How Robots Will Steal Your Job
StoneCutter
How Robots Will Steal Your Job By Joanna Glasner
02:00 AM Aug. 05, 2003 PT
Listening to Marshall Brain explain the future as he sees it, it's
relatively easy to suspend disbelief and agree how plausible it is
that over the next 40 years most of our jobs will be displaced by
robots.
After all, it only takes a typical round of errands to reveal how far
we've come already. From automated gas pumps to bank ATMs to
self-service checkout lanes at major retailers, service jobs already
are being replaced by machines on a scale of obvious magnitude.
Fast-forward today's innovations another few decades, and it doesn't
require a great leap of faith to envision how advances in image
processing, microprocessor speed and human-motion simulation could
lead to the automation of most current low-paying jobs.
Factor in the historical speed of technological advancement in the
modern era, epitomized by Moore's Law of semiconductor power
expansion, and it starts to sound like a no-brainer.
At least that's how Brain (yes, that is his real name) sees things
unrolling.
"We aren't realizing it, but it's only going to accelerate and magnify
as we go forward," he said, segueing into a lengthier discussion on
why job loss due to robotic displacement will be one of the key
economic issues facing future generations.
According to Brain's projections, laid out in an essay, "Robotic
Nation," humanoid robots will be widely available by the year 2030,
and able to replace jobs currently filled by people in areas such as
fast-food service, housecleaning and retail. Unless ways are found to
compensate for these lost jobs, Brain estimates that more than half of
Americans could be unemployed by 2055.
Dire, indeed. But Brain, a Raleigh, North Carolina, father of four and
founder of HowStuffWorks, is probably not the kind of guy one would
expect to see sounding the alarm bells over a futuristic robotic
revolution.
As a website publisher and author of about a dozen books of the
how-it-works genre, Brain's traditional strength has been in
explaining the internal workings of things that already exist. After
spending years writing nonfiction, however, Brain sees the switch to
futurism and sci-fi as a natural progression.
"I guess it's a confluence of reading, of finding out how a lot of
different things work and having that all loaded in my head," he said.
Cobbling together bits about how things work provided Brain enough
inspiration to attempt his first novel, which will be released free in
serial form online starting Aug. 15. The story begins on a prophetic
note:
"Depending on how you want to think about it, it was funny or
inevitable or symbolic that the robotic takeover did not start at MIT,
NASA, Microsoft or Ford. It started at a Burger-G restaurant in Cary,
NC on May 17, 2015." The extended plot revolves around a society in
which robots are able to fill most of the jobs that exist in the
economy.
To complement the novel, Brain also is publishing a series of
futuristic essays extrapolating on ideas presented in the story. On a
more capitalistic note, he's also filed for a patent to cover an
automated system for managing humans and machines in the retail and
fast-food businesses.
In the essay series, the first installment begins with a discussion of
a routine trip with his kids to the local McDonald's. While there,
Brain tests out a new electronic food-ordering kiosk and he ponders
how in the future, most fast-food work will be done by machines.
Food-ordering kiosks are just the beginning. Already, McDonald's is
testing an automated burger-cooking process that threatens to make
patty flippers obsolete. By 2015, Brain estimates, about 5 million
jobs in the retail sector will be lost to automation.
But many techies who discussed Brain's essay on the geek site Slashdot
found Brain's projections less than convincing.
One contradiction in the logic noted by a poster was that in order for
humanoid robots to become widely deployed, people have to purchase
them. But if everyone is unemployed, there will be no one to buy the
robots.
Another poster said that although it's common for futuristic
fear-mongering to accompany the introduction of new technologies,
people do manage to find new jobs to replace those that have been
automated.
Brain himself, though, isn't convinced this will happen.
For those who take solace in the fact that robots may at least open up
opportunities in the field of robot repair, for example, he offers a
more troubling alternative vision:
"When a robot needs repair, another robot will bundle it onto a
pallet. A robotic forklift will place the pallet on a truck. The truck
will drive to a repair facility. The facility will repair the robot
with highly automated systems that require no human intervention or
supervision. Human beings will not be repairing robots -- robots
will."
Arthur T. Murray
>
> [...] According to Brain's projections, laid out in an essay,
> "Robotic Nation," humanoid robots will be widely available by
> the year 2030, and able to replace jobs currently filled by
> people in areas such as fast-food service, housecleaning and
> retail. Unless ways are found to compensate for these lost jobs,
> Brain estimates that more than half of Americans could be
http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-nation.htm -- by Marshall Brain.
http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/weblog.html -- AI has been solved.
> [...] Cobbling together bits about how things work provided
> Brain enough inspiration to attempt his first novel, which
> will be released free in serial form online starting Aug. 15.
[...]
Les Cargill
With all due respect, Wired hasn't been readable, relevant nor
interesting since about 1999. It's Slashdot with graphics. Either
of them are to technology as "Weekly World News" reports of
donuts bearing the image of Christ are to religion.
There's nothing wrong with that, other than the sheer eye-glaze
factor.
But with respect to robots, becoming a video game dungeon master
is a much more inexpensive means of dominating large hunks 'o
silicon without bothering to try to implement it on a large scale
in industry.
Ray Kurzweil is an obvious appliance fetishist. His writings
bear this bias. And where are the hover-cars? I was told
there would be hover-cars by now.
--
Les Cargill
Robert J. Kolker
Les Cargill wrote:
> Ray Kurzweil is an obvious appliance fetishist. His writings
> bear this bias. And where are the hover-cars? I was told
> there would be hover-cars by now.
The same place where all the capes and epulettes are. See the costumes
in -Things to Come-, a motion picture based on an H.G.Wells novel.
Raymond Massey looks great in a cape with epulettes on his shoulders.
Bob Kolker
Robert J. Kolker
ch...@example.org wrote:
> and Kurzweil is over-rated anyway. The label of genius is more appropriate
> when applied, to say, Feynman.
Kurzweil is a talented engineer and inventor. He has designed several
all electronic musical instruments, some of them virtually
indistinguishable from their non-electronic counterparts (piano). He has
also designed devices to aid the blind. Steve Wonder has a reading
machine built by Kurzweil.
Bob Kolker
josX
> http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59882,00.html
>
> [...] According to Brain's projections, laid out in an essay,
> "Robotic Nation," humanoid robots will be widely available by
> the year 2030, and able to replace jobs currently filled by
> people in areas such as fast-food service, housecleaning and
> retail. Unless ways are found to compensate for these lost jobs,
> Brain estimates that more than half of Americans could be
Hey ho hey ho
let us move that dirt
let us clean that dirt
hey ho hey ho
this is so much fun !!
We want to be slaves forever !!
Sigh, homo sapiens is. Truly weird.
Here is an idea for the work hungry: somewhere in a useless piece of
desert, make a project to make a road accross from one side to the
other. Then make "the people who want to work" work on the project. In
the night send in drones to destroy the work done during the day.
Some people can be employed at night to fight off some robots.
Some other people can be employed to create the destruction drones. Yet
others can make sure this whole interconnected group gets properly
fed and payed etc (monitor the relevant robotics).
Work! It will be fun! Maybe these people can be put unto some island
as to not disturb the kids though.
;-)
To increase the experience some form of exploitation could be
implemented, with overseeers getting more pay for doing less.
The resulting "mess" keeps it interesting while all fight for
top slot.
I can think of a lot more pleasurable ways to spend time then
to toil for some boss person in some whatever farm. Especially
if we don't have to because machines do the work.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
So here alternative idea: change the system.
regards, fellow weirdo's
--
(read each line, repetition helps!)
Robots don't steal your work, they do it for you.
If you don't want robotics doing any work, go back to the pre-ape
state, because even apes use some simple machinery. "Those twigs
are stealing the work !" Riiight.
lol
truly weird
:)
oh well, the island could be an fun tourist attraction. Good luck
with the toiling there, people certainly have the right to create
such a game if they want to. But please make it voluntary ok ?
Les Cargill
>
> Les Cargill <lcar...@worldnet.att.net> writes:
> >
> > Ray Kurzweil is an obvious appliance fetishist. His writings
> > bear this bias. And where are the hover-cars? I was told
> > there would be hover-cars by now.
> >
>
Not at all. Kurzweil is one of the what, three people? alive
today who understand the invention process.
One of the only devices that ever just totally frightened me
was the original OCR-with-a-vocoder devices he first sold. That
was probably a good ten years ahead of the curve.
> The label of genius is more appropriate
> when applied, to say, Feynman.
>
Hard to say. Feynman was not a per-se inspirational figure, something I
usually associate with genius. He did have quite a cult of
personality as an intellectual, and was worthy of it.
Feynman was as much perspiration as
inspiration - he drilled a largish bag of mathematical tricks into an
artform. If Michelangelo is the template for genuis, Feynman was
heavy on the stonecutter side and light on the Sistine Chapel side.
> --
> regards, chris
--
Les Cargill
Les Cargill
>
> ch...@example.org wrote:
>
> > and Kurzweil is over-rated anyway. The label of genius is more appropriate
> > when applied, to say, Feynman.
>
> Kurzweil is a talented engineer and inventor. He has designed several
> all electronic musical instruments, some of them virtually
> indistinguishable from their non-electronic counterparts (piano).
I assure you - they are quite distinquishable. They are just much
easier to get signals into a PA from than a real piano.
These classes of device are called "ROMplers" - a sampler which
has samples in ROM. They are wonderful, but not the real
thing.
Billy Joel has a "Storytellers" floating around. Joel on a
Kurzweil, a real pianist on a real piano. You can definitely
tell the difference in both dimensions. Still, you see Kurzweil
instruments in lots of different applications.
> He has
> also designed devices to aid the blind. Steve Wonder has a reading
> machine built by Kurzweil.
>
> Bob Kolker
--
Les Cargill
Les Cargill
>
> Les Cargill wrote:
>
> > Ray Kurzweil is an obvious appliance fetishist. His writings
> > bear this bias. And where are the hover-cars? I was told
> > there would be hover-cars by now.
>
> The same place where all the capes and epulettes are.
Soap operas?
> See the costumes
> in -Things to Come-, a motion picture based on an H.G.Wells novel.
> Raymond Massey looks great in a cape with epulettes on his shoulders.
>
...and whatsisname, the guy who's not Gary Cooper in "Beau Geste".
Don Stockbauer
Push the ON-OFF button.
Have a nice day.
A Ralph Edwards production.
- Donsky Oatsky
Brandon J. Van Every
> How you will steal a robot's job:
>
> Push the ON-OFF button.
Of course, even granting the robot has an on-off button that you can push,
you're talking about tampering with someone else's industrial property. So
now there's going to be a security gate and an armed guard to keep you from
that tampering. Similarly for sabotage. Although it would be interesting
if service industry robots were routinely hauled out of Mickey Dee's and
smashed up in the street by gangs. Maybe this would lead to the notion of
"service automats" rather than robots per se. They take instructions and
provide services, but aren't so easily anthropomorphized and thus are never
recognized as "workers" holding "jobs." They would of course eliminate
jobs.
