If the power grid in California is going to evolve to meet the needs of the state, then one of two things need to happen: people need to pull their heads out of their asses and realize that coal power is nowhere near as dirty as it was even 15 years ago (and *that* was a far cry from the level of pollution produced 50 years ago by coal), or they need to understand that the wind generators need to go somewhere and find a way to build it into the landscape.
I think you are missing the point. All of this talk about building generating capacity is irrelevant if the power distribution grid cannot deliver the power to where it is required. That is what the article does not say, the piece of wire between the power plant and your house can only deliver approximately 30% of the power an electric car infrastructure will require.
For a moment think about what is happening. The kilowatts, per vehicle, once delivered by oil is delivered by wire. I however cannot speak to the sanity of sitting in a traffic jam for hours of the day but if we maintain this "way of life" ALL of that infrastructure HAS to be upgraded if people are to charge their cars at home and if parking stations are to be equipped with charging facilities.
Keeping in mind that I'm an environmentalist myself when I say this... the reason that the power industry in California hasn't moved at the rate it needs to is because of the enviro-nazis blocking the construction of nuclear and coal plants
Keep in mind that I am an advocate of deploying Nuclear Power responsibly when I say this... the reason the Nuclear industry hasn't expanded is because it is rife with Basis Design Issues when deploying new plants. The NRC commissioned Nuclear plant manufacturers (Westinghouse, General Electric, Bechtel, Sargent & Lundy, Northern States Power and Commonwealth Edison) to come up design recommendations to improve the safety of the plants but the AP-1000 incorporates none of the design changes the industry *itself* recommends be applied to reactor facility design. This has nothing to do with anyone or anything other than economic reasons and design changes made to produce the AP-1000 design are there to make Nuclear plants cheaper to build, but they are still expensive. Coal plants are a completely different argument and can be built with the standard 40-50 year finance plan that these plants are built with as the risk affecting return is different. Yes a modern coal plant is more efficient but it still produced a lot of carbon externality.
If anything a decentralisation of the grid will reduce the *cost* of the upgrades required to deliver the current to charge electric vehicles. I doubt there is any party who won't benefit from evolving the grid as the time has certainly come to drive efficiency into it for many other reasons. Our society is encountering growing pains. Our society either adapts to these changes or it withers. The status quo has to change and the opportunity we have now is to create more balanced lifestyles that takes the pressure off our infrastructure.
Every transaction our society conducts costs energy and you must have the means to *deliver* that energy to where it is required. Until we reduce and balance the energetic costs required to run our society we will continue to encounter these types of problems and building new power plants is analogous to printing money in this respect. Quite simply humanity has choice of sustaining growth or growing sustainability.
Obviously your going to feel the stress but the common factor for keeping your cool, at least to me, is indifference. Yes there is a pressing deadline, penalty clauses and blah blah blah but you can't do anything about those factors so you may as well do your best to view them as a distraction from the goal. If you are a tech, it's not your job to feel stress because ultimately that reduces your effectiveness.
Organising your work in certain ways gives you better control which reduces stress. No major changes on Fridays - ever, if you do be prepared to write off your weekend. Also it depends on the team you work with. If they are assholes then the stress levels are going to be higher, if you have passive aggressive types that dig their heals in or the frantic type that create stress or can't handle stress then you have to develop other strategies.
I personally experience stress more from the way people behave rather than from pressing technology task. Ultimately stress is induced as an outside influence usually not in your control. You have to be able to step back from it, figure out what you can control (usually your own reaction to the circumstance) and exert that control to remain effective.
It's a great game, and once you get past being a white belt the tactical aspects really come into a roll. You might look at it and think that there isn't much to it but it's actually very strategic and many times you have to use subterfuge to achieve your goal. For example I get the mount and I set things up so it looks like I'm going for a choke but I've made a mistake and slipped my arm under my opponents arm, as soon as he tries to bridge and escape *blam* I spin and put an arm bar on..tap..tap..tap.
