Using both perl and PHP for my various needs, I find that they have equally valid uses for me. I am much happier programming my PHP for WWW-to-DBI applications. If I have my postgresql DB up and running, then I find it more intuitive to use PHP commands that I've learned to access that data and then use its scripting to do any data manipulation (rather than pass it off to another language, etc).
When I'm not accessing my database and just need to parse output or setup other sorts of webpages and things, I find perl to be exceptionally talented as well. It all depends on the entire context of my problem and the involvement of databases and DBIs for me. I know that perl has DBI capability, but I find PHP's DBI commands and things to be a bit more intuitive to the way I think.
This is very similar to Larry's reason for Perl in the first place: Anything to make the user happier about programming the way they want to program...
Actually, at 12:09 EDT, the post changed to spell it as "vinyl". But realize that most Italians actually spell the word "vinile". The link is also to an Italian website. The poster is also anonymous, but I'm willing to guess since the site is most likely a hoax, the poster was also the author of the site having some fun.
Also realize that they did NOT stop sending a message to story submitters. They simply changed the message to say "you won't receive a message"...which just smacks of more hypocrisy than having received an unsolicited message from a spam-hating website.
The system is being configured to provide a 'telegraph' (email) and telephone (VOIP communication) among the villages, via the Lao phone system, and worldwide through Internet telephony.
And this leads to:
(ring, ring) Hello. I am calling from a small Laotian village to tell you about the great savings you can get by subscribing to Time magazine for only pennies a day...(hangup)
Or this:
("You have mail") These small village Laotian girls are waiting for you! Just click here to see hot wild natives going crazy for you live!
First to answer the question in the post about dragons: This simulation is not going to lead to that without some sort of random addition of mutation to the system (which isn't described in the article). The "cell types" that are used by the program to create the "genomes" are only what we understand on a very low resolution level. We don't have any equal representation for "fire-breath" and we certainly wouldn't have any clue what the high-resolution DNA sequence/genetic expression profile for that cell-type would be even if it were included in the simulation as described.
This simulation is on par (maybe a *little* more in-depth than) the GOLEM project that's been running out of Brandeis for quite a while now (you can download your own evolution simulation). Basic blocks which when recombined with each other "develop" into more complex things that can be rated on their ability to function in a certain role and be recombined to hopefully produce something even more efficient.
More impressive forced-evolution science is the DNA shuffling work of labs and companies like Maxygen. This is truly evolution in a tube and deals directly with the genetic sequence as opposed to higher-level vague cell-type simulations.
But the great thing about science is that there's room enough in it for pretty much any research.
Re:Wasn't there a program somewhat like this...?
on
Virtual Genetic Evolution
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· Score: 3, Informative
It is called GOLEM and is found at http://golem03.cs-i.brandeis.edu/. It's not a bad little program and fun to watch as a screensaver (personally more fun than the SETI@Home fast Fourier transforms flying by).
The parents of Harold Theodore Michelis-Lenord (H. T. M.-L.) are suing the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) for their use of their son's copyrighted initials.
Swords usually cut both ways. If they want to send political spam, then why not have someone start sending out spam purporting to be from any candidate that has begun using spam. Except in *this* spam put suggestively offensive material in it, or anything in opposition to his views, or something entirely disgusting...whatever you want.
The politician who chose to go this route is going to have to waste time and effort defending which e-mail is his *real* spam and his fake spam. Maybe they'll eventually give up on this ridiculous crap. If they want to use a cheaper medium like the internet, instead of spam, they should get a good website together and have pre-poll websites run by the election boards to house links to all of the candidates. Even better would be to then include links to the Women Voters' questionnaire answers and other information from the campaigning period (editorials, interviews, etc).
So it turns out that Ted Williams didn't want to be frozen by cryonics. After seeing the LifeGem website, he actually said "I'd like to be a piece of ice when I die".
More interesting than Zoo Attraction
on
How To Clone A Mammoth
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· Score: 4, Interesting
As a bioinformaticist, I'd find it more interesting to get the DNA sequence from these frozen specimens than growing them up Jurassic-Park-style. A lot of what we know about our "ancestor's DNA" (see the race gene, the talking gene stories by S Paabo) is extrapolated from the DNA in organisms now-a-days. The "years ago" applied to these things are highly suspect (attributed by simple math extractions based upon pseudo-expected mutation rates). Comparing the DNA of these frozen specimens to that of modern-day elephants can shed some light on mammalian DNA mutation rates and protein evolution. Right now, we can usually only make best guesses given a somewhat single-rate equation for time. It is completely imaginable that the mutations happened in batches and by looking at the differences, we may be able to answer some of these questions.
Of course, instead we could just make these things to flash in front of the people and make them shudder in awe of our mighty genetic prowess until they escape our electric fences and hunt us down with their extended middle claw...
For example, I think that if checksum-based spam filtering becomes a serious obstacle, the spammers will just switch to mad-lib techniques for generating message bodies.
I might actually read that kind of spam in the future.
Subject: __________ (noun) Enlargement in ____ (number) days!!!!!
Hello _________(name),
Would you like to __________(verb) for only the cost of _______(number) ___________ (hot beverage)?
Just use this link ____________(website) to get started __________(date)!
If you'd like to unsubscribe, ________(verb) _________ (place).
You might find that supporting intelligent, educated researchers was more gratifying than supported clueless dialup lusers.
