skysight-inc/HackerNews huggingface dataset:
If "strong" AI means conscious AI with subjective experience, we're several milestones in theoretical neuroscience and cognitive science away.

If "strong" AI means software capable of learning any particular task a human could perform, we're so damn close that the research world is proceeding to cross the line as we speak. It's called "imitation learning" nowadays, and once there's a sufficiently general and accurate algorithmic framework with sufficient training data, it'll be everywhere.

If "strong" AI means software capable of learning many tasks a human could perform, generalizing them into a complete worldview, and taking volitional action based on that worldview to accomplish conceptually-specified goals... I'd call it one to two decades away. There are some major substantial problems remaining to research, but we do have solid foundations for it: uncertain reasoning in Turing-complete modeling domains lies at the intersection of several thriving research fields.

In terms of "how much science is left", I'd say our current point is roughly analogous to the physics community having spotted that the photoelectric effect can only be explained by discretized photons and starting to generalize quantum physics, but having most of it remaining to discover.
Because being human is about a lot more than being intelligent, for whatever definition of intelligence you happen to be using.

Roughly half the human population has below-average intelligence, but carries right on being human regardless.

Inventiveness is possibly more of a species marker than raw IQ.

We're not actually that great at being intelligent. But we're very good at using our intelligence to create experiences, invent new things, and pass both to offspring through indirect external memory structures.

>Are humans from 100,000 years ago less human than humans today, even if we have "improved" slightly due to natural selection?

It may be hard to find anyone who accepts that Paranthropus or Homo Erectus were just as human as modern Homo Sapiens.

Homo Erectus died out around 150kybp, which is close enough, I guess.
Doing this for 3 extra ZEV credits in California. Unlikely to see this anywhere else.
Meteor.com is a horrible hosting platform, try http://modulus.io
It wins a few more points in the "you need to give up more of your privacy so we can protect you" campaign when we could be talking about "nation-state cyber-war" rather than a "Target-like hack" by hackers nobody knows or cares about. North Korea is an "iconic enemy" people can rally against.
I understand. I also have children. I run my own web dev firm and put in ~10hrs a day, so consider the many blessings of job that ends at 5pm :)
Just get yourself an ephedra plant and steep your own tea. Pseudoephedrine itself does bad things to some people.
The explicit & implicit statements you've made here leave me speechless.
In general all these cold and flu medications do is suppress your immune response

That's not true at all. Over the counter cold formulations contain one of four products: decongestant, cough suppressant, pain reliever and antihistamine.

None of those suppress your immune system.

EDIT: I think know what you meant now. You mean your immune system reacts to a cold by making you cough and the drugs suppress your cough (thus your immune response)? In that case, I see your point.
Good: Brand

Better: Generic

Best: Nothing

"If takes about 1 week to get over a cold if you don't take medicine, but only 7 days to get over a cold if you take medicine."
> In my opinion, if humans were to create robots as intelligent as humans, then those robot would actually be human. What's the difference between passing information via DNA and passing information via some programming code?

Well, they would be intelligent in whatever way we mean it. But there's an issue of software -- 'human' implies quite a lot of it (for instance, things like the Westermarck effect, which I don't imagine AIs will have for quite a few reasons), and replicating that is pretty hard, so it's anyone's guess whether we do that or try to find a math-based software foundation.
No, it's not tough to seem to remember anything, human memory is very fallible. That's why I prefaced the statement with that bit, because I was in no way sure. That said, my memory wasn't that bad. Here's what I was slightly misremembering from the proposal:

By building it on pylons, you can almost entirely avoid the need to buy land by following alongside the mostly very straight California Interstate 5 highway, with only minor deviations when the highway makes a sharp turn. [1]

So it's I-5, not i-80, and it's beside the highway, not in the median. I'm not sure how either of those mistakes affect the point I was trying to make to the degree it's not worth addressing, so I'm unsure why you used a rhetorical tactic instead of just correcting (since you obviously knew it was incorrect) and addressing that point, but that's your prerogative.

