If it is NOT packing the data into packets, sending it over a regular Ethernet stack and reassembling it with all checksums calculated and all error correction done, then they're doing it wrong.
And no, latency is not an issue: as long as the audio and video signal is perfectly synchronized, it will not matter if the output is 3ms behind the actual laser readout.
Packetize the data, make sure audio/video keeps perfect synch and then use regular software with large buffers to leave room for retransmits and forward error correction to work their magic.
If any system that COULD use software instead relies on the physical link layer to provide a perfect bit-for-bit transfer, it is a kludge, not engineering.
Using a protocol that absolutely requires perfectly identical conductor lengths on internal PCBs can be solid engineering.
Using that protocol outside of separate units, over flexible wiring, is questionable, since there is no control over wiring specs, thermal expansion, wiggling in the cable etc..
Which is probably the reason the Denon Link cable is that expensive: Ethernet cabling is probably incompatible with that protocol and the optimal cabling for the protocol requires very low tolerances for everything.
Which is not to say the Denon Link cable is anything but price gouging: solid engineering would've either - required rigid connectors between units where length is independent of wiggling and twisting of a cable - put all the components inside the same box to get over the need of external connectors - design and use a protocol that increases the wire length tolerance - use a cabling that already has identical strand lenghts (DVI or HDMI?`)
My numbers were for "copper layer" of run-of-the-mill ethernet using cheapest available parts AND transferring 1Gpbs straight the whole time.
You are right, you have a 12.5% chance to hit the most significant bit and that will produce an audible click since the whole sample will be off by half the volume.
But I only demonstrated the single-bit error rate at the link level, which is more than offset by error correction and CRC mechanisms built in layers above.
At the application level, where the pure video and sound bits travel, the chance of meeting a single bit error is probably lower than being hit by aircraft debris on your way to the grocery store. "Probably", because most of that depends on the (software) engineers responsible for implementing these layers and for the Denon Link, I don't dare to say anything.
And I'm saying engineers who don't provide software or hardware level compensation for slight differences in wire lengths should hand in their engineering degree. A Cat-x whatever bundle of cabling will always present a certain tolerance for length or length ratios. Thermal expansion is more than enough for that. Engineers who don't plan on correcting that and rely on perfect cabling instead are lazy.
Using a protocol designed for use on printed circuit boards for external runs of cable is also very high on the list of causes for forfeiting engineering degrees.
And those who are able to see a difference between a "pure" perfect datastream and datastream with the same CRC that has been recreated through forward error correction or a retransmit within 1/10000 of a second - with their naked eyes and ears - should be declared the new Master Race, because they are obviously super human.
I always thought that was the reason why they used digital cabling in the first place: to get a perfectly lossless transfer and have CRCs to prove it.
"Common off the shelf" ethernet parts have now an uncorrectible bit error rate below 10^-10 or so, which means a cheap "small-office-home" Netgear or D-Link part solution will have one bit off every 10 seconds when continuously blasting at full 1Gbps.
One bit off, every ten seconds under maximum transfer speeds.
Software and protocols handle that on the receiving/sending units, that's why we don't have noticeable data corruption at all when transferring endless amounts of data across small home networks. That is two units connected by less than 30 USD worth of networking equipment.
With higher level equipment, medium and large company grade material, this bit error rate is down to 10^-15. That is 1 uncorrectible bit error every 11 *days*(!) while continuously operating at maximum capacity. With 150USD worth of networking equipment, of which is certainly less than 10 USD for the cable alone.
If the Denon link protocol cannot handle 1 single bit error every 10 seconds: shame on them. If the components Denon uses for their Link interface have a higher bit error rate than enterprise-level network switches: shame on them. If these components actually perform worse than cheap commodity SOHO parts: feces will be hitting the fan.
I don't know if audiophile humans can even detect a single bit error every ten seconds. I don't know if that would warrant spending that amount of money even if they actually did.
But I certainly know that digital high-end equipment must outperform cheapest commodity hardware, I also know that software and protocol on either side of the link must provide for and correct single bit errors. The resulting data stream on application level must be much lower than 10^-15 single bit errors using regular cheap Cat5e cabling. That is 1 bit error every 10 hours at 10Gbps, and I know for fact that enterprise grade storage systems have much less than that, or we would have corruption on all our filesystems within the blink of an eye.
If a resulting bit error rate of less than 10^-15 is still producing visible and audible artifacts, someone made a big mistake in unit or software design or manufacturing.
If a bit error rate of less than 10^-15 or even 10^-20 is desired, more shielding is needed. We're talking about centimeters of lead here, since the remaining bit errors are caused by cosmic radiation, not only in the wire, but in the entire circuitry of the connected units.
