We have no fucking clue what it takes to support life as we know it, and we won't until we fully understand life and the process of abiogenesis. We do know a lot about where life cannot survive though, e.g. no oxygen, no water, etc. These equations are pretty much arbitrary.
I agree with you on the premise that quantum effects can't be automatically ruled out in a final (or even partial) explanation for brain function and consciousness. But a direct comparison between neuron count and transistor count makes no sense. The devil is in the details, and there is a lot of power in the architecture of (or lack thereof) the brain. The brain is massively connected and parallel, and we have nothing that comes close to the architecture of the brain. In other words, there is a lot to deal with before we even get to the quantum side of things.
Check out work on the connectome (a mapping of connections of neurons in the brain): Human Connectome Project
And check out this 3 dimensional cross section of actual neurons. It's the cube in the top center of the picture. The complexity of connections between even just a few neurons is immense. Each color is a different neuron: brain slice. Now scale that up to 100 billion, and make sense of it....
if the signal were combined with another sound pattern which the receiving end would know how to properly remove after decryption..... I have to wonder why this isn't being done. It is simply too obvious to patent.
You obviously haven't been paying attention to the absolute nonsense that has been successfully receiving patents these days.
I think there are more reasons why people tie quantum physics and consciousness together than has been discussed here. Anyone with a real understanding of science wouldn't claim that there is an actual connection between the two (unless perhaps they are a neurophysiologist and have actual experimental results). What people are doing is conjecturing and hypothesizing, and there is nothing wrong with that. That is quite different from claiming there exists an actual phenomenon. The reasons people conjecture are many, but here are mine:
* Quantum effects at the microscopic level can have macroscopic consequences. A single photon or electron or other particle can be used to affect change at the macroscopic level. For instance, you could connect a photon detector to switch that would decide whether a train goes north or south. The state of a single electron within a computer can have massive effects on the stock market. * The observer is a critical aspect of quantum theory. Incoherent systems cohere (in relation to the observer) once the state is observed. An "observer" is really just another particle than interacts with the system in question. We as humans are not monolithic objects, but an enormous complex of particles, so when we "observe" a system, what does that mean? Does it mean when the measurement from the instrument hits your eye? Or when the signal from your eye hits your brain? Or when your cortex processes that data? There is a long complex chain of interaction that happens, so it's not as simple as the thought experiments in elementary physics books. * Our consciousness is the subjective experience of the particles that make up our brain. What state are these particles in in a quantum sense? Are they coherent or not? Can we "observe" our own brain? What are the implications of the observed system being the observer itself? * Since particles that make up the brain are normal particles modeled by quantum physics, they are also under the same rules, meaning they can be in a decohered state. Since we have already asserted above that single particles can have macroscopic consequences, is there a possibility that a single particle in the brain cohering into one state or another can have real consequences? Being that our consciousness is subjective, internal experience of these brain particles, is it possible that there could be a causal relationship between the subjective thought itself and external phenomenon, in one direction or another?
I recognize these thoughts are not based in deep quantum theory or neurophysiology, but I still think that they reflect what people are wondering, and the experts in these fields aren't addressing the laymen very well when broaching this topic.
Seriously, this is a really ignorant article. Almost all the complaints are bullshit.
PC-Write, the old DOS text processor I used to write my freelance articles with, and also PEN, a Unix screen-oriented text editor that was at BBN when I worked there, which I used for writing computer documentation and other projects -- could split the screen window as many times as I wanted (e.g., I could have five or six slices of a file showing). For editing long, complex documents, this was a great convenience. By contrast, Microsoft Word can only split the screen in two.
VI anyone?
I really miss the 'clicky' IBM Model M keyboards from the mid and late '80s, for instance.
This is mass hysteria. For every fanboy that raves about their model M, there are 20 people that can't stand 5 minutes typing on these things. I tried it. Your significant other can't sleep at night, and your fingers get tired. They are old outdated pieces of shit.
This keyboard isn't cheap, Hedtke concedes: "They were nearly $200 when CVT was making them directly, and the current Avant Stellar keyboard is around $325. But for many of us, it's more than worth it."