1: https://www.teslamotors.com/sites/default/files/blog_images/...
The Hyperloop remains a well-designed proposal that solves a problem a Shinkansen/TGV model system solves, only it uses technologies that aren't proven or evaluated.

Silicon Valley thinking at its finest.
Seems like there would be substantial traffic logs if 100TB+ of data flowed from Sony to NK, right? Surely the NSA would have seen this traffic, why was Sony not informed of this? Also nobody at Sony noticed suspicious persistent connections to their gateway? Seems if it was not an inside the job the "hackers" must of had access for months to a year to gather that amount of data. I haven't gone looking, but I have doubts the movie in question even existed if there are not copies running rampant on the net. Yes I agree too much of what we're being told does not make sense.
18.5 million consumers in California had their personal info hacked. The population of the state is 38 million. This 38 million figure is allotting for children and other non-internet users like elderly.

Source:
http://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-kamal...

Yet, a voluntarily removed movie and yet another hack on company that has historically shown itself not to give one single damn about network security, demands White house attention.
There is a difference between theory and practice: there is no specific use of stateful firewalls in today's IPv4 mr. nobody home router (i.e. most of the routers do not use the --state option of iptables). If we move to IPv6 only, ISPs need to (and will) use --state (or equivalent). The way mr. nobody has a sort of "stateful firewall" nowadays is actually thanks to the popular use of Masquerading NAT (i.e. iptables -t nat -j MASQUERADE). So jackweirdy is kind of right "NAT" (in practice) as become a pillar of internet security, in spite of itself.
There are fundamental differences between a machine designed by the hand of intelligence and that of a biological system. In the case of biology, the design is completely random although it still has a design, as strange as that sounds.
I remember Hot Shots, where they literally drop a bomb into Saddam Hussein's lap.

This isn't new, though the intimacy with which the subject matter is treated may be different.
Wow I actually agree with Obama.
Well... um. Read the Fortune article, and that pretty much invalidates your statement. This particular company was in the middle of an investigation and was still shipping product. Similar situations have occurred in the past (I can't recall names anymore though).

I would love to pull up an app, tap a few buttons, and ask the pharmacist to change the meds to brand name when they are selling me products produced by $sketchy_fraudulent_company.
> Just having a Java interpretor installed on your system opens you up to untold security threats.

That's not the case at all. A Java interpreter doesn't run with any kind of privileges, so it adds no added security threat above those that already exist when you are able to run code as a user. Having it installed is no more dangerous than having libboost or python installed on your system, if you have any kind of sane setup.

The part of Java with a bad security track record is the applet sandbox, which is supposed to make it safe to run arbitrary code in a browser. The sandbox has turned out to be pretty leaky. So I would not recommend relying on the applet sandbox to run arbitrary untrusted Java code from the internet. But for a local app it's a perfectly reasonable platform (vaguely in the same category as Microsoft's CLR, which is heavily JVM-inspired).
Being specific about which signal is sent, especially if it deals with important nuances such as whether you can change the handler or not, isn't pedantry.
You could circumvent certificate revocations by replaying expired OCSP Staple responses that say a certificate is not revoked.

You could also cause expired certificates to be accepted, which limits the utility of short-lived certs as a means of protecting against key compromise.

And as hannob said, you can circumvent HSTS by setting the time in the future, causing all HSTS entries to be expired.
Network Security for Dummies-eBook|Free EBook
it was, it's been posted several times -- at least I know for sure in comments. I was about to ask, "why are so many links getting re-posted in hackernews?"
It is a lot of fun to be rationalist and deep thinker. It lets one ponder great schemes of how ideas work together.

Without empirical grounding, it can also lead one drastically astray.

You have no examples that your thought is true, nor any mechanism by which it could work, while I have both counter-examples and the observation that any such mechanism is outside of known evolutionary theory.

