I just reread what I wrote and realized that anyone not inside my head would be unable to understand it's relevance.
The parent said, "pure evolution (i.e. order from absolute randomness"... "the things that we call "order" and "intelligence" are just a higher function of chaos (the inevitable byproduct of randomness)."... "If evolution is true, then intelligence will happen regardless of what we do"... "no reason to believe that we have anything to do with it whatsoever, or could influence it in any way at all if we did."
How does this all tie in? The picture painted here is one where our hands may wrought nothing upon the face of the Earth, and all would occur be it our will or not. That we are either powerless to cause change, or science is a sham. Now, despite being inherently contradictory (and prompting me to use that in my reply), he suggests that there is no reason to believe we as humans can utilized existant systems of chemistry and biology in order to craft things in our image if we so desired and came to sufficient understanding.
While I cannot calls us gods or god-like, I must assert that our authority and understanding over our environment, when we decide to collectively (as via taxation and government) effect change is staggering and steadily growing to say the least.
The paradoxical contradiction in the now grandparent is so apparent it is hard to read, and I base this on only context not political assessment.
Hopefully, between these two comments, my true intent and the applicability of my previous response can be gleaned. (I really do think I left out a couple logical steps in my last one)
The parent is suggesting that artificial selection is proof against natural selection.
And you can't breed dogs or horses or humans or anything else to enhance a specific trait can you?
The fact of the matter is that we are fundamentally no different from the amoeboid life we evolved from, and the rest of the life that evolved from it, just more complicated. If simple insectoid neuro circuitry can be approximated with simple neural nets (read this for more info on this highly debated subject) it could easily be argued that it is not the distinction between artificial and "natural" intelligence that should be question/examined but the existence and definition intelligence itself, and quite possibly life for that matter. These are concepts as arbitrary and ill-defined as the spirituality that their nay-sayers flaunt so wantonly in protest.
For christ's sake (pun and capitalization intended), think before you flap your rot. (There's just no escaping them on this subject)
...Perelman waved towards the logo emblazoned on the wall of the lounge behind him. "Then came the PRISM Project."
Perry Simm was seventeen years old when he drove a skycar into the side of a mountain.
.....
"PRISM, my name is Abraham Perelman. It's all true I'm afraid. You are a computer, and your life was merely a simulation whose purpose was to instill you with intelligence and self-awareness. Think about everything you learned in that AI course you took. You are the first of a new breed - the thinking machine. Join me, and I will lead you along a road toward your new existance."
If you were trying to predict rain in the next six months it would be a lot easier than predicting it with any real useful accuracy.
It's the difference between saying it does rain, and when it will. On this scale they are just explaining a phenomena that can happen every so often, in a stellar sense. I'm guessing this eases the difficulty of computation from what would be necessary to predict the number of years before the next occurrence.
It's not 'American, born-Chinese', IT IS American-Born Chinese.
This term refers to someone who's family line comes from the region of the planet referred to as China, but is unfamiliar with the ways and customs of the Chinese culture and government.
This is a problem because they will not afford you the same courtesy they would an obviously "white" American due to his explainable ignorance of their ways and customs. An ABC gets no slack in China. They are expected to be aware of the way things are done, and if anything are treated worse due to their ignorance of what could be thought of as "their own culture".
Obviously this is a close minded viewpoint, but it does happen to ABC who visit China.
At the risk of sounding terribly ungeek, I will admit to still using IE. There is only one reason for this:
Google Toolbar
I happen to like it a lot. I'm lazy, it's ultra convenient. Now if Firefox had a version of the Google toolbar, which up to now it does not, I would switch in a hot minute.
Hopefully, this pairing promises this among other great things.
This is in no way a super-scientific opinion, but there is some truth to the planet itself having some sort of homeostatic tendencies, i.e. whe things like heat and atmospheric constituents get out of whack the planet as a whole has mechanisms to level that out and buffer the changes.
Now I don't mean to sound like a Gaiaist here, but even consider this global warming thing to be the analog of a planetary fever. Something, us, is unbalancing that homeostatis, and the planet is getting rid of it by warming, as a human would when infected by a virus or bacteria.
I know, all of this is basically what is being said above, and in like manner all we would have to do is stopping acting like such a contagion, and begin contributing to maintaining the planets homeostatic balance, therefore returning to the class of endosymbiont as opposed to the parasite we have become.
