Questions About Awaking The Machine

Bloggish, Tid-Bits

Below is a portion of a question/answer email exchange with a friend in Italy. I’ve posted it here on the off chance it might be of interest to others.

(Note: this conversation is part of an on-going dialogue. And as such, we have already shared a common vocabulary. So some of the words may be used and have meanings  that are new or unusual for a first time reader.)

> I have some other questions for you.
> – How long it does take, on average, to awaken the human biological machine?

Awakening the machine is not something that happens once then you stay “on”.
It would be pathological to stay in the waking state. The same as it
would be pathological for you to not sleep in the ordinary sense. Continue reading →

Broaden Your Physics Background

Bloggish, Table-Top Demo, Tid-Bits

I was recently asked by someone what would I suggest that might perhaps maybe help broaden one’s understanding of physics. The “might perhaps maybe” was not part of the question. I’m just stuffing that in there to sow the seeds of uncertainty concerning any specific result that may come from following my hair-brained (or is it hare-brained ala Bugs Bunny) ideas.

I apologize now for the meandering twisty path of my answer. I take the question very serious and thus I feel it is necessary to sneak up on the answer. Continue reading →

Trail Markers

Bloggish

Let’s look at a scenario.

You’ve discovered through the painful process of experience — again, and again — that your attraction to “bad boys” puts you into relationships that just plain don’t work. One messy breakup after another has led you to the conclusion that “bad boys” are not a good idea.

So you resolve: “No more bad boys for me… I know the signs, I know the results, I am swearing them off… no more… period… that’s that.” Continue reading →

No Privacy

Bloggish, Tid-Bits

A post I read today reminded me of something my father told me as a kid. Basically: “never do anything you wouldn’t want to see on the front page of the newspaper.”

I know, how quaint, they had newspapers back in the olden days. I suppose in current vernacular it would be “never do anything you wouldn’t want to see on the home page of youtube.”

Admittedly a video clip of one sitting on the john in the midst of a cataclysmic flu episode is not something you (or anyone else) should want to see on youtube. Embarrassment is one thing, getting caught “cooking the books” or making heated remarks that include graphic details of bodily harm is another.

Posting anything to the internet is like getting a tattoo. It may be with you for a long long time, there is no guarantee that it can be removed ever, and there is no place you can put that tattoo that will be invisible to everyone — folks you’d rather not see it could easily end up with access.

Case in point, the post I mentioned at the start of this blog: “Privacy issue: Google Docs seems to not delete but only hide documents when the trash is emptied“.

In the post it was demonstrated that a deleted google document was still available — for anyone to read. Thing is: this document started life as a private document. It was deleted, trashed, and the trash dumped. Still the document is hanging around. That is the not so good news. But, the really bad news is: anyone (in spite of so called privacy issues) can see the so-called deleted document.

This is not a slam against google. It just serves as a wake up call. Anything that goes over the internet is at risk of being tucked away in dusty corners of the internet. Email drafts saved before you even hit the send button could be available. You could be put to task for an email you wrote that was not even sent, and was in fact later extensively revised. The internet is like one huge, massive cloud storage device. If you live in this world, and use any of the new technologies, you can’t escape it. But, you can learn to be more discreet.

Yes, fight for privacy anywhere you can. Use care when setting your account privacy rules. And, be aware that in spite of your best efforts you may not be able to protect your documents the way you wish. Thus, be careful what you allow onto the cloud. It could easily come back to haunt you.

 

By What Measure

Bloggish

Reading the WSJ (Wall Street Journal) article about the game “Remission” was most enlightening. Maybe not for the reasons that most readers would have found.

Remission has been around since 2006. It is a serious game, aimed at players between 12 and 29 years old — that happen to be undergoing cancer treatment. It is a third-person shooter in which you guide a “nanobot” through your own body killing cancer cells.

The game (seven years later) still has good traction and is well accepted by the medical community as being of value. By what measure? How is it decided that the game is doing its job? Continue reading →

More Than A Clone

Bloggish

Let’s take it as written that sometime earlier today you discovered plausible evidence that you are a clone. What will it mean if it’s true?  What if I am a clone?

As a clone your cells will not be your own — at least you will not be the original owner of the sacred DNA that dictates the construction of the physical you. That DNA will be borrowed from the real you — “You version 1.0”.

And if you are one of those scifi “pop into consciousness as a fully mature adult” type of clones, then all of your memories will be borrowed or manufactured. Since you are fresh out of the vat, those memories of running over grassy hills with your dog Rover have been injected from some source other than experience. Continue reading →

Map vs. Territory

Bloggish

When looking around the Grand Canyon with a gas station folded map in your hand it is plain to see that the map is not the territory. If the map is a good one, there will be scribbly-scrawly things indicating roads, mountains, canyons, rivers, and what not. But a little blue line wiggling across a cellulose sheet of paper is not the same thing as a river. The map will work for navigation purposes. But, for the real thing, you need to look to the territory.

Something that is not so obvious is the fact that as  you stand admiring the landscape you are also looking at a map — not the territory. Because of how our perceptions work, because of the mechanics of our brains, we are never looking at the territory. We are always looking at a map. Continue reading →

Your Voice Matters

Bloggish

The world seems so big, and there seem to be so many excellent voices saying exactly what you would be saying — if only you were saying it. And, they seem to say it so much better than you imagine you would say it. That’s not actually how it is.

You may have noticed that not everyone is the same. People have different tastes, different likes and dislikes, different perspectives, different ways of being in the world. We don’t all experience the world in the same way. Continue reading →