abstract engineer blogspot

  • Subscribe to our RSS feed.
  • Twitter
  • StumbleUpon
  • Reddit
  • Facebook
  • Digg

Monday, 31 January 2011

The Trickle Down Disaster of Sustainability

Posted on 09:00 by hony
So let's say this New Scientist article is right, and we could eliminate 73% of world energy usage simply by changing a few of our habits. Here's what they suggest:
To calculate how much energy could be saved through such improvements, Julian Allwood and colleagues at the University of Cambridge analysed the buildings, vehicles and industry around us and applied "best practice" efficiency changes to them.

Changes to homes and buildings included triple-glazing windows and installing 300-millimetre-thick cavity wall insulation, using saucepan lids when cooking on the stove top, eliminating hot-water tanks and reducing the set temperature of washing machines and dishwashers. In transportation, the weight of cars was limited to 300 kilograms.

They found that 73 percent of global energy use could be saved by introducing such changes.
Here's the problem as I see it: cutting energy usage 73% would destroy the global economy. Let's start with 300 kilogram (660 pound) cars. Currently, the average vehicle on the road, somewhere on Earth, weighs around 2000 kg. Much of that weight is the steel reinforced-hull, the engine block and associated systems, the aluminum/plastic shell, and the electronics.
A 300 kg car is feasible, I should disclaim. Dangerous and probably a death-trap in a collision, but feasible. Volkswagen made one back in 2002.
In fact, the Volkswagen "1 Litre" provides a good example of what I am pushing towards. If you were to reduce by 85% the materials in a car, you almost certainly reduce by more than 85% the labor force required to build that car. First, as the VW shows, electronics have been essentially eliminated. There is no audio system in the car. There is no GPS unit. Air condition is gone. So is cruise control. All these systems require manufacturing facilities, and people to make them, and engineers to design new ones. Those jobs are gone.
The chassis and shell of a 300 kg vehicle are almost certainly not aluminum. The L1 uses a carbon fiber shell over magnesium frame. Let's ignore the fact that magnesium is almost impossible to extinguish when ignited (it is quite flammable) and instead point to the fact that aluminum car parts are a huge industry in many countries, both for the original frame and shell components as well as the replacement parts from cars that have collided. Bye bye to those jobs. Same goes for many aluminum mining operations and aluminum recycling operations.
The list goes on and on, really. But none of this matters, really, and I am surprised the Cambridge researchers included a 300 kg car in their study. In a green utopia world, people don't even drive cars. Mass transit goes everywhere. So instead of having to slice away 85% of the car manufacturing workforce, you slash it 100% and get a much greener world.
Capitalists will scream at me for saying this, and argue that jobs and industries come and go but capitalism lives on. Sure, that may be true...if you continuously increase both supply and demand. But any capitalist would also probably acknowledge that if you decrease demand by...say...73%, you're going to need to drastically reduce supply. Like in the housing industry in America the last 5 years. Demand dropped massively...and capitalism or no, a lot of people lost their jobs in order for the economy to cut supply.
So imagine, if you will, that the energy sector demand dropped 73%, because suddenly everyone grew a conscience and insulated the hell out of their houses. Suddenly, munipal power plants are shutting down, idled due to lack of need. All those employees are sent home. Trains, which are the prime movers of coal throughout the world, stop running, their engineers sent home. Manufacturing plants that build new train engines and cars are shuttered. Engineering companies that design new, powerful coal, nuclear, solar, and wind energy plants are laid off, as their services are no longer needed; less power plants are needed, not more. Miners worldwide are laid off, as coal is now super-abundant and plentiful in comparison to demand. Job losses, globally, would be staggering.
An environmentalist might sigh at me, just now, and suggest that these radical changes are absolutely necessary, though sad and harsh, if the world is to save itself. To which I can only reply "you are absolutely right, but these changes will not happen."
Large corporate and even industrial level contributions are made to politicians worldwide to maintain the status quo. Do you think the coal industry is interested in a cleaner world? Certainly. Just, not at the expense of the coal industry. Do you think powerful corporations, like Burns and McDonnell and Black and Veatch, are committed to providing energy-efficient technologies in their designs of power plants? Absolutely, but I highly doubt they'd be happy if their work was no longer needed.
No, the whole energy industry, which in combination with agriculture props up the global economy, is predicated on the fundamental principle that the world will always increase in total energy and food usage. This is really the bedrock of industrialization. Provide people with electricity, food, and an education, and watch them consume!

So no, I don't think cutting energy usage 73% worldwide is a "powerful" idea. And no, I don't think it will ever be adopted.

Most sustainable ideas follow this concept: "scientist show: less of X and the world will be Y percent better." These press releases are immediately followed by hard-working lobbyists from the companies that manufacture X making serious contributions to political campaigns, and that is followed by media-directed marginalization of the scientists or environmentalists that suggest that reduction of X will have tangible benefits to the Earth, and later, the makers of X will commit a trivial amount of revenue on an advertising campaign pretending to be Earth-conscious.
Now, such companies may seem greedy and evil for doing this, but deep down, there are probably people there who are just trying to save their employees' jobs. If someone came to my boss and said "we don't need engineers at this company anymore; we can do the same job cheaper and faster with technicians only" you better believe my boss would fight to save our jobs, even if it meant the company didn't become cheaper and faster. Is he wrong? That level of ethics will not be addressed in this post.

The point is, articles that suggest Earth's climate woes could potentially be solved in three easy steps if we all just joined hands and sang Kumbaya only serve as a way to entrench the cynicism of an entire score of people otherwise capable of enacting change. People who are smart enough to realize the utility of losing a hundred thousand jobs to keep the Earth alive eventually lose interest when the leadership of their nations make only a token effort to address what they consider the biggest threat to our species. "Job growth in the 2012 really doesn't matter, if the Earth will be uninhabitable in 2050," they mutter. People who aren't smart enough to realize the pressing need for radical, drastic, difficult changes to human society in order to save the Earth hear the doubt pedaled to them on TV by liars, and that doubt is enough to keep them disinterested.

Articles calculating how simple and easy it would be to replace all the Earth's Technology X with Greener Technology Y and everything would be great are no better. For example the myriad of articles suggesting that solar and/or wind power could provide humanity all the power it needs only serve as a way to make us feel ashamed and angry at ourselves, at which point we reject the seer advice and just continue, with a "well that's nice and all, you arrogant jerk, but I'm fine and dandy with the status quo" attitude. Not to mention, libertarians immediately pounce, suggesting anything that artificially steers the energy portfolio of America away from its own self-destructive cheapness is blasphemy. It's funny, politicians listen to libertarians with the selective hearing even a toddler could appreciate. Let's go back to the gold standard? You people are crazy! Let's not invest our futures in clean energy unless America magically does so through innovation? You people are SO SMART! Personally, I love the argument that the changing climate will lead to innovation that will make greener energy technologies feasible. This is like arguing that Kamikaze pilots were innovators.

