Unmaned blimps are far more fuel efficient than unmaned planes. Plus they can stay airborne for more time. Why don't they use blimps all along ?
Because you can't reroute blimps to get a closer look at something very easily.
Funny this article gets posted while I'm in the middle of writing a proposal for follow-on funding on my research into UAV control algorithms...
Endurance is a concern. Collision avoidance is a concern. But UAVs offer incredible surveillance opportunities that stationary sensors just can't match.
First, blimps are pretty damn obvious. Small UAVs (SUAVs) aren't nearly as noticable so there's the ability to conduct covert surveillance. Very useful if you're using the videofeed from an SUAV to direct police to intruders.
UAVs can be rerouted to obtain favorable viewing geometries. Suspect went around the corner so you lose clear line of sight? Just move the sensor to another position. Same with obscuration due to smoke, fog, etc. UAVs give you the ability to pick your line of sight.
While SUAVs can be used for covert surveillance, they can also be used to make it very obvious to a vandal or other petty criminal that they are being observed. Want to scare off the suspect? Just have the UAV follow him really conspicuously. Eventually he'll hear the motor of the plane and notice this thing is tailing him.
SUAVs are reasonably cheap, too. Some of these models are little more than model aircraft with sensors glued onto them.
I could go on and on but I need to get back to writing my UAV proposal. UAVs are one of the hottest military technologies these days. It's not surprising that the commercial and civilian sector is starting to take a look at how these maturing drones can be used to solve their problems.
GMD
Yes, even the general public could brainstorm
on
Idea Stock Exchange
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· Score: 3, Funny
Yes, in fact, the Japanese used this method to allow the general populace to brainstorm creative solutions to the country's most vexing problem. Unfortunately for them, the demographics of the country were such that the votes of children aged 5-12 largely determined the resulting solution.
It's quite simple to prevent this from happening to you. Post "good stuff" under your real name, perhaps linked to a professional-sounding alias, and post other crap under another alias that you never link to your real name.
As others have already pointed out, it's difficult to make sure that every person in the world who has a photo of you won't post something that isn't very flattering. But even ignoring that for the moment, what consistutes "good stuff" in your mind is likely to change. Suppose you are a first-year student in grad school and you post something under your real name stating that your dream is to become a professor. Very noble, very "good stuff". Fast-forward several grueling years when you are burned out. Your goals have changed and academia doesn't sound so great. You start interviewing for companies and tell them during the interview that you have a strong interest in tackling today's technical problems.
After you leave, the people you interviewed with start googling around to see what they can dig up on you and come across this thing you wrote many years earlier. Now there's doubt in their mind. Are you looking at an industrial position because you didn't get a postdoc? Are you just looking to make some big bucks in the private sector for five years before returning to what you love -- academia? Maybe I trust you and realize that your priorities have changed. How do I know they won't change back? You wrote so eloquently about the fact that your life-long dream was to become a professor a few years ago. How much do I want to bet that you won't dream this way again?
And what about posting your politicial, philosophical, or personal beliefs on the web? You write a well-thought-out essay about a woman's right to choose and your pro-life potential-employer finds it. You may think that's "good stuff" but your employer sure doesn't. You're making this way too simple. The article brings up a very good point. You are unwise to dismiss it as "someone else's problem" so easily, my friend.
The Patriot Act provides the same tools for counter-terrorism officials that anti-narcotics officials have been using for years.
Anti-narcotics officials have been able to conduct secret reconnaissance of what books I've been reading?
Perhaps some of you don't remember 9/11.
No, considering how many times the TV news has delighted in replaying those horrific images, I doubt anyone could possibly forget.
This is not a crime-enforcing bill, it is a counter-terrorism bill.
Look, Stargate SG-1 isn't a good show by any stretch of the imagination (except for that hottie Capt. Carter), but I think it's a bit of a stretch to call it terrorism.
Sure, I may be inconvenienced by the Patriot Act, but nothing is more inconvenient than getting blown up on your way to work, like what tragically happened just this last summer.
You were blown up on your way to work this summer?
I mean, one of the government's few purposes is to keep the people safe. The US government failed to do that on 9/11.
Boy, you got that right. The one piece of advice that the Clinton adminstration gave the incoming Bush adminstration was to watch out for bin Laden. The government doesn't need new tools; they just need to learn how to use the tools they already have.
(This is what I honestly think, don't just down-mod me because you don't agree.)
I'm glad that you assured us that you honestly believe this otherwise I would have thought you were trolling. As for modding you down because someone disagrees with you, that's not necessary. Your arguements are so weak, they deserve to be modded down on their own merits, independent of the political opinions of the moderators.
A study found in The Economist has shown that a group of minds working on single pieces of data, can together generate the statistical model used to represent a given sample. Note that it takes a group of people to be able to accurately predict the behaviour of something, not a single individual.
Well, that's a somehwat misleading summary. These people were not knowingly collaborating. Each person would have had to answer the questions independently (not knowing what the other respondants' answers were) in order for Bayes to be applicable. Each person's response counts as a piece of evidence or clue in inferring the underlying probability distribution. Their answers are combined using Bayes's rule by an external third party (the researchers). So, yes, this technically counts as a group of minds working together, but I think the way it this summary was worded might give people the wrong impression.
Think about it this way: if you lock a bunch of people in a room toegther and have them come up with an answer, the "strong" personalities in the room are likely to have a heavy influence on the "weaker" ones. People who aren't really firm in their opinions are going to influenced -- whether they realize it or not -- by people who sound confident. The article makes a big to-do about the fact that Bayesian techniques allow you to get good answers with a small number of people working on the problem. But the key is that those people have to be working independently because it's going to be damn difficult to identify and subtract out the cross-correlation of members influencing each other.
I'm making (what I hope to be) an important point. I think business people who read this article or even slashdotters who read the above summary may get the impression that small meetings are a great way to arrive at strikingly effective solutions. That's not what Bayes techinques are about. If you want to put a small group of people to work on a problem, you'd better separate them , otherwise Bayes's rule is not strictly applicable.
The night before his English Lit class, one of the morons on our dorm floor had to cram all night long since he hadn't done any of the reading or assignments for the class all semester long. I don't know how many of those No-Doze caffeine/uppers pills he took. All I know is that he had overdosed so badly that his hands wouldn't stop shaking. He found it quite difficult to write essays in the blue book with his hands spasming the entire time.
Remeber kids, use drugs with care. They aren't candy.
Good questions, IMHO, to ask are ones that indicate an interest in the company or the position.
I interview a fair number of people at the company I work for. I always ask the applicant if they have any questions. If they don't, I'm usually not too excited about having them work for me. When I'm talking one-on-one with them, I'm trying to figure out their level of enthusiasm and interest in my company and the position I'm offering. Their resume and technical presentation already tell me about their intelligence level so I don't spend too much time asking them technical questions one-on-one. But all the smarts in the world doesn't do me much good if the person isn't interested in the work that I'd be giving them. The world is full of geniuses that don't amount to anything because they don't put forth any effort. I don't want them working for me.
