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http://www.technologyreview.com/TR35/Profile.aspx?Cand=T&TRID=764 I am always amazed when people are able to pull off these feats using things you can find at your local department store.

The criteria for being able to "sign" the petition are pretty shaky as well. http://www.petitionproject.org/qualifications_of_signers.php Well, for one thing, neither computer science nor mathematics are actual sciences. I speak for the computer science side but in my opinion mathematics doesn't count as a science. That said I think computer scientists are generally unqualified to make this sort of statement on the matter, and the same goes for mathematicians. Yes, climate science uses computer models. Yes, climate science uses math. However, these are the tools of climate science. What actually matters are the results. As a computer "scientist" who worked in a support role in the climate science field for 5 years, I look at their model and go "Ugh, why oh why is this written in Fortran?" In certain cases, I am able to spot errors, however, the errors I see are only at the surface level. "Why are you binding this variable and never using it? Did you mean to use it here?" Yes, these are the sorts of things that can add up to simulation failures, but my ability as a computer science to actually judge the validity of the science is extremely limited. When it comes to climate science, I am a layman, and everything I learned has been through osmosis, working side-by-side with climate scientists day after day. It seems this petition is going for a "big tent" of dissenters. It would be much more interesting if the petition specifically included people with backgrounds in the climate and atmospheric sciences. As is, it's rather silly. I don't see it much different than saying "oh, physicists use computers to analyze their results! Let's circulate a petition and see who disagrees with the standard model. We'll take responses from computer scientists too, because physicists use computers!"

Psst, we already do, sort of

How about a potential case Obamacare might cover? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ectopic_pregnancy In an ectopic pregnancy, the fertilized ovum implants itself in the fallopian tube, rather than the uterus. In such a case, the pregnancy can be aborted by the mother ingesting methotrexate. We're talking about a situation where it is almost impossible for the ovum to develop into a state where it could survive without the mother, and unless something is done, the mother will suffer severe trauma and likely die.

I'm talking about artificial neural networks, not computational intelligence in general. I am excited about the prospects of hierarchical temporal memory.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2009/11/09/2009-11-09_prochoice_advocates_furious_over_abortion_amendment_in_health_care_bill_.html The bill that passed the House will not include support for abortions. Republicans: no tax money for abortions, we need it for the war!

However quantum mechanics has demonstrated that the universe acts differently when we're looking as opposed to when we let it be.

I have to say, when they started playing "Why Does The Sun Shine? (The Sun Is A Mass of Incandescent Gas)", I did really enjoy it. They stopped singing and let the crowd, who all knew every word, sing it for them. It reminded me of the songs we'd sing in pre-school, except this was a huge crowd of people singing a song in celebration of science, as opposed to my pre-school where we sang religious songs. It was a crowd of people delighting in simple scientific truth! But there was a little voice nagging me in my head... the Sun isn't made of gas, it's made of plasma! The song is wrong! Wrong I say! At that point I had completely forgotten about their follow-up song... (sorry I'm not a huge fan, although I had heard it before) After they finished the first song, they began talking, and mentioned the song was wrong! The Sun is made of plasma! Then they started playing Why Does the Sun REALLY Shine? I cracked up laughing and thought it was completely awesome.

What is it like to be a different person besides myself?

Short answer: scam

Are you smoking crack? In order to pass legislation the Republicans have vowed to filibuster, the Democrats need a successful cloture vote. This means the bill must be agreeable to the entire Democratic supermajority, including Joe Liberman (who's not a Democrat). So far, this has not happened, and I really have to wonder if it ever will. It seems to be the only way they'll pass the healthcare bill in the Senate in the near future, so we'll see. This is especially hard for the Democrats, because they encompass a far greater portion of the political spectrum than the Republicans. Republicans cover the range from extremely conservative to moderately conservative. Democrats cover the range from moderately conservative to extremely liberal. Bottom line, the way the system is set up now is preventing the Democrats from passing legislation because the Republicans are threatening to filibuster. I'm not saying that's a bad thing per se, but I can't imagine trying to make the system even more restrictive. Merged post follows: Consecutive posts merged Examine their voting record in 2001-06... for example, the absolutely atrocious Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act, a Republican-sponsored bill which was effectively a huge handout of government money to the pharmaceutical companies, and also the one which established the so-called "donut hole" Democrats are trying to close in the new bill. That legislation passed with a small amount of Democratic support. Some Democrats were willing to compromise.