Of course, that bogeyman, that terrifying spectre of job losses, is perhaps the greatest bit of razzle-dazzle in all of modern politics. Someone argues for adoption of a green technology? Well, that treehugger must have no idea what shape the economy is in. Someone wants to cut the Defense budget? That'll cost jobs, and you must hate America's troops! Raise taxes? It'll cost jobs, you socialist! More bailouts? Somehow they'll eventually cost jobs, debt-lover! Putting a lid on your sauce pan? That'll cost jobs too! Apparently putting a nation's people 100% to work is the primary goal of a government. Were that so, why not adopt the governmental structure of Vietnam, which features extremely low unemployment? Freedom of speech is a small price to pay if we all have jobs, right?!

But I massively digress. The point is, simple reductions in energy usage are incompatible with growing economies. And as long as the economy, and not the environment, is the prime mover in social policy, expect sustainability to continue to lose.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Saturday, 29 January 2011

What is coming

Posted on 19:45 by hony
Get ready: I'm working on a series of lengthy rants basically entitled "Living in a Post-Sustainable World."

They all stem from this post.

Should be fun to write. Hopefully fun to read, too.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Wednesday, 26 January 2011

Topics Not Mentioned A Single Time in the SOTU

Posted on 07:24 by hony
1. Climate Change

As I said before, sustainability is a losing cause. It's been deemed such a waste of effort to counter the Denialists that the fight has been completely abandoned in this country.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Monday, 24 January 2011

In which I criticize the antiquated feelings of Ye Olde Mechanikal Engineer

Posted on 10:52 by hony
In a Lawrence Journal World blog, Dave Klamet writes about changing trends in education, especially the increasing competitiveness of non-American engineering talent. And then we get a long-winded comment from Devobrun:

I am an engineering graduate from KU in the 70s and 80s. 3 degrees. After running two companies over a 25 year period of time, I quit. The engineering mind and the engineering way of approaching life and its troubles is not valued in post-modern America.
Engineers use math and physics to design, build and operate machines. The result is a thing, a substance, a physical reality. Young people don't value stuff. They value relationships. More and more those relationships are virtual. Actually doing something is hard. Simulating that something is easier and less likely to get yourself in trouble.

Doing things pollutes.
Building things can cause damage that leads to law suits.
Building stuff is so....old school.

There are no machine shops anymore. Nobody works at a factory anymore. There are no role models for kids to emulate. Manufacturing and engineering are done over seas. It is fun to watch machines in China build stuff, but we don't do that here anymore. So we just watch the work on "Modern Marvels" on TV.
The entrepreneur is expected to make zillions of dollars on some new social network scheme. Actually building something that might make a living is for suckers.
I now teach high school physics. On one hand, I inspire kids through my experience and enthusiasm for the material. On the other hand, they wonder why I now teach instead of being an engineer. The answer is that I love the kids and I have the money already......but I avoid telling them that there are very few jobs for engineers today. Most of those jobs are related to building games, or some unproductive environmental cleanup that really doesn't need to be done anyway.
Finally, the engineer used to be the person who advanced through a company to CEO. The rational, organized mind was valuable in making tough decisions about corporate actions. Today that job is done by people who come from psychology or marketing, or other mind manipulation backgrounds. Companies exist to build cultures. When there is no product to build, you build cultures. The office is all about managing people and their relationships. The engineering mind is far too rational and demanding for this new virtual existence.
Read: "Shop Class as Soulcraft" by Matthew B. Crawford for an erudite explanation of the loss of physical connectedness that exists in our world today.
Now, as you can see I have already replied to Devobrun in the comments. I won't repeat it here. Rather, I want to suggest that engineers who read this blog understand that you can love the past without staying in it. One of TAE's great loves is using the mill and lathe in the machine shop here at work. There is something wonderful about using your hands to "create." But I also live in a modern, post-industrial country, where dangerous work can be outsourced to other nations quite easily, thanks to the internet, which frees up American labor resources for better quality, safer work.

The snowclones of Devobrun sound like many an old mechanical engineer, lamenting the death of the old factory engineer. Whereas the mechanical engineers of old sat at the pinnacle of Industrial AMerica, iIncreasingly, the job of the mechanical engineer is dependent upon the labors and intelligence of electrical and computer engineers. Of course the Modern Age is a hostile one! In my own projects, as a mechanical engineer, product design is almost totally driven by the real estate needs of the electrical engineer. Further, my devices are exquisite paperweights if not for the programming provided by the software engineers.

Devobrun complains of the death of the machine shop. I, however, see the machine shop as a perfect example of evolution in engineering. The old lathe was entirely mechanical. It had no brain, simply a motor and clever gearing to enable various speeds and actions. Modern 3-axis CNC lathes can be programmed remotely, or simply given a 3D model of a part, and autonomously cut and carve that part with sub-micron precision, all while the operator eats a sandwich in the breakroom. Should the machine catastrophically fail, and throw hot metal parts at nearly the speed of sound in every direction...humans are nowhere near the blast. Tell me how this is a bad thing?
Further, these parts can be done in a fraction of the time, because the machine can quickly change its own tools, it can quickly and effectively plan the shortest route to the finished part, and it can easily make multiple copies of a part if so desired. Tell me how this is a bad thing?
Further, company efficiency is increased even more by the fact that design iterations can happen faster. If I send a part down to the machinist at the end of the day, were it 50 years ago he would then get started the next day, and if he could finish it in one day, I'd get it on the morning of the third day. Now, I can send a part to the CNC lathe at the end of the day and the part will be cut overnight, and be ready for me in the morning. I have essentially cut my design time in half.

Look, to use my own snowclone, I don't want to see good jobs disappear overseas. But the honest truth is that the total number of engineers in America is growing, not shrinking, as more and more product is manufactured overseas. The fact is that the US economy is actually strengthened by exporting labor, and importing intellectual property. Suggesting otherwise just makes you sound...crotchety.
And the most important fact is that the world will always change. Change with it...or go extinct.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Friday, 21 January 2011

Metallic Glass Created.

Posted on 09:13 by hony
I can't possibly not mention this new type of material, metallic-glass, which has properties potentially better than steel:
this new type of damage-tolerant glass has actually demonstrated a durability greater than any known material.

The new metallic glass is a microalloy that features palladium, a metal with a high "bulk-to-shear" stiffness ratio that counteracts the intrinsic brittleness of glassy materials.