Because we are only rolling around our RC toys and they lack an electron microscope powerful enough?
But we will never get to Mars, because we need all funds we ever had on other things, like that interesting branch of science where we can clearly prove anything and where isolated experiments to the contrary don't disprove anthing. The science there is settled, folks. For. Ever.
Now excuse me while save some CO2 and pay some taxes.
They could've just taken off and nuked the site from orbit, but no, that stubborn actress just wanted out of the script, only to want to be written back in five years later. And for that they wrote this tearjerker, bah.
But we have billions of third worlders to feed. And a climate to save. And right the wrongs of the past.
We will never get another space age until every third worlder has access to a first-class five-star university for all his 20 children. Everything else is injustice and racist oppression.
Are you paying taxes? Yes? Good, prepare to pay some more.
Did you consume hydrocarbons today? What about carbohydrates? (Stuff with hydrogen and carbon in it, at least)
Did you inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide? Did you somehow got rid of dihydrogenmonoxide or did the / a / one of the girl(s) block the bathroom the entire morning?:) - and did you emit heat while doing so?
If only individuals of a species that exhibit a certain trait ("fur color", "eye color", "drug resistance") survive and have offspring, will their descendants not share that certain trait, just like most puppies have the same fur as their parents, like most babies with blonde curly hair have parents that also had blonde curly hair?
Some individuals of this Peppered Moth have an all black or all white coat, so we have three types of moths: random color, all black, all white.
Some weather or climates heavily select on certain coat colors, because white moths stand out like a sore thumb in 1900's coal-covered forests in England and black moths have a snowball's chance in Hell in light forests and snow covered terrain. Random colored moths blend in best in most environments and while they are more visible in either extreme environmental condition, their chances of survival are fair enough.
Imagine we would spray paint the entire forest black with coal dust, for centuries, just like it was in England, we just need to assume we never run out of coal to do that. Imagine the moths are not really bothered by the coal dust and their overall food sources and their predators conditions remain stable. Now all random and white colored moths are always eaten first by birds, for centuries, selected heavily, that is.
Both species are exposed to the same environment of a pitch-black coal dusted forest. Both have identical predators and food sources.
The Peppered Moth survives in their black-coated variant, while the Common Brimstone, presenting a yellow eat-me sign to all the birds in the area will be swiftly eradicated.
Have the moths adapted to their environment? Has selective pressure brought one species to extinction? Will random and white colored Peppered Moths reappear if the heavily coal-dusted forest clears up after 50 years? Would they also reappear if the forest remained black for 500 or 5000 or 5 million years?
I always thought all cones and rods update independently of each other, giving a constant signal flow from all parts of the retina which is averaged and stitched into a comprehensive image. A bit like interlacing works, but with randomly dispersed imaging. That would perfectly explain motion blur, as a moving light makes several neighboring rods fire with the brain stitching together a blurred image.
We could artificially recreate the effect by assigning all pixels randomly to a group between 1 and, say, 5, and then render the scene at 300fps, but only updating pixel group 1 in the first frame, pixel group 2 in the second and so on (with pixel group 1 again rendered in frame 6 etc.) A moving light that is1 pixel wide would then light up several pixels in different groups.
That way, we would have recreated a like cones and rods perceive light and automatically created motion blur without computing anything artificial. We would just have to update the geometry, game logic and scene at a 300fps rate, and somehow only render the appropriate pixels which is probably more expensive than to just render everything traditionally at 100fps...
Human reaction is less than 100ms in trained people when muscle contractions have only short distances to travel, like in gamers pressing a button.
Human perception, on the other hand, is a lot faster than 100ms. Humans just can't output a useable signal (pressing a button, stomping on the brake pedal, talk etc.) fast enough.
It's mostly about visual smoothness and the naturally fluid looking motion it produces. Maybe movement prediction works better then, but it certainly feels more immersed. Quake 1 and a recent computer are capable of reaching insane frame rates and hard limited 60fps certainly look a lot better than hardlimited 30fps.
I agree with many of your points, but please don't equal and compare murders with accidental deaths, that is ashaming the victims.
Sure, both are dead now, but there the similarities end. For murders, we have the police, homicide units, judges and jails. Hunting murderers and preventing murders is not really negotiable.
Or it could be an El Al style of security: looking for a terrorist instead of looking for a bomb.
But that would mean being politically incorrect, because airliner terrorists are, well, from one particular group.
We could as well make all airline passengers eat a ham sandwich in full before boarding. Those that refuse need the security check, those that eat pork are safe. We just need a way to calm the innocent Vegans, Buddhiststs and Jews.