As much as I love playing computer games (I'm still hooked on Empire at War, I just got Starcraft 2 and Force Unleashed II is my next acquisition) I must admit that I am really hooked on Ju Jitsu as a game. The best way I can describe it is physical chess, plus I stripped almost 15kg of fat off (my tummy is almost ripped!), sleep is so deep and there are other benefits. It's not for everyone and the training is hard but I end up playing computer games when I'm recovering from injury. Plus, I think the thinking skills in computer games translate really well to transitioning a new move in Ju Jitsu once you are physically capable of using them in your game.
I find I'm more selective about how I spend my time and a game has to be *really* good to get my attention. Sadly most games simply aren't worth the effort, but it's ok because everything balances out with the time I have available for games. Beside I just don't think I can sit still for that long any more, but the best time for games is when I have a bunch of friends around - that's when computer games are awesome - but still not as good as Ju Jitsu.
Perhaps that has something to do with it. Perhaps local manufacturing produces less pollution and economies of scale don't factor energy and fuel consumption as a factor.
Makes one wonder what your definition of intelligence is.
OR what Intelligence is. We apply the term "Intelligence" in a very human way. The dictionary defines it as;
capacity for learning, reasoning, understanding, and similar forms of mental activity; aptitude in grasping truths, relationships, facts, meanings, etc.
Even the article says
dogs and cats are smart in different ways
Maybe a dog is better at interacting and cats are better at problem solving, humans just happen to be better at both (good enough to be at the top of the food chain). I think the answer can be discovered by simply observing the behaviour of their wild counterparts. Dogs hunt in packs and are opportunistic and will scavenge and harass Hyenas. Cats are more spread out and have to employ problem solving so they can eat. To animals it's very simple, it's all about food - that's why animals stick around humans, we have food. Dogs and cats are smart enough to figure this out.
Case in point; A woman in Sydney owned 14 dogs. She became incapacitated - her dogs ate her. When I saw the news article of the dogs being led (actually dragged) away to be destroyed the dog had it's paws dug in in front of it and you could see, in that moment, the dog understood consequences. I know of a similar cat story but the point I'm trying to making is that intelligence only serves as a reference point for comparisons of individuals - not entire species. The woman was dumb enough to own 14 hungry dogs.
If we observe our own ancestors (apes etc) to learn about ourselves then we surely must have to apply the same reasoning to learn about our companions in this evolutionary journey, how adaptation and even emotion has played a part in that. I think the experience of "Intelligence" and the self awareness it brings maybe out of humans capability to define adequately.
Which begs the same question when we apply that reasoning to whether it's Artificial Intelligence or Human like Artificial Intelligence or dog or cat like "Intelligence".
But how do you know she's actually trying to catch the fishes?
I've seen humans tap the glass of fish tanks, and most of them certainly know they can't catch the fish through the glass, nor do they intend to break the glass.
Many fish don't appear to know that though and so _respond_ accordingly. And that might be enough for your cat. I doubt someone playing a game is trying to catch something inside an iPad;).
As for whether cats or dogs are smarter, I don't really care. Most don't seem smart enough to be given that much responsibility anyway.
What concerns me are transhumans/posthumans. When scientists start creating human hybrids or very intelligent creatures. At what point do you consider an entity "human", as it it gets the rights, privileges AND responsibilities of a human being?
If society is not ready to answer that question in the near future, then scientists shouldn't be forcing the issue onto society by researching into such directions. It would just lead to more evil being inflicted. Augmenting humans is a different thing from creating more humanlike entities.
If we are creating creatures with near human intelligence (or even smarter) for the purpose of enslaving them, is that really such a good thing? If we are not going to enslave them, what the heck are we doing - we haven't even solved the racism problem yet.
When your pets get really smart, you better hope they treat you nicely, whether because they find you cute and adorable, or something... Maybe out of our good example (haha).
hmmm, interesting, I think your post is a really good example of why you should not take acid (or whatever) and then post to slashdot.
My current cat (I've had several some years ago) learned how to open doors just by watching humans do it
My friend's dog learned how to open doors sliding doors so he could go inside and sit on the couch - the really freaky thing was that the dog closed the door after he'd gone through it.