I also want to see that they are starting to seriously visualize themselves working here. I want to know that they've done their homework and have some knowledge about type of work we do here. So I'd like to see them ask some questions about our technical work but also some questions about benefits, company culture, and other things that make me think that they are imagining themselves working here and staying for many years.
I just gave a talk to some students at the local university here about getting a job and the on-site interview. I told them to think about it as a first date. I realize the concept of a "date" may be a bit foreign to slashdotters so let me elaborate. You want to emphasize your good attributes but stay a bit humble. You also want to show interest without appearing desparate. You wouldn't go to a date and just sit there saying nothing. Similarly, you wouldn't want to monopolize the conversation. There should be an interplay and back-and-forth. You don't have to make the interview your best buddy, but when you leave the room you want s/he to not only respect your technical abilities but also desire to have you as a member of their team.
If you cannot think of some good questions to ask prior to the interview, then you should seriously question whether you are truly interested in the company. A little bit of brainstorming is necessary, but you shouldn't have to strain to come up with questions. If so, then your questions are merely for show and a keen interviewer will see right through them (much like the infamous "My biggest failing is that I'm a workaholic" crap).
Obviously, getting permission is important. But even if you get permission, do you really want to be playing games with work equipment right away? I would strongly recommend waiting until you have become a respected and valued employee before you pull stunts like using work equipment for non-work projects. Hey, I'm a technical manager and I read slashdot damn near every hour -- does your new boss? If s/he sees your post and can easily figure out who you are, what are they going to think about you? You haven't even started work and you're preoccupied with how to play games? That's not the kind of employee I want working for me.
My advise? Concentrate on doing good work and impressing your co-workers and management before you even think about playing around. You can repost your Ask Slashdot question in six-months (and don't include so damn many details about yourself and your job next time).
If you want to figure out how to boost your ratings, why not get the advice from the horse's mouth?
Brin and Page's original paper about PageRank (Google) : the original Google paper
Another PageRank paper Inside PageRank
The problem is that PageRank isn't the end-all-and-be-all of Google. Allow me to quote from this SIAM News article
While Google relies heavily on PageRank for ranking its search results, it uses at least a hundred other metrics as well, making use
of such things as the content of "anchor text," the highlighted description a user clicks on to follow a link. Such methods are powerful
heuristics for sharpening the relevance of link analysis, but they also leave Google more vulnerable to spammers. A search on the
term "miserable failure," for instance, returns a Web page about George Bush as the top result, a type of mischief known as "Google
bombing." To help thwart spammers, Google keeps its exact ranking methods secret and changes them frequently.
Any doofus can look up the details of PageRank; therefore, that information is useless if you want to do better than everyone else. Trying to figure out those "hundred other metrics" is where SEO comes in. Trying to discern hidden logic is a tough problem and that's why those SEO companies can charge an arm and a leg. I have been told that the mathematics involved in SEO algorithms is non-trival.
You're painting with far too wide a brush. Many alternative medicine practitioners and researchers are using the scientific method and expanding our knowledge of medicine. Take a look at the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine - part of the U.S. National Institutes of Health. http://nccam.nih.gov/
I've already taken a look. I recommend you look at this.
I think including alternative medicine with the other topics you mention is pretty short sighted. To think that we have all the medical answers, and that there aren't other medications or treatments that western medicine might not know about is ignorant. Take for instance pressure points: no western doctor or treatment explains or addresses them.
This is almost precisely the same argument used by the Intelligent Design folks to get creationism taught in schools! I'm flabergasted that this got modded up. Yes, yes, yes -- neither evolution or western medicine has all the answers. Scientists fully admit this. However, the fact that those fields don't have all the answers doesn't mean that we should start relying on creationism or alternative medicine. You need to provide verifable evidence that sticking needles into people can cure ailments and not rely on "well, you guys don't have all the answers" arguments. Alternative medicine most definitely belongs with the other things I listed. Not because it's all crap. Because all of those things openly (almost pridefully) reject the scientific method.
However, I'll tell you right now that there are a great many instances where accupressure/puncture can make huge differences in a number of maladies.
Oh boy, take a guess what my next question is going to be. Can you provide references to multiple peer-reviewed studies verifying your claim? You "can tell me", huh? And who the hell are you? Some guy on slashdot? I'm going to take medical advice from User 549286?
redfieldp, I think you misunderstood my post. Maybe I should have left UFOs out of the list. My point was that alternative medicine is anti-science. Alternative medicine practitioners apply their techniques to the public at large without scientific evidence that these methods work or are even safe. Having scientists publically outed for falsifing data is only going to provide more ammunition to those who claim they deserve equal status and recognition. Alternative medicine is welcome to use the scientific method to verify their claims. Until that time, it belongs squarely in the "anti-science" camp.
What you say is true, however, this isn't really the greatest timing for a story to break on the fact that scientists sometimes fabricate their data. This provides a rather juicy opportunity for the various anti-science forces out there to point to this and say "See, scientists aren't the pristine investigators of truth that they would like us to believe! This one got caught, but how many others are doing the same thing right now? That's why we need to keep an open mind about {intelligent design, alternative medicine, bigfoot, global warming is a myth, etc.}."
You and I may see this story as evidence of the scientific system working the way it is supposed to. I suspect that the public will see this as evidence that science doesn't have a monopoly on the truth and maybe we ought to give those creationists equal time. Like I said, this isn't the greatest time for this story to break.
It's about the message science is bringing. Some people, for religious, political or business reasons don't want to hear what science is saying. This is initially a case of trying to silence the messenger.
I'd like to propose a question that has been on my mind for nearly two decades. Would the public at large be interested in science for its own sake without any tie to contemporary issues? I wonder if the attempts by scientists to make their work 'relevant' to the public by linking it to political issues ends up backfiring. That is, the public gets too focused on the message and not on the process. Suppose a pro-business conservative listens watches a documentary on the science of climatology on TV. If the focus of the documentary is on the growing body of evidence that humans have caused global warming and catastrophe awaits, I can see where this guy would change the channel. Now my question is if the documentary simply focused on methods used in climatology and the pure science, would that guy be interested enough to watch the entire show? He wouldn't be offended like before, but could you make a "pure science" show interesting?
My concern is that politics has become a football game in the US. By and large, people will just not listen to viewpoints different from those that contradict the political party that they feel affliation for. It's like they are routing for the home team and can't bare the idea of losing a game. My question is whether attempts to make science relevant to the daily lives of ordinary people ends up doing more harm than good. Or is it an acceptable cost? Do we really need to link science to public issues -- accepting that the conclusions drawn will drive a good chunk of the audience away -- in order to keep them interested enough to learn what science is really all about?
The U.S. is not becoming anti-science. It only appears that way because our administration (sorry if this seems like flamebait.. it is, but its clearly the truth) prioritizes their political success, fiscal policy, and religeon over the recommendations of science.
