Not to mention it's probably easier for developers to hack out a bug free(er?) game on the console do to a lot of standardization than it would be to make something compatible for almost every single computer configuration out there.
I don't know about that. While the big music companies are entrenched and, well... big, they are still losing their viability as a business. Look at how hard RIAA picks fights with p2p clients. The role of having some physical medium for your music is diminishing as electronic copies are far more convenient and cheaper to distribute/share. If all of the big companies left music, Apple could always adapt by consolidating all of the Indie musicians available through the internet and offer a convenient method customers with their favorite (substitute) genre; see Pandora Radio and music genome project. Having the latest album of B. Spears or 50 cent on a dinky piece of silicon for 20$ from the RIAA isn't as appealing as it sounds. If anything, the big companies NEED Apple's vision right now before they become extinct.
I'm just picking up python now, converting some perl code, and it seems pretty nice so far. I've jumped into a few languages and the reason I haven't used python in the past is that there wasn't a need. If I needed some prior solution I could always pick up java and hunt down a library from the community. If I needed something quick and dirty (or doing sequence analysis stuff) I'd use Perl. Hence, my utility for switching to something slightly better but with essentially the same functionality was low. I think it was a problem in that I got introduced to the other stuff first and Python didn't fullfil and niche role.
I don't think profiling is inherently bad, I just think it needs to be dealt with delicately by framing the objectives in the proper context. If we view people or people's traits as something to be reduced or extinguished then at best we have DNA-ism and at worst we have an all out witch hunt. Bandura performed a variant of the Milgram study where dehumanizing labels were applied to the shock subjects (Power of Evil) . It was shown that such labels caused the actual test subjects to apply greater voltage to the presumed to the supposed victims. In the same manner, if we look for people 'criminal behavoir' we may be more inclined to hurt them for simply being different. A change in context, however, might produce more positive effects. Like, we think this person might be more musically inclined so we should promote those attributes. Again, this is a sensitive issue for which the morality of it needs to be dissected before it should ever be implemented.
I think you are right, but since I have karma to burn, I'll provide a counter argument to the idea of collecting DNA for population studies. Profiling people for crime is a rotten idea because it may provide unintended negative outcomes. Profiling people in general, however, might be an interesting experiment into the roles of nature vs. nurture. Maybe there are biomarkers that promote aggressive, submissive, intelligent, funny, etc behaviors. Knowing what markers someone has might enable society to cultivate that person to their fullest potential. The argument about whether we should study these traits, and how to setup comprehensive outcomes measure, shouldn't be dismissed because it is such an emotionally charged issue. Maybe our focus shouldn't be on what makes us bad but what makes us better; you'll notice that there is less of an issue in dealing with genetic treatments for obesity. Sadly, this topic is ripe for abuse by even the most well-intentioned individual. I think that the first question must be, "Should we do this and what are the moral implications?" not "Can we do this?".
First of all, if you pay, doesn't that imply you'll be illegally downloading music? Secondly, doesn't this reek of paying protection money for doing virtually nothing wrong in the first place? I don't think they should be paid as a matter of principle because that would just show them you're willing to bend over and take it up the ass. It's like giving the school bully your lunch money to leave you alone. Acquiescing only emboldens him to come back for me.
Ya but doesn't Hawking still have to type his words in? I think before we delve into this argument, we should have a better definition of telepathy. Mine is that the system doesn't use a physical means of input but instead transmits the brain's thought patterns more directly. Vocal speech and hand written messages still use physical artifacts while this may bypass all physical artifacts.
Though, I suppose you could argue that it is a physical artifact in itself, which is why a better definition of telepathy is needed.
Erm, "training" probably has a specific definition in this context. It doesn't mean helping the user use the tool but really helping the computer to interpret the neuron signals. It's probably some machine learning process where you have some neural net or support vector machine that maps neuron signal patterns to words. Training involves giving the computer a model, or prior probability distribution, and feeding it new examples from the specific user such that it is more accurate in its task.
Yes but there's a big difference between ventriloquism and the content in the main post. In ventriloquism you're still vocalizing the words while giving the illusion that you're not. In this case you are not making vocal sounds but rather, sending neuron signals to a computer to do the talking for you. It's a hell of a lot closer to telepathy than you might think.