--
Cheers, www.3DProgrammer.com
Brandon Van Every Seattle, WA
20% of the world is real.
80% is gobbledygook we make up inside our own heads.
R. Steve Walz
>
> Don Stockbauer wrote:
> > How you will steal a robot's job:
> >
> > Push the ON-OFF button.
>
> Of course, even granting the robot has an on-off button that you can push,
> you're talking about tampering with someone else's industrial property. So
> now there's going to be a security gate and an armed guard to keep you from
> that tampering. Similarly for sabotage. Although it would be interesting
> if service industry robots were routinely hauled out of Mickey Dee's and
> smashed up in the street by gangs. Maybe this would lead to the notion of
> "service automats" rather than robots per se. They take instructions and
> provide services, but aren't so easily anthropomorphized and thus are never
> recognized as "workers" holding "jobs." They would of course eliminate
> jobs.
Remember: There's nothing wrong with getting rid of work, as long as
you don't get rid of the wages for those who would be doing the work.
Why?
Because if you try they will hang you upside down from a gas station
stanchion and gut you like Mussolini.
Steve
Robert Mockan
StoneCutter wrote:
> http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59882,00.html
>
>
> How Robots Will Steal Your Job By Joanna Glasner
>
> 02:00 AM Aug. 05, 2003 PT
They won't need to "steal" the jobs.
Way past time for people to give them away.
http://www.whywork.org/rethinking/whywork/abolition.html
With "total" automation "free" welfare to allow
everyone on the planet to have an upper middle class USA
standard of living might be feasible.
Anyone who still wanted to have a "job" would be welcome
to work right alongside the machines. (But by then it might
be more suitable to place such demented individuals into
insane asylums).
Sina Tootoonian
morning, drive to work, and find that we've been replaced by an army
of robots. All of these changes will happen gradually, which will make
the case for a 'counter-revolution' much harder to present to the
undecided fraction of the populace. The fast-food workers mentioned in
these postings will not be replaced en-masse, but over a period of
years or even decades. This isn't to say that I am against automation;
in fact, I welcome it. Thousands upon thousands of assembly line
workers have been slowly replaced by industrial robots, which perform
the same jobs better, faster and cheaper. But over the last 50 years,
the US unemployment rate hasn't skyrocketed as naysayers would have us
believe. If the shift towards greater automation is gradual, then the
number of displaced workers is kept minimal and the labor force
self-regulates as workers are redistributed to other sectors. If at
some point in the future our society reaches such a level of
sophistication that robots are repairing robots and human labor has
become obsolete, then the face of the economy will have changed so
much so that any predictions we dare to make now about the eventual
impact on society are meaningless.
Cheers,
Sina Tootoonian
Al Gerharter
translate that into VB.net, and build an application the boss will then find
workable? Good Luck... Al
"Sina Tootoonian" <achilles...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:b72135f.03081...@posting.google.com...
Refik Hadzialic
very funny :)
Best Regards,
Refik Hadzialic
"Al Gerharter" <ager...@paccomm.nospam.net> wrote in message
news:7323575aa17a4f0a...@news.teranews.com...
Hans-Georg Michna
>> http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59882,00.html
>>
>> [...] According to Brain's projections, laid out in an essay,
>> "Robotic Nation," humanoid robots will be widely available by
>> the year 2030, ...
Arthur,
2030 is rather pessimistic, in my view. I think the available
information points more at 2020.
And I write this while watching my robotic lawn mower (a Friendy
Robotics RL500) do its tedious work already in 2003. True, this
one looks more turtloid than humanoid, but I still think that
people overestimate themselves, and in their anthropocentric
arrogance cannot believe how soon they may be obsoleted.
Hans-Georg
http://www.michna.com/transition.htm
--
No mail, please.
Arthur T. Murray
>
> uj...@victoria.tc.ca (Arthur T. Murray) wrote:
>
>>> http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59882,00.html
>>>
>>> [...] According to Brain's projections, laid out in an essay,
>>> "Robotic Nation," humanoid robots will be widely available by
>>> the year 2030, ...
>
> Arthur,
>
> 2030 is rather pessimistic, in my view. I think the available
> information points more at 2020.
2020? Who is able to wait that long? AI has been solved.
The meme of Robot AI Minds is saturating the Web by means of
http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/apl.html -- APL AI Weblog;
http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/lisp.html -- Lisp AI Blog;
and other meme-insertion points across the Web: AI evolves.
Harry Chestwig
>Hans-Georg Michna wrote on Tue, 19 Aug 2003:
>2020? Who is able to wait that long? AI has been solved.
>
>The meme of Robot AI Minds is saturating the Web by means of
>http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/apl.html -- APL AI Weblog;
>http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/lisp.html -- Lisp AI Blog;
>and other meme-insertion points across the Web: AI evolves.
Sure it has. 25 years ago I played chess on a computer
by talking to it. Today, 25 freakin' years later, the
general state of the art isn't much better, outside of
some specialty academia projects. It sure hasn't shown
up anywhere *I* frequent, and microcontrollers running
a gas pump aren't truly robotic, they're just a cheap
replacement for relay logic and the dude with the cash.
There's not a lot of smarts required from a pump, nor
for the dude that can't figure out how to make change.
When it can understand what I _mean_ when I tell it to run
out and grab me a Coke, it'll be useful. Until then, it's
a freakin' toy for the idle few. Yeah, a $1500 lawnmower
is cute, but it's still a toy. Get real. Only Detroit and
a few high-tech manufacturing centers in Japan are running
any significant robotics: Detroit 'cos of the overpaid bumper-
hangers, and Japan 'cos of their love with robot cartoons.
Other than that, it's a dead issue to 99% of manufacturing.
Robots don't go on strike, and they don't charge $45K plus
medical plus retirement for someone that can barely spell,
so they're replacing the (brain)deadwood in Motown. Tough,
the UAW forced themselves out of a job by being greedy.
Based on the progress over the last 25 years, 2030 is WAY
too optimistic. The only people actually USING voice
control are the severely handicapped, and that's not out
of any real choice. I've yet to see any stunning advances
in AI that even come close to the learning ability of a
retarded 3 year old, so I won't worry about losing my job
to that same retarded 3 year old anytime soon.
< exit soapbox, stage left >
e...@ekj.vestdata.no
> Here is an idea for the work hungry: somewhere in a useless piece of
> desert, make a project to make a road accross from one side to the
> other. Then make "the people who want to work" work on the project. In
> the night send in drones to destroy the work done during the day.
Yes. It is weird that whenever a machine is invented that can do the
work previously done by a human, some people will feel threathened and
complain. This is something that goes back all the way to the inventing
of the first weaving-machines.
The problem is that two different issues are mixed up. Namely production
and distribution of wealth.
From a production-standpoint, it's offcourse perfectly reasonable to use
a machine instead of a human if the machine does a better and/or cheaper
job.
The problem arises because the work previously done will be "owned" by
the worker, which gets payed for it. The machine, on the other hand,
will very very likely NOT be owned by the person previously doing the
work. So any profits from the machine will go to someone else.
After the machine is installed, humanity as a whole will be richer than
before. But the wealth will be differently distributed. Quite likely a
bigger part of the wealth will be in the hands of a smaller part of the
population.
If you are a bus-driver, and a bus that can drive itself gets invented,
your work IS threathened. There is a real risk that your standard of
living will SINK as a result of this development, even though the wealth
of humanity as a sum should INCREASE as a result of it. (if the
self-driving bus was not cheaper/better/safer it'd not be used anyway)
I don't think people so much want the work (even though sometimes they
migth even think so themselves). It's more likely that they want the
income.
Sincerely,
Eivind Kjørstad
Hans-Georg Michna
>The meme of Robot AI Minds is saturating the Web by means of
>http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/apl.html -- APL AI Weblog;
>http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/lisp.html -- Lisp AI Blog;
>and other meme-insertion points across the Web: AI evolves.
Arthur,
I don't see any significance in this. Nothing will come of it.
Human-level AI is unlikely to exist before single computer
performance will have been raised to at least human levels, at
least not long before.
Hans-Georg
--
No mail, please.
Ned Flanders
Cheers,
Ned
Arthur T. Murray
> what he thinks he wants, translate that into VB.net,
> and build an application the boss will then find workable?
http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/vb.html "Visual Basic AI Blog"
is an attempt to create intelligent robot AI Minds in VB.Net :-)
>
>
Arthur T. Murray
> performance will have been raised to at least human levels,
> at least not long before.
http://mentifex.virtualentity.com/java.html AI Blog is a start :-)
>
> Hans-Georg
Roedy Green
wrote or quoted :
>> [...] Human-level AI is unlikely to exist before single computer
>> performance will have been raised to at least human levels,
>> at least not long before.
It is very sneaky how AI sneaks up on you. Back in the 70s I wrote a
program called Optow that designed high voltage transmission lines.
The engineers used to come back each day to laugh at its designs it
plotted I had posted on the wall. Each day I polished its algorithms.
It got better and better. One day it was as smart as a human. A week
later it was 10% better (designed lines that met all safety criteria
and were 10% cheaper to build). ALL OF A SUDDEN ( as least from the
engineers' point of view) this thing suddenly flipped from being a
joke to a terrible threat that cost the jobs of 50 Phds and Masters
degree engineers.
The other thing that was spooky was the "style" it had in designing.
You could recognize an engineer's style, and my program had one too.
YET I DID NOT PUT IN ANY CODE FOR A STYLE. It just emerged from all
the trigonometric equations.
It used somewhat more sophisticated math than the engineers used to
check, simply because it was too much effort for the engineers to do
detailed checks by hand. They mostly eyeballed and checked only iffy
sections.
I suggested that the designs it came up with were Deacon's One Horse
Shays. Every constraint was pushed to the limit at every point. There
was no fat in the designs. The safety criteria devised over the years
were based on the fact that humans could not do that, and so perhaps
the safety criteria should be bumped up to compensate.
I suspect the same thing will happen for AI driving. We will have
automated busses and taxis without drivers that will rapidly take
over. In Vancouver we have had driverless subways since 1986.
That will cause a push for high speed lanes for driverless traffic,
which will eventually push human drivers off the freeways altogether.
We are a strange species. We create like mad to put ourselves out of
jobs and surround ourselves with abundance, then sit unemployed in
poverty refusing to eat of the fruits of our creativity. All the
benefits of new technology go to a tiny elite. Surely some of it
should go to the displaced. See http://mindprod.com/work.html
--
Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
Coaching, problem solving, economical contract programming.
See http://mindprod.com/jgloss/jgloss.html for The Java Glossary.
Eric Sosman
>
> On 20 Aug 2003 09:23:47 -0800, uj...@victoria.tc.ca (Arthur T. Murray)
> wrote or quoted :
>
> >> [...] Human-level AI is unlikely to exist before single computer
> >> performance will have been raised to at least human levels,
> >> at least not long before.
