"I hereby nominate that we use the more tradition cartographers method of labeling unknown areas with "Thar be Sea monster here", it also tends to scare away the noobys and peasants"
Hey, how 'bout "Thar be Viral Fossils here!!! Beware, Beware!!!"
Unfortunately this isn't the phone you're looking for.
According to TFA it's targetted at rural countries (hence great ideas like "Multi-Lingual voice prompts" and "Bicycle powered charger") and the only way they'll bring it to the west is if they find a way to make more money off it.
They haven't been researching how to give thier current customers phones they'll find more useful, They are researching how to get more money from people who can't afford the current high-tech phones.
"Two, there is evolutionary pressure, caused by partner selection. This is the basis of TFA! Good looking people tend to find good looking partners and make good looking children, ditto for the not-good-looking. I would add to this the element of wealth"...
"Families with money will typically marry pretty people - most likely from other rich/pretty families, but possibly someone from a lower class who happened to look good"
Not entirely accurate. You are leaving out a couple of factors. First, if you observe more closely you will find that *Men* with money tend to marry beautiful *Women*. This is becuase the mating preferences of men and women are obviously different. So wealthy men (whether they are ugly or handsome) will poach the best looking women from the not so wealthy classes, leading to them having (on average) better looking children. However, the good looking man already in the lower class in very unlikely to be picked out of it by a wealthy woman. Infact, what is likely is that he will have more children, by more (lower class) women, than his upper class counter parts. Thereby, increasing the pool of poor but beautiful women to move upwards, and the pool of poor but beautiful men to move sideways.
Second, as much as social mobility may be low, if you think of it in terms of movement of genetic material between classes per generation it's huge. For example, how many of the people on today's top 500 rich list had rich families just 5 generations ago, or even just 3? And how many fifth generation decendants of say, the king of England (or any other royalty, or business mogul) are still considered very wealthy? And, on an evolutionary timescale, five generations is quite small.
Wealth tends to be cyclical. A rough approximation of it being - Rich Parent -> Lazy Child -> Poor Parent -> Desperate Child -> Rich Parent
TFA also ignores two other points: 1. The definition of beautiful changes every few decades. In some african countries as recently as ten years ago women used to go to fat camps, where the purpose was to put ON weight not take it off, becuase the rounded body was considered much more healthy/attractive (Not Hungry-looking = Healthy). However, in the west now, where people are much more likely to die from over-feeding than under nutrition, stick thin is becoming the image of the perfect body (Not Morbidly Obese = Healthy).
2. With the amount of progress being made in the fields of complexion altering makeup and cheap plastic surgery, we will soon be reaching a point where the traits you are marrying into will no longer be genetically transferable. Perhaps that will even lead to a situation (when people can look like anything they want) where looks REALLY don't count and beauty begins to be judged by personality, capability or some other non-physical yardstick.
Basically , whenever anyone tries to predict the future based on the changing fads of today, they usually end up very wrong.
One variable you've eft out is that the children of the poor people tend to have a higher mortality rate than those of the rich.
So what we are actually seeing are two different kind of survival techniques often seen in nature.
1. Have lots of chldren you can't take care of in the hope that a few survive (as seen in frogs and many fish who can lay millions of eggs most of which will never reach maturity) 2. Have a few children and do everything in your power to their survival (Many birds do this, keeping only a few chicks in the nest until they are strong enough to start flying and feeding on thier own).
The interesting thing about both these methods is that they tend to keep the population ratios constant, with the bigger populations closer to the bottom of the food chain, which would tend to match what you see in human society (Afterall, every CEO needs to have an army of cleaners, mailboys, security guards etc. to keep his finely oiled company running).
Hey I'm not saying it's a nice thought, but which part of evolution (or ecology) actually is?
Even though StandardDeviant may have gotten a bit carried away. It's obvious that the maxtor dudes are just using this as an advertisement. You'll even notice that all the accounts that posted how *great* this drive is supposed to be, were created today!
Call me a cynic, but I find it hard to believe that so many slashdot readers suddenly decided they had to register just to proclaim the wonders of a certain external hard drive.
While I agree with the basic premise that looking to only your own family is a selfish and ultimately flawed course of action, the magnitude of insidious errors, exaggerations and downright falsehoods in your post totally eclipses that!
A large part of your post seems to be saying "As long as the outdated values of islam are being taught on a street near you, be very afraid" (And remember, terrorism is NOT an islamic virtue!!! I'll address the terrorism issue farther below).
The truth is though that ALL religions have aspects that seem outdated and abhorrent to western culture today. From forbidding contraception (catholicism) to encouraging polygamy and belief in impurity of darker skinned races (Mormonism) and that doesn't even take into consideration the KKK, Neo-Nazis and various death cults that keep popping up regularly.
All in all, Islam is a very benign religion (I Am Not A Muslim, but I grew up in a society where more than half the population were.) But like every religion it has it's extremists (KKK are christian too).
Then you talk about 9/11
Injustice is the nature of the people we're talking about - and the last time they had a country of their own to run, it was used as a financial and logistical operating base for the attacks that killed 3000 people and wrecked many times that many lives.
I take it you are referring to Afghanistan. (Even though technically, a large part of the financing would have come from Bin Laden's Saudi business interests - yet American business remains in bed with the rest of the Bin Laden family). You may not know it but most middle Eastern and many north African countries are actually "thiers to run" with many of them having very close and friendly ties to the west.
And when these same "Militant Afghan Muslims" had thier weapons pointed against thier other previous enemy (Soviet Russia) the west was only to happy to support thier cause!!