Really, my point in posting this I suppose was to relate the whole concept in terms seemingly more simple to the public eye. The only necessary addition are examples of the planet's homeostatic systems, and some ideas, as listed above, on how to be helpful as opposed to destabilizing to our environment. But then again destabilization seems to be in political vogue at the moment (in the US), so that this not getting attention isn't too surprising.
"estimated there is enough food to last seven to 14 days beyond Christmas Day, after which there will be nothing left."
"they were put on restricted diets in hopes of trimming 5 percent to 10 percent of their daily intake of 3,000 calories."
"NASA and the Russian Space Agency were stunned to learn last week that the astronauts had begun digging into the 45-day food reserve -- which exists to protect against a delayed supply shipment -- in mid-November."
"The station's water supply is not nearly as dire and the two men have been encouraged to drink as much as they want."
And this is great: "Extra food and water has been packed into the supply ship that is scheduled to blast off from Kazakhstan on December 23, including some Asian delicacies -- dim sum dumplings for Chiao, a first-generation Chinese-American, and fried rice for Sharipov, who was born in what is now Kyrgyzstan in central Asia."
Space take-out. Who knew? Evidently it isn't guaranteed to be warm and fresh in thirty minutes or less...??? Looks like consumer space travel has one more bump to overcome.
The FAQ in this article is better than the article...
Two questions on the tip of my tongue were answered outright and the section gives good perspective on the angle company is taking. From the article:
Q. Why are you calling it Palm OS for Linux? Isn't that like saying you have an operating system on top of an operating system?
A. "Palm OS for Linux" is not the formal product name, it's just a description of what we're developing. Our software is known as Palm OS and we wanted to keep continuity with that.
Q. Does Palm OS for Linux replace current versions of Palm OS?
A. This is an addition to our line, not a replacement. Other versions of Palm OS continue to be available. As always, we'll make decisions on their future growth path based on feedback from our licensees and other partners.
My suggestion: scroll down for the good stuff. It's at the bottom of the article.
From the article:
"Personal Internet Communicator, or PIC as AMD calls it..."
"Geode x86 processors, 128MB of Samsung RAM and a 10GB Seagate hard drive." And, "a version of Microsoft's Windows CE operating system, fitted with Windows XP-extensions".
Now, just add all the spyware you can download by the average "families who make the equivalent of between $1,000 and $6,000 annually" (the specified market), and you have a high performance virtually unsinkable machine....
Does anyone else see a problem here, or is it just me???
I was recently in a situation where a guy I know, who actually makes money doing tech services by just consistently networking with people he knows, was working on a mutual friends computer while I was in the area. Kinda hanging around, only paying minimal attention (I don't like to advertise any skill with tech matters, it makes for boring conversation and tons of stupid requests) allowed me to see this guy make some serious errors and oversights, eventually ending with me having to fix the guy's computer so we could listen to this CD a friend brought over. (Somehow he borked it good.)
This experience was enlightening for a few reasons:
1) I normally assume people know how to use their computers. It isn't hard, I taught myself everything I know (including programming skills due to demand at previous employers), and wouldn't consider myself supremely educated in CS, but very literate, or versed if you will. Call it computer intuition, or just simply common sense and some experience.
2) People really don't want to know. I hadn't realized this, but explaining things to my friend in very broad detail, after this other guy made some 'obvious' mistakes, only provoked the dullest interest, no real attention what so ever.... yeah, just happily oblivious.
Basically, it is just odd how something so simple can be so flagrantly disregarded by a great majority of people, when the slightest bit research or inquiry on their part could save a ton of time and headaches. But people are just different. I, for one, and probably many of the people here, find it stimulating to do some research on an author when we have finished a book, or on the information contained in an article, or the history of some discovery. The internet and other mediums provide us with a hand-crafted Discovery Channel-style special on any given topic as we choose them. We find this stimulating and helpful in providing conversation fodder for the future. And then there are people that would rather have the Discovery Channel compose their special for them, or, worse yet, ABC or NBC educate them about the modes and methods of CSI or Law & Order.
There is definitely an increasingly bimodal culture in this country (and possibly the world) along lines similar to these, the 'Tell Mes' and the 'Findout For Ourselves' or something similar to that. It is interesting, and should have increasing effects on politics and the economy. I am interested to see what develops.
