Cancelled my MasterCard, then chopped it up. Enough people do that, MasterCard will start to wise up.
Of course, I'm probably going to replace it with some flavour of Visa, which is probably just as evil and certainly did jump on the ban-Wikileaks bandwagon.
Personally, I think I could manage more than two sexy left-leaning Swedish intellectual feminists before the end of a month. Perhaps as high as 31 if I didn't try for twice a night.
At the end, I'd be so blissfully exhausted I probably wouldn't notice the rest.
292 fatalities a year in a country of 300+ million, and they want to legislate mandatory backup cameras...
If you legislate everyone be strapped to a medical exercise device and fed a perfectly balanced diet through a tube, everyone would be almost perfectly safe.
Actually, we might theoretically colonize Venus using structures that float high up in the Venusian atmosphere.
Since we'd be living in sealed units, we probably wouldn't give a damn about pollution, either... so we'd play even less nicely with Venus that we have with Earth.
In some ways, Venus is a more attractive colonization target than Mars.
I've seen a lot of AIs that have a general strategy that they stick to like glue. I'd love to see an AI that continually evaluates its current position, and if it sees a loss trend, switches tactics.
When you're doing the right thing, but slowly bleeding out to inevitable death, you might want to lower your risk aversion and try something else.
Beyond that, some way of evaluating a player and keeping track over multiple games - and comparing known players and their styles to new players to make predictions, would be nifty.
The point isn't how an alien's eyes might work, but what frequencies are useful for examining a star system.
Humans don't see infrared to any useful degree, nor x-ray, nor radio, and yet we image the heavens in each for different reasons.
While we couldn't guess that an alien might see the same colours on a false-colour representation of our solar system... we can reasonably say they would be looking at some kind of representation of an infrared image of us because that's the best way to get information about us.
I'm pretty sure an android is the best possible all-purpose automation tool, because it can use everything that's already designed for humans.
However, I'm also pretty sure that an android would be the worst possible all-purpose automation tool, since the near-human level AI required would also make it a perfect social replacement for everyone on the planet. Why would I want to deal with everyone else when I can have someone who is the perfect slave?
Instead of a hot air balloon, why not inflatable wings? You strap on the pack (which really should come with 'training wheels' so you don't crack your knees on landing) and when you get to 100' and have some horizontal velocity, out pop the wings to give you some extra lift.
It's not as crazy as it sounds; Back in WWII we had entire ultralight airplanes that would inflate out of a suitcase... and apparently the test pilots said they were very smooth in flight.
Because it works? In the face of a horrific disease that can remain infectious but asymptomatic for a decade, quarantine is an effective tool - assuming you are testing pretty much everybody.
It also works for measles, mumps, & bubonic plague.
In my father's childhood, it wasn't unusual for a public health officer to tell parents to keep their sick kid at home until cleared by a doctor... sometimes with a sign on the door to warn off others.
Yeah, and picking on the gay community exclusively when IV drug users were another good vector...
At the start of 'epidemic', being a straight non-drug user (and ideally male) made it very unlikely you'd ever be near the virus, never mind be infected by it.
And it was political correctness that prevented us from quarantining the sick. You see, it's not a 'gay' disease, but if you're putting AIDS patients into quarantine you're trying to lock the gays away. Holy cognitive dissonance.
I consider the spread of AIDS to be a victory of a virus over simple common sense.
Derr... if it gets too hot, we just turn up the A/C. A small increase in fossil fuel consumption to produce the required electricity is expected, which may increase AGW, but we can just turn up the A/C to compensate.
It's all quantum. When considering a travel back in time, every possible trip with every result exists, but only the consistent options (where past and future do not contradict) are 'permitted'.
There's still plenty of room for free will from the perspective of the time traveler, even though the past and future are effectively written in stone from a 3rd party perspective.
Except they're already in use in test markets in Europe and not having those issues.
As for gyroscopic effect - well, the main part of the motor doesn't spin. We already have many, many examples of bearings carring the mass of a rim and tires spinning at highway speeds without failing.
Yeah, but if it gets a practical full EV on the road, I'm still going to be near the head of the line to buy one.
The government has decided that if you live in Ontario, you get $8500 back on the purchase of a Leaf.
That should drop it into the low 20K range. A bit extra on top for the charging station in the garage (and associated circuit run back to the mains), but still good for tooling around town most of the time...