"I am not arguing that this has always been the case" stands in stark contrast to your proposition that "we are wired" to this behavior.
I think dmschulman summed it up pretty well, but your outrage over a healthy does of skepticism, demands for evidence, and a desire not to jump to conclusions is the truly bizarre thing to me.
Their cryptocurrency engineer /u/ryancarnated said it won't be an altcoin, but coloured coins or sidechains [1].

What's not clear is why they don't use the word "Bitcoin", if they have already decided they will be building on top of its blockchain.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2pt4kl/reddit_anno...
That's an uninformed confused argument. That blogers' links about "traditional" korean are about a few differences in vocabulary that have developed between North and South. Nothing that would suggest that there are any differences in the characters used to type on a computer with. That's because the languages and characters are the same.

BTW, the original investigation on the locale concluded that the UTF8 character could be decoded with korean or chinese locales.

The fact that the hackers were using a korean (or chinese) locale doesn't prove that the hackers were korean, but it also doesn't prove that the hackers were NOT korean, as this blogger tries to do.
>“They caused a lot of damage and we will respond. We will respond proportionately and we will respond in a place and time and manner we choose,” the president said.

So I'm just going to ask, is the Sony hack going to be an excuse for us to intervene in NK?
It would be nice if you explicitly state you are learning Haskell in your article. If I'm a newbie and I see some of the awkward Haskell code(which I also make sometimes), I would feel discouraged. It doesn't seem Haskell is making things better.
very interesting. Machine learning will rule the world, I guess.
Sure, the Java VM has seen many security exploits.

However, Java does avoid memory corruption errors which are sadly easy to create in C and C++. We see exploits of such things all the time. It does make sense to use a language like Java or Rust (or C# or JavaScript - basically, any modern sandboxed language) for that reason.

But yes, Java specifically has seen plenty of exploits, and that is a cause for concern.
wrong link OP -- should be: https://www.mercurymq.com/flow
What products have I bought [must login to Gmail]
Your logic is impeccable.
I find the idea that dominant intelligence in the universe would be artificial very strange. It's just a cool idea, with no empirical proof. Look at our own progress. At the rate we are currently going it is far more likely that we learn how to modify our DNA to extend our life spans before we develop true AI. We have barely understood the human brain, how we can possibly even attempt to replicate something we can not understand. I think progress in the biological science is currently, and will in the future, outstrip the advancements in computer science.

Also, I find it funny that scientists always claim that the the future people will augment their intelligence with computers, to make them selves smarter. It's not a problem of capability, it's a problem of motivation. Have you ever heard someone say: "I wish I was smarter!" Maybe, but most of the time you hear people say "I wish I could have X, screw X, live in X." The simple fact is, most people couldn't care less than they already do about how intelligent they are, as long as they achieve the goals that make them happy.

In the future we will significantly increase the lifespan of humans, create very simplistic AI to do menial tasks for us, improve technology like 3D printing and molecular assembly, and then promptly have an economic collapse followed by a revolution that will lead to death of technology as we know it or utopia, hopefully the letter. I just don't see a place in that chain of events for a consciousness capable AI.
Part of me does wonder whether we're headed in that direction. See: Rainbow's End, by Vernor Vinge.

What is the equilibrium in a world where state funded actors can anonymously attack major companies / infrastructure components? I am not convinced that is possible for a Sony to secure itself to such a level that it will not be vulnerable to attacks by state actors.
Your right, Intelligence is a tricky word to define. I would define it as the ability to predict an outcome better than random chance would allow. Hence, Natural Selection is not a form of intelligence because the mutations that drive Evolution occur randomly without purpose. Intelligence on the other hand would be able to perform better than a brute force trial and error attack.
In terms of energy usage, transporting people by plane is not that efficient compared to alternatives:

http://adl.stanford.edu/aa260/Lecture_Notes_files/transport_...
Greg Egan brought up this idea in his novel Permutation City, only to have a change of heart some years later. To quote his FAQ[1]:

