"We don't get out of bed for less than $10,000 per day." - <AUTHOR> http://www.sebastianmarshall.com/we-dont-get-out-of-bed-for-less-than-10000-per-day <comment><USER2> Am I being pretentious or unfair for wondering what on earth this blog or author is about?

I don't find this specific post terrible, but I'm the type who prefers the advice of people with a track record of success–or, at the very least, who have tried and humbly reflect on their failures. With details.

When the most I get from an About page is _"I've been working and training to be the most skilled strategist of our era."_ and _"I worked as an entrepreneur from 2004 to 2008."_ , meh ... pass.

<comment><USER3> > Am I being pretentious or unfair for wondering what on earth this blog or > author is about?

Nah, that's a common enough reaction. Me, I dropped out of two high schools, was able to pick up an alternative high school diploma at age 16 or so anyways, got a near full ride scholarship to UMass Amherst at 17, left there at 19, have held down a variety of self-employed or owned gigs in contracting, project management, sales, marketing, logistics, and a whole variety of other things. Studied business at Boston University later, paid cash for everything. Lived, worked, or traveled through 40+ countries, been around Asia the last 15 months. My last work was in hospitality/tourism. I'll make at least $65,000 this year (just inked a $65,000 contract, but the cash isn't in the bank yet so no partying yet), maybe a lot more depending.

> I'm the type who prefers the advice of people with a track record of > success–or, at the very least, who have tried and humbly reflect on their > failures. With details.

That's totally fair. I've written hundreds of posts - did you go through any of them? I've written detailed guides on lots of stuff, lots of personal experiences.

This is actually a tricky thing about writing, you never know which piece you write will be the first one someone sees. You write a heavily assertive one, someone thinks you're a jerk. You write an introspective one, someone thinks you're narcissistic. You talk about what you've done, people think you're bragging. You don't talk about what you've done, people think you're full of hot air.

...occupational hazard with writing, I guess. I don't take it personally :)

<comment><USER4> Could you maybe share some posts in which you've described your previous self- employed successes? Anything which gives readers an idea of how you went about creating a business would probably be of interest to HN readers. Even if it's only a moderately profitable life-style business, it would still give ideas to those who want to take the path less traveled.

<comment><USER5> The guy posted on his blog. I do not see why he needs to prove anything unless he wants to.

<comment><USER4> Of course he doesn't _need_ to prove anything. Likewise, HN users don't _need_ to read everything or find equal value in everything on the site. It's about interest, not obligation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> On a related note, it's really interesting to see how people act when they know they can't motivate someone with money.

For example, I used to do client work, but stopped (because I hate it) a few years ago after I sold my design firm. On my blog's contact form I specifically say that I don't do any consulting work, but I still get emails at least once or twice per week from people who want to hire me for iPhone work. I always politely refuse, and thank them for the consideration. Sometimes they'll reply saying "we have a large budget" or something like that, and I'll reply again saying, thanks, but no thanks, it's not about the money. As soon as I say that magical phrase, they just don't know what to say or do because they're used to motivating designers/developers with money. It's actually an interesting sociological situation.

<comment><USER7> It's like turning down someone because you're taken. It goes from nods to nudges pretty quick.

<comment><USER8> What does that mean, "goes from nods to nudges"? It seemed like some idiom I didn't know, so I googled the phrase 'nods to nudges'. However, this very Hacker News page was the only result, so I am still in the dark.

<comment><USER9> Nudges: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jT3_UCm1A5I>

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> The first bolded sentence has it very very wrong:

> _I believe the reason you see sites without ads as superior on some level is > because the absolute-highest-quality writers usually don't have ads._

And then he goes on to list a bunch of tech entrepreneurial writers. Well I hate to break it to you, but those are not the definition of "the absolute- highest-quality writers". Sure they are _very good_ writers, but their secret sauce is that they are great businessmen too, and so their ideas are valuable if they do any reasonably competent job of communicating them.

More importantly, these guys make their money (and a lot of it) elsewhere, so it would be a terrible idea to dilute their brand with cheap ads that were irrelevant to their net worth.

It might very well be true that the best writers don't have ads on their site, but my guess is because you can't really make a lot of money from ads unless your audience is massive, and frankly, the audience for very high-quality writing is disturbingly small. By and large people read for content more than quality—this thesis is supported by the fact that the OA considers entrepundits to be the "absolute best". The absolute best writers are probably people who do it professionally, and to do so professionally requires working for an organization that is extracting the true value out of great writing. That is, either a high-brow periodical, or a book publisher.

<comment><USER11> Yeah. In particular, Joel's blog is essentially a giant ad for everything Fog Creek makes. Not that that's a bad thing -- I tried Fogbugz because I found it through Joel, was willing to give it a try because I thought highly of his writing, and I'm a happy customer. Still, Joel monetizes his blog by indirectly selling software, not by being gauche and slapping adsense all over the place.

<comment><USER12> I think that was kind of the point. The only advertising and marketing a blog should be doing is for the author or products the author feels passionate about.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> "But as soon as you need money – and people know – you're hosed."

Sales-wise, this is where most companies fail. Their salespeople let buyers know they need money. And as soon as buyers sniff you out, they make you their bitch. If you're a salesperson - and everybody should be - you lose.

The trick is to work hard on your attitude until you're ready to walk away from every deal without blinking - even if you really need money. It's really counterintuitive - but winner's attitude works.

<comment><USER14> I never understood this. I always thought that you'd rather buy from someone who is likely to go out of their way to serve your needs than to buy from someone who simply doesn't care. I know that all other things being equal (I mean, assuming I think both companies can actually deliver, at a similar price point, and that one company isn't going to vanish while I still need them.) that's certainly how _I_ feel, when I buy expensive things.

But then, I've pretty much miserably failed to sell any product (other than my time) that was worth, you know, real money per-customer, so this is likely one of those areas where I'm just weird, and another reason why using myself as a model for generalizing human behavior is a bad idea.

Personally, I focus on selling a whole lot of little things, mostly because I've utterly failed to sell big things, and I've met some success selling lots of little things. Obviously, $10/month is not going to make or break me... and if I spend a lot of time on any one sale, obviously, I'm not going to end up with an acceptable hourly rate, especially as I have some significant marginal costs that come out of that $10 before it can be spent on my salary. But I think it's important, to some extent, to still treat people like customers; yeah, the accountant won't even notice if that customer quits next month. But if more people quit than sign up? or if that customer quits and then loudly complains in public about my bad service?

The customer isn't always right, but dealing with customers you don't want as customers is a delicate art. I'm certain that if I took an insulting attitude towards the customers I didn't want, it'd end badly for me rather quickly. So it seems to me like this issue is... complex. You want to appear to care, but you don't want to appear desperate, and the line between those two, much like the line between confidence and arrogance, can be pretty blurry (at least to someone as socially unskilled as myself.)

<comment><USER15> > _I never understood this. I always thought that you'd rather buy from > someone who is likely to go out of their way to serve your needs than to buy > from someone who simply doesn't care. I know that all other things being > equal (I mean, assuming I think both companies can actually deliver, at a > similar price point, and that one company isn't going to vanish while I > still need them.) that's certainly how I feel, when I buy expensive things._

The idea is the person who's desperate for money is more likely to provide a cheap service, while the person who's not is more likely to provide a top notch service, because he has more respect for himself and would never want to be caught delivering garbage.

<comment><USER14> >The idea is the person who's desperate for money is more likely to provide a cheap service, while the person who's not is more likely to provide a top notch service, because he has more respect for himself and would never want to be caught delivering garbage.

huh. see, my thought is always "We're the phone company, we don't care because we don't have to." I know many people go through great pains to avoid dealing with the phone company. Do you use AT&T DSL? I use sonic.net. I mean, yeah, T owns the layer1, but the whole experience is quite a bit more pleasant when I don't have to deal with the T.

I've heard some people explain that companies, generally speaking, prefer to deal with other companies that are similar in size; It makes sense to me, at least in cases where I expect non-automated customer service.

<comment><USER16> Giant oligopolies are unpleasant to deal with for their own reasons. You want to appear indifferent to any particular sale for the same reason that playing hard to get works in dating: It implies that you are desirable/successful enough to pick and choose your partners.

These strategies take advanage of humans' built-in decision making and survival heuristics. Women like a man who's already taken because they can assume that his current mate has already extensively vetted him for desirability. Anyone who smells desperate trips alarms and gets you wondering why they can't find a mate / job /client.

There's a fine line between putting your best foot forward and cynically manipulating everyone around you of course. Robert Cialdini's book "Influence" shows you where the line is and how to stay on the clean side.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Cialdini#Six_.22Weapons_...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Cialdini#Six_.22Weapons_of_Influence.22)

(P.S., thanks for prgmr. I enjoy my service.)

<comment><USER14> >You want to appear indifferent to any particular sale for the same reason that playing hard to get works in dating: It implies that you are desirable/successful enough to pick and choose your partners.

But, I thought that traditionally, that was only supposed to work with women. Men, from my understanding, seem to place a higher value on the physical attractiveness of their mates, and a lower value on the perceived social status of their mates.

Not that I'm an expert on selling or dating; it's just that most of the dating advice I've seen women given has to do with becoming more physically attractive, rather than the advice given to men, which seems to be about raising one's perceived social status. I mean, it could be that the advice (or my perception of that advice) is wrong, but it lines up with my personal observations.