You are a fucking moron if you pay $325 for this $20 dollar contraption. Don't believe the hype. The thing has a PS/2 connector for fuck sake!
CONTROL-C and CONTROL-Q "which could kill an accidentally triggered program, along with the Unix Control-C and kill -9 for command line Unix. I'm not sure if anything exists that can do that as quickly at the GUI level.
ctrl-c and kill -9 STILL work in *nix. You can even kill GUI apps using the command line, duh. Adding a GUI doesn't prevent you from using a terminal.
"One, moving 'Destroy Window' -- usually indicated by a square icon with an 'X' in it -- from the opposite end of the title bar where I'd only click on it when I MEANT it, to right next to 'Iconify' and 'Maximize.'" This window control problem is now universal, according to Cattey: "It's on Windows, Linux and MacOS, as well as Solaris."
What??? It is NOT universal. It depends on what window decorator you use. There is no "standard" for linux. Every distribution is different, and it's always configurable.
Before there were scrollbars, command-line interfaces to Unix and DOS would paginate output and pause when the screen was full, until you requested the next screenful with the "more" command
"more" is still there, but remember, "less" is "more".
"As a developer, I found it very useful for when I ran scripts that produced a surprisingly large amount of output or a lot of error messages," says Franklin. "I did not need to run the command [more] over again in order to see it all. This feature has never been in another version of UNIX or Linux since."
Umm, this actually sounds annoying as hell. There is a reason more and less are separate commands. If you REALLY wanted to have an automatic "more" command, you could write a shell wrapper. But in the end, some programs require a TTY, and having this automatic "more" functionality will break them.
"XEDIT had the ability to restrict the file to a part, and have all editing commands, such as 'go to top/search and replace/select to bottom,' only work on that part of the file."
Once again, VI. While not exactly the same, you can do analogous functionality in VI. And much more.
"It could overlay hardware, firmware and regular memory as needed, and had no reserved memory sections. This let me write macros that were globally available."
This is the dumbest comment of all. Can you imagine if modern computers were implemented this way? You'd be rebooting 10 times a day.
When he switched to PCs, he used DOS's TSR (Terminate and Stay-Resident) feature. "Now, I'm
As someone who studied both orchestral music and computer science, I have a few comments. The equivalent of a "good orchestra" in computer science would be a good research lab or a good product team. These are also quite rare, but don't get the same fame that a "good orchestra" would. There are a few exceptions, such as the iPhone team, MIT media lab, and some others. Also, there are a lot of musicians out there that didn't make the cut. The difference is, in CS, if you don't make the cut, you can still get a job and learn the trade, because the massive amount of computer work out there. The same is not true of music, so if you want to make a living at it, you have to be extremely good - there just isn't a lot of work out there. Mind you, there are gigs that don't require a lot of talent - making music for commercials, cartoons, shitty video games, etc, but the amount is still much less than the amount of computer work. Also, the purpose of CS work is usually quite pragmatic, whereas music is usually quite aesthetic.
My point is just that you can't directly compare the two, because the differences are great.
Is it just me or does there seem to be a serious coffee lobby / PR organization at work here? No exaggeration, every three months for the last couple decades I've seen some story about the benefits of coffee on health. It is clearly legal because it is a workers' drug. It keeps people focused during work, while leaving them slightly frazzled afterwards so that they have no energy for anything else.
Did anyone read the articles on this? The benefit was found for those who drank SIX cups or more a day. Jumping off a tall building also reduces prostate cancer - by 100%.
Do you have a direct source? Please provide us with the link.
Re:This is not the logic you are looking for
on
Is Sugar Toxic?
·
· Score: 1
Everything is toxic
Look up the difference between acute toxicity and chronic toxicity. LD50 is a measure of acute toxicity. This article is about chronic toxicity. big difference. While we're speaking in cliches, let me tell you that it's "apples and oranges".
Paracelsus, the father of toxicology
whatever, dude
Re:This is not the logic you are looking for
on
Is Sugar Toxic?
