Well, 'History yet to be written' is already becoming a history, being pushed to page 3 and I thought to #bump again. Modji, you can practice your '2000 words resolution 2017' here, posting about futurelogy stuffs while I ll now and then entertain (?), also troll(!) like this how maybe. What say?
This video is 8-bit philosophy - jeez, even baby computers are 64-bit these days. Read the real paper, published in the Philosophical Quarterly (2003) here. A response to critical comments may be found here, published in Analysis, Vol. 71 (2011). The papers are not simple to read, but given a little reflection, 'simpler' than you might imagine, in the sense that they yield to effort. The effort is worthwhile. One reason to put some work into this is the following: like the (much simpler) article on the Fermi Paradox posted earlier (also by Bostrom, based on economist Robin Hanson's initial formulation), it is a useful education on how to think about philosophical / scientific problems given extreme uncertainty and the near-complete absence of evidence. The arguments are Bayesian, so it is useful to look into that school of statistics as well. Most people are schooled in the frequentist approach, at least at the high-school level. Bayesian approaches, although now an active area of research, are not often taught in basic stats courses - they ought to be at least intoduced. The entertainment value alone makes it great fun. Note that when the good reverend invented his approach, he was trying to quantitate belief, in an effort to put probability numbers on the existence of God!
In my opinion, Nick Bostrom ranks as one of the most interesting thinkers alive. I have followed his work ... well, since daycare a decade or two ago - he has always made me go hmmmmmmm. It is irrelevant whether you agree with his arguments or not. His ideas are fantastically provocative. Problems are approached with philosophical and mathematical rigor, to the extent possible. Any exercise in (attempted) refutation will stretch your mental muscles to the max. His arguments are continually refined in response to criticism, so nothing is the last word. An intellectual after my own heart. You can check out his videos on Youtube. NB is One Serious Dude - I am persuaded that he may be an exception to the Everyone Poops rule. The professor probably does not have time for such trivialities. Someday I plan to find out whether he's got a sense of humor. I suspect he may have had those brain-bits ablated to conserve glucose better directed to more useful pursuits. He strikes me as an early prototype for Hari Seldon. But then again, he may be the first of the positronic brains. I would highly recommend this book - dry, but provocative reading for the same reasons outlined above and hence great reading for your high-schoolers (how to think, how to marshal arguments). This is the playbook that Musk and others are using, the scenario that's got 'em all so hot and bothered. More later.
@kaniths and I had a serious argument on the effects of machine learning based automation and its impact on livelihoods around the world. Dear K, it has begun. : ) Chinese factory replaces 90% of human workers with robots. Production rises by 250%, defects drop by 80%
Hm. My question was 'how fast they are taking over' Modji, wait , I got my answer too. Now moving on to automation and its implications on livelihoods, here follows my #wordVomit, read at your own risk. // This is not the first time, Previously there was the news about Adidas (This is the first Adidas shoe made almost entirely by robots - Recode), then here is now a bot barrista already. Manufacturing industry and other a service industry, both reminding us the inevitable coming our way, SOON (I got it!) , the machines taking away the jobs, a concern already been discussed to death in the internet forums and most favorite topic of analysis in top tech magazines these days, yes I'm aware. Yet anytime a headline may read 'xyz has increased productivity by going full automation' or something on similar lines I can't help but wonder how organic are these developments to the (future) society, if it will still be about 'people'. To my understanding, Automation may sure create new exciting jobs in the future, but possibly requires higher skillsets to manage the already super efficient robots, or match at par or there will always be the same machines to substitute us if not. Then there is the issue of wages, again why to pay high anyone if 'robots can always substitute' anyone and anytime, given higher productivity rate and efficiency too? So who is having a win win here? Who you think will have that money to buy the high priced produces coming out from these robotized factories? A class division, the one who can afford and who cannot because either he is jobless already or is at the lower wage level, because clearly a high wage claim is out of question, of course 'robots can always substitute', No? Disparity. Inequality. Imbalance. The century old problems with 'Haves & Have Nots' and how does technology plans to solve this? Manufacturing industry is in turn connected to services, so imagine the magnitude of the problem, when machines take over 90% in every factory in that supply chain order? There could be more 'Trump situation' in the future, only not just limited to America and possibly on a wider, worser scale too, may even see every dystopia ever imagined actually becoming some way a reality. Why Workers Are Losing the War Against Machines A video, that's making rounds in the Internet. Also these words by Obama, seem to make some sense to me. Maybe I'm paranoid? On a lighter note, here are some creative thoughts about 'possible futuristic' jobs, sounds funnnn! 7 New Jobs That Are So ‘2017’
Yep headlines everywhere, record feat for India. Kudos! "All but three of the satellites are from foreign countries, most of them from the United States" 'On a different note', did anyone notice these lines (quoted above from the article) and wondered about the futuristic SpaceX and why still 'most of them' are from United states? I like to know.
The United States has the largest number of satellites in orbit by far. For a robust and growing commercial industry, price is a factor. Besides, they are wondering too!
No....its a matter of time and its not just manufacturing. What is now called high-tech for eg Coding/writing software ..is also getting automated . I have already seen its impact in QA(testing) .Most startups hire a couple of good coders...automate the whole thing and easily do away with what used to be large teams . The skill set required for these kind of jobs are non-trivial. Most IT -services can and will be automated . The economic and social implications of these are anyones guess and unless we seriously sit down and propose a viable livelihood for 90% of the population there will be a lot of pain.
Yes, had the same thoughts. I also hear such private space firms are lobbying with the US govt to limit the US space launches to be within US, in a way restricting other foreign players from the market, like ISRO and I wondered (like always) if these american capitalists are trying to kill business for ISRO, which Modji seemed to disagree. Enlighten me please.
