Re:It's not about capacity, but non determinisim
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Download Your Brain
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Well, the whole idea is based on the supposition that the mind is the brain, which follows the laws of physics. The laws of physics are deterministic, with the exception of quantum effects. Quantum effects may not be important in the brain, and if they are, they can be emulated. (Think pseudo-random number generator).
If by "non-determinism" you mean creativity and intuition, those are the result of deterministic processes that we don't realize are deterministic because they're so complex.
You don't, you grow a human body without a brain, and stick a computer in the skull and hook it to the spinal cord. Or you use a humanoid robot. Or something like that.
Having a conversation with yourself would be quite boring, unless you had been duplicated a long time ago and you and your copy had gone through very different experiences. Otherwise you'd say pretty much the exact same things.
The X-bit link says that the "metal" used is patented, so it's not pure gallium like I thought - it must be an alloy, probably the gallium-indium mentioned in a couple other posts.
Hmm... they could use glass or plastic tubing, and attach an air-filled chamber to allow for expansion. This still leaves the problem of melting it initially throughout the whole system to allow it to flow. Maybe there are heating coils around the parts that aren't directly on the GPU?
I'm pretty sure they're using gallium. It melts at 85F, is nontoxic (unlike mercury), and is nonflammable (unlike rubidium, cesium, sodium, and potassium, the only other metals I know of that melt at reasonable temperatures for a graphics card). Gallium also has almost exactly 65 times the thermal conductivity of water.
But you have to dissolve or melt the rock before electrolyzing it. Since the Moon has a similar composition to Earth's mantle, I assume it's mostly insoluble, so you'd have to melt the rock - likely expending more energy than electrolyzing it would require. (However, a simple solar furnace could do this.)
Extracting 11 pounds of oxygen on Earth is a lot different from getting your setup to the Moon at a cost of thousands per pound, having it produce enough oxygen to support human life, making enough nitrogen/argon/(other inert gas) to mix with it to prevent fires and lung damage, setting up highly-efficient water- and biomass-recycling and food-production systems (remember that your operating cost goes up ridiculously with the amount you have to import), and doing it all when one mistake will kill everyone and waste half your work.
Yeah, it'll be a while.
I've thought some on this before, and here's my view:
Technological progress helps social progress. Many new technologies start out as luxuries, then due to economies of scale become widely available. Therefore, no luxuries, less technological progress, less social progress, less ways to help the poor.
Of course, that means you need concrete applications of space technology for non-luxury use... hmm: - various spinoff technologies - orbiting solar power generation - doing polluting/dangerous things in space instead of on Earth
Economies of scale. Once this becomes popular, the infrastructure, research, demand, and the like will allow it to become cheaper. Lots of technologies start as toys for the rich, and then get bootstrapped into everyday use this way.
While I'm not really libertarian, I've got to say I agree with the point raised by someone else in this discussion - legal or not, any company who does this will be despised after a few days. This would happen once and never again.
Historically nations have had "ownership" according to how far they can project force.
Don't you mean 0wnership?
On the subject of lighting - reflection from terrestrial light and fluorescent paint (which converts UV into visible light) wouldn't be enough. I suppose the back would be covered in solar cells, which would charge batteries when the sign was on the day-side, and the batteries would power lights on the night-side. (If that's not enough, power could *theoretically* bebeamed from Earth - hmm, maybe space ads are what will finally get power beaming going.)
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Well, the whole idea is based on the supposition that the mind is the brain, which follows the laws of physics. The laws of physics are deterministic, with the exception of quantum effects. Quantum effects may not be important in the brain, and if they are, they can be emulated. (Think pseudo-random number generator).
If by "non-determinism" you mean creativity and intuition, those are the result of deterministic processes that we don't realize are deterministic because they're so complex.
I once believed something like that, and I suppose if we do have a soul this will have to be the case, but if the brain is just an interface then:
- why do our thoughts produce detectable changes in the brain?
- why do changes in the brain change our personalities and thougts?
You could explain those by saying that a lot of processing is offloaded to the brain, but then why posit a soul at all?
You don't, you grow a human body without a brain, and stick a computer in the skull and hook it to the spinal cord. Or you use a humanoid robot. Or something like that.
Having a conversation with yourself would be quite boring, unless you had been duplicated a long time ago and you and your copy had gone through very different experiences. Otherwise you'd say pretty much the exact same things.
I believe, based on other posts, that they are indeed using that.
The X-bit link says that the "metal" used is patented, so it's not pure gallium like I thought - it must be an alloy, probably the gallium-indium mentioned in a couple other posts.
Hmm... they could use glass or plastic tubing, and attach an air-filled chamber to allow for expansion. This still leaves the problem of melting it initially throughout the whole system to allow it to flow. Maybe there are heating coils around the parts that aren't directly on the GPU?
I'm pretty sure they're using gallium. It melts at 85F, is nontoxic (unlike mercury), and is nonflammable (unlike rubidium, cesium, sodium, and potassium, the only other metals I know of that melt at reasonable temperatures for a graphics card). Gallium also has almost exactly 65 times the thermal conductivity of water.
Low-profile controller, connects to internal or external SCSI devices, has an Intel GC80302 processor, and supports RAID 0, 1, 5, 10, and 50.
Right?
(I'm a non-Norwegian-speaking geek, of course.)
But you have to dissolve or melt the rock before electrolyzing it. Since the Moon has a similar composition to Earth's mantle, I assume it's mostly insoluble, so you'd have to melt the rock - likely expending more energy than electrolyzing it would require. (However, a simple solar furnace could do this.)
Extracting 11 pounds of oxygen on Earth is a lot different from getting your setup to the Moon at a cost of thousands per pound, having it produce enough oxygen to support human life, making enough nitrogen/argon/(other inert gas) to mix with it to prevent fires and lung damage, setting up highly-efficient water- and biomass-recycling and food-production systems (remember that your operating cost goes up ridiculously with the amount you have to import), and doing it all when one mistake will kill everyone and waste half your work. Yeah, it'll be a while.
I've thought some on this before, and here's my view:
Technological progress helps social progress.
Many new technologies start out as luxuries, then due to economies of scale become widely available.
Therefore, no luxuries, less technological progress, less social progress, less ways to help the poor.
Of course, that means you need concrete applications of space technology for non-luxury use... hmm:
- various spinoff technologies
- orbiting solar power generation
- doing polluting/dangerous things in space instead of on Earth
Economies of scale. Once this becomes popular, the infrastructure, research, demand, and the like will allow it to become cheaper. Lots of technologies start as toys for the rich, and then get bootstrapped into everyday use this way.
While I'm not really libertarian, I've got to say I agree with the point raised by someone else in this discussion - legal or not, any company who does this will be despised after a few days. This would happen once and never again.
Historically nations have had "ownership" according to how far they can project force.
Don't you mean 0wnership?
On the subject of lighting - reflection from terrestrial light and fluorescent paint (which converts UV into visible light) wouldn't be enough. I suppose the back would be covered in solar cells, which would charge batteries when the sign was on the day-side, and the batteries would power lights on the night-side. (If that's not enough, power could *theoretically* bebeamed from Earth - hmm, maybe space ads are what will finally get power beaming going.)