tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2557653546475168082012-01-17T18:54:25.161-08:00Speculation on Complexity, Neuroscience, Science Fiction, and the FutureMichael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.comBlogger3251100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-68590145874312300262012-01-17T13:50:00.000-08:002012-01-17T14:28:42.899-08:00

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Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-72918942675852442232012-01-16T18:31:00.000-08:002012-01-17T18:54:25.200-08:00

This post is a departure from our usual discussions. It relates to statistics and information theory, as applied to a somewhat limited model of communication. In this model, we have two variables with normally distributed amplitudes. One variable is the "true" signal, and the other contains the "true" signal mixed in with some noise. This is a model of a noisy Guassian communication channel. The

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-19879108697197693632012-01-10T22:23:00.000-08:002012-01-10T22:26:11.600-08:00

Last time, I wrote about how gameplay is enacted as a negotiation at the table, with the rules serving as one component of the common grounding for negotiation, a means of abstracting tedious or low-player knowledge negotiations, and furthermore as a wagering game that is fun in and of itself. I was planning to write a follow-up about that last part, but before I could, Wizards of the Coast

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-53383123604000067572011-12-31T00:43:00.000-08:002011-12-31T12:17:29.925-08:00

Everybody else is doing it, so why not me?First the big stuff. A year ago, professional intelligence analysts thought that Belgium was more likely to experience political turmoil than Egypt. Then the Arab Spring happened, and ordinary people rose up and overthrew governments across the region. In Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, dictators fell like dominoes. In Bahrain, protesters were crushed with

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-42409094286098457022011-12-20T16:57:00.000-08:002011-12-20T18:16:52.349-08:00

D&D designer Monte Cook has been posting some interesting, if somewhat incomplete articles about the game design process about running the game, mostly focusing on the opposition between complete rules—a kind of fantasy physics—and DM adjudication. Working off of his ideas, I would like to develop my own theory of what pen-and-paper RPGs are actually about, and how we might go about improving

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-67422182902749139812011-11-29T18:21:00.000-08:002011-11-29T18:26:54.204-08:00

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-66495477949698599932011-11-21T11:15:00.000-08:002011-11-27T22:47:35.589-08:00

This past Friday I had the chance to meet Mark Largent, a historian of science at Michigan State University, who after writing an excellent history of American eugenics, is working on a history of the anti-vaccination movement. The anti-vaccination movement is one of the more contentious flashpoints in popular culture, with views on vaccines ranging from the deliberate poisoning of children by

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-6731080373912658662011-11-01T08:11:00.000-07:002011-11-12T05:33:56.761-08:00

A Shepard tone is an auditory illusion which appears to indefinitely ascend or descend in pitch without actually changing pitch at all. Shepard tones work because they actually contain multiple tones, separated by octaves. As tones get higher in pitch, they fade out. New tones fade in at the lower pitches. The net effect is that it sounds like all the constituent tones are continually increasing

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-71143259206336894602011-10-31T23:39:00.001-07:002011-11-01T14:47:58.108-07:00

I've seen an article bemoaning the end of the book about monthly for as long as I can remember. The most recent one is from Curtis Wright, who argues that the only players left standing in books are Google and Amazon, and that everybody else is just waiting to go out of business. Literature is dead, Oprah's book club just pushes endless waves of trash, etc etc. But why do we even need bookstores?

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-87677140736157089022011-10-25T13:46:00.000-07:002011-10-25T14:12:09.330-07:00

Race Against the Machine, a recent report from two MIT professors, has gathered media attention by laying the blame for the Great Recession and weak recovery on advancing technology, particularly computers, which are replacing human beings. As the New York Times writes:"Faster, cheaper computers and increasingly clever software, the authors say, are giving machines capabilities that were once

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-51192082698039492312011-10-24T16:44:00.000-07:002011-10-26T20:28:16.283-07:00

Inspired by this recent Nobel prize, we've been playing with two-dimensional quasi-crystal patterns again. We spoke briefly of quasicrystals previously : patterns that appear somewhat periodic but never actually repeat. Two-dimensional quasicrystals can be generated by summing together four or more plane waves. In collaboration with Keegan, we've explored ( for entertainment purposes entirely ),

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-64343396509733676442011-10-24T06:30:00.000-07:002011-10-24T16:06:27.457-07:00

So I guess I should start with a confession. I'm not a scientist, I studied English literature at University and teaching the English language to Korean children is the way in which I feed myself from day to day. Since I lack a white coat, couldn't begin to interpret the mathematics of M-Theory and have never worn reading glasses in my life the public at large would perhaps assume I have no

Matthew Lynashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02388621429379113430noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-72283782171336395662011-10-12T13:33:00.000-07:002011-10-18T12:04:34.971-07:00

