Going from 8 bit computers to 16 bit computers was a giant leap forward. Compare a ZX Spectrum/Commodore 64/Apple II/Atari 800 to Atari ST/Amiga and the differences are huge. 16-bit computers were machines that you could get things done.
32-bit systems are more than enough for most tasks.
Are 64-bit systems useful? well, perhaps for specialized tasks.
So I am not holding my breath...in 20 years time, we will still have these 32-bit PCs, and a few people will have 64-bit computers and programs.
ADA is the meanest and coolest programming language in existence. It offers features that other languages can only dream of. But it's not suitable for business tasks and such; ADA's purpose is the 'serious' software engineering, i.e. weapon systems, power plants, NASA projects etc. And it may seem similar to Pascal, but that's only superficial; there are many great differences.
But the data on it are horribly outdated! our world has changed so much since Voyager was launched.
Personally, If I was to launch a new spacecraft for this reason, I would put all versions of Microsoft Windows on it. Best security for Earth ever. No aliens will dare to come over here!!!
I believe that the brain does the simplest of operations: it only does pattern matching on the current input (the signals delivered to it from outside). Once the input is delivered, the brain does a pattern matching, and recalls the experience that best maximizes the chances of survival. The experience consists of chemical reactions which is sent back to the body. The whole process is continuous.
It's easy, if you think about it: the better pattern matching a machine can do, the more intelligence it has. Better pattern matching means more memory capacity, more parallelism, faster search, faster output.
"And this leads onto the third point. It is no good having a highly intelligent, creative machine if its use of resources is such that it cannot replicate in large numbers."
A human brain only requires a very small amount of Earth resources to operate for 70-80 years. Billions of people have lived and died. I think there is room for a creature with 10, 100, even 1000 times the intelligence of a human. It does not matter if there are many of them: even one of them is enough to bring the singularity on.
"Why would anyone give this ultra-intelligent machine self-awareness?"
Self-awareness is automatically created in ultra-intelligent entities. Intelligence means to be able to model the world; if you are intelligent enough, the model can have you in the center, and thus you become self-aware.
"Or even give it arms/legs/options to do anything except communicate via a screen?"
Because androids will be really helpful in doing jobs people no longer want to do.
Star Blazers had more drama and better music, plus it had the coolest villains around, and the separation between good and bad guys was so clear! real Hollywood stuff!
TOS was more of a classic hero epic story, i.e. we are the 3 hero guys, everything is about us, watch us, adore us...TOS red shirts died in numbers...TNG was more pragmatic. Less deaths, a captain who could not operate with his officers...Data was the true protagonist of TNG, even if Picard stole the spotlight, thanks to Stewart.
Well, after 2000 years of Christianity, things have come around and now it is a non-violent religion.
Imagine yourself in western continental Europe though, as a peasant, around 1500 AD. If you denounced Christianity openly, you would be burned as a witch.
"Does the "religion" make you pay to find their beliefs? Christians/Jews/Muslims: No Scientology: Yes"
Well, if you ever go to Sunday Church, and don't put money on the collection plate, and receive the cold look from the fellow Christians, you don't really know if you have to pay for it...
Being able to hurt others is not a right. Smokers have the right to smoke anywhere, until someone complains.
Here is an example: suppose I was a crazy person who liked to shoot at every other person around for fun, not directly at them, but around them.
Would you say that I have the right to shoot at you in a restaurant, where you went with your family to have a nice dinner? Would you say you have no right to demand I conform to your expectations of no shooting?
Hahahahahahaha... that gave me a good laugh. I didn't think there were people in Norway reading Slashdot that actually believes that chit. Oh well, I guess all nerds are not smart.
He said "best", not the ideal...which means that, when compared to most other countries, Norway is one of the best places to live right now. Would you rather starve in India, Bangladesh or Africa?
Now, let's work on a myth. "Norway is the best country in the world to live in". It isn't. Never was. Not even close
There is no such thing as a paradise, and it will never be. All places have their problems.
