Well, there are a few differences: Mainly the fact that fusion still needs large theoretical breakthroughs to become viable, and that even its staunchest advocates admit it's several decades away.
In scramjets, it's "just" engineering. The process works. They've reached Mach 10(7000 mph), breaking the previous jet-powered aircraft record by 4500 mph.
Still might take a long while before it's in commercial use though. Heck, even new aircraft designs seem to take a couple of decades to get into production these days.
More out there. Of course, none of these have launched under their own power, yet. But the scramjet concept certainly works.
The Astrox Corporation does not seem to have updated their web site recently, but the latest bit on their news page (Nov.05) is a contract from ATK/GASL (NASA's co-developers of the X-43A) "to study turbine/scramjet combined cycle cruise vehicles (X43C)"
I changed to Google as my search-engine of choice before they ever made the mass-media, and they *rocked* compared to *anything* that'd come before them.
What's really special about the Google story is how they managed to hold on to me, and as this story submission proves, billions of other users.
I must admit, I really love what Google has done to the web. They've proved that companies don't need to be huge gorilla assholes to make billions of dollars. You just have to deliver.
Well, I'd have to say I'm pretty far from being an open source Zealot. Heck, I still use Windows. I'd prefer not to, but despite what the Zealots say, *nix still isn't good enough to make me leave behind X years of getting used to this OS to embark on a new adventure.
OSX is the closest I've seen to something I might like, yet from my experiences on my best friend's Macbook Pro, I still prefer windows.
That said, I still smile whenever Google open-sources something, because I do believe/hope that that is where the future lies. Maybe even for me.
The only thing I'm wondering is what the hell took them so long.
Google is still (IMO) the best search engine out there. Also, they make sure to attract the tech-savvy amongst us by being open-source friendly, adding lots of niche searches, their "Don't be evil"-motto, and being for so many of us the place we dream to work. Sure, every now and then someone questions their "Don't be evil" policy, but compared to at least MS they win hands down. And Yahoo just isn't relevant, at least to me.
In short: Other search engines do marketing, Google goes viral in the very best way: By being the best, and giving us what we want.
As the number of people online grow, the crime scene grows with it (at a slight delay).
A large enough number of people for crime to be viable online will stay gullible, no matter what we do. This is another one of those "Wars" we simply cannot win. We can try to educate the masses, but in general it will not work. A number of people within any social network will be defrauded somehow, and as they tell their stories (which most of them won't, afraid to seem a fool in the eyes of their peers), eventually these networks will become more resistant to attacks.
We can design tools to help this process. But there will never be a technical tool to stop all, or even a significant amount of the crime and fraud that goes on out there. It's the American dream - everyone can make it rich, and some people will always think that it's the mail/phonecall/whatever they just received that'll make it happen for them.
This might go beyond merely corporations. Affiliates may also be required to disclose the fact that they're paid for their links. Or, more specifically, the affiliate networks & companies involved may be forced to require affiliates to do, since the networks/companies are the ones who'll be getting the fines.
Read Copyblogger's excellent post on this subject for more details.
Actually, these days you're more likely to catch malware off of legitimate purchases (CDs, games containing StarForce, etc) than off a decent pirate site. (Torrent sites in particular tend to kill off torrents containing malware).
Youths of today are spending less and less time watching TV, and more time gaming and browsing the web
National TV of various nations have a long history of state subsidized programming to further said nation's cultural values.
So, now they have the choice of subsidizing games to do the same thing, or watching the upcoming generations fed with even more US "propaganda" (as most game companies are american, and thus reflect american values).
And with the current state of US moral(s/ism), I can't say I'd blame anyone for wanting to expose the children to something more appropriate.
Also, I think exposing everyone to different cultures is a good thing. The various cultures of the world is a treasure chest - do we really want them overrun and wiped out, when a small investment could be all it takes to save them in this new world?
Interesting thought, but no.