It's been a month since the start of Occupy Wall Street, and this hmbl blggr is still trying to wrap his head around What It All Means. Occupy has inspired over one hundred similar protests across the United States and the world, prompted some serious discussion of economic inequality, and made pundits say some very silly things (Greenwald has a pretty good summary).First off, why is everybody

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-56978039825370219862011-10-10T12:17:00.000-07:002011-10-11T20:12:46.205-07:00

This Saturday we provided phosphene-hallucination visor kits at less than cost of production for sale at one of the VIA music festival events. It was an interesting experience, honestly somewhat stressful, and there are some things I would have done differently in retrospect. One person unfamiliar with electronics soldering and assembly was able to build a kit over the course of 3 hours, which is

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-8845984199704361152011-10-03T21:51:00.000-07:002011-10-04T19:35:33.342-07:00

Alright kids, as promised, flicker hallucination visor kits for VIA are packed and ready to go! We should have about 30 kits available at Assemble on Wednesday October 5, 4-7PM. There will also be drawdio kits and LED illuminated kites. The Visor kit is a sexy remix of the brain machine kit, which retails for $35. The Visor also cost that much to produce, but we're still looking for last minute

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-16520555399916752152011-09-30T11:07:00.000-07:002011-10-02T17:07:07.781-07:00

Anybody who's paying attention will note that these are unsettled times, from the Arab spring, to youth demonstrations in Spain, Israel, and now Occupy Wallstreet. Via Kevin Kelly who cites the New York Times:Yonatan Levi, 26, called the tent cities that sprang up in Israel “a beautiful anarchy.” There were leaderless discussion circles like Internet chat rooms, governed, he said, by “emoticon”

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-18976351457768364242011-09-29T14:37:00.000-07:002011-11-20T17:25:39.278-08:00

A Model for the Origin and Properties of Flicker-Induced Geometric Phosphenes (PDF). Many people see geometric patterns when looking at flickering lights. The patterns depend on the frequency, color, and intensity of the flickering. People report seeing similar shapes, which care common in visual hallucinations and are called “form constants”. Flicker hallucinations are best induced using a

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-4394970825963981372011-09-28T10:26:00.001-07:002011-09-28T10:38:01.440-07:00

According to Neil deGrasse Tyson circa 2009, republicans politicize science more, but also provide more funding overall. Democrats allocate less funding, but lack fundamentalist biases in how they allocate funding. Which is worse: less funding overall, or overt irrational bias pulling funding from a few key fields? We'd have to look into the details, but if Neil deGrasse Tyson is to be believed,

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-17943265363924224802011-09-27T08:20:00.000-07:002011-09-27T11:27:35.413-07:00

You're probably familiar with Jaron Lanier. VR pioneer, musician, author of You Are Not a Gadget and far too many articles to mention. He's also the inspiration for the Prevail Scenario in Radical Evolution, and the Prevail Project in general. And more recently, he has an hour long interview over at edge.org.The interview and transcript is far too complex to be summarized here, but Jaron

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-88849892680870486692011-09-19T10:16:00.000-07:002011-09-19T10:37:15.371-07:00

WeAlone has teamed up with members of ReplayMyPlay to produce a simplified soldering kit version of the trip visor, complete with professionally fabricated circuit boards and laser etched artwork. This kit is tentatively scheduled for distribution at the Assemble hackerspace in Pittsburgh, in association with the VIA-Pgh electronic arts festival, Saturday October 8, and at the Pittsburgh

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-12700413117893376852011-09-11T06:47:00.000-07:002011-09-16T17:41:16.730-07:00

Kevin Williams at the National Review had a rather controversial article where he posited that it didn't really matter what Rick Perry thinks about evolution, rather science is just another front in the culture war."The broader question, however, is: Why would anybody ask a politician about his views on a scientific question? Nobody ever asks what Sarah Palin thinks about dark matter, or what

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-52623510735889019642011-08-09T16:01:00.000-07:002011-08-09T16:19:52.972-07:00

The latest catastrophe in America governance-the inane brinksmanship over the Debt Ceiling has finally made it official: our representative democracy is too dysfunctional to handle even routine matters, and lack of confidence in government is spilling out into the economy, diplomacy, national security, culture, you name it. Given how totally FUBAR the situation is, I want to take a step back and

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-16085175482598089052011-07-28T16:50:00.000-07:002011-07-28T21:25:04.838-07:00

Kevin Kelly and Bruce Sterling have taken their whacks at the latest from the Long Now foundation. Now only a few days late is my commentary.There's an old adage that if you can describe a problem mathematically, it's 80% solved, and if you can't describe it mathematically, you're never going to get it right. The second modern risks that the world faces today, climate change, political paralysis

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-18129859484492961552011-07-21T17:18:00.000-07:002011-07-22T06:52:09.344-07:00

