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  1. Re:Brain microphone, not brain speech synthetizer on University of Columbia Researchers Translate Brain Signals Directly Into Speech (columbia.edu) · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Yes, this.

    The only thing I would add is that we do know that higher-level cognitive processes re-activate sensorimotor parts of the brain; so thinking the number "nine" might cause some activation similar to hearing that number.

    So, assuming they didn't indeed just pick up on some non-neural artifact, this shows that there is potential - at least in the ideal case where we know the signal is as good as it's ever going to get. It's one step in the direction of being able to deal with weaker, noisier versions you might get from reactivation.

    But yeah, noone's going to read your thoughts anytime soon.

  2. Treating them like a child is an extremely recent cultural development due to the increased length of education typically required to get a job rather than any actual biological or physiological reason.

    There absolutely are biological and physiological reasons - the frontal lobes of the brain (the bits that play a role in rational decision making) are not fully developed until well into the 20s. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...

  3. Re:Hyperbole much? on Apple Is Testing a Feature That Could Kill Police iPhone Unlockers (vice.com) · · Score: 1

    If a product no longer works, it is likely to get discontinued ("killed off"). It's not that much of a stretch to say that making software useless will kill it.

    Captcha: epitaphs.

  4. Re: Not sure... on Doctor Who's 13th Time Lord Announced: Actress Jodie Whittaker (bbc.co.uk) · · Score: 1

    With Missy, they introduced the idea of a male Time Lord regenerating as a woman

    Remember the Corsair

  5. Re: You can't have a female James T. Kirk on Doctor Who's 13th Time Lord Announced: Actress Jodie Whittaker (bbc.co.uk) · · Score: 4, Informative

    Actually, in case of the doctor, you quite explicitly can have a female one. Nothing says Timelords are restricted to one gender and there are canon precedents even before Missy. So there.

  6. Oh that is just textbook xkcd... on Dutch Developer Added Backdoor To Websites He Built, Phished Over 20,000 Users (bleepingcomputer.com) · · Score: 4, Funny
  7. Re: Here's an idea... on Long TSA Delays Force Airports To Hire Private Security Contractors (popsci.com) · · Score: 1

    I clearly must be doing something wrong. I frequently travel to the US from Europe and have hardly ever had any trouble getting in or out. In comparison with the shenanigans at some European airports (Italy, France, I'm looking at you), I'm not sure I see why the US is seen to be so much worse.

  8. He should have gone for trial by combat... might have had a chance then...

  9. Re:He stole, he got arrested on Man Arrested After Charging iPhone On London Overground Train · · Score: 4, Informative

    To plug your phone into the wall should not be to get arrested, unless there is a gigantic sign saying "PLUGGING INTO THIS IS PROHIBITED." [...] What's more, it *shouldn't* be prohibited unless it creates problems.

    You do realise that this is exactly how it was, right? There was a sign, and it exists because plugging in might damage your equipment. From TFA:

    Electricity sockets on Overground trains are clearly marked with the words: âoecleaners use only and not for public useâ.

    On a forum dedicated to the London Underground, members have pointed out that plug sockets on the trains are for cleaning equipment deployed when trains are in depots. They recommend not charging electronic equipment as there is a risk of power surge: âoeIf something was directly plugged into it (for example a standard computer, or a laptop without a battery in) the equipment would probably be damaged at any section gaps where the power supply changes from one substation to another!â

  10. Re: Not quite comparable on Japan Now Has More Car Charging Points Than Gas Stations · · Score: 1

    And a petrol station tends to service several cars simultaneously - from a couple to several dozen - charge points, not so much.

  11. Re:No programming? on A Worm's Mind In a Lego Body · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The behavior emerged through evolution and was encoded in the neurons by nature

    What has been implemented in this robot has nothing to do with biological neurons of C. elegans.

    The robot uses integrate-and-fire neurons. The "signal" sent from pre- to postsynaptic neuron is an integer equal to the number of connection between the neurons in the real worm. If the sum of input exceeds a threshold, the neuron "fires" (sidenote: right here's a bit of programming: how did the threshold values get chosen?).