This taxation made it possible to build a social system that protects the mediocre and cradles it. It has been protected and nourished to the level where it is now the ultimate goal. Meidiocracy (tm). Socialism rewards mediocrity.
One of the reasons humanity suffers is the notion that political systems should only reward the people who rise above mediocrity. This view is the dominant view currently in the world, thanks to the media that always focus on rich and successful people. But what about all the others? should all the rest suffer because the system only favors the more clever and capable people? It's better for the more capable people, in the long run, to have society catter for everyone, and thus spare a revolution or two.
In the real world where resources have to be created and refined, socialism doesn't, and never will, work.
No political system works if people are to exploit it for their own benefit. Take USA, for example: it has the richest people in the world, but also 40 million Americans live below the poverty line.
I think this device shows that pattern matching is all there is to life and intelligence. All that has to be done for artificial AI is an engine which tries to find a solution using statistical methods.
By the way, this thing proves evolution one more: by trial and error, living entities have been developed...
Well said! I think your words must be printed in bold and delivered to the press right away. I will keep your text in a file, so I can show it to people (I am not a native English speaker, so I have trouble saying it so well) when it is required. I will also put your comment in the message boards of startrek.com, because there are lots of people there claiming that DS9 (the Dawson's Creek of Star Trek) was the best series of them all.
So what would you, the programmer do, if faced with the demonic code mentioned earlier and the prospect of managing it for the next forseeable future. Use the well-know way and write on or be bold and pull the plug and start from (almost) scratch?
I would continue the story into the 25th century, showing a new USS Enterprise in a mission to explore the rest of the galaxy, sent by the United Federation of Planets. I would put the Klingons, the Romulans and the Cardassians in the Federation as well, so as that new races would come into focus. I would not update the technology, as the story would be a few years after Voyager. I would continue the story of Utopia of Rodenberry, and the series would be focused on exploration, primarily of space, and then of characters.
If you find it boring, then go watch other things, with death, war, murders and intrigue in it. We Star Trek fans don't want any of that.
The result is infinitely better than what came before
The result is infinitely more stupid than what came before. Human descendants wearing ties and suits, having a president, worrying about terrorism, using hand guns, pistols and rifles, etc? yeah, right. Humans made advanced cyborgs, the Cylons, but they couldn't get a descent ray gun even if their life depended on it...infinitely better my a$$...at least the original Starbuck was THE character.
Reinvent the franchise. Give it new life. Change things around and craft a story that can attract a new generation of fans rather than appealing to the people who spend all their life studying the minutiae of the shows.
And of course, this has to be done with planets being destroyed, political intrigue, war, and a love story in the middle, right? right? well, let me tell you a secret: we, the fans, do not want to see war melodramas. We want to see space mysteries. It's a voyage in the stars, not a retelling of WWII with different people.
I've been a fan of Star Trek all my life, but the franchise grew stale and repetitive.
It got stale and repetitive because, instead of seeing new mysteries every week, we got the same tired formula of one people vs another people. With 200 billion stars in this galaxy alone, the writers could give us something better...at least with TNG and VOY we got to see some space mysteries never seen before in other sci-fi series.
I hope J.J. Abrams has the pure chutzpah
Are you of Jewish origin? isn't the word 'chutzpah' Jewish? isn't JJ Abrams of Jewish origin? isn't Nimoy of Jewish origin?
Assuming your origin does not influence your judgment, TNG was the biggest success of all Star Trek exactly because it was a utopia, a bright future, a cerebral existence. You want to show something different? take this real dark and grim world and turn it into a Utopia...a place with true equality, true democracy, no nepotism, no imperialism, etc. And then write stories that tell you how we got there, how we can achieve it, how we got over our differences, how we can maintain it, what technology can do for us, and analyse everything in the context of a bright future that humanity can achieve. Now that's something interesting, not the next war!
Rodenberry has understood the above, and while he was alive, Trek would never be just another series filled with death, sex and violence...
Security is one of those properties that either exists or not. Saying that something is "more secure" is saying something like "being a little pregnant"!!! you either have security and nobody can break in or you don't.