Yep. They're threatening to filibuster any healthcare bill, rather than working towards an alternate proposal of their own. I'm certainly convinced that the health insurance industry has most of the Republicans, and quite a few Democrats in their pocket. I am not happy with the Democrats performance so far. They lack the ability of the Republicans to tow the party line in lock step. The Democrats are the party of the "big tent" (such that on one hand you have the Blue Dogs voting against the healthcare bill because it's too liberal and Dennis Kucinich voting against it because it's too conservative) But that said, you can't completely blame the Democrats. The Republicans have thoroughly demonstrated a stubborn unwillingness to compromise. Know how many Republicans are even considering voting for the healthcare bill? One! The Democrats have tried, and tried, and tried, to neuter the healthcare bill into something the Republicans might actually vote for. So far, all they've accomplished is ONE "maybe". And the Republicans are going to filibuster any bill. Unless the Democrats can wield the supposed "supermajority" (which would mean convincing Lieberman to side with them, which won't happen) the Democrats will not be able to force a cloture vote and thus the legislation will not get passed. And please keep in mind that the Republicans make your Conservative Party look like a bunch of tie dye wearing patchouli scented pot smoking Marx worshiping hippies. Also, anyone describing themselves as "socialist" has absolutely no chance of holding a higher office as socialism is taboo. As I hope you've gathered from my earlier statements, the Democrats don't have "total control of government", and they are not a stratified group. They are a nuanced group with many differing viewpoints. And unless there's just the tiniest bit of compromise from the opposing site, it's very difficult to pass legislation.

Part 1: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8492625684649921614# Part 2: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1663091361786740235# Dangerous Knowledge is a documentary about the lives of four mathematicians/scientists: Georg Cantor, Ludwig Boltzmann, Kurt Gödel, and Alan Turing. The central theme is one of the discovery of the undiscoverable, and being driven mad by it. For example, Cantor was almost driven mad by his continuum hypothesis. Later Gödel attempted to prove the continuum hypothesis himself, and almost went mad trying to before managing to prove it unprovable. All in all it's a very good program and I highly suggest you watch it.

To put it bluntly, we haven't made any significant advancements in neural networks in the past 30 years. The only kind of neural network I see having future potential is a very different kind of neural network: one which directly tries to model human neural structures. In that regard there is only one project in the entire world attempting this, and that's BlueBrain. Note that BlueBrain is significantly different from what is ordinarily referred to in CS as a neural network. Aside from direct brain emulation attempts like BlueBrain, neural networks are a dead end.

On *IX "locate" rocks the socks, at least IMO...

I don't think we're going to get very far with strong AI unless we crib directly from biology. So far attempts at guessing the mind's behavior and implementing it in software have failed.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6517340/Lord-Drayson-David-Nutts-sacking-has-caused-serious-concern-in-science-world.html Lord Drayson, the UK Science Minister, has expressed concerns over the firing of Prof Nutt: Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedHow To Keep People Convinced Government Policy Is Correct: Merged post follows: Consecutive posts mergedProfessor John Beddington, the UK's chief scientist, has backed Professor Nutt on his statements about cannabis. I think it's safe at this point to say the scientific community has spoken and the government is wrong.

Much of the brain is unnecessary to conscious thought. The cortex, thalamus, and hippocampus are the three most important structures in conscious thought, although there's a host of ancillary structures we also need to understand (amygdala, locus coeruleus, etc)

A CMS will yet you do this (depending on which one)

We're well on our way to understanding the brain's high level functions: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Consciousness_Studies/The_Neuroscience_Of_Consciousness

One of the first people I talked to about it suggested being interested in wanting to retrace the author's journey on a motorcycle as close as possible. I'm like "you're totally missing the point"

Just my gut reaction to this thread: As far as I am aware there is zero, zip, nada, zilch, none, no way, no evidence of Neanderthal genes in our genome. Does someone beg to differ? Please provide links to a peer reviewed scientific paper published in a major journal ktks.

We do still need a proper understanding of the structure of the brain. Jeff Hawkins is well aware of this and the role of structures like the thalamus and the loops between the cortex and the thalamus in conscious thought.

You're describing the basic functionality of a Content Management System (CMS). See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_content_management_systems

This was interesting to see... Kucinich voted no