    C. elegans neurons do not "fire" (they are not spiking neurons and lack Na+ channels) but use calcium-based analog signals.

    The body does matter too. C elegans has muscles on either side that it contracts alternately to move in a sinusoidal fashion. Not wheels. C elegans locomotion does not work like wheeled locomotion.

    So, yes, you are right, C elegans neurons encode behaviour appropriate for a C elegans body given the biology of the neurons available here. None of this, however, makes it into this robot. An abstraction of the connectome does (C elegans has both electrical and chemical synapses; that distinction seems to be lost here too) and that's it.

    It is kinda cool that the connectome does seem to naturally implement some basic response patterns; but given that muscles have been replaced by wheels, I'm not sure how meaningful that actually is.

  12. Re:Mapping the Nematode? on First Movie of an Entire Brain's Neuronal Activity · · Score: 1

    Could a complete mapping of the neural network be accomplished?

    The C elegans brain has been completely mapped in terms of connectivity a long time ago. See for instance:
    http://www.wormatlas.org/neuro...

    Would it be possible to artificially trigger a neuron to verify the mapping?

    Interesting thought - I'm not aware of anyone having done that but it's been a while since I followed the C elegans literature closely.

    C elegans is pressurised, so you can't easily stick an electrode (assuming you had one small enough) next to your neuron of choice to stimulate it. Maybe you could make a secific neuron become light-sensistive and use optical stimulation (the worm's transparent, so that helps) but again, not sure anyone has ever attempted that in C elegans.

    The converse has been done repeatedly though: either ablate a neuron using a laser or design a mutant that won't have it in the first place (remember that the C elegans genome is completely mapped too) and see how it affects behaviour.

  13. I have a much neater solution. on Lucasfilm Announces Break With Star Wars Expanded Universe · · Score: 4, Funny

    Someone from the future travels to the past, changes something fundamental and the universe slips into an alternate reality from which it can never return and in which no event can be expected to unfold as it did in the original.

    Not only will this by definition never be inconsistent with the EU, it will give the writers ways of amusingly rehashing old stories by subtly altering some key elements things, like who gets to die of radiation while saving the crew. Maybe, in Episode VII, Luke will hack off Vader's hand?

    What?

  14. Re:Not possible on Mathematical Proof That the Cosmos Could Have Formed Spontaneously From Nothing · · Score: 1

    Physics is not accessible to mathematics

    This is very much still an active topic of discussion, actually, and certainly not as settled or clear-cut as you seem to think. You can start with Wigner's essay.

    And just to provide the opposite viewpoint to yours, some people will of course argue that physical reality is mathematical.

  15. Re:Actually... on Scientists/Actress Say They Were 'Tricked' Into Geocentric Universe Movie · · Score: 2

    It's an ill-posed question since to say that something is at the center of everything requires some sort of absolute position system (a la Aristotle), which is a meaningless concept (an insight that goes at least as far back as Galileo).

  16. Re:OTA updates on Replicant OS Developers Find Backdoor In Samsung Galaxy Devices · · Score: 2

    I'm curious what functionality is affected, if any is, by rejecting any of these IPC_RFS_ I/O.

    Remotely wiping a stolen mobile phone perhaps? It's just a guess - but by definition that would require the ability to do stuff to the phone's file system without the current user's knowledge or permission.

  17. Ogligatory xkc... no, wait, smbc! on IEEE Predicts 85% of Daily Tasks Will Be Games By 2020 · · Score: 1
  18. Re:Obligatory XKCD on Facebook Mocks 'Infection' Study, Predicts Princeton's Demise · · Score: 1

    Better xkcd - at least this also uses data collected from Google.

  19. Re:I deciphered it last month. on Voynich Manuscript May Have Originated In the New World · · Score: 1

    I'm certain that "words" in the manuscript do not represent words in the original language. They are merely chunks of ciphered text, which explains the unusually homogeneous word lengths, for one thing. I believe the length of the ciphered words is thus arbitrary and chosen by the person doing the ciphering. That also explains how word length and spacing can be perfectly justified and fit along the varied shape of images

    Now that you mention it... it's obviously an early entry to the IOCCC.

