if i understand you correctly, you seem to believe that qualia definitely affects physical reality. we don't know whether that's true or whether qualia is just a byproduct of physical reality, and given the probabilistic nature of what we can observe physically, we may never know.
It seems clear to me that qualia must affect physical reality. If it didn't, we wouldn't be talking about it. If it was just a byproduct with causality going only in one direction, then we'd never talk about it, because the behavior of a physical system with that byproduct would be identical to that same physical system without it. There has to be a causal chain from this discussion back to qualia, unless the discussion happened by coincidence, which is extremely unlikely.
I don't think this tells us anything about what qualia is or whether it is or isn't a material process, but I don't think it's tenable to say that it either doesn't exist entirely, or exists but doesn't affect anything.
i'll admit that that's a convincing argument, but there are ways in which apparent causality can be shown to be illusory. one thought experiment i remember from school involves someone watching a movie in which one character punches another character, and the punched character falls backward. suppose the watcher knows absolutely nothing about how movies are recorded, or re-played, and sees only the lifelike images; then there would be clear, apparent causality of the second character falling over as an effect of being punched by the first. in reality, the only causality is that set up by the mechanics of the movie projector.
Well, it's a probabilistic argument. While it's possible that it's just a coincidence that we both have qualia and discuss qualia, it's an extremely unlikely coincidence.
To twist your movie analogy beyond all use, it's like trying on some clothes in a dressing room, then watching a movie with a scene that features you trying on those exact same clothes in that exact same dressing room in the exact same way you tried them on. It's possible that the filmmaker just happened to capture the exact same scene by chance, but it's vastly more likely that he was secretly recording you.
i would argue that we can't accurately infer any likelihood without knowing what the entire probability space is. in the dressing-room example, we are assuming there are not many, many dressing rooms that look similar, and many, many people that look just like us, and many different sets of the same clothes. but that is just an assumption. we have no idea about the probability space of different material universes and how qualia is embedded in them.
i do not believe in materialsm, but i do believe that intention and goals are emergent phenomena. nevertheless, i think that's mostly a separate issue.
it is a false equivalency to say that materialism is false and that it is impossible to build strong AI. if the material world alone can be described
by laws of causality, then we should expect to be able to simulate some significant part of it. if it cannot, and if extra-material forces impact the material world, then we may have no hope. but existence of extra-material stuff (which i call "qualia") may or may not assert a force that affects the material world.
while i will go off and read a few of the linked papers, this post doesn't do a great job, in my opinion, of showing a meaningful relationship between generalized constraint solvers and one-way dataflow constraints. i use one-way dataflow constraints because they are simple/natural/expressive. generalized constraint solvers are vastly more general, and i can't see how they would apply in a non-geometric setting. isn't cassowary only really interesting when there are inequalities? when there are only equalities, isn't the system either over-constrained (bad) or not (fine)? (to be fair, i haven't read the cassowary paper.) would i ever want code that expresses an object in terms of an inequality with another object? will i ever care about cyclic graphs of constraints between objects that actually require a solver to determine if they are over-constrained, and will any solver be able to do the right thing without knowing some properties of the constraints (e.g. linearity)? (cycles are the one thing i'm careful to avoid when i write one-way dataflow constraints in e.g. MVC code.)
If you are already using one-way dataflow constraints, you weren't exactly the target audience for my writeup, which was trying to introduce this body of work to devs who may only be familiar with the pale imitations. I am a bit surprised that you are careful to avoid cycles, even the one-way solvers I mention handle those.
I also think that the one-way solvers are the most immediately useful. On the other hand, the linguistic support needed for a pluggable one-way solver seems very similar to that needed for other solvers, and yes, they can be quite useful in more general circumstances. After all there is a whole field and several companies that do this sort of thing commercially.
fair enough that maybe i'm not in the target audience. and perhaps i'm too stuck in my own head, writing iOS apps, where i can't imagine general constraint solvers being used to solve a software-design problem (as opposed to an algorithmic problem, where it certainly does make sense). i am genuinely curious - are general constraint solvers useful as a software-design pattern?
are one-way dataflow constraints really any different from the observer pattern? i avoid cycles exactly because i implement it myself, and don't even have a solver, per se. even KVO seems not to handle cycles. and when e.g. i am using auto-layout in IB, even then i am careful to avoid over-constrainedness, even though the solver can settle on a "solution."