I hate Bush as much as the next scientist, but the anti-science draft is not blowing from the White House. Did you RTFA? If so, you must have missed the following:
Polls for many years have shown that a majority of Americans are at odds with key scientific theory. For example, as CBS poll this month found that 51 percent of respondents believed humans were created in their present form by God. A further 30 percent said their creation was guided by God. Only 15 percent thought humans evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years.
Other polls show that only around a third of American adults accept the Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe, even though the concept is virtually uncontested by scientists worldwide.
"When we ask people what they know about science, just under 20 percent turn out to be scientifically literate," said Jon Miller, director of the center for biomedical communication at Northwestern University.
Note the use of "for many years" and polling of non-administration Americans. This is a very widespread problem and it's a rare case where it's not 100% Bush's fault. We have a growing problem and it's dangerous to assume that all will go well once Bush is out of office. The scientific community needs to combat this.
I confess that I don't have the solution. Would a new documentary TV series in the vein of Carl Sagan's Cosmos do the trick? I don't know. Would better and more conservative reporting of scientific achievements in the media (and less hyping every radical article appearing in the New England Journal of Medicine as some sort of scientific consensus) help? Beats me. Would having articulate and engrossing scientists discussing their work publically foster an appreciation for scientists and they work they do? Stop asking me these tough questions, okay?:)
I don't know what the answer is. This board will be filled with various strategies and ideas. But we need to start thinking of how to correct this dangerous trend. Yeah, Bush's administration certainly isn't helping, but saying that "the U.S. is not becoming anti-science. It only appears that way because our administration..." is wishful thinking.
You gotta wonder who's the fucking Einstein who decided to equip the elderly with robotic ninja superpowers. When I was working as a hapless waiter at Denny's years ago, I thought I had I bad whenever one of those geezers would start ranting about the "good old days" and "whatever happened to service?" if their bowl of oatmeal wasn't cooked just right or their order was a few minutes late. Now we're going to have to worry about them going on a rampage and destroying the city. Christ, the Japanese are probably going to have to call in Godzilla to pacify the robots instead of vice-versa! You'd think the Japanese of all people would know better than this.
I for one am very happy to see this technology advancing. It's not gonna take much intelligence to make an autonomous driver better than most human drivers.
The benefits of having cars that drive themselves will be enormous. First, these cars can be programmed to drive in a manner that conserves gasoline (e.g., no jack-rabbit starts, limit speeds to 55 mph, time their accelerations between stoplights so they don't have to come to a complete stop at every one). Second, cars that drive themselves in a rational manner -- instead of the emotional, irrational manner that people drive them -- can significantly reduce traffic jams. There is an insightful analysis of traffic jams at this page which explains that jams are larely the result of people not letting other people merge into their lane coupled with the relatively-slow reaction time of humans. Cars that can synchronize their motion in relation to nearby traffic could make traffic jams a thing of the past.
Not to mention that if the car drives itself, I can read slashdot on the commute home (or watch Natalie Portman movies).
Fusion, AI, and Flying cars are always 10 years away...
The problem with AI is that it is constantly being redefined. At one point, a robot that would vaccum your house without you lifting a finger would have been considered an example of AI. Nowdays, hardly anyone is impressed by a Roomba. It used to be that a computer that could beat a human grandmaster at chess would have sufficed as AI. Today, we consider that to be little more than a clever computer algorithm. AI will always be 10+ years away if we keep redefining it to exclude any successes we achieve.
If you are talking about "strong AI", where machines can actually think for themselves and are sentient beings, I don't think you're going to find any reputable scientist claiming that is only 10 years away.
We've heard about fusion happening just around the corner every month for the last 30 years. What makes this any different?
You're exaggerating. Scientists have always been pretty upfront that creating a confined, sustained fusion reaction is an exceptionally difficult problem. The potential payoff is so large that we continue to study it.
What makes this different is that they are building a large test facility for inertially-confined fusion. Magnetically-confined fusion is the more popular approach. The article doesn't talk about the details very much but one of the primary obstacles to inertially-confined fusion are the presence of hydrodynamic instabilities such as the Richtmyer-Meshkov effect. The lasers are directed at a spherical shell containing a deuterium-tritium pellet and are supposed to cause the shell to implode. Manufacturing imperfections result in the RM instability and the less-than-perfect implosion causes the whole thing to fall apart without the deuterium and tritium fusing together. Does anyone know what the status of research on this is? A decade ago, there were still difficulties getting theoretical models of the RM instability to even agree with experiments, which obviously meant that the process of dealing with the instability seemed pretty far off. Are they still having problems with this?
There's some interesting info on his site but his book is widely considered to be an authoritative tome on fats so it's worth picking up. He does delve a little into conspiracy-theory land at times but overall it's quite informative. Anyone interested in health ought to have this book on their shelf.
I think the chef was mostly kidding but somewhat serious about how he feels about having to load nasty ingredients into recipes that call for them. How he's fighting it is by working towards better recipes that taste good, but won't hurt your body. But then again, he has to make the rich food now and then. His problem is that people will eat the rich stuff every day, not like once a week or once every two weeks.
Okay, I didn't catch the joke. It sounded to me like he was one of these people who thinks people have no responsibility for their actions and that the poor health of his patrons was entirely his fault. You were there and I wasn't so I'll trust your read on his statement.
I suppose there are some people who have to travel a lot for work and have little choice but to eat out more than they should. I'm not going to discourage chefs from trying to make foods that are healthy and delicious. I think your salad is a good example of how easy it can be. On the other hand, as someone who does eat healthy a lot, I want to have the option to eat unhealthy once in awhile. I'd be disappointed in a future in which all yummy but unhealthy foods have been eliminated and replaced with moderately-tasty but much healthier fare. If I want to splurge and pig out on something naughty, that ought to be my choice. I don't go for all these people who are trying to save us from ourselves. I'm an adult and can make my own decisions. I have enough willpower to make a guilty pleasure a rare thing. I understand there are many people who cannot, but I'd be pissed off if I had to suffer because someone else can't control themselves.
I was talking to a chef about a month ago who was complaining about having to put loads of oils, creams, butter and mayo in foods to achieve the taste that the consumer wants, at the expense of their health. "We're paid to kill people," was his complaint, and sadly I think he's right.
What a rediculous statement. It's fine to eat something unhealthy every once in awhile as long as you don't make a habit of it. Eating well 28 days a month will render whatever you do the remaining 2 or 3 days pretty much irrelevant.
Avoiding being stabbed 28 days won't help you to much if you are getting stabbed 2 or 3 days a month.
If your buddy really felt that he was getting paid to kill people, he would quit so obviously he himself realizes his statement is rediculous.
This same chef was saying how it would be nice if there were alternatives to bad food, that would not jeopardize someone's health.
There are. They are called vegetables. Again, you eat plenty of vegies and you can get away with eating all sorts of nasty stuff occasionally.
