>> ^DrewNumberTwo:

Your car analogy is accurate, but misleading. If the car were newer, then it would in fact be against patent law to make one on your own. The SCO case is, I believe, patent law, not copyright.
I don't get your argument regarding publishing companies of various kinds trying to make money for themselves and not paying artists much. This is the old "artists deserve more money" argument. Frankly, they don't. And I'm saying that as an artist. If you're an artist and you give someone your art in exchange for whatever percentage, then you've agreed to that amount and you deserve that amount, and no more. The fact is, selling art is hard. It might not seem that way because we see it everywhere, but having art sitting in your house or on your computer and making money off of it is just plain difficult. The easiest route is frequently to let someone else do that for you, and to artists who can't afford a cup of coffee, making some decent cash sounds like a good deal.
Artists who don't want to go that route are free to keep their content and sell it themselves.


If the car were newer it'd be illegal to sell it. If you made one for your own use, there shouldn't be any legal recourse for the company to follow. It's been a long standing tradition that reverse engineering is allowed, only broken with the digital age and "no bypassing of countermeasures".

SCO is patent law, but they were selling licenses to "guarantee" people they won't be prosecuted once they won. They were selling something they hadn't even proven they owned yet...another aspect of the digital world that's broken. People without the legal rights claiming they do and infringing. Businesses do it all the time by taking other people's pictures and using them in their ads. Even Congressional members have been caught doing it....they don't understand why it's frustrating for a "normal" person who can actually be sued when it happens.

The publisher argument was to show that the traditional way of publishing is no longer relevant in the digital market. They are trying to muscle in after the fact, in spite of customers and in spite of self published authors to dictate what everything should sell for and how it should be sold. They are failing overall, but it doesn't change the fact that they are trying. They are also going after the libraries and trying to undermine the lending system the libraries have, after they've already sold them the goods. So here, the publishing houses are using their wealth and power to attempt to stop distribution channels they don't control much like the RIAA. NYT won't acknowledge self-published authors on their best seller lists, because of it's ties to publishing, in another attempt to discredit non-publisher affiliated authors.

The law is there to protect people, not the people who have corporate backing. A self pubbed author makes 70% of book sale price on Amazon, less than 15% if it's through publisher. The self-pubbed author pricing is usually less than 5 dollars...something around 3 dollars usually. And the publisher authors usually sell for hard back prices, 15 dollars or so. They want to force everyone to sell books at the 15 dollar mark, when self-pubbed authors have found that under 5 bucks gets them the most coverage AND money. So despite the evidence, the big pubs are attempting to influence the market and infringing on the rights (not necessary their copyrights, but I believe they are by attempting to prevent them from distributing it as the people want and the author wants) of the other authors to sell their works as they see fit by attempting to take over the market places.

The future of publishing houses looks like they will have to become small electronic based outfits that provide the author with an editor, cover artwork (relevant and beneficial to sales of book), and possibly facilitate audio book deals and other countries markets so the author can continue writing instead of marketing. For a 15-20% percentage of sales so they have an incentive to do it right and sell quantities at the popular pricing schemes instead of taking the lion's share and scooping up all authors so they get enough to stay afloat despite the content creators getting crumbs. But it still doesn't mean they should be attempting to prevent non-affiliated authors from being noticed and selling books as they see fit due to deals they make on behalf of all "book sales" they control or not.

>> ^grinter:

Taking control of the drone sounds pretty unlikely.. but I wonder if there is a kernel of truth to this. Maybe they just jammed it's guidance signal, autopilot kicked in, and when it ran out of fuel it glided to a, relatively, gentle landing?


I would take a wild guess that those things are designed to go kaboom if there is even the slightest hint of malfunction (malfunction meaning ANY undesired event). The interesting part was the fact that the CIA lead on that perhaps that exact sequence of events didn't quite occur correctly maybe.