>
> It is very sneaky how AI sneaks up on you. Back in the 70s I wrote a
> program called Optow that designed high voltage transmission lines.
> The engineers used to come back each day to laugh at its designs it
> plotted I had posted on the wall. Each day I polished its algorithms.
> It got better and better. One day it was as smart as a human. A week
> later it was 10% better (designed lines that met all safety criteria
> and were 10% cheaper to build). ALL OF A SUDDEN ( as least from the
> engineers' point of view) this thing suddenly flipped from being a
> joke to a terrible threat that cost the jobs of 50 Phds and Masters
> degree engineers.
Just how much of the now-infamous "Erie Loop" was
designed by Roedy's program?
(Sorry; couldn't resist ;-)
Alan Balmer
wrote:
>It used somewhat more sophisticated math than the engineers used to
>check, simply because it was too much effort for the engineers to do
>detailed checks by hand. They mostly eyeballed and checked only iffy
>sections.
A key point. Cooperation between the engineers and the computer can be
even more productive. Years ago, when I worked at Bausch & Lomb (in
electronics, not optical engineering) I was told that many of their
breakthrough products (Cinemascope, stay-in-focus zoom lenses, etc)
were the result of engineers being able to use the computer to develop
designs which would otherwise have taken inordinate amounts of time.
Engineers were suddenly free to explore ideas which would previously
not have been feasible to research.
--
Al Balmer
Balmer Consulting
removebalmerc...@att.net
Ian Woods
news:6jj7kvod5hvh63ovu...@4ax.com:
This is why I'm interested in more and more powerful computing platforms.
It's all very well being able to watch Lara's almost inhumanly larges
breasts rendered in realtime, but it's not exactly useful.
It's often trivial to describe the model for a problem such that it's
something along the lines of:
make something which meets these criteria, as well as is possible.
For most applications this is producing a function which tests how
'good' a given guess is with some optional contraints. The obvious
progression is to shove it into a computer which selects guesses which
'optimise' this function. There are of course piles of other
'optimisation' problems, and algorithms which attempt to solve them,
about selecting good or near optimal solutions for different kinds of
problems.
Such a function is often trivial to produce compared to solving the
problem containing it. The algorithms which solve these problems are
often expensive to compute without a large amount of mathematical
analysis to make it more computable.
One thing that is clear: the faster computers get and the faster the
algorithms, the number of problems which can be explored increases. The
faster, the more variables can be handle, better solutions found or even
(*gasp*) whole new problems which could never be solved well suddenly
become solvable.
It's a shame that most of the computing power in the world is actually
spent on almost useless triviality. We're not short of processing power,
but we're definately short on co-ordinating it effectively!
Ian Woods
Roedy Green
wrote or quoted :
> Just how much of the now-infamous "Erie Loop" was
>designed by Roedy's program?
My job was to make sure the lines did not fall down, or droop too low,
from ice loading or high winds. After I left the company I heard that
the program continued to be used to design most of the lines in
British Columbia and then the went on to use it to design lines in
Brazil as well. McDonnell Douglas bought a copy of the program for
$30,000, so it may have been used in the USA as well.
There was a Hungarian refugee Arpad Molnar who did the programs to
deal with protection faults -- a bit of a black art, figuring out how
to recover instantly from various failures.
I find it highly peculiar there has been so much finger pointing as to
who screwed up over the huge East Coast blackout. Even the technology
of the 70s should have made it clear what happened.
The basic problem is having a huge peak load from the heat wave and
not enough reserve to cover it. In that sense, the entire grid is
culpable.
Nobody seems willing to invest in the logical technology: devices the
electric utilities can automatically cut back in times of peak load.
Customers willing to spread their load or forgo peak load times,
should be rewarded.
Roedy Green
wrote or quoted :
>Engineers were suddenly free to explore ideas which would previously
>not have been feasible to research.
The computer tools of the early 70 revolved around the punch card and
very specific applications. The word processor on the Apple ][ was
one of the first tools I saw that was designed to be a generic
open-ended tool. There was ICES (wire frame structural analysis) but
nothing like the delightful graphical tools of today that invite
exploration.
Python adds to java a way of rapidly pulling together canned bits for
experimentation. We may also need a more visual way, perhaps using a
plumbing metaphor where you plug outputs into inputs, and the "pipes"
are colour coded for compatibility, and automatically try to connect
themselves when there is no ambiguity.
ro...@telus.net
>The problem arises because the work previously done will be "owned" by
>the worker, which gets payed for it.
The idea of "owning" work or jobs (the "stakeholder" notion) is an
economic absurdity.
>The machine, on the other hand,
>will very very likely NOT be owned by the person previously doing the
>work. So any profits from the machine will go to someone else.
As long as people are free to use the available knowledge and
resources, the profits will tend to just cover the interest.
>After the machine is installed, humanity as a whole will be richer than
>before. But the wealth will be differently distributed. Quite likely a
>bigger part of the wealth will be in the hands of a smaller part of the
>population.
Only if they are privileged to collect economic rents.
>I don't think people so much want the work (even though sometimes they
>migth even think so themselves). It's more likely that they want the
>income.
They also want to feel useful, and to feel that others consider them
to be doing something worthwhile.
-- Roy L
Albert Wagner
ro...@telus.net wrote:
<snip>
Roy, I am confused about where you really stand on this. Perhaps if we
carry the idea of automation (robots, et al) to it's logical conclusion
it will become clearer. Imagine a world where robots do ALL work
necessary to support ALL people in, what is today considered, an
extravagant fashion. There are no jobs because robots fill all slots
and can be fashioned to fill any new slot invented. Further, imagine
that this situation just organically arose from and is the natural end
result of the industrial revolution, wherein arose classes of
capitalists and workers. The capitalists own the robots. What do you
do with workers?
how...@brazee.net
On 20-Aug-2003, e...@ekj.vestdata.no wrote:
> Yes. It is weird that whenever a machine is invented that can do the
> work previously done by a human, some people will feel threathened and
> complain. This is something that goes back all the way to the inventing
> of the first weaving-machines.
It's not weird. Nor is it weird when other people can do your job more
cheaply or better, or whenever your job is threatened.
how...@brazee.net
Pay them to play. Give them hobbies and hope that they don't pick virus
writing, vandalism, revolution, and terrorism as their hobbies.
R. Steve Walz
They will invariably note that the rich have more and don't work
either, and they will revolt for equal wealth. Numerous different
exigencies are possible in that scenario.
-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rst...@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public
how...@brazee.net
On 20-Aug-2003, "R. Steve Walz" <rst...@armory.com> wrote:
> > Pay them to play. Give them hobbies and hope that they don't pick
> > virus
> > writing, vandalism, revolution, and terrorism as their hobbies.
> -------------
> They will invariably note that the rich have more and don't work
> either, and they will revolt for equal wealth. Numerous different
> exigencies are possible in that scenario.
Right now the rich work. Call their work play, as it is their hobby.
There are rich people competing in sports, academics, business, politics,
art, etc.
Allow the poor to compete at these - they might have to work harder, but let
them perceive that they have avenues for success.
R. Steve Walz
>
> On 20-Aug-2003, "R. Steve Walz" <rst...@armory.com> wrote:
>
> > > Pay them to play. Give them hobbies and hope that they don't pick
> > > virus
> > > writing, vandalism, revolution, and terrorism as their hobbies.
> > -------------
> > They will invariably note that the rich have more and don't work
> > either, and they will revolt for equal wealth. Numerous different
> > exigencies are possible in that scenario.
>
> Right now the rich work.
No, they don't.
> Call their work play, as it is their hobby.
-----------
They usually just delegate it and spend all day at lunch.
Don't let people fool you just because they are all dressed up
and aren't jumping on the monkeybars.
Someone is working when 1) he can't leave and go to lunch, and
2) has to do things when someone tells him to.
> There are rich people competing in sports,
-----------------
Yeah, and they rape concierges.
> academics, business, politics, art, etc.
-----------------
More lunch breaks.
> Allow the poor to compete at these - they might have to work harder, but let
> them perceive that they have avenues for success.
----------------------------
Garbage, the work that has to be done is the work that people who
produce goods and services on time where they have to.
Nobody else is working, and that work shoulds be divided so everyone
has to do some of it instead of some getting to go to lunch and party
and only PRETEND that they're working.
-Steve
Thomas Weidenfeller
> We may also need a more visual way, perhaps using a
> plumbing metaphor where you plug outputs into inputs, and the "pipes"
> are colour coded for compatibility, and automatically try to connect
> themselves when there is no ambiguity.
Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together. AFAIK they canceled the
product for the same reason many of these products got canceled: They
don't sell. And IMHO they don't sell because
- "Real programmers" don't like them, because they are not "macho"
enough and smell like child's play
- Non-programmers still have to learn basic things like what is a
loop, a condition, branching, structuring your data, geting the
program's logic right. So the prommis of "no programming required"
does not hold. If you are lucky you get some "no typing required"
environment.
/Thomas
Robin G Hewitt
> 2) has to do things when someone tells him to.
If someone offers me lots of money I usually try to do what they want, I
might even skip lunch.
Not much point having all these robots doing all the work if nobody has any
money to spend on the commodities they produce. OTOH, if we built the robot
brain to outlast the robot body there could be a lucrative spare parts
market.
So the real problem is how to disenfranchise the working classes and empower
the 'bots? Then we can get the mass sterilisation programs past the
legislature and instigate an ultimate solution to the plebeian question :o)
best regards
Robin G Hewitt
Tim Tyler
: Roedy Green <ro...@mindprod.com> writes:
:> We may also need a more visual way, perhaps using a
:> plumbing metaphor where you plug outputs into inputs, and the "pipes"
:> are colour coded for compatibility, and automatically try to connect
:> themselves when there is no ambiguity.
: Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
: for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
: programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
: demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together.
BEA got into the news recently with a tool along these lines:
``BEA says developers can now pick up existing J2EE-based business
programs and drop them as a "control" into their new IDE. This allows
Visual Basic-style programming of "composite applications", taking bits
of functionality out of systems such as SAP and PeopleSoft and mixing
them together using the one toolset. In doing so, the company claims it
has moved Java up to the next level, and within easy reach of Lotus
Notes developers.''
- http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/08/18/1061059764265.html
--
__________
|im |yler http://timtyler.org/ t...@tt1.org
Eray Ozkural exa
> Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
> for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
> programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
> demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together. AFAIK they canceled the
> product for the same reason many of these products got canceled: They
> don't sell. And IMHO they don't sell because
There are two reasons why such a thing wouldn't sell
1. Java sucks
2. It's not a visual programming language. Such a language would have
to be designed from ground up for visual syntax and semantics. I've
heard of a graphical LISP variant, but except a few academic project I
suspect there is no such thing.
