Category Archives: General

Books/Literature, General

Your daily dose of anxiety…

Today, let’s worry about the rise of Artificial Intelligence machines, and the fact that so many scientists and figures involved in high level technology have expressed concern regarding the imminent appearance of said machines:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-barrat/hawking-gates-artificial-intelligence_b_7008706.html

For those who have read all five (so far) of my Corrosive Knights novels, the concept of Artificial Intelligence, along with a few others, are a central concern.  I have wondered about the possible appearance of a self-sustained AI and, like many in the article, worry what will happen once such a creature appears.  Will it view humans as an obstacle?  I can’t help but think it will.  And depending on how much power it controls, the effects could be devastating.

It is certainly something to think about…yet another worry to ease you into your day.

General

Welcome to the future…part deus

After the scary news of hackers shutting down a major French TV network, here’s some good technology news: It would appear the clean energy “revolution” is ahead of schedule:

http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-04-08/clean-energy-revolution-is-way-ahead-of-schedule

How interesting that as we reach what seems to be a tipping point regarding global warming/pollution, we’re moving pretty quickly into the area of far cleaner renewable energy.

To this, all I have to say is I couldn’t be happier.  If there is an alternative cleaner energy source out there to use, why would anyone want to continue using the older, dirtier methods?  Why would anyone want to live in a world increasingly filled with polluted skies, land, and water?

Here’s hoping at least this part of the future is bright.

General

About that Cross-Country Delphi Driverless car…

A few days ago (you can read the original post here) I wrote about how the Delphi company, which has driverless car software, had initiated a cross-country trip from San Francisco to New York, effectively duplicating Horatio Nelson Jackson’s famous 1903 cross country trip that was the first made in a car.

It barely made the news then, and out of curiosity I did a search to see if the car made it to its destination.  It did.  Three days ago:

http://www.nbcnews.com/tech/innovation/driverless-car-completes-cross-country-trip-9-days-n334776

It amazes me that this story didn’t receive much press (at least none in the venues I usually frequent!).  Granted, the car supposedly made 99% of the trip using its driverless features, so it didn’t make the entire trip using only the Delphi software, but still: It crossed 99% of the entire United States, effectively, on “auto pilot”!

That’s pretty damn amazing!  And, paradoxically, chilling.

Once again I can’t help but think what the future of car transport will be like.

On the one hand, using driverless cars will greatly reduce both traffic congestion and highway/road fatalities/accidents.  As I noted before and given some of the smaller driverless cars such companies as Google are working on, there may come a time when people no longer even have to have a car.  I envision a future where there is a small fleet of very economical to use driverless cars on the streets.  You use an app on your phone to call one in, it takes you to your destination, and when you need to return home, you call one in to do that.

The other side of the coin is darker.  How many jobs will be lost with the full arrival of the driverless car?  Already there are several careers that will be endangered, from truck drivers to taxi/Uber drivers.  What about public transportation drivers?  School/Public bus drivers might become irrelevant as well.

Alas, technology moves ahead and there’s no turning back.  After all, there was a time the Blacksmith had one of the most secure jobs in any town.

Not anymore.

General

Is This Thing On…?

Fascinating article by Dan Falk for Slate magazine concerning the debate over whether Search For Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) should be more proactive in its search for alien life (ie, send out signals for alien races to receive, informing them we’re here and want to make contact) or should we be more cautious and hang back and listen for signals coming to us from potential alien races.

Check it out:

Salon.com: Is This Thing On?

I have to admit that before reading this article I hadn’t given much thought to the real life implications of our race seeking to make “first contact” with an alien culture (this despite my fictional writings!).  Having read the article and given both sides consideration, my feeling it is better to be cautious rather than attempt more active means of contact.

Or, as the article points out, via science fiction author David Brin:

…David Brin is an outspoken critic of Active SETI. He points to the history of our own planet, in which encounters between cultures of greatly differing technological sophistication rarely go well.