Crowded subways - carry a lot of people, but a whole lot less than 30.000 liters of highly flammable fuel. - don't travel at 600kph and cannot be aimed at buildings, landmarks and nuclear power plants. - can stop at any time and throw the terrorist out. - have hundreds of exits along the way. - are used by more people per day than an airport sees in a week. - have fares so cheap that an airport-like security check would cause a tenfold increase in ticket price. - have less media value and attacks don't produce much spectacular imagery, so terrorists gain less media echo - cannot be avoided by most of its passengers, so an attack would cause much more backlash than "usual"
To be serious: the terrorists either didn't notice or don't want to attack these targets. But let them do - a few attacks on the subway, where people cannot avoid it and have to travel daily there, with the usual Muslim perpetrators, and we make them wear "I am Muslim" badges and make them use their own goddamn planes. If we have a major Muslim attack every week, we will see that faster than you can say "Islamophobe". Because "phobia" is an irrational fear and with these things happen daily, it's no longer irrational.
Until then, I am confident that our terrorists will go after the tried and true airliner target, because the images are much more emotional and the inherent fear that many people have for air travel is a catalyst and amplifier for them.
Make it airlock style and transfer people in large batches, with the air / tarmac side being the "vacuum/outer side":
State A: outer door open, inner door closed, 100 people come in from the plane, with all their baggage.
Transition A->B (when airlock is full of people or a certain amount of time has passed) outer door closes inner door opens when the outer door has been shut for 3 seconds
State B: inner door opens, all 100 people leave with their baggage
Transition B->A (when airlock is 100% void of anything) inner door closes outer door opens, when nothing is detected within the airlock
If both doors are open at the same time, start the alarm If transition B->A cannot initate, because baggage or people are still in the airlock, start the alarm. If states A and B or its transitions take 0.1s longer than allowed, start the alarm. Draw a yellow no-step zone on the floor before and after each door and make the passengers keep clear of these zones while operating.
If the airlocks are large enough, this will only take a few seconds and you can gate in thousands of passengers. The airlocks could also made very small, so only one person is gated every time. Transition times can then be half a second, with ten of these airlocks operating in parallel.
Hear, hear, you're telling us TAXES are set to keep the winners of society from consuming their profits.
All the time I sheepishly thought TAXES were justified and different from theft, because they are for financing the state, the government, the police and everything. And I also thought TAX RATES were set "to each according to his ability, to each according to his needs".
I guess I start burglaring in some millionaire's houses to take something (but not all), to "specifically keeping the winners of society from consuming all the profits".
Ah no, I rather vote for higher state welfare, because burglaring in takes effort.
I have spent a measurable amount of time in Europe. All my life, more than 25 years.
That's the reason why I spoke of Eurabia: it is real.
And Vietnamese and Muslim immigrants are apples and oranges. Ironically, that is the only thing they have in common: first generation immigrants usually have small shops selling fruit and vegetables.
Second generation immigrants, however, differ wildly: Vietnamese immigrants beat native students in all disciplines, have higher scores, a higher college attendande and a higher wage overall. Most common crime: tax evasion. Muslim immigrants also beat native students. In the face, to obtain their mobile phones. They also occasionally stab people in the back, girls for ending a relationship, sisters for having sex before marriages, sons for not going to the Mosque, strangers for reminding them to not smoke in the subway. Most common crime: violent assault.
While this all seems to be a criminal matter rather than a fascist one, the problem is that increasingly, these "criminals" are calling upon Allah before committing to their deeds. And they're targeting women without a veil, vendors selling alcohol or pork.
I've never heard of a group of Vietnamese called "Buddhism4UK", rallying to violently impose their religion on the entire country that welcomed their fathers only a generation ago. All the while Muslims are occupying entire streets in Paris for provocative open street prayers. Every week. And yes, they've got Mosques here, it's just that inner city locations are not cheap enough, so they cannot rival the old churches (yet).
Not all cultures are equally compatible. It's not that they are worth more or less, just that they don't like each other - and I prefer the company of people I like, unless I'm at work and get paid for it.
Then disallow people voting themselves free lunches.
Because People who *can* vote themselves a free lunch *will* do.
This is not the end of democracy, but a much needed protection. Without such, it will (d)evolves into socialism and then end in bankruptcy as usual.
People who pay no taxes, can vote for all benefits without any downsides. Benefits must be paid, so the weakest taxpayers drop into unemployment or bankruptcy. Now there are more people who pay no taxes, more in need of established benefits and more votes behind establishing new benefits. Again, the weakest taxpayers fall out of work and the cycle continues.