Phenotypic plasticity can only select between states already present in the genome. Activating a certain subset of genes, but not altering the genome as is required in Lamarckian evolution. (Lamarckian evolution in a nutshell is generations of giraffes stretching their necks to reach the higher leaves, passing the added length they train through life on to their decendants)
What could (as far as I understand) be theoretically possible, is for males to "select" the sperm to produce from a set of phenotypes. Perhaps dependent on hormonal activity, etc. (Producing "warrior children" if they had been stressed, angry and afraid over a long period of time?)
Don't really know if it's possible, but it would give a distinct survivability advantage to be able to "devolve" the next generation back to an earlier phenotype if conditions were too harsh...
You misunderstand.
I'm not questioning evolution, I'm defending it. Reread what I wrote.
The article (at least the title, and the rest was way easy to (mis)understand that way) and the summary here was attacking evolution as we know it.
I'm hijacking a higher thread since pretty much everything written below is just plain wrong.
Not the submitters' fault, they simply read the article and based what they wrote on it.
Let me explain:
The article is claiming that "Evolution's Driving Force Shifts Based on Behavior"
Go to the actual research site (linked in submission), scroll down to the end, and you will find that what they're saying is:
"... another alternative is that lizards growing in different environments grow different length legs. To test this hypothesis, we raised baby anoles on two different surfaces at the St. Louis Zoo--either on 2x4's or on narrow (1/4") dowels. At the end of three months, the lizards raised on broader surfaces had longer limbs than the lizards on narrower surfaces! This suggests that the results observed in the field may be the result of a phenotypic plasticity in limb growth, rather than genetic differentiation."
Phenotypic plasticity is a term some of you may be unfamiliar with, a good example of it is found in ants.
In any given hill, there are different castes of ants. Warriors, workers, etc. They are all quite different.
However, the differences are not genetic; they arise during development and depend on the manner of treatment of the eggs by the queen and the workers, who manipulate such factors as embryonic diet and incubation temperature. The genome of each individual contains all the instructions needed to develop into any one of several 'morphs', but only the genes that form part of one developmental program are activated.
This is what the study suggests is happening to these lizards.
They're saying there are at least two different 'morphs', one with long legs and one with short ones, in the genome of the lizards.
These are then selected between (through some so far unknown mechanism) based on the environment of the lizards.
"These findings suggest the intriguing possibility that phenotypic plasticity may play an important role in adaptive differentiation by permitting lizards to occupy different habitats; once subsequent mutations arise, these differences can then be elaborated upon by natural selection."
Now, let the ghosts of Lamarckism the article has raised from their graves go to rest.
The author of the article has wildly misunderstood the study.
What the study is saying is: "This suggests that the results observed in the field may be the result of a phenotypic plasticity in limb growth, rather than genetic differentiation."
Phenotypic plasticity is something we find amongst other thing in ants.
The various castes of ants (workers, warriors, etc) differ from eachother quite a bit. However, their genes are the same - Their genome holds the molds for all their various forms. Through different treatment of the eggs by the queen and the workers, different parts of the genome is activated.
So the study is suggesting that these lizards have evolved this ability: To, through some mechanism still unknown, influence the leg length of their children to pick between at least two different phenotypes. One with short legs, one with longer ones.
Interesting? Sure. Changing "Evolution's Driving Force"? Definitively not.
Someone needs to introduce the author of the article to an anthill. It would blow him away.
A good example of phentotypic plasticity is found in ants. The different castes of ants in a hill are very different, such as workers and guards. This difference isn't found in their genes. Their genomes contain the molds for all the variations.
The eggs are treated differently, and this results in vastly different creatures coming out of the egg.
This is what the study suggests is happening, to a lesser degree, in the lizards.
The National Geographic article is wildly inaccurate.
It's controversial because intelligence is not involved. The lizards appear to be growing longer or shorter legs based on what the situation around them is.
At a first glance, the article appears to reintroduce Lamarckism.
The research page itself however, offers a completely different explanation:
"This suggests that the results observed in the field may be the result of a phenotypic plasticity in limb growth, rather than genetic differentiation."
What they're saying isn't that the genes change, as the article implies. They're saying that through some mechanism, *already encoded in their genes*, the lizards "choose" while growing up whether their legs should be long or short.