This ignoring the vast differences between initiating short-term relationships and maintaining a long-term relationship, and the differences between selling a product and initiating a relationship.

(Oh, and thanks for being a customer. This is what I've always wanted to do.)

<comment><USER16> You should read (a synopsis of) The Rules. It's the female equivalent to the PUA craze, and it focuses on consistently acting like a high-value mate.

The idea is that a man with a passing interest in you will slowly convince himself that you are worth striving for and when he finally "wins" your hand he will feel like he has successfully proven himself and earned something he dearly wanted.

It's an implementation of the idea that things you work for are dearer to you than things that come your way with little effort.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rules>

<comment><USER14> Huh. sounds like a strong counterexample to what I was saying. Interesting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I wrote three comments for this and didn't post any of them, so I obviously have something to say, if I can just get it out :)

I think Sebastian is actually answering a different question than he sets out to answer. What I think he's answering is "How do I be cool with what goes on my blog?"

If so, it was a pretty long and roundabout way of answering.

I usually like Sebastian's work, I just felt this one article had a lot of opinion and a lot of text but not a lot of depth or analysis. It was strangely unsatisfying and frustrating.

</comment><comment><USER18> AdBlock-Plus has made ads virtually irrelevant for me. Sometimes I forget that people are even subjected to them.

Last year, while traveling through eastern Asia, I would occasionally drop by an internet cafe. I couldn't believe the amount of ads non-ABP users had to see. It still baffles me.

<comment><USER19> Getting content for free because advertisers are paying for it is pretty great, though, right? As Heinlein would say, there's no such thing as a free lunch...

<comment><USER20> I turn ABP off for domains that have made it a point to never have abusive ads (popovers, moving, flashing, expanding, generally being a nuisance). I'd highly recommend this to others. The advertising economy is crucial to maintaining free (as in beer) access to information on the internet, and _complete_ rejection of it is just going to mean more paywalls in the future.

I don't mind banner ads or text ads so long as they are neither deceptive (mixing ad content with real content or masquerading as such) nor abusive (flashing! look at me! you're the 1 millionth visitor! tiny dismiss buttons, or worse, no dismiss buttons!)

<comment><USER21> I don't think it's my responsibility to ensure third-party companies' business models work. I have a TCP pipe open to a remote web server; however I manipulate the data after it has come out of that TCP pipe is up to me, providing I don't violate copyright etc. Trying to prop up businesses in spite of economic forces - free-riding in this case - is usually pointless. Economic forces are too powerful; it's a waste of effort. It's better to work on more sustainable models that aren't as weak.

<comment><USER22> What about terms of use for sites where they specifically disallow the use of ad blocking software?

<comment><USER23> I'd take terms of use more seriously if they were presented as something resembling a real contract with a choice to accept/decline, e.g. they showed me an up-front page with the terms, and made me check that I agreed to them before letting me view the site. Obviously sites don't do this, because they would lose a bunch of readers who would just close the window.

I don't consider fine print buried in a footer that I "implicitly" agree to to be an actual contract.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> _If you're looking to grow in popularity as quickly as possible and the cash you could get from ads doesn't matter, then yes, go without ads._

It's not one way or the other. You can fall in the middle. You can run ads on a site to only non logged in users or only on posts over a certain age. For a long established blog, just running ads on posts over a month old could still cover 50%+ of the pageviews. I use this "trick" myself and the CTRs are great because it's mostly people coming in from search engines who hit those ads rather than my "regulars" :-)

</comment><comment><USER25> I like this. I wonder if there's a google-killer in targeting ads at the quality, or type, that suits you? It would build brands both ways, as the article says. Of course, it's not needed at the high-end of BMW et. al., because they already have full-time staff for this stuff; but there's a huge middle-ground between that and the weight loss ads. Now, how to make it convenient and low-cost enough, to bring those benefits to the next tier, who are presently non-consumers of this service, but would love it (like lionhearted here)?

aside: low-cost in this article happen to also be unpleasant; but they needn't coincide. Most disruptions are low-cost (e.g. PCs). They are indeed low- quality, but only with respect to users who already have something better (e.g. mainframes). Google text ads are very low-cost, but also pretty good, especially when related to what you're searching for anyway - this is the idea they copied from (and paid off) overture.com (was: goto.com, now yahoo owns them). I think this was a fantastic idea, even better than google's search, because it aligns everyone's interest, even as it optimizes profit (the auction part).

Re: "needing the money": I recently negotiated my highest ever deal (by a significant integer factor). I did it by pretending I didn't need the money. But I really, really did, so this was... stressful. At the last, I gave in; but I estimate I could have gotten an extra $50,000 or so. Oh well, I still did really well. I prefer the article's plan of _not actually_ needing the money. Fortunately, that deal is very close to putting me in that position.

</comment><comment><USER26> >I believe the reason you see sites without ads as superior on some level is because the absolute-highest-quality writers usually don't have ads.

I think it's the opposite. It's rather because the lowest quality sites on the internet are filled with ads.

</comment><comment><USER27> _I believe the reason you see sites without ads as superior on some level is because the absolute-highest-quality writers usually don't have ads.

Sites like Paul Graham's, Eliezer Yudkowsky's, Mark Cuban's, and Steve Blank's don't have advertisements._

I've been subscribed to Cuban's feed for some time now and think he has some interesting things to say on occasion but I wouldn't call him a high quality writer. He's not in the same category as the others listed there.

</comment><comment><USER28> Few things in the article ring a bell close to me.

1)One being the power to choose things without bothering about the money part is like a drug.

I still remember the time, when I would take design prjects for as cheap as $20 per hour (which for India's standard is not cheap) but I knew I had to build my name and it was a good enough price to pay for a while.

Then I realised that I could do more interesting and challenging personal projects than make sites with no budget and affection for design from the companies' end.

2) _"You don't need the money?" – well, 95%+ of people in the world would like more money. Maybe 99%+._

Well I would say it is 100%. Never come across someone who would say not to money. And no I am not talking moral issues, grey area, lack of time reasons. I am talking reasons where you did not take that money for the sake of not just taking that money.

That power of being able to refuse projects left and right and be very picky is what I cherish the most. I might rather just enjoy a quite night with my girlfriend than slog for some work I don't get a thrill out of.

</comment><comment><USER29> Blogs are one of the worst monetizing categories of sites; a blog has to have a LOT of traffic (like 100k a month) to move the meter, and if you don't get that kind of traffic you're just hurting your credibility by running ads.

Sebastian's site doesn't even show up in quantcast, so Sebastian is probably turning up $2.35 a month in ad revenues, if that.

<comment><USER30> >a blog has to have a LOT of traffic (like 100k a month) to move the meter, and if you don't get that kind of traffic you're just hurting your credibility by running ads.

I get a quarter of that on my blog, but I'm pretty random and rarely blog. All my ads do is pay the hosting costs for itself and a couple of extra domains that are in perpetual [un]development and maybe if I'm lucky buy me a meal out once a year (at a pretty low class restaurant) - but do people really disrespect me for that?

Personally despite it being cheap I probably couldn't afford to run the blog without ads (for at least another year) and 250k visits p.a. suggests that at least a few thousand folks might be moderately distracted or find worth in my blog.

In your opinion should I stop the blog? (based on this very limited information alone).

<comment><USER29> It's up to you. I won't think less of you for running ads (I run several non- blog advertising funded sites), but I know that some people would. Paying for your hosting costs is fine, but it's another thing to get paid for your time.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER31> Linda Evangelista is a bad example. She -had- to get out of bed to make money. If she was sick, out of town or otherwise engaged, she couldn't generate revenue. Everything was dependent upon her physically showing up somewhere to do something. Smart people figure out a way to stay in bed and still make the $10k.

<comment><USER32> That's a bold statement.

Many SaaS/e-Book/App-People think, the money comes in even when they're sick. This might be true for a short period of time but as time changes the value of your work decreases. Let's say you stop working for 6month on your project — usually your sales will collapse.

People bashing freelancers/contractors usually ignore this fact. I for one prefer to get e.g. 10k$/month freelancing instead of 30k$ for an e-book that requires 6month work to write + promote.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> I absolutely agree with everything he said. It mirrors my own opinions on money.

</comment><comment><USER34> I think the reason Linda won't get out of bed for less than $10k is because they pay her that much to stay in bed

<comment><USER20> I'm not sure if I'm parsing your post right - are you trying to suggest that models are prostitutes?</comment></comment>


CSS Nyan Cat - <AUTHOR> http://michalbe.github.com/css-nyan-cat/ <comment><USER2> A lot of people here are (rightly) confused by what this is outside the technical (CSS) aspect of it.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyan_Cat>

<http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/nyan-cat-pop-tart-cat>

This site has to have crazy music that auto-plays. If it doesn't it would not be Nyan Cat.

</comment><comment><USER3> Nice hack! I totally forgot about CSS animation with keyframes.

The YouTube custom progress bar for the Nyan Cat video made me do a double take too:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH2-TGUlwu4>

</comment><comment><USER4> I hate any site that autoplays audio, no matter what it is. Even worse when it's something like this, though.

<comment><USER5> So, YouTube?

It's Nyan Cat. What the hell did you expect?

<comment><USER6> Well, that's what TubeStop is for: <https://addons.mozilla.org/en- US/firefox/addon/tubestop/>

I'm not the guy you replied to but I didn't know what to expect when I followed the link, I had no idea what "Nyan Cat" even means.

