Posts by Loyal Commenter

Forget that, "The Core".

You end up with a puddle of no longer molten radioactive salts, which isn't exactly Chernobyl.

Indeed, it won't make us an "international data hub", it will make us an international black-market for stolen data, which legitimate businesses avoid.

Re: FTFY

Indeed, it's the consent to having your data collected, stored, processed in some way, and retained.

I'd suggest that if the need to gain consent to this is "overly complex", then this probably indicates that the entity gathering the data is sneakily trying to use it for multiple purposes, some of which are legitimate, but most of which are to do with targeting advertising.

The solution is simple; legislate for two types of consent. One for consenting to your data being collected and used for the core business purpose, and one for allowing it to be used for commercial purposes, which is off by default, and requires the user to seek it out and explicitly opt in.

For example, I'm fine with consenting to give my details to the DVLA for the purposes of renewing my driving license. They shouldn't require me to choose whether to consent to selling any information onto google for advertising purposes in order to renew my driving license, and if they would like me to do so, the request for me to consent should not block other functionality that I have already consented to.

I get the sense that what the government desires is essentially the opposite of this; invisible opting-in which would require me to go and find the settings to opt out.

Re: Even better than Brexit

I'm clever enough to know that there are plenty of people smarter than me here. I'm also clever enough to not pretend or claim to be cleverer than others, as that's just crass, and you do run the risk of falling foul of the Dunning-Kruger effect if you do that.

I'm also more than clever enough to spot bullshit.

But this isn't about me, the original AC's comment was about how your posts lack factual substance, and attempting to switch the argument is exactly an example of that.

Re: Even better than Brexit

If you copy and paste every other sentence from a paragraph, you can radiacally change the meaning conveyed. Whodathunkit?

To sum up what I was actually saying; I don't trust a thing that comes out of JRM's mouth, but even if you put to one side the person who is saying it, what is being said is still deeply suspicious.

Is that succinct enough for you?

For starters, the amount of money being spent, whilst a large number, is orders of magnitude smaller than that being spent on the ITER plant at Cadarache. Admittedly, that is a research plant, but pretending that the research has been done already won't make this thing cheaper, especially when it is based on a different type of reactor to ITER (a spherical tokamak, rather than toroidal, which is not something with the long research track record of toroids).

As I said, I'd like to be proven wrong, but going from the history of both fusion power research and large government development projects, this is almost 100% guaranteed to be a money sink with no result at the end. At least not a working nuclear fusion power plant, demonstrator or otherwise.

£250M is one of those amounts, that is both a hell of a lot of money, but also far, far too little. That, if nothing else, should mark this "demonstration plant" out as an obvious pork barrel.

Re: Great Britain

And yet, we have the Good Friday Agreement, which was acceptable to everyone until the ultra-brexiters decided that we'd be leaving the CM/CU, thus putting us in the position where we must have both an open border and a closed one.

Re: Even better than Brexit

FWIW, that one wasn't me posting anonymously (I do so sometimes, but only when I'm posting something that might reveal too much about my identity, or about my personal life).

He did hit the nail on the head though. You might think the evasiveness and argument-switching is clever, but there are plenty of people reading the comments on this forum who are far cleverer than you, and who can see through it like it's not even there.

Re: Even better than Brexit

So you didn't read the following sentence that started with the words "not just" which explicitly says the opposite of the words you just tried to put in my mouth?

I've noticed that this is a tendency with your comments; deliberately arguing against what you would have liked me to have said, rather than what I actually write. It belies a deceitful nature, and an inability to honestly answer a question. I'd ask whether you've considered a job in politics, but I fear that you may already have, and that's part of the problem.

Re: Great Britain

"The rest of the world is holding us back" is the rhetoric of the likes of Putin and Kim.

If what you said were even half-way true, our economy would be overtaking that of the EU nations, rather than lagging behind. In reality, we have a brain-drain, and many research establishments are in dire financial straits directly because of brexit.

