My gut reaction is one of, "Shut up, suck it up, and do the job. Morals have no business in the workplace. You are a paid employee/droid that is given a task to complete. So do it. Have your morals on your time not the company's."
Most people have a threshold though. What about working on weapons? What about being the pilot on route to drop a nuke on a major city? By your argument a job is a job after all - should we not think about our actions?
Many people associate true AI with the slave race scenario. I don't see this. If we are truly advanced enough to create intelligence, then certainly we can use that knowledge to improve our own brains.
Imagine the creation of strong AI that can either self-replicate (or figure out how to self replicate). Would its rate of improvement exceed our ability to modify ourselves to match? Given how hard it currently is to modify biological systems, I'd be tempted to say so. But since we're not there yet, who knows what will and will not be possible?
I, for one, welcome our new tea and biccie munching AI overlords.
Anyway, once we've invented AI that can do our jobs, the whole human race is pretty much redundant. Sounds like the next logical evolutionary step. They'll look back on us as The Flesh Age and perhaps keep a few of us as pets (or stuffed humans in a museum). Beyond that, our usefulness is exhausted.
I love the smell of optimism burning in the morning.
I've been managed by non-technical managers and technically-aware managers, and also been a technically-aware manager myself for a little while.
It's a double edged sword. Non-technical managers might not understand the importance of technical details/problems, but technical managers might end up micromanaging.
Personally I believe it all comes down to trust (and hence personality). The best managers are those that are technically competent but trust their team to make the correct judgements without the managers input. The worst are managers that are technically competent but want to make every decision for the team. Engineers *need* to have creative input and make decisions in order to be happy in their roles. Non-technical managers are in-between - they are forced to trust their team, but might not understand the pros and cons of important technical decisions.
Like it or not, those "difficult to quantise" aspects of running a technical project (such as personality) can make or break it. Surviving as a techie manager depends 100% on your personality. Put your trust in your team.
The OLPC's produced earlier this week in Shanghai still need to go through loads of testing, such as knocking them off desks and dropping them in mud, as kids are wont to do. They may also be kicked around, like soccer balls, a popular sport in 99.9 percent of the world.
I propose the "slashdotprod", a USB powered device that gives moderators a hefty jolt for not being independantly subjective. (And you'd have to have one plugged in in order to moderate).
3.3V @ 500mA ain't gonna dissade anyone from moderating badly, so obviously the slashdotprod would have to have some form of flyback circuit or switcher/ladder circuit and accumilate charge over time.
Since robots are getting good at pretty much everything these days, we'll just leave it to them to decide who is subjective and who just tastes of bacon and deserves a good prodding. A few false negatives never hurt anyone until now.
Quick, I'd better patent it before LSI or Microsoft get in there first.
...and I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of people with genital piercings suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.
At one of the first companies I worked for out of uni, one of my colleagues put something pretty derogatory about a particular manager in an e-mail - and accidentally sent it to that manager. (Must've been thinking his name, subconsciously added it to the list of people in the To: field - who knows?)
Fortunately for him that manager had just popped out of his office.
Cue Mission Impossible style assault on that manager's office by the employee in question, in an attempt to delete the e-mail from the manager's e-mail client while remaining hidden in case the manager returned.
While the rest of the world umms and ahhs about OSS and things like nuclear power, the French just get in there and do it. Despite the poor attitude that many have towards the French (you know who you are!), you've really got to admire them sometimes.:)
Around here, it seems a lot of people are afraid to use self checkout lines, where you scan and bag the items yourself. So, they all line up at the cashiers, meanwhile, I can get through the self checkout in record time.
...unless something goes wrong, in which case it takes ten times as long. Or if you're buying alcohol (which requires age verification), for example.
While I don't doubt your premise that some people are afraid to use them, there are circumstances where people might not choose to use them as well. Sounds like risk assessment to me.
That's true. When Nintendo announced the name, many people were disappointed, upset, and even angry. There was even a petition to Nintendo of America to change the name.
Certainly everyone talked about it.
And now we make affectionate jokes about the name, and it's quite accepted.
Methinks Nintendo made a very smart (or lucky) choice.
Given the number of consoles Nintendo must be anticipating serving those pages to, I'd expect them to be pretty much unslashdottable. A few people from slashdot? T'is but a scratch!
Aside from triggering the attack, how does this make it anonymous?
Surely the "http://URI-with-malicious-code.php" section will still create logs on the victim server pointing to the source of the malicious code (but perhaps not who triggered it).
When I was at uni, I left an OpenGL software project too late before deadline. I underestimated the massive amount of work it would take. It was due in Friday, I realised Sunday evening. I worked late into the night, until it was so late, I figured I might as well not bother sleeping. So I didn't. I stayed up for five days coding solidly, including throughout the night (coffee fuelled), stopping just to fulfil basic body functions. The project got done, and it looked great.
But, I learnt a few things.
My body followed the daily cycles despite not sleeping. Each day I would be at my least attentive between 4am-8am. Then, by mid-day I'd be feeling a lot more awake and alert. I did not hallucinate in any way, but I did feel like crap pretty much all the time.
In hindsight, because I waas so tired during the days, I'd have probably got exactly the same amount of work done if I'd followed the normal cycles and slept during the nights. It definitely doesn't do you any favours to skimp on the sleep.
And on the fifth day, after I handed it in, I slept very well.:) (But it did take another week to fully recover from my sleep depravation).
