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User: maxwell+demon

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Comments · 12,279

  1. Re:A good start on Ask Slashdot: Should More Math and Equations Be Used In the Popular Press? · · Score: 1
  2. Re:A good start on Ask Slashdot: Should More Math and Equations Be Used In the Popular Press? · · Score: 1

    Units of measurements are points of comparison.

  3. Re:Mathematics is taught in schools... on Ask Slashdot: Should More Math and Equations Be Used In the Popular Press? · · Score: 1

    You limit yourself to a very low degree of complexity combined with a high level of fuzziness if you limit yourself to words.

    Only if you don't master the language. A text has exactly as much complexity and as much fuzziness as you allow it to have, not less, not more.

    If you think a text cannot have a high degree of complexity, however you define that complexity (you didn't give a definition; that's a fuzziness on your part, but that fuzziness is certainly not caused by the use words, but only by your decision to not define it more precisely — or, more likely, your lack of decision to do so), you obviously have not yet encountered any truly complex text. Of course in principle there exists the possibility that you are hyperintelligent and therefore consider even the most complex text as simple, but then you would surely have seen that a text does in no way have to be fuzzy (which by the way again is a term which you didn't really define).

    Oh, and you can also put mathematical formulas into words (and when doing so, you can even replace the one-letter names of the quantities by the actual names of those quantities). For example Einstein's famous equation E=mc^2 can be written in words as "the energy equals the mass times the square of the speed of light in vacuum." Of course, the essence of this equation can be formulated as "mass and energy are equivalent." Which has no obvious formulation in equations.

  4. Re:Mental capability on Ask Slashdot: Should More Math and Equations Be Used In the Popular Press? · · Score: 1

    But -1 for misspelling "Weltanschauung".

  5. Re:I just say on Ask Slashdot: Should More Math and Equations Be Used In the Popular Press? · · Score: 1

    But it is not at all obvious why the space we live in can be described accurately as such a space.

    But that's not a question of mathematics, but a question of physics.

  6. Re:No, it still looks like Snowden was lying... on Training Materials for NSA Spying Tool "XKeyScore" Revealed · · Score: 1

    Someone in some person?

  7. Re:No, it still looks like Snowden was lying... on Training Materials for NSA Spying Tool "XKeyScore" Revealed · · Score: 1

    Nor should there be. Ever.

    I see, you don't believe in human rights, only in American rights.

  8. Re:Before anybody asks... on Training Materials for NSA Spying Tool "XKeyScore" Revealed · · Score: 1

    Oh, why didn't they say this from the start! If it's running Linux, it can't be evil! Everyone knows that everything evil comes from proprietary operating systems!

  9. Re:Quote from another dead hero on Training Materials for NSA Spying Tool "XKeyScore" Revealed · · Score: 1

    Seems you need Moderatrix.

  10. Re:Skynet anyone? on Microsoft Will Have To Rename SkyDrive · · Score: 1
  11. Re:Obligatory Terminator reference on Why the Internet Needs Cognitive Protocols · · Score: 1

    If you're going to buy food anyway, it's a no-brainer to add some milk to your shopping cart. Indeed, it's less effort than constantly checking your door if some milk appeared that your fridge ordered for you. Not to mention that you generally know if next week you will be on vacation and therefore ordering new milk is a bad idea, but your fridge most likely won't.

  12. Re:Obligatory Terminator reference on Why the Internet Needs Cognitive Protocols · · Score: 3, Funny

    Put another way, "It's 2013, damnit, how can it be I'm sitting here without toilet paper!"

    You are supposed to use the three sea shells.

  13. Re:Obligatory Terminator reference on Why the Internet Needs Cognitive Protocols · · Score: 2

    Some say by 2020 or so, food, energy and water are not a problem anymore. It will be dirt cheap:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEWLjVmweoE

    And others said that by 2000, we would have flying cars.

  14. Re:Physics is a bitch on Why the Internet Needs Cognitive Protocols · · Score: 1

    Well, those cognitive routers will license technology from Sirius Cybernetics Corporation which allows the routers to see the future. Since the routers will know in advance what packets will arrive when for which destination, they can figure out the routing in advance, and as soon as the packet arrives, sent it to the right port immediately.

  15. Re:Obligatory Terminator reference on Why the Internet Needs Cognitive Protocols · · Score: 1, Funny

    I want my fridge to know what I have so that I literally never have to think about buying food again. It tracks what I use an orders more.

    If that works for you, I feel sorry for you having such a boring food plan.

  16. Re:Obligatory Terminator reference on Why the Internet Needs Cognitive Protocols · · Score: 1

    You may know it. But the NSA doesn't.

    You say they are not interested in the content of your fridge? Well, if they are interested in what you eat in the plane, then why should the not be interested in what you eat at home?

  17. Re:"lacks B-frame support" on Next-Gen Video Encoding: x265 Tackles HEVC/H.265 · · Score: 2

    "With -b 1 you activate a hack which enables a "random access" GOP structure which uses B frames."

    Will they also have a version with Democrat structure?

  18. Re:Problem is, that hollywood is ran by MBAs on Hollywood's Love of Analytics Couldn't Prevent Six Massive Blockbuster Flops · · Score: 1

    Well, maybe there should be a law against MBAs taking leading positions (unless they additionally have a relevant degree for the respective field).

  19. Re:Art, not science on Hollywood's Love of Analytics Couldn't Prevent Six Massive Blockbuster Flops · · Score: 1

    If the science is to extract as much money as possible, then there must be a flaw in that science, or else how could those movies be flops?

    Well, unless they somehow profit from those flops, of course.

  20. Re:Here's an idea on Hollywood's Love of Analytics Couldn't Prevent Six Massive Blockbuster Flops · · Score: 1

    I just want a 1% cut of all new movies.

    OK, here are some cut-out scenes. They were shit anyway.

  21. Re:It's a real shame... on What Wi-Fi Would Look Like If We Could See It · · Score: 1

    that we can't see them. ;)

    Some people can't.

  22. Re:Ummm... on Ubuntuforums.org Hacked · · Score: 1

    Actually, a cryptographic hash could be considered lossy encryption.

  23. Re:Ummm... on Ubuntuforums.org Hacked · · Score: 1

    *shrug*
    There isnt any better way to do it.
    If you post a link, your screwed too, anyone can click on it to reset the password.
    If you dont scramble the passwords, and make everyone change it on re-login, then the hackers can do that too.

    If the password to a service is sent in the clear to your email, anyone who manages to get read access to your email also gets access to that service. Even if he isn't the one who originally cracked the password of the service. That's worse than if only the original hackers can do so.

  24. Re:Sounds iffy on Study Finds Fracking Chemicals Didn't Pollute Water · · Score: 1

    Sheesh, what are you people concerned about?

    That the unique markers might pollute the environment, of course. :-)

  25. Re:treason? on MIT Uses Machine Learning Algorithm To Make TCP Twice As Fast · · Score: 1

    It's like how they can't actually charge your parents with murder if you kill someone, even if they taught you how to shoot and that it was ok to kill people.

    Certainly not for teaching you to shoot. But I'm not so sure about teaching you that it was OK to kill people.

    If they ordered you to kill people, or offered you an incentive, they certainly would be found guilty. That would basically be like hiring a killer. So there's the question at which point exactly it stops.