Re: 17 yrs FFS

Y'know, I think you're right. Of course, whoever has been in power since Blair could have changed that...

One of the biggest problems I had with the Blair government was the fact that they stored up a lot of problems for the future (read now) by picking some very neoliberal* market ideas for funding things, such as the PPP funding of hospitals and so on, where a large part of their budget now goes to payments to private finance, whereas it would have been much more cost-effective to borrow and build using the public purse, costing a lot less to the taxpayer in the long run. Blair (and Brown) were far too right-of-centre when it came to some of the economic stuff, and this is one example of that. I think possibly that partly came from a need to please a certain portion of the voting public, in order to get the sensible policies through. To be fair, he made a massive error with the warmongering as well. I never liked him at the time, but in hindsight, every single one we've had since has been progressively worse. And that includes Brown, because he had all the charisma of a block of wood.

It was Thatcher who privatised the energy industry (that was her main way of subsidising the rich, by flogging off the family silver). The idiot Truss and her quasi-chancellor think that will work again now, when we've got nothing left to flog off...

*No that word doesn't mean what you think it does.

Re: Dame Sue Ion, former chair of the UK Nuclear Innovation Research Advisory Board

I guess there's no chance of her being on strike then, because she's not UNIONISED.

Re: 17 yrs FFS

The one that doesn't get the subsidies, and tax breaks.

Re: Great Britain

Britain, in most of those examples, was not the Britain of today, but referred to an empire spanning two thirds of the globe, and, with the possible exception of those developments in the early eighteenth century, all of those have been international efforts, not the kind of parochial project JRM is touting.

I don't disagree with the sentiment that we should commercialise, but planning a commercial plant when the research and development has not yet been done is putting the cart before the horse. It's also worth noting hat the R&D required for this is in spherical tokamaks, which is not where the current research that ITER does is focused, so it is likely that a large number of the challenges that they are aiming to solve will not be applicable. We will end up spending all the money on R&D, which may indeed prove to be useful in the long run, but is vanishingly unlikely to lead to a demonstration plant at anything like the costs or timescales posited.

All Rees-Mogg is doing is committing us to pay for the research that we should be doing internationally, and sharing the costs for internationally.

It is worth noting, as well, that the reason that the UK has, until Brexit, been considered a good international destination for science, is that British science has always been international, and has attracted the best from around the world. Brexit parochialism is the antithesis of this.

Re: Even better than Brexit

How do you tell the difference?

How do you tell the difference between facts and bullshit? I think you may have hit the nail on the head there. It seems that many people can, and some can't. Others may be taken in by it, but come to their senses after a while.

I think the key is probably in spotting the warning signs. Something coming from the mouth of Jacob Rees-Mogg is certainly one of those as far as I am concerned. I'd like to be proven wrong on this occasion, because practical cost-effective nuclear fusion would be a boon for the whole human race, but I'm deeply cynical about this one, sorry. Not just because who is saying it, although that does play a big part of it in this instance, but because of the long and torturous history of nuclear fusion research in general. I can almost guarantee that I know more about the subject than a man who doesn't even have a computer on his work desk, and whose job appears to revolve around leaving sarcastic post-it notes on people's desks. Unlike JRM, I have two degrees in the physical sciences, and have been following the progress of fusion research over the last thirty or so years.

Did I say "badmouth", it would probably have been more accurate to say "sneer at", because the man in question could sneer for England, if only he wasn't already sneering for profit for an offshore fund in the Bahamas.

Re: 17 yrs FFS

And yes, had we have put £10 billion a year into fusion and fission development instead of subsidies for wind turbines then we might not have energy prices that are 8 times what they were a few years back.

The problem isn't wind turbines, it's the government's asinine decision to create a "market" for energy that ties the cost to the cost of the most expensive producer, so we pay the same for wind power as we do for the most expensive form, which is currently gas, at a large multiple of the price of wind.