Well in response to your argument, there are good statistical models, that combined with dictionary checking, could input the correctly spelled query based on the context of the surrounding text. The user would then visually verify the query and then submit. I've seen some fellow students playing with this on a shitty mic for medical stuff and it works fairly well with a few conditions. One is that the system needs to be trained for each user's voice. The next is that they haven't used the system in a noisy environment. In terms of usability, these systems appear to be best used in isolation, like if you're in an office on a car and your hands are otherwise preoccupied. They would not work well in a customer service environment, where mistakes could make the service look stupid(er), or a factory like environment where you have many people shouting in to mics.
Overall, I don't think it's a replacement for the keyboard, rather an addon to support additional input features at the user's discretion. If the user implements it over a tiny keyboard in certain conditions, then that indicates that there is some utility for such a device.
True, but you also want to make sure that you don't generalize too much. I've seen many forum posts about people bemoaning their position as a tech-monkey because they do low-level tasks such as write perl scripts and setup servers instead of managerial tasks like organizing a project or gathering resources. Being an office hero is fine, but that position has as much potential to backfire when you don't have the same capacity as others to lead and no one else can do, or be bothered to do, the technical labor that you provide.
What I don't get is why the Cylons launched an unprovoked attack. They seem like a pretty self sufficient race that would be better off leaving the humans to muck about in their tiny puddle of the galaxy. It would be like if we decided to launch a nuclear strike against pandas; we could but there's really no driving reason to.
It's not enough to just hire engineers away. You gotta setup some level of structure, allocate resources (lawyers, PR, HR, cash, tools, vendors), plan objectives, negotiate problems (delays, bugs, lawsuits). A 'guy in a garage' works for small projects like writing your Hello World website, but if you want to solve more complex problems you are probably going to depend on other people's expertise, or even grunt work. That is unless you have a B.S. in Law, Economics, Business Management, IT, CS, CE, and EE with the associated work experience. Expecting a lone super engineer to solve all your problems is just naive bullshit. For M$, setting up competition for Google is a complex management problem that is cheaper and quicker to circumvent by buying a solution: Yahoo.
It's funny that you should mention Eclipse. At one point in time I wanted a nice ide, but as a poor student visual studio cost money. I tried out eclipse and loved it. Found I needed more tools and started using linux. Eventually I stopped using Eclipse because it was easier to understand why stuff worked or didn't work if I setup a lot of things manually. So all in all, Eclipse was sorta like my gateway drug to linux ^^ (that and compiz-fusion for the hallucinogenic affects).
I find that blaming video games for the decline of intellect is only partially correct. On one hand, they are giant time sinks that do not challenge us mentally. On the other hand, they can inspire the more industrious of us to construct, or learn how to construct, more vivid/realistic worlds. If look back to your comparison, Halo was more complex on a technical level than MI was; by this I'm implying that there was a physics engine, not that the graphics were prettier. If you look around, there are a few projects that explore modeling physics and AI to give the playing a more realistic experience (instead of a scripted experience). Essentially, what I'm saying is that while many of us are playing video games, some of us are designing them, and this can be intellectually stimulating. Media may seem self-indulgent until it inspires us to do more.
(note, I'm not really disagreeing with your comment)
Eh, I never really saw Godzilla as a horror movie. Three Extremes is a better example of comparing horror movies. Same with The Grudge, Ichi the Killer, Audition, etc. These movies tend to be pretty graphic mind-fucks, and if they were advertised in the states, they would probably get banned by some hyper conservative. A good comparison might be to think of Saw kicked up a couple of notches.
By that consideration games could be considered art. Some of my friends have spent 8 years mastering the zerg rush and camping creeps for loot and they're still in college!
Or even better yet, it checks the house for chemical signs of spoilage. From this it can tell that you smell like "leftover casserole" and that it's time to clean yourself.
Actually, that doesn't (or at least shouldn't) matter. If you're given a grant (or series thereof) for x amount, you shouldn't expect "x plus inflation", but instead only plan for spending just "x". That way you're not surprised when you get the same amount next year that you got last year.
The sad thing is that is also what causes wasteful spending in research. You get X amount and you spend X amount. If you managed to do it under budget you must not need that extra money. Hence PIs blow all their grant money to make sure they have more for future research.
Technically, there is a monetary cost to human lives. That's why we have things like life insurance, such that, if we are injured or killed unexpectedly, we (or our families) are compensated for the years we should have lived pulling in some income. Robots aren't used now because humans are cheaper and more effective. This brings new meaning to 'Cheaper by the dozen'.
Slashdot Mirror
Not to mention it's probably easier for developers to hack out a bug free(er?) game on the console do to a lot of standardization than it would be to make something compatible for almost every single computer configuration out there.