But it's on Hacker News, so it would be something interesting and valuable, right? ;)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> Why should you be proud to fail CSSLint?

<comment><USER8> I lot of people disagree with a lot of the rules laid out for csslint <http://csslint.net/about.html>

I do as well

<comment><USER9> One of many many fails was:

Don't use IDs in selectors. #nyanCat {

What's the thinking behind disallowing ids in selectors?

<comment><USER10> The idea is that using IDs reduces the reusability of your css rules.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> that code isn't semantic!</comment>


'Do Not Resist': A look at the normalization of warrior cops - <AUTHOR> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2016/09/30/do-not-resist-a-chilling-look-at-the-normalization-of-warrior-cops/ <comment><USER3> In Los Angeles I see so many cops driving black mustang cars, a predator style car. As if they enjoy their predator status and want to express and enforce their masculinity on the community. Every time I see a cop car it makes me nervous just by the sight of it.

I think its time we give them Pink colored bug beetle cars. That will remind them they are here to protect the community, not be a hero in an action movie.

<comment><USER4> In Montreal, cops are ditching their uniform as a form of protest. They look stupid but we are still afraid of them. They have incredibly eye-catching pants, check it out: [http://www.cjad.com/EI/sharedobjects/handlers/ir.ashx?p=ZgAv...](http://www.cjad.com/EI/sharedobjects/handlers/ir.ashx?p=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&w=590&mw=590)

<comment><USER5> OK, that's just silly. We can have police be approachable parts of the community without silly pants.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> "The striking thing about the footage is, again, the utter mundanity of the raid. A family was just violently raided over an immeasurable amount of pot. A man was arrested over that pot. The money he needed for his business was taken from him. Yet there's no shame or embarrassment from the officers. There's no panic that the whole thing was captured on video. That's when it hits you. They don't think they've made a mistake. This is what they do."

</comment><comment><USER7> Ultimately this type of behavior erodes all trust in law enforcement in the communities where this kind of policing is practiced. A vicious cycle is amplified whereby residents learn to put little trust in police and in turn police decide to use more and more force, believing those (untrusting) residents would use violence against them.

As a side note, why don't police approach dangerous criminals the way radiological workers approach "hot" material. I'm not sure how "danger" should be enumerated but I'd imagine it decreases with the square of the distance. Unless there are other bystanders nearby who might be hurt, closing the distance to suspects seems to be one of the more dangerous things an officer could do. Seems like containing someone and letting them cool off is safer for both parties.

<comment><USER8> Re your side note: That's how police forces almost everywhere in Europe are trained.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> The problem with US police is that they now want to behave like deployed military troops without any of the risk. They want to play with all these "cool toys", and pretend they are raiding some compound in Fallujah or something, but they refuse to risk their life.

That's how they end up killing people who are fetching their ID in their pocket, or people carrying a black book, or really just standing there. The excuse is always the same: I feared for my life. And their superiors always back them up: The officer thought he was in danger, police officers have the right to use lethal force if they _think_ their life is in danger. I remember reading an amazing post by a vet who joined the force, and he was totally baffled to see that his new coworkers were _more_ agressive than his platoon in Irak.

Guess what, real military troops accept the fact that sometimes they'll get shot and die. They always make sure that the guy on the other side is actually shooting at them before they open fire. And when they don't, they're punished. Severely.

I know it's not a popular opinion in a country where cops are called heroes. But I'd rather see 10 dead cops than a single innocent citizen shot. It sucks, it's a lot to ask for, but it comes with the job. When you're a cop you _have_ to put the life of others before your own. Otherwise become an accountant.

<comment><USER10> I get your point about the relative discipline of actual soldiers, but in Iraq it seems likely that at least 100 noncombattants died for every soldier who was killed.

<comment><USER5> Maybe. But those non-combatants were rarely killed by US troops in direct combat. More commonly, they were killed by 1) insurgent fighters 2) IEDs 3) US air strikes or other indirect fires.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> And how many members of that family will EVER call the police to report anything short of a murder - if that - out of concern of being charged with it because they were convenient?

I'll throw in a relevant quote from this week's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel article about the 20% decline in 911 calls over the year following news of a beating by off-duty officers: ([http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/investigations/2016/09/29...](http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/investigations/2016/09/29/911-calls- fell-black-milwaukee-neighborhoods-after-jude-beating-study-finds/90907882/))

"In the Jude study, researchers found data suggesting people withdraw from the system after an incident of police violence. Papachristos said the study shows that police violence and other misconduct hurts officers' ability to work with communities and may result in a deepening of so-called "legal cynicism" — the idea that police are either unable or unwilling to help — within communities. That dynamic can perpetuate crime and distrust."

The Harvard study in question: "Police Violence and Citizen Crime Reporting in the Black Community" [https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3114813-Jude-911-Cal...](https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3114813-Jude-911-Call- Study.html)

edit: rearranging URLs

<comment><USER12> In Dennis Smith's memoir, "Report from Engine Co. 82", he wrote that in South Bronx people would call the fire department instead of the police, because they didn't trust the police.

<comment><USER13> That's very interesting, I might consider doing this in the future when needed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Nowadays cops are a lot less likely to tussle and mix it up. It's all a sort of antiseptic interaction where commands are shouted from afar.

It used to be cops were willing to take a punch and punch back at someone who didn't cooperate. If that happens now it's resisting arrest, assaulting an officer, etc.

Not sure if it's a legacy of needles and aids which lead police to avoid any physical contact with a suspect or perp. It's a change that has led to much less "give" on the part of cops.

<comment><USER15> I think the general public is unaware of how dangerous physical altercations are. The antisepsis of staged fight scenes on TV make it seem like any well- trained person can recover from a tussle and be back to normal by the next scene. In the real world, it only takes seconds for a struggle to turn fatal, even discarding the presence of any other weapons.

In the case of a police officer carrying a gun, all physical fights have to be assumed to be fights to the death. If the officer gets knocked out, there is now a loaded weapon on the table that is no longer under the control of the officer.

(Edited to fix typos.)

<comment><USER16> Police work is much less dangerous than many civilian jobs, yet the police are paid to assume risk. I think the balance is off, and society as a whole is suffering, because civilians who generally are nonviolent are much less capable of taking on that risk than the tainted police officers who are paid to do so.

<comment><USER17> Ahem... "police work is much less dangerous than many _other_ civilian jobs".

<comment><USER18> The police ARE civilians. That they imagine themselves to be a branch of the military is the very problem!

<comment><USER14> They are civilians... however, colloquially "civilian" can refer to a non- insider, someone outside the profession.

A group of boxers might say "yeah, civilians wouldn't understand why we love the sport".

In other words, it's not always used in the strict sense of military vs non- military.

<comment><USER18> _it 's not always used in the strict sense of military vs non-military_

When people with machine guns and armoured vehicles, etc refer to others as "civilians", I think it's clear what sense it is used in.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> One point that I don't see discussed often, is the background of police officers. How many are Iraq vets that apply in America's streets the exact same methods that made Iraq hell on earth... And why could anyone think applying occupation tactics to domestic law enforcement was remotely a good idea...

<comment><USER20> I've heard the opposite hypothesis. Previously police departments had a much higher percentage of vets. After having experienced the horrors of war, they had no need nor no desire to play soldier on the street. Also they would have calibrated their us versus them response. The criminals they encounter on the street are the same people they were defending and fighting with at war.

<comment><USER21> .

<comment><USER22> They don't explain the same conclusion. One predicts that police departments with more vets will tend to be less militarized, the other predicts that police departments with more vets will tend to be more militarized. These could be easily distinguished by gathering data, and it would be very helpful to know which, if either, is true.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER23> The drug war is what gives these type of police the justification for their actions. The drug war will be our undoing.

<comment><USER24> Yup. It starts with the very term "war".

We have military hardware and military guns. We have an institution of filled with arrogance and the instillation of fear ("Contempt of cop" is a real thing.) Even in this article, they talk about how the sheriff's swat team has a logo featuring a human skull. Not exactly in the "protect and serve" department, but more much more "I'm gonna fuck someone up" department. Civil forfeiture. Targeting communities for fines. Broken windows policing. A privatized prison system. Policing as a money maker.

This is contemporary police culture, and it is dysfunctional.

I've said this multiple times, but the older I get, the more I see the wisdom in NWA[0].

[0] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tke_27wbW-0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tke_27wbW-0)

<comment><USER25> >Some are wearing T-shirts with the tactical team's logo. It's a human skull imposed over two crossed AR-15s.

Have they realized they're the baddies[1]?

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1VxaMEjRU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hn1VxaMEjRU)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER26> Give everyone: 1\. Food 2\. Clean, safe and warm shelter, doesn't need to be fancy 3\. A little money to spend (just a little! There still needs to be incentive to go out and work!) 4\. Free and good quality education

And legalise drugs.

No more need for warrior cops.

</comment><comment><USER27> What pisses me off most about this is that people say the cops need these tools, etc. Well, how come the cops suck so much at their jobs?! No, I'm serious. My local PD is in the midst of a crime wave. They take many hours to respond, never actually catch anyone, catch the wrong people, act like idiots.

