When faced with an awkward question, logical positivism asks: what would the answer tell me about the future?
Suppose you had a definitive, 100% guaranteed answer to the "discovered vs invented" question. What would it allow you to do that you couldn't do before? What could you predict? What would you gain?
Nothing, nothing and nothing.
It's meaningless; merely a matter of perception, wordplay and people having too much time on their hands.
...that the field of biology was ripe for an investment of programmer time. We even had a course touching on the basics of DNA and the types of searching/sorting/etc that would be relevant.
I suppose it's not surprising that the big boys are coming to play, then:)
...is so obviously wrong that he's either a) been misquoted, b) an idiot or c) misquoting someone else. Given how impressive his title is I'd say that last one is most likely...
As for the internet "reaching capacity"... that's a pretty meaningless thing to say. At the root of all this we get the actual "story": bandwidth use is likely to increase more quickly over the next few years than ever before.
Is anyone really surprised? The fast links are starting to be there, so people are starting to figure out ways of using them that appeal to the masses. Exponential growth is not exactly a new concept in the computer industry...
So a journalist used Wikipedia as a primary source, added something incorrect to an article. Now the same Wikipedia page is using that article as its primary source, which in the view of Wikipedia makes the incorrect fact true. Chaos ensues.
The weak link is the journalist -- who should have known better. And now the newspaper presumably knows all about it. So perhaps this kind of problem can be self-correcting in the long run...
I think any of those would be quite hard to inject into open source code.
After all, in a p2p app the traffic is the most important thing... and is going to be watched very closely. Patches that modify what go over the wire will be under considerable scrutiny.
And how are you going to collect those details once they're transmitted? By their nature p2p apps are hard to keep track of.
Not to say it couldn't happen. But I don't think it's much of a risk compared to the simple fact that your IP address is very visible when using a p2p app...
If they've been accepting orders (and credit card numbers) for a product that doesn't exist -- isn't that called fraud?
I know there can be concern about legal implications in making such statements... but surely the way to protect yourself is to make only statements backed up by evidence? Being vague is certainly not a way to sidestep libel laws...
Once they stop paying, they lose the right to use any version.
So, an office suite linked to a security product and you lose both if you stop paying... does this sound at all unpalatable to anyone else?
(Apparently; currently the survey on the page says 41% prefer the traditional way of buying Office, 38.5% would rather not buy it at all, and 20.5% think it sounds better).
I suppose the deciding factor is the price -- value for money. And as we know Microsoft has never failed to deliver on that one...
You are very close to an answer! At least, IMHO...
I am deterministic but my actions cannot be predicted 100% without recreating an incredibly complicated system, i.e., me. So somebody could predict my behaviour by copying me, putting me in the same situation, and waiting to see what I'll do.
Do I find it problematic that somebody could predict my actions by waiting to see what I'll do? Not in the slightest!
In fact the question comes down to: can my actions be predicted by any means that does not experience consciousness?
And there I suspect the answer is "no". If it is even worth answering, since it is obviously not measurable:)
There is nothing new about having lives depend on software.
Air traffic control, medical devices, nuclear power stations, space travel... bugs in software in any of these can very quickly cost lives.
My point being, it's not impossible to achieve an acceptable level of safety in these cases. (Although it's expensive). So it's not necessarily impossible here.
One obvious feature... which I would hope is in there... is a physical rather than software safety catch on the weapon. Have it be possible to disable/enable it remotely, sure, but require the software to manipulate mechanical interlocks that are very visible.
There is no point in arguing with people on this one... at least in my experience.
There are already clear and complete explanations available, and if you actually try it for yourself the odds become apparent quite quickly. But there seems to be a kind of blindness that causes people to say "two choices = 50%" and refuse to consider the actual situation.
The psychologists were claiming that if you choose X over Y then you are more likely to choose Z over Y because your *choice* causes bias against Y. (This fits the observed data).
The new suggestion is that if you choose X over Y then you are more likely to choose Z over Y because the choice indicates prior bias against Y. The important part being that this holds even if the bias against Y is so small that it is hard to detect. The only thing required is that there is a fixed "preferred order" of the three.
At least, that's what I understand from the article. Given the field, I also understand that I am most probably wrong:)
It wouldn't be via the RFID tags. But the RFID tags can't do the position check on other tags, either, so there has to be some separate UI for that. And it could notify...
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That's a matter for lawmakers, not for philosophers. If the law relies on something that is not currently defined then it's the law that needs fixing.
And anyway you can patent naturally-occuring sequences of DNA in America. Don't tell me those are invented...
Correct in what sense?
For me it provides a useful question to ask when things are getting overly confused; a way of pointing out that something has questionable relevance.
Actually the main reason I referred to it explicitly was to build up to the punchline ;)
When faced with an awkward question, logical positivism asks: what would the answer tell me about the future?
Suppose you had a definitive, 100% guaranteed answer to the "discovered vs invented" question. What would it allow you to do that you couldn't do before? What could you predict? What would you gain?
Nothing, nothing and nothing.
It's meaningless; merely a matter of perception, wordplay and people having too much time on their hands.