Or, to put it another way: Think about what happened to, among others, the Native Americans when the Europeans first came over.  One race was more sophisticated and had better armor and weapons.  Subsequently, the native Americans were at the receiving end of some very nasty experiences while this more sophisticated race took their resources for themselves.

In light of this, should we really be actively sending out signals in the hope that others races out there receive them so we can make first contact?  While the pluses to this are obvious in the sense that we can perhaps become an interstellar community, the downside is considerable.

Who’s to say that any alien race we come into contact with will be enlightened and/or benevolent?  In the example I mentioned above, the Europeans didn’t come over to America to share their technologies with the Native Americans.  No, they used their advanced knowledge to wipe the smash the Native peoples while taking as much of their resources as they could.

What makes us think an alien race out there might not want to do exactly the same?

And what if we send out signals and the very worst case scenario turns out to happen: That the alien race nearest to us that picks up this transmission winds up being a warrior race that waits around just for such signals to appear so they can pounce on planets like ours without having to spend the time and energy looking for them?

A chilling thought!

Books/Literature, General

Biggest Sellout…

Interesting article on Slate.com and by Ben Mathis-Lilley concerning a childhood favorite of mine, The Guinness Book of World Records, and the fact that their ties to -ie payment to attend- Corporate Sponsored Events (in this case “The Largest Champagne Toast”!) may make you question the validity of these supposed “world records”:

Guiness World Records, Business Calls Into Question

Like the author (and as mentioned above), as a child I was fascinated with the Guinness World Records books.  Seeing photographs of the world’s tallest/shortest man/woman, of feats of endurance, of unique landmarks, of sporting events, etc. etc. genuinely held my interest and opened up my world to what lay outside its pre-internet small confines.

But time marches on and, like many other things, the internet has had an effect on the Guinness World Record Business.  The books aren’t selling anywhere near as well as they used to, which isn’t that big a surprise as you can find most of the interesting facts/records online if you were to look around.  In spite of all this, there is still publicity to be had surrounding a “Guinness World Record” your business is involved in and this is what lies at the article’s heart:

If businesses sponsor events and pay the Guinness people to come around to oversee them and report on their “World Record”, then is it not possible the businesses may influence -to a degree unknown- what the Guinness judges observe?  Are the judges more likely to officially sanction a record even if, again in the case of the particular “Largest Champagne Toast”, they do not personally witness everyone involved in the event?

I believe part of the problem lies in the fact that some of these records are, frankly, silly.  And yes, I am referring to the “World’s Largest Champagne Toast” in particular.  If you have the “World’s Tallest Person”, this is an easily measurable thing.  So too are things like the “World’s Longest Nails”, or the “World’s Most Expensive Car”, or the “World’s Tallest Building,” or “World’s Fastest Wo/Man”, etc. etc.

Even as I was still reading the Guinness Books, I noticed some of the records presented veered into the weird, not unlike this “World’s Largest Champagne Toast”.  They were clearly silly creations made specifically for entry into that book.  I suspect all those weirder records sponsored by Corporations are being done to get the word out on their product, whatever it may be.

Ah well, I guess the bottom line is that Guinness did such a good job creating a point of interest for people to focus on that its little wonder others have used it as an advertising platform.

General

4 Ways the Suburban Dream is About to Die…

I usually go to Cracked.com for the humor, but at times the articles presented give you something to think about (along with the humor!).  Here then is a list of 4 Ways the Suburban Dream is About to Die:

http://www.cracked.com/blog/4-ways-suburban-dream-about-to-die/

I think the very first thing mentioned, “Prime Businesses Going Away”, is the key here.  If you don’t have a viable local economy -a place to spend and make money- then people will drift away to places where they can make and spend their money.

Sounds stupidly simple and obvious, but there you have it.

I’ve mentioned before being intrigued with the way the economic landscape has changed due to the arrival of the internet.  If you’re as old as I am, you recall a time when Record/Music stores were practically on every corner.  They (gasp!) sold music at these now extinct places.  First vinyl records, then CDs, then videos/DVDs.  However, the day a song could be fashioned into an MP3 file and sold/pirated over the internet was the day the music store died.