WeAlone contributor Keegan has adapted the video feedback method of rendering Julia sets to fit in 512 bytes of Intel machine code that runs from the master boot record. This program was created for the IO MBR demo competition.When a computer starts up, a very small program begins the process of loading and booting up progressively more complex programs, until an entire modern operating system is

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-65037714915103489702011-07-15T11:30:00.000-07:002011-07-15T11:41:04.490-07:00

Today, I was catching up on my news, reading about the Clock of the Long Now, when I heard a little story about roof beams at Oxford's New College (really, you should just watch Stewart Brand's clip). Five hundred years ago, at the same time as the college was built, the founders planted oak trees, because they knew that long after they were all dead, the beams would become beetley and

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-4005314006743444442011-07-13T12:17:00.000-07:002011-07-13T12:19:37.327-07:00

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-63505476143247359202011-07-13T11:13:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:09:48.919-07:00

The last two mandatory blogs from my time at Breakthrough are up. Click the links for the full thing.Technological MojoLiberalism as it exists today isn't so much an ideology as a flag of convenience. The progressive position on policies promoting the welfare state and cultural attitudes towards abortion, gun control, and gay marriage unites a solid minority coalition, but one without big ideas

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-1721226626673475622011-06-29T13:39:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:10:53.231-07:00

Google just came up with a report on the potential of clean energy technology, which has received some fairly rapturous coverage in the environmental press. The key insights of the report, as follows:Energy innovation pays off big: We compared “business as usual” (BAU) to scenarios with breakthroughs in clean energy technologies. On top of those, we layered a series of possible clean energy

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-63233566154808054932011-06-23T11:24:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:13:38.970-07:00

Breakthrough has my second blog, on innovation and technological evolution. Is evolutionary economics worthwhile, or just more psuedo-scientific bunk?Policy-makers seeking to ignite the engines of economic growth are turning to a new theory of "innovation economics," which focuses on technological evolution and its supporting institutions. However, the axiom that "innovation drives economic

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-13769243078077858832011-06-15T16:35:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:13:13.626-07:00

I'm spending the summer with the goods folks at the Breakthrough Institute, and as part of that, they have us blogging. Entry #1 has arrived.No country remains great forever; Britain, Spain, Rome, all declined and fell. For many, the 20th century was the American Golden Age, and all that's left is its inevitable decline. Washington DC is a city defined by gridlock and partisan paralysis.

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-66773391139100857672011-06-10T23:48:00.000-07:002011-09-30T15:12:48.758-07:00

I have a google alert out for Bruce Sterling. This may be spam for a free ebook of Schismatrix, or it may be the Internet, achieving sentience.Submitted by Lemesofstog on Fri, 06/10/2011 - 01:57..DOWNLOAD EBOOK >>> SCHISMATRIX BY BRUCE STERLING.A document thus attested can no more be forged or repudiated than a photograph-not so easily, for while the period of half a lifetime effects great

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-48566647743572391652011-06-07T13:41:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:15:34.684-07:00

In my fine tradition of letting We Alone know about everything I'm doing last, if at all, last week I had another article published by the good folks at Science Progress. Biff-1, Conservatives-0.A new report produced by the staff of Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) rails against the National Science Foundation while illustrating a profound misunderstanding of how science is done and how the agency

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-12133963831121307012011-05-14T15:35:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:15:59.650-07:00

I spend a fair amount of time thinking about how we can make humans better, and what the consequences of making people better might be, so reading about how amazing people already are. Brad Voytek is a neuroscientist, and he has an amazing post on the power of our senses.We're used to thinking of our senses as being pretty shite: we can't see as well as eagles, we can't hear as well as bats, and

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-20315389385186167422011-05-05T10:52:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:16:56.283-07:00

By the way, yr humble correspondent has published another article at Science Progress.Innovation is a serious matter. It is the key to American prosperity, security, better jobs, and better health, as well as responses to coming challenges like energy security and global warming. But it’s not as simple as the president’s State of the Union address, or his Strategy for American Innovation would

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-60563097534082281072011-04-23T01:48:00.000-07:002011-07-21T17:17:20.921-07:00

Science in the 20th century produced miracles. Physicists discovered the fundamental building blocks of the universe, chemists invented almost every modern object with plastics, biologists cracked the genetic code, and engineers literally flew to the moon. But at some point, the relationship between science and society went off the rails. Maybe it was a variety of food scares in the European

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-12727123073506158652011-04-10T09:21:00.000-07:002011-11-20T16:51:55.724-08:00

I spent the weekend cooking up an L-system renderer in Processing that zooms into the fractal indefinitely. L-systems are defined by recursive re-write rules, so to zoom simply apply the re-write rule to visible edges, zoom in, and discard off-screen edges. The actual depth of re-write is limited and elements are selected for re-write pseudo-randomly, which creates additional fractal clustering