Does matter itself expand? Do galaxies and celestial bodies become bigger as the universe expands? or it is only the space between matter that expands? what about the space between particles?
Slashdot Mirror
Its the mud that causes the problem...
Going from 8 bit computers to 16 bit computers was a giant leap forward. Compare a ZX Spectrum/Commodore 64/Apple II/Atari 800 to Atari ST/Amiga and the differences are huge. 16-bit computers were machines that you could get things done.
32-bit systems are more than enough for most tasks.
Are 64-bit systems useful? well, perhaps for specialized tasks.
So I am not holding my breath...in 20 years time, we will still have these 32-bit PCs, and a few people will have 64-bit computers and programs.
ADA is the meanest and coolest programming language in existence. It offers features that other languages can only dream of. But it's not suitable for business tasks and such; ADA's purpose is the 'serious' software engineering, i.e. weapon systems, power plants, NASA projects etc. And it may seem similar to Pascal, but that's only superficial; there are many great differences.
But the data on it are horribly outdated! our world has changed so much since Voyager was launched.
Personally, If I was to launch a new spacecraft for this reason, I would put all versions of Microsoft Windows on it. Best security for Earth ever. No aliens will dare to come over here!!!
"Here's a previous Slashdot article about the fact that he may have grasped the concept of zero"
Too bad he's dead. If he could grasp the concept of null as well, he would be a fine programmer.
I believe that the brain does the simplest of operations: it only does pattern matching on the current input (the signals delivered to it from outside). Once the input is delivered, the brain does a pattern matching, and recalls the experience that best maximizes the chances of survival. The experience consists of chemical reactions which is sent back to the body. The whole process is continuous.
"Intelligence is not well defined"
It's easy, if you think about it: the better pattern matching a machine can do, the more intelligence it has. Better pattern matching means more memory capacity, more parallelism, faster search, faster output.
"And this leads onto the third point. It is no good having a highly intelligent, creative machine if its use of resources is such that it cannot replicate in large numbers."
A human brain only requires a very small amount of Earth resources to operate for 70-80 years. Billions of people have lived and died. I think there is room for a creature with 10, 100, even 1000 times the intelligence of a human. It does not matter if there are many of them: even one of them is enough to bring the singularity on.
"Why would anyone give this ultra-intelligent machine self-awareness?"
Self-awareness is automatically created in ultra-intelligent entities. Intelligence means to be able to model the world; if you are intelligent enough, the model can have you in the center, and thus you become self-aware.
"Or even give it arms/legs/options to do anything except communicate via a screen?"
Because androids will be really helpful in doing jobs people no longer want to do.
Star Blazers had more drama and better music, plus it had the coolest villains around, and the separation between good and bad guys was so clear! real Hollywood stuff!
Apart from user stupidity, is Windows to blame for this situation? if Windows had a better security model, would there be such problems?
Can a massive lawsuit against Microsoft work?
TOS was more of a classic hero epic story, i.e. we are the 3 hero guys, everything is about us, watch us, adore us...TOS red shirts died in numbers...TNG was more pragmatic. Less deaths, a captain who could not operate with his officers...Data was the true protagonist of TNG, even if Picard stole the spotlight, thanks to Stewart.
It does not have to be killed...a nice delay, say, Moonlight being one year behind Silverlight, is enough to hurt Linux's reputation.
Well, after 2000 years of Christianity, things have come around and now it is a non-violent religion.
Imagine yourself in western continental Europe though, as a peasant, around 1500 AD. If you denounced Christianity openly, you would be burned as a witch.
It's only a matter of time...
"Does the "religion" make you pay to find their beliefs? Christians/Jews/Muslims: No Scientology: Yes"
Well, if you ever go to Sunday Church, and don't put money on the collection plate, and receive the cold look from the fellow Christians, you don't really know if you have to pay for it...
"Most examples of the former were created with the best of intentions"
And how do you know that?
Being able to hurt others is not a right. Smokers have the right to smoke anywhere, until someone complains.
Here is an example: suppose I was a crazy person who liked to shoot at every other person around for fun, not directly at them, but around them.