·
· Score: 1
Everything is toxic
There is a big difference between acute toxicity and chronic toxicity. LD50 is a measure of acute toxicity. This article is about chronic toxicity. While we are in the realm of cliche, let me tell you that the comparison is "apples and oranges".
And swimming is the healthiest exercise, and other stupid cliches. I suggest you all look up the difference between acute toxicity and chronic toxicity.
Re:This is not the logic you are looking for
on
Is Sugar Toxic?
·
· Score: 1
Everything is toxic
How does this mindless repitition get rated insightful? LD50 is used to measure a single deadly dosage (acute toxicity). That is much different from disease caused by long term exposure to a toxin (chronic toxicity). It's like comparing the effect of shooting yourself in the skull to the effects of a series of concussions. apples and oranges.
Can I be the first to say that? Is this what people are aspiring to these days? Toilet paper folding records??? Is there some complex math or interesting folding dynamics involved here? What's the hook? Or are they just a bunch of obsessive compulsive retards?
Every company I've worked at and virtually every ISP I've utilized have used CentOS as their main Linux distro. Maybe Debian is tops for hobbyist use, but CentOS / Redhat Enterprise is king of the corporate world.
In other words, there is no one distro to rule them all - depends on the context.
Hey look, I can store all my data on Chinese government owned computing equipment where they can read it at will and the government can then threaten to cut me off from said data unless I pay them a bribe! I can get all this for slightly less than I'm paying now! I'd be a fool not to!
Do you seriously think that other data centers in China are not directly accessible by the government?
Slashdot Mirror
We have no fucking clue what it takes to support life as we know it, and we won't until we fully understand life and the process of abiogenesis. We do know a lot about where life cannot survive though, e.g. no oxygen, no water, etc. These equations are pretty much arbitrary.
I agree with you on the premise that quantum effects can't be automatically ruled out in a final (or even partial) explanation for brain function and consciousness. But a direct comparison between neuron count and transistor count makes no sense. The devil is in the details, and there is a lot of power in the architecture of (or lack thereof) the brain. The brain is massively connected and parallel, and we have nothing that comes close to the architecture of the brain. In other words, there is a lot to deal with before we even get to the quantum side of things.
Check out work on the connectome (a mapping of connections of neurons in the brain): Human Connectome Project
And check out this 3 dimensional cross section of actual neurons. It's the cube in the top center of the picture. The complexity of connections between even just a few neurons is immense. Each color is a different neuron: brain slice. Now scale that up to 100 billion, and make sense of it....
if the signal were combined with another sound pattern which the receiving end would know how to properly remove after decryption ..... I have to wonder why this isn't being done. It is simply too obvious to patent.
You obviously haven't been paying attention to the absolute nonsense that has been successfully receiving patents these days.
I think there are more reasons why people tie quantum physics and consciousness together than has been discussed here. Anyone with a real understanding of science wouldn't claim that there is an actual connection between the two (unless perhaps they are a neurophysiologist and have actual experimental results). What people are doing is conjecturing and hypothesizing, and there is nothing wrong with that. That is quite different from claiming there exists an actual phenomenon. The reasons people conjecture are many, but here are mine:
* Quantum effects at the microscopic level can have macroscopic consequences. A single photon or electron or other particle can be used to affect change at the macroscopic level. For instance, you could connect a photon detector to switch that would decide whether a train goes north or south. The state of a single electron within a computer can have massive effects on the stock market.
* The observer is a critical aspect of quantum theory. Incoherent systems cohere (in relation to the observer) once the state is observed. An "observer" is really just another particle than interacts with the system in question. We as humans are not monolithic objects, but an enormous complex of particles, so when we "observe" a system, what does that mean? Does it mean when the measurement from the instrument hits your eye? Or when the signal from your eye hits your brain? Or when your cortex processes that data? There is a long complex chain of interaction that happens, so it's not as simple as the thought experiments in elementary physics books.
* Our consciousness is the subjective experience of the particles that make up our brain. What state are these particles in in a quantum sense? Are they coherent or not? Can we "observe" our own brain? What are the implications of the observed system being the observer itself?