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-80015259516256514842011-04-04T10:30:00.000-07:002011-07-21T15:13:15.295-07:00

Twelve deep thinkers over at The Edge have a series on risk after the Fukushima disaster. I won’t try and reproduce the complexity and subtlety of their arguments, but risk and risk management are at the heart of what the Prevail Project is about. How can we think about risk in a domain of technological uncertainty? What does risk actually mean?Risk is modern concept, compared with the ancient

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-23944640696364260572011-03-31T19:50:00.000-07:002011-03-31T19:54:56.862-07:00

Though it's definitely not that simple.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-23927933970847104502011-03-31T06:43:00.000-07:002011-04-12T21:11:39.514-07:00

I was reading "What Color are the Bits?", an in depth discussion of the interplay between information theory and copyright law. I like this discussion, with one exception.The authors reference an interesting thought experiment. If I take a copyrighted file, x-or it with a public domain file to produce gibberish, is that gibberish still copyrighted? Their argument is that a Lawyer would say "yes

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-13183741576033725892011-03-29T08:44:00.000-07:002011-04-12T21:24:08.540-07:00

The potential implications of human enhancement is one of the main reasons why I’m at CSPO, so I was excited and a little worried when the trailer for Limitless appeared. Would Hollywood do justice to the topic, or would they make yet another trite cautionary tale?Limitless follows one Eddie Morra, a hapless failure at the age of 35, unable to write, living in a squalid Chinatown walk-up, and

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-48644523965121446262011-03-25T14:50:00.000-07:002011-04-12T21:27:45.828-07:00

In this post, I will advance an explanation of the differences between law and technology, and how ordinary people can reclaim control over their lives through what I refer to as “technological citizenship.”The modern liberal state is defined by the rule of law, a fair and evenhanded treatment of all people according to clear rules. The most basic laws are constitutional, those that define the

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-19241367706183310782011-03-15T22:04:00.000-07:002011-03-23T19:44:15.377-07:00

Many of our most deeply held beliefs, the core principles that underlie our actions, are simply arational. The problem for a pluralistic society is incorporating diverse beliefs without oppressing any minorities; having a conversation that involves ethics on a deep level, without get caught up in a circular debate over definitions and principles. One field that focuses on these issues is

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-7183860475034862542011-03-07T19:56:00.000-08:002011-03-07T19:57:34.911-08:00

Midterms are really hammering me, but for now, enjoy this shiny infographic about future technology.Keeping track of all the shiny new emerging technologies coming out is no easy task, fortunately for those us who aren't professional futurists, Michell Zappa has created this handy inforgraphic. Technologies are grouped in clusters of similarity, and the further away from the center, the longer

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-65001716308474691092011-03-01T19:37:00.000-08:002011-03-01T20:51:29.193-08:00

One of the major perks of going to school is getting to see amazing speakers, like Temple Grandin. Temple Grandin is famous for her humane and efficient designs for livestock handling systems, her advocacy for autism, and for having autism herself. She is a provocative and charismatic speaker, coming from a place of deep experience and concern (Really, just watch her TED talk).Temple's major

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-65719699166426937522011-02-27T13:40:00.000-08:002011-02-27T14:53:14.942-08:00

Predrag Bokšić | perceptronA few days ago, I attended a short conference called Dangerous Liaisons held at the Biodesign Institute. Speakers included researchers in genetics and synthetic biology, the chains of the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, the senior FBI agent for WMD threats, and a AAAS fellow in biosecurity. The subject of the talk was dual-use research, and how it can

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-52737462781597246522011-02-25T00:27:00.000-08:002011-02-25T05:36:29.628-08:00

Predrag Bokšić | perceptronGoverning is no easy task. While in some idealized, Athenian past, every decision required of the body politic might have drawn solely on common sense, these days every decision is intertwined with knowledge known only to specialists in the relevant field; it is locked behind walls of expertise. The body politic, if it is not to flail randomly in an insensate throes,

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-46341317851145327492011-02-21T04:18:00.000-08:002011-02-21T19:28:06.943-08:00

Predrag Bokšić | perceptronSheila Jasanoff is one of my personal academic heroes*, so her visit to ASU last week was perhaps the highlight of the many lectures I've attended so far. I remember back when I was a sophomore, and Shelley Hurt handed us Designs on Nature and said something like “this is a difficult book, but this is a very important book, so pay attention!” Since then, Jasanoff has

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-42975072255934917912011-02-18T13:20:00.000-08:002011-02-21T14:47:09.539-08:00

Predrag Boksic | perceptronGames have been on my mind more than usual lately, both because of Jane McGonigal's new book Reality is Broken, and Bruce Sterling's review of The Art of Game Design. Games are fascinating because players perform pointless tasks that under any other circumstances would be considered work, and master arcane skills, all in the name of fun. If the energy put into playing

