At the current rate of technological progress, I do not believe we will have a computer powerful enough to model the human brain until 2015 or 2020.
And even if we do, that is unlikely to be enough. The human brain is very much not a closed system. It depends on a terribly complex series of feedback mechanisms within the body, not to mention interaction with an environment that can meaningfully impinge on it.
My point isn't to claim that this makes it impossible to model (that is, after all, an empirical question): only that discussions about what would need to be modeled often seem to underestimate the real task by several orders of magnitude. We have tended to pick out the functions that are salient to us (like high-level manipulation of symbols) and striven to reproduce them alone, without a good understanding of their physiological underpinnings. If we could model even a fruit-fly's brain, we might be off to a better start.
No mention of Friedman's steaming pile of content-free platitudes would be complete without a link to this very funny review thereof:
Predictably, Friedman spends the rest of his huge book piling one insane image on top of the other, so that by the end--and I'm not joking here--we are meant to understand that the flat world is a giant ice-cream sundae that is more beef than sizzle, in which everyone can fit his hose into his fire hydrant, and in which most but not all of us are covered with a mostly good special sauce.
Ooops. I didn't mean to suggest clean water prevents AIDS. Just that simpler things that are far more cost-effective are to be preferred to intensive, but ineffective medications.
I think that you go and teach people what all the alternatives are, give them the tools, then carefully explain, that not a single ONE of those tools has done jack to STOP the increasing prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases amongst the American population.
I must be missing something here. You think condoms don't prevent transmission of STDs?
Interesting and sad. And you're right, the U.S. are not the only idiots here. Another bad superstition that's out there is that if you fuck a virgin, you will be cured. And you're right that some places where the disease is the most devastating are the poorest, making prevention more difficult. But as elsewhere in the developing world, it's been shown that the improvements that would have by far the greatest impact on health are on very basic, and relatively inexpensive things like better nutrition, clean water supply, and introduction (through education) of hygienic practices. I'm not against medicines, but if the cost of getting one person his meds is effectively 50 or 100 miserable lives that are not improved because those basic things were not taken care of, then I can't support that. That's all I meant to say about cost.
I believe that, once they know the facts, it is possible for a human being to stop themselves from doing it.
As for why anyone should stop, that is a question with many answers. One of those answers is: "So you don't get AIDS."
What do you take the facts to be? That sex inevitably leads to death? I have trouble believing you can fail to see that this is false. Condoms make sex way safer. That's all. If your only argument against it is "you might die," then you have to accept a counter-argument that shows how you can do the same thing AND NOT DIE!
Because as a taxpayer, I want the money I contribute to be put to good use, not frittered away on symbolic and meaningless programs that have no other purpose than to pacify zealots.
Are you seriously arguing that the leaders of Africa cannot or should not do anything, unless the U.S. government foots the bill?
Nope. Just that if we do help foot the bill to combat AIDS in Africa, we should do so intelligently.
Are you saying that the people of Africa lack the insight to see the wisdom of such a course, and the self-control to adopt it?
Self-control or self-mutilation? Staying indoors is a guaranteed prophylactic against roadway accidents. Do you have the insight to see the lack of wisdom in inferring from that that one should just stay indoors?
I'm against horrible diseases and unwanted pregnancies, but I don't have to be celibate to uphold those values. Why should anyone else be? The only reason can be that one is surreptitiously advocating a life in which people have little to no sexual intercourse, or only under highly restricted circumstances (e.g., marriage as a "sex license"). This is not wisdom. People who have no sexual contact in their lives are unhappier and unhealthier than those who do. It's something we're made for, and it's not something that false threats (of death, pregnancy, or worse:) can or ought to change.
Are you aware of studies that show no discernible change in the number of unwanted pregnancies in U.S. school districts where "abstinence-only" education is mandated by school boards? Teaching teens about safer sexual practices, by contrast, has been shown to have the good effects on which you claim to base your appeal to abstinence. If those results were proved to your satisfaction, would that change your mind?