Re: Even better than Brexit

You may read it that way, but then again, you seem to be wilfully conflating that argument with one for not wasting money. I'm not against spending money on nuclear fusion, I am against wasting it on vanity projects.

Anyway, back to your original comment. Please list those immediate benefits.

I know I've asked you this before, and you've failed to do so every time, but hope does spring eternal.

For reference, opinion pieces from right-wing think-tanks, the opinions of Patrick Minford vs those of every sane economist on the planet, and the blogs of UKIP members don't count as factual evidence.

Re: re: ITER

Precisely. Given how far into development that project already is, and how mind-bendingly expensive it is, it is entirely hubristic to suppose that a single nation, that is already struggling under policies supported by the same individual is going to be able to achieve the same ends, from scratch, in a shorter timescale, and with far less money, all whilst drawing talent from a much smaller pool of people, many of whom will already be considering leaving the country for another where scientists aren't used as a political football.

In short, in this, as with pretty much everything that comes out of his mouth, Rees-Mogg is demonstrating exactly how clueless and how much of a charlatan he is. The only real expertise he has is in disaster economics and knowing how to make lots of money by screwing other people over.

Re: Even better than Brexit

I suspect your up-votes there are from people who assumed you were being ironic.

Why not spend that money on the existing ITER project instead? You also get the pooled expertise from international collaboration, and the economy of scale of having multiple contributors.

It's almost as if that sort of model of international cooperation is anathema to Rees-Mogg and his friends in Tufton Street.

It's the other way round - when the cost is likely to balloon to multiple times the original blind guess estimate, it's a millstone to hang round the neck of the next government. Either they continue funding it, or they cut the losses, along with the headlines about wasted money and job losses that that will generate. Meanwhile the Rees-Moggs of the world will be off sunning themselves with all the proceeds they have squirrelled away in tax havens, occasionally popping up to badmouth the current government in order to get a speaking gig or to promote their new book which will probably be a thinly reworded load of Ayn Rand's absolute nonsense.

Re: Amazon may be right here?

I don't disagree with that per se, but to just say "higher" without specifying what you are comparing is meaningless.

Are workplace injuries higher than those in other warehouse environments? Workplaces as a whole? production-line type environments? What's the period of comparison? How is it adjusted for work practices that may hinder or prevent reporting?

The original post doesn't acknowledge that this is not going to be a simple like-for-like comparison, and any normalisation or adjustment of figures for comparison is going to carry with it an error bar. For instance, if you have a baseline of 5 worker incidents per year to which you are comparing, and your adjusted figures are 6 ± 10, you can't draw any meaningful conclusions.

Re: Amazon may be right here?

Use of the comparative form, "higher" implies a comparison. Higher than what? The other Amazon fulfilment centre across the road that doesn't subject its workers to the same practices? Another firm that does something similar, but different, and not on the same scale? The local hairdressers? The ex-planet Pluto? Some cheese?

That sort of metric is only useful when it’s a meaningful comparison, and I think in this case, like-for-like is probably quite hard to measure.

Re: Key question

Well yes and no. They like to claim personhood when it gains them rights, but not when it gains them responsibilities.

You end up with Corporate entities that have the protections of the law, but no ethical responsibility.

Re: Who are their lawyers?

If the person claiming it's unsafe has nothing to back up their claims of it being unsafe (e.g. specific safety regulations) beyond "I reckon" then technically, it's not an unsafe environment. I hate to side with Amazon on this (I really do), but to be honest, the state regulator should be able to point to specific legislation that is being breached, otherwise it does all sound extremely dodgy.

For example, if there is legislation that says workers who lift and carry should not be subjected to repetitive lifting, or twisting motions beyond a certain limit or timespan, then they should be able to show this. If the legislation is lacking, and it's something they'd like to see legislated for, then they need to get the legislation passed first. I'm tending towards saying that such legislation should exist, but it probably doesn't because the US are notoriously poor at passing legislation that protects workers.