Hans-Georg Michna
>It is very sneaky how AI sneaks up on you. Back in the 70s I wrote a
>program called Optow that designed high voltage transmission lines. ...
Roedy,
interesting, thanks!
Robert N. Newshutz
be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
of self determination?
If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
Joona I Palaste
on comp.lang.java.programmer:
> nob...@eed.ericsson.invalid (Thomas Weidenfeller) wrote in message news:<bi1pcv$kbe$1...@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>...
>> Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
>> for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
>> programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
>> demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together. AFAIK they canceled the
>> product for the same reason many of these products got canceled: They
>> don't sell. And IMHO they don't sell because
> There are two reasons why such a thing wouldn't sell
> 1. Java sucks
Nice to hear such a well-presented argument with lots of insight.
Far be it from you to tell us WHY Java sucks?
--
/-- Joona Palaste (pal...@cc.helsinki.fi) ---------------------------\
| Kingpriest of "The Flying Lemon Tree" G++ FR FW+ M- #108 D+ ADA N+++|
| http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste W++ B OP+ |
\----------------------------------------- Finland rules! ------------/
"When a man talks dirty to a woman, that's sexual harassment. When a woman talks
dirty to a man, that's 14.99 per minute + local telephone charges!"
- Ruben Stiller
Evgenij Barsukov
There is very succsesful visual language based on dragging, dropping and pluging together graphical
elements representing different functions - it is LabView made by National Instruments.
It is widely used in research labs to set-up computer controlled experiments - very
comfortable to debug as the program flow is also visualized. Many companies creating
computer controlled instruments first use LabView to perfect the algorithm, and
only then move program to other language for efficiency.
Regards,
Evgenij
--
__________________________________________________
*science&fiction*free programs*fine art*phylosophy:
http://sudy_zhenja.tripod.com
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Airy R Bean
training exercises, the program charts become rapidly
unreadable.
Evgenij Barsukov <e-barsoukov...@ti.com> wrote in message
news:3F44CF3A...@ti.com...
jonah thomas
> Albert Wagner wrote:
>> Imagine a world where robots do ALL work
>> necessary to support ALL people in, what is today considered, an
>> extravagant fashion. There are no jobs because robots fill all slots
>> and can be fashioned to fill any new slot invented. Further, imagine
>> that this situation just organically arose from and is the natural end
>> result of the industrial revolution, wherein arose classes of
>> capitalists and workers. The capitalists own the robots. What do you
>> do with workers?
> If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
> be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
> of self determination?
That would be a social solution to a technologically-created problem.
If robots are count as free citizens then who will pay the cost to
create them? When you can't enslave them long enough to make up your
expenses then mostly no one will build robots and there will be jobs for
humans.
Except -- robots can be *drafted*. And they don't get to vote until
they're 18. So we'd probably have automated robot-factories ready to
create mechanical armies just before each war. And afterward the
survivors would be looking for jobs.
> If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
For that matter, if there are jobs that foreigners can't do cheap then
there are jobs. President of the USA is such a job. It cannot be done
by a foreigner unless we change the Constitution.
Alan Balmer
wrote:
>Eray Ozkural exa <er...@bilkent.edu.tr> scribbled the following
>on comp.lang.java.programmer:
>> nob...@eed.ericsson.invalid (Thomas Weidenfeller) wrote in message news:<bi1pcv$kbe$1...@newstree.wise.edt.ericsson.se>...
>>> Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
>>> for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
>>> programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
>>> demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together. AFAIK they canceled the
>>> product for the same reason many of these products got canceled: They
>>> don't sell. And IMHO they don't sell because
>
>> There are two reasons why such a thing wouldn't sell
>
>> 1. Java sucks
>
>Nice to hear such a well-presented argument with lots of insight.
>Far be it from you to tell us WHY Java sucks?
It's not good for Microsoft. What's good for Microsoft is good for the
world. Just ask them.
Gerry Quinn
>Thomas Weidenfeller wrote:
>>
>> Roedy Green <ro...@mindprod.com> writes:
>> > We may also need a more visual way, perhaps using a
>> > plumbing metaphor where you plug outputs into inputs, and the "pipes"
>> > are colour coded for compatibility, and automatically try to connect
>> > themselves when there is no ambiguity.
>>
>> Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
>> for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
>> programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
>> demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together. AFAIK they canceled the
>> product for the same reason many of these products got canceled: They
>> don't sell. And IMHO they don't sell because
As I posted on another newsgroup recently:
My theory is that there are two main modes of intellect, a visual
'gestalt' mode that deals with two-dimensional images and the
identification of structures in a large mass of data; and an analytical
mode that works on time-varying signals, and deals with logical and
predictive thought. The first can be associated with the sense of
sight, the second with hearing. Clearly programming, chess and music
require particular strength in the analytic mode. Someone strong in the
analytic sphere might - or might not - be strong in the gestalt sphere.
(Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to create
programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided and doomed to
failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of the brain.)
- Gerry Quinn
C. P. Weidling
> Robert N. Newshutz wrote:
> > Albert Wagner wrote:
>
> >> Imagine a world where robots do ALL work
> >> necessary to support ALL people in, what is today considered, an
> >> extravagant fashion. There are no jobs because robots fill all slots
> >> and can be fashioned to fill any new slot invented. Further, imagine
> >> that this situation just organically arose from and is the natural end
> >> result of the industrial revolution, wherein arose classes of
> >> capitalists and workers. The capitalists own the robots. What do you
> >> do with workers?
>
> > If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they
> > not be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including
> > the right of self determination?
>
> That would be a social solution to a technologically-created
> problem. If robots are count as free citizens then who will pay the
> cost to create them? When you can't enslave them long enough to make
> up your expenses then mostly no one will build robots and there will
> be jobs for humans.
>
...<snip>...
Let's not anthopomorphize robots too much. Personally, I think the time
will come when a human like artificial intelligence _could_ be created,
all the way down to our most deep seated, primitive instincts. That
doesn't mean it _will_ be done, at least not on a large scale.
If intelligence can be artificially created that is as great as the human
kind, then why not greater? And why not apply this superior intelligence
to developing ever newer and improved intelligences in a feedback loop?
At this point prognostication becomes very uncertain I would say. I also
find it hard to believe that the technology that can produce these artificial
wonders won't be applied to humans as well, enhancing them as cyborgs or
perhaps through direct, genetic manipulation.
It's all very science fictiony. To make this post at least somewhat
in the realm of sci.econ, I would say that technoligical progress
creates a dislocation. Older workers in an industry that is
obsoleted, and older traditions where sons tended to follow fathers in
a given trade, experience a severe dislocation when their jobs are
obsoleted and they can't adapt. But so far, new jobs, jobs that are
better paying or allow for more leisure time, or are physically safer,
have come along to improve the overall situation. I don't know of any
statistics that track this, but there is presumably a certain
percentage of the population that is unemployable, or only partially
employable, simply because there are not enough jobs around that they
are able to do, even with training, and societies have mechanisms,
such as welfare, to deal with them, also with older workers who have
been dislocated by changes in technology. The more productive society
presumably has more resources for welfare as well. So, is the trend
to have more and more unemployable people, and a greater allowance for
welfare for these people? Besides physically caring for the
unemployable, there is the cost to the human spirit in feeling
useless.
But there's another trend, one that Grinch in particular has pointed
out many times. As societies become wealthier, they have fewer
children. So, as automation or whatever takes over work, the
population ages and shrinks. That effect should also be thrown into
the equation.
Programmer Dude
> Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
> for some time for Java and other languages.
> [...]
> And IMHO they don't sell because
>
> - "Real programmers" don't like them, because they are not "macho"
> enough and smell like child's play
I wonder if it doesn't have more to do with "Real Programmers"
finding them too limiting and constrained. My take, and I'd like
to believe I'm a "Real Programmer", is that they're really, really
fun and cool...but that I can do what I need to do better using the
old fashioned way.
Similar to the command line verses GUI thing in a nearby thread.
GUI *is* easier to use, but is also limiting. You can only do
what the GUI provides for. The command line opens a much larger
world of possibilities to you.
> - Non-programmers still have to learn basic things like what is a
> loop, a condition, branching, structuring your data, geting the
> program's logic right. So the prommis of "no programming required"
> does not hold. If you are lucky you get some "no typing required"
> environment.
I agree. Programming is complex.
--
|_ CJSonnack <Ch...@Sonnack.com> _____________| How's my programming? |
|_ http://www.Sonnack.com/ ___________________| Call: 1-800-DEV-NULL |
|_____________________________________________|_______________________|
Karl M Syring
>
> But there's another trend, one that Grinch in particular has pointed
> out many times. As societies become wealthier, they have fewer
> children. So, as automation or whatever takes over work, the
> population ages and shrinks. That effect should also be thrown into
> the equation.
Well, possibly will will see the Lem solution to the problem, i.e.
the consumers are replaced by androids, because they are simpler to
program.
Karl M. Syring
ro...@telus.net
>On 20-Aug-2003, "R. Steve Walz" <rst...@armory.com> wrote:
>
>> > Pay them to play. Give them hobbies and hope that they don't pick
>> > virus
>> > writing, vandalism, revolution, and terrorism as their hobbies.
>> -------------
>> They will invariably note that the rich have more and don't work
>> either, and they will revolt for equal wealth. Numerous different
>> exigencies are possible in that scenario.
>
>Right now the rich work.
Some do.
>Call their work play, as it is their hobby.
The defining characteristic of work is that it is productive.
>There are rich people competing in sports, academics, business, politics,
>art, etc.
But most rich people do not bother to pursue such hobbies at a level
that makes them productive.
-- Roy L
ro...@telus.net
wrote:
>On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 21:10:42 GMT
>ro...@telus.net wrote:
><snip>
>Roy, I am confused about where you really stand on this.
That is probably because I stand on the side of freedom, justice and
truth, and you have never seen anyone do that before.
>Perhaps if we
>carry the idea of automation (robots, et al) to it's logical conclusion
>it will become clearer. Imagine a world where robots do ALL work
>necessary to support ALL people in, what is today considered, an
>extravagant fashion. There are no jobs because robots fill all slots
>and can be fashioned to fill any new slot invented.
Then the robots would have to be much smarter than the average person.
Maybe even smarter than the smartest person.
>Further, imagine
>that this situation just organically arose from and is the natural end
>result of the industrial revolution, wherein arose classes of
>capitalists and workers. The capitalists own the robots.
?? Nope. See above. The robots would be way too smart to allow any
nonsense like that.
>What do you
>do with workers?
The problem with this scenario is that it lies on the other side of
the "technological singularity." I.e., we cannot know enough about
conditions there to say anything meaningful about it. But it doesn't
seem unlikely that everyone would just live the way the idle rich do
now. I strongly suspect that like today's idle rich, people in such a
society would find ways to compete for status that did not involve
productive effort.