An initially sharp impact does not develop into a fully opened crack. Those findings come from experiments conducted at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology.

Robert Richie is the materials scientist who led the Berkely contribution to the research. In a press release, he says the new glass is stronger than steel because "that glass undergoes extensive plasticity in response to stress, allowing it to bend rather than crack."

My bold. Palladium is restrictively expensive, and unfortunately rare. Show me glass-metal with titanium, in many ways a cousin of palladium, and you'll have a great product.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Quote of the Day

Posted on 07:02 by hony
"I think that the press has been all over the iPad because Apple puts on a good show, and because everyone in journalism-land is looking for a daddy figure who'll promise them that their audience will go back to paying for their stuff. The reason people have stopped paying for a lot of "content" isn't just that they can get it for free, though: it's that they can get lots of competing stuff for free, too. The open platform has allowed for an explosion of new material, some of it rough-hewn, some of it slick as the pros, most of it targetted more narrowly than the old media ever managed. Rupert Murdoch can rattle his saber all he likes about taking his content out of Google, but I say do it, Rupert. We'll miss your fraction of a fraction of a fraction of a percent of the Web so little that we'll hardly notice it, and we'll have no trouble finding material to fill the void." - Cory Doctorow
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Wednesday, 19 January 2011

Das Klima ist kaput. (The Climate is broken)

Posted on 07:55 by hony
"It's only after you lose everything that you're free to do anything." - Tyler Durden, Fight Club

I suppose this post will irritate some people. I didn't actually sit down at my laptop, just now, and think "I should write a post that will irritate the small group of readers who actually visit here."

But the truth is, I've come to believe, after waffling back and forth for a long time, that Earth's biosphere is totally finished. And I don't think this really is that novel of a thought. The truth is, our environment was probably inescapably doomed many years ago, when homo sapiens discovered that combustion of carbon could be converted into mechanical work. At that point, the peculiarly balanced biosphere of carbon dioxide fixing via photosynthesis and carbon dioxide respiration via metabolism suddenly was thrown in a decidedly one-directional explosion of black smog. Prior to that day, the worst a city of humans could do was burn a little wood in their stoves for warmth. Upon the advent of the boiler, we got this. And this. And eventually, this.

In any case, upon the discovery that mechanical work could be derived from the combustion of carbon, the world was forever doomed. I say doomed because no real significant progress is being made to slow the imbalance of carbon dioxide on this planet. I say doomed because carbon dioxide isn't even the worst thing our species is doing, and most of the other things get significantly less media exposure.
The way I see it, there are three main reasons why the current biosphere of this planet is inexorably moving towards finity.

1. Industrialized countries, especially the United States, are host to a peculiar version of humans that deny our species is capable of destroying the biosphere. They seem to argue that Earth is some pseudo-magical super-organism, and that the planet itself can correct any imbalance..."right the ship" if you will. Of course, these people are the ones that listened to Phil Cooney, as he doctored White House memos. They listen to Rush Limbaugh, who argued that Al Gore and Arnold Schwarzenegger should be hospitalized for mental instability due to their professed concerns over the climate. These people were the first in line when any sort of environmental legislation comes about, ready to make fun of environmentalists like Al Gore, ready to suggest that because some data was fudged, it all must be, ready to pay lobbyists to convince Congresspeople that pro-climate legislation will almost certainly cost the United States at least one job. And one job is one too many to lose!
And these people are winning. They are the loudest, their audience is the vote-iest, and their numbers are growing. More Americans today acknowledge skepticism that global warming exists...at all.
A skeptic might tell me that America isn't the only Industrialized Nation out there, and that Europeans have been doing a much better job of cleaning their air...but thanks to the incredibly-well-publicized Climategate, people all across the globe are hopping on the bandwagon of the "Climate Change Doubtful."
As the biosphere accelerates away from stability, humans actually seem less likely to try to fix it, not more.

2. We're already totally destroying the air and developing nations are not even close to their potential yet. Let's compare per capita incomes of a few nations, their per person annual CO2 emissions, and their population.


What is really remarkable here isn't how high the U.S. CO2 output is, but rather how low everyone else is. Quick math would show that despite lower per capita CO2, China has a higher total CO2 output than the US, due to its much higher population. And there's the worry.
But what I want readers to note is that pre-industrial countries, i.e. India, Indonesia, Brazil, and nearly a hundred others, all have inconsequential CO2 output...for now. But as industrialization spreads, as it is into China in the last two decades, you can see how CO2 output starts to ramp up. If the Chinese were producing CO2 like their American cousins...you think we'd notice?
So the problem becomes not one of "what can we do?" but "who will be doing it?" because developing nations really don't have the capability to worry about CO2 emissions. Industrialization is an inherently dirty process; history seems to suggest that only at the top of the pile can you stop and dust your pants off. So it is one thing to suggest that Americans (and Europeans) clean up their act, but it is another to try to suggest that the entire human race do the same.
What I am getting at is this: while many humans on this planet might believe we can cut CO2 emissions and even save the biosphere...about 9 out of 10 humans currently alive are in no place to worry about it. But 10 out of 10 humans produce CO2.

3. While I write about CO2 emissions, another 1,000 acres of ocean becomes a lifeless, airless cesspool. Like I've written before...so many times...poisoning the air with CO2 isn't really a problem (little human food comes from the air) as is the poisoning of the seas. Humans, especially those in many parts of the developing world, rely on a diet containing fish.
I almost don't want to talk about the declining populations of fish in our oceans...or the difficulty in regulating fisheries due to the complexities of international waters. I don't feel like suggesting that in the last 10 years, a growing Western taste for sushi has been catastrophic to many species of fish from many different ecosystems. I almost can't describe how even as ocean species obviously dwindle towards extinction...our species just pretends to be doing "research" to continue extracting them from the ocean at an alarming rate.
No, what I want to point out is the accelerating spread of "ocean dead zones," which are basically huge swaths of normally fish-friendly tropical ocean that have become barren, lifeless wastes due to the algae sucking all the oxygen out of the water. "But algae night-time cellular respiration is a naturally-occurring phenomenon," some wikipedia-armed skeptic  argues.
While algae are in fact real creatures, what isn't a naturally occurring phenomena is the dumping of thousands of tons of nitrogen-rich, fertilizer laden freshwater out into the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River. Is it any coincidence that the place on Earth that has the most ocean dead zones is the exact location where all the silty runoff (from government subsidized farmers trying to produce "sustainable" biodiesel from corn) ends up? And if you look at this map and follow my logic from section two, the industrialized nations are the ones with lovely, growing dead zones. As India and China continue to develop (and other smaller nations as well) will ocean dead zones continue to spread...uh, duh.
So we've got this scenario, coming, and by scenario I mean "the way it IS going to be" where almost all the life in the oceans is concentrated in the regions where all the dead zones are going to occur. Oh, and try to tell a starving fisherman that he can't fish anymore, the ocean needs a century to recover. But then again, if he doesn't stop fishing now, he'll have to stop later...when his catch disappears into history.