[or]...that we shouldn't sweat Iran saying that Israel should be "wiped off the map"
If such statements are so worrying, how would you feel if you woke up one morning and heard your country was now considered part of a nefarious "Axis of Evil!!!" and the first country on that list was already being invaded!! (Oh sorry,...liberated!!)
Would you
a.) Be thankful there is such a benevolent leader ready to raze countries to the ground for attempting to hold on to thier soveriegnity while loudly declaring thier innocence (which even after being proven true but didn't slow down the invasion). Or
b.) Immediately start building the necessary weapons to prevent your own invasion?
Is it really a coincidence that, soon after that speech, the other two countries involved began actively (and publicly) pursuing nuclear ambitions?
I am in no way condoning or supporting terrorism (even though one mans terrorist is another man's freedom fighter - see South Africa - Nelson Mandela) but the kind of angry paranoia your article seems to be full of will only make the problem worse.
Hate begets hate! and vengeance is a cycle that never ends! (What would you do if you were related to this family that was raped, killed then burned by American soldiers http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5253160.stm ).
The question is How should they be fixed. It's easy to point and go "That's bad, and that's bad and that's bad..." ad infinitum. But if you cannot produce a solution that is realistically better - i.e. not one that solves a small problem while creating a lot of bigger ones. Then let's hear it.
As much as a lot of people hate to hear it, both patents and IPs improve creativity by assuring people that they will get some reward for thier effort. While both systems have thier flaws (and no one claims they are perfect, that is why they are constantly working on changing/improving it).
Can you honestly say you believe you will have a toaster, or vacuum cleaner in your house right now, if the inventor didn't expect to make some money from it? Or that you believe you would have read or watched a quarter as many books and films as you have, if the writers/producers/e.t.c. didn't expect to get rich off it? How many pharmaceutical companies do you think will be willing to go through years of drug testing, if at the end of it every Tom, Dick and Harry with a basement lab could take most of the profit from thier work?
The patent system simply acknowledges that people are greedy, and tries to find the best way to turn that to the good of the general population.
If you want to help, make a positive criticism, i.e. one that makes positive suggestions of how to improve it, not negative ones, i.e. ones that simply say destroy everything 'cuz it's bad.
This is a major point anti-stem cell groups ignore.
IIUC, most of the embryo's that are used are already going to die anyway!! If that is morally reprehensible then talk about stopping that negative action (i.e. the fertility treatments, and abortions). Not the possible positive results which would prevent it from being a total waste.
The point this grand parent, and many other posts, are making is that perhaps what the study has actually found is that coffee makes people more alert so they can analyse what they are hearing.
A person who is alert and analyses a persuasive argument is more likely to say yes than one who too drowsy (or tired or distracted) to listen properly in the first place.
And in the same way a person who is reading a contract is more likely to pay attention to the details if they are alert than if they are not.
Becuase of the terms being used in the TFA it actually is very misleading. The 'Brain-port' should actually be described as a 'Tongue Port'.
It doesn't somehow transfer data directly to your brain, it simply uses tiny electrodes to shock different parts of your tongues with really small current.
From TFA:
Michael Zinszer, a veteran Navy diver and director of Florida State University's Underwater Crime Scene Investigation School, took part in testing using the tongue to transmit an electronic compass and an electronic depth sensor while in a swimming pool.
He likened the feeling on his tongue to Pop Rocks candies.
"You are feeling the outline of this image," he said. "I was in the pool, they were directing me to a very small object and I was able to locate everything very easily."
Imagine it as someone scratching a really small image on your tongue. They originally used the back (I asssume becuase of the large surface area) but the tongue actually has many more nerves and is much more sensitive.
Of course, if you had the choice of asking the Navy for funding for "a device capable of scratching images unto your tongue to convey information" or "a brain port which extends the senses of a soldier in the field by giving him sonar or night vision". You can guess which will get more money.
Don't get me I wrong, I do think it's a fantastic idea. But it's not new technology, just creative use of current ones.
At first glance I assumed that what was being offered was a copy of the web on removable media. I personaly think this would be much more useful as there are still many parts of the world where internet access is still extremely expensive and slow, and even out of date copies of things like university research papers, online encyclopdias (yes, yes, wikipedi too), information on engineering processes etc. can still be very useful years after they are published.
Unfortunately though, thier product will require you to go online and wait while it updates your 'copy-of-the-internet'(tm) so that you browse offline.
It'll be cheaper (and prolly just as effective) to google the topic you want and add the results page to your favourites with the "Make available offline" option active (in internet explorer) and your link depth set to a high value.
Actually, this Ask slashdot question strikes me as Research for a school project.
The way it's phrased sounds very much unlike someone asking out of curiousity.
It sounds more like someone ticking off bullet points for thier report. Which tends to bring to mind either research for a school report or a report for a government organisation that is looking for a technical way to phrase what they already know is true so that they can go ahead and do whatever they wanted anyway.
You'll find that there are far more points clustered around treble twenty than the bull's eye, I think.
Very interesting! and this is actually a very good representation of what these user content generated sites become. Every one crowd around the high scoring but 'safe' option. And very few even attempt to get to the true centre of the issue.
For instance, on a site that raises a political issue, you are likely to find that most of the contributions either fall into the currently accepted 'politically correct' view or the currently popular 'anti-establishment' view.
Most people will simply be repeating arguements they've heard before, even if the flaws in it are already widely known. Only very few will actually attempt to analyse the situation from thier own perspective, or try to suggest a new way to address the problem which may be the 'bullseye' we're looking for.