Well if this is the Cantonese "Ng" then it is pronounced like this. That is a wave file of the Cantonese pronunciation from the same CSU Pomona website.
And thanks to the respondents for their jovial spirit.
The viewing cylinder is about ten inches high with an eight inch circumference. That works out to roughly 2.5 inches in diameter.
Okay, so this works out fine for people that are, let's say (the height is arbitrary, not taken from article), up to 6'2" inches tall, and are a little more than 1.5 feet wide, or 4.8 feet (about 58 inches) in circumference, but any more than that and you will have some cropping taking effect.
In fact, would the image simply be stretched across the cylinder, or would it appear normal from different angles? In the case that it would appear stretched it would simply normalize the width of all viewed through this device. This would likely be very unflattering for most, and in any case it would be a bit unflattering for at least a few (albeit a small portion of the population if it was only the very overweight).
Something else to consider is that over the course of human existence and the existence of communication as a whole the trend has been towards: A) less personal interaction, and B) quicker communication of details. From speaking, to writing, then Morse code, radio telegraph, then telephone (quite possibly an anomaly to this trend, but very quick, so maybe not), then email and instant messaging (the best of both worlds). It may very well be safe to assume that this won't catch on, but then again, we never know what will be deemed the most desirable in the tech world.
I am not sure, so don't take this as gospel in any way shape or form, but....
My guess is this is a glitch in the Babelfish. It is probably caused by any one of the surrounding words using a male tense of some sort. I believe this is what is generally used for inanimate objects.
Likewise, the same character(s) (i.e. the one for the word male) could be used more than once in the language for completely different meanings, or could be used combined with others in certain combinations to mean certain things.
But, then again the whole sentence could be completely misleading and mistranslated. I really don't know.(This being slashdot I'm sure someone more versed than either of us will chime in however.)
Slashdot Mirror
I just reread what I wrote and realized that anyone not inside my head would be unable to understand it's relevance.
... "the things that we call "order" and "intelligence" are just a higher function of chaos (the inevitable byproduct of randomness)." ... "If evolution is true, then intelligence will happen regardless of what we do" ... "no reason to believe that we have anything to do with it whatsoever, or could influence it in any way at all if we did."
The parent said, "pure evolution (i.e. order from absolute randomness"
How does this all tie in? The picture painted here is one where our hands may wrought nothing upon the face of the Earth, and all would occur be it our will or not. That we are either powerless to cause change, or science is a sham. Now, despite being inherently contradictory (and prompting me to use that in my reply), he suggests that there is no reason to believe we as humans can utilized existant systems of chemistry and biology in order to craft things in our image if we so desired and came to sufficient understanding.
While I cannot calls us gods or god-like, I must assert that our authority and understanding over our environment, when we decide to collectively (as via taxation and government) effect change is staggering and steadily growing to say the least.
The paradoxical contradiction in the now grandparent is so apparent it is hard to read, and I base this on only context not political assessment.
Hopefully, between these two comments, my true intent and the applicability of my previous response can be gleaned. (I really do think I left out a couple logical steps in my last one)
The parent is suggesting that artificial selection is proof against natural selection.
And you can't breed dogs or horses or humans or anything else to enhance a specific trait can you?
The fact of the matter is that we are fundamentally no different from the amoeboid life we evolved from, and the rest of the life that evolved from it, just more complicated. If simple insectoid neuro circuitry can be approximated with simple neural nets (read this for more info on this highly debated subject) it could easily be argued that it is not the distinction between artificial and "natural" intelligence that should be question/examined but the existence and definition intelligence itself, and quite possibly life for that matter. These are concepts as arbitrary and ill-defined as the spirituality that their nay-sayers flaunt so wantonly in protest.
For christ's sake (pun and capitalization intended), think before you flap your rot. (There's just no escaping them on this subject)
...Perelman waved towards the logo emblazoned on the wall of the lounge behind him. "Then came the PRISM Project."
.....
Perry Simm was seventeen years old when he drove a skycar into the side of a mountain.
"PRISM, my name is Abraham Perelman. It's all true I'm afraid. You are a computer, and your life was merely a simulation whose purpose was to instill you with intelligence and self-awareness. Think about everything you learned in that AI course you took. You are the first of a new breed - the thinking machine. Join me, and I will lead you along a road toward your new existance."
If you were trying to predict rain in the next six months it would be a lot easier than predicting it with any real useful accuracy.