True .. and while I revisit the linked references some of which I'm familiar with (fran and ilk, for ex), I'd like to point out that having the list of references at the bottom of the post of something would be much more handy than scanning the text for normal words with weird colours. The traditional paper format is awesome for readability when dealing with material that references a lot.
In my opinion, the front page should really, really highlight the call-back-and-show-script feature. Sending this out to family and friends, this is the piece I really want them to see.
I read GauntletWizard's point as that such devices are becoming like "brain prostheses." If the device were embedded in your skull/brain, but could be wiretapped, would it be subject to the fifth amendment? If technology develops to read information from another's brain without their consent, would that be subject to the fifth amendment?
An interesting question.
Again, the main historical reason for the fifth amendment was torture, not to avoid knowing the truth, or that you were somehow magically sacred.
If you could read it out of people's brains, harmlessly, painlessly, etc, i think that would be fine.
Now remember, the fifth amendment protections apply in custodial settings (and similar), so you would already have to have been arrested/etc at this point (IE probable cause would have existed).
In that situation, if i could read your brain to get the truth, harmlessly, and painlessly, I have trouble seeing how that would be against the reason the fifth amendment was created (now, it may arguably run afoul of the fifth amendment as written, though things like blood tests, etc, are not considered testimonial. I don't believe literal memories would be either)
If you could read it out of people's brains, harmlessly, painlessly, etc, i think that would be fine.
I must state that this sentiment sickens me slightly. I sincerely hope that this interpretation is absolutely unthinkable by the time technology reaches that point. I don't believe that any world in which one's thoughts and memories are not private can ever be free.
Sorry, I should have been clear: I meant fine legally, in the context of the fifth amendment.
It is not a statement of what I believe the social view/norm/etc should be, or whether it should be allowed.
Only an objective assessment of whether it would fall within the context of what was currently protected and the intent of protecting that.
Personally, I would find it abhorrent, but that is not particularly relevant to the law.
I read something recently --- can't remember what --- that suggested that the expensive ceremony around obtaining phone wiretaps at the state level were in part motivated by the concern that wiretaps came close to reading the thoughts of the accused.
I imagine this is more along the lines of 4th amendment or thoughtcrime.
I actually believe we are likely to need another amendment to protect us in the future, because I don't think the fifth does or would do a good job of this.
I think this is one of the sources of abrasion between lawyers and hackers on HN -- the distinction between "legal" and "ethical" is not always made clear. Sometimes you'll see a hacker post that things must be one way, while a lawyer replies that, no, in fact, they are completely the opposite (the hacker invariably reads "you imbecile" after this, even though it's not actually typed ;-) ).
In reality, the hacker may have a perfect understanding of the current law, but disagree with it vehemently, while the lawyer's personal philosophy is actually in agreement with the hacker's statement.
"In reality, the hacker may have a perfect understanding of the current law"
Maybe?
I find engineers, like a lot of intelligent people, read a lot and think this means they understand things. If they spend their time starting by reading and learning fundamentals, i'd agree with you.
Instead, a lot of the time, IMHO, they read and understand particular cases in particular jurisdictions, and then take that as a truth that applies elsewhere, when it doesn't.
Maybe someday i'll make a law for hackers course as a MOOC.
They also want the law to be logical, and present logical extensions of arguments (IE they want the law to be an entirely rule based system, where if all rules are memorized, all outcomes are clear) . It's certainly a necessity to be able to reason logically, but the problem is, at its core, the law is about people and situations, and not logic. Logic is just a method that is used to come up with some possible solutions to these problems, and to determine possible outcomes. It is not a god that must be followed at all costs.
IE Judges are not going to do things just because they are logical, because they are people, and not logical reasoning automatons. The law's goal is to serve a societal need, not to be theoretically sound in all cases.
This often grates on most engineers, who want bright lines and definite answers.
Anyway, this is my experience having been a "real" engineer for 15 years before/during/after becoming a lawyer, and talking to an ungodly number of engineers over the years about things.