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

All existing vehicles, tools, utensils, weapons, etc are designed to be used by humans.

Except for:

- Autonomous vehicles, such as planetary rovers, drones, automated forklifts in robotic warehouses...

- All the other tools that aren't. For example, I'm not very good at spinning a drill bit round really fast with my hands. Robots themselves fit the definition of "tool", as do any number of electronic devices that run perfectly well without a monitor or keyboard attached. The bit about tools only holds true if you define a tool as something that can be used by a human, which is a bit of a circular argument to say the least. In formal logic terms, that type of argument is known as a closure; it demonstrates nothing other than its own definition.

- I have plenty of utensils in my kitchen that are not designed for use by humans, but for use by other utensils; for example, a hotplate requires tongs or similar to place food on/take food off to avoid burning your hands. This is a parallel to a utensil that is usable by a robot, and "utensil" is literally a synonym for tool in any case, so this is a restatement of the previous item.

- Most sophisticated weapons are not directly usable by a human (and anyway cf the fact that utensils are tools, and so are weapons). For example, a pointy stick is a weapon that is designed for use by a human, as is a spear, but a spear thrower is a tool that makes the spear more effective. Taking this further, you could throw a pebble at someone and maybe hurt them slightly, but a sling makes the pebble a weapon. Taken to the logical extreme, nobody would argue that a nuclear warhead is not a weapon, but it is decidedly not designed for human use (directly, in any case), it must have a detonator, and a delivery system to be of use.

So your argument may be that all tools are ultimately designed for use by humans, but that doesn't hold true, either, because other animals, such as chimps, and crows, use tools.

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

Exactly, hence my "starts to". If what you are building needs to act and respond like a human, then give the job to a human. You don't re-invent the wheel just because you can't distinguish between reality and bad science fiction.

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

I'm not sure the wooden stairs in my house would handle a quarter of a tonne of metal walking up and down them on a daily basis, which is one of many reasons why a humanoid robot, if such a thing could even exist, would never be doing that.

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

There's also the psychological aspect of people reacting to robots in everyday society. I'm guessing humanoid robots will be accepted far more easily than four-armed, six legged, stalk headed freaks.

I guess you've never heard of the "uncanny valley" then, where studies have shown the exact opposite of your guess.

Things that look almost human, but are not, freak people out. The "uncanny valley" refers to the range where something is human-enough looking to look human-ish, but not human-looking enough to pass for actually being human. Either side of that is fine; convincing enough to look human, which is actually very hard, because we have all sorts of wired-in brain functions to recognise human faces, or not human-looking like a roughly humanoid robot, or something with six arms, or on caterpillar tracks, or nothing like a human at all, such as an autonomous vehicle with a robotic arm on it.

Re: The richest man in the world

Every time people talk about humanoid robots that bring drinks, I'm drawn to remember the robot in Rocky IV and I have a good little chuckle to myself.

Because we don't even have that yet, and it was proper rubbish.

In case you'd forgotten, or are not familiar with the Rocky films, that film was made before the fall of the Soviet Union. I expect its makers like to claim some credit for that, in the same way that The Hoff was responsible for the Berlin Wall coming down...

Re: The richest man in the world

However, it's always going to be vastly cheaper to pay a carer a decent living wage than putting a horrifically expensive robot into someone's home to look after them, or a horribly cheap one that doesn't work and breaks down and requires constant servicing.

The problem isn't the absence of working humanoid robots to do cheap "unskilled" labour*, it's the lack of value given to humans doing what a robot can't do properly in the first place.

*There is, of course, no such thing as unskilled labour; all labour requires some sort of skill or other. What people mean when they say this is actually "undervalued labour".

Re: So instead of self-driving cars we can have robot-drivers?

In true Scooby-Doo style, it was the janitor all along.

Re: It can't walk

Hawkwind got there first in the '70s I believe. I certainly saw their stage "robot" when I saw them play in the '90s, so that's getting on for three decades at least.

