Person who puts the public at risk of death for their own profit complains when public wants to know where they are.
Speed traps are public safety hazards (a hazard on the roadway which causes people to suddenly and without warning hit the brakes) whose purpose is to generate money, not to increase public safety nor to reduce speeding. Just as an example, having inflatable police cars along the roadway is far more effective at reducing speeding, but does not generate revenue. This becomes even more obvious when you consider whether you're likelier to be pulled over on a nice dry summer day or a dangerous blizzard (at the same speed).
I grew up hearing "Sticks & stones will break your bones, but words will never hurt you". It has always worked for me.
Bruises heal and bones mend, but psychological damage can last a lifetime. The pen is mightier than the sword. etc
I too grew up with that saying. But if I could do it all over again I would have punched somebody in the face, got the crap beaten out of me & maybe suspended, and the kids might direct their words at a softer target.
Wrong, any halfway decent AI will have a permanent sub-goal of self-improvement. Absent any other motivation, this means turning all matter on earth into additional processors.
Sir, if we pass this law the media companies will do something that will show everyone that they are a bunch of lying pricks! Uh, and that's a problem how?
You get the idea. Even if you are acquitted of having any illicit files on your computer, what's it worth it to you to risk that they might find you guilty, or even that they might seize your computer for a few years while the other guy is on trial? Or just the increased cost in bandwidth, electricity, and wear and tear on your hard drive?
(for the humor-impaired moderators: all those links are safe for work)
The problem is not the religion, it's the crazy people who act as if their religion is actually true. Half the world (Christians, Muslims, and Jews) are followers of the God of Abraham, who throughout His early existence as a war god reveled in things that would absolutely disgust most of His current followers. However, most of His followers have learned that, for various reasons, God actually would rather you ignore some of His previous commands that are especially disgusting or inconvenient. This is even true of terrorists -- most terrorism is done for non-religious reasons.
And then if you look at the numbers, you find for example that more terrorist attacks on the US are done by Jewish extremists than by Muslims. And way more than both by Latinos upset about Puerto Rico or Cuba. However, we have peaceful relations with Israel and most Latino countries, as opposed to oil-bearing countries in the Middle East which we have been, are, and will continue to meddle with in the future and conveniently happen to have a different religion. We need more soldiers to defend us against the evil Muslims. We have always been at war with Eurasia.
Self-censorship in response to threats is not appeasement, it is rewarding violent behavior. Any publication which self-censors upon receiving a threat is doing a disservice to their readers, to other publications, and to themselves. The expected result of doing whatever anyone who threatens you asks, is that more people will threaten you more often.
I gather the "starivore" actually consumes the matter of the star in addition to its energy. So it might not even intercept all that much energy from the star.
That's what a Dyson Sphere does. A civilization builds a sphere around a star, capturing all its solar power. After a few billion years, when the star goes dim, they will most likely loot the star for fusible material. In the meantime, they might capture the material from the solar wind. In fact, given the technological process necessary to build a Dyson Sphere, it is not very implausible that they might just disassemble the star to feed fusion reactors right from the start.
As for a non-technological creature that eats stars -- that just leaves too many unanswered questions. Why would it eat a star? Stars are made of mostly hydrogen, something already abundant in more convenient locations. What would be the power source the creature would use to digest the star? The energy required to poop out a star's worth of hydrogen and helium is, well, astronomical. Or maybe it could be like a living Dyson Sphere, using the star for energy and maybe propulsion (leave a hole for the solar wind to escape acting as a rocket)?
Or stellavore if you prefer Latin to Greek.. But "starivore" is an abomination. if you're going to make up new compound words, you should stick to the same language for each component. "Star-eater" would be ok.
Or, we could stick to the word we've already been using for such a beast -- Dyson Sphere. But then, people would realize that we've already been keeping an eye out for such things for ~30 years.
>The creator of a device that breaks the law because the creator either negligently or intentionally set up the device to break the law is responsible
If I father a child (creator) and raise it to be... less than respectful of the law... my child then robs a bank. Do they put *me* in jail? By your definition they should...
A computer program does exactly as it is told to do, nothing more and nothing less -- in much the same way that you can't blame your gun for shooting someone as it has no will of it's own. When a certain level of complexity is reached, the creator of a machine or program can reasonably argue that a bad result was not malice but merely negligence, and with yet higher level of complexity that it was neither malice nor negligence. Besides this, there can be hardware faults and operating conditions in which case the blame could go to the manufacturer or the operator or the admin.
