The STEM thread

our building automation systems mgr and i just had a discussion on this. he thinks a.i. will beat the brain someday. mainly because a.i. machines will design a.i. machines, and they will get better. i maintained that i agree they will be more "efficient" and a lot of times more "accurate" but sometimes the very falliabilities of the brain lead to amazing discoveries.
The over-used term "outside-the-box thinking" is one way that "falliabilities" can be expressed - I was in the library the other day, and as I was walking through the stacks I saw a book by E.L. Doctorow ("The March").

I had recently read an article by Cory Doctorow (no relation), and probably would not have noticed that book were it not for the name association (a form of recency bias). So I borrowed that book and am currently reading it - I'll post a summary in the Five Books thread when I've finished it.

Would an AI/ML algorithm that was trained in a specific problem domain that included material generated by Cory Doctorow (a science fiction author) branch out from that to look at the work of E.L. Doctorow?

I doubt it, unless the specific AI was trying to duplicate the thought-process of TipRoast (which probably can be done with a few lines of Python). :biggrin:
 

Yeah, we'll see. Obviously a Big Ass Deal if true, reproducible, scalable, viable, etc.
I am skeptical about this announcement. I think the folks at the NIF were feeling pressure from Commonwealth Fusion Systems, and felt that they needed to announce some forward progress to justify their next round of funding.

I do like the tension that now exists between government sponsorship and privately funded research in things like space exploration and fusion energy.
 
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the existence of top level reasearchers who are human beings is one reason that as much as i respect a.i. and find it amazing and fascinating, i don't believe any machine will ever replace a human brain. some of the decisions these researchers made were based on personal experiences. i know a.i. has learning capabilities, but i believe that neither the uniqueness of personal interaction nor the resulting decisions can be replicated by machines.

Thank you.

I've been taking a deep dive into this subject recently because of
German National friend and his wife who live in Arizona, and who are looking to move here to the Live Free Or Die state have been discussing a lot about this lately.

I have wanted to understand it better from all angles for quite a while.

I'm learning it now.

Absolutely fascinating subject with great ramifications. Ethics, cognition and much beyond.

I will start a thread devoted to this subject when I begin to get my head around it.

Fascinating to say the least.
 
My instincts tend to put the idea up along side my perpetual motion machine. :coffee:

But who ever knows these days?

Cheers, :toast:

Nuclear fusion does seem be to a key here.

Will anyone let it rock is the biggest question.

I mean basically free power?

Who benefits from this?

Oh yeah, us, every single individual human being.

How can that benefit those in power?

It can't.
 

This is not the current state of the art, it's a possible far-future (200 years way, maybe?) engineering achievement that I'd love to see.

I first came across the idea in John Ringo's Live Free Or Die book, and am quite pleased to see this idea adopted more seriously by the scientific community.

This is the future I imagined back during the Mercury 7 days of my wide-eyed, optimistic youth.


Edit: there's an error in that article - it states "so the team decided on a minimum of 0.3g – a third or so less than you'd get living on Mars."

That should say Earth, not Mars. The 0.3g figure is close to Mars gravity, which is 0.38g.
 
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A few more tidbits regarding the Antikythera mechanism that dates back to 500 BC or thereabouts.

Apparently we still don't fully know all its secrets:
Very nice discussion of not only the mechanism itself, but also a little bit of speculation on the attainments of the Greek civilization of the time.

The mechanism is a product of science and engineering and metallurgy - there had to be a significant technological and industrial capability in place to produce something like that.
 
Very nice discussion of not only the mechanism itself, but also a little bit of speculation on the attainments of the Greek civilization of the time.

The mechanism is a product of science and engineering and metallurgy - there had to be a significant technological and industrial capability in place to produce something like that.

Yea Tip, the science and engineering conceptual aspects are mind boggling, and to be able to facilitate the actual manufacture of the components is simply remarkable for that time period....hope they uncover more specimens - and more secrets - soon.
 
A few more tidbits regarding the Antikythera mechanism that dates back to 500 BC or thereabouts.

Apparently we still don't fully know all its secrets:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkL5Wkj1gYk


Very nice discussion of not only the mechanism itself, but also a little bit of speculation on the attainments of the Greek civilization of the time.

The mechanism is a product of science and engineering and metallurgy - there had to be a significant technological and industrial capability in place to produce something like that.
If you guys haven't watched Ancient Apocalypse on Netflix yet, I strongly recommend it. Graham Hancock is the narrator and filmmaker. Really interesting stuff...
 
Nuclear fusion does seem be to a key here.

Will anyone let it rock is the biggest question.

I mean basically free power?

Who benefits from this?

Oh yeah, us, every single individual human being.

How can that benefit those in power?

It can't.

The last two dozen wars/invasions for energy or geopolitics the last 50 years would look downright silly with free energy.

Unfortunately fusion tech sounds like it’s still many many steps away from being scalable or usable for human use
 
The last two dozen wars/invasions for energy or geopolitics the last 50 years would look downright silly with free energy.

Unfortunately fusion tech sounds like it’s still many many steps away from being scalable or usable for human use
I've been following the progress of the team at Commonwealth Fusion Systems.

If their claims are correct, fusion is not that far away.
 
I don't recall if we have posted anything previously regarding the Antikythera Mechchanism - it was discovered by sponge divers off the Greek coast around 1900:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqlJ50zDgeA


So a dozen centuries before Galileo, scientists already knew the earth was round and in orbit around a solar system. It’s the only way this machine makes sense.

How many other ancient truths and technologies did humanity know about, forget, and rediscover again, and also just how far back….

reminds me of that ancient battery found in Egypt…

.
 
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absolutely stunned by these buildings lasting so long, and also the ingenuity and precision of the aqueducts, bath houses etc. saw a special one time on the history channel i believe. i'm one of those geeks who would love a themed tour of these in Italy, based on how they were engineered.
the talent and skill involved are amazing. kind of like accurate crimesolving before fingerprints, cell phones, computers, and dna
 
absolutely stunned by these buildings lasting so long, and also the ingenuity and precision of the aqueducts, bath houses etc. saw a special one time on the history channel i believe. i'm one of those geeks who would love a themed tour of these in Italy, based on how they were engineered.
the talent and skill involved are amazing. kind of like accurate crimesolving before fingerprints, cell phones, computers, and dna
International travel is something I recommend to everyone that wants to do it.

And I agree with PF09, who has said several times on various threads that there's no place like Italy.

I could list some specifics, but i don't want to use up all of UTs server space. :biggrin:
 
International travel is something I recommend to everyone that wants to do it.

And I agree with PF09, who has said several times on various threads that there's no place like Italy.

I could list some specifics, but i don't want to use up all of UTs server space. :biggrin:
Been to a good number of places in europe and the far east and eastern australia (NSW & Brisbane). Best (JMO) Italy then Ireland. Wandered in Italy looking for bad wine and bad food. No luck. And Ireland to me is poetry and beauty.

Cheers
 
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