But your fallacy is that you presume intelligence is the only factor in trainability. If I "trained" two people how to jump off a cliff ("you need to get a really good running start, like this..."), and one of them did it but the other refused, is the one who jumped more intelligent?
Maybe cats can't be trained because they don't find it in their best interest. (And I say this as a dog lover who can't stand cats.)
The one that convinced the other one to throw you off a cliff.
You can easily make robots and computers do what you want. Does that make them smarter too?
Likewise, I wonder how well you'd have been able to train Einstein to jump over fences and run through tubes on your command.
Dogs are stupid lol.
The timing of all this is convenient maybe someone is thinking ahead. The guy is engaged in a campaign against organisations who have a dirty tricks department. I can see it panning out...
Assange goes to court, is found guilty and thus can be contained on a "short sentence", is then isolated, is some how "neutralised" (maybe made sick or something).
Until he stops his life will continue to be on the run, they will be after him until they get him, somehow. We will see more of this type of behaviour, whether it's true or not is irrelevant - the game is get Assange.
maybe you'd only need a few grams of antimatter to push a craft to/past the speed of light(?)
We can't get to or past the speed of light, the power requirements increase asymptotically (that is, they grow towards infinity) as we approach light speed. And even at E=mc^2 its power is limited, it's estimated that 10 grams can make us reach Mars in one month. To get to a reasonable fraction of lightspeed we'll probably need tons, it also depends on how good we can make the engines use it.
What you must understand is that we're extremely far from interstellar travel today.
Yeah, I know you are right, we haven't even got out into our own solar system let alone anywhere else. Maybe one day we will stop spending our energies on territorial exploits and actually *expand* our territory outside our gravity well.
I guess I was being nostalgic, thanks for the reality check though.
Enough to solve all of Earth's energy issues as well as drive interstellar spacecraft. So I'd say there's interesting opportunities even if it turns out it's just like normal matter, only reversed.
maybe you'd only need a few grams of antimatter to push a craft to/past the speed of light(?)
What I mean is, there's almost no expensive components in this phone. Heck, it doesn't even have a screen. All it needs is the simplest or the cheapest microprocessors that is capable of making a call. Yet, it still costs £60 to £80.
It's best feature is it's margin allows for lots of profit.
Slashdot Mirror
The Force will be with him, always.
I think you are missing the point. All of this talk about building generating capacity is irrelevant if the power distribution grid cannot deliver the power to where it is required. That is what the article does not say, the piece of wire between the power plant and your house can only deliver approximately 30% of the power an electric car infrastructure will require.
For a moment think about what is happening. The kilowatts, per vehicle, once delivered by oil is delivered by wire. I however cannot speak to the sanity of sitting in a traffic jam for hours of the day but if we maintain this "way of life" ALL of that infrastructure HAS to be upgraded if people are to charge their cars at home and if parking stations are to be equipped with charging facilities.
Keep in mind that I am an advocate of deploying Nuclear Power responsibly when I say this ... the reason the Nuclear industry hasn't expanded is because it is rife with Basis Design Issues when deploying new plants. The NRC commissioned Nuclear plant manufacturers (Westinghouse, General Electric, Bechtel, Sargent & Lundy, Northern States Power and Commonwealth Edison) to come up design recommendations to improve the safety of the plants but the AP-1000 incorporates none of the design changes the industry *itself* recommends be applied to reactor facility design. This has nothing to do with anyone or anything other than economic reasons and design changes made to produce the AP-1000 design are there to make Nuclear plants cheaper to build, but they are still expensive. Coal plants are a completely different argument and can be built with the standard 40-50 year finance plan that these plants are built with as the risk affecting return is different. Yes a modern coal plant is more efficient but it still produced a lot of carbon externality.
If anything a decentralisation of the grid will reduce the *cost* of the upgrades required to deliver the current to charge electric vehicles. I doubt there is any party who won't benefit from evolving the grid as the time has certainly come to drive efficiency into it for many other reasons. Our society is encountering growing pains. Our society either adapts to these changes or it withers. The status quo has to change and the opportunity we have now is to create more balanced lifestyles that takes the pressure off our infrastructure.