Slashdot Mirror
Imagine the creation of strong AI that can either self-replicate (or figure out how to self replicate). Would its rate of improvement exceed our ability to modify ourselves to match? Given how hard it currently is to modify biological systems, I'd be tempted to say so. But since we're not there yet, who knows what will and will not be possible?
Human slave race synario? Maybe.
I, for one, welcome our new tea and biccie munching AI overlords.
Anyway, once we've invented AI that can do our jobs, the whole human race is pretty much redundant. Sounds like the next logical evolutionary step. They'll look back on us as The Flesh Age and perhaps keep a few of us as pets (or stuffed humans in a museum). Beyond that, our usefulness is exhausted.
I love the smell of optimism burning in the morning.
...I'm not interested.
Nothing wrong with lugging a big lead-acid about with you wherever you go. Right? Hello? Anyone there?
Put your ego to one side and trust your team. Message ends.
I've been managed by non-technical managers and technically-aware managers, and also been a technically-aware manager myself for a little while.
It's a double edged sword. Non-technical managers might not understand the importance of technical details/problems, but technical managers might end up micromanaging. Personally I believe it all comes down to trust (and hence personality). The best managers are those that are technically competent but trust their team to make the correct judgements without the managers input. The worst are managers that are technically competent but want to make every decision for the team. Engineers *need* to have creative input and make decisions in order to be happy in their roles. Non-technical managers are in-between - they are forced to trust their team, but might not understand the pros and cons of important technical decisions.
Like it or not, those "difficult to quantise" aspects of running a technical project (such as personality) can make or break it. Surviving as a techie manager depends 100% on your personality. Put your trust in your team.
Very interesting reading - I'd mod you up if I could.
I love the smell of burning karma in the morning.
Conversely, will there be cases where Vista Home falsely detects it is running on a virtual machine when, in fact, it isn't? (WGA springs to mind)
Does anyone know the mechanism by which an OS can detect if it is running virtualised?
I propose the "slashdotprod", a USB powered device that gives moderators a hefty jolt for not being independantly subjective. (And you'd have to have one plugged in in order to moderate).
3.3V @ 500mA ain't gonna dissade anyone from moderating badly, so obviously the slashdotprod would have to have some form of flyback circuit or switcher/ladder circuit and accumilate charge over time.
Since robots are getting good at pretty much everything these days, we'll just leave it to them to decide who is subjective and who just tastes of bacon and deserves a good prodding. A few false negatives never hurt anyone until now.
Quick, I'd better patent it before LSI or Microsoft get in there first.
...and I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of people with genital piercings suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.
At one of the first companies I worked for out of uni, one of my colleagues put something pretty derogatory about a particular manager in an e-mail - and accidentally sent it to that manager. (Must've been thinking his name, subconsciously added it to the list of people in the To: field - who knows?)
Fortunately for him that manager had just popped out of his office.
Cue Mission Impossible style assault on that manager's office by the employee in question, in an attempt to delete the e-mail from the manager's e-mail client while remaining hidden in case the manager returned.
Amazingly, he managed to get away with it!
While the rest of the world umms and ahhs about OSS and things like nuclear power, the French just get in there and do it. Despite the poor attitude that many have towards the French (you know who you are!), you've really got to admire them sometimes. :)
While I don't doubt your premise that some people are afraid to use them, there are circumstances where people might not choose to use them as well. Sounds like risk assessment to me.
...just have someone playing with their Wii in the shop window, that should get peoples attention.
That's true. When Nintendo announced the name, many people were disappointed, upset, and even angry. There was even a petition to Nintendo of America to change the name.
Certainly everyone talked about it.
And now we make affectionate jokes about the name, and it's quite accepted.
Methinks Nintendo made a very smart (or lucky) choice.
...in Office 2007 format, forcing the commission to buy a licence to read them?
:)
Oh, that'd be so funny.
Given the number of consoles Nintendo must be anticipating serving those pages to, I'd expect them to be pretty much unslashdottable. A few people from slashdot? T'is but a scratch!
..when developers play with their Wii.
(Sorry, couldn't resist YAWJ (Yet Another Wii Joke))
Aside from triggering the attack, how does this make it anonymous?
Surely the "http://URI-with-malicious-code.php" section will still create logs on the victim server pointing to the source of the malicious code (but perhaps not who triggered it).
When I was at uni, I left an OpenGL software project too late before deadline. I underestimated the massive amount of work it would take. It was due in Friday, I realised Sunday evening. I worked late into the night, until it was so late, I figured I might as well not bother sleeping. So I didn't. I stayed up for five days coding solidly, including throughout the night (coffee fuelled), stopping just to fulfil basic body functions. The project got done, and it looked great.
:) (But it did take another week to fully recover from my sleep depravation).
But, I learnt a few things.
My body followed the daily cycles despite not sleeping. Each day I would be at my least attentive between 4am-8am. Then, by mid-day I'd be feeling a lot more awake and alert. I did not hallucinate in any way, but I did feel like crap pretty much all the time.
In hindsight, because I waas so tired during the days, I'd have probably got exactly the same amount of work done if I'd followed the normal cycles and slept during the nights. It definitely doesn't do you any favours to skimp on the sleep.
And on the fifth day, after I handed it in, I slept very well.
Do not try this at home kids.
As one of my friends puts it: it's just like two children arguing over who's imaginary friend is the best.
Dammit, when I submitted this story two days ago and had it rejected, I at least bothered to find a link to the gear:
http://www.audaxuk.com/cylon/specs.htm
It's not 360 degrees as suggested by the article.
*mutter* *mutter*