The biggest problem right now is that the USPTO is being paid for the amount of patents that is approved, as opposed to being paid for the amount of patents that are turned down (due to prior art, etc.)
It is a bit like paying fishermen for the amount of fish they *didn't* catch.
If she would accept this change in financial dependence, then I'd say there is hope. But right now I don't see it happening.
At least put the court tax dollars to some better use than trying to push your "religion" on people.
Religious would be to see the chimps as different from us (the current status quo).
But in fact, that pile of atoms you're made of has no clear boundary. It's not like you, the pile of atoms, is a separate entity from the pile of atoms that makes up the chimp. So in fact, you and the chimp are one entity. You *are* the chimp. Don't you think it's time somebody stood up for your rights?
2^1,000,000 should of course been 2^-1,000,000, a rather small number.
Another question: the example was for a 2-dimensional universe; will the average distance between prescribed NxN patterns increase or decrease with increasing dimensionality?
The problem with theories of extra-terrestrial life is: the probability of us being here is 1, regardless of the a-priori probability of life being created on this planet.
Here's a nice way to look at it.
Consider the formation of the first life-generating molecules, like DNA, or the first ribosomes. You can compare the corresponding probability (i.e., of those molecules actually forming) to the following situation. Assume you have a grid of infinite times infinite squares (our analogy of the universe). Each square is, randomly, either black or white.
In some regions of the grid, you may see certain patterns. For example, in some pieces of this universe, you will see the complete work of Shakespeare written in Helvetica 16pt. (In other regions, you may see a dithered version of our beloved goatse picture.)
Now what is the probability of a 1,000x1,000 patch at a given position to be completely black? Well, 2^1,000,000, a rather big number. Any other pattern in that 1,000x1,000 patch would have the same probability. What is the average manhattan distance between such blocks? (Left as an exercise for the reader).
If, in this thought-experiment, a molecular structure that can bootstrap life corresponds to an NxN structure on a grid, you can compute the distance between these life-generators. And you will find rather large numbers.
The lesson is of course to keep those numbers in mind the next time you expect life on some planet with seemingly earthlike properties.
They may have a point in that Elsevier effectively locks up research behind a paywall, and thereby greatly reduce its accessibility. But the arguments should indeed be fair.
I'd say their activist website should at least contain a reply from Elsevier, and if possible it should offer an open dialogue between scientists and the publisher.
While your intentions may seem noble and progressive, it is exactly this attitude that reduces the engineer to a "worker" that should shut up and do his work, while governments/corporations use or abuse his creations. Not good for society, not good for the social status of the engineer.
Then should the engineer not build the bomb such that it can only be used for the given purpose?
Imagine a world where we could 3d-print molecules. Imagine that it could be used to print viruses as well, and in particular that it would be possible to target these viruses to a particular string of nucleotides occurring only in people from a particular race. Now, don't you think engineers have the moral obligation to prevent this technology from being abused?
An engineer should just look into the license.txt files that came with the particular technologies he/she used.
If, for example, it says: "this technology SHALL NOT be used to harm people", then you should either not build weapons with it, or you should search for another technology with a more liberal license.
Plus, they brainwash you into thinking that you're a rockstar programmer. But in the end, you're just creating boring office applications, while you could have been on the edge of technology in fields like high energy physics or medicine.
Yes, the road ahead now looks a little more rubble-strewn, but when there's only one road, stopping to complain isn't going to speed the journey.
Stopping to complain? Who said anything about stopping? Celebration sounds more like stopping to me.
What scientist do you think makes more progress? The one that throws a party every time he figures out that he made a mistake? Or the one that says "damn it", and goes back to work?
Slashdot Mirror
The biggest problem right now is that the USPTO is being paid for the amount of patents that is approved, as opposed to being paid for the amount of patents that are turned down (due to prior art, etc.)
It is a bit like paying fishermen for the amount of fish they *didn't* catch.
If she would accept this change in financial dependence, then I'd say there is hope. But right now I don't see it happening.
"We do no evil...
...not ourselves anyway...
...we leave that to our robots"
That's all great for in the browser.
In real life, I often ask random people on the subway to swap discount, club and rewards cards with me.
But what if the sole purpose of the app was to launch missiles (under certain conditions)?
Imagine an app that does:
try
{
fileSystem.read("/path/to/file");
}
catch(error)
{
launchMissiles()
}
What if you suddenly take the filesystem permissions away after allowing the app to be installed?!?
At least put the court tax dollars to some better use than trying to push your "religion" on people.