> What I regret most is my uncritical treatment of the idea of allowing intelligent life to evolve in the Autoverse. Sure, this is a common science-fictional idea, but when I thought about it properly (some years after the book was published), I realised that anyone who actually did this would have to be utterly morally bankrupt. To get from micro-organisms to intelligent life this way would involve an immense amount of suffering, with billions of sentient creatures living, struggling and dying along the way. Yes, this happened to our own ancestors, but that doesn’t give us the right to inflict the same kind of suffering on anyone else.

> This is potentially an important issue in the real world. It might not be long before people are seriously trying to “evolve” artificial intelligence in their computers. Now, it’s one thing to use genetic algorithms to come up with various specialised programs that perform simple tasks, but to “breed”, assess, and kill millions of sentient programs would be an abomination. If the first AI was created that way, it would have every right to despise its creators.

His more recent story "Crystal Nights"[2] examines the same idea with more focus on the moral implications.

[1]: http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/PERMUTATION/FAQ/FAQ...

[2]: http://ttapress.com/553/crystal-nights-by-greg-egan/
There is actually an excellent reason to choose a brand name over a generic. People with gluten intolerance, allergies, or those who suffer from Celiac disease need some guaranty that the medicine they are purchasing does not use filler which may contain gluten. Many of the brand name makers actually do make an effort to test for gluten and indicate its presence, but (in my experience) that is less common among generic offerings. (This is particularly so for prescription generics, where you really don't see or think about the maker of the pill.)
DockerCon EU: The Future of the Docker Project
That's another wrinkle. Because boards are so expensive and turnaround's so long you typically want to rework them when possible to validate changes. That takes a talented technician, fairly expensive equipment and time. Reworking e.g. a dozen boards can take days.
Isn't the real problem that those borders are kind of blurry and depending on the perspective?

I.e. the individual does not create in isolation. It took several generations of people to create to a point where we can even make computers.

So at least to me the whole divide between artificial and natural isn't really there.
Got to early revenue and some pretty encouraging sustained compounding growth in my side-project-turned-startup: https://www.zerotier.com/

This is a three year old project. 2014 saw the first auto-updating binary releases on three platforms, the first commercial users, and the first revenue. It also made HN's front page twice: once for the site itself, and once for a blog entry that I wrote on the mechanics of NAT traversal.

Currently working on a lot of prep for a possible seed round in early-mid 2015. If all keeps going well it might happen.
Thanks for the compliment about Rust for Rubyists! I've pretty much stopped working on it in favor of contributing to the official documentation, though.
I saw this yesterday and shared it with a friend who had introduced me to code golf. Simply fantastic, particularly the comments.
a) the HSR is a political boondoggle that California will suffer with paying for decades even if it does get done.

b) if Musk is so confident on his ability to deliver, let private industry take the risk and put it up.

Its bad enough we have to foot the bill for political showmanship and braggarts, we don't need to be footing the bill for untested technology by private interest who profess extreme confidence, but seemingly not enough to back with their own money. If he will, more power to him. Love Space X, don't care for this idea other than the out of this world feel
Debugging Node.js Apps in Production
I can't believe so many people are rendering verdicts sans evidence that the FBI is wrong about this.

Look, I don't trust the FBI completely. But as of this point they're the only people who have actually seen any of the pertinent evidence. Unless you have a prior that they are actually MORE likely to be malicious than not, there's no grounds to do anything but acknowledge their claim (with as much salt as your please, of course).
I definitely have Eliot and John to thank for my recent career switch. I was working as a technical recruiter for various major/global financial services institutions (yes, shoot me now please) and I took their iOS7 course and within 4 months was able to find work as a junior developer for a NYC based startup.