Also yes, that is a fake airplane... The drones are MUCH bigger than that piece of crap, paper-mâché high school project. For example this is a bomber drone that is brand new, it's 65 to a possible 90 feet across (BTW, in the video you can see that they label it as the RQ-170, which is what I linked to)... Like I said it's a bomber, it needs to be pretty big. So unless the CIA has a stealth version that is 3/4 the size of the bomber, they are full of crap. I think what the CIA was worried about is maybe that the entirety of the drone wasn't destroyed leaving possible tidbits behind like it's stealth mesh and other composites to be reverse engineered--I think TDS had a bit on this a few days ago.

-Second Part
I did look around some more and there are some US officials taking this very seriously, so maybe they do in fact have their 45~ft drone. If you read at the bottom of the RQ-170 on Wikipedia (I linked it above), it has been updated with much more current information. So it may indeed be a small coup for the Iranian Military indirectly, as it seems to be a navigational flight error. Which asks the question: where the hell is it's self-destruction switch; are they really that stupid?

(snip of BRP profane rant)

Well - if that plunge into logic doesn't lay out the sides then nothing really will.

Look - this isn't difficult. Judaism banned homosexuality under judeic law. Now - those who are not religious would argue that such a standard was established by evil men. Those who believe that God exists & has a plan for his children would accept that these rules ("Commandments" if you will) were established to help the mortal family to know the ins and outs of what God expects his children to do or not do for their own happiness.

So homosexuality was wrong both under Judaic law, and Judaic moral belief. This is not in question except by people who are trying to reverse-engineer history in order to justify their own world views. Christ did not come along and say, "That was wrong". Quite to the contrary. Christ doubled down. Judaic law commmanded people to not commit sexual sin. Christ didn't say, "It's OK now as long as you love each other..." Nuh-uh. Christ said, "He who LOOKETH upon another woman and hath committed adultery in his heart." The lesson is clear. Judeaic law was trying to command & control people with "don't do this" rules. Christ was trying to teach people to not even THINK about doing the wrong thing.

What does that say about homosexuality? People who think Christ or God would be "OK" with it are lying to themselves. Sexual sin is sin and needs to be forsaken. Period. That never changed. Christ told the adulteress, "Go thy way and SIN NO MORE". He did not say, "Go thy way and I don't care what you do as long as you love them."

So yes - like ANY moral sin - you can love the sinner and hate the sin and labor to correct it. It doesn't make you a bigot. It doesn't mean you're a hater. It means you see people who need help, and you try to help them.

As far as this chick goes - phht. If she's even LDS (which isn't a given), her argument is full of holes and we've got an actual LDS guy who says she's full of bologna with her claims of "being cast out". Is such a thing possible? You'd have to ask the guys in SLC about that and not this chick. As far as the Mormon church's opposition to Prop 8? I saw that more as a means to prevent a lousy law from happening. The gay community needs to come up with a plan that addresses their wants (equal rights) without stepping on the definition of marriage and protections for those who hold to a traditional view. When that happens they'll find they have a better shot compared to these half-@$$ed bum-rush votes on lousy, flawed legislation.

This might get more views with a better title. I only noticed it because of the tags.


Anyway, to translate:

Computers give us the tools to develop better computers, and we're getting better at controlling computers directly with thought alone. Because of the increasing power and sophistication of computers (and the continued advances in reverse-engineering the human brain) we will eventually be able to design computers that are better (or at least faster) at designing computers than humans.

Along this path it is believed that we (or computers) will gain the knowledge needed to enhance the intelligence of the human brain, possibly through intelligent nano-machines. This will blur the lines between biological and artificial intelligence and should (in theory) eventually allow a person's mind to be copied to a completely artificial machine (either partially or completely).

@lampishthing

Regarding the balance of evidence for or against religion, I've previously written:

We might have faith in the esential spiritual hypothesis, that there's an invisible spiritual material (soul, spirit, universal consciouss etc.) that invisibly perturbs neural circuits to make it look as if the brain is self-contained, but 1. modern history is a relentless chipping away of magical thinking like that, and 2. science will finish reverse engineering the human brain in 20-50 years, so I humbly don't recommend betting too much money on that hypothesis.
...
The neuroscience of religion basically shows mystical feelings are just turning off some neural circuits and over-activating others. For example, 'oneness with the universe' is just turning off the neural circuits we develop in infancy that allow us to distinguish between self and world, between where my hand stops and the table starts (one is "me" .. the other is not).