The idea that the globe can support around 9.5 billion humans sustainably is a laugh. "All you have to do is give world leaders more engineers on their staffs," engineers claim. Somehow, they think that 9.5 billion people can be fed if we "solve world hunger politics and eliminate food waste." As in, they take "eat your veggies, kids in Africa are starving" literally. The way I see it, Earth can sustain as many people as our civilization can sustain prior to the Industrial Revolution. So maybe 1-1.5 billion. Of course, part of the reason the Industrial Revolution happened was that so many people in urbanized areas had a really unhealthy lifestyle, and the innovations of the time allowed them to achieve a healthier living which countered the unhealthy urban location/work they inhabited. Really, Earth cannot sustain urbanized humans at all, so perhaps a human population of around 500 million, scattered in small villages in temperate and coastal zones.
But I'd be kidding myself if I even tried to pretend like a human population reduction of 93% in the next century was plausible, or even desirable.

"So what is to be done?" Optimists who have written off my three points as "fixable" or "hyperbole" probably have a few ideas, like "increasing the efficiency of buildings will reduce carbon consumption for heating and cooling" and "solar panels" and "increased use of mass transit." More radical (yet equally futile) ideas like "nuclear fusion" and "humanity switching completely to a vegan diet" would certainly make a dent. But like I said before...try getting a starving fisherman to stop fishing...and to switch to tofu. Other people might argue with me that "gradual change" will save the day. Unfortunately for them, the current gradual change is a gradual decline in the number of animal species on Earth, a gradual decline in the quality of air on Earth, a gradual decline in the amount of available freshwater, a gradual decline in habitable zones, a gradual incline in the global average temperature, a gradual incline in the number of humans living in urban areas, a gradual incline in the amount of fertilizer and pesticide being used, a gradual incline in the number of antibiotic resistant bacteria, a gradual increase in the cases of plague and other "urban" diseases, a gradual incline in the size of deserts, a gradual decline in the size of aquifers, a gradual decrease in the quality of wild animal herds, and of course...a gradual increase in human population.
Others might argue that it is a moral imperative that developed nations enact sustainable living practices. To which I say "I dare you to send a bill to Congress proposing that."

No, friends, I just don't think we can fix it. I just don't think that by the time my daughter is old enough to write her own blog posts, that the world will even be headed in the right direction. Too much has to change, too soon.

Rather, I think we need to start coming to grips with the idea that the biosphere of our grandparents will simply not be the biosphere of our grandchildren. Our grandchildren will not get to eat fresh Pacific salmon. They will not have raw oysters on the half shell. Or at least not for a realistic price. They will probably consider water a much more serious utility to pay for than electricity. They will consider filet-o-fish, not filet mignon, an exquisite meaty delicacy. Our grandchildren will certainly pay a lot more for food.
Smart people in our grandchildren's generation will have invested in arable land, or in mountainous land that sees a lot of snowmelt. Lobbyists will increasingly work for corporate farmers, to secure water rights for irrigation. As the temperature continues to rise, and weather subsequently continues to become more extreme, food crops that can withstand higher temperature ranges will become more common. More sensitive crops, like fruit, will become less feasible to grow in many areas, and so will become very expensive. As more countries urbanize and develop, this will further push demand for fruits and vegetables up. I imagine my grandchildren will get most of their vitamins and minerals from multi-vitamins and supplements...if not from genetically-modified grain crops that produce additional nutrients artificially.
Pork (the de facto third option meat) will rise in popularity, both because it can be produced with less resources than beef, and also because GMO pork that produces Omega 3 fatty acids is already a reality.
National and State Parks will be increasingly crowded; as arid nation-states continue to develop, parks could very easily become the target of terrorists wanting to tarnish the Western Image, rather than cities.

Anyway, if you remember the quote at the top of this post, here's my point: we need to start accepting the idea that we screwed up the Earth beyond fixing. We need to start understanding that those who will deny change occurred at all are a significant enough force that those who want to prevent further change will be exhaustively defeated. We need to stop brainstorming solutions to the "sustainability problem" and start brainstorming solutions to the unsustainable reality. Can we really, especially in the divisive political climate found in every nation on Earth, expect the human race to radically change? No. But the Earth cannot tolerate gradual change. So we must instead do what humans do best: adapt. Accept the reality of Earth as a biosphere in transition to a new biosphere, and work hard to protect ourselves as the change occurs. Almost certainly, Earth in a thousand years will be significantly less habitable for most species than it is now. But that does not mean humans cannot continue to thrive.

Perhaps that is the deeper point I am driving towards here. I have given up hope that Earth, as we know it now or knew it a hundred years ago, can be recovered. But I still cling to the hope that our brilliant, adaptable species can survive the change. I'm sure it is going to be messy. I'm sure it won't to be fair. But I really believe, deep down, that humans possess the ability and the innate instinct to survive almost anything. Even themselves.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Tuesday, 18 January 2011

Why Your Patent Won't Be Reviewed in a Timely Manner

Posted on 13:10 by hony
I just stumbled across this page on the Canon U.S.A. website, touting their awesome achievement of 2,204 patents granted to them in 2009. Sadly, they only got fifth place in the patent-war, with winner IBM being granted 4,897 patents in 2009.

How in the HELL do you submit that many patents in a single year? Between the top 5 companies on this list, 13,615 patents were awarded in a single year. And this doesn't even cover the huge percentage of patents that were rejected. It's likely that these 13,615 patents are less than 50% of the number of patent applications filed by these companies.

How could these companies possibly hope to police all their patents, if they are granted at this rate? TAE suggests they make no effort at all to prevent people using their technology, but rather upon finding someone making a profit off a technology they have patented...they then seize that profit as infringement.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

The DIY Arduino Sous Vide Cooker, Part II - Results

Posted on 10:47 by hony
So I finally got my DIY sous vide cooker up and running. I actually had it "done" a few months ago, but due to moving, busy-ness at work, and life in general, I haven't gotten around to putting together this write-up, until now.
The first step was to acquire, which I did for free, a cooler. I had this old one from my fraternity days with a missing handle, so it was really ready for a dissection (vivisection?).
From the hardware store (McMaster-Carr in this case) I got a 120V, 1 phase, 1500W water heater heating element. I drilled a hole in the long side of the cooler down at one end (near where I would place my fan) and installed, via a crapton of silicone caulk, the water heater. I drilled a second hole on the short end above the drain plug and installed a submersible fan, which I had jury-rigged basically by taking the butt-end of this decoy propellor and wiring a twisted pair to it. Outputting 1.5V from an Arduino Duemilanove is pretty easy, so I figured that would work fine.