</comment><comment><USER28> this is the reality in our black communities. night raids, arbitrary detention, brutality, denigration. the police fight a war against the poor.

if they behave like an occupying army, they should not be so offended when they are fought like an occupying army. the black communities will continue to be oppressed, and so there will be more incidents like the slaughter in dallas. everyone will say "oh, the humanity" or similar, but nothing will change until public policy tightens the leash on the cops.

until we start taking officer safety more seriously and hobble their ability to abuse the public, we should expect continued violence against the police. to improve officer safety, the police need to be stripped of their weapons, armor, and legal leeway to abuse. it's simple: violence begets violence. rather than doubling down, pull back. unless the lives of police don't matter-- then by all means, let the police try continuing with the shootings until the morale of the black community improves.

under the best circumstances, the black community won't trust the police for another generation or two, provided that the police stop doing damage now. we need to aim for the children of their children being able to trust the institutions that are there for their benefit... or we could keep beating/shooting/stealing from/raiding them for another 20 years, and cause peace to be that much farther off.

</comment><comment><USER29> That's why I'm leaning more and more towards the idea that paying taxes is immoral and wrong in our current system.

And that is because a good chunk of the taxes we pay go towards arming young people and sending them to kill other young people - military/war/defence.

Another chunk goes towards arming your own people against your own people, thus making dissent and protest hard and dangerous.

And another chunk goes towards maintaining big and powerful institutions, like the IRS, threatening us with violence if we don't pay up.

Centralised taxation systems should be replaced with citizen crowdfunding, in which everyone can choose where his tax money goes.

I'm curious if we'd still be spending as much on police and military if we could choose how we spend our taxes.

<comment><USER30> There are many parts of government that I disagree with, including many that I consider immoral. That's why it's important to participate in the political process. Government and law can be changed; it's a slow process and it requires a _lot_ of work, but it's possible.

Picking and choosing where your taxes go a terrible idea, because government isn't à la carte[1]. Everybody has their own opinion on what they don't want to pay for, such as the religious fanatics that don't want to cover certain medical items (e.g. some types of birth control). The "market" is not a law of nature that fixes everything, so you're really advocating for a failed government where nothing is properly funded.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSQCH1qyIDo#t=170](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSQCH1qyIDo#t=170)

<comment><USER29> > Picking and choosing where your taxes go a terrible idea, because government > isn't à la carte

And why not ? Our current system stems from a different age, when there were no technological means of communication and collaboration similar to what we have today. Democracy (majority wins, regardless of competence) was the best tech people could come up with in those circumstances.

But this is no longer the case.

If we could start over, how would we build SocietyOS today ?

Laws ? Why not write them in a special programming language, which can then be executed against facts from reality (coming from sensors and human input) - <USER2> judges, lawyers and lawmakers - input facts, click and get the judgement.

Use collaboration and communication tools like Github to write the laws. Let citizens submit pull requests.

Let citizens have the "Society" app on their phones and let them up/down vote serious things too, not just pictures of cats.

Log the public opinion and gather feedback in real time.

Use advanced reputation systems, in which people's opinions have different weights in various domains. And so on.

Many many ways in which we can use today's technology to create a 'better', 'fairer' society - we just have to let go of the old system.

I think this will inevitably happen 'naturally' some time in the future, but the weight of the 'old' makes it very difficult to move forward now..

<comment><USER30> > And why not ?

Because you are advocating for the government to fail due to under funding. Do you not realize that _every_ piece of government has some group that wishes it didn't exist? You are advocating for the de-funding of everything.

Living with other people requires compromise. We cannot _all_ have the government we want, because most of those governments are contradictory. Instead, the goal should be to guarantee the ability to _change_ government.

> regardless of competence

That's a feature, not a bug, because there isn't (and never will be) agreement on the definition of "competence". In the past, for example, tests of "competence" were used to disenfranchise people.

> best tech

You cannot define this either.

> Why not write them in a special programming language

I would love to have laws written in a strict, machine-checkable grammar. "Legalease" already approaches this idea, with many defined terms and standard formats for some things. There is a lot of room for improvement, of course.

> executed against facts from reality ... no judges, lawyers and lawmakers

You should _really_ hang out with lawyers more, because this sentence is wildly detached from reality. You're pretending that "facts" and the interpretation of how the law applies to them are (or ever could be) some sort of automatic process. A large part of trials is deciding _what the facts are_ , as there is often disagreement about that.

> coming from sensors

Sensors fail. It requires _interpretation_ and _argument_ to decide how to handle those situations.

> input facts, click and get the judgement.

Automatic judgment of law is terrifying. Consider that from the perspective of people that _don 't_ have your level of privilege. Minority groups regularly have to fight democratically created prejudices, and human judgment - judges, juries, etc - that has the option to _not_ apply the law is an important safety mechanism.

> Use collaboration and communication tools like Github to write the laws.

Sounds great. When are you introducing these tools to your local government? Also... "collaboration and communication" to decide how to run society is called _politics_. I strongly recommend participating in that process; just remember that you may have to do a lot of remedial work before everybody else is ready for tools like git.

> Log the public opinion and gather feedback in real time.

I'd love to have that. If you know of a way to do that which isn't trivially broken _and_ doesn't allow coercion by employers or other people in positions of power, do share it. It would solve a _lot_ of problems. Right now, we already try to do this in the voting process; adding in the internet or a phone "app" is guaranteed to create problems. For an explanation of why, see this[1] talk by Andrew Appel (CS prof at Princeton).

\--

I suspect you're suffering from a tech-focused variation of the Just World Fallacy[2]. Reality just doesn't work that cleanly, even when you use computers. In fact, computers have a nasty tendency to amplify and automate mistakes and prejudices, just like they can amplify and automate useful work.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abQCqIbBBeM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abQCqIbBBeM)

[2] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just- world_hypothesis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis)

<comment><USER31> > Automatic judgment of law is terrifying. Consider that from the perspective > of people that don't have your level of privilege. Minority groups regularly > have to fight democratically created prejudices, and human judgment - > judges, juries, etc - that has the option to not apply the law is an > important safety mechanism.

In other words, are you saying the system might be prejudiced?

But even so, as long as it's less prejudiced than humans (notoriously bad), it'll be better.

<comment><USER30> > In other words, are you saying the system might be prejudiced?

Every system has prejudices and biases.

> But even so, as long as it's less prejudiced than humans (notoriously bad), > it'll be better.

I'll take a system that has less prejudice, but first show that it actually is less prejudiced in practice.

Non-human systems "bake in" and automate the biases of the creator of the system, and it is _very_ hard to create a system that isn't full of preconceptions, misunderstandings, and _bad data_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> These are all from different countries. Just a quick image search. Would a visitor from another planet be entirely wrong to deduce that local regime propaganda aside, _all_ governments have assumed a paramilitarized posture towards their citizens?

[http://media.presstv.com/photo/20160325/1bd21648-c58b-4d39-a...](http://media.presstv.com/photo/20160325/1bd21648-c58b-4d39-a3a8-6bb2bcde34c0.jpg)

[http://media.presstv.com/photo/20160323/f17b570b-68b6-4d7d-9...](http://media.presstv.com/photo/20160323/f17b570b-68b6-4d7d-93b9-176787213a53.jpg)

[http://media.presstv.com/photo/20150519/76bdc4b0-98ca-42b1-b...](http://media.presstv.com/photo/20150519/76bdc4b0-98ca-42b1-b08d-9d410b1eb493.jpg)

[http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200704/r137524_467947.jpg](http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200704/r137524_467947.jpg)

[http://worldnews.indywatch.org/archiver/worldnews.indywatch....](http://worldnews.indywatch.org/archiver/worldnews.indywatch.org/resources/timemachine/tftppull.freethoughtllc.netdna- cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/riot-police.jpg)

<comment><USER26> We don't know the context these photos were taken in though. Might have been during riots, or a terrorist alert. I'd personally want the cops to look like that if there was a nutter on the loose with a machine gun.

<comment><USER32> Context is a fair point. Interestingly enough, they are _all_ beating the "terrorist" drums at your local regime.

> I'd personally want the cops to look like that if there was a nutter on the > loose with a machine gun.

Here is the point: Physical protection of police personnel does not invariably require 'psychological intimidation' aesthetics.

Your "lone nutter" is by your description already nuts and has already crossed the line, so what's the point of dressing up in storm trooper outfits?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER33> It's been a few years that Terry Gilliam's Brazil movie got upgraded to 'mostly documentary' status. At the time, 1985, it seemed only a dark comedy / cautionary tale.

(Well, the caution against ugly tech seems to have worked. Architecture and policing, not so much.)

</comment><comment><USER34> Oh I _get_ it now. The warrior cop is the new Klu Klux Klan. Violently suppressing the ability of the (poor/black/?) to succeed in America

It is the civil forfeiture thing with the lawnmowers that was a light bulb moment for me.

</comment><comment><USER35> The author might be right about some things, but he is also clearly exaggerating toward his narrative in some others.

It wasn't the _" Ferguson Protests"_ as the author is trying to put it, it was the _" Ferguson Riots"_, there was looting, violence amongst the people and destruction of public property all around, you can't expect the police to show up in their blue uniform armed only with a baton in those cases.

<comment><USER12> Ferguson involved both protests and riots. More people were involved in the former than the latter.

Quoting M. L. King's "The Other America":

> These conditions are the things that cause individuals to feel that they > have no other alternative than to engage in violent rebellions to get > attention. And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the > unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear > that the plight of the negro poor has worsened over the last twelve or > fifteen years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and > justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of > white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than > about justice and humanity. - > [http://www.gphistorical.org/mlk/mlkspeech/](http://www.gphistorical.org/mlk/mlkspeech/)

I can expect the police to not yell out "Bring it, all you fucking animals! Bring it!".