The basic premise of relativity is that you cannot define an absolute position, time or speed, not that you cannot compensate for time differences. Morley's experiment is relevant as it set out to measure our absolute speed versus the ether and proved that no such thing exists.
Actually, what the Morley experiment specifically proved was that we have no relative movement to the luminous ether. There was a lot of debate about whether this meant such an ether did or didn't exist and Einstiens conclusion was that, whether it was everywhere or nowhere, as long as we couldn't detect it in anyway and it doesn't affect any of our observations, we could proceed by ignoring it in all our experiments.
While I'm not saying that it does exist, I think we should bear this caveat in mind when considering situations like the gravitational bending of light.
You're assuming that the direction of time is parallel to the direction of motion
Not exactly, I am actually working based on the initial observations that were described (in above mentioned book, which was recommended to me by a friend working on his maths PhD, and was the only source I found which actually went into the proofs of the theory) which led to the formation of the theory.
E.g. If an object is one light second away from you at time t and travels away from you at the 0.5 the speed of light for two seconds it will end up two light seconds away from you. Now, the light from it's first position will reach you after one second at time t +1, it will take time t + 2 to reach it's end point and the light from it's endpoint will reach you at time 2 seconds later at time (t+2)+2 = t+4. So the journey that appeared to take 2 seconds to the flying object, will appear to take 3 seconds to you! Hence the slower timeframe. This is the proof that was given, however, if the object flies towards you the time light takes to make the journey will be less at the end than at the beginning. Hence it will speed up!
As I mentioned this is the only proof of the formula i could find, however if you have any resources to a better source of info I'd be really interested in seeing it too.
Observation is all there is for us. It's like the question, "If a tree falls in the woods but nobody is aroud to hear it, does it make a sound?" You can't talk about a sound unless you also have a listener in mind.
That was exactly the premise Einstien was working from. So what he said was not "This is what will happen!" but "This is what you will see happening!"
These equations are great at helping us translate the effects we see from high speed particle accelerators and such. But I never saw any indication in there that we could use it to actually answer any questions about the nature of the universe, Spacetime, Wormhole physics, lorentz contractions, or any of the other conditions which are not actually a matter of observation but exprience.
To make an analogy between with the speed of sound you need to make a lot of assumptions (e.g. the uniformity of the medium through which sound is travelling) and it gets really iffy really quickly.
IANAPhycist but I have actually read up a lot on the subject. The book which explained it best, to me, started by describing a way to compensate for anomalies of observation due to the speed of light and then suddenly states a few chapters down the line that these are not 'observed effects' but 'real effects'.
IIUC Einstien's basic premise was that, since you cannot accurately compensate for the time between when and incident occurred and the time it is observed, and since Michalson Morley's experiment seemed to prove that the speed of light can always be assumed to be constant (in a vacuum), then you can simply treat your experiment as if the moment at which an incident is observed, is the moment it occured.
He goes on to design a series of formulas that will always let you compensate for the difference in observational timeframes (i.e. the apparent difference in timing due to the changes in distance which will cause light to take more/less time in travelling from incident to observer).
In all the material I read I never found any reason given for anyone to believe that these observational timeframes are actual timeframes (i.e. objects actually passing through time at different rates).
In fact, it seemed to me that if you looked at time as a vector, an object travelling away from you near the speed of light would seem to age more slowly, while one travelling towards you near the speed of light would age faster.
The interesting thing about proving/disproving the factuality of this theory is that it accurately describes how an object will be observed, at least when that observation is done using electromagnetic waves (or other light speed signals).
And the object will be observed to age more slowly or quickly (depending on direction of travel).
So, as far as I can tell, the only way to disprove it is to find a way of observing something at a speed faster than that of light, which isn't that easy, especially when practically every serious researcher begins with the assumtion that such things (tachyons) don't exist (Or that they are travelling backwards through time).
I think the main issue here is one of timescales. You seem to be thinking about the consequences in terms of decades while I'm thinking more in generations.
I have the sickle cell trait (I'm originally from west Africa), only one of my gene pair (AS) has it so it isn't full blown(SS). What this means is that under stressful conditions my red blood cells have the tendency to commit suicide.
Five generations ago one of my Dad's ancestors (on his dad's side) was 'Oba' of Benin (i.e. He was the sole ruler of the largest empire in west africa). While my paternal grandmother was the daughter of a court advisor (the equivalent of a cabinet minister). And this was not one of those poor starving kingdom you see on tv (You can still see examples of Bini Bronzes in many museums).
However, in a relatively short time, the wealth they had has been greatly reduced as the economics and politics of the region has changed, and, while the royal family itself is still well off, even second generation descendants can sometimes be seen begging for money. Any wealth we have now we have had to work for seperate from our ancestors.
The symptoms of the sickle cell trait (at least the kind I have) means that I have very little toleration for cold temperatures. This wasn't such a bad problem in the tropics (except when people got carried away with air conditioners) but since I've moved to the Uk I've had to stop drinking cold water. A glass of ice water can sometimes send me into shivering fits which can last over an hour at times. It gets worse when I haven't been eating well.
For people with the full blown trait(SS) the attacks can be much worse if it's not well managed but the triggers are much the same, perhaps with lower thresholds. However, in thier case the attacks are so serious they can actually be fatal. In an environment where food is scarce children with the full blown trait don't survive long.
Now, in the 1950's WHO began an effort to wipe malaria from the planet. And from the successes that were seen in more temperate and wealthier regions there was no reason to believe they wouldn't suceed. In addition fantastic new drugs like chloroquine were being discovered/invented which could cure a malaria infection after just four doses!