After all, if you go onto Amazon.com or iTunes you can find just about every album available out there.  In the comfort of your own home you can buy said album and be listening to it within a matter of minutes.  Why would you get yourself ready, drive/walk to a Record/Music store, look through the inventory (and hope the album you’re looking for is there!) and pick up said product there when you can far easily/faster get it online?

Bookstores are facing the exact same thing.  Who would have thought that in my lifetime I, a complete maniac for the written word, would reach a point where he didn’t care to go to a bookstore?  I used to do that at least twice and three times a week.  Today, I can download and read books at Amazon.com.  Hell, my books are available there as well!

What about Movie stores?  Remember Blockbuster Video?  There was a time that store was literally everywhere.  People flocked to the place to pick up the latest movies.  Now?  You can order a film through Amazon and get it on the date it is officially released without having to (once again) get out of your house.  Or you can watch it on pay-per-view.  Or Netflix.  Or Amazon Prime.  Or iTunes.

What about video games?  While there still exist game stores, I suspect they’re dying out as well.  Today, if you play off your computer or any of the new generations of video game systems, you can simply download them.  If you want a physical copy of the same, you could order them through (yet again) Amazon or directly from the companies that produce them.  Again, you don’t need to get out of your comfortable chair and go to a store and hope they have the product.

Four once big industries, industries that not only provided commerce for an area but also employment for people, have been torpedoed thanks in large part to the arrival of the internet and the availability of these items online.

I suspect that in the near future the stores/businesses that will remain in existence will be ones that the internet cannot take over (at least not easily): Grocery stores (you want to see the product -especially perishables like meats, vegetables, and fruits- you’re buying), Restaurants (there are attempts at creating “to go” apps for all servers, but sometime you want to get out and eat), Hotels (when vacationing, you have to have a place to go, though the internet has figured out a way to make/pay your reservations in advance).

What other businesses are there out there?

Movie theaters?  I think things are rather grim for their future given the pay per view choices though they remain a good place to “get away”.  That might keep them going for a while.

Clothing stores?  I suspect there will come a time when companies create very good programs that offer truly lifelike scans/images of your body in real time and allow you to “try on” clothing online. If you like what you see, you’ll order it and it’ll arrive at your house, perhaps by the end of the day.  When that happens, the clothing store as we know it might also go away, though thrift/secondhand stores will likely go on.

The point is this: The Economy in the past decade has changed radically and we’re still in the process of changing.  Where will we end up in another decade’s time?

I don’t know, but one thing is for sure: You can’t go back now.

General

What the hell is going on…?

French Prosecuter states the Germanwings Co-Pilot Deliberately crashed the Airbus Jet, killing all aboard:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/27/world/europe/germanwings-crash.html

Not to sound glib, but seriously, what is going on with airline pilots?  The infamous disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 and now this.  Though what happened to Flight 370 is open to speculation (at least until the remains of the flight are found) there are indications that the pilot(s) -or whomever was at the cockpit at the time!- might have had a hand in the plane’s disappearance.

Now, with the Airbus Jet’s crash, it appears the co-pilot was locked out of the cockpit and tried to make his way back inside as the plane descended and ultimately crashed.

So damn weird…and scary.

General

Delphi Driverless Car on Cross-country Trip…

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Haven’t heard much about this other than the initial news that it was happening:

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/delphi-driverless-car-sets-off-cross-country-trip/story?id=29829148

The upshot is this: Delphi Automotive PLC’s are giving a driverless car its ultimate test: Driving from San Francisco and across the United States and to New York.

If you’re familiar with early automotive history, then you know of Horatio Nelson Jackson’s famous 1903 (!!) first ever drive across the United States.  Mr. Jackson’s route back then was essentially the same, departing from San Francisco and driving to New York.

I’ll be curious to see how this driverless car fares.  Of course, the vehicle has a human driver who is capable of taking over immediately should any problems arise, but wouldn’t it be astonishing if the entire length of this trip is performed entirely for the on board computer?

I’ll be curious to see the follow-up stories.