If people are going to have lots of sex (which millions of years of evolution suggest they will continue to do), then why not "educate" them to do it safely, not pretend you can stop them from doing it? And in any case, why should anyone stop?
Education's very important, sure. And so is changing people's sexual practices. Those things are what will help much more than some wonder-drug. That said, the U.S. won't give money to education programs that don't preach abstinence. This is foolish, though it and things like it probably helped win Bush votes among Christian conservatives.
Yeah, there would be a hell of a lot of money in it for whoever came up with such a drug. But the things that would save the most lives right now are very well known (education, condoms, clean needles) and don't have to wait on miraculous research. What's the problem? They don't make anyone very much money (except maybe condom manufacturers). A second problem is that effective AIDS education requires telling the truth about sex (and/or intravenous drug use), something a large number of powerful people are committed to avoiding for their supposedly moral or religious reasons. Needle-exchange programs, realistic safer-sex education, and easy access to condoms have made big changes wherever they have been implemented. Unfortunately, the US only funds "abstinence-only" education programs that wag imperious fingers at people for doing something as "bad" as having sex. This is an f*ing epidemic claiming 10s of millions of lives, and we'd rather be dicks about it.
It's funny that you would say this and then say you've "grown out of high school." Look, I like shit blowing up, too, but I need more spice; I have to care, and I can't care, for example, about hunky Kevin Sorbo strutting around his ship playing basketball with "Nietzscheans," no matter how many exciting chase-scenes or laser-pistol fights the show provides.
That doesn't make me a drama queen, that makes me discerning. BTW, nice troll.;->
This criticism of names for Linux apps is right on in my opinion (I'm looking at you, KDE developers). That said, the least informative name ever has to be Adobe Acrobat, confused even further by the difference between Acrobat and Acrobat Reader.
Your criticism about "shaky cams" is fitting... to the first season of NYPD Blue, all those years ago. There, it was used as a gimmick, without any rhyme or reason beyond looking "edgy." Camera movements were unnecessary and unmotivated, adding nothing to the perception of the action. I don't think you can say the same about the use of this filming technique in BSG.
Here, some of the best moments--the real high points of the show--occur when people's non-verbal reactions are highlighted by judicious use of close-up or shifting of perspective. You get to watch people make bad decisions on the basis of their emotional reactions at the same time that you sympathize with them, or at least understand why they feel they have to act as they do. It doesn't always hit the mark, but when it does, I think, it's better than anything else on TV.
Slashdot Mirror
And even if we do, that is unlikely to be enough. The human brain is very much not a closed system. It depends on a terribly complex series of feedback mechanisms within the body, not to mention interaction with an environment that can meaningfully impinge on it.
My point isn't to claim that this makes it impossible to model (that is, after all, an empirical question): only that discussions about what would need to be modeled often seem to underestimate the real task by several orders of magnitude. We have tended to pick out the functions that are salient to us (like high-level manipulation of symbols) and striven to reproduce them alone, without a good understanding of their physiological underpinnings. If we could model even a fruit-fly's brain, we might be off to a better start.
Anyway, that's my two cents.
You shouldn't use computers. Computers are bad, m'kay? If you use computers, which are bad, you're bad, m'kay? And that's bad.
Can I cite you on that?
...is this the result of another brilliant recess appointment of an unqualified person to a government post? ;-)
I'm a mere hobbyist, and I agree. I knew no C++ before starting to write a QT4 app, but found it pretty easy going.
Sounds like Bush. Now more people will switch to Democ^H^H^H^H^H Mac OS X.
Oi! Get off the lawn, you lot!
The Horta?
Ooops. I didn't mean to suggest clean water prevents AIDS. Just that simpler things that are far more cost-effective are to be preferred to intensive, but ineffective medications.
I must be missing something here. You think condoms don't prevent transmission of STDs?
Here's one article on "health infrastructure" in developing countries.