So let's assume that it was possible to screen out (or remove) the sickle cell trait at that time. My ancestors would definitely have gone for it. Afterall every one knows how much people with the trait 'suffer' and no one wants to wish that on thier children.
Fast forward 50 years. DDT, the miracle insecticide, is now practically useless against mosquitoes, and turns out to be poisonous to humans. The malaria plasmodium keeps developing resistances to the new drugs they throw at it (some of the drugs being used now are so toxic you are advised not to take more than one dose a year).
Now malaria infections are a very common thing where i grew up (I used to get infected once or twice a year). I used to worry about the parasites resistance to drugs and was really scared about having to keep taking stronger and stronger drugs. However, after a while I realised that I never had a fever for more than a couple of hours a day and never more than two days in a row. I didn't like taking the pills anyway and by the time I was 13 I didn't even bother telling my parents when I started to feel sick.
I only realised this was different when a friend of mine was sick and I mentioned that all he needed to do was drink a lot of water wrap up warmly and go to bed (which was what I always did). He actually woke up feeling much worse!
Even today millions are spent trying to come up with a dependable treatment, and millions of people still die from it.
But I, and millions of others like me, never have to worry about it. And who knows what other advantages (or weaknesses may have come with it).
Yes, when combined with malnutrition this condition can be fatal (but then even totally healthy people can die from hunger). Personally, I'm
The 'wierd radiation' one is definitely lacking reality as I mentioned.
However, In the case of sickle cell anaemia you are focusing on the problem we already know about (malaria). What about a possible future problem which we do not know about but which this same condition will act as a deterent for.
Diversity means that the likelyhood of the whole race being wiped out by a single change in the environment is highly unlikely (someone else has spoken more about this in reply to the original post).
However, when all of humanity has an 'ideal' genetic makeup, all it takes is one germ or virus that the designer genes don't cater for and the whole species will be ended.
You also seem to believe that only a small percentage of people will have gene therapy becuase it will be expensive. What you are neglecting is that once one person has it roughly 50% of his offspring will also have it (if it is a dominant trait, possible more). And since these people will be healthier and probably more attractive (who will want to code for an ugly child) they will be more likely to reproduce. Eventually, the 'negative' trait you are coding against may be wiped out from the gene pool FOREVER.
Plus as more people are born with the 'corrected' trait the treatment will become cheaper, and who will want to be the only short-sighted person in a world where glasses aren't even manufactured anymore. (For an example of a similar situation, just look at plastic surgery, which was once thought to be only affordable to the rich but is now within reach of anyone with a credit card)
It is similar to the main issue with GM crops. Since any genetic engineering will be obviously meant to adjust crops (or people) for the current environment. The new strain will quickly replace all the old ones becuase when it comes to competing for resources (again in the current environment) that strain is just sooo much better. Now at first this all seems great! However, when the environment does change (and eventually, it always does) all the old strains which would have been better suited for this new environment would have been wiped out and the single new strain that is left, which was so fantastic in the old environment, will now be unable to cope and will die.
So..., the more successful the new strain is..., the more likely it is that the whole species will die.
In the wild, bad eyesight is detrimental. In the current human environment (which is anything but wild) it is not. Afterall we have glasses, contacts, even laser corrective surgery (and most of us no longer need to be able to hit a deer at fifty paces with a wonky arrow).
As I said the 'weird radiation' thing was a crazy example. A better example, for instance, is sickle cell anaemia.
This is a congenital 'disease' which causes a persons blood cells to commit suicide when under excessive stress. It also makes a person much more likely to survive a bout of malaria which still kills millions of people in west african countries.
Now this is a disease which is obviously dangerous to those who have it (some times so many cells die that the person body can't sustain thier metabolism) but how sure are we that it may not also be our major hope of survival against some yet undiscovered blood bourne pandemic.
I am not saying such things shouldn't be 'treated' just that removing an attribute from our gene pool forever, when we still don't understand the full ramifications of it, doesn't strike me as a great idea .
The truth is that the world we live in is no longer the one nature designed, so just becuase nature doesn't like something, doesn't mean we shouldn't.
Genetic diversity is always a good thing. The fact that genes which were previously considered detrimental can now thrive means that those genes are no longer detrimantal in this environment, and gives a major boost to diversity. A wild example for instance: The sun someday might start giving of some wierd radiation that is dangerous to people with good eye sight. At that point having people with bad eyesight in the gene pool increases humanities chance of survival.
I think though the more pertinent issue is that most of humanities survival is no longer totally dependent on the possession of physical attributes but the possesion of mental ones as well. The fact that some human beings have been able to remove some of the weaknesses inherent in certain genetic traits have been overcome means that we might be able to begin to see certain strentghs those traits have which we were unaware of.
For instance, anecdotal evidence would seem to indicate that a genetic disposition towards 'smartness' is accompanied by a disposition away from 'strentgh' (I'm not saying it's true just giving an example). In that case it's a good thing we have created an environment where physically weak people can still survive becuase that means we will have more smart people(e.g. Steven hawkings would never have survived as a hunter/gatherer). As we change our environment we also change the evolutionary pressures we subject ourselves to.
For this reason I am also quite hesitant about the use of gene therapy in fixing any conditions. Changing a persons genes to something we consider to be 'better' may actually in the end lead to huge losses for the human race as a whole. For example if all levels of autism could be cured genetically most parents would immediately go for it. However, many geniuses historically show signs of mild autism.
Basically, before we decide to make everyone 'better', we have to figure out if we have any idea exactly what 'better' is?