The lid of the cooler had four cup-holders built into it, so I drilled holes in two of them. These holes were for my two temperature sensors. I eventually decided to write my software to do a simple (X + Y) / 2 temperature average. To make my temperature sensors, I decided against the termistors and instead bought some LM34 temperature sensors off of Digikey. Then I wired the red/green/black to them, and put them inside of a 1" long piece 3/8" diameter stainless steel tubing. To waterproof this, I filled it with a 2-part epoxy with good thermal conductance that we had sitting around here in the lab. Waterproof silicone caulk should work as well. Although this method makes for rugged, easy temperature sensors that cost almost nothing, the delta T gets much slower. This really isn't a concern though, because cook times are on the order of hours, and by "slow delta T" I mean 15-30 seconds. For a good guide on how to make these sensors, go see this website on Arduino-based beer brewing.
To further ruggedize the temperature sensor, I heat shrank over the twisted trio. This single black wire then routed up out the lid through the two pre-drilled holes, and over to the Arduino. I caulked the gaps in these holes shut with epoxy, for better insulation.
Finally, I added an old dial thermometer, for calibration purposes. This hard-mounted through the side of the cooler via a 17/64" hole. I caulked it in, just to be sure.

That's it for hardware. Well, kind of. The water heating element, obviously, requires AC power, so I grabbed an old 10A, 120V AC/DC relay we had in the lab that takes 2.3-5V input and controls the output. I figured the 1500W heater would be current limited by this switch, and therefore wouldn't risk exploding/frying. NOTE: DO NOT RUN A HEATING ELEMENT NOT SUBMERGED, IT WILL TORCH ITSELF!
I also ended up getting a relay for the submerged fan; although using a square wave to output variable voltage is possible with my Arduino, the fan seemed to surge and die, surge and die, surge and die and I wanted it to have a good long life before the motor burned out, so I got a switch that input 0-5V and output from a 1.5V AA battery.

I made a simple breadboard with a 5V line and a 0V line. The two LM34 sensors took 5V input, as did the two switches. I then tied the Arduino board across everything (wiring diagram will come when I have some friggin' time). The way it works basically is this:
1. Every minute (60,000 steps) it takes a reading from each of the LM34 sensors, sums and divides them, then converts this value into a temperature value based on a pre-selected calibration (depending on the manufacturer, this value may be given...confirm it via testing anyway).
2a. If the temperature falls below the temperature you selected at the beginning of your run, the heating element and the fan kick on for 30 seconds. Then they heating element kicks off and the fan runs for another 20 seconds. Then the fan kicks off for 10 seconds. Repeat back to 1.
2b. If the temperature >= desired cook temperature, the system simply waits a minute before returning to state 1.

At first I wanted to write some elaborate PID control loop, but it turned out I needed a PID-capable switch for my heating element to vary the output current...which I didn't want to buy because I wanted this project to be EL CHEAPO. So instead I've got this super simple if/else control loop. It works because the heating element has such a low power that the water basically doesn't get thermally shocked. If you do your own version of this project, you'll need to develop your own timing, but the steps 1, 2a, and 2b can work for you just the same as it did for me. The trick was to not turn the heating element on and off too much, as this would fatigue both the heating element and the switch.

When I start a new cooking-series, I just set the Arduino software with a "time" which is just hours *60000 and temperature, in Fahrenheit. Then I put my food in vacuum-saver bags, put them in the cooler, and fill the cooler most of the way full with tepid water. You can find a host of sous vide recipes online, you can find other DIY sous vide cookers online too. But this cooker cost almost nothing and works perfectly, so I thought I'd share it with the DIY crowd.

Parts:
Cooler = Free
Heating Element = 12.09
Switch = Free
LM34 Sensor X 2 = 5.02
Arduino Duemilanove = Free
Submersible Fan =  9.99
Submersible Fan Relay = 3.98
Silicone Caulk = 1.24
Wires etc = Free
TOTAL: $32.32

Like I said above, I have not had a chance to draw up the wiring diagram I used...though it is so incredibly simple that it is a laugh that I should even need to do it. But I'll try to get around to it. I'll also post a few pictures. Including pictures of some delightful food! For now, just understand that this was my first Arduino project and it went splendidly and you should be completely unafraid of taking this project on yourself if you are also interested. Please email me or send me comments if you need help understanding what I did, have recommendations for other readers, or just want to chime in with your own ideas!

Update: I noticed the $400 Sous-Vide Supreme comes with a vacuum sealer system. For my work, I just used Freezer Bags (generic brand, of course), and closed them up except for the very corner where I piped in a small tube to a tiny, $5 vacuum pump I had at work. I use this to suck out as much air as I can, then I simply pull the tube and close the freezer bag. Worked like a charm every time. Best to freeze any liquids you might be adding to your mix, though, else the vacuum pump would suck them right up!

Update 2: Schematic can be found here.
_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Monday, 17 January 2011

Computers as brains - ethics

Posted on 18:52 by hony
Tim Lee and Robin Hanson have had a good time going back and forth on this and I added my two cents as well, but I think I'll let the topic go...well, almost...

One last thought (building off my last two posts) on modeling the human brain with a computer: why would anyone want to?
Perhaps one could argue that an accurate brain model on computer would allow us to create and study various illnesses that occur in the brain, and understand them better. We could "age" our computer brain, and learn just what happens to a brain as it gets old, and hopefully develop methods to keep the biological counterparts sharp to the last.
Those are noble wishes, and I can't say I disagree with them. But this entire argument stemmed from the idea that we'd all "port" or "emulate" ourselves onto machines and the Singularity would come.

This, then, begs a serious ethical response. Should it be legal to clone a copy of yourself and keep it under medically induced coma, in case you are injured and need spare parts? I think the issues here are the same. A clone of myself would come in handy if I got shot in the chest, or fell off a building. A clone of myself would be nice if I were called to fight in war, and needed replacement limbs after IEDs blew the originals to shreds. But a clone of me, a fully functional human being...is a human being nonetheless, and therefore has rights.
What does this have to do with computer-brains? Well, the answer is simple. If I were able to port my brain, exactly as it is, into a computer, the first act upon completing this task would be CTRL + C. The second act would be CTRL + V, CTRL + V, CTRL + V, CTRL + V, CTRL + V, CTRL + V, CTRL + V...