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-53126649263523743602011-02-15T16:33:00.000-08:002011-02-21T14:42:58.990-08:00

Predrag Boksic | perceptronI was watching this interview of Neil deGrasse Tyson (via). I'm not going to post a full transcript of the segment, mostly because Neil argues that transcripts are bad about 45 seconds into the video. Click on the first link to watch this segment of the interview.In brief, Neil states that some may not want neuroscience to explain beauty. But, if one were to record

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-70363328623904496652011-02-14T08:32:00.000-08:002011-02-15T19:35:25.358-08:00

I need to revise my 3D printing ≠ digital reproduction post, which at the time was meant to balance some optimism surrounding 3D printing. This revision prompted by reading this old opinion piece on why the internet will never be awesome. The piece reads like a point by point outline of every major web 2.0 company to emerge in the past decade. In other words, by spelling out the limitations of

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-51310840794448104042011-02-14T00:20:00.000-08:002011-02-21T14:17:50.813-08:00

Predrag Boksic | perceptronEver want to punch yourself in the metaphorical nuts? Check out Sarah Palin's facebook page, where she communicates with her hordes of slobbering followers. The latest missive is entitled Sputnik vs Sputnut, and is a direct response to Obama's State of the Union."Now, in a recent interview I mentioned analogies that could relate to solutions to our economic challenges,

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-50773453408853724402011-02-10T22:16:00.000-08:002011-02-11T00:18:20.586-08:00

This is the post where I destroy any chance of ever having a career in politics. I try not to point out how utterly vapid and harmful the Republican party is, because in the style of some more senior academic, I'm trying to be an honest broker and make friends. But I don't care. I don't give a flying fuck. Sometimes, you see something so fantastically stupid that the only response is mockery.

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-48682182783023305952011-02-06T14:51:00.001-08:002011-02-26T21:51:12.565-08:00

Progress and innovation let us build a world that departs increasingly from the environment for which we evolved. To resolve the mismatch between our genetic disposition and the world we build, we must either adapt our environment or adapt ourselves. Winters are pretty dark up here, some days I'm not sure the sun even rises. So, I built this lamp. Its on a timer, and functions to keep the

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-41448746305474888362011-02-05T04:00:00.000-08:002011-02-05T16:16:34.128-08:00

Innovation is Serious Business. It's the key to prosperity, national security, health, jobs, you name it, innovation will solve it. But for all the talk that gets thrown around about innovation, and innovation policy (at least in the circles I run in), one question which is largely unaddressed is: Can we innovate in any direction we want, or are there historical patterns that describe how

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-6296722942954184632011-02-01T14:52:00.000-08:002011-02-01T15:03:59.541-08:00

This is a continuation of a previous article. I won't be breaking any news when I say that the Mubarak regime is done. At this juncture, the momentum of the crowd is only accelerating, the army has refused to intervene, and President Obama publicly has called for Mubarak not to run for re-election in the fall. American envoy Frank Weisner demanded Mubarak step down, and was rebuffed, but there

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-35405618529131066212011-01-31T20:16:00.000-08:002011-02-01T15:01:53.791-08:00

Revolution in Egypt is the story of the week. Over the past seven days, ordinary Egyptians have come together to oppose the 30 year rule of Hosni Mubarak. The protests are a wonder of civil disobedience, technological coordination, and bottom-up action. But what are the origins, chances, the potential outcomes, and options for US policy? Revolution is like a fire. All the necessary

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-43465674812054652982011-01-28T01:11:00.001-08:002011-01-28T11:03:16.442-08:00

Ancient peoples worshiped many gods, but modern civilization bows before a single principle: Innovation. As President Obama said in Tuesday's State of the Union address, “In America, innovation doesn't just change our lives. It is how we make our living.” He went on to use the word innovation ten more times, making it the major theme of his speech. Innovation is more than just a word, its

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-52907206067370546922011-01-27T09:08:00.001-08:002011-01-27T09:16:25.707-08:00

Transmission Glimpse from ian brill on Vimeo.see also here

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-90471130845374359702011-01-25T14:48:00.000-08:002011-01-26T09:11:06.824-08:00

Parag Kanna has a fascinating thesis on what the Davos conference is. Davos, for the unfamiliar, "where each January the planet’s most influential heads of state, CEOs, mayors, religious leaders, NGO heads, university presidents, celebrities and artists flock for the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum (WEF), an event that over the past four decades has established itself as what “60

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-4954599313592143022011-01-24T14:55:00.001-08:002011-01-24T19:36:59.645-08:00

Robert Gütig & Haim Sompolinsky, The tempotron: a neuron that learns spike timing–based decisions, Nature Neuroscience 9, 420 - 428 (2006) doi:10.1038/nn1643Hey guys, Is anyone familiar with the ideas in this paper? It seems like its some kind of alternative neural network model that tries to explicitly incorporate the idea of spike trains, rather than just being an integrator composed with a

Beckhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623702114152344862noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-71920268819274453742011-01-24T12:32:00.000-08:002011-01-24T13:36:39.181-08:00

IEET Fellow and nanotech researcher Sascha Vonger has dropped a bomb on unethical practices in nanotechnology. According to him, rigorous research is being avoided in favor of flashy 'experiments' that are essentially non-scientific."Publish-or-perish culture turned science into an endeavor where deception is vital to get ahead, and nanotechnology ranks as one of the worst. A scientific field

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-36143806234954736122011-01-20T20:45:00.000-08:002011-01-21T01:12:40.811-08:00

Anybody who's ever had to deal with a remodel or roadwork knows that construction is slow, slow, slow. Of course, it wasn't always this way. The Empire State Building was built in 14 months and was under budget, the Pentagon was built in 16 months, the Hoover Dam took five years. So what the hell happened since then?That was the topic of a lecture I attended today by Edd Gibson, ASU

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-74859989661486510262011-01-19T10:22:00.000-08:002011-01-19T11:05:58.581-08:00

In the past decade, the U.S. military’s interest in human enhancement technologies has waxed and waned. An initial surge of interest, fueled by a desire to create the “Future Force Warrior” has given way, over time, to the more mundane challenges of meeting the needs of soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. We would be fooling ourselves, however, if we believed that the U.S. military had abandoned

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-62876973996220332112011-01-17T21:44:00.000-08:002011-01-18T07:08:43.731-08:00

Let's start this year off with a bang! I just got back from HeatSync Labs, where the local hackers are taking their eyes off of 3D printing, near-space missions, tesla coils, and cylon Roombas and working on something a little closer to home: themselves.Okay, that requires a little explanation. HeatSync is a Phoenix area hackerspace, a place for technically inclined people to come together,

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-89970418234943995172011-01-17T10:19:00.000-08:002011-01-18T13:09:00.188-08:00

( taken from an e-mail wherein I try to explain briefly "information" to an English major. )Information, in math and science, is formalized as a collection of answers to yes-no questions. Usually we talk about binary strings of bits "01011011101", and say that "1" is a "yes" and "0" is "no". Information is not meaning. "01011011101" can be a series of random coin tosses, or encode the password to

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-21940029324883214372011-01-16T15:41:00.001-08:002011-01-16T16:12:42.404-08:00

One of humanity's oldest impulses has been to conquer death. From Egyptian mummification to the Christian heaven, the idea that some way, through material or spiritual works, we can transcend the mortal coil and live forever is highly seductive. These day, since and technology promise longer lives and immortality, ranging from the modest and sensible precautions of eating correctly and

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-67391714998271156992011-01-08T15:36:00.000-08:002011-01-09T00:45:12.895-08:00

Today has been a dark and tragic day in Arizona. At least six people are dead, a Congresswoman is in critical condition after being shot through the head, and everybody has been terrified by a rare act of violence. Our hearts and thoughts go out to Representative Giffords and her family.But meanwhile, the blogosphere is full of theories and speculation. Some people jumped immediately to it

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-74825803131127181472011-01-07T15:41:00.000-08:002011-01-07T15:43:09.509-08:00

When I wake up in the morning and ask "how does physics support this waking feeling" I wave my hands and say "something about bits and information, maybe, keep researching". This is part of an elaborate system of self deception designed to keep me from dropping out of graduate school.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-81553456755664266912011-01-06T00:57:00.000-08:002011-01-08T09:23:33.357-08:00

As part of my day job, I'm setting up a futurism blog called The Prevail Project (it's in early alpha, so don't look). I have a backlog of interesting articles to work through, and the cool ones will be cross-posted to We Alone.No matter how smart you are, you can't fix the problems of the world by yourself. Teamwork is the order of the day, and a new study by MIT suggests that the skills of

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-28797323702615352392011-01-03T07:43:00.000-08:002011-01-03T07:52:08.031-08:00

A friend has written up a nice post surveying communication prosthetics and information theory. Check it out.I have been told that devices for the severely disabled, like eye-trackers, are too unreliable and break down too often to be practical, especially when caregivers aren't computer literate. Problems like this seem to be simple a matter of engineering. I imagine that this disabled

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-30309615789117740162011-01-02T16:59:00.000-08:002011-01-08T07:51:22.841-08:00

Every once in a while, I stumble across a paper so weird that it just has to be read. Several weeks ago, Bruce Schneir's security blog posted a Master's Thesis from the Naval Postgraduate College. I promised a review of it, so without further ado, he's my take on Major Norman Springer's thesis, “Patterns of Radicalization: Identifying the Markers and Warning Signs of the Lone Wolf Terrorists

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-77855465083393479612010-12-31T22:24:00.001-08:002010-12-31T22:25:36.237-08:00