Actually it may not be that simple. Evolutionary success is not measured necesarily by the number of individuals with a particular set of genes, but the self-preservation (or persistence) of that set of genes.
Many species have two ways of dealing with this. Either having so many kids that it doesn't matter if a few are lost, or having a few kids and fighting to make make sure that those few do survive to reproduce
The difference in reproduction rate between 'poor' and 'rich' tends to be similar to the difference in thier mortality rate and thus reflects these two techniques of preservation.
I also wonder if anyone has examined the evolution of culture due to natural selection. For example, How do value systems and systems of morality change over the course of a few generations? A simple example, for instance, will be that a culture that believes in ritual suicide during an eclipse will quickly wipe itself from the gene pool. Of course, unlike genes, cultures can simply go into hiding, in history books or religous documents and such, to be reborn ages later. It's probably a bit off-topic but I think it'll be interesting to research.
Slashdot Mirror
"I hereby nominate that we use the more tradition cartographers method of labeling unknown areas with "Thar be Sea monster here", it also tends to scare away the noobys and peasants"
Hey, how 'bout "Thar be Viral Fossils here!!! Beware, Beware!!!"
Unfortunately this isn't the phone you're looking for.
According to TFA it's targetted at rural countries (hence great ideas like "Multi-Lingual voice prompts" and "Bicycle powered charger") and the only way they'll bring it to the west is if they find a way to make more money off it.
They haven't been researching how to give thier current customers phones they'll find more useful, They are researching how to get more money from people who can't afford the current high-tech phones.
"Two, there is evolutionary pressure, caused by partner selection. This is the basis of TFA! Good looking people tend to find good looking partners and make good looking children, ditto for the not-good-looking. I would add to this the element of wealth" ...
"Families with money will typically marry pretty people - most likely from other rich/pretty families, but possibly someone from a lower class who happened to look good"
Not entirely accurate. You are leaving out a couple of factors.
First, if you observe more closely you will find that *Men* with money tend to marry beautiful *Women*.
This is becuase the mating preferences of men and women are obviously different. So wealthy men (whether they are ugly or handsome) will poach the best looking women from the not so wealthy classes, leading to them having (on average) better looking children.
However, the good looking man already in the lower class in very unlikely to be picked out of it by a wealthy woman. Infact, what is likely is that he will have more children, by more (lower class) women, than his upper class counter parts. Thereby, increasing the pool of poor but beautiful women to move upwards, and the pool of poor but beautiful men to move sideways.
Second, as much as social mobility may be low, if you think of it in terms of movement of genetic material between classes per generation it's huge.
For example, how many of the people on today's top 500 rich list had rich families just 5 generations ago, or even just 3?
And how many fifth generation decendants of say, the king of England (or any other royalty, or business mogul) are still considered very wealthy? And, on an evolutionary timescale, five generations is quite small.
Wealth tends to be cyclical. A rough approximation of it being - Rich Parent -> Lazy Child -> Poor Parent -> Desperate Child -> Rich Parent
TFA also ignores two other points:
1. The definition of beautiful changes every few decades. In some african countries as recently as ten years ago women used to go to fat camps, where the purpose was to put ON weight not take it off, becuase the rounded body was considered much more healthy/attractive (Not Hungry-looking = Healthy).
However, in the west now, where people are much more likely to die from over-feeding than under nutrition, stick thin is becoming the image of the perfect body (Not Morbidly Obese = Healthy).
2. With the amount of progress being made in the fields of complexion altering makeup and cheap plastic surgery, we will soon be reaching a point where the traits you are marrying into will no longer be genetically transferable. Perhaps that will even lead to a situation (when people can look like anything they want) where looks REALLY don't count and beauty begins to be judged by personality, capability or some other non-physical yardstick.
Basically , whenever anyone tries to predict the future based on the changing fads of today, they usually end up very wrong.
One variable you've eft out is that the children of the poor people tend to have a higher mortality rate than those of the rich.
So what we are actually seeing are two different kind of survival techniques often seen in nature.
1. Have lots of chldren you can't take care of in the hope that a few survive (as seen in frogs and many fish who can lay millions of eggs most of which will never reach maturity)
2. Have a few children and do everything in your power to their survival (Many birds do this, keeping only a few chicks in the nest until they are strong enough to start flying and feeding on thier own).
The interesting thing about both these methods is that they tend to keep the population ratios constant, with the bigger populations closer to the bottom of the food chain, which would tend to match what you see in human society (Afterall, every CEO needs to have an army of cleaners, mailboys, security guards etc. to keep his finely oiled company running).
Hey I'm not saying it's a nice thought, but which part of evolution (or ecology) actually is?
Even though StandardDeviant may have gotten a bit carried away. It's obvious that the maxtor dudes are just using this as an advertisement. You'll even notice that all the accounts that posted how *great* this drive is supposed to be, were created today!
Call me a cynic, but I find it hard to believe that so many slashdot readers suddenly decided they had to register just to proclaim the wonders of a certain external hard drive.
While I agree with the basic premise that looking to only your own family is a selfish and ultimately flawed course of action, the magnitude of insidious errors, exaggerations and downright falsehoods in your post totally eclipses that!
A large part of your post seems to be saying "As long as the outdated values of islam are being taught on a street near you, be very afraid" (And remember, terrorism is NOT an islamic virtue!!! I'll address the terrorism issue farther below).
The truth is though that ALL religions have aspects that seem outdated and abhorrent to western culture today. From forbidding contraception (catholicism) to encouraging polygamy and belief in impurity of darker skinned races (Mormonism) and that doesn't even take into consideration the KKK, Neo-Nazis and various death cults that keep popping up regularly.