* Since particles that make up the brain are normal particles modeled by quantum physics, they are also under the same rules, meaning they can be in a decohered state. Since we have already asserted above that single particles can have macroscopic consequences, is there a possibility that a single particle in the brain cohering into one state or another can have real consequences? Being that our consciousness is subjective, internal experience of these brain particles, is it possible that there could be a causal relationship between the subjective thought itself and external phenomenon, in one direction or another?
I recognize these thoughts are not based in deep quantum theory or neurophysiology, but I still think that they reflect what people are wondering, and the experts in these fields aren't addressing the laymen very well when broaching this topic.
LS
Seriously, this is a really ignorant article. Almost all the complaints are bullshit.
PC-Write, the old DOS text processor I used to write my freelance articles with, and also PEN, a Unix screen-oriented text editor that was at BBN when I worked there, which I used for writing computer documentation and other projects -- could split the screen window as many times as I wanted (e.g., I could have five or six slices of a file showing). For editing long, complex documents, this was a great convenience. By contrast, Microsoft Word can only split the screen in two.
VI anyone?
I really miss the 'clicky' IBM Model M keyboards from the mid and late '80s, for instance.
This is mass hysteria. For every fanboy that raves about their model M, there are 20 people that can't stand 5 minutes typing on these things. I tried it. Your significant other can't sleep at night, and your fingers get tired. They are old outdated pieces of shit.
This keyboard isn't cheap, Hedtke concedes: "They were nearly $200 when CVT was making them directly, and the current Avant Stellar keyboard is around $325. But for many of us, it's more than worth it."
You are a fucking moron if you pay $325 for this $20 dollar contraption. Don't believe the hype. The thing has a PS/2 connector for fuck sake!
CONTROL-C and CONTROL-Q "which could kill an accidentally triggered program, along with the Unix Control-C and kill -9 for command line Unix. I'm not sure if anything exists that can do that as quickly at the GUI level.
ctrl-c and kill -9 STILL work in *nix. You can even kill GUI apps using the command line, duh. Adding a GUI doesn't prevent you from using a terminal.
"One, moving 'Destroy Window' -- usually indicated by a square icon with an 'X' in it -- from the opposite end of the title bar where I'd only click on it when I MEANT it, to right next to 'Iconify' and 'Maximize.'" This window control problem is now universal, according to Cattey: "It's on Windows, Linux and MacOS, as well as Solaris."
What??? It is NOT universal. It depends on what window decorator you use. There is no "standard" for linux. Every distribution is different, and it's always configurable.
Before there were scrollbars, command-line interfaces to Unix and DOS would paginate output and pause when the screen was full, until you requested the next screenful with the "more" command
"more" is still there, but remember, "less" is "more".
"As a developer, I found it very useful for when I ran scripts that produced a surprisingly large amount of output or a lot of error messages," says Franklin. "I did not need to run the command [more] over again in order to see it all. This feature has never been in another version of UNIX or Linux since."
Umm, this actually sounds annoying as hell. There is a reason more and less are separate commands. If you REALLY wanted to have an automatic "more" command, you could write a shell wrapper. But in the end, some programs require a TTY, and having this automatic "more" functionality will break them.
"XEDIT had the ability to restrict the file to a part, and have all editing commands, such as 'go to top/search and replace/select to bottom,' only work on that part of the file."
Once again, VI. While not exactly the same, you can do analogous functionality in VI. And much more.
"It could overlay hardware, firmware and regular memory as needed, and had no reserved memory sections. This let me write macros that were globally available."
This is the dumbest comment of all. Can you imagine if modern computers were implemented this way? You'd be rebooting 10 times a day.
When he switched to PCs, he used DOS's TSR (Terminate and Stay-Resident) feature. "Now, I'm
As someone who studied both orchestral music and computer science, I have a few comments. The equivalent of a "good orchestra" in computer science would be a good research lab or a good product team. These are also quite rare, but don't get the same fame that a "good orchestra" would. There are a few exceptions, such as the iPhone team, MIT media lab, and some others. Also, there are a lot of musicians out there that didn't make the cut. The difference is, in CS, if you don't make the cut, you can still get a job and learn the trade, because the massive amount of computer work out there. The same is not true of music, so if you want to make a living at it, you have to be extremely good - there just isn't a lot of work out there. Mind you, there are gigs that don't require a lot of talent - making music for commercials, cartoons, shitty video games, etc, but the amount is still much less than the amount of computer work. Also, the purpose of CS work is usually quite pragmatic, whereas music is usually quite aesthetic.