<comment><USER5> Well, let's be honest, justice and humanity is only possible in an atmosphere of respect for law and relative tranquillity. Justice has seldom been found at the head of a mob.

<comment><USER36> You are not wrong in general but for cases like these maybe try to see it more as a "thrown exception" where as per the MLK quote above, the base "promises of freedom and justice have not been met".

<comment><USER5> It's not a simple problem, true. But I stand by my belief that riots are simply going to provoke a more powerful backlash in opposition to the rioters.

<comment><USER12> The Stonewall riots seem to have lead to long-term success. What better alternative would you have suggested than to riot?

The Zoot Suit Riots had the opposite effect from what you describe. Some of the police joined in on the riot against young Latino males, and there wasn't a powerful backlash against the rioters.

The riots in Romania in 1989 provoked a more powerful backlash. The government eventually lost.

That makes it sound like things aren't as simple as you describe.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Who brings what at your party? (made with Vue.js, Graphcool and Bulma) - <AUTHOR> https://freatle.com/ <comment><USER2> We usually just message each other what we are bringing. This seems overly bureaucratic.

<comment><USER3> Some people like bureaucracy, when you organize an event with more than 10 people, that can help!

Even if you're just 5, that would be n(n-1) = 5*4 = 20 messages to send!</comment></comment>


Ask HN: your favourite server side JavaScript web framework? - <AUTHOR>

I really think JavaScript is the future, but I still haven't made the leap. Just wondering what people who did it are using? I have heard of Helma and AppJet, but that is about it. Oh, and node.js, of course, but I think it is not a complete framework. Also CouchDB, but I don't fully understand how they intend to host applications in the client, with verifications and all. I think some middleware might still be required (node.js might be perfect for that). <comment><USER2> Check out <http://commonjs.org/>

\-- MV</comment>


IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life - <AUTHOR> http://adobegripes.tumblr.com/post/231806385/adobe-gets-bitchy-over-the-iphone-and-flash-bit

<comment><USER2> For 90% of the sites that I visit, I would prefer no flash. Not to mention the battery, last thing I want is flash chewing through my battery for flash that I dont even want to see. I wouldnt mind the ability to click on a flash movie that isnt youtube, and have it launch a player.

<comment><USER3> <sarcasm> \- I guess since it's on the Internet it must be true. \- All the other smartphones which have Flash must have 30 min battery life. \- Apple is saint and Adobe is evil. \- iPhone is such an open platform. </sarcasm>

<comment><USER4> Agreed, this "story" smells fishy. How is it that flash works acceptably on other platforms but not the iPhone?

A much more likely explanation is the one everyone has been assuming, viz., Apple doesn't want any code they haven't approved running on the phone, period.

<comment><USER5> Flash doesn't run "acceptably" on OSX or Linux. It uses around 30% of my cpu on either platform, compared to using only 3% of the cpu on my windows machine. Clearly they have some work to do before they can make flash as efficient as running on their core platform.

Adobe should make flash work decently on other platforms before making one for the iphone...

Running any flash app on my macbook causes the fan to turn on within 5 minutes -- it's horrible.

<comment><USER6> Let's add insult to injury: Apple has reported that a majority of crashes on a Mac — _across the board_ — are due to Flash.

<comment><USER7> If that's true, why doesn't Apple make their own swf viewer? I mean, they're _Apple_ , they have twenty billion dollars in the bank; they can afford to reimplement Flash Player.

<comment><USER8> They _are_ making their own "swf viewer". It's called HTML5 and it's the reason you can't find any Flash on their own webpage, or on their iPhones.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> No offense, but something you read on Reddit that some random dude heard from "a good friend" is probably complete bullshit.

Nonetheless, it's still totally believable. But it probably represents almost no optimization on their end. If I can play a 3d multiplayer game over 3G for an hour without the phone crapping out, a think some vector graphics are surmountable. There just has to be a desire there. And clearly Apple doesn't desire to be supporting a proprietary standard when HTML5 does the same thing in a completely open way.

Now, we just need a Flash (the big desktop creation app) equivalent that spits out HTML5 code. Anyone working on that?

<comment><USER10> > Now, we just need a Flash (the big desktop creation app) equivalent that > spits out HTML5 code. Anyone working on that?

I was just discussing this exact idea with a friend yesterday (although it's something I personally wouldn't be interested in). If done correctly, you could backend to HTML5+JS+CSS and still emit SWF for legacy support. Would certainly be interesting.

<comment><USER11> I heard about OpenLaszlo - <http://www.openlaszlo.org/> \- a few years ago, but I never got around toworking with it. It emitted Flash & Dynamic HTML.

<comment><USER12> It's pretty good. Definitely better than Adobe's tools for code. The art still has to be made in Flash though.

Unless there is some compelling reason to use Flash though, open tech (like AJAX) wins every time.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> All I'm seeing here are comments about video performance on Flash on various systems. Nothing about games or website navigation or etc.

So why can't we just admit that what we _really_ want is a way to play those other video formats (especially ON2, you porn lovers) on the iPhone?

</comment><comment><USER14> I have a Nokia N800, in terms of hardware is half the performance of the iPhone, and flash runs fine and I've never measured battery life, but seemed fine to me. I have to question the validity of this. Anybody else have the n800 or even the n700

</comment><comment><USER15> I have a 2nd generation iPod touch. They could have doubled the thickness to provide a longer battery life.

</comment><comment><USER16> Come on, the real reason flash "can't perform" is because it would open up a competing app delivery vector that would undermine the app store. One with no approval power.

<comment><USER17> I call bullshit on these conspiracy theories that Apple is blocking Flash because it would compete with the app store. You can make apps in JS that will run in Mobile Safari. Is that a "competing app delivery vector"? If so, then why would Apple allow it, if it's so worried about hanging on to it's app store business?

I find it a little dubious that Flash would even _be_ competition for the app store. The whole reason the app store and the iTunes store are so successful is because it's incredibly easy and, much to the chagrin of some people on here, centralized. Joe Schmoe can easily download and install a new app on his shiny new iPhone pretty easily with the app store. He knows where to go for new apps. That won't necessarily be the case with Flash.

I bet there's more to the story than performance issues, but I'd imagine it has more to do with Adobe producing a crappy product than it does with any of this nonsense. Apple thrives on the user experience being good, end-to-end, and I'd imagine they'll outright reject anything that sullies that.

<comment><USER16> I don't think it's a matter of comspiracy, but rather of control. It's seen in their app store approval process and it's key to their product's success. Why leave important aspects of a product's perception (3rd Party Software), up to chance and also make money through that control? Sounds like a good way to make a profit.</comment></comment></comment>


Obama Seeking to Boost Study of Human Brain - <AUTHOR> http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/18/science/project-seeks-to-build-map-of-human-brain.html?hp&gwh=272E78410C052816AA5CF561786F33C7 <comment><USER2> I was stunned reading this. It looks like the group pushing this project are just taking advantage of the president's advisers ignorance. Cognitive neuroscientists, psychologists and neurologists have been "mapping" the human brain for well over 20 years now. There's even a conference dedicated to the pursuit (<http://www.humanbrainmapping.org>) it attracts over 2500 attendees each year. Unless this project is focusing on some aspect of the brain that has yet to be studied (not very likely) it looks like this is just going to take NIH funds away from researchers who are already working in these areas. It doesn't surprise me though. Francis Collins (head of NIH) was the leader of the publicly funded half of the Human Genome Project. I guess he's trying to pull the same trick twice. It will be very interesting to see what the final proposal looks like.

EDIT:

Also claims that "we'll be able to cure Alzheimers!" are pretty much part of every grant proposal submitted to NIMH in one way or the other. It's just an easy way to get your "impact on public health" covered. I can't believe they're failing for it here.

<comment><USER3> Right, and people had been playing with rockets for 30 years before the Apollo project. There is something to be said for large, concerted effort toward a singular goal. There are still enough massive gaps in our understanding of the brain to justify further research.

That said, this press speculation is just fluff and it's unclear to me whether it is possible to define such a focused goal.

As an aside, I don't quite get all the cynicism in this thread. President: we will spend more money on science! HN: Meh?

<comment><USER4>
      President: we will spend more money on science! HN: Meh?

The cynicism is that all "science" is not equal. Correct or not, cantastoria's criticism is that giving money to charlatans takes that money away from basic research. A good counterargument would outline why "mapping the brain" is possible and a good use of resources. Personally, I'm still waiting for that from someone.

<comment><USER3>
      Correct or not, cantastoria's criticism is that giving money to
      charlatans takes that money away from basic research.

I don't understand who the supposed charlatans are. The basic scientists lauded by cantastoria for doing existing research are almost certainly going to get the lion's share of this new money.

      outline why "mapping the brain" is possible and a good use of
      resources.

[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627312...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0896627312005181)

<comment><USER4>
      ...are almost certainly going to get the lion's share of this new money.

Not sure why you think that.

Here's the pdf for your link (I can only guess that you find this paper convincing): <http://bit.ly/Y2AXtz>

<comment><USER3>
      Not sure why you think that.

Because that's how grant peer-review works? Who will compose the review panels for this funding? Mostly the same people who already compose the review panels for existing NIH/NINDS/etc. funding mechanisms.

      I can only guess that you find this paper convincing.