This cycle initially rolls slowly, depending on inner morale and objectivity of non-taxpaying voters, but it is hardly reversible. The net-positive benefit line continually rises: - slow at first, when there's enough people to pay and only a few to receive - increasing in speed, when fewer people have to provide more taxes for more benefits for more people.
The main problem of this is, that it shows a positive feedback loop: more wealth-receivers cause more wealth-distribution causing more wealth-receivers.
This process should show an exponential gain in speed and volume, like all positive feedback loops. This is offset by soft factors like morality of wealth-receivers and two exponential processes: general inflation (lowering distributed wealth) and general economic growth (drawing people above the net-receiver line).
The result should be a low exponential trend without adjusting for inflation and a linear trend with inflation.
I think the general principle behind that would be
"This valuable item is not in use, it is not on private property, its rightful owner has for all intents and purposes forgotten that it existed anymore and will very likely not use it ever again. But all citizens have an interest in not letting value vanish, so it is appropriate that the disclaimed value is transferred to the State to use it. That way, all can benefit from lower taxes and higher revenues. No one is hurt, because the value was disclaimed long ago and would have otherwise benefitted someone who's not the rightful owner or no one at all when the value finally vanished."
AT&T or any other gift card issuer have the money and never had to deliver any goods. They are not the rightful owner of the money unless they found a way to hold up their part of the deal. Letting them keep the money for unredeemed gift cards would be an unjust benefit for them, even introducing an incentive to prefer "store money" instead of Fed Money. Because it is impractical to have all stores track down the gift card buyers, the State can reappropriate the funds and put them to use before the store goes bankrupt or moves out of state and the monies are finally lost.
I'm surprisingly okay with that, because I think it reduces the incentive of businesses to use anything other than the green Fed Money known the world over or to devise schemes that leave over untold uselessly fractioned monies. The State as a catch-all for fall-out from the daily business routines is not impractical. Use it, claim it or the State puts it to good use for you before it is lost.
The State better not even think about applying that principle to real estate or bank accounts held in real currency. These are property forms especially chosen to store value as they are unperishable. Reappropriating them is only acceptable when their owner died and absolutely no living heirs can be found for twenty years. But anything else than that will warrant an early Guy Fawkes day.
a) Keep increasing the debt? b) Keep a stable budget and hold the debt until inflation renders it irrelevant? c) Actively pay back the debt? d) Default on the debt?
Since the voters never vote on anything but increased spending, "more for $group" if you will, anything but b) and d) are an illusion. We had only one administration since the fifties that managed to come close to option b) and that for three years only. The US will get to a point where it cannot satisfy its debt, trust me. Loans are like crack to electorate and administration. Quitting is hard and they are lazy. Interest alone made up 8% of the annual budget in 2008 and continues creeping in.
I would completely agree with the "Keeping the State objective and fair" line.
But tax rates of 95%? (to quote a popular movie) "How's that NOT stealing?"
For a world, where emigration now presents a sensible way out of tax hell even for private individuals, this is becoming increasingly unlikely. There are islands with a beautiful landscape and friendly climate to live, welcoming anyone rich enough to build a hotel or two. Why should I stay in rainy UK if I had a billion pounds and face 95% tax rate when I can emigrate to warm and cozy Cyprus with a 10% tax rate where I can do the same business since they are in the EU? Why would anyone? And most people can speak English there, because of the past.
Face it, the rich (1m. and up) and the super rich (1b. and up) stay in high-tax countries for patriotism, habit and influence and leaving for a tax haven is getting cheaper every year. In Germany, every other country but Belgium is regarded as a tax haven, BTW, so around 250'000 people are fleeing from here - every single year, and most of them got a college degree. The middle class fleeing from taxes, a quarter of a million per year, can you imagine that?
Raising taxes becomes theft beyond a point, there's no point in claiming otherwise. And if stealing by the state becomes necessary, we will also need a new Iron Curtain, because all the productive members of society will just rush for the exit once you press them. And that is forced labor and also pure irony.
95% taxes - The State lets you have only 5% of your income. If you really advocate that kind of wealth redistribution, be honest and call it Socialism, because it is.
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If it is NOT packing the data into packets, sending it over a regular Ethernet stack and reassembling it with all checksums calculated and all error correction done, then they're doing it wrong.
And no, latency is not an issue: as long as the audio and video signal is perfectly synchronized, it will not matter if the output is 3ms behind the actual laser readout.
Packetize the data, make sure audio/video keeps perfect synch and then use regular software with large buffers to leave room for retransmits and forward error correction to work their magic.