What natural language is most similar to mathematical notation ?What natural language is most similar to programming languages ?I hear legal English is pretty close.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-36928249809192259022010-12-30T10:02:00.000-08:002010-12-30T10:12:11.999-08:00

*I should have set a lower framerate for smoother playback

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-43170096652859127692010-12-28T17:39:00.000-08:002010-12-29T18:57:17.835-08:00

2010 is the year of the leak. From the Afghanistan and Iraq war diaries, to Cablegate, and the upcoming revelations about Bank of America, the website Wikileaks has driven the media debate, challenged American foreign policy, and proposed a new way to control governments and corporations. The hyperbole surrounding Wikileaks has been tremendous. Senators have demand the head of Julian Assange

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-9519773832002292072010-12-28T09:53:00.000-08:002010-12-29T12:14:54.510-08:00

On the unusually long train ride back to Providence, I decided to re-read Warren Ellis'* 'Transmetropolitan' comic series. I remember Warren Ellis' work being my first introduction to transhumanist fiction. The series follows a character much like Hunter S. Thompson, had he lived in a hilariously messed up future. I'd definitely recommend it ( I found the first couple chapters a bit slow, but

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-43930321260467508542010-12-20T21:26:00.000-08:002010-12-20T21:37:38.448-08:00

This being from a drunken conversation last night, about renewable energy.There are 300 million people in America, 10% of these people have been designated as America's Greatest Renewal Resource (TM), and their patriotic duty is to be rendered into biodiesel to fuel our tanks, SUVs, and snow machines.For parsimony, assume the average American weights 100 kg. This gives us 3*10^9 kg of raw

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-36917671722298613362010-12-12T14:36:00.000-08:002010-12-12T19:07:14.390-08:00

OpenMaterials.org is a pretty nice website. Their blog is a nicely curated mix of science, art, hacking, and sustainability. I want to re-link a lot of the stuff they've covered, but you can head over and check out their website in full. Here are the top five cool things that I didn't know existed before today :PapercreteAppropediaOpen Source Washing MachineRe:FarmTheCityembedding circuits in

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-34374796113277734132010-12-08T22:35:00.000-08:002010-12-10T06:51:23.810-08:00

I've noticed that, when I'm using the computer, I "hallucinate" user interface states in my peripheral vision. Usually, these hallucinations are related to instant messenger or e-mail status notifications. I imagine seeing someone is on-line who is not, or imagine that a new message has been received when it has not.I'm not actually loosing my mind. In fact, my brain is automatically trading off

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-53721781461679669902010-12-08T13:24:00.001-08:002010-12-08T14:48:21.425-08:00

Dan Sarewitz writes one of those articles about something that we all know, and that should prove terrifying.A Pew Research Center Poll from July 2009 showed that only around 6 percent of U.S. scientists are Republicans; 55 percent are Democrats, 32 percent are independent, and the rest "don't know" their affiliation...Could it be that disagreements over climate change are essentially

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-53368883971113801832010-12-08T08:02:00.001-08:002010-12-10T06:51:53.407-08:00

Edit : never-mind, this post is redundant to this much more comprehensive review.There was, a few years ago, some debate on "the binding problem". This problem stems from the fact that distinct areas of the brain are specialized for extracting certain visual features. For instance, the brain regions that represent the location and motion of objects are far away from the brain regions that

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-49401985002024148262010-12-06T18:50:00.000-08:002010-12-07T14:49:22.664-08:00

This past weekend (Dec 3-4), I attended the Transforming Humanity: Fantasy? Dream? Nightmare? Conference hosted by the Center for Inquiry, Penn Center for Bioethics, and the Penn Center for Neuroscience and Society. James Hughes and George Dvorsky of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies give their blow-by-blow record of the conference, but I'd like to step back and provide an

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-89744033345516598712010-12-01T15:48:00.000-08:002010-12-10T06:52:33.310-08:00

Over at [this] foum I noticed the following comment #10, which plays into some recent thoughts I've been having :"Evidence-based certainty uses rationality to gradually prove or disprove theories based on empirical evidence. Belief-based certainty works in the other direction, the desired certainty is already known and rationality is abused to build on carefully selected evidence to “prove” that

Beckhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623702114152344862noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-90763339308762825142010-11-26T07:39:00.001-08:002010-11-26T08:14:29.979-08:00

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-32615087873205020252010-11-24T17:27:00.000-08:002010-11-24T17:53:35.384-08:00

what also this

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-9410712878639142922010-11-24T06:04:00.000-08:002010-11-24T07:12:28.790-08:00

This is a pretty comprehensive list of links regarding the new TSA screening procedures. I'm sure we'll be seeing some more interesting stories over this holiday weekend.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-86326082800378046442010-11-23T19:14:00.000-08:002010-11-23T19:22:03.062-08:00