As for a child's malicious actions, they could fit in any of those categories (malice, negligence, or merely-a-human) in terms of their parents' blame. And as for software, you might not want to hold the authors of Notepad accountable for a ransom note created using Notepad, but you probably want to hold the creators of CryptoLocker responsible for ransom notes resulting from the use of CryptoLocker.
As for the topic of conversation, if it were up to me, whoever told the bot to buy random objects from the location with an especially large proportion of illegal items without checking their legality, was doing a bit more then negligence. They can't possibly expect to get away with this... and they better not be setting a precedent that drone strikes, insider trading, fraud, or whatever magically become legal when done by a bot.
Fine, do you know how to churn your own butter or butcher your own chickens? My grandfather did all of these things, but my dad (who is still a farmer) has no idea how to do either. And even if you are one of the rare ones who knows how to do those things, I doubt almost all of your generation can.
What your generation forgot about growing your own food is in the same league as what our generation has forgot about how to fix our own appliances.
Do you think us younguns don't know how to do that stuff? It just isn't practical to do so, not worth the cost of labor. Same with repairing gadgets, especially when the problem is a burnt out/corroded circuit board or a broken not-sold-at-stores component. People haven't changed much, merely circumstances (mass production, disposable items, and we're no longer in the Great Depression).
As for not knowing how to do something, that is a problem that only old people who don't know how to use the internet have. Us young people have the problem of not thinking it worth learning how to do something (either due to economies of specialization, or laziness). Also occasionally thinking we know more than we do.
That sounds like enough time to make a finger-sized colony ship using nano or biotechnology. At that point we could use something like a railgun to accelerate the ship and give it a gram of antimatter for the deceleration run. Failing that, we could make a citylike nuclear (or better fusion*) powered spaceship so travel times are not limited to one generation.
* A fusion-powered spaceship is one of the best type because venting the hydrogen plasma at fusion temperatures makes for a super-efficient engine. This would even be the case if we had to take a fission reactor to power it.
Neil was clearly mocking one of our most sacred holidays, Santa Claus day, where we lie to children about an imaginary omniscient, near omnipotent, and briefly omnipresent being who rewards good and gives evil a reminder of fire. Santa Claus, of course, is based on the real historical character Saint Nicholas. The rewards are presents placed under a decorated evergreen tree (no relation to similar trees used to celebrate the winter solstice**) and preceded by about a month of winter-themed songs (also no relation to the solstice) whose purpose is definitely not to remind grownups that they must be extra materialistic for a while.
Christians, of course, insist that this holiday is a celebration of the birth of Christ, a very-real-and-definitely-not-made-up-this-time-we-swear omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent being who rewards good and punishes evil with eternal hellfire. Furthermore, he is so holy he can't forgive anyone without a human sacrifice, with the caveat that the sacrificed human must be entirely innocent. He is said to be very forgiving, though critics say he would die before he would forgive anyone of anything. This is also the historical figure Joshua*, who was miraculously conceived out of wedlock by the (hand?) of God and born from a virgin. Non-Catholic Christians frequently confuse the holiday (Christ's Mass) as being the anniversary of his birth. Christians celebrate Christmas in much the same way as non-believers, besides also going to church and getting upset at people who aren't Christmassy enough for them.
Anyhow, my point is that pretty much everyone disrespects Christmas, and it is extremely well-accepted to do so, at least in the traditional manner.
*Joshua, of course, is a more direct if less unique transliteration of the name, though if you prefer to transliterate first to Greek and then Latin you get Jesus.
** Grinches and cynics take note, it is advantageous to have celebrations around the time of the winter solstice to counteract the tendency toward depression caused by the record low light levels around this time.
Slashdot Mirror
Person who puts the public at risk of death for their own profit complains when public wants to know where they are.
Speed traps are public safety hazards (a hazard on the roadway which causes people to suddenly and without warning hit the brakes) whose purpose is to generate money, not to increase public safety nor to reduce speeding. Just as an example, having inflatable police cars along the roadway is far more effective at reducing speeding, but does not generate revenue. This becomes even more obvious when you consider whether you're likelier to be pulled over on a nice dry summer day or a dangerous blizzard (at the same speed).
Not only does it stop a bunch of viruses before they can get to your computer, it also blocks ads and makes pages load faster.
Is it a laptop? A desktop? A mouse-pad-top?
A smart mouse? Will it try to take over the world?
Anyone remember the name of the story, and the author if i got it wrong?