Oh, and the correct answer is "discovered".
And "reasonable compensation" is not reasonable enough in normal circumstances because...
(I know, I know, -1 Troll).
...that the field of biology was ripe for an investment of programmer time. We even had a course touching on the basics of DNA and the types of searching/sorting/etc that would be relevant.
I suppose it's not surprising that the big boys are coming to play, then :)
...and also one that's fun to play with (needs java).
I fully agree. I'll take a HOWTO over a book any day!
...is so obviously wrong that he's either a) been misquoted, b) an idiot or c) misquoting someone else. Given how impressive his title is I'd say that last one is most likely...
As for the internet "reaching capacity"... that's a pretty meaningless thing to say. At the root of all this we get the actual "story": bandwidth use is likely to increase more quickly over the next few years than ever before.
Is anyone really surprised? The fast links are starting to be there, so people are starting to figure out ways of using them that appeal to the masses. Exponential growth is not exactly a new concept in the computer industry...
Still. Not a good time to be an ISP.
Hum. The linked article implies that this sort of thing is going on all the time. In which case it could be not so much conspiracy as coincidence...
*cough* RTFA?
Your comment would make more sense if it related to the story at all :)
So a journalist used Wikipedia as a primary source, added something incorrect to an article. Now the same Wikipedia page is using that article as its primary source, which in the view of Wikipedia makes the incorrect fact true. Chaos ensues.
The weak link is the journalist -- who should have known better. And now the newspaper presumably knows all about it. So perhaps this kind of problem can be self-correcting in the long run...
I think any of those would be quite hard to inject into open source code.
After all, in a p2p app the traffic is the most important thing ... and is going to be watched very closely. Patches that modify what go over the wire will be under considerable scrutiny.
And how are you going to collect those details once they're transmitted? By their nature p2p apps are hard to keep track of.
Not to say it couldn't happen. But I don't think it's much of a risk compared to the simple fact that your IP address is very visible when using a p2p app...
Libel laws have a lot to do with it if you say someone is committing fraud and they aren't...
If they've been accepting orders (and credit card numbers) for a product that doesn't exist -- isn't that called fraud?
I know there can be concern about legal implications in making such statements... but surely the way to protect yourself is to make only statements backed up by evidence? Being vague is certainly not a way to sidestep libel laws...
There is a certain amount of historical evidence on the "value for money" issue :)
But as long as you save in OOXML you can always read your data ... it's an ISO standard!
Once they stop paying, they lose the right to use any version.
So, an office suite linked to a security product and you lose both if you stop paying ... does this sound at all unpalatable to anyone else?
(Apparently; currently the survey on the page says 41% prefer the traditional way of buying Office, 38.5% would rather not buy it at all, and 20.5% think it sounds better).
I suppose the deciding factor is the price -- value for money. And as we know Microsoft has never failed to deliver on that one...
You are very close to an answer! At least, IMHO...
I am deterministic but my actions cannot be predicted 100% without recreating an incredibly complicated system, i.e., me. So somebody could predict my behaviour by copying me, putting me in the same situation, and waiting to see what I'll do.
Do I find it problematic that somebody could predict my actions by waiting to see what I'll do? Not in the slightest!
In fact the question comes down to: can my actions be predicted by any means that does not experience consciousness?
And there I suspect the answer is "no". If it is even worth answering, since it is obviously not measurable :)
I've done much the same myself. I suppose now it's someone else's turn ... good that someone still cares ;)
There is nothing new about having lives depend on software.
Air traffic control, medical devices, nuclear power stations, space travel ... bugs in software in any of these can very quickly cost lives.
My point being, it's not impossible to achieve an acceptable level of safety in these cases. (Although it's expensive). So it's not necessarily impossible here.
One obvious feature ... which I would hope is in there ... is a physical rather than software safety catch on the weapon. Have it be possible to disable/enable it remotely, sure, but require the software to manipulate mechanical interlocks that are very visible.
There is no point in arguing with people on this one ... at least in my experience.
There are already clear and complete explanations available, and if you actually try it for yourself the odds become apparent quite quickly. But there seems to be a kind of blindness that causes people to say "two choices = 50%" and refuse to consider the actual situation.
The psychologists were claiming that if you choose X over Y then you are more likely to choose Z over Y because your *choice* causes bias against Y. (This fits the observed data).
The new suggestion is that if you choose X over Y then you are more likely to choose Z over Y because the choice indicates prior bias against Y. The important part being that this holds even if the bias against Y is so small that it is hard to detect. The only thing required is that there is a fixed "preferred order" of the three.
At least, that's what I understand from the article. Given the field, I also understand that I am most probably wrong :)
...and all that stuff.
Since it seems incredibly fitting, here is the Wikipedia article on Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China.
It wouldn't be via the RFID tags. But the RFID tags can't do the position check on other tags, either, so there has to be some separate UI for that. And it could notify...
This sounds not entirely unlike the bat system worked on in Cambridge, UK.
IIRC one very simple approach to privacy was to notify people when someone checked on their position, and who it was.