Oh, if only it were so easy! In order to have selection, you must have: *phenotypic variance *fitness differences for different phenotypes *heritable fitness
This presents a bit of a problem for computer programs, as you really can't select for thinking programs if there isn't a little thinking to begin with.
Abiogenesis research is currently undergoing the same problem. I suspect we will solve abiogenesis and AI at around the same time, some 10-50 years from now; with true AI that rival even dogs currently unattainable in all but theory.
Show me the chess program that only wins half the time against the same moves, and then you'll have something to select for (random number generators do not count!).
What? That's ridiculous logic. I've used the dock on OS X (a little bit, anyway) and it's wonderful, except that you can't tell if something is running or not.
If I glance at the KDE bar under the browser window right now, I can see a couple of PDFs, my Thunderbird Inbox, and Firefox open to Slashdot. In a separate area, I can see commonly used stuff that could be open but isn't right now (Konsole, Ktorrent, KVpnc, and Amarok).
Tell me, why is it better to have these bunched together into a single menu where you can't differentiate what's open and what isn't?
P.S. I bet I hit -1, Flamebait in less than 2 minutes for this, but I'm asking an honest question and would appreciate an well-thought-out answer from someone.
Which would be utterly useless, because it's not like you could set up a Sourceforge project for it (legally), and you couldn't crack the DRM.
Besides, why would anyone want to use this when DVD Decrypter and Handbrake work so well?
Actual spite would involve hiring a bunch of devs to work on Handbrake and really make it easy enough so your grandma could use it; add decryption functionality, etc. Although I'm not sure that would be legal either...
Fact: Mr. Webster is only slightly more reliable than Wikipedia, and indeed much less authoritative than 6th edition of the Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which was one of the first sources in the universe to discover that things could be made true simply by prefacing them with the word "Fact:"
Huh? I agree that this article was short on facts and long on suckage, but how about you test your LCD right now?
Back when I was considering upgrading to an LCD, I tested around 20 LCD monitors using my Killawatt, and they all come up somewhere around 30-50 watts. That was a while ago, I bet they're better now. CRT's OTOH, are pretty variable, pulling anywhere from 50-120 (and I imaging quite a bit more for a really large one).
One "myth" I was hoping to see debunked here is that it's more efficient to upgrade to an LCD: this is only true if you run your monitor 24/7 and your current monitor is broken. I only have my monitor on about 3 hours a day on average, so it would have been just plain bad for the environment to throw out my, perfectly good, saved-from dumpster, 10-year old, 22" CRT for a $150 dollar LCD that uses half the power (remember manufacturing and disposal costs).
OK, I have a stupid question. How do you tell how much power a component is going to pull before you buy it?
Looking around newegg, I only see a handful of "green" items that advertise their low power usage.
For the record, my system pulls 120 W idle, 230 running CoHOF, and 5 in S3. It is extremely overclocked and mostly older components which tends to skew things, but I'm looking to upgrade and wouldn't mind saving a few bucks in energy costs in the long term.
For Leonard Boyarsky, lead world designer of Diablo III: why was the decision made to cut LAN play from Diablo III? Simply to stop piracy, or to reduce hacking, or something else?
I ask because I spent over 3000 hours grinding characters with my brother on a LAN, and still don't have any sort of reliable (lag-free) internet connection at home.
Will there at least be some sort of Open Battle.net on which we can use mods and/or play single player characters?
For Leonard Boyarsky, lead world designer of Diablo III: Will any character stat elements change from Diablo II to III? (Or will it still be Strength, Dexterity, Vitality, and Mana with a separate sheet for skills?)
Will any Role Playing aspects of your previous outstanding games, like Fallout or Vampire - Bloodlines show up in Diablo III?
For Leonard Boyarsky, lead world designer of Diablo III: I'm really excited that Diablo III will include more options for players to interact with the world (source).
What specifically will this entail? Will these be limited to the Bioware [Good/Evil/Mercenary] decisions, or opt for the VTMB/The Witcher system of [no right choice/moral grays]?
Also, how much impact can we have on the world if the dialogs are optional?
IIRC, compressed air is orders of magnitude less efficient (in terms of energy conversion) than electric is.
Also, the battery technology is almost there already. All we really need is something like the Chevy Aveo that runs on electricity only. That would be awesome.
Grab a can of spray paint and put a cool design on it yourself. Works for my laptop, and having a black and silver Tux on the case is cooler (IMHO) than having a pink case.