Would you say that I have the right to shoot at you in a restaurant, where you went with your family to have a nice dinner? Would you say you have no right to demand I conform to your expectations of no shooting?
I don't think you would.
He said "best", not the ideal...which means that, when compared to most other countries, Norway is one of the best places to live right now. Would you rather starve in India, Bangladesh or Africa?
There is no such thing as a paradise, and it will never be. All places have their problems.
One of the reasons humanity suffers is the notion that political systems should only reward the people who rise above mediocrity. This view is the dominant view currently in the world, thanks to the media that always focus on rich and successful people. But what about all the others? should all the rest suffer because the system only favors the more clever and capable people? It's better for the more capable people, in the long run, to have society catter for everyone, and thus spare a revolution or two.
No political system works if people are to exploit it for their own benefit. Take USA, for example: it has the richest people in the world, but also 40 million Americans live below the poverty line.
I think this device shows that pattern matching is all there is to life and intelligence. All that has to be done for artificial AI is an engine which tries to find a solution using statistical methods.
By the way, this thing proves evolution one more: by trial and error, living entities have been developed...
Well said! I think your words must be printed in bold and delivered to the press right away. I will keep your text in a file, so I can show it to people (I am not a native English speaker, so I have trouble saying it so well) when it is required. I will also put your comment in the message boards of startrek.com, because there are lots of people there claiming that DS9 (the Dawson's Creek of Star Trek) was the best series of them all.
I would continue the story into the 25th century, showing a new USS Enterprise in a mission to explore the rest of the galaxy, sent by the United Federation of Planets. I would put the Klingons, the Romulans and the Cardassians in the Federation as well, so as that new races would come into focus. I would not update the technology, as the story would be a few years after Voyager. I would continue the story of Utopia of Rodenberry, and the series would be focused on exploration, primarily of space, and then of characters.
If you find it boring, then go watch other things, with death, war, murders and intrigue in it. We Star Trek fans don't want any of that.
The result is infinitely more stupid than what came before. Human descendants wearing ties and suits, having a president, worrying about terrorism, using hand guns, pistols and rifles, etc? yeah, right. Humans made advanced cyborgs, the Cylons, but they couldn't get a descent ray gun even if their life depended on it...infinitely better my a$$...at least the original Starbuck was THE character.
And of course, this has to be done with planets being destroyed, political intrigue, war, and a love story in the middle, right? right? well, let me tell you a secret: we, the fans, do not want to see war melodramas. We want to see space mysteries. It's a voyage in the stars, not a retelling of WWII with different people.
It got stale and repetitive because, instead of seeing new mysteries every week, we got the same tired formula of one people vs another people. With 200 billion stars in this galaxy alone, the writers could give us something better...at least with TNG and VOY we got to see some space mysteries never seen before in other sci-fi series.
Are you of Jewish origin? isn't the word 'chutzpah' Jewish? isn't JJ Abrams of Jewish origin? isn't Nimoy of Jewish origin?
Assuming your origin does not influence your judgment, TNG was the biggest success of all Star Trek exactly because it was a utopia, a bright future, a cerebral existence. You want to show something different? take this real dark and grim world and turn it into a Utopia...a place with true equality, true democracy, no nepotism, no imperialism, etc. And then write stories that tell you how we got there, how we can achieve it, how we got over our differences, how we can maintain it, what technology can do for us, and analyse everything in the context of a bright future that humanity can achieve. Now that's something interesting, not the next war!
Rodenberry has understood the above, and while he was alive, Trek would never be just another series filled with death, sex and violence...
And 2 seconds is enough to make a conscious decision...
SP2 is on its way!!! (hurrah! I never dared to use a brand-new Microsoft product without at least SP2 out).
Security is one of those properties that either exists or not. Saying that something is "more secure" is saying something like "being a little pregnant"!!! you either have security and nobody can break in or you don't.
Does matter itself expand? Do galaxies and celestial bodies become bigger as the universe expands? or it is only the space between matter that expands? what about the space between particles?