Your theories on fat murdering other fat are interesting to say the least. You might want to pick up a copy of Fats That Heal, Fats That Kill by Udo Erasmus for a slightly more scientific explanation of how fats operate inside your body.
When I go out to eat, I don't worry about how healthy the food is and my cholesterol numbers kick holy ass. How do I do it? Because I don't go out to eat very much and when I eat at home I'm very, very healthy. There's no need for genetically engineered superfoods. Just eat right 95% of the time and live a little the reminaing 5%.
Damn right. Not only did he expertly play the character that hooked many a kid on the idea of science and engineering, but was also a decorated war veteran and a genuine class act. He was always warm and receptive to his fans and a beloved fixture of the convention circuit.
This is an important point. Doohan really gave so much back to the community. In the fascinating (and sometimes hilarious) documentary Trekkies, Doohan relates the story of a suicidal Trek fan who confided in him. Doohan took it upon himself to nurse this poor soul back to health. He told the fan that he wanted to see them at the next convention. To his amazement, the fan was there and Doohan graciously met with them, allowing them to come backstage and the whole deal. Doohan tried it again and again the fan showed up at the next convention. They kept this up for a long time (I forget -- it might have been years) when suddenly the fan stopped coming. Doohan feared the worst had happened.
Years later Doohan was stunned when the fan showed up at a convention out of nowhere! The fan told Doohan that they had turned their life around, enrolled in school, and become... an electrical engineer.
If you haven't seen this film you should definitely rent it. Watching Doohan come close to tears as he tells this story is worth the rental fee right there.
I could go on and on replying to your message but I'll try to make it short. In summary, I agree with almost everything you wrote but I want to comment on one thing in particular:
We need to focus on fundamentlas, reading, writing, arithmetic, etc. They need to read more and write more, and be able to construct cogent arguments and analyses in both written and oral form. They need classes in rhetoric and philosophy.
This needs to be emphasized. I think having kids confront all the stuff they hold dear by having them learn Philosophy would be wonderful. I think a Senior-level course would do great things. Just before they go out the door into the so-called "real world", they get a glimpse of the fact that they are about to enter a period of their life where the answers aren't so easy. Where they really will have to think for themselves rather than review what was in Section 3.4 of their textbook. I would couple this with the need for critical thinking and analysis. If kids are so obsessed with how they are "going to use this", then present them with articles from the daily newspaper and have them examine the issues and think about what the story didn't mention or glossed over.
The problem is that parents wouldn't stand for any of this. Can you imagine trying to have a debate in a high school philosophy class about abortion? It might be a much-needed chance for kids to see the side of the issue that their parents haven't crammed down their throat but the parents certainly would never stand for such a thing. Alas, the critical thinking and analysis skills that kids need to develop would never be allowed in public schools.
Yes, you've correctly identified the primary problem in all of this. Once you get kids to think that being smart is cool then all other problems melt away. Kids would be sufficiently motivated to find ways around bureaucratic and financial roadblocks. There are many different ways to learn. But how you make being smart cool is not at all clear. One idea is to look at how the asian countries do it. In countries like China and Korea, being intelligent is considered very enviable. I think Japan used to be that way but I fear that American influence has caused them to lose sight of that fact.
Another idea is to encourage competitivism in the academic arena just like it is encouraged in sports. I think this approach has significant merit. When I was in high school, my calculus teacher used to post the scores for the tests on the wall. It motivated me to be at the top of the class and beat everyone else. But I suspect there is increasing pressure on teachers not to do such things for fear of alienating students who aren't among the top 5. Years later when I headed off to grad school in mathematics, I wrote my high school teacher a letter telling him how effective that approach was for me personally. I encouraged him to continue to the practice in spite of any objections he might face. And I'm sure in this day and age, any teacher that would do such a thing would get plenty of complaints. But why should that be? Sports heros regularly gloat when they score a touchdown. This seems tame compared to that.
A third approach is for the mass media as a whole to change. Several people here at slashdot have pointed out in past articles that TV and movies always feature a hero that solves problems largely with muscles or guns instead of brains. They may have a side-kick who can hack into a mainframe or search for clues, but in the end it's the bravery and testosterone of the hero that saves the day. The villains are usually the brainy ones and films play on the latent anti-intellectualism and fear of being outsmarted to get the audience to immediately hate the bad guy. Yes, I'm sure we can come up with exceptions to these rules and cite movies or TV shows where the hero can actually think, but by an large the media -- which has such an impression on the young -- is continuing to feed the anti-intellectualism of this country especially. If Hollywood were to turn things around and show being intelligent as something admirable, that might solve a lot of the problems right there.
These are just ideas and I don't claim that any of them are the answer. I agree wholeheartedly with the parent about the underlying cause. But it's been with us for several decades now. Finding a solution that can be implemented will not be easy.
GMD
Re:This is not exactly a good thing
on
Sci-Fi on the Cheap
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· Score: 2, Interesting
The idea that SciFi can be well-written and produced with some care is hard for many people to accept these days, as all they see is schlock put together on the cheap as fast as humanly possible to give the channel in question a quick cash infusion
I posted some comments above which address some of your statements. But I'll take this moment to make another point: I don't think most people are really ready for serious science fiction right now. I understand that sounds very elitist. What I mean is not that people aren't smart enough for it; they just want to see some escapist entertainment. We are in a time where many people are very uncertain about the future. I don't what to sound like Jon Katz here but events like 9/11 have really affected people deeply. America is not on an upswing right now. Our economy seems to be stalled, Iraq is not going well, terrorists seem to be able to strike wherever they want. I think most people are very worried deep down inside. That's one reason why the horror genre has found new life. Not because there are lots of well-written, well-directed horror flicks all of the sudden. You have to give people what they want. And right now, people want mindless, escapist entertainment. They don't want something that challenges their way of viewing the world. They want to think about the world in terms of good and evil, right and wrong, black and white.
Y-Create, you and I and most of slashdot may be praying for thoughtful science fiction but the fact is that most people are not. They just don't want to be challenged in such a way -- at least not right now. Now if things turn around in five years time and people are breathing a little easier, that may be the time for the types of science fiction that you refer to to find a larger, more receptive audience. But the timing is just not right. My fear is that even if someone were to do a fantastic job of bringing a famous science fiction novel to the silver screen, it would be a flop at the box office.
Someone mod this up so those of us without NYTimes logins can read.
The critics' disfavor doesn't seem to bother the folks behind the films, who have no pretensions to high art. Bonnie Hammer, the Sci Fi Channel president, likes to refer to the pictures as "popcorn movies for those who love the genre," adding, "Viewers come for the ride; it's a guilty pleasure." Jeff Beach, whose Unified Film Organization has made 20 films for the network, calls them "high-concept action-adventure movies with elements that are fun, whether a creature or a disaster."