I don't know about Excel, but using my copy of OO.o calc, I have concluded that this type of "broken-off ending" joke will become 3.71% more funny once the LHC is back online.
(Insignificant, p less than.05, however, because no one will be laughing then, either)
Well, yes and no. It would be wonderful to stop slash and burning the tropical rain forests, for a million reasons, but even stopping the depletion of this major carbon sink would only delay the inevitable global warming.
What we need is to not only stop cutting down trees and start practicing sustainable agriculture, but to also remove excess CO2 from the atmosphere. We could achieve all these goals without sacrificing a single bit of economic growth and without any real lifestyle change if we just used nukes as a transition fuel to get us on to solar, wind and in certain sectors gasification, but for some reason Jimmy Carter agreed with a bunch or moronic hippies that breeder reactors were scary and evil./rant
Video games introduce a new element. There's interactivity. That's where the art comes in. The audience participates within the performance, and that demonstrates the true art form.
Bingo! We have a winner!
This is how videogames will become art. Instead of being told, "we have free will" or "don't trust authority" (or whatever deep statement you like), games can present players with different, conflicting, ideas, and let the player be the one who decides which is right.
We've seen a few games which do stuff like this - Planescape Torment, Deus Ex, Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines, and to some extent The Witcher - but we've yet to see a game that fully realizes the artistic potential of the medium (for example, The Witcher asked you if you thought the quest for the holy grail was a metaphorical voyage, a journey of enlightenment, or a literal quest, but sadly, never made any gameplay changes based on your responses).
If a game actually let you drastically alter the outcome of the story based on your philosophical decisions, it would: 1) develop an intensely loyal fanbase, 2) recieve amazing critical reviews, 3) sell less than 10,000 copies.
You know, I usually ignore trolls that respond to my posts, but I'm bored, so I'm going to feed you with a reply.
I wasn't asking for quotes that disprove the existence of God. The only thing I really despise is people taking the Bible literally. I (up until now) have been using the shellfish quote that proved that almost all sane people do not take the Bible at face value. I just found out here that the quote has been refuted, and I'm now looking for another quote which shows the same thing but hasn't been repealed.
As for my religion, I am an atheist, but not based on "feelings;" I've never seen a single scrap of evidence that there is any sort of order or any master plan to the universe. I'll leave history to judge whether or not I'm right, I've never actively tried to dissuade people from not believing in God (I have little more evidence against his existence that you have for it), only from people taking a musty old tome as the literal truth.
They [shellfish] shall be an abomination to you; you shall not eat their flesh, but you shall regard their carcasses as an abomination.
(Leviticus 11:11)
This is one of my favorite Bible quotes. I ask people if they take the Bible literally, then (if yes) ask them why they eat shellfish. If they do not take the Bible literally, then why are they against homosexuality?
Slashdot Mirror
Oh, if only it were so easy! In order to have selection, you must have:
*phenotypic variance
*fitness differences for different phenotypes
*heritable fitness
This presents a bit of a problem for computer programs, as you really can't select for thinking programs if there isn't a little thinking to begin with.
Abiogenesis research is currently undergoing the same problem. I suspect we will solve abiogenesis and AI at around the same time, some 10-50 years from now; with true AI that rival even dogs currently unattainable in all but theory.
Show me the chess program that only wins half the time against the same moves, and then you'll have something to select for (random number generators do not count!).
If I glance at the KDE bar under the browser window right now, I can see a couple of PDFs, my Thunderbird Inbox, and Firefox open to Slashdot. In a separate area, I can see commonly used stuff that could be open but isn't right now (Konsole, Ktorrent, KVpnc, and Amarok).
Tell me, why is it better to have these bunched together into a single menu where you can't differentiate what's open and what isn't?
P.S. I bet I hit -1, Flamebait in less than 2 minutes for this, but I'm asking an honest question and would appreciate an well-thought-out answer from someone.
That page made my bookmarks. You officially kick ass.
Besides, why would anyone want to use this when DVD Decrypter and Handbrake work so well?
Actual spite would involve hiring a bunch of devs to work on Handbrake and really make it easy enough so your grandma could use it; add decryption functionality, etc. Although I'm not sure that would be legal either...
Fact: Mr. Webster is only slightly more reliable than Wikipedia, and indeed much less authoritative than 6th edition of the Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which was one of the first sources in the universe to discover that things could be made true simply by prefacing them with the word "Fact:"
Back when I was considering upgrading to an LCD, I tested around 20 LCD monitors using my Killawatt, and they all come up somewhere around 30-50 watts. That was a while ago, I bet they're better now. CRT's OTOH, are pretty variable, pulling anywhere from 50-120 (and I imaging quite a bit more for a really large one).