All in all, Islam is a very benign religion (I Am Not A Muslim, but I grew up in a society where more than half the population were.) But like every religion it has it's extremists (KKK are christian too).
Then you talk about 9/11
Injustice is the nature of the people we're talking about - and the last time they had a country of their own to run, it was used as a financial and logistical operating base for the attacks that killed 3000 people and wrecked many times that many lives.
I take it you are referring to Afghanistan. (Even though technically, a large part of the financing would have come from Bin Laden's Saudi business interests - yet American business remains in bed with the rest of the Bin Laden family). You may not know it but most middle Eastern and many north African countries are actually "thiers to run" with many of them having very close and friendly ties to the west.
And when these same "Militant Afghan Muslims" had thier weapons pointed against thier other previous enemy (Soviet Russia) the west was only to happy to support thier cause!!
[or] ...that we shouldn't sweat Iran saying that Israel should be "wiped off the map"
If such statements are so worrying, how would you feel if you woke up one morning and heard your country was now considered part of a nefarious "Axis of Evil!!!" and the first country on that list was already being invaded!! (Oh sorry, ...liberated!!)
Would you
a.) Be thankful there is such a benevolent leader ready to raze countries to the ground for attempting to hold on to thier soveriegnity while loudly declaring thier innocence (which even after being proven true but didn't slow down the invasion). Or
b.) Immediately start building the necessary weapons to prevent your own invasion?
Is it really a coincidence that, soon after that speech, the other two countries involved began actively (and publicly) pursuing nuclear ambitions?
I am in no way condoning or supporting terrorism (even though one mans terrorist is another man's freedom fighter - see South Africa - Nelson Mandela) but the kind of angry paranoia your article seems to be full of will only make the problem worse.
Hate begets hate! and vengeance is a cycle that never ends!
(What would you do if you were related to this family that was raped, killed then burned by American soldiers http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5253160.stm ).
As much as a lot of people hate to hear it, both patents and IPs improve creativity by assuring people that they will get some reward for thier effort. While both systems have thier flaws (and no one claims they are perfect, that is why they are constantly working on changing /improving it).
Can you honestly say you believe you will have a toaster, or vacuum cleaner in your house right now, if the inventor didn't expect to make some money from it? Or that you believe you would have read or watched a quarter as many books and films as you have, if the writers/producers/e.t.c. didn't expect to get rich off it? How many pharmaceutical companies do you think will be willing to go through years of drug testing, if at the end of it every Tom, Dick and Harry with a basement lab could take most of the profit from thier work?
The patent system simply acknowledges that people are greedy, and tries to find the best way to turn that to the good of the general population.
If you want to help, make a positive criticism, i.e. one that makes positive suggestions of how to improve it, not negative ones, i.e. ones that simply say destroy everything 'cuz it's bad.
IIUC, most of the embryo's that are used are already going to die anyway!! If that is morally reprehensible then talk about stopping that negative action (i.e. the fertility treatments, and abortions). Not the possible positive results which would prevent it from being a total waste.
A person who is alert and analyses a persuasive argument is more likely to say yes than one who too drowsy (or tired or distracted) to listen properly in the first place.
And in the same way a person who is reading a contract is more likely to pay attention to the details if they are alert than if they are not.
It doesn't somehow transfer data directly to your brain, it simply uses tiny electrodes to shock different parts of your tongues with really small current.
From TFA:
Michael Zinszer, a veteran Navy diver and director of Florida State University's Underwater Crime Scene Investigation School, took part in testing using the tongue to transmit an electronic compass and an electronic depth sensor while in a swimming pool.
He likened the feeling on his tongue to Pop Rocks candies.
"You are feeling the outline of this image," he said. "I was in the pool, they were directing me to a very small object and I was able to locate everything very easily."
Imagine it as someone scratching a really small image on your tongue. They originally used the back (I asssume becuase of the large surface area) but the tongue actually has many more nerves and is much more sensitive.
Of course, if you had the choice of asking the Navy for funding for "a device capable of scratching images unto your tongue to convey information" or "a brain port which extends the senses of a soldier in the field by giving him sonar or night vision". You can guess which will get more money.
Don't get me I wrong, I do think it's a fantastic idea. But it's not new technology, just creative use of current ones.
Unfortunately though, thier product will require you to go online and wait while it updates your 'copy-of-the-internet'(tm) so that you browse offline.
It'll be cheaper (and prolly just as effective) to google the topic you want and add the results page to your favourites with the "Make available offline" option active (in internet explorer) and your link depth set to a high value.
Why is this considered Science?
Hmmm..., I wonder what the SRI in 'SRI Internatinal' stands for.
Do you think..., just perhaps..., maybe... it stands for 'Stanford Research Institute'?
*Big Gasp* Nooooohh...!!!
The way it's phrased sounds very much unlike someone asking out of curiousity.
It sounds more like someone ticking off bullet points for thier report. Which tends to bring to mind either research for a school report or a report for a government organisation that is looking for a technical way to phrase what they already know is true so that they can go ahead and do whatever they wanted anyway.
Very interesting! and this is actually a very good representation of what these user content generated sites become. Every one crowd around the high scoring but 'safe' option. And very few even attempt to get to the true centre of the issue.
For instance, on a site that raises a political issue, you are likely to find that most of the contributions either fall into the currently accepted 'politically correct' view or the currently popular 'anti-establishment' view.