Religious would be to see the chimps as different from us (the current status quo).
But in fact, that pile of atoms you're made of has no clear boundary. It's not like you, the pile of atoms, is a separate entity from the pile of atoms that makes up the chimp. So in fact, you and the chimp are one entity. You *are* the chimp. Don't you think it's time somebody stood up for your rights?
And now it's time to ban commercials featuring unrealistically beautified people.
# sudo apt-get upgrade
Extracting templates from packages: 100%
Selecting previously unselected packages.
(Reading database
Uninstalling package gnome
Uninstalling package linux-kernel
Uninstalling package X-server
Uninstalling package posix
Uninstalling package bash
Uninstalling package ext3
Installing package shuttleworth-os-almost-finished
Done
#
kernel panic
Canonical moving away from POSIX.
Wake me up when we can print silicon.
Any developments in this direction? It surely would be possible to print a 1950's type of transistor at home, right?
2^1,000,000 should of course been 2^-1,000,000, a rather small number.
Another question: the example was for a 2-dimensional universe; will the average distance between prescribed NxN patterns increase or decrease with increasing dimensionality?
The problem with theories of extra-terrestrial life is: the probability of us being here is 1, regardless of the a-priori probability of life being created on this planet.
Here's a nice way to look at it.
Consider the formation of the first life-generating molecules, like DNA, or the first ribosomes. You can compare the corresponding probability (i.e., of those molecules actually forming) to the following situation. Assume you have a grid of infinite times infinite squares (our analogy of the universe). Each square is, randomly, either black or white.
In some regions of the grid, you may see certain patterns. For example, in some pieces of this universe, you will see the complete work of Shakespeare written in Helvetica 16pt. (In other regions, you may see a dithered version of our beloved goatse picture.)
Now what is the probability of a 1,000x1,000 patch at a given position to be completely black? Well, 2^1,000,000, a rather big number. Any other pattern in that 1,000x1,000 patch would have the same probability. What is the average manhattan distance between such blocks? (Left as an exercise for the reader).
If, in this thought-experiment, a molecular structure that can bootstrap life corresponds to an NxN structure on a grid, you can compute the distance between these life-generators. And you will find rather large numbers.
The lesson is of course to keep those numbers in mind the next time you expect life on some planet with seemingly earthlike properties.
A better question is this: what is this article from the transportation age doing here in the information age?
They may have a point in that Elsevier effectively locks up research behind a paywall, and thereby greatly reduce its accessibility.
But the arguments should indeed be fair.
I'd say their activist website should at least contain a reply from Elsevier, and if possible it should offer an open dialogue between scientists and the publisher.
While your intentions may seem noble and progressive, it is exactly this attitude that reduces the engineer to a "worker" that should shut up and do his work, while governments/corporations use or abuse his creations. Not good for society, not good for the social status of the engineer.
Then should the engineer not build the bomb such that it can only be used for the given purpose?
Imagine a world where we could 3d-print molecules. Imagine that it could be used to print viruses as well, and in particular that it would be possible to target these viruses to a particular string of nucleotides occurring only in people from a particular race. Now, don't you think engineers have the moral obligation to prevent this technology from being abused?
An engineer should just look into the license.txt files that came with the particular technologies he/she used.
If, for example, it says: "this technology SHALL NOT be used to harm people", then you should either not build weapons with it, or you should search for another technology with a more liberal license.
They have no moral obligation to prevent it from being used incorrectly.
How about weapons of mass destruction?
And consider the asymmetric case, where 1 party has access to this technology but the other(s) do not.
Playing the devil's advocate, when was the last time you got sued for malpractice for bugs in your code?
What is wrong with that concept, really?
I've no problem hearing Kaching! every time I get a blue screen.
You just gave Bigcorp a good testbed for free.
Plus, they brainwash you into thinking that you're a rockstar programmer. But in the end, you're just creating boring office applications, while you could have been on the edge of technology in fields like high energy physics or medicine.
Yes, but they didn't win the Super Bowl.
Yes, the road ahead now looks a little more rubble-strewn, but when there's only one road, stopping to complain isn't going to speed the journey.
Stopping to complain? Who said anything about stopping? Celebration sounds more like stopping to me.
What scientist do you think makes more progress? The one that throws a party every time he figures out that he made a mistake? Or the one that says "damn it", and goes back to work?
(Disclaimer: IANAS, not a scientist)
On the other hand, how are you going to get your 3D printing supplies delivered?
By printing a drone, and sending it to the shop?
A minor problem is still that their drones can only fly up to 10 miles.