The nanoprobe and "complex emergent properties" stuff at the beginning are a bit hand-wavy, but the concrete 5 and 10-year goals are sufficiently ambitious while certainly not outlandish.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> While there has been a huge growth in brain research over the last decade or so, the methods and analysis are still immature, and results are often quite fuzzy (even if researchers would like their reviewers to believe otherwise). There also doesn't seem to be a clear goal here, other than to throw a bunch of money at some interesting questions. The Genome Project had the very clear goal of mapping the human genome. The European project aims to simulate a human brain. This just seems to be directing a lot of money at research which is already being done.

That being said, I think there might be some very interesting opportunities here for talented developers. When I worked in the field a few years ago, the software used for this stuff was generally a lot of MATLAB scripts with C subroutines held together by some scripting language duct tape (Python/Bash). It was slow, it was buggy, we were basically writing documentation as we figured it out ourselves, different labs had different methods and scripts and in general it was kind of a mess. It's actually bad enough that there are research grants out there to develop better analysis software. Most of the researchers are trained in statistics, neuroscience, and psychology but have very little programming experience. If you are interested in some of the software that is out there right now, below is a partial list. Also, if you are interested in this kind of research but can't contribute code-wise, contact your local research university. They are always looking for test subjects for this kind of stuff, you usually get paid pretty well ($50-100/hour for imaging studies) and you get some cool images of your own brain out of it if you ask.

<http://www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/spm/>

<http://fsl.fmrib.ox.ac.uk/fsl/fslwiki/FSL>

<http://afni.nimh.nih.gov/afni>

<http://surfer.nmr.mgh.harvard.edu/>

<http://nipy.sourceforge.net/>

<http://www.trackvis.org/>

<comment><USER6> I've thought a lot about why fMRI data analysis tools are so terrible, and I've come up with a few reasons:

\- It's impossible to implement the algorithms for fMRI data analysis efficiently in most "dynamic" programming languages due to the performance hit you take from using a dynamic language. (It might actually be possible in Julia, NumPyPy, Python with Numba, but these languages are not yet well- established.) On the other hand, dynamic programming languages are much better suited to exploratory data analysis than C is, so essentially all fMRI data analysis ends up being a mixture of C code and glue code in some other language. In this regard, I don't think SPM (MATLAB with C MEX files) is really that bad. It's fast and it avoids having to read the data from disk multiple times.

\- People use what the tools they know, not the tools that are best for the job. FreeSurfer is a mess of C, C shell, and Tcl/Tk, but there's nothing else that can visualize fMRI data with comparable ease and accuracy. Most people in neuroimaging only know MATLAB, which is pretty terrible for analyzing large data sets because it can't mmap files (and it doesn't have the language features necessary to make this possible, and it's closed source).

\- Related to the above, it's easier to get funding to develop a novel algorithm than to implement an existing algorithm in a way that makes it more useful/accessible to researchers. I believe this is slowly changing.

\- There are a lot of different algorithms used for analyzing fMRI data, and no single package implements all of them. The necessity of each algorithm differs by lab and researcher, according to scientific necessity, personal preference, or the conventions of their subfield. People end up writing their own code to glue together methods from different analysis packages, which is, again, often written using the wrong tools.

\- Us graduate students who know how to code well need to publish papers. There is comparatively little incentive to publish code.

<comment><USER7> Let's add to that fMRI data is next to useless for actually studying the brain. It can map large scale organisation, but it's like trying to measure the economy based on which power stations are in use at any given time.

<comment><USER8> You could learn quite a bit about the organization and function of a country based on the temporal-spatial patterns of its energy consumption particularly when you're given the power to control external stimuli. But yeah, it could be pretty useless for studying something on the scale of a subdivision. It depends entirely on which spatial scales you are interested in studying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> I went to a fantastic talk by Microsoft Research's Stephen Emmott recently in which he referred to fMRI as "phrenology for the 21st century" and advocated the building of computational models of the brain. Mixed feelings about this announcement - some of the newer methods do look promising.

<comment><USER10> The proposed research is not focused on fMRI...

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> This sounds like a reactionary move after Europe announced their own. Can't complain though. Great to see they are taking this sort of research seriously. Now if they started funding international anti-asteroid systems, too (like how Russia suggested), that would be great.

</comment><comment><USER12> Sounds like snake oil. Too early to build a complete human brain model. Simpler brain models (cat, lizard) haven't been done yet (?) but that's not headline-worthy.

How about "President announces program to solve all human suffering"? About as meaningless, but would actually be more useful if by some astronomical fluke they succeeded.

<comment><USER13> It's on the same timescale as the European Blue Brain Project (and also Kurzweil's predictions, if you put any faith in that). If you believe that this an information technology that has an exponential growth, it's not a sufficient objection that we're far off now. The same objections were raised for the Human Genome Project, which was far from completion most of its duration, but followed an exponential growth and completed on time.

<comment><USER12> Genome is a couple megabytes. Brain is terabytes. A billion times more complex. And its not all about the chemistry, its about the physical wiring. So the same techniques won't apply.

<comment><USER13> Yes, but you only have to double a megabyte 30 times to get a terabyte. That's a better perspective to take when dealing with exponential growth. Of course, the genome and the brain are different things, but the point remains that if you believe this will have an exponential growth, being far away from solving it is exactly where you expect us to be right now. And even now, we do have quite good computational models for certain small parts of the brain.

<comment><USER14> > you only have to double a megabyte 30 times to get a terabyte.

It seems to be only 19.93 times according to Wolfram Alpha?

[http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=log%281+terabyte%2F1+me...](http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=log%281+terabyte%2F1+megabyte%29%2Flog%282%29)

<comment><USER13> You're right, I assumed the billion times figure was correct, it should be a million.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> It's clear that the software that we are using is not sufficient, and a lot of it seems to be a lack of quality control. I've been in science now for close to 10 years and the software that we use looks like it was built in 1995.

This is a serious problem with science software. The features are there (for the most part), but it seems clear that much of the software engineers are not working with the users. There is a severe lack of thought when it comes to UI and as such the learning curve is pretty steep.

With that said, my first YC application was to build software (web based) to tackle some of these issues. I'm actually looking for coders to help build this product, so if you have any interest in jumping into this field, send me an email (in profile). I intend on applying to YC this summer and would love to work with a few programmers to give this project a real shot.

<comment><USER16> I've spent some time making web-based software while sitting across the lab from the scientists who use it. This looks like an interesting project, I'll email you for more info.

</comment></comment><comment><USER17> I may be way out of my depth on this, but isn't this project assuming that there is a 'normative' human brain, and that we all have the same neuron structure?

I know we all have the same general brain regions, and in most of us they function approximately the same. But to go down to the neuronal-level will any single brain be able to give a map that would be useful to the population as a whole? Or are they planning on making some type of composite map from multiple sources?

<comment><USER5> I used to work in functional brain imaging (fMRI), so perhaps I can shed some light on this. Generally what happens is you take a group of subject, and get "structural" (anatomic) scans of their brain as well as the functional scans showing brain activity for the given task. The structural scans are then run through a statistical "normalization" procedure, which basically does some fancy bending/warping of everyone's brains such that they all line up. Once this is done you apply that normalization function to the functional scans so you can compare everyone. It is also important to note that typically neuroimaging does not go down the neuronal level, the resolution is just not that high. Typically you are looking for brain regions, or sub-regions that correlate with a given activity. Something on the order of millimeters to centimeters. However there are other ways of investigating brain activity, and some of those can go down to the neuronal level.

Here is an example of common software package to do such normalization and analysis: <http://www.fil.ion.ucl.ac.uk/spm/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I'm currently working to develop neural prosthetics (computer cursor, robotic arm, etc.) and it's clear to me that the president's proposed research will have _real_ clinical impact over the timescale of 5-10 years. Our lab and others already have paralyzed human patients controlling computers in clinical trials via a brain-machine interface, but it is hard to overstate the potential possibilities that remain hidden due to our lack of low-level understanding of low level circuits.

To clear up some misconceptions in this thread, this new work is NOT focused on top-down cognition using hand-wavy tools. Instead, it's focused on understanding neural circuits starting with simple organisms and working up to primates/humans by developing new technologies that allow us to radically scale up the scope of question we can ask.

</comment><comment><USER18> I'm skeptical, but if it's reasonable to spend over a Trillion on a manned fighter project (F-35) considering the pathetic state of that project, then the few billion for this is worthwhile a million times over

<comment><USER19> How about neither.

The Paul Allen brain Atlas, among many other private initiatives, is capable of pursuing this goal better than the federal government, in the same way and for the exact same reasons that Craig Venter & Co. embarrassed the human genome project.

<comment><USER20> Actually, UC Santa Cruz and the NHGRI/NIH embarrassed Celera by publishing the human genome and setting the whole thing public domain several days before Celera could publish then patent their mappings. And, anyway, the only reason Venter went private was to draw a line in the sand about shotgun sequencing, for which he was having trouble finding public funding/support.

Besides, no one got into space faster than governments, no one has managed to develop cures and vaccines for large-scale and deadly diseases than labs directly funded by the NIH and other governmental agencies, and no one has had the infrastructure to build large-scale networks like the Internet like governments.