Every transaction our society conducts costs energy and you must have the means to *deliver* that energy to where it is required. Until we reduce and balance the energetic costs required to run our society we will continue to encounter these types of problems and building new power plants is analogous to printing money in this respect. Quite simply humanity has choice of sustaining growth or growing sustainability.
but is it a metric assload?
I've used their ERWin product which seems pretty good but they have an actual database?!?!?!
Obviously your going to feel the stress but the common factor for keeping your cool, at least to me, is indifference. Yes there is a pressing deadline, penalty clauses and blah blah blah but you can't do anything about those factors so you may as well do your best to view them as a distraction from the goal. If you are a tech, it's not your job to feel stress because ultimately that reduces your effectiveness.
Organising your work in certain ways gives you better control which reduces stress. No major changes on Fridays - ever, if you do be prepared to write off your weekend. Also it depends on the team you work with. If they are assholes then the stress levels are going to be higher, if you have passive aggressive types that dig their heals in or the frantic type that create stress or can't handle stress then you have to develop other strategies.
I personally experience stress more from the way people behave rather than from pressing technology task. Ultimately stress is induced as an outside influence usually not in your control. You have to be able to step back from it, figure out what you can control (usually your own reaction to the circumstance) and exert that control to remain effective.
It's a great game, and once you get past being a white belt the tactical aspects really come into a roll. You might look at it and think that there isn't much to it but it's actually very strategic and many times you have to use subterfuge to achieve your goal. For example I get the mount and I set things up so it looks like I'm going for a choke but I've made a mistake and slipped my arm under my opponents arm, as soon as he tries to bridge and escape *blam* I spin and put an arm bar on..tap..tap..tap.
As much as I love playing computer games (I'm still hooked on Empire at War, I just got Starcraft 2 and Force Unleashed II is my next acquisition) I must admit that I am really hooked on Ju Jitsu as a game. The best way I can describe it is physical chess, plus I stripped almost 15kg of fat off (my tummy is almost ripped!), sleep is so deep and there are other benefits. It's not for everyone and the training is hard but I end up playing computer games when I'm recovering from injury. Plus, I think the thinking skills in computer games translate really well to transitioning a new move in Ju Jitsu once you are physically capable of using them in your game.
I find I'm more selective about how I spend my time and a game has to be *really* good to get my attention. Sadly most games simply aren't worth the effort, but it's ok because everything balances out with the time I have available for games. Beside I just don't think I can sit still for that long any more, but the best time for games is when I have a bunch of friends around - that's when computer games are awesome - but still not as good as Ju Jitsu.
The Apple-1, which didn't include a casing, power supply, keyboard, or monitor
Is that *was* user friendly back in those days.
Questioning the suspect only cost $5
Perhaps that has something to do with it. Perhaps local manufacturing produces less pollution and economies of scale don't factor energy and fuel consumption as a factor.
thats cool!
OR what Intelligence is. We apply the term "Intelligence" in a very human way. The dictionary defines it as;
capacity for learning, reasoning, understanding, and similar forms of mental activity; aptitude in grasping truths, relationships, facts, meanings, etc.
Even the article says
Maybe a dog is better at interacting and cats are better at problem solving, humans just happen to be better at both (good enough to be at the top of the food chain). I think the answer can be discovered by simply observing the behaviour of their wild counterparts. Dogs hunt in packs and are opportunistic and will scavenge and harass Hyenas. Cats are more spread out and have to employ problem solving so they can eat. To animals it's very simple, it's all about food - that's why animals stick around humans, we have food. Dogs and cats are smart enough to figure this out.
Case in point; A woman in Sydney owned 14 dogs. She became incapacitated - her dogs ate her. When I saw the news article of the dogs being led (actually dragged) away to be destroyed the dog had it's paws dug in in front of it and you could see, in that moment, the dog understood consequences. I know of a similar cat story but the point I'm trying to making is that intelligence only serves as a reference point for comparisons of individuals - not entire species. The woman was dumb enough to own 14 hungry dogs.