As for why anyone should stop, that is a question with many answers. One of those answers is: "So you don't get AIDS."
What do you take the facts to be? That sex inevitably leads to death? I have trouble believing you can fail to see that this is false. Condoms make sex way safer. That's all. If your only argument against it is "you might die," then you have to accept a counter-argument that shows how you can do the same thing AND NOT DIE!
Are you able to read?
Because as a taxpayer, I want the money I contribute to be put to good use, not frittered away on symbolic and meaningless programs that have no other purpose than to pacify zealots.
Are you seriously arguing that the leaders of Africa cannot or should not do anything, unless the U.S. government foots the bill?
Nope. Just that if we do help foot the bill to combat AIDS in Africa, we should do so intelligently.
Self-control or self-mutilation? Staying indoors is a guaranteed prophylactic against roadway accidents. Do you have the insight to see the lack of wisdom in inferring from that that one should just stay indoors?
I'm against horrible diseases and unwanted pregnancies, but I don't have to be celibate to uphold those values. Why should anyone else be? The only reason can be that one is surreptitiously advocating a life in which people have little to no sexual intercourse, or only under highly restricted circumstances (e.g., marriage as a "sex license"). This is not wisdom. People who have no sexual contact in their lives are unhappier and unhealthier than those who do. It's something we're made for, and it's not something that false threats (of death, pregnancy, or worse :) can or ought to change.
Are you aware of studies that show no discernible change in the number of unwanted pregnancies in U.S. school districts where "abstinence-only" education is mandated by school boards? Teaching teens about safer sexual practices, by contrast, has been shown to have the good effects on which you claim to base your appeal to abstinence. If those results were proved to your satisfaction, would that change your mind?
What you mean is the sale of such drugs "has to" enrich someone.
I have a prescription for you: 500g of this snake-oil I'm peddling. It contains 100% atoms! It's bound to work!
And ... 8 times a day? Where does that happen?
Education's very important, sure. And so is changing people's sexual practices. Those things are what will help much more than some wonder-drug. That said, the U.S. won't give money to education programs that don't preach abstinence. This is foolish, though it and things like it probably helped win Bush votes among Christian conservatives.
Yeah, there would be a hell of a lot of money in it for whoever came up with such a drug. But the things that would save the most lives right now are very well known (education, condoms, clean needles) and don't have to wait on miraculous research. What's the problem? They don't make anyone very much money (except maybe condom manufacturers). A second problem is that effective AIDS education requires telling the truth about sex (and/or intravenous drug use), something a large number of powerful people are committed to avoiding for their supposedly moral or religious reasons. Needle-exchange programs, realistic safer-sex education, and easy access to condoms have made big changes wherever they have been implemented. Unfortunately, the US only funds "abstinence-only" education programs that wag imperious fingers at people for doing something as "bad" as having sex. This is an f*ing epidemic claiming 10s of millions of lives, and we'd rather be dicks about it.
It's funny that you would say this and then say you've "grown out of high school." Look, I like shit blowing up, too, but I need more spice; I have to care, and I can't care, for example, about hunky Kevin Sorbo strutting around his ship playing basketball with "Nietzscheans," no matter how many exciting chase-scenes or laser-pistol fights the show provides.
That doesn't make me a drama queen, that makes me discerning. BTW, nice troll. ;->
This criticism of names for Linux apps is right on in my opinion (I'm looking at you, KDE developers). That said, the least informative name ever has to be Adobe Acrobat, confused even further by the difference between Acrobat and Acrobat Reader.
Here, some of the best moments--the real high points of the show--occur when people's non-verbal reactions are highlighted by judicious use of close-up or shifting of perspective. You get to watch people make bad decisions on the basis of their emotional reactions at the same time that you sympathize with them, or at least understand why they feel they have to act as they do. It doesn't always hit the mark, but when it does, I think, it's better than anything else on TV.
Urging others to commit criminal acts might arguably be restricted.