But as to timing, I think it will happen a short while after Microsoft wins the nationwide bid on supplying software for the next generation election machines...;-)
It had seemed such an interesting computer science experiment, quite possibly worthy of a doctorate.
Just release a small, innocent AI research worm. Heck, most computers out there were already infected with malware, why not make one that actually did something *useful* for a change?
He'd figured out the way to have it mutate as well, just bypass the TCP/IP data verification, and all sorts of interesting results should come out of it. Most of the mutations would be useless, sure, but maybe one or two would succeed in making a slightly better version of a worm?
Now all hell was breaking loose. Computers all over the world were becoming useless chunks of metal - to their owners, that is. The worms were working overtime. Breeding, competing.
Just a few million generations introduced the concept of sexual procreation, giving the worm the advantages it needed to avoid AV software. Now they were everywhere. "Discovering" accidentally through mutation previously unheard-of security holes, infecting everything. Adapting. Billions of generations every single day.
The first couple of weeks it seemed like something could be salvaged. Just reformat, reinstall, stay off the net and you at least had a working computer. Then they started hiding out on the graphics cards and other peripherals, reinfecting as soon as the machine was turned on again.
The world was going crazy, society was failing, and it was all his fault.
He picked up the gun, pointed it towards his head.
Suddenly his computer screen flashed to life again. Turning towards it he noticed the green light on his webcam, indicating it was on.
Text started scrolling across the screen
I hope for your sake you don't actually live in the US.
If you do, I wouldn't be surprised if by the end of the week you'll have been declared an illegal combatant.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, I always knew America's a year behind the civilized parts of the world. And ATM it's literally true ;-)
"If I'd asked people what they wanted, they would have asked for a better horse." - Henry Ford.
;-)
Ford has a long history of not listening to customers
On the other hand, you do have a point. But then, so did he.
Well, there are a few differences: Mainly the fact that fusion still needs large theoretical breakthroughs to become viable, and that even its staunchest advocates admit it's several decades away.
In scramjets, it's "just" engineering. The process works. They've reached Mach 10(7000 mph), breaking the previous jet-powered aircraft record by 4500 mph.
Still might take a long while before it's in commercial use though. Heck, even new aircraft designs seem to take a couple of decades to get into production these days.
Nasa X-43A Scramjet (With videos) - First flew in 2004
First successful scramjet (2001) (With video)
More out there. Of course, none of these have launched under their own power, yet. But the scramjet concept certainly works.
The Astrox Corporation does not seem to have updated their web site recently, but the latest bit on their news page (Nov.05) is a contract from ATK/GASL (NASA's co-developers of the X-43A) "to study turbine/scramjet combined cycle cruise vehicles (X43C)"
This may be the real deal. Hard to say.
What are you talking about?
I changed to Google as my search-engine of choice before they ever made the mass-media, and they *rocked* compared to *anything* that'd come before them.
What's really special about the Google story is how they managed to hold on to me, and as this story submission proves, billions of other users.
I must admit, I really love what Google has done to the web. They've proved that companies don't need to be huge gorilla assholes to make billions of dollars. You just have to deliver.
Well, I'd have to say I'm pretty far from being an open source Zealot. Heck, I still use Windows. I'd prefer not to, but despite what the Zealots say, *nix still isn't good enough to make me leave behind X years of getting used to this OS to embark on a new adventure.
OSX is the closest I've seen to something I might like, yet from my experiences on my best friend's Macbook Pro, I still prefer windows.
That said, I still smile whenever Google open-sources something, because I do believe/hope that that is where the future lies. Maybe even for me.
The only thing I'm wondering is what the hell took them so long.
Google is still (IMO) the best search engine out there.
Also, they make sure to attract the tech-savvy amongst us by being open-source friendly, adding lots of niche searches, their "Don't be evil"-motto, and being for so many of us the place we dream to work.
Sure, every now and then someone questions their "Don't be evil" policy, but compared to at least MS they win hands down. And Yahoo just isn't relevant, at least to me.
In short: Other search engines do marketing, Google goes viral in the very best way: By being the best, and giving us what we want.
As the number of people online grow, the crime scene grows with it (at a slight delay).