If any system that COULD use software instead relies on the physical link layer to provide a perfect bit-for-bit transfer, it is a kludge, not engineering.
Using a protocol that absolutely requires perfectly identical conductor lengths on internal PCBs can be solid engineering.
Using that protocol outside of separate units, over flexible wiring, is questionable, since there is no control over wiring specs, thermal expansion, wiggling in the cable etc..
Which is probably the reason the Denon Link cable is that expensive: Ethernet cabling is probably incompatible with that protocol and the optimal cabling for the protocol requires very low tolerances for everything.
Which is not to say the Denon Link cable is anything but price gouging: solid engineering would've either
- required rigid connectors between units where length is independent of wiggling and twisting of a cable
- put all the components inside the same box to get over the need of external connectors
- design and use a protocol that increases the wire length tolerance
- use a cabling that already has identical strand lenghts (DVI or HDMI?`)
My numbers were for "copper layer" of run-of-the-mill ethernet using cheapest available parts AND transferring 1Gpbs straight the whole time.
You are right, you have a 12.5% chance to hit the most significant bit and that will produce an audible click since the whole sample will be off by half the volume.
But I only demonstrated the single-bit error rate at the link level, which is more than offset by error correction and CRC mechanisms built in layers above.
At the application level, where the pure video and sound bits travel, the chance of meeting a single bit error is probably lower than being hit by aircraft debris on your way to the grocery store. "Probably", because most of that depends on the (software) engineers responsible for implementing these layers and for the Denon Link, I don't dare to say anything.
And I'm saying engineers who don't provide software or hardware level compensation for slight differences in wire lengths should hand in their engineering degree. A Cat-x whatever bundle of cabling will always present a certain tolerance for length or length ratios. Thermal expansion is more than enough for that. Engineers who don't plan on correcting that and rely on perfect cabling instead are lazy.
Using a protocol designed for use on printed circuit boards for external runs of cable is also very high on the list of causes for forfeiting engineering degrees.
And those who are able to see a difference between a "pure" perfect datastream and datastream with the same CRC that has been recreated through forward error correction or a retransmit within 1/10000 of a second - with their naked eyes and ears - should be declared the new Master Race, because they are obviously super human.
I always thought that was the reason why they used digital cabling in the first place: to get a perfectly lossless transfer and have CRCs to prove it.
"Common off the shelf" ethernet parts have now an uncorrectible bit error rate below 10^-10 or so, which means a cheap "small-office-home" Netgear or D-Link part solution will have one bit off every 10 seconds when continuously blasting at full 1Gbps.
One bit off, every ten seconds under maximum transfer speeds.
Software and protocols handle that on the receiving/sending units, that's why we don't have noticeable data corruption at all when transferring endless amounts of data across small home networks. That is two units connected by less than 30 USD worth of networking equipment.
With higher level equipment, medium and large company grade material, this bit error rate is down to 10^-15. That is 1 uncorrectible bit error every 11 *days*(!) while continuously operating at maximum capacity. With 150USD worth of networking equipment, of which is certainly less than 10 USD for the cable alone.
If the Denon link protocol cannot handle 1 single bit error every 10 seconds: shame on them.
If the components Denon uses for their Link interface have a higher bit error rate than enterprise-level network switches: shame on them.
If these components actually perform worse than cheap commodity SOHO parts: feces will be hitting the fan.
I don't know if audiophile humans can even detect a single bit error every ten seconds. I don't know if that would warrant spending that amount of money even if they actually did.
But I certainly know that digital high-end equipment must outperform cheapest commodity hardware, I also know that software and protocol on either side of the link must provide for and correct single bit errors. The resulting data stream on application level must be much lower than 10^-15 single bit errors using regular cheap Cat5e cabling. That is 1 bit error every 10 hours at 10Gbps, and I know for fact that enterprise grade storage systems have much less than that, or we would have corruption on all our filesystems within the blink of an eye.
If a resulting bit error rate of less than 10^-15 is still producing visible and audible artifacts, someone made a big mistake in unit or software design or manufacturing.
If a bit error rate of less than 10^-15 or even 10^-20 is desired, more shielding is needed. We're talking about centimeters of lead here, since the remaining bit errors are caused by cosmic radiation, not only in the wire, but in the entire circuitry of the connected units.
The question is: does the Denon units use the Ethernet protocol?
The answer to this question will determine if you're smart or if you bought into their marketing chant.
Because we are only rolling around our RC toys and they lack an electron microscope powerful enough?