My point is just that you can't directly compare the two, because the differences are great.
Is it just me or does there seem to be a serious coffee lobby / PR organization at work here? No exaggeration, every three months for the last couple decades I've seen some story about the benefits of coffee on health. It is clearly legal because it is a workers' drug. It keeps people focused during work, while leaving them slightly frazzled afterwards so that they have no energy for anything else.
Did anyone read the articles on this? The benefit was found for those who drank SIX cups or more a day. Jumping off a tall building also reduces prostate cancer - by 100%.
Yo Dawg,
I heard you like me so we put my music videos on Xiang Zhang's graphene modulator network so you can watch Xzibit on Exabit.
Problem is that logic is based on axioms. And logic itself is not provably consistent. Reference: Godel's incompleteness theorem
ISI and al Qaeda have confirmed he was killed
Do you have a direct source? Please provide us with the link.
Everything is toxic
Look up the difference between acute toxicity and chronic toxicity. LD50 is a measure of acute toxicity. This article is about chronic toxicity. big difference. While we're speaking in cliches, let me tell you that it's "apples and oranges".
Paracelsus, the father of toxicology
whatever, dude
Everything is toxic
There is a big difference between acute toxicity and chronic toxicity. LD50 is a measure of acute toxicity. This article is about chronic toxicity. While we are in the realm of cliche, let me tell you that the comparison is "apples and oranges".
Paracelsus, the father of toxicology
Whatever, dude
"Everything is toxic"
And swimming is the healthiest exercise, and other stupid cliches. I suggest you all look up the difference between acute toxicity and chronic toxicity.
Everything is toxic
How does this mindless repitition get rated insightful? LD50 is used to measure a single deadly dosage (acute toxicity). That is much different from disease caused by long term exposure to a toxin (chronic toxicity). It's like comparing the effect of shooting yourself in the skull to the effects of a series of concussions. apples and oranges.
Paracelsus, the father of toxicology.
whatever, dude.
They become excellent learners in the new state, and stop learning entirely in the old state.
Which means you'll learn great in the classroom, and you'll learn absolutely nothing from normal experiences -- when you're off the juice.
Sounds like coffee to me. I'm not joking.
I believe the only reason coffee isn't outlawed is because it allows you to borrow energy from your personal life and input it into your work life.
Wish I had mod points.... +1 funny!
Can I be the first to say that? Is this what people are aspiring to these days? Toilet paper folding records??? Is there some complex math or interesting folding dynamics involved here? What's the hook? Or are they just a bunch of obsessive compulsive retards?
So If I weighed something in a bright yellow zone, then in a dark blue zone, would I be able to see a difference on an ordinary scale?
No, it's about ACTUALLY fooling people. This is fooling no one. Also, it's about fun. This is not fun.
So why is beating and killing prostitutes in GTA ok, but this some kind of travesty?
Every company I've worked at and virtually every ISP I've utilized have used CentOS as their main Linux distro. Maybe Debian is tops for hobbyist use, but CentOS / Redhat Enterprise is king of the corporate world.
In other words, there is no one distro to rule them all - depends on the context.
LS
I have not seen a WYSIWYG tool for any of these technologies that comes even close to the development environment of Flash
Not released yet, but this might be it: Adobe Edge
Hey look, I can store all my data on Chinese government owned computing equipment where they can read it at will and the government can then threaten to cut me off from said data unless I pay them a bribe! I can get all this for slightly less than I'm paying now! I'd be a fool not to!
Do you seriously think that other data centers in China are not directly accessible by the government?
Let's test it. Here's some chinese: slashdot
Nuke them all. Their respective God will provide his true chosen people with the ability to live in the radioactive wasteland.
Your half-conscious response is just as stereotypical as theirs.