It could be my view is skewed because of the career path i've taken :)
I do agree that there is tension between lawyers and engineers on HN, but IMHO, this is due in large part to most lawyers being able to objectively detach their feelings from their legal analysis of a situation (something one is trained to do in law school), and forgetting to mention they are doing this.
This often grates on most engineers, who want bright lines and definite answers.
FWIW, the thing that bugs me the most is that sometimes the bright lines are more important than the soft stuff like intent and sometimes they are not and there is little rhyme or reason for why. I'm not just talking things like strict liability versus mens rea either, its just that I don't have a good example off the top of my head. Maybe AT&T vs Weev?
I use a credit union, and I have been the victim of a similar problem as the author, and the credit union folded in exactly the same way. Notably, the credit union is local to a state different from the one that tried to shake me down. I don't especially blame the credit union, though: they were upfront and communicative with me, and told me that their hands were tied.
The advice I was given (not by the CU): either withdraw all my money from the account and put it in a safe deposit box, or wire it to a (very) close relative ASAP -- before the lien is officially issued.
"withdraw all my money from the account and put it in a safe deposit box, or wire it to a (very) close relative ASAP -- before the lien is officially issued."
IT is generally too late. Both are problematic and can be clawed back relatively quickly (the timing looks suspicious, etc). Yes, they would have to take you to court, but the defense costs usually exceed the asset value (and the author notes this).
The state actually gave a fair amount of advance notice. I was given an exact date for when the lien would go in effect, with over a month of lead time, as I recall.
I'm a little too paranoid to say exactly what I did, but I will say that I'm glad I was given that advice. (I was younger, and had much less money saved at the time; obviously that amount would affect any similar decision now.)
I think that (or I wonder whether) you've touched upon the difference between personal vs. public freedoms, the latter of which we impose many regulations upon. Many people would object to a sub-minimum-wage job offer, but would be fine to pay friends/family/neighbors (including children) such amounts for odd jobs. Or I might slander someone I don't like within a small group of friends, and nobody would object to that; but the New York Times, which is sold for public consumption, is prohibited from publishing libel or slander.
"... this falsehood perpetuated on the big screen in Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained where the eponymous character spells his name, adding 'the D is silent'."
...
"The D is not silent, it's very much pronounced."
...
"... Tarantino's film teaches the correct pronunciation ... it is incorrect to say 'the D is silent'."
...
"But in French, /dʒ/ can be written 'dj' because the 'j' alone is just /ʒ/."
OK, if the "d" is not silent, don't you mean that /dʒ/ must be written "dj"?
Why not just say that, in English, "j" as in "James" has the tongue touching the roof of the mouth, so it always sounds a little like a "d", but in French it doesn't?
/dʒ/ doesn't have to be be written "dj" (it isn't in English, for example). It just is written that way in French because "j" alone is just /ʒ/ (as you quote above).
When you ask "why not just say...", well that is pretty much what I say in the first sentence of the third card.
#1: You preface that sentence with "But in French" so why mention English? Can /dʒ/ actually be written some other way than "dj" in French? From your post, it seems like the answer is no.
#2: The first paragraph of the third card neither mentions nor implies (to the non-linguists among us, at least) anything about English "j" having a hint of "d". This is something I'd never realized before, and only discovered it by saying "James" aloud a few times after this post; and I'm still not 100% sure that it's right, based on the post.
I second the call of bullshit. Though I've only skimmed the paper, I don't see any concrete performance numbers. I only see this:
"The group has written sev- eral million lines of code, including: core libraries (includ- ing collections with polymorphism over element permis- sions and data-parallel operations when safe), a webserver, a high level optimizing compiler, and an MPEG decoder. These and other applications written in the source language are performance-competitive with established implementa- tions on standard benchmarks; we mention this not because our language design is focused on performance, but merely to point out that heavy use of reference immutability, includ- ing removing mutable static/global state, has not come at the cost of performance in the experience of the Microsoft team."
"we mention this not because our language design is focused on performance, but merely to point out that heavy use of reference immutability, ...has not come at the cost of performance in the experience of the Microsoft team."