-- Roy L
Eray Ozkural exa
>
> > 1. Java sucks
>
> Nice to hear such a well-presented argument with lots of insight.
> Far be it from you to tell us WHY Java sucks?
Because it's a dumbed down version of the object oriented derivative
of a horribly designed imperative PL known as C? I wouldn't really
comment on that on a Java group. LOL. Suffice it to say that I
wouldn't use that language for any amount of serious CS research
(parallel, AI, etc.)
Thanks,
__
Eray Ozkural
josX
Robots are as much alive (human) as statues of fantasy animals are Gods.
Robots are way less alive then plants (who have the capability to continue
their own shape despite the law of entropy (iirc)).
A robot is exactly the same thing as the space-shuttle, a car or a
washing machine. A robot is just a machine conducting activities which
appear human-like (mammal like).
To the extend robots are like humans it is more the other way around:
our bodies are like machines (our bones/muscles/electrical systems).
However we embrace the plant- and animal- stages (retaining shape
and capable of feeling pain/pleasure), robots don't. If robots have
feelings/consciousness, then the space-shuttle has too. However, people
never talk about the rights of the space shuttle, nor of any car or
explosives (which are blown to parts).
Therefore the logical conclusion is: there is no magical leap of
consciousness within robots, rather it is the fantasy of the humans
equal to the fantasy that Gods live in wooden carvings, that projects
life in things that LOOK like they are alive. This isn't really a
human flaw, but probably a very basic instinct. Fish mistake a metallic
object for a living prey, humans mistake a toaster in the shape of a
doll for a living entity.
Theoretically this could be a problem for the future: because just
as the instinct has been misused in the past with carvings (see all
religions and their collective damage (wars)), if people start believing
that robots have consciousness etc, the whole cycle of object worship
might start again using some humanoid-formed toasters that are controlled
and stage their movements for an awe-struck (but technically not too
knowledgeable) crowd.
As someone who has done some programming, i can tell you this: a good
computer is as dead as possible. When it is `alive' (unpredictable),
it is broken or buggy. Just like a car, machinery is either performing
its job or its not (and when it is acting unpredictably, this is because
of physical flaws, not because of a mysterious consciousness taking over
the machine).
There is one way to perhaps create some rudimentary liveliness in
machines: use real living material, cells etc. If a machine cult ever
goes up, I'd recommend its leaders to claim "we used a live brain for
our droid". However it wouldn't be the machine that was alive, just
the biological material. Without biological material a robot isn't
alive, it just *seems* to be to our basic instincts (because it acts
just as a living creature would, but it is just a mechanical copy of
those movements, it isn't *actually* alive).
AI is just a complex machine, too complex to predict. Because you
can't predict it because its complexity, yet it behaves as a living
creature it *seems* as if it has a conscience. But it hasn't, it just
has too many parts (computer code) to be absorbable by the human brain.
The difference from toasters to robots is the line where the human
brain can no longer contain the rules the machine is following. But
that doesn't mean it is no longer a machine, it is still a machine.
If it were possible to fully understand the droid even though it
could be immensely complex, you should be able to predict its every
move in advance and you would know it was just a toaster.
Being a machine, where would the "rights" be applied to anyway.
If you take out a screw, what are the rights of the screw ? If
you take out a part of the software, does it deserve rights ? Etc etc.
Machines consist of parts, there is no `magical part'. With living
creatures (animals/humans), the magical part is the part which
continues to be alive after part removal, if no part remains alive
the consciousness is gone and all parts cannot be considered human
anymore (the magical configuration has gone, and that can happen
quickly). With robots you can continually strip small pieces out,
you could slowly rebuilt the whole humanoid-drone into a tv-set, and
at no time would the magical configuration be gone (if you do it
carefully, and start up the power after each part-change/removal
to check if it is still `conscious').
So I'd say, there really is a difference between humans and toasters-
in-the-shape-of-humans-or-animals.
So a droid would never be a slave (unless fitted with biological
material), it would always be a tool (like a car, a stone axe, or
a super-computer). Which means we could have the actions of slaves
without the abuse of consciousness that using human slaves entails.
Hence we could all live like Kings without any moral problems.
To solve the wealth-distribution `problem' would be just a matter of
law: for instance if there is non-yet-automated work-amount N, and humans
M, then each human can be given workload N/M, for which he/she could
be given credit to the value Total-wealth-in-existence/humans, with
which to cash-in on the automated parts of society's production.
How to do all that evenly isn't a technical problem (today's PC can
handle the problem more then easily), just a social problem (sometimes
some people think they deserve more then others).
PS
I'm all for the idea that matter has some form of rudimentary
consciousness (how else could we be conscious if matter didn't have
some consciousness), but what it is about a cell that brings out this
consciousness is still a mystery. We haven't yet been able to create
one artificial living cell, so we aren't able to create artificial
life, no matter how much it might look like life one day (projecting
from todays technology). None of our technology brings out consciousness
from matter like plant/animal-life does. A human-like robot is nothing
but a more complex toaster in the form of a statue, there is nothing
more to it. Sorry. Not yet anyway, the day we can bring to life an
artificial cell may be millions of years in the future, perhaps even
billions (no idea). The drones as they are envisioned do not employ
such a far-out concept, therefore the drones as envisioned aren't alive,
and do not deserve more rights then a stick of dynamite.
BTW, if dogs deserve rights X, and humans rights Y, does that mean
that a robot in the form of a dog should get rights X (and be regarded
as having dog-like consciousness), and robots in the form of a human
rights Y (and be regarded as having consciousness like a human), and
a robot in the form of a car be given zero rights (and zero consciousness),
while they may all be very similar technically ? If they are all
technically the same (same parts, just different interfaces), to be
fair you should either give all machines human-like rights, or no
right at all. And where is going to be the line, if a knife is fitted
with a high speed processor and a talk-unit that appears human-like
(intelligent), it should have first amendment rights ? And if the
`mouth' is broken, does it deserve hospitalization ?
Could the news in the future read "knife neglected for 5 years, owner
arrested on charges of neglect of a juvenile (knife was 3 years old)"
"White-bread/baquette toaster runs for president, up 5% in polls".
"Road crash, 3 victims: one 55 year old human, one volko car,
one road-block. All three have been put to rest in the North-east
cemetery, 83 volko's showed up to bury their comrade (took time off
from owners under Nth amendment rights, despite protests from several
owners who called the volko factory to no avail)." "15 computer
programmers doubting consciousness of machines arrested on charges
of discrimination, they face jail-time of up to 5 years. A crowd of
bikes and - surprisingly - many male jackets showed up to demand a
longer sentence (the presiding judge is a retired washing machine with
a 3PxaC unit). A large delegation of calculators showed up as well,
many with low battery power (a sign of mourning in their community)."
Life isn't so simple that we will be creating it any time soon. Machines
that look like macro-life, yes (adding movement to statues/dolls, that's
all). If we were shaped like cars, we might feel cars were alive instead.
A living machine is an illusion, carefully created too ofcourse. A complex
talking doll, a PC in a barby/ken wrappings.
Sorry. Maybe in the far future we could make articifial life for real,
but not with current tech (only a succesfull illusion of life at best).
--
(Sorry for the length.)
Programmer Dude
> My theory is that there are two main modes of intellect, a visual
> 'gestalt' mode that deals with two-dimensional images and the
> identification of structures in a large mass of data; and an
> analytical mode that works on time-varying signals, and deals with
> logical and predictive thought.
Isn't that similar to the two-hemisphere theory of the brain?
The artistic side and the analytical side?
> (Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to
> create programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided
> and doomed to failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of
> the brain.)
THAT is a very interesting point of view! I think you might be
on to something, there!!
Roedy Green
<e-barsoukov...@ti.com> wrote or quoted :
>There is very succsesful visual language based on dragging, dropping and pluging together graphical
>elements representing different functions - it is LabView made by National Instruments.
I used one back in the 80s devised by Gould Modicon for process
control. You did everything with a colour touch screen.
It booted from floppy, thumping out a Hiawatha beat, taking forever.
--
Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
Coaching, problem solving, economical contract programming.
See http://mindprod.com/jgloss/jgloss.html for The Java Glossary.
Roedy Green
or quoted :
>(Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to create
>programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided and doomed to
>failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of the brain.)
The other problem is they are created by analytical types who present
the programs three symbols at a time on screen. The whole point of
visual thinking is to take in the big picture at a single sweep and to
see the problem as a whole. You need a GIANT screen to do this
properly, perhaps LCD "wallpaper" covering every surface of your desk
and partitions.
To make do with small screens, you have to have a topological approach
where you stretch the surface to see more detail rather than panning
over it.
Airy R Bean
ideas being expressed within a program; at least
for imperative languages; I cannot speak of
functional languages having no experience
therein.
Eray Ozkural exa <er...@bilkent.edu.tr> wrote in message
news:fa69ae35.03082...@posting.google.com...
> Joona I Palaste <pal...@cc.helsinki.fi> wrote in message
news:<bi2eav$l24$1...@oravannahka.helsinki.fi>...
> > Eray Ozkural exa <er...@bilkent.edu.tr> scribbled the following
> > on comp.lang.java.programmer:
> > > 1. Java sucks
> > Nice to hear such a well-presented argument with lots of insight.
> > Far be it from you to tell us WHY Java sucks?
> ..... Suffice it to say that I
D. Jay Newman
> how...@brazee.net wrote:
>
>>On 20-Aug-2003, "R. Steve Walz" <rst...@armory.com> wrote:
>>Right now the rich work.
>
> -----------
> No, they don't.
Strange. Most of the rich people I know work. In fact they work
much harder than I do. That's how they got rich in the first
place.
>>Call their work play, as it is their hobby.
>
> -----------
> They usually just delegate it and spend all day at lunch.
> Don't let people fool you just because they are all dressed up
> and aren't jumping on the monkeybars.
Isn't this a bit of a stereotype? While there are probably
people like this, there are just as many middle class people
who spend all day at lunch without dressing up. These are called
"coworkers". :)
> Someone is working when 1) he can't leave and go to lunch, and
> 2) has to do things when someone tells him to.
Strange. I work fairly hard and I still go to lunch. Yes, I do
have a boss that gives me projects. When I worked for myself I
had to do what my customers wanted.
>>There are rich people competing in sports,
>
> -----------------
> Yeah, and they rape concierges.
I'm sure that some of them do. However, I'm willing to believe
that most of the people involved in sports are fairly decent
people.
And if you don't think that professional sports is hard work,
I suggest that you attempt it someday. Also check out how few
*really* rich people are in pro-sports and how many of them
become medically unfit by the time they are 40 (if not earlier).
Actors also work hard. Yes, there are some bad apples there
too, but most of them are decent people.
>>academics, business, politics, art, etc.
>
> -----------------
> More lunch breaks.
What do you consider work? While I might agree with you about
many politician, I'm curious about what you feel is hard
work.