(Originally from: http://blog.videosift.com/dag/On-Atheism?loadcomm=1#comment-910402 )

I should read the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

He's definitely not counting on our politicians to slow everything down and even "reverse engineer" human progress.

That's my prediction and I'll be proven correct.

>> ^mentality:
This is also the guy who predicted in 1999 that by 2009, we'd have hundreds of 3d computer chips in our house, wearable computers embedded into our clothing, keyboards replaced by speech recognition software, glasses that projected HUDs directly onto our retina, and all our wars will be fought with robots.
Keep that in mind when listening to his prophecies. I feel that reverse-engineering of the human brain by 2029 is like HAL and manned missions to Jupiter by 2001.


A worthy addendum.

This is also the guy who predicted in 1999 that by 2009, we'd have hundreds of 3d computer chips in our house, wearable computers embedded into our clothing, keyboards replaced by speech recognition software, glasses that projected HUDs directly onto our retina, and all our wars will be fought with robots.

Keep that in mind when listening to his prophecies. I feel that reverse-engineering of the human brain by 2029 is like HAL and manned missions to Jupiter by 2001.

>> ^ReverendTed:
>> ^gwiz665:
but one thing is fairly evident, there is no ethereal element to it.
How is this "evident"? The physical model does not accommodate unified experience. Just as you suggested, the body and the brain are simply organic machines. They should only "do" - impulse in, algorithm run, impulse out, and there is no reason for them to "be aware" of it. There is no step in the prescribed process where a cell does anything more than pass along an electrical stimulus to some other cells. (Which, again, I'm fine with - it's just that awareness remains completely unaccounted for.)


It is evident, because we cannot observe it directly OR indirectly. You'll agree with me, I presume, that we cannot observe something that is not material or physical, yes? Much like we cannot observe dark matter/energy (if that exists), but we can see the influence it has on the physical world.

We cannot see any influence on the physical brain from the consciousness, it goes the other way around . the physical brain determines the conscious thought.

And the consciousness is not aware of how the input/output works either, like I said, we have no introspective knowledge other than what the brain presents to "us". A car's speedometer does not know how much CO² the car releases into the world either. (Obviously there are some differences between a static closed thing like a speedometer and a dynamic, changing system like a brain, but it's a metaphor. )

There is no step in a computer either, which would account for how we can perceive programs on it - we just can, because we use certain filters and tables, which determines what that particular 1 or 0 means. You cannot see whether you run word, firefox or world of warcraft on a computer very easily, by looking at the electrical impulses, but that's the only way we have to analyze the brain right now.

Imagine having to reverse engineer a program on a computer, with only the hardware available? It's possible, but fuuck, it's hard. That's what neuroscience is trying to do (I think).

IBM (among others) is making some nice progress simulating brain function with the intent of reverse-engineering the processes of cognition. Perhaps that will shed some light on these questions.

The substance dualism argument is an "argument from ignorance". It rightfully points out that current theories of perception are not complete, but then begins filling in those gaps with unsupported speculation. The fact that our theories are not complete is not evidence for the existence of souls any more than a person's inability to identify a light in the sky is evidence of alien visitation.

Anything that affects the physical world is testable, even if we do not currently have the tools to see it. If there are immortal souls then we will find the exact way in which they affect the physical world.

However, there are always people who begin with a conclusion and then look for evidence that supports it, and for such people any hole in our established understanding is evidence for their belief. Those are they types of people QS's video seems to address. There may be souls or whatever people think are there beyond death, but until we have actual evidence supporting that position then any confidence in such speculation is misplaced.

"But unfortunately there still remains the difficult problem of just how the brain gives rise to conscious experience."

We're getting there slowly but surely.

Researchers separately stimulated parts of the brain involved in the desire to move, the belief that we've moved, and movement itself. ... Up to now it has been very difficult for neuroscientists to deal with the idea of intentions or wishes or will."