I think this is a very good point. There are many among us who will bemoan the fact that the shlock that the Sci-Fi Channel puts out makes our favorite genre look bad. Remember that it's not called The Thoughtful Science Fiction Channel, it's the "Sci-Fi" Channel. It's supposed to be a watered-down "lite" version of science fiction in the same way that "lite" cookies bear only a passing resemblance to a delicious full-fat treat. Yes, the movies they are making are terrible but look at what's out in theaters these days. It seems half the movies are horror films. That entire genre is largely a collection of poorly-executed guilty pleasures used by younger demographics as an excuse to get out of the house and indulge in a guilty pleasure. But, as has been cited on slashdot many times before, the movieplex is becoming an increasingly unpleasant experience. Sci-Fi Channel is simply providing an alternate venue for these low-quality thrillers. I think the Sci-Fi Channel has got a great idea. Now, I'm sure as hell not going to watch any of this crap myself. But that doesn't stop me from being impressed that Sci-Fi has finally started to get its act together.
Slashdot Mirror
Unmaned blimps are far more fuel efficient than unmaned planes. Plus they can stay airborne for more time. Why don't they use blimps all along ?
Because you can't reroute blimps to get a closer look at something very easily.
Funny this article gets posted while I'm in the middle of writing a proposal for follow-on funding on my research into UAV control algorithms...
Endurance is a concern. Collision avoidance is a concern. But UAVs offer incredible surveillance opportunities that stationary sensors just can't match.
I could go on and on but I need to get back to writing my UAV proposal. UAVs are one of the hottest military technologies these days. It's not surprising that the commercial and civilian sector is starting to take a look at how these maturing drones can be used to solve their problems.
GMD
Yes, in fact, the Japanese used this method to allow the general populace to brainstorm creative solutions to the country's most vexing problem. Unfortunately for them, the demographics of the country were such that the votes of children aged 5-12 largely determined the resulting solution.
GMD
It's quite simple to prevent this from happening to you. Post "good stuff" under your real name, perhaps linked to a professional-sounding alias, and post other crap under another alias that you never link to your real name.
As others have already pointed out, it's difficult to make sure that every person in the world who has a photo of you won't post something that isn't very flattering. But even ignoring that for the moment, what consistutes "good stuff" in your mind is likely to change. Suppose you are a first-year student in grad school and you post something under your real name stating that your dream is to become a professor. Very noble, very "good stuff". Fast-forward several grueling years when you are burned out. Your goals have changed and academia doesn't sound so great. You start interviewing for companies and tell them during the interview that you have a strong interest in tackling today's technical problems.
After you leave, the people you interviewed with start googling around to see what they can dig up on you and come across this thing you wrote many years earlier. Now there's doubt in their mind. Are you looking at an industrial position because you didn't get a postdoc? Are you just looking to make some big bucks in the private sector for five years before returning to what you love -- academia? Maybe I trust you and realize that your priorities have changed. How do I know they won't change back? You wrote so eloquently about the fact that your life-long dream was to become a professor a few years ago. How much do I want to bet that you won't dream this way again?
And what about posting your politicial, philosophical, or personal beliefs on the web? You write a well-thought-out essay about a woman's right to choose and your pro-life potential-employer finds it. You may think that's "good stuff" but your employer sure doesn't. You're making this way too simple. The article brings up a very good point. You are unwise to dismiss it as "someone else's problem" so easily, my friend.
GMD
The Patriot Act provides the same tools for counter-terrorism officials that anti-narcotics officials have been using for years.
Anti-narcotics officials have been able to conduct secret reconnaissance of what books I've been reading?
Perhaps some of you don't remember 9/11.
No, considering how many times the TV news has delighted in replaying those horrific images, I doubt anyone could possibly forget.
This is not a crime-enforcing bill, it is a counter-terrorism bill.
Look, Stargate SG-1 isn't a good show by any stretch of the imagination (except for that hottie Capt. Carter), but I think it's a bit of a stretch to call it terrorism.
Sure, I may be inconvenienced by the Patriot Act, but nothing is more inconvenient than getting blown up on your way to work, like what tragically happened just this last summer.
You were blown up on your way to work this summer?
I mean, one of the government's few purposes is to keep the people safe. The US government failed to do that on 9/11.
Boy, you got that right. The one piece of advice that the Clinton adminstration gave the incoming Bush adminstration was to watch out for bin Laden. The government doesn't need new tools; they just need to learn how to use the tools they already have.
(This is what I honestly think, don't just down-mod me because you don't agree.)
I'm glad that you assured us that you honestly believe this otherwise I would have thought you were trolling. As for modding you down because someone disagrees with you, that's not necessary. Your arguements are so weak, they deserve to be modded down on their own merits, independent of the political opinions of the moderators.
GMD
A study found in The Economist has shown that a group of minds working on single pieces of data, can together generate the statistical model used to represent a given sample. Note that it takes a group of people to be able to accurately predict the behaviour of something, not a single individual.
Well, that's a somehwat misleading summary. These people were not knowingly collaborating. Each person would have had to answer the questions independently (not knowing what the other respondants' answers were) in order for Bayes to be applicable. Each person's response counts as a piece of evidence or clue in inferring the underlying probability distribution. Their answers are combined using Bayes's rule by an external third party (the researchers). So, yes, this technically counts as a group of minds working together, but I think the way it this summary was worded might give people the wrong impression.
Think about it this way: if you lock a bunch of people in a room toegther and have them come up with an answer, the "strong" personalities in the room are likely to have a heavy influence on the "weaker" ones. People who aren't really firm in their opinions are going to influenced -- whether they realize it or not -- by people who sound confident. The article makes a big to-do about the fact that Bayesian techniques allow you to get good answers with a small number of people working on the problem. But the key is that those people have to be working independently because it's going to be damn difficult to identify and subtract out the cross-correlation of members influencing each other.
I'm making (what I hope to be) an important point. I think business people who read this article or even slashdotters who read the above summary may get the impression that small meetings are a great way to arrive at strikingly effective solutions. That's not what Bayes techinques are about. If you want to put a small group of people to work on a problem, you'd better separate them , otherwise Bayes's rule is not strictly applicable.
GMD
The night before his English Lit class, one of the morons on our dorm floor had to cram all night long since he hadn't done any of the reading or assignments for the class all semester long. I don't know how many of those No-Doze caffeine/uppers pills he took. All I know is that he had overdosed so badly that his hands wouldn't stop shaking. He found it quite difficult to write essays in the blue book with his hands spasming the entire time.
Remeber kids, use drugs with care. They aren't candy.
GMD
Good questions, IMHO, to ask are ones that indicate an interest in the company or the position.
I interview a fair number of people at the company I work for. I always ask the applicant if they have any questions. If they don't, I'm usually not too excited about having them work for me. When I'm talking one-on-one with them, I'm trying to figure out their level of enthusiasm and interest in my company and the position I'm offering. Their resume and technical presentation already tell me about their intelligence level so I don't spend too much time asking them technical questions one-on-one. But all the smarts in the world doesn't do me much good if the person isn't interested in the work that I'd be giving them. The world is full of geniuses that don't amount to anything because they don't put forth any effort. I don't want them working for me.