I've never considered making a course myself, but I will say that I could certainly learn some more from those two on how to be successful!
Walker's rejection of WI HSR was based on the nearly $1Bn of federal dollars allocated to Wisconsin, in addition to the federal dollars that would have gone to the other states. Some portion of all those dollars came out of the pockets of WI residents. As would a portion of all the subsequent federal spending the WI HSR plan would set a precedent for.

I'm in favor of Chicago-MSP HSR, of infrastructure spending in general, and not a fan of Walker, but it's worth getting the argument right.
Well I don't have stats but from personal experience (perhaps I have a bit more experience with french rather than US providers), home routers do not use a specific stateful firewall, and use masquerading NAT. So it would depend on the way NAT is done.
evolution is not random, it's purpose is to adapt to the environment changes and become better
Bayes Impact’s First Hackathon
Start looking around. It doesn't hurt to look.

Also, it sounds like the startup will be deadpool in a year. Better to look now while you can patiently shop around, than wait til the end.

If the startup fails, the equity is worth $0. If you start looking, you'll get an idea how much salary you're giving up.
"Naturally occurring" is a red herring itself. Consciousness must be a property of a system rather than its elements. Whatever the constraints on systems that can be conscious, it is not going to come down to "natural" vs. "artificial", unless mystical metaphysics turns out to be true.

So the answer to your hypothetical is mysticism as reality.
They updated to 2.0.4 today, but it crashed right away. I'm on OS X 10.7. Now their support site is down.
"[Dvorak] was created in the 1930’s and promised to be vastly superior to QWERTY. I went ahead and tried it out and soon enough after doing “ls -latr” on the terminal, I had to shake my head and sadly walk away from it."

Because, obviously, Dvorak was optimized in 1930 for typing things like ls -ltar on a typewriter.
Who the hell is talking about a war? It's the usual posturing on HN for people to
Out do each other in histrionics and paranoia.
What kind of article are you looking for? I talk about all kind of Meteor related stuff on my blog.

Don't confuse your circle of vision on twitter/hackernews/etc as a limited view of what is actually going on in the Meteor community.

Have you ever looked at a Devshop talk?

As for Atmosphere, I would love to pitch in and help but they haven't bothered to open source it yet (and sounds like they won't).

Try http://fastosphere.meteor.com/, judge speed based on that :)
I think this is a good point. I'm out of my depth talking about evolution, so I don't know when we would stop classifying a species as Homo Erectus and start calling it Homo Sapien. That is probably what would say about these robots: they are a new species. But in a lot of ways, since we are products of a natural world, so are they. Just a little more indirectly.
From the original Alpha Document

4.5.3. Capsule Stranded in Tube
"If a capsule were somehow to become stranded, capsules ahead would
continue their journeys to the destination unaffected. Capsules behind the
stranded one would be automatically instructed to deploy their emergency
mechanical braking systems. Once all capsules behind the stranded capsule had
been safely brought to rest, capsules would drive themselves to safety using
small onboard electric motors to power deployed wheels. "

http://www.spacex.com/sites/spacex/files/hyperloop_alpha-201...
Thanks!

Lecture 6 seems to be offline, unfortunately.
No one should work at an early stage startup with the expectation to make a high market salary or get regular raises in the early years. Not that a startup should pay like crap (or they won't exist long), but usually you work at a startup because you believe in the idea, team and feel you can help make it real. The payoff for you is in the equity turning into real money after some years of work, but that money can really be life changing if you are in early enough with enough equity.

There is nothing wrong with admitting that it isn't for you and you'd rather work at a more mature company. It is whatever works for you, but just recognize this is what a startup or really any young business is generally like. If you don't think equity is a good reward though, I think your answer is clear, move on.

BTW -- I don't think you are a spoiled brat, but you are figuring out that this just may not be for you. And if you figured this out now, its your cue to move on likely. Or accept that equity is the reward and jump on the bandwagon to make it super successful so you and the team can get the satisfaction of making something cool and hopefully the monetary rewards.