Technology and Society

Hybrid Computers

The distinction between hardware and wetware is going to really start to blur in the coming years:

Charles Higgins, an associate professor at the University of Arizona, has built a robot that is guided by the brain and eyes of a moth. Higgins told Computerworld that he basically straps a hawk moth to the robot and then puts electrodes in neurons that deal with sight in the moth’s brain. Then the robot responds to what the moth is seeing — when something approaches the moth, the robot moves out of the way.

Higgins explained that he had been trying to build a computer chip that would do what brains do when processing visual images. He found that a chip that can function nearly like the human brain would cost about $60,000.

“At that price, I thought I was getting lower quality than if I was just accessing the brain of an insect which costs, well, considerably less,” he said. “If you have a living system, it has sensory systems that are far beyond what we can build. It’s doable, but we’re having to push the limits of current technology to do it.”

There are going to be some humdinger ethics issues to deal with along this road.

Education

Grammar Rant

I was going to just link something, but after quite a Google search, I couldn’t find a good explanation on line that focused on just this issue (I found lots of hits, but none of them satisfied). It’s been bugging me for decades now (ever since I first went on line, and found so much misuse of the words). I don’t know if it’s a new phenomenon, or if we just see a lot more of it because we see a lot more people’s written material. I also don’t understand why it’s so hard for some people to get right, though perhaps because of the “oo” sound in “lose.” Anyway:

“Lose” = “to not win, or to misplace.”

“Loose” = “not tight, or not bound.”

“Loser” = “someone who has lost.”

“Looser” = “making less tight (or more loose).”

“Losing” = “in the process of achieving a loss, of a sporting event, or political race, or valuable assets.”

“Loosing” = “to set free (e.g., loosing the horses to let them run free, or loosing the dogs to chase a criminal).”

[Sunday update]

Behold, a blog devoted to needless quotation marks.

Political Commentary

Arrogance

Hillary seems to be quite confident that she will be the next president:

Couric asked, “How disappointed will you be” if she doesn’t win; Clinton replied: “Well, it will be me.” “Clearly,” the CBS anchor persisted, “you have considered” the “possibility of losing”? “No, I haven’t,” said Clinton. “So you never even consider the possibility?” “I don’t. I don’t.”

Really?

In that case, why not give up your Senate seat? You’ll have to quit next year, anyway, and you’d be able to devote full time to your campaign, and not short change the good people of New York of one of their Senator’s services. And the governor (at least until he’s indicted and has to resign) is a Democrat who would nominate another to replace you, so there’d be no change in the Senate party alignment.

What are you waiting for?

Or is it just an act?

The amusing thing is that it isn’t clear that such arrogant statements even help her. Novak, after all, calls it a gaffe (though I don’t know why he thinks it’s her first). I think that it will reinforce the negative feelings that a lot of people already have about her.

Media Criticism

Sophomoric

But perhaps it’s forgivable, since it was probably written by actual sophomores. Here’s a call by the editorial staff of the Harvard Crimson to repeal the Second Amendment. The amount of historical (and other) ignorance displayed here is breathtaking. I don’t have time to do it, but this needs a thorough fisking.

I do think it’s a good sign in a sense, though. They’re realizing that the jig is up, and that the court is very likely to overturn the DC gun laws, and many others. They’ll no longer be able to pretend that it’s not an individual right.

[Update at 3 PM EST]

Gullyborg has risen to the challenge. He missed a key point here, though:

Written in an age in which minutemen rose to dress and fight at a moment

Technology and Society

Bring It On

Early detection of cancer and Alzheimers with blood tests:

The company is also validating protein-based tests for Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s, the latter an affliction for which the only conclusive test is currently an autopsy. Among the possible benefits of a proteomic Alzheimer’s test, due out late next year, would be the ability to definitively separate sufferers from those with other neurodegenerative problems, now a major obstacle to running effective clinical trials of drugs for Alzheimer’s.

“Power3 won’t do it all,” says Essam Sheta, the company’s director of biochemistry. “But my expectation is that in the next five years, we as a scientific community will be able to develop diagnostic tests for many, many types of diseases.”

Let’s hope so.

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!