I also want to see that they are starting to seriously visualize themselves working here. I want to know that they've done their homework and have some knowledge about type of work we do here. So I'd like to see them ask some questions about our technical work but also some questions about benefits, company culture, and other things that make me think that they are imagining themselves working here and staying for many years.
I just gave a talk to some students at the local university here about getting a job and the on-site interview. I told them to think about it as a first date. I realize the concept of a "date" may be a bit foreign to slashdotters so let me elaborate. You want to emphasize your good attributes but stay a bit humble. You also want to show interest without appearing desparate. You wouldn't go to a date and just sit there saying nothing. Similarly, you wouldn't want to monopolize the conversation. There should be an interplay and back-and-forth. You don't have to make the interview your best buddy, but when you leave the room you want s/he to not only respect your technical abilities but also desire to have you as a member of their team.
If you cannot think of some good questions to ask prior to the interview, then you should seriously question whether you are truly interested in the company. A little bit of brainstorming is necessary, but you shouldn't have to strain to come up with questions. If so, then your questions are merely for show and a keen interviewer will see right through them (much like the infamous "My biggest failing is that I'm a workaholic" crap).
Good luck,GMD
Obviously, getting permission is important. But even if you get permission, do you really want to be playing games with work equipment right away? I would strongly recommend waiting until you have become a respected and valued employee before you pull stunts like using work equipment for non-work projects. Hey, I'm a technical manager and I read slashdot damn near every hour -- does your new boss? If s/he sees your post and can easily figure out who you are, what are they going to think about you? You haven't even started work and you're preoccupied with how to play games? That's not the kind of employee I want working for me.
My advise? Concentrate on doing good work and impressing your co-workers and management before you even think about playing around. You can repost your Ask Slashdot question in six-months (and don't include so damn many details about yourself and your job next time).
GMD
If you want to figure out how to boost your ratings, why not get the advice from the horse's mouth?
Brin and Page's original paper about PageRank (Google) : the original Google paper
Another PageRank paper Inside PageRank
The problem is that PageRank isn't the end-all-and-be-all of Google. Allow me to quote from this SIAM News article
Any doofus can look up the details of PageRank; therefore, that information is useless if you want to do better than everyone else. Trying to figure out those "hundred other metrics" is where SEO comes in. Trying to discern hidden logic is a tough problem and that's why those SEO companies can charge an arm and a leg. I have been told that the mathematics involved in SEO algorithms is non-trival.
GMD
You're painting with far too wide a brush. Many alternative medicine practitioners and researchers are using the scientific method and expanding our knowledge of medicine. Take a look at the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine - part of the U.S. National Institutes of Health. http://nccam.nih.gov/
I've already taken a look. I recommend you look at this.
GMD
I think including alternative medicine with the other topics you mention is pretty short sighted. To think that we have all the medical answers, and that there aren't other medications or treatments that western medicine might not know about is ignorant. Take for instance pressure points: no western doctor or treatment explains or addresses them.
This is almost precisely the same argument used by the Intelligent Design folks to get creationism taught in schools! I'm flabergasted that this got modded up. Yes, yes, yes -- neither evolution or western medicine has all the answers. Scientists fully admit this. However, the fact that those fields don't have all the answers doesn't mean that we should start relying on creationism or alternative medicine. You need to provide verifable evidence that sticking needles into people can cure ailments and not rely on "well, you guys don't have all the answers" arguments. Alternative medicine most definitely belongs with the other things I listed. Not because it's all crap. Because all of those things openly (almost pridefully) reject the scientific method.
However, I'll tell you right now that there are a great many instances where accupressure/puncture can make huge differences in a number of maladies.
Oh boy, take a guess what my next question is going to be. Can you provide references to multiple peer-reviewed studies verifying your claim? You "can tell me", huh? And who the hell are you? Some guy on slashdot? I'm going to take medical advice from User 549286?
redfieldp, I think you misunderstood my post. Maybe I should have left UFOs out of the list. My point was that alternative medicine is anti-science. Alternative medicine practitioners apply their techniques to the public at large without scientific evidence that these methods work or are even safe. Having scientists publically outed for falsifing data is only going to provide more ammunition to those who claim they deserve equal status and recognition. Alternative medicine is welcome to use the scientific method to verify their claims. Until that time, it belongs squarely in the "anti-science" camp.
GMD
What you say is true, however, this isn't really the greatest timing for a story to break on the fact that scientists sometimes fabricate their data. This provides a rather juicy opportunity for the various anti-science forces out there to point to this and say "See, scientists aren't the pristine investigators of truth that they would like us to believe! This one got caught, but how many others are doing the same thing right now? That's why we need to keep an open mind about {intelligent design, alternative medicine, bigfoot, global warming is a myth, etc.}."
You and I may see this story as evidence of the scientific system working the way it is supposed to. I suspect that the public will see this as evidence that science doesn't have a monopoly on the truth and maybe we ought to give those creationists equal time. Like I said, this isn't the greatest time for this story to break.
GMD
It's about the message science is bringing. Some people, for religious, political or business reasons don't want to hear what science is saying. This is initially a case of trying to silence the messenger.
I'd like to propose a question that has been on my mind for nearly two decades. Would the public at large be interested in science for its own sake without any tie to contemporary issues? I wonder if the attempts by scientists to make their work 'relevant' to the public by linking it to political issues ends up backfiring. That is, the public gets too focused on the message and not on the process. Suppose a pro-business conservative listens watches a documentary on the science of climatology on TV. If the focus of the documentary is on the growing body of evidence that humans have caused global warming and catastrophe awaits, I can see where this guy would change the channel. Now my question is if the documentary simply focused on methods used in climatology and the pure science, would that guy be interested enough to watch the entire show? He wouldn't be offended like before, but could you make a "pure science" show interesting?
My concern is that politics has become a football game in the US. By and large, people will just not listen to viewpoints different from those that contradict the political party that they feel affliation for. It's like they are routing for the home team and can't bare the idea of losing a game. My question is whether attempts to make science relevant to the daily lives of ordinary people ends up doing more harm than good. Or is it an acceptable cost? Do we really need to link science to public issues -- accepting that the conclusions drawn will drive a good chunk of the audience away -- in order to keep them interested enough to learn what science is really all about?
GMD
The U.S. is not becoming anti-science. It only appears that way because our administration (sorry if this seems like flamebait.. it is, but its clearly the truth) prioritizes their political success, fiscal policy, and religeon over the recommendations of science.
I hate Bush as much as the next scientist, but the anti-science draft is not blowing from the White House. Did you RTFA? If so, you must have missed the following:
Note the use of "for many years" and polling of non-administration Americans. This is a very widespread problem and it's a rare case where it's not 100% Bush's fault. We have a growing problem and it's dangerous to assume that all will go well once Bush is out of office. The scientific community needs to combat this.