If we observe our own ancestors (apes etc) to learn about ourselves then we surely must have to apply the same reasoning to learn about our companions in this evolutionary journey, how adaptation and even emotion has played a part in that. I think the experience of "Intelligence" and the self awareness it brings maybe out of humans capability to define adequately.
Which begs the same question when we apply that reasoning to whether it's Artificial Intelligence or Human like Artificial Intelligence or dog or cat like "Intelligence".
But how do you know she's actually trying to catch the fishes?
I've seen humans tap the glass of fish tanks, and most of them certainly know they can't catch the fish through the glass, nor do they intend to break the glass.
Many fish don't appear to know that though and so _respond_ accordingly. And that might be enough for your cat. I doubt someone playing a game is trying to catch something inside an iPad ;).
As for whether cats or dogs are smarter, I don't really care. Most don't seem smart enough to be given that much responsibility anyway.
What concerns me are transhumans/posthumans. When scientists start creating human hybrids or very intelligent creatures. At what point do you consider an entity "human", as it it gets the rights, privileges AND responsibilities of a human being?
If society is not ready to answer that question in the near future, then scientists shouldn't be forcing the issue onto society by researching into such directions. It would just lead to more evil being inflicted. Augmenting humans is a different thing from creating more humanlike entities.
If we are creating creatures with near human intelligence (or even smarter) for the purpose of enslaving them, is that really such a good thing? If we are not going to enslave them, what the heck are we doing - we haven't even solved the racism problem yet.
When your pets get really smart, you better hope they treat you nicely, whether because they find you cute and adorable, or something... Maybe out of our good example (haha).
hmmm, interesting, I think your post is a really good example of why you should not take acid (or whatever) and then post to slashdot.
My current cat (I've had several some years ago) learned how to open doors just by watching humans do it
My friend's dog learned how to open doors sliding doors so he could go inside and sit on the couch - the really freaky thing was that the dog closed the door after he'd gone through it.
Right. I have both. My dogs are more easily trained, but my cats seem to figure out stuff by themselves.
Maybe dogs think they are smarter than cats, but cats know they are smarter than dogs.
But your fallacy is that you presume intelligence is the only factor in trainability. If I "trained" two people how to jump off a cliff ("you need to get a really good running start, like this..."), and one of them did it but the other refused, is the one who jumped more intelligent?
Maybe cats can't be trained because they don't find it in their best interest. (And I say this as a dog lover who can't stand cats.)
The one that convinced the other one to throw you off a cliff.
You can easily make robots and computers do what you want. Does that make them smarter too? Likewise, I wonder how well you'd have been able to train Einstein to jump over fences and run through tubes on your command. Dogs are stupid lol.
Maybe this person has a cat.
damn its possessive!
yes you are right, my bad not paying attention.
Assange goes to court, is found guilty and thus can be contained on a "short sentence", is then isolated, is some how "neutralised" (maybe made sick or something).
Until he stops his life will continue to be on the run, they will be after him until they get him, somehow. We will see more of this type of behaviour, whether it's true or not is irrelevant - the game is get Assange.
maybe you'd only need a few grams of antimatter to push a craft to/past the speed of light(?)
We can't get to or past the speed of light, the power requirements increase asymptotically (that is, they grow towards infinity) as we approach light speed. And even at E=mc^2 its power is limited, it's estimated that 10 grams can make us reach Mars in one month. To get to a reasonable fraction of lightspeed we'll probably need tons, it also depends on how good we can make the engines use it.
What you must understand is that we're extremely far from interstellar travel today.
Yeah, I know you are right, we haven't even got out into our own solar system let alone anywhere else. Maybe one day we will stop spending our energies on territorial exploits and actually *expand* our territory outside our gravity well.
I guess I was being nostalgic, thanks for the reality check though.
maybe you'd only need a few grams of antimatter to push a craft to/past the speed of light(?)
It's best feature is it's margin allows for lots of profit.
Isn't it wonderful how science uncovers the nature of god's universe for all to marvel at?
This really illustrates intelligent design's truly blasphemous form.
I thought you said BOFH and realised you might mean "Bastard Of To Hell". The use of the negation is confusing though.
I'd read this but I have other things to do
Now imagine the LOS from a tower at the top of Everest!