I have found that when it comes to computers, supporting most intelligent, educated science researchers is barely one half-step up from clueless dialup lusers. More often than not, they are no more tech-saavy (hey, someone has to go home after a hard day in the lab and be the clueless dialup luser at night) and maybe even more pushy than your regular dipstick behind the keyboard (they like to think they're a step ahead of a WebTV user). In the end, that means you have users under you who are experimenting with things they shouldn't, crashing things and not telling anyone or restarting the system, and if it's a shared computer in the lab that you're being asked to work on...god help you. If you do go out to find a sysadmin job in academia, be sure to survey the damage before you say yes and determine whether the user base is as good with computers as they hope they are in their prospective degrees. Trust me.
(21:13:55) Me: who's on first?
(21:13:55) DellDudeSteven: who
(21:14:10) Me: what's the guy's name on first base?
(21:14:10) DellDudeSteven: no. what is on second.
(21:14:24) Me: i'm not asking you who's on second
(21:14:24) DellDudeSteven: who's on first.
(21:14:29) Me: i don't know
(21:14:29) DellDudeSteven: third base.
(21:14:39) Me: how did i get on third base?
(21:14:40) DellDudeSteven: i have no idea.
What is it about appreciating music that is evolutionary important?
Obviously nothing. Otherwise, evolution would have the previous generation killing the current generation. Every adult has lamented "the music these kids play nowadays" since the beginning of beguines.
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When I'm not accessing my database and just need to parse output or setup other sorts of webpages and things, I find perl to be exceptionally talented as well. It all depends on the entire context of my problem and the involvement of databases and DBIs for me. I know that perl has DBI capability, but I find PHP's DBI commands and things to be a bit more intuitive to the way I think.
This is very similar to Larry's reason for Perl in the first place: Anything to make the user happier about programming the way they want to program...
Actually, at 12:09 EDT, the post changed to spell it as "vinyl". But realize that most Italians actually spell the word "vinile". The link is also to an Italian website. The poster is also anonymous, but I'm willing to guess since the site is most likely a hoax, the poster was also the author of the site having some fun.
We didn't have to let them take off from our airspace.
Also realize that they did NOT stop sending a message to story submitters. They simply changed the message to say "you won't receive a message"...which just smacks of more hypocrisy than having received an unsolicited message from a spam-hating website.
If I blockquote your trademarked phrases in my own reply...is that considered a DMCA violation of embedded code?
(ring, ring) Hello. I am calling from a small Laotian village to tell you about the great savings you can get by subscribing to Time magazine for only pennies a day...(hangup)
Or this:
("You have mail") These small village Laotian girls are waiting for you! Just click here to see hot wild natives going crazy for you live!
Why would I want to buy an R2, when I can just build my own droid.
They had to take out all of the stuff on the mind-reading device development before they were able to release it again.
Some heroin junkies taught me how to hook up a clean IV bag, so now I just mainline high fructose corn syrup whenever I need that "extra boost".
This simulation is on par (maybe a *little* more in-depth than) the GOLEM project that's been running out of Brandeis for quite a while now (you can download your own evolution simulation). Basic blocks which when recombined with each other "develop" into more complex things that can be rated on their ability to function in a certain role and be recombined to hopefully produce something even more efficient.
More impressive forced-evolution science is the DNA shuffling work of labs and companies like Maxygen. This is truly evolution in a tube and deals directly with the genetic sequence as opposed to higher-level vague cell-type simulations.
But the great thing about science is that there's room enough in it for pretty much any research.
It is called GOLEM and is found at http://golem03.cs-i.brandeis.edu/. It's not a bad little program and fun to watch as a screensaver (personally more fun than the SETI@Home fast Fourier transforms flying by).
dr evil voice: ... BILLION!?!a haa...
Why ask for 2.2 trillion when you can ask for 2.2
Muahahaha...muhaha...mmmmuuuahahahhah
The parents of Harold Theodore Michelis-Lenord (H. T. M.-L.) are suing the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) for their use of their son's copyrighted initials.
From the homepage:
If you ask me, that's pretty damning evidence of binary-level code stealing!
The politician who chose to go this route is going to have to waste time and effort defending which e-mail is his *real* spam and his fake spam. Maybe they'll eventually give up on this ridiculous crap. If they want to use a cheaper medium like the internet, instead of spam, they should get a good website together and have pre-poll websites run by the election boards to house links to all of the candidates. Even better would be to then include links to the Women Voters' questionnaire answers and other information from the campaigning period (editorials, interviews, etc).
So it turns out that Ted Williams didn't want to be frozen by cryonics. After seeing the LifeGem website, he actually said "I'd like to be a piece of ice when I die".
Of course, instead we could just make these things to flash in front of the people and make them shudder in awe of our mighty genetic prowess until they escape our electric fences and hunt us down with their extended middle claw...
I'm sorry, what were you saying about turning my cell phone off? I missed it. I was out in the lobby...buying a coke.
I might actually read that kind of spam in the future.
Subject: __________ (noun) Enlargement in ____ (number) days!!!!!
Hello _________(name),
Would you like to __________(verb) for only the cost of _______(number) ___________ (hot beverage)?
Just use this link ____________(website) to get started __________(date)!
If you'd like to unsubscribe, ________(verb) _________ (place).
(21:13:55) Me: who's on first?
(21:13:55) DellDudeSteven: who
(21:14:10) Me: what's the guy's name on first base?
(21:14:10) DellDudeSteven: no. what is on second.
(21:14:24) Me: i'm not asking you who's on second
(21:14:24) DellDudeSteven: who's on first.
(21:14:29) Me: i don't know
(21:14:29) DellDudeSteven: third base.
(21:14:39) Me: how did i get on third base?
(21:14:40) DellDudeSteven: i have no idea.
iGreg has an archive of some of his friends' encounters with ActiveBuddys here.
Wow, I never thought I'd be jaded by something so quickly before.