I confess that I don't have the solution. Would a new documentary TV series in the vein of Carl Sagan's Cosmos do the trick? I don't know. Would better and more conservative reporting of scientific achievements in the media (and less hyping every radical article appearing in the New England Journal of Medicine as some sort of scientific consensus) help? Beats me. Would having articulate and engrossing scientists discussing their work publically foster an appreciation for scientists and they work they do? Stop asking me these tough questions, okay? :)
I don't know what the answer is. This board will be filled with various strategies and ideas. But we need to start thinking of how to correct this dangerous trend. Yeah, Bush's administration certainly isn't helping, but saying that "the U.S. is not becoming anti-science. It only appears that way because our administration..." is wishful thinking.
GMD
You gotta wonder who's the fucking Einstein who decided to equip the elderly with robotic ninja superpowers. When I was working as a hapless waiter at Denny's years ago, I thought I had I bad whenever one of those geezers would start ranting about the "good old days" and "whatever happened to service?" if their bowl of oatmeal wasn't cooked just right or their order was a few minutes late. Now we're going to have to worry about them going on a rampage and destroying the city. Christ, the Japanese are probably going to have to call in Godzilla to pacify the robots instead of vice-versa! You'd think the Japanese of all people would know better than this.
GMD
I for one am very happy to see this technology advancing. It's not gonna take much intelligence to make an autonomous driver better than most human drivers.
The benefits of having cars that drive themselves will be enormous. First, these cars can be programmed to drive in a manner that conserves gasoline (e.g., no jack-rabbit starts, limit speeds to 55 mph, time their accelerations between stoplights so they don't have to come to a complete stop at every one). Second, cars that drive themselves in a rational manner -- instead of the emotional, irrational manner that people drive them -- can significantly reduce traffic jams. There is an insightful analysis of traffic jams at this page which explains that jams are larely the result of people not letting other people merge into their lane coupled with the relatively-slow reaction time of humans. Cars that can synchronize their motion in relation to nearby traffic could make traffic jams a thing of the past.
Not to mention that if the car drives itself, I can read slashdot on the commute home (or watch Natalie Portman movies).
GMD
Fusion, AI, and Flying cars are always 10 years away...
The problem with AI is that it is constantly being redefined. At one point, a robot that would vaccum your house without you lifting a finger would have been considered an example of AI. Nowdays, hardly anyone is impressed by a Roomba. It used to be that a computer that could beat a human grandmaster at chess would have sufficed as AI. Today, we consider that to be little more than a clever computer algorithm. AI will always be 10+ years away if we keep redefining it to exclude any successes we achieve.
If you are talking about "strong AI", where machines can actually think for themselves and are sentient beings, I don't think you're going to find any reputable scientist claiming that is only 10 years away.
GMD
We've heard about fusion happening just around the corner every month for the last 30 years. What makes this any different?
You're exaggerating. Scientists have always been pretty upfront that creating a confined, sustained fusion reaction is an exceptionally difficult problem. The potential payoff is so large that we continue to study it.
What makes this different is that they are building a large test facility for inertially-confined fusion. Magnetically-confined fusion is the more popular approach. The article doesn't talk about the details very much but one of the primary obstacles to inertially-confined fusion are the presence of hydrodynamic instabilities such as the Richtmyer-Meshkov effect. The lasers are directed at a spherical shell containing a deuterium-tritium pellet and are supposed to cause the shell to implode. Manufacturing imperfections result in the RM instability and the less-than-perfect implosion causes the whole thing to fall apart without the deuterium and tritium fusing together. Does anyone know what the status of research on this is? A decade ago, there were still difficulties getting theoretical models of the RM instability to even agree with experiments, which obviously meant that the process of dealing with the instability seemed pretty far off. Are they still having problems with this?
GMD
Thank you for that site -- I will check it out.
There's some interesting info on his site but his book is widely considered to be an authoritative tome on fats so it's worth picking up. He does delve a little into conspiracy-theory land at times but overall it's quite informative. Anyone interested in health ought to have this book on their shelf.
I think the chef was mostly kidding but somewhat serious about how he feels about having to load nasty ingredients into recipes that call for them. How he's fighting it is by working towards better recipes that taste good, but won't hurt your body. But then again, he has to make the rich food now and then. His problem is that people will eat the rich stuff every day, not like once a week or once every two weeks.
Okay, I didn't catch the joke. It sounded to me like he was one of these people who thinks people have no responsibility for their actions and that the poor health of his patrons was entirely his fault. You were there and I wasn't so I'll trust your read on his statement.
I suppose there are some people who have to travel a lot for work and have little choice but to eat out more than they should. I'm not going to discourage chefs from trying to make foods that are healthy and delicious. I think your salad is a good example of how easy it can be. On the other hand, as someone who does eat healthy a lot, I want to have the option to eat unhealthy once in awhile. I'd be disappointed in a future in which all yummy but unhealthy foods have been eliminated and replaced with moderately-tasty but much healthier fare. If I want to splurge and pig out on something naughty, that ought to be my choice. I don't go for all these people who are trying to save us from ourselves. I'm an adult and can make my own decisions. I have enough willpower to make a guilty pleasure a rare thing. I understand there are many people who cannot, but I'd be pissed off if I had to suffer because someone else can't control themselves.
Thanks for the clarification of your post mfh.
GMD
I was talking to a chef about a month ago who was complaining about having to put loads of oils, creams, butter and mayo in foods to achieve the taste that the consumer wants, at the expense of their health. "We're paid to kill people," was his complaint, and sadly I think he's right.
What a rediculous statement. It's fine to eat something unhealthy every once in awhile as long as you don't make a habit of it. Eating well 28 days a month will render whatever you do the remaining 2 or 3 days pretty much irrelevant. Avoiding being stabbed 28 days won't help you to much if you are getting stabbed 2 or 3 days a month.
If your buddy really felt that he was getting paid to kill people, he would quit so obviously he himself realizes his statement is rediculous.
This same chef was saying how it would be nice if there were alternatives to bad food, that would not jeopardize someone's health.
There are. They are called vegetables. Again, you eat plenty of vegies and you can get away with eating all sorts of nasty stuff occasionally.
Your theories on fat murdering other fat are interesting to say the least. You might want to pick up a copy of Fats That Heal, Fats That Kill by Udo Erasmus for a slightly more scientific explanation of how fats operate inside your body.
When I go out to eat, I don't worry about how healthy the food is and my cholesterol numbers kick holy ass. How do I do it? Because I don't go out to eat very much and when I eat at home I'm very, very healthy. There's no need for genetically engineered superfoods. Just eat right 95% of the time and live a little the reminaing 5%.
GMD
Damn right. Not only did he expertly play the character that hooked many a kid on the idea of science and engineering, but was also a decorated war veteran and a genuine class act. He was always warm and receptive to his fans and a beloved fixture of the convention circuit.