But we will never get to Mars, because we need all funds we ever had on other things, like that interesting branch of science where we can clearly prove anything and where isolated experiments to the contrary don't disprove anthing. The science there is settled, folks. For. Ever.
Now excuse me while save some CO2 and pay some taxes.
Saddest episode ever.
They could've just taken off and nuked the site from orbit, but no, that stubborn actress just wanted out of the script, only to want to be written back in five years later. And for that they wrote this tearjerker, bah.
But we have billions of third worlders to feed. And a climate to save. And right the wrongs of the past.
We will never get another space age until every third worlder has access to a first-class five-star university for all his 20 children. Everything else is injustice and racist oppression.
Are you paying taxes? Yes? Good, prepare to pay some more.
It's not like the ones we're talking about actually need any more calories, do they?
We already have intelligent living fire.
Did you consume hydrocarbons today? What about carbohydrates? (Stuff with hydrogen and carbon in it, at least)
Did you inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide? Did you somehow got rid of dihydrogenmonoxide or did the / a / one of the girl(s) block the bathroom the entire morning? :) - and did you emit heat while doing so?
I wonder if that would work on other pests we currently are at war with.
Nah, we just protect our homeland against terrorism, that is sufficient.
If only individuals of a species that exhibit a certain trait ("fur color", "eye color", "drug resistance") survive and have offspring, will their descendants not share that certain trait, just like most puppies have the same fur as their parents, like most babies with blonde curly hair have parents that also had blonde curly hair?
There is a population of moths that exhibit a random mixture of black and white pigments, most individuals look like this:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6c/Biston.betularia.7200.jpg
Some individuals of this Peppered Moth have an all black or all white coat, so we have three types of moths: random color, all black, all white.
Some weather or climates heavily select on certain coat colors, because white moths stand out like a sore thumb in 1900's coal-covered forests in England and black moths have a snowball's chance in Hell in light forests and snow covered terrain. Random colored moths blend in best in most environments and while they are more visible in either extreme environmental condition, their chances of survival are fair enough.
Imagine we would spray paint the entire forest black with coal dust, for centuries, just like it was in England, we just need to assume we never run out of coal to do that. Imagine the moths are not really bothered by the coal dust and their overall food sources and their predators conditions remain stable. Now all random and white colored moths are always eaten first by birds, for centuries, selected heavily, that is.
Now imagine we have another species of moth, a blindingly yellow type, say the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Brimstone.
Both species are exposed to the same environment of a pitch-black coal dusted forest. Both have identical predators and food sources.
The Peppered Moth survives in their black-coated variant, while the Common Brimstone, presenting a yellow eat-me sign to all the birds in the area will be swiftly eradicated.
Have the moths adapted to their environment? Has selective pressure brought one species to extinction? Will random and white colored Peppered Moths reappear if the heavily coal-dusted forest clears up after 50 years? Would they also reappear if the forest remained black for 500 or 5000 or 5 million years?
I always thought all cones and rods update independently of each other, giving a constant signal flow from all parts of the retina which is averaged and stitched into a comprehensive image. A bit like interlacing works, but with randomly dispersed imaging. That would perfectly explain motion blur, as a moving light makes several neighboring rods fire with the brain stitching together a blurred image.
We could artificially recreate the effect by assigning all pixels randomly to a group between 1 and, say, 5, and then render the scene at 300fps, but only updating pixel group 1 in the first frame, pixel group 2 in the second and so on (with pixel group 1 again rendered in frame 6 etc.) A moving light that is1 pixel wide would then light up several pixels in different groups.
That way, we would have recreated a like cones and rods perceive light and automatically created motion blur without computing anything artificial. We would just have to update the geometry, game logic and scene at a 300fps rate, and somehow only render the appropriate pixels which is probably more expensive than to just render everything traditionally at 100fps...
Human reaction is less than 100ms in trained people when muscle contractions have only short distances to travel, like in gamers pressing a button.
Human perception, on the other hand, is a lot faster than 100ms. Humans just can't output a useable signal (pressing a button, stomping on the brake pedal, talk etc.) fast enough.
It's mostly about visual smoothness and the naturally fluid looking motion it produces. Maybe movement prediction works better then, but it certainly feels more immersed. Quake 1 and a recent computer are capable of reaching insane frame rates and hard limited 60fps certainly look a lot better than hardlimited 30fps.
I agree with many of your points, but please don't equal and compare murders with accidental deaths, that is ashaming the victims.
Sure, both are dead now, but there the similarities end. For murders, we have the police, homicide units, judges and jails. Hunting murderers and preventing murders is not really negotiable.
Well nice security then.
Or it could be an El Al style of security: looking for a terrorist instead of looking for a bomb.