If one of me is fun (I like myself quite a bit) then surely eight of me would be even better! But now I've got eight sentient Alex Wallers floating around in the the ethereal reaches of cyberspace. Which one is me? Which one has rights? Do any of them? Do all of them? How does my lovely wife know if she's interacting with the original me? Would it matter? Copying our brains to machines seems like an incredibly reckless and society-destroying plan.


I know this sounds ridiculous, but what is to stop me, upon downloading my conscience to cyber space...from completely filling every hard drive I can with copies of myself...like some viral Agent Smith, filling The Matrix with me, me, and more ME! I digress. The point is, while developing the technology to create a brain-simulator seems like a worthy and admirable goal...developing the technology to create a brain-emulator seems like a dangerous and perilous goal. That said, I have argued already that I see that day coming. Heaven help us if it comes before our species is ready.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

More on Modeling the Human Brain with Computers

Posted on 17:55 by hony
I was pleased (humbled?) to get a polite and not-angry response from Timothy B. Lee in regards to his dissent that we can model the human brain via computers. He does beg me for a reply:
I agree with you that an insect brain would be a good starting place. Do you know if there are any efforts in this area? I would be surprised if anyone has succeeded in simulating an insect brain in software, but if that happens it will cause me to re-consider my argument.
Here, you can find an IBM press release about trying to build a cat-sized brain. Here, you can find my exact argument (written by someone who actually knows this stuff) that a human-brain model is such a monumental task that scientists should, and are, building bug models first.


But I think Lee, in his well-written reply, overstates the peril in modeling a complex system:
I'm not a neurologist, but as I understand it, neurons do all sorts of interesting things that aren't really captured by the models you described: they grow new connections to other neurons, they change their behavior in reaction to changes in the concentrations of various hormones, they're tightly coupled to various other bodily systems like your eyes and your muscles, and so forth.

The question is whether you could build a software model that modeled all of these relevant behaviors while still being reasonably efficient. I'm skeptical on both counts: I doubt we'll ever have a mathematically tractable model for every relevant aspect of a neuron's behavior (we're still struggling with protein folding, for example), and I think that if we did come up with such a model, it's likely to be sufficiently bloated that we won't have enough computing power to run 100 billion copies in parallel for many decades.

I think he has a valid point; exactly mimicking a neuron in every way is probably impossible, either with hardware, or with software as I suggested. However, I think we need to ponder the following: can nature be computationally modeled accurately using simplifications?
By and large, the answer is yes. He admits it, really, in his original post. If we simplify the weather and model it,we can fairly accurately forecast it...at least in the short term. And the thing is, if I want to know the weather forecast for 24 hours in the future I don't need all the world's supercomputers combined doing a massive CFD simulation. I just need a single weather station's Doppler and a decent software program.
Another example would be computational dynamics modeling of human-made structures, like bridges and buildings. Sure, a fair argument could be made that the only truly accurate model of a bridge would be one that included every single iota of concrete, perfectly modeled the wind blowing past it, and perfectly modeled each and every possible combination of cars and trucks that could ever go over it (including perfect models of those vehicles). But for the sake of sanity, a simplified computational model with a few million nodes can give a pretty damn accurate picture of just what might happen to the bridge in the next 25 years.

I'd be an arse if I tried to say dynamic modeling of a bridge was anywhere near the complexity required to model the brain. But nevertheless, what I am getting at is that increasingly complex models of neuronal interaction and increasingly accurate models of the behavior of a neuron could create more and more realistic models of a human (or insect or cat or whatever) brain. Eventually, its not impossible to believe that we could hack together some sort of simulation that actually was accurate enough to mimic a brain.

I think people who suggest the Technological Singularity will occur in their lifetime are the same as people who suggest Jesus will return during theirs or people who expect to make contact with aliens during their lifetime. I do not know if it is arrogance that makes a human think that the influential events will occur while they are alive (not after or worse - before), but something about us makes us want to "be here" for these events. I do not agree with Tim Lee; the day will come when humanity constructs a computational simulation of a human brain that equals our biological one. The day will come with biology and technology blur and meld. But I find it extremely dubious when people suggest it will happen by next Tuesday.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Friday, 14 January 2011

A Failed Take-Down of Robin Hanson

Posted on 08:56 by hony
If you ever disagree with someone on a subject, and want to write a counterargument, the first thing you should do is argue semantics. Or at least that is what Timothy B. Lee thinks. By arguing that your opponent doesn't have a grasp of the terms used, you can effectively cut him or her off at the knees. Once you've got your reader doubting that your opponent knows what he or she is talking about, explain what word they should have used. This makes your reader automatically think you are very knowledgeable. Finally, use an analogy the reader can understand to explain why your opponent is wrong, even if the analogy doesn't really apply. Since the reader probably cannot understand the complexities of the ACTUAL argument you and your opponent are making, they'll grasp your analogy as an easier version. Once again, your analogy doesn't really need to apply. It just has to seem like it does.

Tim Lee, a PhD student from Princeton, argues that Robin Hanson is wrong; we'll never port emulate the human brain inside a machine. He reasons that human neurons are simply too complicated to mimic with circuitry. This, to me, is a fair argument, given that modern electronics (at least until quantum computing is realized) consists of digital media. Neurons work more like an analog system, with varying levels of input excitation causing varying outputs. But the argument he makes, that "But each neuron is itself a complex biological system. I see no reason to think we’ll ever be able to reduce it to a mathematically tractable model." is a fallacy because we already have pretty rigorous models of neurons. Back in college, I took a graduate level class entitled "Bioelectricity" whose fundamental premise was that you could mathematically model the propogation of electricity in a field of interconnected neurons with a high level of accuracy. The Professor, Dr. Gillis, did a fantastic job of teaching us breakdown voltages, propagation rules, and the electrical output that could be monitored via external sensors.

In a huge oversimplification, here's what happens: a neuron receives a signal. If the incoming signal is weak, it does not cause a cascade in the neuron. But once a neuron receives a signal of high enough intensity to cause an ion cascade, the signal is amplified and propagated down the neuron to another neuron. Repeat. The reason you have memories is because neurons have developed specific, strong connections with each other. When you want to recall something, the neuron chain fires a strong cascade down this pre-ordained path, and your brain "rethinks" the memory. Basically.

In any case, what I think Lee is not addressing is that neurons needn't be modeled as hardware, interconnected via software. Instead I think we should imagine the brain as a collection of 100 billion software programs all connected by other software programs. Whereas logic gates are 1 or 0, software has no such digital restriction. PID controllers are a good example of this.
If we could write a software that accurate mimicked the aforementioned breakdown voltage curves, the propagation speed, and the ability to communicate with other softwares, I can see us making a sufficiently accurate model of a neuron. Then other software could (like brain simulating systems already do) mimic the interconnectedness of the nerves. A software-based emulation of the brain seems plausible to me.
Though not without hardware issues. Namely, 100 billion software-neurons with several trillion axon-softwares would potentially require an individual processor and memory for each program. That's a lot of hardware. Conversely, as CPUs and memory get faster, its possible a single CPU (running at gigahertz) could handle many software-neurons, which operate much slower.