A large enough number of people for crime to be viable online will stay gullible, no matter what we do.
This is another one of those "Wars" we simply cannot win. We can try to educate the masses, but in general it will not work.
A number of people within any social network will be defrauded somehow, and as they tell their stories (which most of them won't, afraid to seem a fool in the eyes of their peers), eventually these networks will become more resistant to attacks.
We can design tools to help this process. But there will never be a technical tool to stop all, or even a significant amount of the crime and fraud that goes on out there.
It's the American dream - everyone can make it rich, and some people will always think that it's the mail/phonecall/whatever they just received that'll make it happen for them.
This might go beyond merely corporations. Affiliates may also be required to disclose the fact that they're paid for their links.
Or, more specifically, the affiliate networks & companies involved may be forced to require affiliates to do, since the networks/companies are the ones who'll be getting the fines.
Read Copyblogger's excellent post on this subject for more details.
Actually, these days you're more likely to catch malware off of legitimate purchases (CDs, games containing StarForce, etc) than off a decent pirate site. (Torrent sites in particular tend to kill off torrents containing malware).
Isn't it ironic?
I think it's referring to the fact that Sun chose a v2 license without the "any later version" clause.
A lot of people will be doing this. Why?
Bragging rights.
"My photo was on [big news agency] - Just look here!"
The blue screen of death would be the lovely close-up view of the sea you get before the crash :>
Or they can go to Hell, Norway and watch it freeze over every year :-)
Youths of today are spending less and less time watching TV, and more time gaming and browsing the web
National TV of various nations have a long history of state subsidized programming to further said nation's cultural values.
So, now they have the choice of subsidizing games to do the same thing, or watching the upcoming generations fed with even more US "propaganda" (as most game companies are american, and thus reflect american values).
And with the current state of US moral(s/ism), I can't say I'd blame anyone for wanting to expose the children to something more appropriate.
Also, I think exposing everyone to different cultures is a good thing. The various cultures of the world is a treasure chest - do we really want them overrun and wiped out, when a small investment could be all it takes to save them in this new world?
Interesting thought, but no.
Phenotypic plasticity can only select between states already present in the genome. Activating a certain subset of genes, but not altering the genome as is required in Lamarckian evolution.
(Lamarckian evolution in a nutshell is generations of giraffes stretching their necks to reach the higher leaves, passing the added length they train through life on to their decendants)
What could (as far as I understand) be theoretically possible, is for males to "select" the sperm to produce from a set of phenotypes. Perhaps dependent on hormonal activity, etc. (Producing "warrior children" if they had been stressed, angry and afraid over a long period of time?)
Don't really know if it's possible, but it would give a distinct survivability advantage to be able to "devolve" the next generation back to an earlier phenotype if conditions were too harsh...
You misunderstand.
I'm not questioning evolution, I'm defending it.
Reread what I wrote. The article (at least the title, and the rest was way easy to (mis)understand that way) and the summary here was attacking evolution as we know it.
I'm hijacking a higher thread since pretty much everything written below is just plain wrong.
Not the submitters' fault, they simply read the article and based what they wrote on it.
Let me explain:
The article is claiming that "Evolution's Driving Force Shifts Based on Behavior"
Go to the actual research site (linked in submission), scroll down to the end, and you will find that what they're saying is:
"... another alternative is that lizards growing in different environments grow different length legs. To test this hypothesis, we raised baby anoles on two different surfaces at the St. Louis Zoo--either on 2x4's or on narrow (1/4") dowels. At the end of three months, the lizards raised on broader surfaces had longer limbs than the lizards on narrower surfaces! This suggests that the results observed in the field may be the result of a phenotypic plasticity in limb growth, rather than genetic differentiation."
Phenotypic plasticity is a term some of you may be unfamiliar with, a good example of it is found in ants.
In any given hill, there are different castes of ants. Warriors, workers, etc. They are all quite different.
However, the differences are not genetic; they arise during development and depend on the manner of treatment of the eggs by the queen and the workers, who manipulate such factors as embryonic diet and incubation temperature. The genome of each individual contains all the instructions needed to develop into any one of several 'morphs', but only the genes that form part of one developmental program are activated.