Most people will simply be repeating arguements they've heard before, even if the flaws in it are already widely known. Only very few will actually attempt to analyse the situation from thier own perspective, or try to suggest a new way to address the problem which may be the 'bullseye' we're looking for.
Actually, what the Morley experiment specifically proved was that we have no relative movement to the luminous ether. There was a lot of debate about whether this meant such an ether did or didn't exist and Einstiens conclusion was that, whether it was everywhere or nowhere, as long as we couldn't detect it in anyway and it doesn't affect any of our observations, we could proceed by ignoring it in all our experiments.
While I'm not saying that it does exist, I think we should bear this caveat in mind when considering situations like the gravitational bending of light.
You're assuming that the direction of time is parallel to the direction of motion
Not exactly, I am actually working based on the initial observations that were described (in above mentioned book, which was recommended to me by a friend working on his maths PhD, and was the only source I found which actually went into the proofs of the theory) which led to the formation of the theory.
E.g. If an object is one light second away from you at time t and travels away from you at the 0.5 the speed of light for two seconds it will end up two light seconds away from you. Now, the light from it's first position will reach you after one second at time t +1, it will take time t + 2 to reach it's end point and the light from it's endpoint will reach you at time 2 seconds later at time (t+2)+2 = t+4. So the journey that appeared to take 2 seconds to the flying object, will appear to take 3 seconds to you! Hence the slower timeframe. This is the proof that was given, however, if the object flies towards you the time light takes to make the journey will be less at the end than at the beginning. Hence it will speed up!
As I mentioned this is the only proof of the formula i could find, however if you have any resources to a better source of info I'd be really interested in seeing it too.
Observation is all there is for us. It's like the question, "If a tree falls in the woods but nobody is aroud to hear it, does it make a sound?" You can't talk about a sound unless you also have a listener in mind.
That was exactly the premise Einstien was working from. So what he said was not "This is what will happen!" but "This is what you will see happening!"
These equations are great at helping us translate the effects we see from high speed particle accelerators and such. But I never saw any indication in there that we could use it to actually answer any questions about the nature of the universe, Spacetime, Wormhole physics, lorentz contractions, or any of the other conditions which are not actually a matter of observation but exprience.
IANAPhycist but I have actually read up a lot on the subject. The book which explained it best, to me, started by describing a way to compensate for anomalies of observation due to the speed of light and then suddenly states a few chapters down the line that these are not 'observed effects' but 'real effects'.
IIUC Einstien's basic premise was that, since you cannot accurately compensate for the time between when and incident occurred and the time it is observed, and since Michalson Morley's experiment seemed to prove that the speed of light can always be assumed to be constant (in a vacuum), then you can simply treat your experiment as if the moment at which an incident is observed, is the moment it occured.
He goes on to design a series of formulas that will always let you compensate for the difference in observational timeframes (i.e. the apparent difference in timing due to the changes in distance which will cause light to take more/less time in travelling from incident to observer).
In all the material I read I never found any reason given for anyone to believe that these observational timeframes are actual timeframes (i.e. objects actually passing through time at different rates).
In fact, it seemed to me that if you looked at time as a vector, an object travelling away from you near the speed of light would seem to age more slowly, while one travelling towards you near the speed of light would age faster.
The interesting thing about proving/disproving the factuality of this theory is that it accurately describes how an object will be observed, at least when that observation is done using electromagnetic waves (or other light speed signals).
And the object will be observed to age more slowly or quickly (depending on direction of travel).
So, as far as I can tell, the only way to disprove it is to find a way of observing something at a speed faster than that of light, which isn't that easy, especially when practically every serious researcher begins with the assumtion that such things (tachyons) don't exist (Or that they are travelling backwards through time).
I have the sickle cell trait (I'm originally from west Africa), only one of my gene pair (AS) has it so it isn't full blown(SS). What this means is that under stressful conditions my red blood cells have the tendency to commit suicide.
Five generations ago one of my Dad's ancestors (on his dad's side) was 'Oba' of Benin (i.e. He was the sole ruler of the largest empire in west africa). While my paternal grandmother was the daughter of a court advisor (the equivalent of a cabinet minister). And this was not one of those poor starving kingdom you see on tv (You can still see examples of Bini Bronzes in many museums).
However, in a relatively short time, the wealth they had has been greatly reduced as the economics and politics of the region has changed, and, while the royal family itself is still well off, even second generation descendants can sometimes be seen begging for money. Any wealth we have now we have had to work for seperate from our ancestors.
The symptoms of the sickle cell trait (at least the kind I have) means that I have very little toleration for cold temperatures. This wasn't such a bad problem in the tropics (except when people got carried away with air conditioners) but since I've moved to the Uk I've had to stop drinking cold water. A glass of ice water can sometimes send me into shivering fits which can last over an hour at times. It gets worse when I haven't been eating well.
For people with the full blown trait(SS) the attacks can be much worse if it's not well managed but the triggers are much the same, perhaps with lower thresholds. However, in thier case the attacks are so serious they can actually be fatal. In an environment where food is scarce children with the full blown trait don't survive long.
Now, in the 1950's WHO began an effort to wipe malaria from the planet. And from the successes that were seen in more temperate and wealthier regions there was no reason to believe they wouldn't suceed. In addition fantastic new drugs like chloroquine were being discovered/invented which could cure a malaria infection after just four doses!
So let's assume that it was possible to screen out (or remove) the sickle cell trait at that time. My ancestors would definitely have gone for it. Afterall every one knows how much people with the trait 'suffer' and no one wants to wish that on thier children.