I don't know about that. While the big music companies are entrenched and, well ... big, they are still losing their viability as a business. Look at how hard RIAA picks fights with p2p clients. The role of having some physical medium for your music is diminishing as electronic copies are far more convenient and cheaper to distribute/share. If all of the big companies left music, Apple could always adapt by consolidating all of the Indie musicians available through the internet and offer a convenient method customers with their favorite (substitute) genre; see Pandora Radio and music genome project. Having the latest album of B. Spears or 50 cent on a dinky piece of silicon for 20$ from the RIAA isn't as appealing as it sounds. If anything, the big companies NEED Apple's vision right now before they become extinct.
I'm just picking up python now, converting some perl code, and it seems pretty nice so far. I've jumped into a few languages and the reason I haven't used python in the past is that there wasn't a need. If I needed some prior solution I could always pick up java and hunt down a library from the community. If I needed something quick and dirty (or doing sequence analysis stuff) I'd use Perl. Hence, my utility for switching to something slightly better but with essentially the same functionality was low. I think it was a problem in that I got introduced to the other stuff first and Python didn't fullfil and niche role.
I don't think profiling is inherently bad, I just think it needs to be dealt with delicately by framing the objectives in the proper context. If we view people or people's traits as something to be reduced or extinguished then at best we have DNA-ism and at worst we have an all out witch hunt. Bandura performed a variant of the Milgram study where dehumanizing labels were applied to the shock subjects (Power of Evil) . It was shown that such labels caused the actual test subjects to apply greater voltage to the presumed to the supposed victims. In the same manner, if we look for people 'criminal behavoir' we may be more inclined to hurt them for simply being different. A change in context, however, might produce more positive effects. Like, we think this person might be more musically inclined so we should promote those attributes. Again, this is a sensitive issue for which the morality of it needs to be dissected before it should ever be implemented.
I think you are right, but since I have karma to burn, I'll provide a counter argument to the idea of collecting DNA for population studies. Profiling people for crime is a rotten idea because it may provide unintended negative outcomes. Profiling people in general, however, might be an interesting experiment into the roles of nature vs. nurture. Maybe there are biomarkers that promote aggressive, submissive, intelligent, funny, etc behaviors. Knowing what markers someone has might enable society to cultivate that person to their fullest potential. The argument about whether we should study these traits, and how to setup comprehensive outcomes measure, shouldn't be dismissed because it is such an emotionally charged issue. Maybe our focus shouldn't be on what makes us bad but what makes us better; you'll notice that there is less of an issue in dealing with genetic treatments for obesity. Sadly, this topic is ripe for abuse by even the most well-intentioned individual. I think that the first question must be, "Should we do this and what are the moral implications?" not "Can we do this?".
First of all, if you pay, doesn't that imply you'll be illegally downloading music? Secondly, doesn't this reek of paying protection money for doing virtually nothing wrong in the first place? I don't think they should be paid as a matter of principle because that would just show them you're willing to bend over and take it up the ass. It's like giving the school bully your lunch money to leave you alone. Acquiescing only emboldens him to come back for me.
Being that it's Japan, I'm surprised one of the animals didn't have tentacles.
Ya but doesn't Hawking still have to type his words in? I think before we delve into this argument, we should have a better definition of telepathy. Mine is that the system doesn't use a physical means of input but instead transmits the brain's thought patterns more directly. Vocal speech and hand written messages still use physical artifacts while this may bypass all physical artifacts.
Though, I suppose you could argue that it is a physical artifact in itself, which is why a better definition of telepathy is needed.
Erm, "training" probably has a specific definition in this context. It doesn't mean helping the user use the tool but really helping the computer to interpret the neuron signals. It's probably some machine learning process where you have some neural net or support vector machine that maps neuron signal patterns to words. Training involves giving the computer a model, or prior probability distribution, and feeding it new examples from the specific user such that it is more accurate in its task.
Yes but there's a big difference between ventriloquism and the content in the main post. In ventriloquism you're still vocalizing the words while giving the illusion that you're not. In this case you are not making vocal sounds but rather, sending neuron signals to a computer to do the talking for you. It's a hell of a lot closer to telepathy than you might think.