But that would mean being politically incorrect, because airliner terrorists are, well, from one particular group.
We could as well make all airline passengers eat a ham sandwich in full before boarding. Those that refuse need the security check, those that eat pork are safe. We just need a way to calm the innocent Vegans, Buddhiststs and Jews.
Crowded subways
- carry a lot of people, but a whole lot less than 30.000 liters of highly flammable fuel.
- don't travel at 600kph and cannot be aimed at buildings, landmarks and nuclear power plants.
- can stop at any time and throw the terrorist out.
- have hundreds of exits along the way.
- are used by more people per day than an airport sees in a week.
- have fares so cheap that an airport-like security check would cause a tenfold increase in ticket price.
- have less media value and attacks don't produce much spectacular imagery, so terrorists gain less media echo
- cannot be avoided by most of its passengers, so an attack would cause much more backlash than "usual"
To be serious: the terrorists either didn't notice or don't want to attack these targets. But let them do - a few attacks on the subway, where people cannot avoid it and have to travel daily there, with the usual Muslim perpetrators, and we make them wear "I am Muslim" badges and make them use their own goddamn planes. If we have a major Muslim attack every week, we will see that faster than you can say "Islamophobe". Because "phobia" is an irrational fear and with these things happen daily, it's no longer irrational.
Until then, I am confident that our terrorists will go after the tried and true airliner target, because the images are much more emotional and the inherent fear that many people have for air travel is a catalyst and amplifier for them.
Make it airlock style and transfer people in large batches, with the air / tarmac side being the "vacuum/outer side":
State A:
outer door open, inner door closed, 100 people come in from the plane, with all their baggage.
Transition A->B (when airlock is full of people or a certain amount of time has passed)
outer door closes
inner door opens when the outer door has been shut for 3 seconds
State B:
inner door opens, all 100 people leave with their baggage
Transition B->A (when airlock is 100% void of anything)
inner door closes
outer door opens, when nothing is detected within the airlock
If both doors are open at the same time, start the alarm
If transition B->A cannot initate, because baggage or people are still in the airlock, start the alarm.
If states A and B or its transitions take 0.1s longer than allowed, start the alarm.
Draw a yellow no-step zone on the floor before and after each door and make the passengers keep clear of these zones while operating.
If the airlocks are large enough, this will only take a few seconds and you can gate in thousands of passengers.
The airlocks could also made very small, so only one person is gated every time. Transition times can then be half a second, with ten of these airlocks operating in parallel.
Hear, hear, you're telling us TAXES are set to keep the winners of society from consuming their profits.
All the time I sheepishly thought TAXES were justified and different from theft, because they are for financing the state, the government, the police and everything. And I also thought TAX RATES were set "to each according to his ability, to each according to his needs".
I guess I start burglaring in some millionaire's houses to take something (but not all), to "specifically keeping the winners of society from consuming all the profits".
Ah no, I rather vote for higher state welfare, because burglaring in takes effort.
I have spent a measurable amount of time in Europe. All my life, more than 25 years.
That's the reason why I spoke of Eurabia: it is real.
And Vietnamese and Muslim immigrants are apples and oranges. Ironically, that is the only thing they have in common: first generation immigrants usually have small shops selling fruit and vegetables.
Second generation immigrants, however, differ wildly:
Vietnamese immigrants beat native students in all disciplines, have higher scores, a higher college attendande and a higher wage overall. Most common crime: tax evasion.
Muslim immigrants also beat native students. In the face, to obtain their mobile phones. They also occasionally stab people in the back, girls for ending a relationship, sisters for having sex before marriages, sons for not going to the Mosque, strangers for reminding them to not smoke in the subway. Most common crime: violent assault.
While this all seems to be a criminal matter rather than a fascist one, the problem is that increasingly, these "criminals" are calling upon Allah before committing to their deeds. And they're targeting women without a veil, vendors selling alcohol or pork.
I've never heard of a group of Vietnamese called "Buddhism4UK", rallying to violently impose their religion on the entire country that welcomed their fathers only a generation ago. All the while Muslims are occupying entire streets in Paris for provocative open street prayers. Every week. And yes, they've got Mosques here, it's just that inner city locations are not cheap enough, so they cannot rival the old churches (yet).
Not all cultures are equally compatible. It's not that they are worth more or less, just that they don't like each other - and I prefer the company of people I like, unless I'm at work and get paid for it.
Then disallow people voting themselves free lunches.
Because People who *can* vote themselves a free lunch *will* do.
This is not the end of democracy, but a much needed protection. Without such, it will (d)evolves into socialism and then end in bankruptcy as usual.