As for Timothy B. Lee's weather prediction analogy, while it is true that a massive amount of computing is required for weather forecasting, and that these forecasts decrease in accuracy the further into the future they predict. This, Lee writes, is because these little imperfections will "snowball" into larger inaccuracies.
But here's the problem: he's saying global weather prediction is accurate in the present but not in the future. And he's saying this would apply to a model of the brain because it is also a complex system. But why do we need to predict what a brain will do in the future? We don't. What we need is a highly-accurate model of the brain in the present. And he admits a highly accurate model of weather can be created for the present.
Who cares what a brain does in the future? It's impossible to know what it will think next! Creating a highly accurate map of a human brain, including the interconnections between each and every neuron would be an incredibly difficult feat...but not an impossible one. Creating a customized software-neuron that accurately represented the behavior of the real-neuron that it was intended to mimic would be an incredibly difficult feat...but not an impossible one. Building a computer capable of running all these neuron-softwares at the same time would be an incredibly difficult feat...but once again, not an impossible one.

Further, its pretty hard to model weather for a small area of the world, given that the input into that system come from outside of it. But with a brain, you can start small scale, quite easily. Research into modeling a cat brain is ongoing. As I've argued before: why not start small, with an insect brain or a rodent brain. The neuron-software will still be as complicated as ever, but the total number of neuron-softwares and axon-softwares needed will be greatly diminished. If we could build a bee-brain first, it would help determine the accuracy of the system...help eliminate "snowballs" from rolling down the hill before we scaled up to your brain and my brain.

I agree that copying our brains into a computer will not be possible in the next couple decades. But as Arthur C. Clarke famously wrote: "When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right; when he states that something is impossible, he is probably wrong."


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Friday Poetry Burst

Posted on 06:28 by hony
I'm cheating, this week. I'm going to post some prose! While prose and poetry are seemingly exclusive...certain segments of prose can accomplish the same purpose as a poem; invoke feelings and imagery, make the reader introspect on something, etc. Anyways, here it is:

"There, peeping among the cloud-wrack above a dark tor high up in the mountains, Sam saw a white star twinkle for a while. The beauty of it smote his heart, as he looked up out of the forsaken land, and hope returned to him. For like a shaft, clear and cold, the thought pierced him that in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty for ever beyond its reach." -Tolkien, The Return of the King

Tolkien had a gift.
_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Thursday, 13 January 2011

Happy 10th Birthday, Wikipedia

Posted on 18:24 by hony
My life would suck without you. Seriously. Websites like Wikipedia, and forums related to DIY are what make the internet great.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Wednesday, 12 January 2011

Wikipedia Article of the Day

Posted on 11:41 by hony
Pumapard.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Magnetic Foxes

Posted on 10:29 by hony
Forgive me while I gush, but this research is simply astounding. Apparently foxes typically pounce on prey in a northeasterly direction? Nature is unbelievable.
Foxes jump high into the air before dropping onto prey. Burda's team found that when the foxes could see their prey they jumped from any direction but when prey were hidden, they almost always jumped north-east. Such attacks were successful 72 per cent of the time, compared with 18 per cent of attacks in other directions.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Where are the women that go insane?

Posted on 10:21 by hony

Dan Savage’s map brought to my mind one very poignant constant in all of these incidents (Ft. Hood, Oklahoma City and 17 separate postal incidents included): they were perpetrated by men. Can you think of a woman assassin in all of U.S. history? Though some may exist, I cannot think of them. Shouldn’t someone be looking into this!? Surely there is some critical cause that makes a man (and not a woman) capable of gunning unarmed people down.
Male propensity towards acts of violence have been documented for centuries though. Yet male-oriented classes on peaceful conflict resolution are few and far between. In order to get my engineering degree I was required to take an “ethics” course, with the hope it would make me more ethical. Why not have young men take a conflict resolution class, or a peaceful self-expression class? Should Congress rush to pass a sweeping Gun Control Law…or should they rush to enact better counseling and education for boys on how to deal with their anger?
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Friday, 7 January 2011

Friday Poetry Burst

Posted on 11:48 by hony
John D. Rockefeller, 1926 -

I was early taught to work as well as play,
My life has been one long, happy holiday;
Full of work and full of play-
I dropped the worry on the way-
And God was good to me everyday.



_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Thursday, 6 January 2011

The End of an Era

Posted on 08:02 by hony
Last night, the beginning of the end of the laptop officially began.

Sure the iPad has been around...but with nearly 30 tablets debuting at CES, and with Android 3.0 nearing rollout, and with Microsoft announcing a tablet-friendly version of Windows 7...one has to really start to ask: why would you buy a $600 laptop when you could get a tablet for the same price that does the same stuff...better?


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

I should read this post to myself every day.

Posted on 07:45 by hony

Father Forgets, by Livingston Larned

Listen, son: I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead. I have stolen into your room alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me. Guiltily I came to your bedside.

There are the things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.

At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, ‘Goodbye, Daddy!’ and I frowned, and said in reply, ‘Hold your shoulders back!’

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came up the road I spied you, down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated you before your boyfriends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were expensive – and if you had to buy them you would be more careful! Imagine that, son, from a father!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door. ‘What is it you want?’ I snapped.You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither. And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible sickening fear came over me. What has habit been doing to me? The habit of finding fault, of reprimanding – this was my reward to you for being a boy. It was not that I did not love you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night. Nothing else matters tonight, son. I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

It is a feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours. But tomorrow I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come. I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: ‘He is nothing but a boy – a little boy!’

I am afraid I have visualized you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby. Yesterday you were in your mother’s arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much, too much.

Love you, Ava.
_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Wednesday, 5 January 2011

Speaking of Studying

Posted on 06:21 by hony
Perhaps the most valuable wikipedia entry ever created.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misconceptions


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Quote for the Day

Posted on 06:15 by hony
"Say not, 'When I have free time I shall study'; for you may perhaps never have any free time." -Hillel the Elder


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Tuesday, 4 January 2011

Hollywood Rewrites the Laws of Celestial Motion

Posted on 06:45 by hony
Phil Torbett:
"In the just-released trailer for the third Transformers movie, the premise is that the Apollo missions were a cover to explore a downed alien spacecraft. When the moon spins and the Apollo landing area is no longer facing Earth, the astronauts climb a ridge and explore the massive alien craft which is mere feet away from the Lunar Module. When the moon spins back, the astronauts quickly return to the lander and pretend to be collecting rocks. But the moon revolves such that we always see the same side. This makes the opening premise of the movie impossible, because any alien craft that landed in the Sea of Tranquility would have been continuously observable from Earth with a decent telescope."