I won't even mention interstate/intercontinental highways, sewer systems, healthcare outside of the US, etc. There are simply some things that cannot be done by anyone but the uppercase-P People.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> <http://bluebrain.epfl.ch/cms/lang/en/pid/56882> Here are more details of the European project (labelled Blue Brain Project) other posters had mentioned about in this thread. Also, there is this TED talk [http://www.ted.com/talks/henry_markram_supercomputing_the_br...](http://www.ted.com/talks/henry_markram_supercomputing_the_brain_s_secrets.html) by Henry Markram, the project director of the blue brain project.

<comment><USER22> For anyone still curious after watching the TED talk, also see the Almaden Cognitive Computing 2006 series - these presentations are technically intense (cellular biology, beyond-pop neuroscience) but(/and) enjoyable. The second one in the series is a lecture/presentation by the same Henry Markram: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gFI7o69VJM>

NB: intros (by those other people at the start of each video) tend to be long (especially for the first presentation (which is by the way very interesting as well)), I'd maybe skip them.

There are a couple of other videos from the series on youtube, but the original collection of twelve was removed from google video once that service became defunct. They are still available via somewhat obscure means from the original source:

webpage (original now gone from the source for some reason) with links to original AVIs and PPTs: <http://kostas.mkj.lt/almaden2006/agenda.shtml> ; I'm redownloading those AVIs now just in case... (www.almaden.ibm.com/institute/resources/2006/Disk[1-12].avi (replace integer interval with a single integer.))

</comment></comment><comment><USER23> On the claimed $800 billion dollar return on the human genome project: [http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110511/full/news.2011.281.ht...](http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110511/full/news.2011.281.html) (It's skeptical but vague; it looked like the rest of the top hits just parroted the press release.)

Anyone have access to the brain-mapping proposal? [http://www.cell.com/neuron/abstract/S0896-6273%2812%2900518-...](http://www.cell.com/neuron/abstract/S0896-6273%2812%2900518-1) "The function of neural circuits is an emergent property that arises from the coordinated activity of large numbers of neurons. To capture this, we propose launching a large-scale, international public effort, the Brain Activity Map Project, aimed at reconstructing the full record of neural activity across complete neural circuits. This technological challenge could prove to be an invaluable step toward understanding fundamental and pathological brain processes."

<comment><USER24> At columbia.edu via scholar.google.com:

<http://academiccommons.columbia.edu/catalog/ac%3A147969> [http://academiccommons.columbia.edu/download/fedora_content/...](http://academiccommons.columbia.edu/download/fedora_content/download/ac:147970/CONTENT/Neuroview_original.pdf)

<comment><USER23> Thanks!

On skimming it sounds well thought out as research on its own terms, though the connection to curing diseases is just as handwavey.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> This sounds awfully familiar (Europe's a step ahead, this time, at least in the press):

[http://uk.news.yahoo.com/billion-euro-supercomputer-to-- simu...](http://uk.news.yahoo.com/billion-euro-supercomputer-to--simulate- entire-human-brain---120811728.html)

<comment><USER3> Not exactly.

      The Obama initiative is markedly different from a recently
      announced European project that will invest 1 billion euros
      in a Swiss-led effort to build a silicon-based "brain." The
      project seeks to construct a supercomputer simulation using
      the best research about the inner workings of the brain.

      Critics, however, say the simulation will be built on
      knowledge that is still theoretical, incomplete or
      inaccurate.

</comment></comment><comment><USER26> This is great news. As skeptical as I am about the prospects for actually simulating the human brain in the near future the benefits that are likely to arise from devoting more resources to understanding it are enormous, both in terms of technology and human health. This is probably one of the best things the government could be spending research money on. I only hope that this proposal is funded at the level it deserves.

</comment><comment><USER27> Anders Sandberg and Nick Bostrom's "Whole Brain Emulation Roadmap" might interest some people here:

[http://www.philosophy.ox.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/3...](http://www.philosophy.ox.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0019/3853/brain- emulation-roadmap-report.pdf)

Most of it is over my head, but it was an interest read and shows the kind of techniques we'd need to be able to do this.

</comment><comment><USER28> How will this help "paving the way for Artificial intelligence"? We already have neural networks as a computational metaphor for the brain. I doubt we will find new metaphors. I doubt we will learn new computational tricks. Please enlight me on this issue.

<comment><USER29> ANNs were build with the assumption of point neurons as nodes in a network and many of their training algorithms are biophysically unrealistic. While ANNs can be good function approximators, they are a very inaccurate representation of brain neuronal neurons and networks (which have intricate dendrites and biophysics). We don't know yet how fundamental processes like memory storage work in the brain; it's one of the great mysteries of neuroscience.

</comment></comment><comment><USER30> I agree with the skepticism in the other comments. But I still happy to hear the news! We need more research on human brain! The more, the better! How human brain works is still pretty much a mystery..

</comment><comment><USER31> Do not let this man fool you. Our president has every intention of developing a My Little Pony MMORPG once research is finished.

<comment><USER32> I bet you really wish HN comments allowed images.

</comment></comment><comment><USER33> How about a 10 year project to pay off the National Debt?

Quit wasting money on science projects that aren't needed (this is already being done).

<comment><USER19> 3% interest times $20 trillion = $600 billion per year in interest. (interest rates will not stay this low indefinitely, and even 3% would be crazy low given the actual default risk via inflation that the US poses)

That interest basis alone would effectively wipe out the ability to continue Social Security (or almost the entire US military, take your pick).

The national debt can never be repaid under any circumstances. We can't afford the real interest cost right now, which is why the Fed is paying for that via debt monetization (aka QE). Throw in just a trillion per year in principle, and it becomes a sad joke.

We will never, and have no plans to ever pay for the national debt. There's no scenario under which the math works out, unless our government suddenly becomes hyper disciplined and initiates an uncompromising 50 year payback plan that takes a hatchet to the entire welfare state (corporate, social, military).

</comment></comment><comment><USER34> Politicians gonna pander. In unrelated news, the sun rose as expected this morning.

</comment><comment><USER35> maybe this is the science project to unite the US and push STEM forward.

</comment><comment><USER36> 1984: We're behind schedule.</comment>


Kindle formatting is a PITA. Why is there no e-book equivalent for FrontPage? - <AUTHOR> http://www.xconomy.com/national/2010/02/05/kindle-conniptions-how-i-published-my-first-e-book/

<comment><USER2> _"My first step toward creating Pixel Nation was simply to_ gather up all of my old columns, which meant copying and _pasting them from the Web pages on Xconomy into a Word_ document. I would never have attempted this task before _November 2009, when we added a single-page view option that_ lets you see an entire article on one page. Many of my _columns are fairly long, so they get broken into two, three,_ or four pages on the site, and it would have taken forever to stitch them all together from these separate pages."

I had to read this twice to make sure I really was reading it. His "method" of acquiring all his articles is browsing to each webpage and copy/pasting the text into Word. The rest of the article shows a similar level of technical expertise in the tools of his craft.

I am flabbergasted that a writer would do that. Writers deal with text all day. Creating, editing, and managing the text files seem like pretty basic components of writing. Anyone know if this is normal for writers? Are they normally this incompetent with text manipulation and management?

</comment><comment><USER3> It sounds like his problem was Word (and how he used it), not that formatting for Kindle is a PITA. He needed it in very basic HTML, hardly a PITA.

</comment><comment><USER4> Sigil? Adobe InDesign?(<http://www.adobe.com/devnet/digitalpublishing/>)</comment>


An Ultra-Selective University Just Dropped the ACT/SAT. So What? - <AUTHOR> https://www.chronicle.com/article/An-Ultra-Selective-University/243678 <comment><USER2> We should be moving more towards standardized tests, not moving away.

They are one of the most background-blind ways of establishing student intelligence and creativity, as they have been shown in studies to measure the ephemeral 'g' value representing general intelligence very well.

Now, critics say that impoverished students do worse on the SAT than students from wealthy families, but the fact is that study resources for the SAT exist for free on the internet as well as for low cost in the form of study manuals. Poor students from certain communities probably don't have the same encouragement to study for the SAT as other groups, especially wealthy families. Fortunately, cultivating a culture which encourages study for standardized tests in theory costs nothing.

This puts poor students on a much more level playing field than if we base elite college admissions on things like high school quality, which is already a huge determinant of admissions at top colleges. Unfortunately students can't use free online resources to get into top private high schools. Doing so requires their parents to be well off enough to afford the high cost.

Judging students based on grades is also very difficult because of grade inflation, which obscures things.

We will never be able to fully eliminate the influence of wealth on college admissions, but standardized tests offer the best conceivable way to fairly judge students of all backgrounds.

<comment><USER3> I'm most curious about the evidence for a relationship between SAT and creativity which is stronger than other correlations, like for socioeconomic background or quality of high school courses.

Since you agree that SAT test prep improves one's SAT, and you argue that SAT is predictive of creativity, does that mean that SAT test prep makes one more creative? Or am I misinterpreting?

When you write "Poor students from certain communities", which 'certain communities' do you mean?

Because I think you mean the community I was brought up in.

I grew up the 3rd or 4th generation descendant of northern European emigrants to North American. By the US census definition I am "white". My parents were working class, with no college education, and my mother stayed at home.

My sister, on the other hand, has a Master's degree and is middle management in a large international organization. Her husband has a MA, and husband's father was a college professor.

Her kids are approaching college age. I am astonished at the difference in the amount of specific support those kids get from having parents who have gone through the system, compared to the support my sister and I got from parents with no college experience.

Don't get me wrong, we had plenty of encouragement to study ... for grades. But the SAT? How were my parents supposed to know that they should ease off on getting us to do homework and instead spend time preparing for the SAT?