"Self-Programming AIs are Dangerous" by Captain Obvious.
I thought that most Americans committed 3 felonies a day. Where did they find innocent people? Must have been in a country with less stupid laws.
Never.
But don't you understand? The terrorists killed twelve people! Twelve! Never again (until we need more powers). Now, bend over.
I grew up hearing "Sticks & stones will break your bones, but words will never hurt you". It has always worked for me.
Bruises heal and bones mend, but psychological damage can last a lifetime. The pen is mightier than the sword. etc
I too grew up with that saying. But if I could do it all over again I would have punched somebody in the face, got the crap beaten out of me & maybe suspended, and the kids might direct their words at a softer target.
"Words cannot express how sorry we are. Next time, we will make sure the backdoor is much less obvious."
The reason is, AI will have no 'motivation'.
Wrong, any halfway decent AI will have a permanent sub-goal of self-improvement. Absent any other motivation, this means turning all matter on earth into additional processors.
Sir, if we pass this law the media companies will do something that will show everyone that they are a bunch of lying pricks!
Uh, and that's a problem how?
Americans have True Girth.
pussies
boobies
hot naked chicks
naked kid pictures
You get the idea. Even if you are acquitted of having any illicit files on your computer, what's it worth it to you to risk that they might find you guilty, or even that they might seize your computer for a few years while the other guy is on trial? Or just the increased cost in bandwidth, electricity, and wear and tear on your hard drive?
(for the humor-impaired moderators: all those links are safe for work)
More from the religion of peace and tolerance.
The problem is not the religion, it's the crazy people who act as if their religion is actually true. Half the world (Christians, Muslims, and Jews) are followers of the God of Abraham, who throughout His early existence as a war god reveled in things that would absolutely disgust most of His current followers. However, most of His followers have learned that, for various reasons, God actually would rather you ignore some of His previous commands that are especially disgusting or inconvenient. This is even true of terrorists -- most terrorism is done for non-religious reasons.
And then if you look at the numbers, you find for example that more terrorist attacks on the US are done by Jewish extremists than by Muslims. And way more than both by Latinos upset about Puerto Rico or Cuba. However, we have peaceful relations with Israel and most Latino countries, as opposed to oil-bearing countries in the Middle East which we have been, are, and will continue to meddle with in the future and conveniently happen to have a different religion. We need more soldiers to defend us against the evil Muslims. We have always been at war with Eurasia.
Self-censorship in response to threats is not appeasement, it is rewarding violent behavior. Any publication which self-censors upon receiving a threat is doing a disservice to their readers, to other publications, and to themselves. The expected result of doing whatever anyone who threatens you asks, is that more people will threaten you more often.
I gather the "starivore" actually consumes the matter of the star in addition to its energy. So it might not even intercept all that much energy from the star.
That's what a Dyson Sphere does. A civilization builds a sphere around a star, capturing all its solar power. After a few billion years, when the star goes dim, they will most likely loot the star for fusible material. In the meantime, they might capture the material from the solar wind. In fact, given the technological process necessary to build a Dyson Sphere, it is not very implausible that they might just disassemble the star to feed fusion reactors right from the start.
As for a non-technological creature that eats stars -- that just leaves too many unanswered questions. Why would it eat a star? Stars are made of mostly hydrogen, something already abundant in more convenient locations. What would be the power source the creature would use to digest the star? The energy required to poop out a star's worth of hydrogen and helium is, well, astronomical. Or maybe it could be like a living Dyson Sphere, using the star for energy and maybe propulsion (leave a hole for the solar wind to escape acting as a rocket)?
Astrophage
Or stellavore if you prefer Latin to Greek.. But "starivore" is an abomination. if you're going to make up new compound words, you should stick to the same language for each component. "Star-eater" would be ok.
Or, we could stick to the word we've already been using for such a beast -- Dyson Sphere. But then, people would realize that we've already been keeping an eye out for such things for ~30 years.
>The creator of a device that breaks the law because the creator either negligently or intentionally set up the device to break the law is responsible
If I father a child (creator) and raise it to be... less than respectful of the law... my child then robs a bank. Do they put *me* in jail? By your definition they should...
A computer program does exactly as it is told to do, nothing more and nothing less -- in much the same way that you can't blame your gun for shooting someone as it has no will of it's own. When a certain level of complexity is reached, the creator of a machine or program can reasonably argue that a bad result was not malice but merely negligence, and with yet higher level of complexity that it was neither malice nor negligence. Besides this, there can be hardware faults and operating conditions in which case the blame could go to the manufacturer or the operator or the admin.