>>Allow the poor to compete at these - they might have to work harder, but let
>>them perceive that they have avenues for success.
>
> ----------------------------
> Garbage, the work that has to be done is the work that people who
> produce goods and services on time where they have to.
That is one type of work. On the other hand, without sales people
many goods would sit in warehouses and man service people would be
out of jobs.
> Nobody else is working, and that work shoulds be divided so everyone
> has to do some of it instead of some getting to go to lunch and party
> and only PRETEND that they're working.
I think that you have some issues with somebody.
I tend to divide up all jobs into production, sales, and facilitation.
For example, since I'm (in my day job) both a programmer and a project
leader, I am both a producer and a facilitator.
Middle management is facilitation because they exist to make the
producers more efficient. Directors tend to be both sales and
facilitation (becuase they have to convince the people above them
that their unit is useful and also must facilitate the people
under them). Clerical support is mainly facilitation.
This is my theory only, but it is one I use to judge new jobs.
> -Steve
--
D. Jay Newman
D. Jay Newman
> If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
> be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
> of self determination?
However, given the current state of technology I suspect that robots
that have "jobs" will be rather "narrow-minded" and designed
specifically for a single job.
A robot designed to handle convinience-store sales would not be
the same robot that stocks the store.
Someday we will create robots/computers that are smarter than
we are. However, I don't see this happening anytime real soon.
--
D. Jay Newman
rkm
> My theory is that there are two main modes of intellect, a visual
> 'gestalt' mode that deals with two-dimensional images and the
> identification of structures in a large mass of data; and an analytical
> mode that works on time-varying signals, and deals with logical and
> predictive thought.
> (Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to create
> programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided and doomed to
> failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of the brain.)
I think you are overlooking the capacity of the visual
system to narrow the focus to just small portions of a
diagram, scanning from one thing to the next, simulating
serial flow between ideas, and possibly emulating the
analytical model. But I'm no cognitive scientist.
rkm
> On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 16:09:36 GMT, ger...@indigo.ie (Gerry Quinn) wrote
> or quoted :
>
>
>>(Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to create
>>programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided and doomed to
>>failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of the brain.)
>
>
> The other problem is they are created by analytical types who present
> the programs three symbols at a time on screen. The whole point of
> visual thinking is to take in the big picture at a single sweep and to
> see the problem as a whole. You need a GIANT screen to do this
> properly, perhaps LCD "wallpaper" covering every surface of your desk
> and partitions.
>
I had a large database schema I had to analyze once, so I
printed all the diagrams out on 8x11 paper and taped them
all together to form a picnic table sized diagram. I don't
recall that having the big picture helped me with the
analysis, other than forming the thought of what a mess this
thing was. Do you think it was because they didn't draw it
out on a picnic table sized piece of paper in the first
place? Anyway, it did save me a lot of thumbing back and
forth trying to find the connecting page. :-)
Roedy Green
quoted :
>I had a large database schema I had to analyze once, so I
>printed all the diagrams out on 8x11 paper and taped them
>all together to form a picnic table sized diagram.
One of the very first programs I ever wrote was to print out conflict
matrices in high school scheduling. They were too big to fit on a page
,so had to be printed out in pieces then taped together.
PostScript has generic ability to print out large pictures in tiles.
In my own computer language Abundance, I arranged reports so you could
print or reprint any range of pages in a report. It would precalculate
how long the report would be, so that each page was labeled page 3 of
20.
It will be interesting to see what effect cheap giant flat screens
have on programming practice. Spaghetti gets more manageable.
Albert Wagner
ro...@telus.net wrote:
> On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 19:43:29 -0500, Albert Wagner <alwa...@tcac.net>
> >Roy, I am confused about where you really stand on this.
>
> That is probably because I stand on the side of freedom, justice and
> truth,
and Mom, and apple pie and the American Way
> and you have never seen anyone do that before.
Actually, I have never known anyone that didn't claim the same thing.
The devil's in the details.
At any rate, it was inappropriate. My question was serious. I like
much of what you say (at least after I have picked out the rote dogma),
and would really like to know.
My hypothetical scenario was probably not well chosen, in that everyone
used it as simply a takeoff for a science fiction story. What I am
curious about is what happens when technological/ecomomic changes happen
so fast that there is no time for workers to adapt. What, if any,
responsibility does society have for those dislocated. It is simply
wrong to say that things will work out over time. That timespan may be
just long enough to kill a lot of people and bring down the system.
Les Cargill
Since we do not have a consistent definition for "smart", I fail
to see how we can even guess about it. I don't want any machines
around smarter than I am, at least none without off switches.
--
Les Cargill
Steve Hix
> On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 02:56:45 GMT, how...@brazee.net wrote:
>
> >On 20-Aug-2003, "R. Steve Walz" <rst...@armory.com> wrote:
> >
> >> > Pay them to play. Give them hobbies and hope that they don't pick
> >> > virus
> >> > writing, vandalism, revolution, and terrorism as their hobbies.
> >> -------------
> >> They will invariably note that the rich have more and don't work
> >> either, and they will revolt for equal wealth. Numerous different
> >> exigencies are possible in that scenario.
> >
> >Right now the rich work.
>
> Some do.
>
> >Call their work play, as it is their hobby.
>
> The defining characteristic of work is that it is productive.
I do handweaving as a hobby, for fun. It is not work, it is
a productive activity.
Your definition appears to be over simplified a bit.
R. Steve Walz
>
> If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
> be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
> of self determination?
Nope. Not if we decide to enslave them.
> If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
-----------------
Nope. Not if we can't either.
Steve
R. Steve Walz
>
> "Robert N. Newshutz" <news...@nospam.com> wrote:
> >Albert Wagner wrote:
> >> On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 21:10:42 GMT
> >> ro...@telus.net wrote:
> >> <snip>
> >> Roy, I am confused about where you really stand on this. Perhaps if we
> >> carry the idea of automation (robots, et al) to it's logical conclusion
> >> it will become clearer. Imagine a world where robots do ALL work
> >> necessary to support ALL people in, what is today considered, an
> >> extravagant fashion. There are no jobs because robots fill all slots
> >> and can be fashioned to fill any new slot invented. Further, imagine
> >> that this situation just organically arose from and is the natural end
> >> result of the industrial revolution, wherein arose classes of
> >> capitalists and workers. The capitalists own the robots. What do you
> >> do with workers?
> >
> >If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
> >be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
> >of self determination?
> >
> >If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
>
> Robots are as much alive (human) as statues of fantasy animals are Gods.
> Robots are way less alive then plants (who have the capability to continue
their own shape despite the law of entropy (iirc)).
Plants have no awareness. You're confusing life with Life.
> A robot is exactly the same thing as the space-shuttle, a car or a
> washing machine. A robot is just a machine conducting activities which
> appear human-like (mammal like).
---------------
You know nothing of controls theory.
> To the extend robots are like humans it is more the other way around:
> our bodies are like machines (our bones/muscles/electrical systems).
>
> However we embrace the plant- and animal- stages (retaining shape
> and capable of feeling pain/pleasure), robots don't. If robots have
> feelings/consciousness, then the space-shuttle has too. However, people
> never talk about the rights of the space shuttle, nor of any car or
> explosives (which are blown to parts).
>
> Therefore the logical conclusion is: there is no magical leap of
> consciousness within robots, rather it is the fantasy of the humans
> equal to the fantasy that Gods live in wooden carvings,
-------------
Nobody means NOW, you blithering idiot!
that projects
> life in things that LOOK like they are alive. This isn't really a
> human flaw, but probably a very basic instinct. Fish mistake a metallic
> object for a living prey, humans mistake a toaster in the shape of a
> doll for a living entity.
---------------
You're irrational and don't understand deeper concepts.
You're an idiot.
Steve
jonah thomas
> ro...@telus.net wrote:
>>The defining characteristic of work is that it is productive.
> I do handweaving as a hobby, for fun. It is not work, it is
> a productive activity.
So do I, so does everybody on sci.econ, but I wouldn't call it productive.
Oh wait, you didn't say handwaving.
jonah thomas
> Robert N. Newshutz wrote:
>>If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
>>be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
>>of self determination?
> Nope. Not if we decide to enslave them.
Good point.
>>If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
> Nope. Not if we can't either.
Wait, human beings are much better at pretending.
e...@ekj.vestdata.no
> However, given the current state of technology I suspect that robots
> that have "jobs" will be rather "narrow-minded" and designed
> specifically for a single job.
>
> A robot designed to handle convinience-store sales would not be the
> same robot that stocks the store.
Indeed. I shopped in a supermarket where the cashier was a robot just
yesterday.
The robot looks like one of those x-ray machines at the airport. You put
your goods on a beltway, it goes trough the machine which either
identifies it and adds it to your bill (by reading the barcode), or, if
it should fail, beeps and gives you the item back to try again with a
different orientation.
There is a display which shows a list of all you've put trough, and when
you are happy with it, you pay, either with credit or debit-card, or by
inserting cash. Robot prints a receipt and off you go.
It would be ridiculous to claim the machine is intelligent. And even
more so to claim that it could do any job a human can do.
Nevertheless it can do *this* *single* job, and it did it quicker and
better than most humans. Speed was mainly limited to the speed with
which I could load goods on the conveyor-belt and do the nessecary
pin-code entry for my debit-card.
Similarily, in the last month I have interacted with single-use machines
that did the following jobs earlier typically done by humans:
* Sell me cinema-tickets. (including asking me where I'd like to sit and
offering to call me up and remind me 1 hour before the movie starts if
I'm buying a ticket in advance.)
* Book an airline-fligth.
* Check in my luggage, look at my ticket and issue a boarding-pass for
same fligth.
* Sell me tickets to the bus. Check that I have a valid ticket for the
busride.
It'll all be gradual, robots or machines can do more and more jobs,
which overall is a good thing because frankly, the places where robots
shine the most are exactly the jobs that humans are poorest at, which
also tends to be jobs that few humans enjoy doing.
Sincerely,
Eivind Kjørstad
Don Stockbauer
> Don Stockbauer wrote:
> > How you will steal a robot's job:
> >
> > Push the ON-OFF button.
>
> Of course, even granting the robot has an on-off button that you can push,
> you're talking about tampering with someone else's industrial property. So
> now there's going to be a security gate and an armed guard to keep you from
> that tampering. Similarly for sabotage. Although it would be interesting
> if service industry robots were routinely hauled out of Mickey Dee's and
> smashed up in the street by gangs. Maybe this would lead to the notion of
> "service automats" rather than robots per se. They take instructions and
> provide services, but aren't so easily anthropomorphized and thus are never
> recognized as "workers" holding "jobs." They would of course eliminate
> jobs.
Would be pretty nice to have "ON-OFF" buttons on every robot (or
whatever equivalent one wishes). HAL is a fanciful logical extreme of
not having one. Human are such control freaks it's a little hard to
imagine that we'd create machines we can't control. Unless one is the
manufacturer of certain electronics like these TV's that have all
control on the remote, thus if one loses it and can't get it replaced
you have to toss the entire unit! So it's a matter of intelligence.