So when you write "cultivating a culture which encourages study for standardized tests in theory costs nothing", I don't believe you. That time doesn't come for free. It must be taken from something else.

Going back to my question, which "certain communities" are you talking about, and what should they be doing less of in order to study for a test which seems less predictive of success than getting good high school grades from rigorous courses?

<comment><USER3> Looks like Forbes earlier this month posted on this topic, at [https://www.forbes.com/sites/prestoncooper2/2018/06/11/what-...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/prestoncooper2/2018/06/11/what- predicts-college-completion-high-school-gpa-beats-sat-score/) . "What Predicts College Completion? High School GPA Beats SAT Score"

> For instance, a student with a high SAT score (above 1100) but a middling > high school GPA (between 2.67 and 3.0) has an expected graduation rate of > 39%. But students with the opposite credentials—mediocre SAT scores but high > GPAs—graduate from college at a 62% rate.

> Put another way, the expected graduation rate of a student with a given GPA > doesn't change very much depending on her SAT score. But the expected > graduation rate of a student with a given SAT score varies tremendously > depending on her GPA.</comment></comment></comment>


Whats your opinion on my startup? (RMS) - <AUTHOR> http://outfyts.com/#/screens/d12245cc-1680-458d-89dd-4f0d7fb22724 Hi HN users,
I am creating my first online startup and would greatly appreciate your input.
ONE LINE PITCH:
Outfyts.com is the easiest way to create, share and purchase outfits from your favorite retailers and fashion bloggers
LONG WINDED SUMMARY:
Purchasing clothing online is cumbersome and unintuitive. Lets say you want to buy an entirely new outfit for the weekend. You will need to find a pair of shoes, pants and a top but doing so will most likely take you to multiple website and you will have to click back and forth between clothing categories and your shopping cart, constantly checking if your items create the look you want.
Outfyts simplifies the above process by creating content "streams", clothing categories arranged vertically so that you can see the entire outfit as you build it. Clothing is aggregated from around the web from your favorite brands and stylists and can be filtered by price, style, brand, color, etc.
Please check out my site at Outfyts.com (http://outfyts.com/#/screens/d12245cc-1680-458d-89dd-4f0d7fb22724) where you can try a simple demo of this new method of outfit creation.
I am in the "validation" stage of my startup, therefore ALL feedback is appreciated.
Do you think Outfyts will make online shopping better and simpler? Why or why not?
Do you think you would use this service? Do you think your wife/daughter/friend would use this service?
Imagine the one thing that you wish you could change about shopping online. Is there anyway that Outfyts can solve it?
Polyvore.com has a free outfit creator here: http://www.polyvore.com/cgi/app
Do you like it more than Outfyts? Whats better, whats worse?
<comment>----Your input is priceless, thank you!</comment><comment></comment><comment>----- </comment><comment><USER2> Disable autoplay on the video. I always close a window if there is noise that I did not make happen through a button click, <PLAY> link etc. Regardless of the presence of the pause button, I hate "auto-noise" on web pages.

Because of that, I cannot review your startup.

Others might be able to though.

<comment><AUTHOR> Autoplay disabled :)

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> oops, moving this over to ask HN :) sorry</comment>


Germany's Refugee Detectives - <AUTHOR> https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/04/the-refugee-detectives/554090/?single_page=true <comment><USER2> It is completely naive to think that refugees in Europe are anything other than economic refugees. Look at the data, non-European refugees are overwhelmingly working-age males: [http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/08/02/4-asylum-seeker- demograp...](http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/08/02/4-asylum-seeker-demography- young-and-male/)

I'm not discounting the struggle in Syria, but it seems fairly obvious that the opportunists well outweigh those who truly need asylum. In a real crisis the refugee population would be age and gender agnostic within a reasonable margin.

<comment> shaki-dora What's so great about this article is the nuance. It doesn't deny the existence of economic refugees, nor the reality of war refugees. It also grapples with the morality of even making such a distinction: why should someone in danger of torture have more rights than someone in danger of starvation? Your comment is sorely lacking such nuance, and making indefensible claims.

As for your supposed data: sending able-bodied men ahead, while women and children remain in refugee camps along the way (or die) is independent of the reason for leaving their respective countries.

And the many refugee camps all the way from Syria to Germany, in Turkey, Greece, and Hungary, are quite obviously proof that many Syrians fled.

<comment><USER2> I'm arguing the cat-and-mouse game described in the article as a fundamentally flawed approach. The system is set up in favor of the opportunists.

If your goal is truly humanitarian you must be proactive. Yes, many Syrians fled due to immediate danger. Are those the ones making it to BAMF headquarters? Arguably not.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: What about applying Comet to Hacker News? - <AUTHOR>

Hi All,<p>Just a thought: YC News is a "live" application that updates constantly, what do you thing on using Comet to push the updates to the page while it's active? <comment><USER2> I don't know about the rest of you, but I would personally prefer a fix to the "Unknown or expired link" problem.

</comment><comment><USER3> An interesting thought, but I personally believe that the small size of HN doesn't justify implementing Comet.

<comment><AUTHOR> Comet to Reddit ? :)</comment></comment>


Dolphins, and the right side of history - <AUTHOR> http://swombat.com/2012/11/6/dolphin-history

<comment><USER2> Sad, but not surprising, to see this flagged off the front page and into oblivion. It took some time to find it, but it's now at rank 1181.

</comment><comment><USER3> I am a vegetarian and agree with most of the article up until the very last sentence - "where would you have stood on the issue of slave labour" or words to that effect.

I feel like that confuses the issue and makes it easier to argue against - humans are very clearly different to dolphins and equating the two does noone any favours.

<comment><USER2> It used to be that people would say:

        "These savages are clearly different
         from civilised people"

and I can easily imagine them saying:

        "... and equating the two does no one any favours."

There's the point of the entire article: In the future, perhaps people will find it incomprehensible that we, today, considered humans different from dolphins in a significant aspect.

<comment><USER4> They didn't then try to eat the savages did they? It's comparing apples and oranges..

<comment><USER2> I don't believe it is comparing apples and oranges. It was once considered by some slave owners to be a mere trifling problem occasionally to beat one of them to death, or work them to death, or otherwise behave in ways that are now considered unacceptable.

In the same way, some people put dolphins in captivity, and consider it an inconvenient side-effect of tuna fishing that dolphins are regularly killed in large numbers. And yes, some people eat dolphins, and that supports an industry that kills them for profit, just as slave traders used to capture people and ferry them across oceans. For profit. Deaths of a percentage were considered acceptable losses.

It seems to me that the parallels are stronger than the differences, and I also wonder how people of the future will judge the actions of today, and silence of those who didn't speak up.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Nature is cruel, animals are food, we are animals.

I don't see why any animal no matter how cute or intelligent deserves more rights than any other, but it's a messy philosophical argument.

Does an animal have the right not to be made extinct? The scientist in me says No, the naturalist says Yes.

<comment><USER5> "we are animals" && "I don't see why any animal ... deserves more rights than any other"

I think that's his point. We are not too different from dolphins.

<comment><USER4> You missed my point, sentience is a human concept, what happens when robots have indistinguishable sentient properties?

It's a messy philosophical argument, what about the vegetables they feel pain too! <http://www.vegetablecruelty.com>

<comment><USER5> We are animals. We are not robots or vegetables.

If a robot becomes sufficiently sentient, possesses emotions and needs, has empathy and reproductive capacity, and other such animal traits, then I see no reason not to extend similar rights to it too. If we develop the ability to create such a creature (for that is what it will be), and choose to create such a creature, then we must face the responsibilities that our actions bring and the rights that that creature will have.

It is unlikely carrots will evolve to a similar level any time soon, so we've a while to think about vegetable ethics. In the meantime, brussels sprout genocide is fine by me.

<comment><USER4> Haha..

I like your little reproductive capacity caveat.

But since it's a purely philosophical argument.. If you create a program with all the sentient properties, feels pain etc.. Does it not afford these magic rights you speak of? After all pain is just an electrical impulse expressed as a negative emotion..

If vegetables prove to create a chemical response to trauma, does that not mean they feel pain too?

<comment><USER5> If we create a program that has all of that, then yes.

Note that my criteria (individual items are of course up for discussion, but the point is a broad range of human/animal like criteria) go way beyond pain. Emotion, empathy, maybe other things like self-learning etc. are a long, long way off being implemented successfully in software. I think that maybe when we reach the point where they are, it may not seem such a daft idea to protect them in this way. "After all pain is just an electrical impulse expressed as a negative emotion" which helps to illustrate the close relation between us and the (currently) mythical software we are talking about.

The rights which we are talking about aren't "magic" as you quote. They actually serve a practical purpose and in my opinion are a positive evolutionary trait. When applied to humans, their purpose is obvious (protecting us from each other, promoting cooperation and ensuring our survival as a species). But we live in a world beyond just humans, and inter- species protection and co-operation is in both human and animal (and, one day perhaps, computer) interests.

On the subject of vegetables, I have never found cabbages to be particularly empathetic, so I happy to relegate them to the inferior classes for the time being.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Study on Exercising Your Mind - <AUTHOR> https://science.sciencemag.org/content/369/6500/144 <comment><AUTHOR> New research demonstrates that the beneficial effects of exercise in mitigating brain aging can be conveyed from exercising mice to sedentary mice through plasma transfer.</comment>