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-27043819531834474662010-11-21T08:43:00.000-08:002011-11-23T15:13:44.724-08:00

The folks at fractalforums.com have been rendering more of those crazy alien-cyborg-city-spaceship ray-traced fractals. I don't understand their algorithms but their "mandelbulb" software is free for download. Perfect for zoning out for a little brain-massage.And I thought I was just going to pop over to youtube to grab this little wheel illusion video. The fractals are much more entertaining.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-73025521655428001872010-11-18T21:21:00.000-08:002010-11-19T07:18:59.475-08:00

Hope I'm not opening pandora's box by retweeting Paul Krugman, but I really thought this was a gem.http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/18/cheese-eating-vat-paying-surrender-monkeys/

Beckhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623702114152344862noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-88913822102970882002010-11-18T07:27:00.000-08:002010-11-18T11:34:30.774-08:00

I've been thinking, and blogging, thoughts on the practical challenges for organizing a farming-based hackerspace community. Right now we're all still brainstorming ideas as to how this could work. Hopefully in a few years we could make it a reality. We're really still in early planning stages, I just wanted to show your that writeup.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-33056576374226389842010-11-10T17:33:00.000-08:002010-12-08T14:53:05.139-08:00

BoingBoing has mentioned a new whitepaper outlining the copyright and patent complexities of at-home 3D printing. Copyright violation and 3D printing may not be as big of a potential issue as the paper makes out.The current copyright controversy is driven by the fact that duplicating an information artifact costs much, much less than purchasing said artifact. However, this effect is not present

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-19262461177104329922010-11-09T22:34:00.000-08:002010-11-09T22:36:08.622-08:00

We define a new notion of Pseudoproductivity, which we call Pseuductivity. We leave it to the reader to mentally fill in the rest of the page with pseuductive blather....

Beckhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15623702114152344862noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-65133935687208927012010-10-24T01:01:00.000-07:002010-10-24T01:05:48.957-07:00

The New Scientist has a Flash Fiction contest. The topic is "futures that never were." Maybe the geniuses at We Alone have 350 words.This week, New Scientist goes in search of lost classics of science fiction – brilliant books that could stand alongside The War of the Worlds andNineteen Eighty-Four as masterpieces of speculative literature, but have somehow or other lapsed into obscurity. Each

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-82475244032162183912010-10-21T10:03:00.000-07:002010-10-21T10:04:51.703-07:00

Whether one views a lifetime to be finite or infinite depends upon whether time is considered countably or uncountably infinite. There are as many points in a finite length of the real line as along the entire axis.

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-42797517361040834372010-10-20T17:52:00.000-07:002010-10-21T10:14:40.028-07:00

I'm pretty ignorant of the details of economics and society, but "the robots are taking our jobs, its happening now," gets my attention. But, isn't this approximately analogous to the industrial revolution ? Mechanical fabrication moved jobs out of cottages in the countryside into city factories, and workers into tenements ? Perhaps this is a prevailing trend : progress eats aways at the middle

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-80748156932069988472010-10-20T11:17:00.001-07:002010-10-20T14:49:45.459-07:00

You should all read this interview with Bruce Sterling. Full of tasty nuggets on global warming, fiction writing, futurism, Google, other cultures, Texas, science funding, morality.Rhys: The great Italian writer Primo Levi, who was an accomplished chemist, came to believe that research for the sake of research was fundamentally immoral and that individual scientists should remove themselves from

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-35716986784162742412010-10-19T12:43:00.001-07:002010-10-19T18:48:20.841-07:00

Yesterday, I visited the Immortals. I abandoned my car at the periphery wall, no vehicles are allowed inside the Old City, lest immortality be cut short by accident. The narrow streets were packed with shuffling, cautious forms, cast into darkness by the overhanging extensions and expansions of the longevity hospitals, their needs for space long impossible to meet on the ground. I met Enos at a

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-52164247046940131422010-10-15T20:38:00.000-07:002010-10-15T20:50:29.782-07:00

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-41800527020937788152010-10-14T19:57:00.000-07:002010-10-14T19:57:47.111-07:00

Consciousness is meaning without context.

Fedor Maninnoreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-3756742142791470522010-10-13T17:23:00.000-07:002011-11-29T18:27:19.745-08:00

Michael Rulehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05279969393617122722noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-255765354647516808.post-79795412424556370892010-10-10T16:28:00.000-07:002010-10-11T07:03:37.233-07:00

Two of the players in my ASUDND game have posted some great thoughts on their experience with RPGs so far (MK and John), and I feel it's only fair to post mine. Why do we play games? Because they're fun. And why are they fun? When RPGs work, they combine the best parts of the narrative experience of a good novel, the tactic cut-and-thrust of a skirmish wargame, and the social pleasure of

Michael BFhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16757274897589421838noreply@blogger.com2