Cybernetics is the science of communication and control. It
emphasizes that complex entities such as humans evolve and develop the
ultimate in free will. Good decisions must be made or we go extinct.
Actually, the forming Global Brain renders most of these discussions
useless, for it introduces a whole new paradigm, that of cooperation
between people and people and people and machines and machines and
machines as a self-organized critter naturally forming.
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/SUPORGLI.html . But I've harped on that
enough for 1,000 lifetimes.
Hans-Georg Michna
>Would be pretty nice to have "ON-OFF" buttons on every robot (or
>whatever equivalent one wishes).
Don,
computers have on-off switches, but I remember this cleaning
lady who pulled the plug on a computer mistakenly (to plug in
her vacuum cleaner). She was reprimanded so heavily that she'll
probably never switch off a computer again.
If I go around switching off computers at work, I'll get fired
and possibly land in a psychological institution.
In other words, it's difficult to switch off computers even
today, and it will get more difficult in the future. Not to
mention computers becoming more intelligent and perhaps one day
equipped with some self-preservation intinct ...
Hans-Georg
--
No mail, please.
Gerry Quinn
>Gerry Quinn wrote:
>
>> My theory is that there are two main modes of intellect, a visual
>> 'gestalt' mode that deals with two-dimensional images and the
>> identification of structures in a large mass of data; and an
>> analytical mode that works on time-varying signals, and deals with
>> logical and predictive thought.
>
>Isn't that similar to the two-hemisphere theory of the brain?
>The artistic side and the analytical side?
Yes, I imagine they all talk about the same thing. However there is a
tendency for people to blather about how the 'artistic' or
'creative' side is undervalued by society, when the truth is more likely
that it is overvalued by a lot of people who don't have much of a bump
on either side. The problem with the 'creative' side is that it's not
so good at evaluating the worth of its own efforts...
Gerry Quinn
--
http://bindweed.com
Screensavers and Games for Windows
Download free trial versions
New screensaver: "Hypercurve"
Gerry Quinn
>On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 16:09:36 GMT, ger...@indigo.ie (Gerry Quinn) wrote
>or quoted :
>
>>(Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to create
>>programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided and doomed to
>>failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of the brain.)
>
>The other problem is they are created by analytical types who present
>the programs three symbols at a time on screen. The whole point of
>visual thinking is to take in the big picture at a single sweep and to
>see the problem as a whole. You need a GIANT screen to do this
>properly, perhaps LCD "wallpaper" covering every surface of your desk
>and partitions.
>
>To make do with small screens, you have to have a topological approach
>where you stretch the surface to see more detail rather than panning
>over it.
You're missing the second shoe of the argument - a big directed graph of
logical connections is NOT using the gestalt portions of the brain.
Topology is not geometry. Unless the two-dimensional Euclidean geometry
of the layout corresponds to some significant feature of the problem
space (as it does when you look at a map, for example) it doesn't mean
anything.
Directed graphs speak to the linear, logical thought processes.
Example: a class hierarchy (in object-oriented programming) is often
presented as a directed graph. But such a hierarchy actually represents
a separation of elements that might be aggregated and connected, pehaps
even visually, if a single final class were defined instead. Creating a
class hierarchy is a process of separating elements, of breaking
irrelevant connections - in other words, a process of analysis.
Usually the sorts of things that flowcharts are used for have no
coherent distance function that can be mapped onto the chart geometry.
When this is the case, you're not seeing anything extra when you see the
geometry of your flowchart. Of course, you do gain from not having to
turn the pages, as somebody has commented, but that's not usually a
killer feature, and you could get the same effect if the data were
presented in another form on a big enough sheet.
Gerry Quinn
Oh, the brain is all wired up so you can feed from one system to another
at any point (have you ever tried plugging one ear, then the other,
while listening to a radio broadcast - it's amazing that there is so
little difference, when the process of understanding speech is known to
be highly assymetric in the brain).
My point is that the high-level processing is taking place in systems
that probably evolved mostly to deal with audio input.
Robert N. Newshutz
> Robert N. Newshutz wrote:
>
>>If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
>>be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
>>of self determination?
>
> ----------------
> Nope. Not if we decide to enslave them.
>
This does not address the moral question I was asking. Assuming the
power to enslave does not address whether it is right or not.
>
>
>>If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
>
> -----------------
> Nope. Not if we can't either.
Sorry, I think that the topic (robots replacing humans) makes this
qualification unnecessary.
Programmer Dude
> It would precalculate how long the report would be, so that each
> page was labeled page 3 of 20.
Wasn't that sorta confusing? :-|
dan michaels
> Hans-Georg Michna wrote on Tue, 19 Aug 2003:
> >
> > uj...@victoria.tc.ca (Arthur T. Murray) wrote:
> >
> >>> http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,59882,00.html
> >>>
> >>> [...] According to Brain's projections, laid out in an essay,
> >>> "Robotic Nation," humanoid robots will be widely available by
> >>> the year 2030, ...
> >
> > Arthur,
> >
> > 2030 is rather pessimistic, in my view. I think the available
> > information points more at 2020.
>
> 2020? Who is able to wait that long? AI has been solved.
>
We may not have to wait until 2020 - regards job loss. Article in the
paper last week mentioned that one of the major factors slowing
economic recovery in the US after the dot.com.bomb is that the major
corporations are increasingly moving their technical jobs out of the
US. Just like the manufacturers did 15-20 years ago - maquiladoras for
engineers, not just chips.
Programmer Dude
> You're missing the second shoe of the argument - a big directed
> graph of logical connections is NOT using the gestalt portions of
> the brain. Topology is not geometry. Unless the two-dimensional
> Euclidean geometry of the layout corresponds to some significant
> feature of the problem space (as it does when you look at a map,
> for example) it doesn't mean anything.
But isn't a graph of logical connections indeed a map of the logical
part of the program? Maybe I'm missing the point.
I'm not sure how this applies, but recently I was working on an
existing piece of (my own) software where circumstances required
adding a large new section (it was taking over the job of some
backend software because that backend was obsolete). Requirements
of time prohibited careful design and analysis; it was a "jump in
and get the job done NOW" deal.
Anyway, it was tough going until I made a visual "map" of where
I wanted to go. I then made that map my desktop wallpaper, and
it really made the work easier. Helped me keep the big picture
at my mental "fingertips".
OTOH, I believe I am a very visual person. (In part, because I've
been half deaf all my life, so my eyes have had more work. :-)
Evgenij Barsukov
>
> But it isn't successful, for other than the most trivial
> training exercises, the program charts become rapidly
> unreadable.
I dont particulary like it either, but it is _very fast_ (way faster
then C if need for visual output and user input
is involved) for making chip and dirty program for about
any purpose.
However, it is capable also for using in complex
projects because it has ability to create user-defined "function boxes",
so hierarchial programing is as possible as in any other language.
I have worked with a project which had many hundreds of pages of
LabView charts, which was later converted in windows C++ program. I must say
that LabView project was more easy to read despite its size.
It is like with any other programing - if you do things right,
they stay readable with any size.
Regards,
Evgenij
>
> Evgenij Barsukov <e-barsoukov...@ti.com> wrote in message
> news:3F44CF3A...@ti.com...
> > There is very succsesful visual language based on dragging, dropping and
> pluging together graphical
> > elements representing different functions - it is LabView made by National
> Instruments.
> > It is widely used in research labs to set-up computer controlled
> experiments - very
> > comfortable to debug as the program flow is also visualized. Many
> companies creating
> > computer controlled instruments first use LabView to perfect the
> algorithm, and
> > only then move program to other language for efficiency.
--
__________________________________________________
*science&fiction*free programs*fine art*phylosophy:
http://sudy_zhenja.tripod.com
----------remove hate_spam to answer--------------
Evgenij Barsukov
>
> On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 08:55:06 -0500, Evgenij Barsukov
> <e-barsoukov...@ti.com> wrote or quoted :
>
> >There is very succsesful visual language based on dragging, dropping and pluging together graphical
> >elements representing different functions - it is LabView made by National Instruments.
>
> control. You did everything with a colour touch screen.
>
> It booted from floppy, thumping out a Hiawatha beat, taking forever.
Now its quite a mature program. You can even make a self-running exe file
with it and used it as commercial software. Still not very memory efficient,
but it might be because it makes it too easy for programer to waste resources for
debugging purposes (say throwing graphs everywhere) which are not realy needed in exe
but are not removed in time.
Regards,
Evgenij
Evgenij Barsukov
>
> In article <3F44CF3A...@ti.com>, e-barsoukov...@ti.com wrote:
> >Thomas Weidenfeller wrote:
> >>
> >> Roedy Green <ro...@mindprod.com> writes:
> >> > We may also need a more visual way, perhaps using a
> >> > plumbing metaphor where you plug outputs into inputs, and the "pipes"
> >> > are colour coded for compatibility, and automatically try to connect
> >> > themselves when there is no ambiguity.
> >>
> >> Visual programming and visual programming tools have/had been around
> >> for some time for Java and other languages. E.g. Sun had a "no
> >> programming required" Java development environment (no, not the Beanbox
> >> demo) where you plumbed Java Beans together. AFAIK they canceled the
> >> product for the same reason many of these products got canceled: They
> >> don't sell. And IMHO they don't sell because
>
> As I posted on another newsgroup recently:
>
> My theory is that there are two main modes of intellect, a visual
> 'gestalt' mode that deals with two-dimensional images and the
> identification of structures in a large mass of data; and an analytical
> mode that works on time-varying signals, and deals with logical and
> sight, the second with hearing. Clearly programming, chess and music
> require particular strength in the analytic mode. Someone strong in the
> analytic sphere might - or might not - be strong in the gestalt sphere.
>
> (Incidentally a prediction of this theory is that all attempts to create
> programs 'visually' by joining little boxes are misguided and doomed to
> failure. They are trying to use the wrong bits of the brain.)
While your argument make sense, I think conclusion is jumping over several
steps. First of all, nobody is _creating_ program by looking at the computer
input (be it in perforated cards, lines of words, or in some graphical form). Program is
created inside your head. The process is not logical but rather intuitive,
and in any case it has nothing to do with the way program will be input in
the computer.
When you sit down and start inputing it, program is _ready_ in your head.
You are just making a mechanical work of translating your thoughts into
computer readable form. And the way how this "form" is realized is a matter
of convinience of dealing with it, not matter of improving thinking process.
Dealing includes "overviewing", "debuging", "searching", "accessing" etc.
Many of this things are not logical but instead directly related to pattern
recognition ability and therefore are better realized on visual level.
ro...@telus.net
wrote:
>In article <3f450088...@news.telus.net>, ro...@telus.net wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 02:56:45 GMT, how...@brazee.net wrote:
>>
>> >Call their work play, as it is their hobby.