People who pay no taxes, can vote for all benefits without any downsides. Benefits must be paid, so the weakest taxpayers drop into unemployment or bankruptcy. Now there are more people who pay no taxes, more in need of established benefits and more votes behind establishing new benefits. Again, the weakest taxpayers fall out of work and the cycle continues.
This cycle initially rolls slowly, depending on inner morale and objectivity of non-taxpaying voters, but it is hardly reversible. The net-positive benefit line continually rises:
- slow at first, when there's enough people to pay and only a few to receive
- increasing in speed, when fewer people have to provide more taxes for more benefits for more people.
The main problem of this is, that it shows a positive feedback loop: more wealth-receivers cause more wealth-distribution causing more wealth-receivers.
This process should show an exponential gain in speed and volume, like all positive feedback loops. This is offset by soft factors like morality of wealth-receivers and two exponential processes: general inflation (lowering distributed wealth) and general economic growth (drawing people above the net-receiver line).
The result should be a low exponential trend without adjusting for inflation and a linear trend with inflation.
Suspiciously like that:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Us_federal_spending(4).png
I think the general principle behind that would be
"This valuable item is not in use, it is not on private property, its rightful owner has for all intents and purposes forgotten that it existed anymore and will very likely not use it ever again. But all citizens have an interest in not letting value vanish, so it is appropriate that the disclaimed value is transferred to the State to use it. That way, all can benefit from lower taxes and higher revenues. No one is hurt, because the value was disclaimed long ago and would have otherwise benefitted someone who's not the rightful owner or no one at all when the value finally vanished."
AT&T or any other gift card issuer have the money and never had to deliver any goods. They are not the rightful owner of the money unless they found a way to hold up their part of the deal. Letting them keep the money for unredeemed gift cards would be an unjust benefit for them, even introducing an incentive to prefer "store money" instead of Fed Money. Because it is impractical to have all stores track down the gift card buyers, the State can reappropriate the funds and put them to use before the store goes bankrupt or moves out of state and the monies are finally lost.
I'm surprisingly okay with that, because I think it reduces the incentive of businesses to use anything other than the green Fed Money known the world over or to devise schemes that leave over untold uselessly fractioned monies. The State as a catch-all for fall-out from the daily business routines is not impractical. Use it, claim it or the State puts it to good use for you before it is lost.
The State better not even think about applying that principle to real estate or bank accounts held in real currency. These are property forms especially chosen to store value as they are unperishable. Reappropriating them is only acceptable when their owner died and absolutely no living heirs can be found for twenty years. But anything else than that will warrant an early Guy Fawkes day.
How do you propose to act then?
a) Keep increasing the debt?
b) Keep a stable budget and hold the debt until inflation renders it irrelevant?
c) Actively pay back the debt?
d) Default on the debt?
Since the voters never vote on anything but increased spending, "more for $group" if you will, anything but b) and d) are an illusion. We had only one administration since the fifties that managed to come close to option b) and that for three years only. The US will get to a point where it cannot satisfy its debt, trust me. Loans are like crack to electorate and administration. Quitting is hard and they are lazy. Interest alone made up 8% of the annual budget in 2008 and continues creeping in.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:GAO_Slide.png
I would completely agree with the "Keeping the State objective and fair" line.
But tax rates of 95%? (to quote a popular movie) "How's that NOT stealing?"
For a world, where emigration now presents a sensible way out of tax hell even for private individuals, this is becoming increasingly unlikely. There are islands with a beautiful landscape and friendly climate to live, welcoming anyone rich enough to build a hotel or two. Why should I stay in rainy UK if I had a billion pounds and face 95% tax rate when I can emigrate to warm and cozy Cyprus with a 10% tax rate where I can do the same business since they are in the EU? Why would anyone? And most people can speak English there, because of the past.
Face it, the rich (1m. and up) and the super rich (1b. and up) stay in high-tax countries for patriotism, habit and influence and leaving for a tax haven is getting cheaper every year. In Germany, every other country but Belgium is regarded as a tax haven, BTW, so around 250'000 people are fleeing from here - every single year, and most of them got a college degree. The middle class fleeing from taxes, a quarter of a million per year, can you imagine that?
Raising taxes becomes theft beyond a point, there's no point in claiming otherwise. And if stealing by the state becomes necessary, we will also need a new Iron Curtain, because all the productive members of society will just rush for the exit once you press them. And that is forced labor and also pure irony.
95% taxes - The State lets you have only 5% of your income. If you really advocate that kind of wealth redistribution, be honest and call it Socialism, because it is.