This is the thing I don't like about the Leaf; you can make the car even simpler if you put in four hub motors.
You're always going to need suspension and steering, but you can eliminate a lot of mechanical crap (and add redundancy, regenerative braking, ABS, traction control, etc as software upgrades) by putting the motors in the rims.
I really don't know why they didn't take the extra step.
You know, that was one of the harder things to remember when I was in school. What images of Africa do we get as kids in the west? Starving anonymous black people, and some animals we see at the local zoo. It was like trying to understand that Hanika wasn't just the Jewish name for Christmas.
If we at least broke it up into three areas - the Mediterranean coast, Saharan, and Sub-Saharan maybe kids would realize sooner that it's not some monolithic entity any more than Europe or Asia.
Bring it on down to the actual transistor level and compare it to the brain - we use x more neurons for a given job than a human might use transistors for a similar function.
The brain expects neurons to misfire and goes on averages of clusters. This allows neurons to be kept on more of a hair trigger, which makes them less energetically expensive to change state. The same can theoretically be done with transistors - we use fairly high voltage (I'm not an EE, feel free to correct me here) differences to register as 1 or 0, but if we allowed for higher error rates, we could use closer values, or have a RANGE of values and get better than binary complexity, at a lower energy cost.
Oxygen enabled faster metabolism. Eyes led to the acceleration of the predator/prey arms race. The extinction of the dinosaurs led to mammals taking over. Climate stability led to larger social groups for humans. Larger social groups led to technology and knowledge growth.
Now, show me how any conceivable change in our biosphere will be beneficial to HUMANITY.
Personally, I think we're doing pretty well right now, and any change is likely to be negative for us.
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Cancelled my MasterCard, then chopped it up. Enough people do that, MasterCard will start to wise up.
Of course, I'm probably going to replace it with some flavour of Visa, which is probably just as evil and certainly did jump on the ban-Wikileaks bandwagon.
This is a problem how?
Personally, I think I could manage more than two sexy left-leaning Swedish intellectual feminists before the end of a month. Perhaps as high as 31 if I didn't try for twice a night.
At the end, I'd be so blissfully exhausted I probably wouldn't notice the rest.
292 fatalities a year in a country of 300+ million, and they want to legislate mandatory backup cameras...
If you legislate everyone be strapped to a medical exercise device and fed a perfectly balanced diet through a tube, everyone would be almost perfectly safe.
Actually, we might theoretically colonize Venus using structures that float high up in the Venusian atmosphere.
Since we'd be living in sealed units, we probably wouldn't give a damn about pollution, either... so we'd play even less nicely with Venus that we have with Earth.
In some ways, Venus is a more attractive colonization target than Mars.
No way, I'm keeping my shellfish for myself. Yummy!
But I'll pass on the Red Bull.
How very shellfish of you.
I've seen a lot of AIs that have a general strategy that they stick to like glue. I'd love to see an AI that continually evaluates its current position, and if it sees a loss trend, switches tactics.
When you're doing the right thing, but slowly bleeding out to inevitable death, you might want to lower your risk aversion and try something else.
Beyond that, some way of evaluating a player and keeping track over multiple games - and comparing known players and their styles to new players to make predictions, would be nifty.
The point isn't how an alien's eyes might work, but what frequencies are useful for examining a star system.
Humans don't see infrared to any useful degree, nor x-ray, nor radio, and yet we image the heavens in each for different reasons.
While we couldn't guess that an alien might see the same colours on a false-colour representation of our solar system... we can reasonably say they would be looking at some kind of representation of an infrared image of us because that's the best way to get information about us.
I'm pretty sure that stars AREN'T balls of burning gas. That would imply some element was bonding with oxygen and releasing energy in the process.
I think they're giant balls of gas undergoing nuclear fusion, which is a different order of activity.
As long as it actually WAS libel.
There are enough people out there who distrust the police, we don't need unfounded accusations reducing police support further.
On the other hand, if the statements were factual, the cops and prosecutors involved need to be lined up against a wall and shot.
I'm pretty sure an android is the best possible all-purpose automation tool, because it can use everything that's already designed for humans.
However, I'm also pretty sure that an android would be the worst possible all-purpose automation tool, since the near-human level AI required would also make it a perfect social replacement for everyone on the planet. Why would I want to deal with everyone else when I can have someone who is the perfect slave?
Thank you for that. I would have sworn it was a suitcase for the plane and a suitcase for the motor.