One "myth" I was hoping to see debunked here is that it's more efficient to upgrade to an LCD: this is only true if you run your monitor 24/7 and your current monitor is broken. I only have my monitor on about 3 hours a day on average, so it would have been just plain bad for the environment to throw out my, perfectly good, saved-from dumpster, 10-year old, 22" CRT for a $150 dollar LCD that uses half the power (remember manufacturing and disposal costs).
Looking around newegg, I only see a handful of "green" items that advertise their low power usage.
For the record, my system pulls 120 W idle, 230 running CoHOF, and 5 in S3. It is extremely overclocked and mostly older components which tends to skew things, but I'm looking to upgrade and wouldn't mind saving a few bucks in energy costs in the long term.
http://www.diablofans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=14654
There are many more, too. :(
(HiDef "Fellow Terrans" speech would be amazing.
I ask because I spent over 3000 hours grinding characters with my brother on a LAN, and still don't have any sort of reliable (lag-free) internet connection at home.
Will there at least be some sort of Open Battle.net on which we can use mods and/or play single player characters?
Will any Role Playing aspects of your previous outstanding games, like Fallout or Vampire - Bloodlines show up in Diablo III?
What specifically will this entail? Will these be limited to the Bioware [Good/Evil/Mercenary] decisions, or opt for the VTMB/The Witcher system of [no right choice/moral grays]?
Also, how much impact can we have on the world if the dialogs are optional?
I think that's one of the Soviet's units in Red Alert 3.
Also, the battery technology is almost there already. All we really need is something like the Chevy Aveo that runs on electricity only. That would be awesome.
Grab a can of spray paint and put a cool design on it yourself. Works for my laptop, and having a black and silver Tux on the case is cooler (IMHO) than having a pink case.
Come on, this is a non-issue! Someone, please! Just call it IMP or something, anything is a better name than GIMP.
(Insignificant, p less than .05, however, because no one will be laughing then, either)
What we need is to not only stop cutting down trees and start practicing sustainable agriculture, but to also remove excess CO2 from the atmosphere. We could achieve all these goals without sacrificing a single bit of economic growth and without any real lifestyle change if we just used nukes as a transition fuel to get us on to solar, wind and in certain sectors gasification, but for some reason Jimmy Carter agreed with a bunch or moronic hippies that breeder reactors were scary and evil. /rant
Bingo! We have a winner!
This is how videogames will become art. Instead of being told, "we have free will" or "don't trust authority" (or whatever deep statement you like), games can present players with different, conflicting, ideas, and let the player be the one who decides which is right.
We've seen a few games which do stuff like this - Planescape Torment, Deus Ex, Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines, and to some extent The Witcher - but we've yet to see a game that fully realizes the artistic potential of the medium (for example, The Witcher asked you if you thought the quest for the holy grail was a metaphorical voyage, a journey of enlightenment, or a literal quest, but sadly, never made any gameplay changes based on your responses).
If a game actually let you drastically alter the outcome of the story based on your philosophical decisions, it would: 1) develop an intensely loyal fanbase, 2) recieve amazing critical reviews, 3) sell less than 10,000 copies.
there is no conspiracy do some research
I wasn't asking for quotes that disprove the existence of God. The only thing I really despise is people taking the Bible literally. I (up until now) have been using the shellfish quote that proved that almost all sane people do not take the Bible at face value. I just found out here that the quote has been refuted, and I'm now looking for another quote which shows the same thing but hasn't been repealed.
As for my religion, I am an atheist, but not based on "feelings;" I've never seen a single scrap of evidence that there is any sort of order or any master plan to the universe. I'll leave history to judge whether or not I'm right, I've never actively tried to dissuade people from not believing in God (I have little more evidence against his existence that you have for it), only from people taking a musty old tome as the literal truth.
OK, I modded you up, but my background didn't change, so I'm posting this to undo the mod.
Awesome, thanks. That's why I read Slashdot. I've been using that one for 5 years, and never, never has anyone been able to respond.
Does anyone have a similar/harder to refute quote I can use instead from here on out?
(Leviticus 11:11)
This is one of my favorite Bible quotes. I ask people if they take the Bible literally, then (if yes) ask them why they eat shellfish. If they do not take the Bible literally, then why are they against homosexuality?
Cheney? Is that really you? Since when do you post on Slashdot?