This is an important point. Doohan really gave so much back to the community. In the fascinating (and sometimes hilarious) documentary Trekkies, Doohan relates the story of a suicidal Trek fan who confided in him. Doohan took it upon himself to nurse this poor soul back to health. He told the fan that he wanted to see them at the next convention. To his amazement, the fan was there and Doohan graciously met with them, allowing them to come backstage and the whole deal. Doohan tried it again and again the fan showed up at the next convention. They kept this up for a long time (I forget -- it might have been years) when suddenly the fan stopped coming. Doohan feared the worst had happened.
Years later Doohan was stunned when the fan showed up at a convention out of nowhere! The fan told Doohan that they had turned their life around, enrolled in school, and become ... an electrical engineer.
If you haven't seen this film you should definitely rent it. Watching Doohan come close to tears as he tells this story is worth the rental fee right there.
GMD
I could go on and on replying to your message but I'll try to make it short. In summary, I agree with almost everything you wrote but I want to comment on one thing in particular:
We need to focus on fundamentlas, reading, writing, arithmetic, etc. They need to read more and write more, and be able to construct cogent arguments and analyses in both written and oral form. They need classes in rhetoric and philosophy.
This needs to be emphasized. I think having kids confront all the stuff they hold dear by having them learn Philosophy would be wonderful. I think a Senior-level course would do great things. Just before they go out the door into the so-called "real world", they get a glimpse of the fact that they are about to enter a period of their life where the answers aren't so easy. Where they really will have to think for themselves rather than review what was in Section 3.4 of their textbook. I would couple this with the need for critical thinking and analysis. If kids are so obsessed with how they are "going to use this", then present them with articles from the daily newspaper and have them examine the issues and think about what the story didn't mention or glossed over.
The problem is that parents wouldn't stand for any of this. Can you imagine trying to have a debate in a high school philosophy class about abortion? It might be a much-needed chance for kids to see the side of the issue that their parents haven't crammed down their throat but the parents certainly would never stand for such a thing. Alas, the critical thinking and analysis skills that kids need to develop would never be allowed in public schools.
GMD
Yes, you've correctly identified the primary problem in all of this. Once you get kids to think that being smart is cool then all other problems melt away. Kids would be sufficiently motivated to find ways around bureaucratic and financial roadblocks. There are many different ways to learn. But how you make being smart cool is not at all clear. One idea is to look at how the asian countries do it. In countries like China and Korea, being intelligent is considered very enviable. I think Japan used to be that way but I fear that American influence has caused them to lose sight of that fact.
Another idea is to encourage competitivism in the academic arena just like it is encouraged in sports. I think this approach has significant merit. When I was in high school, my calculus teacher used to post the scores for the tests on the wall. It motivated me to be at the top of the class and beat everyone else. But I suspect there is increasing pressure on teachers not to do such things for fear of alienating students who aren't among the top 5. Years later when I headed off to grad school in mathematics, I wrote my high school teacher a letter telling him how effective that approach was for me personally. I encouraged him to continue to the practice in spite of any objections he might face. And I'm sure in this day and age, any teacher that would do such a thing would get plenty of complaints. But why should that be? Sports heros regularly gloat when they score a touchdown. This seems tame compared to that.
A third approach is for the mass media as a whole to change. Several people here at slashdot have pointed out in past articles that TV and movies always feature a hero that solves problems largely with muscles or guns instead of brains. They may have a side-kick who can hack into a mainframe or search for clues, but in the end it's the bravery and testosterone of the hero that saves the day. The villains are usually the brainy ones and films play on the latent anti-intellectualism and fear of being outsmarted to get the audience to immediately hate the bad guy. Yes, I'm sure we can come up with exceptions to these rules and cite movies or TV shows where the hero can actually think, but by an large the media -- which has such an impression on the young -- is continuing to feed the anti-intellectualism of this country especially. If Hollywood were to turn things around and show being intelligent as something admirable, that might solve a lot of the problems right there.
These are just ideas and I don't claim that any of them are the answer. I agree wholeheartedly with the parent about the underlying cause. But it's been with us for several decades now. Finding a solution that can be implemented will not be easy.
GMD
The idea that SciFi can be well-written and produced with some care is hard for many people to accept these days, as all they see is schlock put together on the cheap as fast as humanly possible to give the channel in question a quick cash infusion
I posted some comments above which address some of your statements. But I'll take this moment to make another point: I don't think most people are really ready for serious science fiction right now. I understand that sounds very elitist. What I mean is not that people aren't smart enough for it; they just want to see some escapist entertainment. We are in a time where many people are very uncertain about the future. I don't what to sound like Jon Katz here but events like 9/11 have really affected people deeply. America is not on an upswing right now. Our economy seems to be stalled, Iraq is not going well, terrorists seem to be able to strike wherever they want. I think most people are very worried deep down inside. That's one reason why the horror genre has found new life. Not because there are lots of well-written, well-directed horror flicks all of the sudden. You have to give people what they want. And right now, people want mindless, escapist entertainment. They don't want something that challenges their way of viewing the world. They want to think about the world in terms of good and evil, right and wrong, black and white.
Y-Create, you and I and most of slashdot may be praying for thoughtful science fiction but the fact is that most people are not. They just don't want to be challenged in such a way -- at least not right now. Now if things turn around in five years time and people are breathing a little easier, that may be the time for the types of science fiction that you refer to to find a larger, more receptive audience. But the timing is just not right. My fear is that even if someone were to do a fantastic job of bringing a famous science fiction novel to the silver screen, it would be a flop at the box office.
GMD
Someone mod this up so those of us without NYTimes logins can read.
The critics' disfavor doesn't seem to bother the folks behind the films, who have no pretensions to high art. Bonnie Hammer, the Sci Fi Channel president, likes to refer to the pictures as "popcorn movies for those who love the genre," adding, "Viewers come for the ride; it's a guilty pleasure." Jeff Beach, whose Unified Film Organization has made 20 films for the network, calls them "high-concept action-adventure movies with elements that are fun, whether a creature or a disaster."
I think this is a very good point. There are many among us who will bemoan the fact that the shlock that the Sci-Fi Channel puts out makes our favorite genre look bad. Remember that it's not called The Thoughtful Science Fiction Channel, it's the "Sci-Fi" Channel. It's supposed to be a watered-down "lite" version of science fiction in the same way that "lite" cookies bear only a passing resemblance to a delicious full-fat treat. Yes, the movies they are making are terrible but look at what's out in theaters these days. It seems half the movies are horror films. That entire genre is largely a collection of poorly-executed guilty pleasures used by younger demographics as an excuse to get out of the house and indulge in a guilty pleasure. But, as has been cited on slashdot many times before, the movieplex is becoming an increasingly unpleasant experience. Sci-Fi Channel is simply providing an alternate venue for these low-quality thrillers. I think the Sci-Fi Channel has got a great idea. Now, I'm sure as hell not going to watch any of this crap myself. But that doesn't stop me from being impressed that Sci-Fi has finally started to get its act together.
GMD