It's the difference between saying it does rain, and when it will. On this scale they are just explaining a phenomena that can happen every so often, in a stellar sense. I'm guessing this eases the difficulty of computation from what would be necessary to predict the number of years before the next occurrence.
It's not 'American, born-Chinese', IT IS American-Born Chinese.
This term refers to someone who's family line comes from the region of the planet referred to as China, but is unfamiliar with the ways and customs of the Chinese culture and government.
This is a problem because they will not afford you the same courtesy they would an obviously "white" American due to his explainable ignorance of their ways and customs. An ABC gets no slack in China. They are expected to be aware of the way things are done, and if anything are treated worse due to their ignorance of what could be thought of as "their own culture".
Obviously this is a close minded viewpoint, but it does happen to ABC who visit China.
I am now using FireFox.
I really had no clue... Thanks to all.
I just read that above after posting my last message. and in fact tried to post about it saying something along the lines of:
Ah shit.... Why wasn't I informed...
Oh the karma.
Looks like I'm off to install Firefox.
At the risk of sounding terribly ungeek, I will admit to still using IE. There is only one reason for this:
Google Toolbar
I happen to like it a lot. I'm lazy, it's ultra convenient. Now if Firefox had a version of the Google toolbar, which up to now it does not, I would switch in a hot minute.
Hopefully, this pairing promises this among other great things.
This is in no way a super-scientific opinion, but there is some truth to the planet itself having some sort of homeostatic tendencies, i.e. whe things like heat and atmospheric constituents get out of whack the planet as a whole has mechanisms to level that out and buffer the changes.
Now I don't mean to sound like a Gaiaist here, but even consider this global warming thing to be the analog of a planetary fever. Something, us, is unbalancing that homeostatis, and the planet is getting rid of it by warming, as a human would when infected by a virus or bacteria.
I know, all of this is basically what is being said above, and in like manner all we would have to do is stopping acting like such a contagion, and begin contributing to maintaining the planets homeostatic balance, therefore returning to the class of endosymbiont as opposed to the parasite we have become.
Really, my point in posting this I suppose was to relate the whole concept in terms seemingly more simple to the public eye. The only necessary addition are examples of the planet's homeostatic systems, and some ideas, as listed above, on how to be helpful as opposed to destabilizing to our environment. But then again destabilization seems to be in political vogue at the moment (in the US), so that this not getting attention isn't too surprising.
More importantly are they Peril Sensitive?
*cn;t c teh keybrd....
NOTICE: the impending IPR lawsuit filed by Joo Janta 200 Corp has been avoided due a passing SEP Field. Have a nice day!
Ahh, that's better. Where were we?
Oh, I thought that was common knowledge around here.
Not Interesting and NOT Informative....
Who mods these things anyway?
That my NES emulators aren't challenging my brand new P4, or utilizing my gig of ram to peak performance??
rexec -l username -n password razor shave -uname user
From the article:
"estimated there is enough food to last seven to 14 days beyond Christmas Day, after which there will be nothing left."
"they were put on restricted diets in hopes of trimming 5 percent to 10 percent of their daily intake of 3,000 calories."
"NASA and the Russian Space Agency were stunned to learn last week that the astronauts had begun digging into the 45-day food reserve -- which exists to protect against a delayed supply shipment -- in mid-November."
"The station's water supply is not nearly as dire and the two men have been encouraged to drink as much as they want."
And this is great: "Extra food and water has been packed into the supply ship that is scheduled to blast off from Kazakhstan on December 23, including some Asian delicacies -- dim sum dumplings for Chiao, a first-generation Chinese-American, and fried rice for Sharipov, who was born in what is now Kyrgyzstan in central Asia."
Space take-out. Who knew? Evidently it isn't guaranteed to be warm and fresh in thirty minutes or less...??? Looks like consumer space travel has one more bump to overcome.
Two questions on the tip of my tongue were answered outright and the section gives good perspective on the angle company is taking. From the article:
My suggestion: scroll down for the good stuff. It's at the bottom of the article.
From the article: "Personal Internet Communicator, or PIC as AMD calls it..."
"Geode x86 processors, 128MB of Samsung RAM and a 10GB Seagate hard drive." And, "a version of Microsoft's Windows CE operating system, fitted with Windows XP-extensions".