Fast forward 50 years. DDT, the miracle insecticide, is now practically useless against mosquitoes, and turns out to be poisonous to humans. The malaria plasmodium keeps developing resistances to the new drugs they throw at it (some of the drugs being used now are so toxic you are advised not to take more than one dose a year).
Now malaria infections are a very common thing where i grew up (I used to get infected once or twice a year). I used to worry about the parasites resistance to drugs and was really scared about having to keep taking stronger and stronger drugs. However, after a while I realised that I never had a fever for more than a couple of hours a day and never more than two days in a row. I didn't like taking the pills anyway and by the time I was 13 I didn't even bother telling my parents when I started to feel sick.
I only realised this was different when a friend of mine was sick and I mentioned that all he needed to do was drink a lot of water wrap up warmly and go to bed (which was what I always did). He actually woke up feeling much worse!
Even today millions are spent trying to come up with a dependable treatment, and millions of people still die from it.
But I, and millions of others like me, never have to worry about it. And who knows what other advantages (or weaknesses may have come with it). Yes, when combined with malnutrition this condition can be fatal (but then even totally healthy people can die from hunger). Personally, I'm
Doesn't that make the term redundant?
However, In the case of sickle cell anaemia you are focusing on the problem we already know about (malaria). What about a possible future problem which we do not know about but which this same condition will act as a deterent for.
Diversity means that the likelyhood of the whole race being wiped out by a single change in the environment is highly unlikely (someone else has spoken more about this in reply to the original post).
However, when all of humanity has an 'ideal' genetic makeup, all it takes is one germ or virus that the designer genes don't cater for and the whole species will be ended.
You also seem to believe that only a small percentage of people will have gene therapy becuase it will be expensive. What you are neglecting is that once one person has it roughly 50% of his offspring will also have it (if it is a dominant trait, possible more). And since these people will be healthier and probably more attractive (who will want to code for an ugly child) they will be more likely to reproduce. Eventually, the 'negative' trait you are coding against may be wiped out from the gene pool FOREVER.
Plus as more people are born with the 'corrected' trait the treatment will become cheaper, and who will want to be the only short-sighted person in a world where glasses aren't even manufactured anymore. (For an example of a similar situation, just look at plastic surgery, which was once thought to be only affordable to the rich but is now within reach of anyone with a credit card)
It is similar to the main issue with GM crops. Since any genetic engineering will be obviously meant to adjust crops (or people) for the current environment. The new strain will quickly replace all the old ones becuase when it comes to competing for resources (again in the current environment) that strain is just sooo much better. Now at first this all seems great! However, when the environment does change (and eventually, it always does) all the old strains which would have been better suited for this new environment would have been wiped out and the single new strain that is left, which was so fantastic in the old environment, will now be unable to cope and will die.
So..., the more successful the new strain is..., the more likely it is that the whole species will die.
As I said the 'weird radiation' thing was a crazy example. A better example, for instance, is sickle cell anaemia.
This is a congenital 'disease' which causes a persons blood cells to commit suicide when under excessive stress. It also makes a person much more likely to survive a bout of malaria which still kills millions of people in west african countries.
Now this is a disease which is obviously dangerous to those who have it (some times so many cells die that the person body can't sustain thier metabolism) but how sure are we that it may not also be our major hope of survival against some yet undiscovered blood bourne pandemic.
I am not saying such things shouldn't be 'treated' just that removing an attribute from our gene pool forever, when we still don't understand the full ramifications of it, doesn't strike me as a great idea .
The truth is that the world we live in is no longer the one nature designed, so just becuase nature doesn't like something, doesn't mean we shouldn't.
So what you're saying is...
You don't know the source of this energy from an unknown source.
Well, Dag nabbit! If that don't just beat all.
Unfortunately the z-machine already has had billions of $ put into it.
I think though the more pertinent issue is that most of humanities survival is no longer totally dependent on the possession of physical attributes but the possesion of mental ones as well. The fact that some human beings have been able to remove some of the weaknesses inherent in certain genetic traits have been overcome means that we might be able to begin to see certain strentghs those traits have which we were unaware of.
For instance, anecdotal evidence would seem to indicate that a genetic disposition towards 'smartness' is accompanied by a disposition away from 'strentgh' (I'm not saying it's true just giving an example). In that case it's a good thing we have created an environment where physically weak people can still survive becuase that means we will have more smart people(e.g. Steven hawkings would never have survived as a hunter/gatherer). As we change our environment we also change the evolutionary pressures we subject ourselves to.
For this reason I am also quite hesitant about the use of gene therapy in fixing any conditions. Changing a persons genes to something we consider to be 'better' may actually in the end lead to huge losses for the human race as a whole. For example if all levels of autism could be cured genetically most parents would immediately go for it. However, many geniuses historically show signs of mild autism.
Basically, before we decide to make everyone 'better', we have to figure out if we have any idea exactly what 'better' is?
Many species have two ways of dealing with this. Either having so many kids that it doesn't matter if a few are lost, or having a few kids and fighting to make make sure that those few do survive to reproduce
The difference in reproduction rate between 'poor' and 'rich' tends to be similar to the difference in thier mortality rate and thus reflects these two techniques of preservation.
I also wonder if anyone has examined the evolution of culture due to natural selection. For example, How do value systems and systems of morality change over the course of a few generations? A simple example, for instance, will be that a culture that believes in ritual suicide during an eclipse will quickly wipe itself from the gene pool. Of course, unlike genes, cultures can simply go into hiding, in history books or religous documents and such, to be reborn ages later. It's probably a bit off-topic but I think it'll be interesting to research.