But the argument is that the shifting of this to private hands meant that all of the New World resources could be exploited more efficiently. Sadly, some of these resources were human beings. But the argument still stands, that the privatization led to a better deal for the consumer (that consumer being the European).
As I said before, giving the consumer what they want is not always a good thing. I gave different examples of this above, and the European colonization is another good example. But the argument still stands: privatization gives the consumer a good deal. The only question to ask is whether or not it is right that they get it.
Privitazation does not equal progress. We already see what happens when we have privatized airline security. Privatization is certainly useful for some things, like sanitation and road building. Privatizing NASA is pure corporate welfare giveaways.
I agree that privatization does not equal progress, in the same sense that giving people what they want is not always the best thing. SUVs are probably a good example of that. Personally, I'm all for the government stepping in and taking over airline security; I think that would be a good idea. But I'm sure you would agree that if this were to happen, this would definitely drive up the cost of airline tickets (by some estimates, actually quite a bit). In this case, I think it is obvious the high costs are worth it, but you will agree that the costs will be higher?
In general, of course you can't make any statements about "good" and "bad" without looking at a particular situation, and weighing all of the factors.
Do low costs justify anything? Of course not.
Does privatization imply low costs? Definitely.
Let me see if I get this right. You're asserting that there are Economics texts which agree with your earlier statement (paraphrased) "The consumer always gets the worst deal in the private sector"? I would love to see a reference on that one.
(Regarding supply and demand...) In simplistic models yes, but they fail to take into account many of the realities of real world economics - the lack of perfect information for instance. They also don't take into account human capital either, although neo-liberals are quite happy about leaving such concerns out of their propaganda
I will certainly grant you that Supply and Demand is not perfect; it describes an equilibrium situation, and if the conditions change rapidly enough, or if, as you said, there isn't a perfect flow of information, it will not work as well. But it is definitely true (and is true on principle and has been determined empirically) that in a static situation, the consumer gets the best deal in a free market.
Ok, so your argument then is that if the market flucuates rapdily, then SD does not accurately predict prices. Are you then really going to assert that the government would be better equipped to deal with pricing in a rapidly fluctuating market? This seems even more preposterous. We all know the speed at which the government can react, and it's actually much slower than the market. I would argue that the only time the government has a fighting chance against the free market is in the static situation. This is why feudalism worked well for a while; during the Dark Ages, technological growth was slow enough that tight government control could react to it. It would be inconceivable now.
Also, I don't know what your definition of neo-liberal is above. You are saying that neo-liberalism is pro-free-market? I would think you would style that neo-conservatism if anything. (?)
The Soviet Union was a mess, sure. But look at it today with a far freer market than the US - massive corruption, waste and poverty. My, what a success.
True enough. I am not asserting that a lack of government, e.g. anarchy, is preferable to a government. But the present Soviet Union is perhaps not a good example, because it has serious problems which trancend its economy. But I will agree with you that a rapid switch from a tightly-controlled economy to a completely unregulated free economy is dangerous. But again, this in no way supports your assertion that the free market inherently shafts the consumer.
I think I have to disagree with this... The funding for the NSF rose quite a bit during the Clinton administration, and this is a trend which has been carried out so far during the Bush administration. For example, from 99 to 00 the funding grew at about 10%. See here for some numbers.
Some complain because there's been a lopsidedness in NSF grants in recent years, that essentially way too much money has been going towards biology instead of basic math and physics. But the government has been very kind to the research community under Clinton, and, hopefully, this will continue.
I think there's a valid fear of lost research here, but I think the situation would get even better. If the government laid out less money to NASA, then conceivably more money could migrate towards the NSF in the long run. Actually, I think this would lead to an increase in scientific research done in space, since the money could concentrate on the actual research up there, and we'd not have to spend so much getting the dudes in orbit...
I can't imagine a statement less true than this. Would you characterize the corporate Internet in that way, i.e. that the American consumer is worse off with respect to the Internet than had it been held in government hands? Was ARPANet somehow better?
You should have read your Economics textbook more closely. A free market always gives a good situation for the consumer, always gives an optimal situation for the consumer. This is simply known as the Law of Supply and Demand. For some empirical evidence instead, contrast the Soviet Union's consumer with the American consumer in the mid-80s. You would rather stand in line for toilet paper?
I'll grant you that the free market does have its drawbacks. I think the biggest one may very well be the exact opposite of what you said, that the consumer does get exactly what he wants. For example, the American consumer wants big-ass gas-guzzling cars, and that is precisely what the American consumer gets, at a cheap price. Of course, this may end up being bad in many ways (environmental damage, for one). But the people are getting exactly what they want for the best possible price.