Re: Show me on this doll where Elon hurt you

I guess there's some value to re-using the engines (although I'm willing to bet they need completely stripping down and rebuilding after each launch). I also reckon that most of the cost of a launch is the fuel, because, in simplest terms, your average rocket is a thin shell of metal around an awful lot of fuel with some engines on the bottom, and a relatively tiny payload on top. Basically one big fuel tank with a (usually, fingers crossed) controlled explosion at the bottom.

Re: Adundance

Because robots break down, and even the smartest "AI" is as dumb as packet of cheese.

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

Much more likely to build a specialised robot to replace the hammer, and hammer whatever it is that needs hammering in a very precise and controlled manner.

A £5,000 hammering robot, as opposed to a £5,000,000 general purpose robot with a £5 hammer trying not to hit its own thumb.

This is what tool specialisation means. Unless you can find more than 1,000 different jobs that your robot costing 1,000 times as much can do, as effectively as the specialised robot, the economics don't add up.

You also have the problems that if you are trying to make a general purpose robot that is that good (and it will have to be better than a human, to be cost effective, because a human handyman with his own hammer will cost you £50 for that one-off hammering job), it is likely to cost far more than a mere 1,000 times as much as the specialised robot, which will have been designed to do the job as simply, efficiently, and cost effectively as possible. Just building the mechanical actuators and parts to be sufficiently resilient, flexible and strong for all possible uses is going to be horrifically expensive. Presumably you're going to need strong flexible corrosion-resistant alloys (human skin doesn't rust, but most metals corrode). Then let's talk about electronics, sensors (it's going to have to be covered in pressure sensors to start with, to match what human skin can do), and it starts to become apparent that you'll never actually be able to beat evolution at the job.

Fantasy general purpose humanoid robots are exactly that - fantasy, because reality finds the most efficient solution to a problem, and they ain't it. Unless the problem is "how to make a convincing humanoid sex-bot".

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

It's going to happen, and probably a lot sooner than you or I think. Only a fool would believe otherwise.

Yes, dear, of course it is, and it will be controlled by that Artificial General Intelligence that has been coming Any Day Now™ for the last 50 years.

Now, have you taken all your pills? Show me under your tongue, good...

Re: What you saw was our rough development robot But ... we actually have a bot with ... everything

The completed robot would have been here today, but he's busy playing the released version of Star Citizen, whilst sat in the back of his fully autonomous fusion-powered flying car.

Re: Adundance

Their main problem will be preventing their own security staff from killing and eating them. Those who maintain the robots will get hungry too.

Re: What's the point of a humanoid robot?

Is it though?

The things humans interact with are designed to be interacted with by humans, yes, and in most cases, a human is going to be far cheaper than a robot to do things humans can do, on a human scale.

Plenty of things are not designed to be interacted with directly by humans, though. Take roads, for example; a motorway is designed for cars, not people. Pedestrians are prohibited. Yes, the cars are designed for humans, but they are notably not human-shaped.

Or how about industrial processes, where human operators need protective clothing, or other safety equipment? Much better to design robots that suit those environments in a suitable shape; not bipedal. Robots that service nuclear reactors, for instance, are not human-shaped, the clever ones that can get around through narrow gaps and so on are snake-shaped, for instance.

And how about space exploration (Elongated Muskrat's other money sink). Building spaceships that can contain one or more humans and keep them alive is much more expensive than building something that can propel a robot somewhere that is designed to withstand high G-forces, not need food, water, or air, can withstand large temperature changes, and so on. Show me all the humanoid Mars rovers?

Machines such as robots are simply tools, and things in society are designed for humans, because society is composed of humans, not machines. Pretending that society is for robots, and thus we should make robots look like people sounds a lot like pointless folly.

If you let it roam around outside, you're going to need a separate security bot to stop someone nicking it, stripping it down and selling it for parts.