Great post. It's important that we recognize the rights of simulated humans just as much as those of living humans. Of course, eventually the computing power necessary to do so will be available in everyone's PC, so the only way to prevent someone from creating a human simulator on their computer and torturing the sim within, will be to mandate that all computers come with DRM to prevent any kind of non-government-approved software from running. Oh well, who cares about freedom when there's imaginary people to protect?
You mean the same way as the only way to make sure we are not torturing non-simulated people is to install surveillance cameras in our homes?
What are they doing, connecting the vehicle to a nuclear power plant with 4-inch thick cables?
Well, I guess the MIT power plant isn't nuclear, but yes, according to the article, they are connecting it directly to the power plant. You don't have one in your backyard?:-)
According to the article, in order to charge the car in 10 minutes, you need 356 volts at 1000 amps. This gives a total energy of about 60kWh. Assuming 10 cents per kWh, the total refill would cost 6$. With a range of about 320 km, that would be about 53 km/$, or 33 miles per dollar.
According to this site, the Toyota Prius gets just 15 miles per dollar.
ICANN needs to figure out an enforcement policy. Perhaps it should order the root servers to stop accepting new registrations from registrars not following the rules.
But it should announce that some time before, so that innocent people registering domains know to avoid those registrars.
Time to grow up and act professionally; that means treating others with respect and judging them on their actions rather their your own prejudice.
Judging someone on his actions always means to include past actions in your judgement. If someone has a track record of being a child molester, and now opens a school, you wouldn't give your children there, just on the basis that during the last few days he didn't molest any childs, and after all, giving children an education is a good thing.
Microsoft's secret plan might look as follows: Embrace: Make more people to use the proprietary Microsoft servers. For that, it's important to allow connecting to those servers from all important clients. Therefore the Moodle contribution Extend: As soon as MS controls the server side, they can make "improvements" to the protocol which they implement in their servers and their clients (i.e. Sharepoint), but not in Moodle (possibly patent-protecting them, so Moodle cannot implement them by themselves). Since Moodle doesn't support some features of the then most popular server (see "Embrace"), people will have an incentive to switch from Moodle to Sharepoint. Extinguish: Since now MS has the majority of both the servers and the clients, it can do incompatible changes and build on the network effects to kill the competition.
So if I buy some stolen goods from a thief and then sell that stuff back to the original owners, then I'm fine because I'm not the one who has stolen the stuff? I don't think so. So why is this case different?
If by "strong determinism" you mean that someone inside the deterministic universe can do unlimited predictions about that universe, then I think "strong determinism" isn't attainable anyway. After all, under this premise, the state of the universe includes the state of the very person trying to predict it. So to determine the future of the universe, he must also predict his own future predictions, which would probably give an infinite regress.
Ok, so start the filesharing religion where one of the central beliefs is that god wants people to share, and saying anything against it is blasphemy. And then sue the music and film industry associations of the world.:-)
I admit that there could in fact be a supernatural being that we are not aware of or able to perceive
Since we cannot perceive that supernatural being, it must be in a superposition of the existence and nonexistence states. Therefore it neither does nor doesn't exist. Provided supernatural beings follow the laws of quantum mechanics, of course.
In 2000 years... Archaeologist 1: I've found an ancient data storage disk! Archaeologist 2: Cool, did you already analyze the data? A1: Strangely, there was no data on it. A2: Strange, why would someone bury a disk without data? A1: Well, those disks were writable. My theory is that the disks became very expensive at that time, and he wanted to save one disk for future use.
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Isn't that why it's called the Blue Brain Project?
What if the artificial brain sues? :-)
Well, fusion is 30 years ahead. Since more than 30 years.
Great post. It's important that we recognize the rights of simulated humans just as much as those of living humans. Of course, eventually the computing power necessary to do so will be available in everyone's PC, so the only way to prevent someone from creating a human simulator on their computer and torturing the sim within, will be to mandate that all computers come with DRM to prevent any kind of non-government-approved software from running. Oh well, who cares about freedom when there's imaginary people to protect?