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

A Book

Posted on 06:09 by hony
People keep telling me "you should write a book."
I keep responding "um, about what?"

Dear readers, please email or post in comments book ideas for me. If I choose your idea and write a book about it and get filthy stinking rich, I'll buy you a Chipotle burrito for having the winning idea. Hell, I'll buy you TWO burritos.

_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Monday, 3 January 2011

Bold Predictions - 2011

Posted on 06:33 by hony
Back in the year 2000, there were about 360 million human beings on Earth that used the internet regularly. That was about 5% of the population. In 2010, 1.9 billion people use the internet, which is approximately 25% of the people on Earth. That is a staggering increase in a mere decade, considering the infrastructure and technology required to reach certain inhospitable regions.
One must wonder, however, if we'll ever reach 100%. Certainly internet access will continue to proliferate. In the last ten years, the number of new internet users has increased every year. That is, the internet has accelerated. Will it ever slow down?

TAE thinks 2011 will be the first year that the number of new internet users will be less than the year before. I humbly suggest that many locations where internet access was easily gotten have reached saturation. As you read this...can you think of a single person you know who doesn't have any internet access?
As it becomes harder to find new users (though there are 5+ billion), infrastructure (both electrical and data) must spread ahead of the internet. Perhaps this is an argument for smartphones; you don't need the data lines anymore, eliminating one level of infrastructure. But the cost of a smart phone (which basically can only serve a single user) is so much higher than the cost for the internet (where a group could share a single internet connection quite easily).
In any case, looking farther ahead, this makes me wonder of ISPs could become change agents, forcing hostile governments to aid their people, or just marching in on their own with power lines and data cabling and cheap computers, desperate for new users to see their ads. Could it be that the proliferation of the internet will force, in some places, a better world?
Because what use does a starving man have for the internet? But give him food, and a warm bed, and suddenly he has time to watch youtube videos. As the internet spreads into remote regions (and it will), it can only do so if it can sell ads to the people in those places. And so the spread of the internet will become limited by the spread of industrialization.

And so TAE's Official Prediction is 2011 - The Year The Internet Slowed Down


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments

Bold Predictions - 2010

Posted on 06:11 by hony
Last year, I called 2010 the year of the human machine interface. Turns out I was pretty accurate. From announcements that nanowires could read/write to nerve fibers to DARPA's Reliable Peripheral Interfaces program, it seems this year a lot of folks were interested in getting machines to communicate with humans more intimately.
Some day soon, I believe, the efforts of scientists in 2010 in this field will yield my long-awaited USB port in my arm. TAE's Law of Bionics: All You Need is Drivers.


_
Read More
Posted in | No comments
Newer Posts Older Posts Home
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)

Popular Posts

  • In which I criticize the antiquated feelings of Ye Olde Mechanikal Engineer
    In a Lawrence Journal World blog, Dave Klamet writes about changing trends in education, especially the increasing competitiveness of non-A...
  • The End of an Era
    Last night, the beginning of the end of the laptop officially began . Sure the iPad has been around...but with nearly 30 tablets debuting at...
  • I promise to stop writing about STEM soon. Just not yet.
    Imagine you are a tech company that makes widgets. You've gotten a factory in China to make the parts for the widgets for a tiny amount....
  • Schadenfreude
    Ran into a kid that bullied me from elementary school all the way up through my junior year of high school. He's really fat now, and dri...
  • Ross Vs. Gay Marriage
    Listening to Ross Douthat (a Catholic) try to explain that the institution of marriage will be damaged by allowing gays to marry just seems...
  • Links
    I've been terribly swamped with work the last week, and when I wasn't working, I was loudly defending gun rights. Subsequently, the ...
  • Staying abreast of technology
    TAE thinks that it is a good idea to embrace every new technology that emerges, be it Twitter, Facebook, mp3s, tablet PCs, and now the new M...
  • flash on the Droid
    made posting this much easier.
  • Being Randomly At A Movie Isn't "True Heroism'
    Now I realize I am probably making no friends when I post this, but I did feel strongly about it. What exactly makes the victims of the Auro...
  • Apex Predator Predation
    So it's a tragedy if African Lions are being massively depopulated, and "there has to be a political commitment to protect wildlif...

Blog Archive

  • ►  2013 (41)
    • ►  July (4)
    • ►  June (7)
    • ►  May (4)
    • ►  April (6)
    • ►  March (8)
    • ►  February (8)
    • ►  January (4)
  • ►  2012 (91)
    • ►  December (8)
    • ►  November (5)
    • ►  October (11)
    • ►  September (8)
    • ►  August (8)
    • ►  July (3)
    • ►  June (10)
    • ►  May (12)
    • ►  April (3)
    • ►  March (9)
    • ►  February (10)
    • ►  January (4)
  • ▼  2011 (205)
    • ►  December (11)
    • ►  November (14)
    • ►  October (10)
    • ►  September (18)
    • ►  August (18)
    • ►  July (10)
    • ►  June (15)
    • ►  May (11)
    • ►  April (32)
    • ►  March (24)
    • ►  February (16)
    • ▼  January (26)
      • The Trickle Down Disaster of Sustainability
      • What is coming
      • Topics Not Mentioned A Single Time in the SOTU
      • In which I criticize the antiquated feelings of Ye...
      • Metallic Glass Created.
      • Quote of the Day
      • Das Klima ist kaput. (The Climate is broken)
      • Why Your Patent Won't Be Reviewed in a Timely Manner
      • The DIY Arduino Sous Vide Cooker, Part II - Results
      • Computers as brains - ethics
      • More on Modeling the Human Brain with Computers
      • A Failed Take-Down of Robin Hanson
      • Friday Poetry Burst
      • Happy 10th Birthday, Wikipedia
      • Wikipedia Article of the Day
      • Magnetic Foxes
      • Where are the women that go insane?
      • Friday Poetry Burst
      • The End of an Era
      • I should read this post to myself every day.
      • Speaking of Studying
      • Quote for the Day
      • Hollywood Rewrites the Laws of Celestial Motion
      • A Book
      • Bold Predictions - 2011
      • Bold Predictions - 2010
  • ►  2010 (163)
    • ►  December (20)
    • ►  November (20)
    • ►  October (23)
    • ►  September (28)
    • ►  August (28)
    • ►  July (29)
    • ►  June (15)
Powered by Blogger.

About Me

hony
View my complete profile