Instead of a hot air balloon, why not inflatable wings? You strap on the pack (which really should come with 'training wheels' so you don't crack your knees on landing) and when you get to 100' and have some horizontal velocity, out pop the wings to give you some extra lift.
It's not as crazy as it sounds; Back in WWII we had entire ultralight airplanes that would inflate out of a suitcase... and apparently the test pilots said they were very smooth in flight.
Because it works? In the face of a horrific disease that can remain infectious but asymptomatic for a decade, quarantine is an effective tool - assuming you are testing pretty much everybody.
It also works for measles, mumps, & bubonic plague.
In my father's childhood, it wasn't unusual for a public health officer to tell parents to keep their sick kid at home until cleared by a doctor... sometimes with a sign on the door to warn off others.
Yeah, and picking on the gay community exclusively when IV drug users were another good vector...
At the start of 'epidemic', being a straight non-drug user (and ideally male) made it very unlikely you'd ever be near the virus, never mind be infected by it.
And it was political correctness that prevented us from quarantining the sick. You see, it's not a 'gay' disease, but if you're putting AIDS patients into quarantine you're trying to lock the gays away. Holy cognitive dissonance.
I consider the spread of AIDS to be a victory of a virus over simple common sense.
Derr... if it gets too hot, we just turn up the A/C. A small increase in fossil fuel consumption to produce the required electricity is expected, which may increase AGW, but we can just turn up the A/C to compensate.
It's all quantum. When considering a travel back in time, every possible trip with every result exists, but only the consistent options (where past and future do not contradict) are 'permitted'.
There's still plenty of room for free will from the perspective of the time traveler, even though the past and future are effectively written in stone from a 3rd party perspective.
Oh shut up. Why are you preaching about medicare in a Tron thread?
It was a joke.
Hah! I'm Canadian, so the medical costs are irrelevant.
Of course, I'm also A) a coward and B) don't have $35K hanging around doing nothing.
I'm a middle-aged geek, but luckily I'm not fat. However, I can't ride a motorcycle.
Just how cool would I look sliding sideways down the freeway on this thing with bits of melted Spandex and skin trailing behind me?
Except they're already in use in test markets in Europe and not having those issues.
As for gyroscopic effect - well, the main part of the motor doesn't spin. We already have many, many examples of bearings carring the mass of a rim and tires spinning at highway speeds without failing.
Yeah, but if it gets a practical full EV on the road, I'm still going to be near the head of the line to buy one.
The government has decided that if you live in Ontario, you get $8500 back on the purchase of a Leaf.
That should drop it into the low 20K range. A bit extra on top for the charging station in the garage (and associated circuit run back to the mains), but still good for tooling around town most of the time...
This is the thing I don't like about the Leaf; you can make the car even simpler if you put in four hub motors.
You're always going to need suspension and steering, but you can eliminate a lot of mechanical crap (and add redundancy, regenerative braking, ABS, traction control, etc as software upgrades) by putting the motors in the rims.
I really don't know why they didn't take the extra step.
You know, that was one of the harder things to remember when I was in school. What images of Africa do we get as kids in the west? Starving anonymous black people, and some animals we see at the local zoo. It was like trying to understand that Hanika wasn't just the Jewish name for Christmas.
If we at least broke it up into three areas - the Mediterranean coast, Saharan, and Sub-Saharan maybe kids would realize sooner that it's not some monolithic entity any more than Europe or Asia.
Bring it on down to the actual transistor level and compare it to the brain - we use x more neurons for a given job than a human might use transistors for a similar function.
The brain expects neurons to misfire and goes on averages of clusters. This allows neurons to be kept on more of a hair trigger, which makes them less energetically expensive to change state. The same can theoretically be done with transistors - we use fairly high voltage (I'm not an EE, feel free to correct me here) differences to register as 1 or 0, but if we allowed for higher error rates, we could use closer values, or have a RANGE of values and get better than binary complexity, at a lower energy cost.
Oxygen enabled faster metabolism.
Eyes led to the acceleration of the predator/prey arms race.
The extinction of the dinosaurs led to mammals taking over.
Climate stability led to larger social groups for humans.
Larger social groups led to technology and knowledge growth.
Now, show me how any conceivable change in our biosphere will be beneficial to HUMANITY.
Personally, I think we're doing pretty well right now, and any change is likely to be negative for us.