You mean the same way as the only way to make sure we are not torturing non-simulated people is to install surveillance cameras in our homes?
However, the artificial brain should have a say in whatever we may do to it. Experimenting with it against its will would be unethical.
Well, I guess the MIT power plant isn't nuclear, but yes, according to the article, they are connecting it directly to the power plant. You don't have one in your backyard? :-)
How much are the transfer losses (as in fuel burned per fuel transported) for gasoline?
According to the article, in order to charge the car in 10 minutes, you need 356 volts at 1000 amps. This gives a total energy of about 60kWh. Assuming 10 cents per kWh, the total refill would cost 6$. With a range of about 320 km, that would be about 53 km/$, or 33 miles per dollar.
According to this site, the Toyota Prius gets just 15 miles per dollar.
Of course you can ask. If it will help is another question.
ICANN needs to figure out an enforcement policy. Perhaps it should order the root servers to stop accepting new registrations from registrars not following the rules.
But it should announce that some time before, so that innocent people registering domains know to avoid those registrars.
Judging someone on his actions always means to include past actions in your judgement. If someone has a track record of being a child molester, and now opens a school, you wouldn't give your children there, just on the basis that during the last few days he didn't molest any childs, and after all, giving children an education is a good thing.
The GPL was successfully tested in Germany [German language link]
Microsoft's secret plan might look as follows:
Embrace: Make more people to use the proprietary Microsoft servers. For that, it's important to allow connecting to those servers from all important clients. Therefore the Moodle contribution
Extend: As soon as MS controls the server side, they can make "improvements" to the protocol which they implement in their servers and their clients (i.e. Sharepoint), but not in Moodle (possibly patent-protecting them, so Moodle cannot implement them by themselves). Since Moodle doesn't support some features of the then most popular server (see "Embrace"), people will have an incentive to switch from Moodle to Sharepoint.
Extinguish: Since now MS has the majority of both the servers and the clients, it can do incompatible changes and build on the network effects to kill the competition.
Well, now that the FSF is using GPLv3, Microsoft can use GPLv2 and at the same time still claim the license used by FSF is evil :-)
So you can protect possible targets from radar-controlled missiles by putting wind parks nearby?
So if I buy some stolen goods from a thief and then sell that stuff back to the original owners, then I'm fine because I'm not the one who has stolen the stuff? I don't think so.
So why is this case different?
If by "strong determinism" you mean that someone inside the deterministic universe can do unlimited predictions about that universe, then I think "strong determinism" isn't attainable anyway. After all, under this premise, the state of the universe includes the state of the very person trying to predict it. So to determine the future of the universe, he must also predict his own future predictions, which would probably give an infinite regress.
No, the clear winner is Unlambda. With Shakespeare as a close second (gives a whole new meaning to literate programming!)
1: Pass a law preventing making fun of religion
2: Start a new, silly religion (like I believe in an all-powerful, all-knowing being who needs your MONEY!)
3: Profit!
That's different from all other religions how?
For most religions, the order of the first two steps is reversed.
Ok, so start the filesharing religion where one of the central beliefs is that god wants people to share, and saying anything against it is blasphemy. And then sue the music and film industry associations of the world. :-)
That's not true: Bohmian mechanics is deterministic and gives the exact same results as standard quantum mechanics.
Since we cannot perceive that supernatural being, it must be in a superposition of the existence and nonexistence states. Therefore it neither does nor doesn't exist. Provided supernatural beings follow the laws of quantum mechanics, of course.
Monism?
No, they'll be replaced by nucleolytes.
In 2000 years ...
Archaeologist 1: I've found an ancient data storage disk!
Archaeologist 2: Cool, did you already analyze the data?
A1: Strangely, there was no data on it.
A2: Strange, why would someone bury a disk without data?
A1: Well, those disks were writable. My theory is that the disks became very expensive at that time, and he wanted to save one disk for future use.