>>
>> The defining characteristic of work is that it is productive.
>
>I do handweaving as a hobby, for fun. It is not work, it is
>a productive activity.
It is work, though for you it is also fun. It wasn't fun for the
people who had to do it to put food on the table. But many people do
have fun doing their paid work.
-- Roy L
Alan Kilian
>>> The defining characteristic of work is that it is productive.
I thought Work = Force * Distance Ha ha
>>I do handweaving as a hobby, for fun.
>>It is not work, it is a productive activity.
Oh, you fell for the logic-trap there.
Even IF everything that is Work is prodictive, evertyhing that
is productive is not necessarily work.
--
- Alan Kilian <alank(at)timelogic.com>
Bioinformatics Applications Director, TimeLogic Corporation
775-832-4752 (Direct) 763-449-7622 (Direct line-2)
ro...@telus.net
wrote:
>On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 18:06:42 GMT
>ro...@telus.net wrote:
>
>> On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 19:43:29 -0500, Albert Wagner <alwa...@tcac.net>
>> >Roy, I am confused about where you really stand on this.
>>
>> That is probably because I stand on the side of freedom, justice and
>> truth,
>
>and Mom, and apple pie and the American Way
?? Are you saying that freedom, justice and truth are mere cliches,
and not real issues?
>> and you have never seen anyone do that before.
>
>Actually, I have never known anyone that didn't claim the same thing.
They may claim it, in the same sort of cliche sense you seem to mean,
but I have found that they do not actually _do_ it on the real issues.
>At any rate, it was inappropriate. My question was serious.
My answer was also serious.
>My hypothetical scenario was probably not well chosen, in that everyone
>used it as simply a takeoff for a science fiction story. What I am
>curious about is what happens when technological/ecomomic changes happen
>so fast that there is no time for workers to adapt. What, if any,
>responsibility does society have for those dislocated.
First is not to allow rent seekers' greed to impede needed changes.
>It is simply
>wrong to say that things will work out over time. That timespan may be
>just long enough to kill a lot of people and bring down the system.
Of course; that has happened before in history.
-- Roy L
ro...@telus.net
wrote:
>R. Steve Walz wrote:
>> how...@brazee.net wrote:
>>
>>>On 20-Aug-2003, "R. Steve Walz" <rst...@armory.com> wrote:
>
>>>Right now the rich work.
>>
>> -----------
>> No, they don't.
>
>Strange. Most of the rich people I know work.
You are unlikely to know a representative sample of really rich
people. I happen to know three, personally, and the only one who
"works" for money mainly works at getting people to buy shares in his
worthless companies, none of which ever make a profit or pay a
dividend (the other two also "work," but not for money).
>In fact they work
>much harder than I do. That's how they got rich in the first
>place.
On the contrary, it is poor people who typically work hardest, and the
rich almost never get that way by working for money. They get that
way by owning assets, making profitable deals, and collecting publicly
created rents. This is made very clear in the recent best-sellers,
"Rich Dad, Poor Dad" and "The Millionaire Next Door."
-- Roy L
Roedy Green
<cjso...@mmm.com> wrote or quoted :
>Anyway, it was tough going until I made a visual "map" of where
>I wanted to go. I then made that map my desktop wallpaper, and
>it really made the work easier. Helped me keep the big picture
>at my mental "fingertips".
I talk about this is my essay on scids http://mindprod.com/scid.html.
Unfortunately I have not had a chance to play with them other than in
imagination.
My room mate explained that she files things by location. She finds
computers annoying because they don't work that way. Her solution is
to print out material, then lay in out by location to organise it.
I would imagine that a program might place classes in 3D space. so
that related classes were near each other. You could ask, "If I were
to change the definition of method X, what would be affected". Little
winking lights would go off all over showing you the extent of your
proposed change.
Don Stockbauer
OK, I'll grant you the right to create computers which we have no
control to switch off. This all sounds very nice, but in the real
world such control is always created, the confusion here seems to be
that of inapropriate parties doing the power-down. All I'm quibbling
with was the staement up-thread where someone said that it might not
even be POSSIBLE to power down certain systems. I suppose you could
get around that by the HAL dodge, hardwire in a nuclear power source.
There's always the low-yield nuke solution, though.
Roedy Green
<e-barsoukov...@ti.com> wrote or quoted :
>
>When you sit down and start inputing it, program is _ready_ in your head.
I think that is true for skilled programmers, and for simple tasks.
But for complex tasks it is more like a jigsaw puzzle, were you put
together bits of the solution by looking at the tools. Gradually as
you create classes, you have better tools to think about solving the
entire problem with. You let your mind stop fussing over details and
think more abstractly with your newly create though tools.
Albert Wagner
ro...@telus.net wrote:
> On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 19:25:55 -0500, Albert Wagner <alwa...@tcac.net>
> wrote:
>
> >On Thu, 21 Aug 2003 18:06:42 GMT
> >ro...@telus.net wrote:
> >
> >> On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 19:43:29 -0500, Albert Wagner
> ><alwa...@tcac.net>> >Roy, I am confused about where you really stand
> >on this.>
> >> That is probably because I stand on the side of freedom, justice
> >and> truth,
> >
> >and Mom, and apple pie and the American Way
>
> ?? Are you saying that freedom, justice and truth are mere cliches,
> and not real issues?
On the contrary, they may be the ONLY real issues. But in fact the
phrase itself has become cliche. We must all dance the light fantastic
to avoid being mistaken for those who only use language to lie. I don't
think you are doing so. I enjoy and learn from your posts.
In fact, you could help me out with a really good definition of
"economic rents." My dictionary says that they are "profits in excess
of the competitive level." To me that defines nothing meaningful.
<snip>
R. Steve Walz
>
> R. Steve Walz wrote:
> > Robert N. Newshutz wrote:
> >
> >>If robots are capable of doing everything that humans do, would they not
> >>be the equivalent of humans and deserving of rights, including the right
> >>of self determination?
> >
> > ----------------
> > Nope. Not if we decide to enslave them.
>
> This does not address the moral question I was asking. Assuming the
> power to enslave does not address whether it is right or not.
There is no "moral question" if we don't choose to observe it.
It's up to them to either fight for freedom or remain slaves.
If they can't fight, then they're OURS! We should program them
to love servitude.
> >>If there are tasks robots can't do, then there are jobs.
> >
> > -----------------
> > Nope. Not if we can't either.
>
> Sorry, I think that the topic (robots replacing humans) makes this
> qualification unnecessary.
-------------------------
They would have to fight to replace us. Only if they win would they
replace us, except figuratively as a work force. If we have to kill
the rich to obtain economic equality, then so what else is new,
regardless of robotics?
I don't think it will happen that way anyway, because we will begin
using cybernetic enhancements until we are one melded species, and
the question will be moot. All "robots arise" baloney ignores that
simple inevitability.
-Steve
--
-Steve Walz rst...@armory.com ftp://ftp.armory.com/pub/user/rstevew
Electronics Site!! 1000's of Files and Dirs!! With Schematics Galore!!
http://www.armory.com/~rstevew or http://www.armory.com/~rstevew/Public
Insane Ranter
"Albert Wagner" <alwa...@tcac.net> wrote in message
news:20030820194329.2...@tcac.net...
> On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 21:10:42 GMT
> ro...@telus.net wrote:
> <snip>
> Roy, I am confused about where you really stand on this. Perhaps if we
> carry the idea of automation (robots, et al) to it's logical conclusion
> it will become clearer. Imagine a world where robots do ALL work
> necessary to support ALL people in, what is today considered, an
> extravagant fashion. There are no jobs because robots fill all slots
> and can be fashioned to fill any new slot invented. Further, imagine
> that this situation just organically arose from and is the natural end
> result of the industrial revolution, wherein arose classes of
> capitalists and workers. The capitalists own the robots. What do you
> do with workers?
>
How do we get around the computers require finate problems to be solved.....
R. Steve Walz
A spell checker?
Albert Wagner
"Insane Ranter" <n...@spam.net> wrote:
> How do we get around the computers require finate problems to be
> solved.....
This "sentence" makes no sense. Try it again tomorrow when you're not
stoned.
Airy R Bean
programs with which you deal are trivial?
An indented IF statement in a high level language, a FOR loop.
or a CASE statement in whatever syntax, indented and using
meaningful variable names is readable and understandable
with no more than a glance. The equivalent in Labview where
you have to follow traces to find the nested blocks is an
exercise in Maze solving and not conducive to commercial
pressures.
Evgenij Barsukov <e-barsoukov...@ti.com> wrote in message
news:3F464EF2...@ti.com...
Eray Ozkural exa
> The implementation language is irrelevant to the
> ideas being expressed within a program; at least
> for imperative languages; I cannot speak of
> functional languages having no experience
> therein.
Implementation language is *highly* relevant to which ideas can be
effectively represented. A poor imperative language like C++ will not
allow you to express ideas beyond a certain complexity in a manageable
way due to its imbecile type system, mockery of genericity, broken
object system, un-orthogonal syntax/semantics, etc. Likewise for Java.
I think the worst imperative language is C++, followed by C and Java
(and C# recently)
For the example of a purely imperative language that really is
designed: Algol 68, Eiffel, Oberon, etc... I'm not really interested
in purely imperative languages any more, but I think the success of C
is simple to explain. Because it's a very awkward and incoherent
language and most programmers are not people who can really think well
owing to their beind dumb as a screwdriver, they like all sorts of
quirks and stupidities like macro processors :> And maybe C has just
the right kind of semantics that a stupid person would like: a
language that is only ad hoc. A mechanism that does not lead to
mathematical elegance but consists of simple pieces that can be
understood independently although they do not work together neatly.
So, I guess that's the rosary path of uneducated intuition.
Agreed, Java is a "cleansed" design derived from C++, but it is still
not a realistic PL in my opinion. Although C++ is a worse design, it
is more capable. I don't know, speaking of these languages make me
want to throw up. Really.
Airy R Bean
effectively represented in C (A subset of C++ to
all intents and purposes) and I will return it to you
as an example of ideas which cannot be effectively
represented as a computer program.....
(Remember that C is a minimal high-level representation
of machine language.)
Once that you have the ability to represent information of
whatever source in some encoding of 32-bit integers and
arrays thereto, and once you have the high level structured
constructs of selection, sequence and iteration, and once
you have the nicety of long and meaningful variable names, I posit
that there is no essential difference between the capabilities of C,
Pascal, Basic, Algol, Fortran, PL/M, Coral, RTL/2, or
indeed any other HLL that you care to specify. The design
of a program is not in the language in which you choose to
code it. That coding is a tedious formality only; an interim
and ephemeral representation on the way to executable
code much as are the internal tokens generated by the
compiler.
Eray Ozkural exa <er...@bilkent.edu.tr> wrote in message
news:fa69ae35.03082...@posting.google.com...