  20. Re: wait on Elsevier Going After Authors Sharing Their Own Papers · · Score: 4, Informative

    It isn't clear here whether the papers in question were the pre- or post-editing versions

    They are going after the final, published versions (including Elsevier formatting and all), commercial use of accepted manuscripts, systematic distribution and the like (some of which applies to academia.edu). In other words, what you said was fair game still is - you are allowed to share the accepted manuscript with others (including on your website where Google Scholar will pick it up and render it discoverable in a matter of days, so it's not like this restricts you), you (or anyone else) just can't make money off it and you can't use their typesetting.

    For the accepted manuscript version, let me just quote from Elsevier's author rights:

    Elsevier believes that individual authors should be able to distribute their AAMs for their personal voluntary needs and interests, e.g. posting to their websites or their institutionâ(TM)s repository, e-mailing to colleagues. However, our policies differ regarding the systematic aggregation or distribution of AAMs to ensure the sustainability of the journals to which AAMs are submitted. Therefore, deposit in, or posting to, subject-oriented or centralized repositories (such as PubMed Central), or institutional repositories with systematic posting mandates is permitted only under specific agreements between Elsevier and the repository, agency or institution, and only consistent with the publisherâ(TM)s policies concerning such repositories. Voluntary posting of AAMs in the arXiv subject repository is permitted.

    So you can see how academia.edu falls foul of this while your right to share your work does not.

    (Some of my papers are published in Elsevier journals - they are however also all open access. In case you're wondering.)

  21. Re:and how do you resolve the paradox on Should the Next 'Doctor Who' Be a Woman? · · Score: 1

    Unless you are going to make the time lords all capable of changing sex

    Meet the Corsair Also, Romana was at least once capable of choosing what she would regenerate into (though I don't think that got mentioned again since) - so I guess that if the Doctor wanted to regenerate as a woman, he could.

  22. Re:No way on Matt Smith Leaves "Doctor Who" · · Score: 2

    we know (unless they changed it since he's the last timelord), timelords only get 12 regens (making 13 total lives)

    Not anymore, the Doctor has had infinitely many regenerations for a while now.

  23. Re:Security on Facebook "Trusted Contacts" Lets You Pester Friends To Recover Account Access · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I suppose the one worry is that if someone has the ability to impersonate your e-mail and has access to your friends list, he could then impersonate you and ask *all* your friends for codes. The attacker doesn't need to know who the trusted friends are since your circle of friends would not easily be able to detect that everyone's been contacted. The attacker may mine the publicly available info on the friends to personalise the message a bit, if not, keep it short and very simple. It's not like this request would come in a long personal message anyway. It IS likely that it will come by e-mail though since you'll already be at the computer, trusted friends may be around the globe and so on. In short, you need your friends to be capable of detecting an impersonation attempt, even if brief and potentially conveying a sense of urgency. Remember, your trusted friends may be the same people who click on links that appear to be from you *because* they trust you. So in summary, while I do think this is pretty neat, I also wonder if this is not rather vulnerable to social engineering (perhaps not so much among the /. crowd - but generally)?

  24. Bragging about crimes in public on Facebook Lands Drunk Driving Teen In Jail · · Score: 4, Interesting

    is never a good idea.

    I'm reminded of the Belgian who had a video of himself doing 300km/h on the motorway posted to youtube.

    He was driving an Aston Marting Vantage Carbon Black edition of which only three were sold in Belgium. Didn't take the police long to figure out which one it was.

  25. Additional conditions on Sexism In Science · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Not to disagree with anything in the paper and certainly not with the message, but personally, I would definitely have wanted to see at least one more condition: same resumes with no names at all. That should give nice baseline against which to compare both conditions (e.g. are female salaries marked down or are male salaries marked up).

    Also, I wonder what would happen if one were to replace the names with simply an indication of gender (male/female). Unlike the neutral condition, I don't think this would improve the study... I'm just curious if the gender is enough or if there's something specific about reading male vs female names.