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17092-possible-site-of-free-will-found-in-brain.html

My sense is if you isolate and take out of the equation enough of the components of consciousness, like 1. intentions/desires, 2. short term and long term memory, and 3. actions themselves (which don't require consciousness to be executed) we're left with a stripped-down version of consciousness that isn't very meaningful.

If it can't do anything or express preference, and it doesn't know anything, even that it exists, does it really exist in any meaningful way? In that sense, consciousness in its normal form is just a "user illusion" that is a conglomeration of separate brain functions.

When scientists talk about reverse engineering the human brain and building a complete computer simulation, they say we'll have to decide what that means... if it's a complete simulation, that means it has the same user illusion and it thinks it's alive. When we get to that point, I think we'll just build the simulations so that they don't have things like our fear of death.

---------
Chilaxe: "As a side-note, we might have faith in the esential spiritual hypothesis, that there's an invisible spiritual material (soul, spirit, universal consciouss etc.) that invisibly perturbs neural circuits to make it look as if the brain is self-contained, but 1. modern history is a relentless chipping away of magical thinking like that, and 2. science will finish reverse engineering the human brain in 20-50 years, so I humbly don't recommend betting too much money on that hypothesis."
---------

I'm no proponent of this widespread religious assumption Chilaxe has identified. That said, there's some room for clarification.

But first a quibble: the error behind the belief that there is some tangible animating spirit somewhere offstage from human affairs is based not on an assumption of brain isolation but rather the contrary. In fact, the assumption is that the brain, specifically in its capacity to generate interiority, is somehow profoundly *involved* with the "unseen."

In other words, spiritualists always presuppose an intrinsic bridge between some common "essence" -- that is, "human essence" -- and their particular oceanic-hidden-premise (OHP). Gary Zukov's quantum Woo-Woo and this "Secret" come to mind.

Contrast this view with Buddhism (Theravadin Buddhism) which asserts that all phenomena can arise only when the necessary preconditions are present. So, for example, as far as brains are concerned, emotional experience is contingent upon a functioning limbic system. (Compare the behavior of your dog to, say, a gecko.)

Science has greatly advanced our understanding of how the brain functions, and how it is able to integrate the various complex physiological processes. But there still remains the difficult problem of just how the brain gives rise to conscious experience.

That's the hard question, *ahem* AI people...

^As a side-note, we might have faith in the esential spiritual hypothesis, that there's an invisible spiritual material (soul, spirit, universal consciouss etc.) that invisibly perturbs neural circuits to make it look as if the brain is self-contained, but 1. modern history is a relentless chipping away of magical thinking like that, and 2. science will finish reverse engineering the human brain in 20-50 years, so I humbly don't recommend betting too much money on that hypothesis.

>> ^Kreegath:
So there was a spaceship hovering over Johannesburg for 20 years and no nation has even tried to deconstruct or even claim it? You'd think that the US and the Soviet Union would be the first to jump at the chance of an extraterrestrial technology advantage and would go to great lengths to get it, regardless if it had landed in either territory or not.

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. -Arthur C. Clarke

In the movie you already see that they have no idea how to reverse engineer the alien weapons, even though they've been trying for 20 years. My guess would be that they must have tried the same with the spaceship but also failed. They might have removed interesting bits and just let the rest of the ship hang. They also wouldn't want to break the engines because it would come crashing down on Johannesburg.

Imagine the humans of 1930 (the electron microscope was discovered in 1931) getting their hands on an iPhone. They wouldn't know what to do with it. They wouldn't even be able to see the actual circuits let alone know how they worked. It would be a long time before they could actually discover and use anything of use out of an iPhone.

>> ^southblvd:
You're a new-ish species to them, of COURSE they're going to experiment with you. What do you expect?


Have you ever considered joining the Nazis or the Imperial Japanese Army? Your cavalier attitude towards experimenting on sentient beings meshes well with theirs.

"Oh hi intergalactic refugees, we grant you asylum on our planet. Let's try to foster peace and understanding between our species. By the way, the company in charge of your safekeeping during your stay here will also be kidnapping, torturing and murdering a few of your citizens, in an attempt to reverse engineer your awesome weapons for profit. No hard feelings, k? Such action is only expected after first contact."