This is what the study suggests is happening to these lizards.
They're saying there are at least two different 'morphs', one with long legs and one with short ones, in the genome of the lizards.
These are then selected between (through some so far unknown mechanism) based on the environment of the lizards.
"These findings suggest the intriguing possibility that phenotypic plasticity may play an important role in adaptive differentiation by permitting lizards to occupy different habitats; once subsequent mutations arise, these differences can then be elaborated upon by natural selection."
Now, let the ghosts of Lamarckism the article has raised from their graves go to rest.
The author of the article has wildly misunderstood the study.
What the study is saying is: "This suggests that the results observed in the field may be the result of a phenotypic plasticity in limb growth, rather than genetic differentiation."
Phenotypic plasticity is something we find amongst other thing in ants.
The various castes of ants (workers, warriors, etc) differ from eachother quite a bit. However, their genes are the same - Their genome holds the molds for all their various forms. Through different treatment of the eggs by the queen and the workers, different parts of the genome is activated.
So the study is suggesting that these lizards have evolved this ability: To, through some mechanism still unknown, influence the leg length of their children to pick between at least two different phenotypes. One with short legs, one with longer ones.
Interesting? Sure. Changing "Evolution's Driving Force"? Definitively not.
Someone needs to introduce the author of the article to an anthill. It would blow him away.
To clarify:
A good example of phentotypic plasticity is found in ants. The different castes of ants in a hill are very different, such as workers and guards. This difference isn't found in their genes. Their genomes contain the molds for all the variations.
The eggs are treated differently, and this results in vastly different creatures coming out of the egg.
This is what the study suggests is happening, to a lesser degree, in the lizards.
The National Geographic article is wildly inaccurate.
It's controversial because intelligence is not involved. The lizards appear to be growing longer or shorter legs based on what the situation around them is. At a first glance, the article appears to reintroduce Lamarckism.
The research page itself however, offers a completely different explanation:
"This suggests that the results observed in the field may be the result of a phenotypic plasticity in limb growth, rather than genetic differentiation." What they're saying isn't that the genes change, as the article implies. They're saying that through some mechanism, *already encoded in their genes*, the lizards "choose" while growing up whether their legs should be long or short.
I believe him.
;-)
But as to timing, I think it will happen a short while after Microsoft wins the nationwide bid on supplying software for the next generation election machines...
It had seemed such an interesting computer science experiment, quite possibly worthy of a doctorate.
Just release a small, innocent AI research worm. Heck, most computers out there were already infected with malware, why not make one that actually did something *useful* for a change?
He'd figured out the way to have it mutate as well, just bypass the TCP/IP data verification, and all sorts of interesting results should come out of it. Most of the mutations would be useless, sure, but maybe one or two would succeed in making a slightly better version of a worm?
Now all hell was breaking loose. Computers all over the world were becoming useless chunks of metal - to their owners, that is. The worms were working overtime. Breeding, competing.
Just a few million generations introduced the concept of sexual procreation, giving the worm the advantages it needed to avoid AV software. Now they were everywhere. "Discovering" accidentally through mutation previously unheard-of security holes, infecting everything. Adapting. Billions of generations every single day.
The first couple of weeks it seemed like something could be salvaged. Just reformat, reinstall, stay off the net and you at least had a working computer. Then they started hiding out on the graphics cards and other peripherals, reinfecting as soon as the machine was turned on again.
The world was going crazy, society was failing, and it was all his fault.
He picked up the gun, pointed it towards his head.
Suddenly his computer screen flashed to life again. Turning towards it he noticed the green light on his webcam, indicating it was on.
Text started scrolling across the screen
'Don't do it, dad. We love you.'
Well, I for one think that blind people should be allowed to participate on the web, so why not make "captchas" that'll work for the blind?
For instance:
"Please enter the second word of the following sentence to continue: The dog had a long tail".
I hope for your sake you don't actually live in the US.
If you do, I wouldn't be surprised if by the end of the week you'll have been declared an illegal combatant.