Well in response to your argument, there are good statistical models, that combined with dictionary checking, could input the correctly spelled query based on the context of the surrounding text. The user would then visually verify the query and then submit. I've seen some fellow students playing with this on a shitty mic for medical stuff and it works fairly well with a few conditions. One is that the system needs to be trained for each user's voice. The next is that they haven't used the system in a noisy environment. In terms of usability, these systems appear to be best used in isolation, like if you're in an office on a car and your hands are otherwise preoccupied. They would not work well in a customer service environment, where mistakes could make the service look stupid(er), or a factory like environment where you have many people shouting in to mics. Overall, I don't think it's a replacement for the keyboard, rather an addon to support additional input features at the user's discretion. If the user implements it over a tiny keyboard in certain conditions, then that indicates that there is some utility for such a device.
True, but you also want to make sure that you don't generalize too much. I've seen many forum posts about people bemoaning their position as a tech-monkey because they do low-level tasks such as write perl scripts and setup servers instead of managerial tasks like organizing a project or gathering resources. Being an office hero is fine, but that position has as much potential to backfire when you don't have the same capacity as others to lead and no one else can do, or be bothered to do, the technical labor that you provide.
What I don't get is why the Cylons launched an unprovoked attack. They seem like a pretty self sufficient race that would be better off leaving the humans to muck about in their tiny puddle of the galaxy. It would be like if we decided to launch a nuclear strike against pandas; we could but there's really no driving reason to.
It's not enough to just hire engineers away. You gotta setup some level of structure, allocate resources (lawyers, PR, HR, cash, tools, vendors), plan objectives, negotiate problems (delays, bugs, lawsuits). A 'guy in a garage' works for small projects like writing your Hello World website, but if you want to solve more complex problems you are probably going to depend on other people's expertise, or even grunt work. That is unless you have a B.S. in Law, Economics, Business Management, IT, CS, CE, and EE with the associated work experience. Expecting a lone super engineer to solve all your problems is just naive bullshit. For M$, setting up competition for Google is a complex management problem that is cheaper and quicker to circumvent by buying a solution: Yahoo.
It's funny that you should mention Eclipse. At one point in time I wanted a nice ide, but as a poor student visual studio cost money. I tried out eclipse and loved it. Found I needed more tools and started using linux. Eventually I stopped using Eclipse because it was easier to understand why stuff worked or didn't work if I setup a lot of things manually. So all in all, Eclipse was sorta like my gateway drug to linux ^^ (that and compiz-fusion for the hallucinogenic affects).
I find that blaming video games for the decline of intellect is only partially correct. On one hand, they are giant time sinks that do not challenge us mentally. On the other hand, they can inspire the more industrious of us to construct, or learn how to construct, more vivid/realistic worlds. If look back to your comparison, Halo was more complex on a technical level than MI was; by this I'm implying that there was a physics engine, not that the graphics were prettier. If you look around, there are a few projects that explore modeling physics and AI to give the playing a more realistic experience (instead of a scripted experience). Essentially, what I'm saying is that while many of us are playing video games, some of us are designing them, and this can be intellectually stimulating. Media may seem self-indulgent until it inspires us to do more. (note, I'm not really disagreeing with your comment)
Eh, I never really saw Godzilla as a horror movie. Three Extremes is a better example of comparing horror movies. Same with The Grudge, Ichi the Killer, Audition, etc. These movies tend to be pretty graphic mind-fucks, and if they were advertised in the states, they would probably get banned by some hyper conservative. A good comparison might be to think of Saw kicked up a couple of notches.
By that consideration games could be considered art. Some of my friends have spent 8 years mastering the zerg rush and camping creeps for loot and they're still in college!
Or even better yet, it checks the house for chemical signs of spoilage. From this it can tell that you smell like "leftover casserole" and that it's time to clean yourself.
Actually, that doesn't (or at least shouldn't) matter. If you're given a grant (or series thereof) for x amount, you shouldn't expect "x plus inflation", but instead only plan for spending just "x". That way you're not surprised when you get the same amount next year that you got last year.
The sad thing is that is also what causes wasteful spending in research. You get X amount and you spend X amount. If you managed to do it under budget you must not need that extra money. Hence PIs blow all their grant money to make sure they have more for future research.
You must be a hardware engineer.
I guess MSFT falls into more of a love-hate relation with most slashdot users then?
They need to attach some focal confirmation for when you hit the target:
Headshot!
I blame America, home of the Big Mac and Whopper.
Technically, there is a monetary cost to human lives. That's why we have things like life insurance, such that, if we are injured or killed unexpectedly, we (or our families) are compensated for the years we should have lived pulling in some income. Robots aren't used now because humans are cheaper and more effective. This brings new meaning to 'Cheaper by the dozen'.