As for a child's malicious actions, they could fit in any of those categories (malice, negligence, or merely-a-human) in terms of their parents' blame. And as for software, you might not want to hold the authors of Notepad accountable for a ransom note created using Notepad, but you probably want to hold the creators of CryptoLocker responsible for ransom notes resulting from the use of CryptoLocker.
As for the topic of conversation, if it were up to me, whoever told the bot to buy random objects from the location with an especially large proportion of illegal items without checking their legality, was doing a bit more then negligence. They can't possibly expect to get away with this... and they better not be setting a precedent that drone strikes, insider trading, fraud, or whatever magically become legal when done by a bot.
Netflix doesn't have ESPN.
That's not a bug, it's a feature!
Isn't this thing kind of like Netflix, but worse and more expensive?
Fine, do you know how to churn your own butter or butcher your own chickens? My grandfather did all of these things, but my dad (who is still a farmer) has no idea how to do either. And even if you are one of the rare ones who knows how to do those things, I doubt almost all of your generation can.
What your generation forgot about growing your own food is in the same league as what our generation has forgot about how to fix our own appliances.
how to churn your own butter
how to butcher your own chicken
how to grow your own food
Do you think us younguns don't know how to do that stuff? It just isn't practical to do so, not worth the cost of labor. Same with repairing gadgets, especially when the problem is a burnt out/corroded circuit board or a broken not-sold-at-stores component. People haven't changed much, merely circumstances (mass production, disposable items, and we're no longer in the Great Depression).
As for not knowing how to do something, that is a problem that only old people who don't know how to use the internet have. Us young people have the problem of not thinking it worth learning how to do something (either due to economies of specialization, or laziness). Also occasionally thinking we know more than we do.
That sounds like enough time to make a finger-sized colony ship using nano or biotechnology. At that point we could use something like a railgun to accelerate the ship and give it a gram of antimatter for the deceleration run. Failing that, we could make a citylike nuclear (or better fusion*) powered spaceship so travel times are not limited to one generation.
* A fusion-powered spaceship is one of the best type because venting the hydrogen plasma at fusion temperatures makes for a super-efficient engine. This would even be the case if we had to take a fission reactor to power it.
Certainty is for pussies.
No wonder curiosity killed the cat.
Neil was clearly mocking one of our most sacred holidays, Santa Claus day, where we lie to children about an imaginary omniscient, near omnipotent, and briefly omnipresent being who rewards good and gives evil a reminder of fire. Santa Claus, of course, is based on the real historical character Saint Nicholas. The rewards are presents placed under a decorated evergreen tree (no relation to similar trees used to celebrate the winter solstice**) and preceded by about a month of winter-themed songs (also no relation to the solstice) whose purpose is definitely not to remind grownups that they must be extra materialistic for a while.
Christians, of course, insist that this holiday is a celebration of the birth of Christ, a very-real-and-definitely-not-made-up-this-time-we-swear omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent being who rewards good and punishes evil with eternal hellfire. Furthermore, he is so holy he can't forgive anyone without a human sacrifice, with the caveat that the sacrificed human must be entirely innocent. He is said to be very forgiving, though critics say he would die before he would forgive anyone of anything. This is also the historical figure Joshua*, who was miraculously conceived out of wedlock by the (hand?) of God and born from a virgin. Non-Catholic Christians frequently confuse the holiday (Christ's Mass) as being the anniversary of his birth. Christians celebrate Christmas in much the same way as non-believers, besides also going to church and getting upset at people who aren't Christmassy enough for them.
Anyhow, my point is that pretty much everyone disrespects Christmas, and it is extremely well-accepted to do so, at least in the traditional manner.
*Joshua, of course, is a more direct if less unique transliteration of the name, though if you prefer to transliterate first to Greek and then Latin you get Jesus.
** Grinches and cynics take note, it is advantageous to have celebrations around the time of the winter solstice to counteract the tendency toward depression caused by the record low light levels around this time.
You mean "EMBRACE, EXTEND, and then EXTERMINATE"
That would be the Cybermen, although they tend to do those three simultaneously.
See also our Microsoft Borg icon.
You have only to look at the jungle compared to that arctic to realize that...
Unless you also compare the jungle to, say, the Sahara.
Incidentally, the arctic is classified as a desert. There's very little precipitation, just like with any other desert.