Now, just add all the spyware you can download by the average "families who make the equivalent of between $1,000 and $6,000 annually" (the specified market), and you have a high performance virtually unsinkable machine....
Does anyone else see a problem here, or is it just me???
Who says violence with violence doesn't work??
;^9
Didn't you see Boondock Saints??
Seeing as this is a story about degree mills, I was wondering if I could make a joke about Derek Smart?
Thanks
Evidently, you could not.
Next?
This brings up some really good points.
I was recently in a situation where a guy I know, who actually makes money doing tech services by just consistently networking with people he knows, was working on a mutual friends computer while I was in the area. Kinda hanging around, only paying minimal attention (I don't like to advertise any skill with tech matters, it makes for boring conversation and tons of stupid requests) allowed me to see this guy make some serious errors and oversights, eventually ending with me having to fix the guy's computer so we could listen to this CD a friend brought over. (Somehow he borked it good.) This experience was enlightening for a few reasons:
1) I normally assume people know how to use their computers. It isn't hard, I taught myself everything I know (including programming skills due to demand at previous employers), and wouldn't consider myself supremely educated in CS, but very literate, or versed if you will. Call it computer intuition, or just simply common sense and some experience.
2) People really don't want to know. I hadn't realized this, but explaining things to my friend in very broad detail, after this other guy made some 'obvious' mistakes, only provoked the dullest interest, no real attention what so ever.... yeah, just happily oblivious.
Basically, it is just odd how something so simple can be so flagrantly disregarded by a great majority of people, when the slightest bit research or inquiry on their part could save a ton of time and headaches. But people are just different. I, for one, and probably many of the people here, find it stimulating to do some research on an author when we have finished a book, or on the information contained in an article, or the history of some discovery. The internet and other mediums provide us with a hand-crafted Discovery Channel-style special on any given topic as we choose them. We find this stimulating and helpful in providing conversation fodder for the future. And then there are people that would rather have the Discovery Channel compose their special for them, or, worse yet, ABC or NBC educate them about the modes and methods of CSI or Law & Order.
There is definitely an increasingly bimodal culture in this country (and possibly the world) along lines similar to these, the 'Tell Mes' and the 'Findout For Ourselves' or something similar to that. It is interesting, and should have increasing effects on politics and the economy. I am interested to see what develops.
And if so, how will they determine whom should be recompensed???
My understanding is this has been going on for a long time. How would we determine what market rates should be?
Well if this is the Cantonese "Ng" then it is pronounced like this. That is a wave file of the Cantonese pronunciation from the same CSU Pomona website.
And thanks to the respondents for their jovial spirit.
Okay, according to the Cal Poly Pomona Asian Name Pronunciation Guide the name "Ng" is Filipino and is pronounced as 'nahng'.
The viewing cylinder is about ten inches high with an eight inch circumference. That works out to roughly 2.5 inches in diameter.
Okay, so this works out fine for people that are, let's say (the height is arbitrary, not taken from article), up to 6'2" inches tall, and are a little more than 1.5 feet wide, or 4.8 feet (about 58 inches) in circumference, but any more than that and you will have some cropping taking effect.
In fact, would the image simply be stretched across the cylinder, or would it appear normal from different angles? In the case that it would appear stretched it would simply normalize the width of all viewed through this device. This would likely be very unflattering for most, and in any case it would be a bit unflattering for at least a few (albeit a small portion of the population if it was only the very overweight).
Something else to consider is that over the course of human existence and the existence of communication as a whole the trend has been towards: A) less personal interaction, and B) quicker communication of details. From speaking, to writing, then Morse code, radio telegraph, then telephone (quite possibly an anomaly to this trend, but very quick, so maybe not), then email and instant messaging (the best of both worlds). It may very well be safe to assume that this won't catch on, but then again, we never know what will be deemed the most desirable in the tech world.
I am not sure, so don't take this as gospel in any way shape or form, but....
My guess is this is a glitch in the Babelfish. It is probably caused by any one of the surrounding words using a male tense of some sort. I believe this is what is generally used for inanimate objects.
Likewise, the same character(s) (i.e. the one for the word male) could be used more than once in the language for completely different meanings, or could be used combined with others in certain combinations to mean certain things.
But, then again the whole sentence could be completely misleading and mistranslated. I really don't know.(This being slashdot I'm sure someone more versed than either of us will chime in however.)