In summary, I think it may be bad sometimes that the consumer gets what he wants. But your claim that the free market shafts the consumer is, at best, completely ridiculous.
should not be available for the obscene profit gouging that the US supports wholeheartedly.
Why should travel to the Moon and other planets not give some company a profit? If someone doesn't make a profit off of it, they're not going to provide the service. Contrary to what you may believe, people don't provide services out of the goodness of their heart. They want to get paid for their work.
Consider the Internet again. The recent tech boom is of course attributable to the fact that all of these companies saw the Internet as a way to make money, and did so. The fact that there are so many CS-like jobs out there is only because a bunch of companies are making obscene profits.
You talk about this as if it were a horrible thing. What exactly is the problem here? It seems to me that the main reason to have the government involved in the space race in the first place is that it was such a big enterprise that it was completely out of the scope of any type of private investor. Now that the technology has progressed to a certain point, it becomes cheap enough for a corporation to get into the game.
Two analogies: First, the simpler case of space travel, simply putting stuff into orbit. Think about it: as recently as 1957 (?), we were completely and totally amazed that the Russians could put something the size of a soccer ball into orbit for a couple of revolutions. Now, every little broadcasting company can put an intricate satellitein orbit which does any number of things. Unless you're claiming that the fact that we have private satellite communications is bad, this change to privatization of satellites has been very good for everyone.
Another example: transAtlantic boats. Columbus had to go begging to the government of Spain to get funding to send the first couple of boats over here,and they were putting them over here at the rate of about one every 2-3 years... But the mid-16th century, colonization was in private hands (in England and France, at least), and I'm sure you'll agree that transatlantic commerce got "a little better" as a result. Unless, again, you're arguing that Europe should still be sending boats over here at the rate of one every year or so...
This is a good move in the right direction. As soon as someone works out a business plan that allows them to make a profit off of flying to the moon, Mars, etc., there will be all kinds of stuff in space. And this will of course drive costs down, just through volume and through increased R&D budgets. if this all goes according to plan, maybe one day there will be a permanent Lunar settlement with regular shuttles. This would be sweet...
I've heard grad students complain about many things (lack of money, too much work, impossiblity of a social life), but I have never heard a grad student (in fields like math, CS, physics, etc.) complain that the problems are too boring, that they're just implementing others' ideas. It forces you to be creative, to either solve problems which have never been solved, or to take solutions which are not understood well, and turn them into something which is conceptually nice.
Also, I would like to add to anyone thinking about entering grad school in a technical field, it is becoming harder for graduate schools to attract qualified candidates (I understand that these reasons are more demographic than economic, i.e. there just aren't so many people in that age group, as opposed to too many people wanting to be in industry). In short, it is reasonable for someone who hasn't focused on a graduate career so far to move toward that track, because the competition is less. -- Incidentally, I could probably dig up some stats on this, if people really wanted them...
If you want the BMW and a loft downtown, finish the degree, get the job, and deal with your angst somehow. If you want to work on original and interesting problems, and hang out with, literally, the smartest group of people in the world^{TM}, go to grad school, get the advanced degree, and create something all your own.
All else failing, pr0n is, in fact, the one constant in this world.
And I think he's still in public office, being president of the UMass system (the kid brother, that is)... the older one is still on the run from the FBI.
This has got to be a joke, right?
while(1){ amazementThatWithAllTheCrazyShitGoingOnInTheWorldR ightNowYourFaithInHumanityIsBasedOnWhetherTVIsFree OrNot++;
}
How much acceleration does one want to be subjected to?
But it makes no sense to refer to e being the "most efficient base" because it maximizes some function, when actually using base e will give you all the other problems we've noted.
Maybe I'm being too particular?
In particular, since e is irrational (NB it's even a bit worse than that), if you were to represent an integer in base e, it would have to be represented in floating-point. So efficient integer arithmetic will only be good for this special class of numbers which are not integers. On the other hand, I also can't see how having an integer base close to e helps at all either. Doing logarithms in base e is best for certain mathematical reasons, but if you're off, you're off. Perhaps there's a definition of efficiency here that I don't know, but it's the obvious tradeoff: if by efficiency you mean short expressions, then the bigger the base, the better... of course, the bigger the base, the harder it is to implement in hardware. This is why humans use decimal and hexadecimal but computer use binary. So, in summary, I can't see what e has to do with anything.